Warhammer 40,000 is largely distinguished by its massive scale. Billions of humans are piled into hive cities, trillions of humans sign up for the Imperial Guard (and die horribly in the process), and quadrillions of humans are scattered across the galaxy. Not to mention the various alien races known as xenos – terrifying space beetles, ferocious orcs, awe-inspiring space-elves and immortal robotic skeletons.
But that’s not what the conversation with fans is about. When you check out Warhammer 40K fan rooms and content channels, you’ll find that much of the conversation is about twenty horrible guys and all the bad decisions they make. What about that?
The God-Emperor of Mankind is the man who set up the Imperium of Man, powers the lighthouse that all Imperium ships use to travel, and prevents an endless horde of demons from invading Terra and causing the planet to explode. The God-Emperor contracted an ouchie 10,000 years ago, meaning he’s locked in the chair, a scavenger lord who consumes a thousand souls a day. And it’s all because of his terrible sons – the Primarchs – and their nonsense.
Image: Games Workshop
The Primarchs and their exploits began as vague myths and legends, half-remembered from a lost time. These characters existed way back in history and had no realistic impact on contemporary gameplay – and their stories weren’t told explicitly. That used to be black library, Games Workshop’s prolific book publishing company, began publishing books about these guys. There are now dozens of books in the Horus Heresy series, chronicling the exploits of each Primarch.
The various Black Library authors do this by writing the Horus Heresy series as a particularly nasty WWE-style feud, or a soap opera with constant gunfights and running tanks. Many of the Primarchs either seem ridiculous, or they just merge into a swarm of big men and space battles. Each Primarch also has their own supporting cast of their legion of Space Marines, transhuman biosoldiers built from the gene seed of their Primarchs. Space Marines are the poster boys of the setting and one of the most iconic parts of 40K, and each legion has its own role and function.
However, if you are not deeply acquainted with Space Marines and Primarchs, this nuance can easily be lost on the reader. For example, the Imperial Fists, Iron Hands, and Iron Warriors each have their own niche – but if you’re interested in reading about the Aeldari or Necron, they all look like Space Marine palette swaps. (Although if you’re interested in the details, there are good resources to break that down.)
Two of the God-Emperor’s sons were removed from the file – we don’t know what happened to them, and we’ll never learn, thanks to a series of memory wipes and document burnings – leaving eighteen boys to fight the Great Crusade to begin , the Emperor’s attempt to reunite humanity and take over the entire galaxy. Each boy has a legion of Space Marine sons, triggering a recursive spiral of bad father/son relationships. The Emperor went to the basement to work on his projects for a few decades, only showing up occasionally (making things worse along the way).
But the Primarchs can also feel over-represented in the setting. The problem is that it creates a vicious cycle of people loving Primarchs, so more Primarch books are written, which helps build a fan base for Primarchs. If you’re pursuing stories about other factions and you’re not a Space Marine fan, it can be frustrating to feel like every other major corner of the universe is drowned out by the nonsense of these great sons.
Personally, I fell into this camp. I’m still not too fond of Space Marines since they are depicted in 40K. But I found myself charmed, first by the memes and tidbits I picked up on these guys – did you know that Fulgrim, Primarch of the Emperor’s Children, is a giant serpent demon who had put his soul into a painting for a while? Or that great Bobby G of the Ultramarines who once fought in space without a helmet for twelve hours, fueled by rage at brotherly betrayal? — and then by delving into the actual stories depicted in print.
Image: Games Workshop
In 40K’s modern day, only two Loyalist Primarchs have returned: Lion El’Jonson and Roboute Guilliman. Guilliman’s return in 2017 was a huge deal that rocked the whole setting, but as time went on, he became less of a protagonist and more of a garnish on top of the nightmare pasta that is the Imperium of Man. The treacherous Primarchs are fantastic bosses and have cool tabletop models, but they’ve already lost. They lost 10,000 years ago, and it means characters like Angron are more like environmental effects than actual characters.
These characters risk overwhelming the setting due to their massive popularity, but they work best as background characters that only make things worse (or at least more complicated) for everyone around them. They are also a reminder not to take the attitude at serious. When characters like Corvus Corax of the Raven Guard are running around, it’s a charming relic of the old days of 40K where not everything was so carefully and carefully sanded down to be cool. I like my garbage boys the way they are, heresy and all.