The Emperor's Gift: Discussion

[dienekes96]

Spectacular novel. Coming off of finishing Deliverance Lost and the differences were very palpable. ADB is just a superior writer, both in technical capability in pacing, and in overall structure. And DL was OK...I just never invested emotionally with any character, scene, or situation.

His vision of the GK stands in quiet contrast to the Codex, which was overblown pomp and fanwankiness. The GK never worked as an army to me anyway. Were I playing many games of 40K, I'd let any Imperial army use a squad or two of GK or GKT as a requisition in any games against Chaos (and maybe DE). And then if the other army is defeated, you roll a die to determine if you need to be cleanesed. If so, the opponent controls the remaining GK until nothing remains. And then I'd up-power the GKs. But I don't play much.

I did love the callback to a previous =][= series. Simple and understated, but effective at bolstering both stories. And it was essentially a free "origin", so kudos for literary efficiency. It was nice to finally see ADB tackle the Wolves (my favorite army) and I loved his take on them. The book was well-structured, and some of the sequences just sizzled. Typically, when something in 40K history is expanded to book form, it tends to lose the aura it had in the smaller size chunks. ADB manages to pay respect to the scale of the events, but add texture and even scope. Events become more powerful under his pen, rather than diminished.

Well worth the read. ADB continues to impress.

[Xisor]

It just makes no sense that fully initiated Grey Knights, almost statistically nonexistent perfect balance of psyker, warrior, and pure soul, get turned into techmarines or retire from active combat into a librarium.

Yes, I suppose the Grey Knights would never have to fight possessed vehicles, repair vehicles during combat, work aboard starships with highly technical machinery in the midst of daemonic intrusion etc etc. Similarly, I'm certain that the Prognosticator contributes less to the chapter than a single fighting Grey Knight.

[goldenhorde]

It's not that scrying for demonic incursions or working with machines aren't vital to the GK's mission - it's just those things can be done well by nonGKs while no one (possibly excepting Exorcist marines) can fight daemons toe-to-toe like the GKs. Prognosticators don't need any battle skills or SM physiology at all and the GK seem to have great access to Mechanicus assets (even Hyperion's single squad gets a very elite Mechanicus contingent, led by a high ranking Artisan).

Since it takes a million failed psykers to make a GK, surely a huge choir or several huge choirs are more efficient than burning out GKs as a perpetually meditating Prognosticators (even if individual psykers burn out faster).

As for GK Techmarines, the novel points to the typical service life of a GK as in the low hundreds of years (let's say, 250). Techpriest training takes 30 years out of that (55 for the GK techmarine in the book). That's more than 1/10th of the GK's entire service life, for a capability that the Inquisition can requisition from elsewhere. If he dies sooner than average, all that techpriest training plus GK training goes down the tubes.

[dienekes96]

I don't think they'd trust a prognosticator who hadn't gone through GK training to do what they need to do. Two, the physiology probably allows him to survive longer at the most critical job in the Chapter.

Made perfect sense to me.

[martyrdon]

Great Book. Shame to read that Aaron doesn't want to make another grey knights novel when thisone was sooooo awesome.

Maybe an ordo malleus tale with some guest stars would suffice?

[shadowhawk2008]

Great Book. Shame to read that Aaron doesn't want to make another grey knights novel when thisone was sooooo awesome.

Maybe an ordo malleus tale with some guest stars would suffice?

At the risk of speaking for him and going by some imperfect recollections of stuff I've read here and there, I think it has more to do with him not being able to fit a second novel in his schedule. This novel is meant to be a "rewrite" of two planned books since the new GK codex came out in the middle of him writing the first one and lots of things then had to be changed.

[dienekes96]

I would presume ADB said what we wanted to say in this novel. It doesn't require a sequel, and he might enjoy tackling a different corner of the 40K universe. I'm just happy this book was so good. It was a complete story, soup to nuts.

[malika]

I really dug the book. The premise of a Grey Knights novel at first kinda put me off since to me they aren't the most interesting thing in the 40k universe, but this was done really well! There is one thing I don't fully get:

I noticed the dates are a bit messed up:
-The story took place in the time surrounding the First War at Armageddon, that would be around 444.M41.
-Logan Grimnar is already the "First Jarl" (equivalent to Chapter Master and thus Great Wolf), but according to that novel by William King that only occured in 659.M41.
-Hyperion is Zael from the Ravenor books, that I can get since those stories kind of occur around 400.M41.
-Now comes the real confusing bit, namely the mention of the Badab War, but that one takes place around 500 years later, namely in 901.M41.

Now I know the Warp can mess up some time stuff, but this is quite extreme...right?

Or maybe I'm looking too much into this. Like I said, I really liked the book, so I'm just being nitpickery here!

[The Judge]

Well Logan was always Great Wolf during the First War for Armageddon, so that would be William King's mistake?

[shadowhawk2008]

In which SW novel is the date of his ascension to High King mentioned?

[Dead.Blue.Clown]

-Logan Grimnar is already the "First Jarl" (equivalent to Chapter Master and thus Great Wolf), but according to that novel by William King that only occured in 659.M41.
-Now comes the real confusing bit, namely the mention of the Badab War, but that one takes place around 500 years later, namely in 901.M41.

Easily answered (and sadly, very boring). The Grey Knights Codex lists Logan as Great Wolf by that point, hence Logan being Great Wolf. I'm not really fussed on what an old novel says; I went for the most recent source.

The Badab mention (already corrected in the ebook and future printings) is purely one of those "listing loads of famous events as you write at 4am in the middle of the SFX Weekender, through a hangover and half-closed eyes" deals. It's basically a headsplat typo.

Well Logan was always Great Wolf during the First War for Armageddon, so that would be William King's mistake?

At a guess? Probably, yeah. BL was a different beast back then.

[MajorWesJanson]

This is Warhammer. Unless there is specific mention of the details of Badab, we can just assume it means an earlier war that took place there.

[shadowhawk2008]

This is Warhammer. Unless there is specific mention of the details of Badab, we can just assume it means an earlier war that took place there.

You mean like the POV character at the time saying I don't want another Badab War on my hands?

Its not a big deal really. Its a milisecond blip on the radar.

[MajorWesJanson]

That's all the reference is? Well, easy fix. According to IA9, between &-20 M40 and 580 M41, there was a major upsurge in problems with the Maelstrom. Nice bit of fluff for my chapter which is on the far side of the Maelstrom from the Badab area, and easy conflict to title a Badab war, as ironically it was this that led to the Astral Claws and others being deployed in the area.

I'm still waiting for the book to show up at my local Barnes and Noble. Looking forward to it.

Edit: Got it, brought it with me to my duty shift. Awesome book. probably give it another pass before any indepth analysis.

Few comments though.
Wish Exorcists were confirmed as GK successors.
Is there a conspiracy within BL to make Bjorn so awesome? Between Prospero Burns, Battle of the Fang, and now this, we have a good grasp on his personality now, I think. Though between problems with serfs decorating his chassis while he sleeps, and everyone kneeling to him, my mental picture of Bjorn is of a dreadnought facepalming in annoyance.
Bjorn should meet Ciaphas Cain. They would get along swimmingly, I think.
Still a bit iffy on the million recruits to make one GK, but I can see that a lot better if many of the failures did not die outright, but instead fed to the astronomicon like other psykers.
Cool to see the tie in with Abnett's books. ADB seems to do that quite abit, tie into other works. makes if feel a tad more cohesive.
A lot of other chapters are spoken for, but I'd like to see ADB take a whack at the Imperial Fists. maybe with some grey knight cameos.

[Lupe]

You know what's funny? The entire Badab war would probably make a lot more sense if it was set in 901 M40 )

It would certainly make the power build-up of the Red Corsairs into a force rivaling First Legions a lot more more easy on my suspension of disbelief...

[DDM]

Another good read by ADB. I only wish the book was longer. The Grey Knights were portrayed well and the SW were great. I was surprised by the relative lack of daemon-slaying, but it wasn't an entirely unpleasant surprise.

My 2 spoiler-filled cents:

Is it me, or do the Grey Knights seem to lose a lot? Also, I'm curious as to the nature of the null-SM in the Dead Fields. I was hoping we'd get some more info, but, alas, such was not the case.

Overall, a fun read that I will confidently recommend to any Grey Knight lovers as well as some Space Wolf fans.

[shadowhawk2008]

Are you referring to Armageddon, Hyperion's earlier scrap with his squad or the aftermath of the Angron-banishment?

Grey Knights fight the most desperate and the most important battles that few are ever aware of. The odds are almost always against them. But really, saying that they lose a lot is like saying the Imperial Guard loses a lot.

[DDM]

The aftermath of the Banishment, mostly. Just seems that they always come out on the bottom. It does, however, highlight the awesomeness of another particular group.

[shadowhawk2008]

Well that's already established lore. They do take a severe beating on Armageddon. But seriously, 100 GKs going up against Angron, his bodyguard of 12 Bloodthirsters AND a part of the Khornate horde while the Space Wolves kept the rest of the Chaos army busy elsewhere. They were *bound* to take some serious casualties and it is all highlighted really well in the novel.

[Wyrmwood]

Well that's already established lore. They do take a severe beating on Armageddon. But seriously, 100 GKs going up against Angron, his bodyguard of 12 Bloodthirsters AND a part of the Khornate horde while the Space Wolves kept the rest of the Chaos army busy elsewhere. They were *bound* to take some serious casualties and it is all highlighted really well in the novel.

I don't necessarily agree with DDM, but if you read his post again you'll see that he was talking about the entire novel and the events of Armageddon within that context, not the battle with Angron as a singular event. As in, it's not that they suffered such huge casualties on Armageddon - but that their previous attempt at banishing the taint of the Wolf ship didn't go particularly well either, nor did their encounters with a certain other chapter.

Personally, having a tough time against Chaos doesn't bother me. That's how it should be.