Warhammer 40k

Seconding Luetin09's channel if you want to just learn WH40k lore

I would recommend not diving into the Horus Heresy novels unless you're autistic + have a lot of time on your hands.

Seananigans said:

I’ve always been enamored of WH40k lore, but it has always felt unapproachable. Not really sure why, probably because it began just as the background lore for a minis war game as opposed to stories from shows/movies/games.

Anyway, for someone who’s very interested in learning more, where should I begin? Any good novels that do a solid job of laying groundwork and don’t require a bunch of pre-knowledge? Any particular vidya games that do a good job of explaining the lore, good stories, etc?

It kinda feels like the lore of Dark Souls or Elden Ring, but without the game to immerse myself in to absorb it. Yeah, I realize there are tons of games that have licensed the IP, but that’s not the same as the lore originating in a game by the creators. Hence the feeling of unapproachability.

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If you get into books, the Dan Abnett series are the best. Without exception.
- Eisenhorn trilogy
- Ravenor trilogy
- the Gaunt’s Ghost line of books

I tried the Horus Heresy series and most of the authors just aren’t good enough. Other people love them, however.

Seananigans said:

Thanks dudes, have plenty to dig into now! I think lore youtubes will probably be a good primer, then I’ll check out some of those books.

Anyone know if good audiobook versions have been made of them? I like to read books but I’m able to go much quicker in audiobook format because I can listen while I do other things. I’m a super slow reader because I reread and really absorb details and such, don’t like going fast, too much tism.

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Not sure about any audio version. Honestly, going slow with these will be beneficial because of the language used and the newness of the content to you.

Seananigans said:

Thanks dudes, have plenty to dig into now! I think lore youtubes will probably be a good primer, then I’ll check out some of those books.

Anyone know if good audiobook versions have been made of them? I like to read books but I’m able to go much quicker in audiobook format because I can listen while I do other things. I’m a super slow reader because I reread and really absorb details and such, don’t like going fast, too much tism.

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There are audio books for pretty much every Warhammer novel. I use audible and mainly just listen to 40k novels while driving.

I'm not sure how it would work as an introduction, but the Night Lord trilogy is easily my favorite. (Starts with Soul Hunter)

The Eisenhorn series is almost universally recommended, but I was not a fan of them.

If the books get heavy, I've always liked getting most of my dose from just the games, random Instagram reels, and can probably give full downloads of at least carrots old codexes, skip the roles and just scroll thru for fluff and pretty pictures

Lasch said:

I'm not sure how it would work as an introduction, but the Night Lord trilogy is easily my favorite. (Starts with Soul Hunter)

The Eisenhorn series is almost universally recommended, but I was not a fan of them.

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Night Lord was also great. Fun to hear the other side’s perspective and it was well written.

Ive only listened to one War40k book on audio and it was the first one in the Dark Angels series about the Lion. It was good, but no idea if the others in the series are any good

The first 3-4 books of the Horus Heresy series are pretty good, its a huge financial commitment to buy them all and its a massive storyline that treally jumps around. The order they were released does not fit the timeline very well, but for the later books they are kind of standalone stories somif you have a legion you like you can just kinda read their stuff. There are some gunkers and some really awesome ones. I remember really liking Legion, The First Heretic and the 2 Prospero Burns / A Thousand Sons books.

that night lords trilogy is great and there was a word bearers trilogy (dark apostle) that I remember liking. Aaron Dembeski Bowden, Dan Abnet and Graham McNeil are probably the big 3 of the good stuff and a good place to start.

I'm on book 22 out of 54 in the Horus Heresy series, and I can attest that it's very uneven. I've not found any downright BAD books so far, but some have much more interesting stories than others. After a while some of the stories kind of blur together because you can only have so many remarkable characters in legions made up of thousands of nearly identical characters, except for the Primarchs and the occasional original character that's not a space marine.

It's my first dive into Warhammer 40K lore and I figured I'd start at the Horus Heresy because it explains why the galaxy is how it is in the 41st millenium. It's interesting and I don't regret reading it so far, but the epic / memorable moments are very spaced out, you can have entire books where the status quo hasn't moved an inch.

In a way, it's realistic than on a galactic scale, a Legion or some isolated garrisons don't know yet about what is happening on the other side of the galaxy even months or years after, but it really slows the story moving forward.

Considering said heresy happens 3 books in, you'd think by book 22 I'd be starting to see some shit happening near Terra, but nope.

Feels like a super slow Warcraft 3 multiplayer where everyone plays turtle.

Just looked up 22. The Sevatar short story gets a big thumbs up from me for that mad lad.

Whichever book has the Emperor's Children fall was my most hated book.

yes, some books have great amounts of new info and lore and some of them are dry as hell. Alot depends on which Legions you like, some are just very very boring in certain parts because they have entire books about them later on. Guys like the Ultramarines and Imperial Fists are going to just seem boring because quite frankly they are. The traitor legions tend to have a lot of the fun info as sometimes you get a peek behind the curtain on things going on that you might not have expected.

not sure how much planning they did on the whole story, its absolutely massive and absolutely some super dry and boring parts, but it does feel like they at least did a good job of making sure they did not contradict themselves in spots and from a lore standpoint its extremely consistent (at least as far as I can tell reading them all over a 10-15 year period). You definitely end up with your favorite authors but all in all its pretty good stuff for the price (compared to anything else GW sells). Some of the Anthologies are great, where its 4-8 short-ish stories in one book, you get some nice filler on those. As the series plays on, you end up really looking forward to anything in regards to a Primarch, Custodian, The Emperor or Malcador, or a few key "humans" who tend to pop up throughout the story-line. Outside of a handful of the named space marines in each legion though its almost impossible to keep the sheer number of names straight. All things considered I think the HH story does give a great background on 40k and a lot of the info seems to be relevant in the modern game / world.

I remember reading the first.... 10-12 Heresy books? The first 4 are awesome, as they set the plot and introduce the characters, take you up to the Dropsite Massacre. Then there are a whole bunch of "Introduction to this Legion During the Heresy" books. I actually liked the Emperor's Children one (seeing Fulgrim's mistakes and how it leads to him killing Manus was really good). I really liked the Alpha Legion one as well. At that time, it was a huge new lore drop about how/why they turned. The Dark Angels and the betrayal of Luther was also pretty good, as well as the introduction to the Dark Mechanicus. But then you have shit like the one about the giant Word Bearer's Battleship and some assassin nonsense and I just stopped. Did they ever do a book about the assassination of Kurze? Or was that too far past the timeline. Also the revealing of the super-duper immortals (while important for the Emperor's backstory) was, not really fun, especially when it gets to Vulkan. I never got back on the wagon to read the final setup and the Siege of Earth, I just read the wiki's once they were released.