Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

In many settings, there are prophecies and people have a variety of reactions to them. Warhammer 40k, particularly the Horus Heresy, contains many future visions. Aside from being an overused plot device, even though they are extremely unreliable without looking into the whole context rather than just a few scenes, too many characters are just complete dumbasses for buying into these without question. Some are actually cool, but 90% of them are completely unjustifiable.

Let's take a run down.

+ Horus is convinced that he (and half of the Primarchs) would be forgotten by the Imperium while the Emperor would ascend to godhood and the other half of the Primarchs would become saints. This is one of the reasons for his betrayal. Why does he take it seriously the first time he sees it? Who knows. We have been told of his insecurities, but a demigod with hundreds of years of experience should have known better.

+ Alpharius is stupid for thinking he is doing a service to the Emperor by... betraying the Emperor and letting Horus win. This is one of my biggest gripe with the setting: the misanthropic nature of Warhammer 40k. It's not the Imperium of Men that is anti-human, the writers of Warhammer 40k are guilty of this and I hate them for it. Chaos existed for millions of years and I have an interesting theory about Khrone being created by the Krorks (resulting in that race degenerating to the Orks), Nurgle being created by the remnants of the Necrontyr who didn't undergo biotransference (resulting in that race's extinction), and Tzeentch being created by humanity during the Dark Age of Technology (resulting in the Age of Strife). Somehow, humanity's extinction will starve Chaos, even though Chaos has existed for millions of years. This one makes me want to kill myself. Alpharius never goes with the plan anyway and even though he joined the Traitors, he is killed and the Traitors still lost in the end. Would have been much better if he just stayed loyal.

+ Konrad Curze is haunted by visions of the Emperor assassinating him. And then he let it come true by not fighting back when the assassin came. Curze has the IQ at the level of a pre-schooler for this one. Nothing tragic. Absolutely lame. He who fears his own death is not fit to be a warrior. Curze brought it upon himself due to his gakky personality and sheer stupidity.

+ Some glimpses into the future can be done well, especially when they are kept vague and the characters don't make too much of a fuss about it, and the focus is on how the vision turns out rather than people desperately trying to prevent it from happening/making it come true. There are genuinely good cases such as the case of Erebus upsetting everyone by ingloriously killing Argel Tal, thus fulfilling the latter's death prophecy in an unexpected way, or the case of Sanguinuis fighting to the bitter end despite his dark vision.

+ The Aeldari's ability to see into the future is completely butchered. Most of the time, it just makes no sense at all. Gav Thorpe really destroyed the Aeldari by having them charge into battles head-on like Space Marines. But unlike Space Marines, the space elves don't have super endurance or plot armor, so they just die very fast. Like, a dozen Aeldari die by the time it takes for a Space Marine to fall. How could you ever let this happen if you knew the different future scenarios? Why not pick better fighting spots? Why not pick better counter units (like skirmishers against slow-moving blobs or infiltrators against artillery or plasma/power melee weapons against heavy armor)? The story also ends with a peace treaty. If peace is possible, then why not open negotiation in the first place instead of fighting first and then suddenly realize you can just talk?

+ Dawn of War 3. The Spear of Khaine turns out to be a Khornate plot device. The Autarch is so obsessed with it even though the prophecy is from a Farseer who is both already dead and from another Craftworld. Yeah, right.

+ In Shadow Breaker, the Inquisitor is manipulated by a demon into using a device that will destroy the Tyranids. The demon wants the Inquisitor to rise through the ranks to control the Imperium, which it shows visions of grandeur and the Inquisitor believes wholeheartedly. My biggest gripe with this is that we don't know how the device will destroy the Tyranids, so whatever plotting between these two is just nonsensical at the moment. I hate it when authors tease at something, make it sound important, and then refuse to explain. It's absolutely incompetent.

It sort of depends. Foreshadowing is a narrative device. But a vision of the future? How reliable is that. How can you know that they know? Even if they happened, was it self for filling.

Perfect knowledge (Dune books 2 to 4) are doable as long as the source is reliable. The Eldar has future knowledge that is very reliable. It is build into the setting. But every one else feelsmlike you could just have called a psykick add in the phonebook.

Regarding the Eldar piece treaty thing. Perhaps those actions where the only once who led to Eldar piece treaties? Look at the Golden Path in Dune. Perfect knowledge (until they build the void ships in book five.) Now you just need to perform the Golden Path to save the universe, but Paul does not have the stomach to do it. In Marvel Infinety War/End Game doctor strange sees only one way to Winn. With perfect knowledge he initiates those blocks of dominos. I believe the tree daemon from the Name of the Wind books has a similar power and all contact with it is banned. Likewise Groundhog Day, but that is not so much knowledge as lived experience.

bibotot wrote:
+ Konrad Curze is haunted by visions of the Emperor assassinating him. And then he let it come true by not fighting back when the assassin came. Curze has the IQ at the level of a pre-schooler for this one. Nothing tragic. Absolutely lame. He who fears his own death is not fit to be a warrior. Curze brought it upon himself due to his gakky personality and sheer stupidity.

Curze didn't fear his own death and if you think he did then you haven't read his story properly, or at all.

Curze when insane because all of his visions were not only true but he had absolutely no control over when they came or how powerful they would be. He could be sitting doing nothing then his brain would explode with images of the dark future that mankind was to endure.
In his madness, he took it upon himself to prepare the Imperium for what was to come by crafting the VIIIth Legion into the ultimate weapon of terror to control the masses. With the iron grip of the Night Haunter removed from Nostramo, it slid back into scum and villainy which in turn caused the Legion to do the same. Nostraman recruits were criminals taken from the colossal prisons and the VIIIth was never all that big on indoctrination so the sadistic and brutal tendencies of the criminal Aspirants remained.
By the time Curze realised what was going on it was too late, so being judge, jury, and executioner, he destroyed Nostramo as an example, albeit one that the Emperor did not sanction and Curze was summoned to answer for his act, which of course he never answered.

But Curze knew the Emperor would have to punish him and the other Traitor Primarchs for their betrayal, and the assassin sent to kill Curze was the vindication of the Night Haunter's ideals. If someone keeps causing problems, you remove the problem. Curze knew he had to die to prove his point to the Emperor, and the Imperium unknowingly took the lessons of the Night Haunter and implemented them empire-wide.

As the man himself said, "Death is nothing compared to vindication".

bibotot wrote:

+ Horus is convinced that he (and half of the Primarchs) would be forgotten by the Imperium while the Emperor would ascend to godhood and the other half of the Primarchs would become saints. This is one of the reasons for his betrayal. Why does he take it seriously the first time he sees it? Who knows. We have been told of his insecurities, but a demigod with hundreds of years of experience should have known better.

This one does feel a little forced. Although personally I read one of the main points of Horus's fall to not be the vision of the future itself, but rather the realization that the Emperor is fallible. Like, committing atrocities across the galaxy was all well and good when the guy telling you to do it was literally infallible and thus could assure you that the ends justify the means. But if that guy turns out to just be another imperfect being? Oh no.

+ Alpharius is stupid for thinking he is doing a service to the Emperor by... betraying the Emperor and letting Horus win... Somehow, humanity's extinction will starve Chaos, even though Chaos has existed for millions of years.

It's hard to speak with certainty about the nature of lovecraftian entities. That said, chaos gods seem to have primarily fed on the eldar in the past, and then humanity once humanity became populace enough to start churning out a decent amount of psychic energy. We know that the chaos gods do feed on humanity currently and that most of the other major players in the galaxy have methods to avoid feeding them. So if humanity were suddenly to lose 99% of its population, it makes sense that Chaos's mana bars would get depleted pretty quickly and that their influence on the galaxy would be severely diminished.

Alpharius never goes with the plan anyway and even though he joined the Traitors, he is killed and the Traitors still lost in the end. Would have been much better if he just stayed loyal.

This whole thread basically got dropped, which is annoying. My headcanon was that the twins didn't really choose a single outcome of the prophecy to support. Rather, they were pursuing a less obvious third option or possibly pursuing multiple outcomes at once to give themselves more flexibility. This would explain why Omegon started doing stuff behind Alpharius's back after the events of Legion and would also fit the whole, "We think things through and embrace lateral thinking" thing that pops up a few times during that book. You gave the lateral thinking guys a binary choice. It's fitting that they'd immediately start pursuing one of the options you didn't give them. This also potentially makes sense with the whole... psychic surgery, Alpharius let Dorn "kill" "him" theory. That is, the primarch totally died, you guys. Now don't mind me. I'll just be over here with my knowledge of the Cabal's prophecy working from the shadows.

+ Konrad Curze is haunted by visions of the Emperor assassinating him. And then he let it come true by not fighting back when the assassin came. Curze has the IQ at the level of a pre-schooler for this one. Nothing tragic. Absolutely lame. He who fears his own death is not fit to be a warrior. Curze brought it upon himself due to his gakky personality and sheer stupidity.

You and I have very different understandings of Curze. He wasn't afraid of his death. He saw it as vindication. The crux of his insanity was that he was tortured by the combination of his sense of extreme black & white "justice" and the knowledge that he was himself an absolute monster. His visions added to the mix by basically making him aware of what story he was in. He knows that he's in a prequel to the 41st millennium. Where a lot of the primarchs were able to justify their atrocities through their belief in the Emperor, Kurze both became disillusioned early and personally committed way more nightmarish acts than most of his brothers.

Forseeing his own death isn't why he went traitor. The tragedy of allowing himself is that, in the moments leading up to it, he basically saw that he could choose to change his future/behavior, but then refused to believe it basically because the idea that the nightmarish visions that had driven him weren't inevitable was too much for him to handle.

+ Some glimpses into the future can be done well, especially when they are kept vague and the characters don't make too much of a fuss about it, and the focus is on how the vision turns out rather than people desperately trying to prevent it from happening/making it come true. There are genuinely good cases such as the case of Erebus upsetting everyone by ingloriously killing Argel Tal, thus fulfilling the latter's death prophecy in an unexpected way, or the case of Sanguinuis fighting to the bitter end despite his dark vision.

+ The Aeldari's ability to see into the future is completely butchered. Most of the time, it just makes no sense at all. Gav Thorpe really destroyed the Aeldari by having them charge into battles head-on like Space Marines. But unlike Space Marines, the space elves don't have super endurance or plot armor, so they just die very fast. Like, a dozen Aeldari die by the time it takes for a Space Marine to fall.

Are you referring to the Path of the Eldar trilogy here? The thing is, the eldar avoid most of the fights that they potentially could be forced into. In that novel, they're forced to deal with a direct attack on their craftworld, which means there's only so much guerilla fighting they can do. Especially if they don't want their home to be burned down by the time the enemy is dealt with. Sometimes the space elves have to engage in a relatively direct fight despite their best efforts. Remember that they don't have perfect vision of the future. They can theoretically follow most possible courses of events, but they aren't omniscient. They have to take the time find the relevant futures, take actions to make those futures happen, spend a lot of time reviewing those threads to pick out specific pieces of information.

As for dying more quickly than marines, well. That's what happens when the novel respects antagonists that are supposed to be a big deal instead of treating them as a punching bag for the protagonists. As an eldar player, I find the way the marines are handled in that trilogy to be well done. The marines aren't unstoppable, but they are a big deal. Fighting them is costly.

How could you ever let this happen if you knew the different future scenarios? Why not pick better fighting spots? Why not pick better counter units (like skirmishers against slow-moving blobs or infiltrators against artillery or plasma/power melee weapons against heavy armor)?

See above about not being omniscient. Even moving at the speed of thought, a seer is still basically trying to make a bunch of complicated queries to the database that is the future, and then manually parsing the information they get back to form an idea of what actions will (probably/hopefully) work at relatively well. Most of the high-level version of this is done by your farseers and non-combat seers who then have to pass their findings on to an autarch or directly to those on the front lines, and then those orders have to actually be carried out. Seers on the front lines are able to predict things more quickly and clearly because they're making much simpler predictions less far into the future. Seeing that standing still will mean you get blasted by some ordnance in about 3 seconds is pretty straight-forward. But even then, you only have 3 seconds to move your squad to safety.

All that said, they do use the tactics you described to the best of their ability. In fact, you basically described the essential swordwind strategy. They lead the humans into domes, then vent the atmosphere. They turn the craftworld itself against the enemy. When they fight, they have autarchs doing their best to send the best available unit for the job to do that job. But they also have a finite number of aspect warriors who can't be everywhere at once fighting against overwhelming numbers. Even the best RTS player can become overwhelmed if you crank the difficulty up high enough.

The story also ends with a peace treaty. If peace is possible, then why not open negotiation in the first place instead of fighting first and then suddenly realize you can just talk?

It has been a while, but from what I recall... It's less that anyone declares "peace". It's more that the marines realize they're functionally being asked to spend their brothers' lives to settle the personal grudge of a governor who betrayed his fellow humans to xenos for profit. The eldar arrange for a battlefield parlay in which they reveal this information to the marines and basically say:

"Bro. You'll destroy our craftworld, but we'll make you bleed for it. Your call. Is helping a heretic get revenge worth devastating your own chapter?"

+ In Shadow Breaker, the Inquisitor is manipulated by a demon into using a device that will destroy the Tyranids. The demon wants the Inquisitor to rise through the ranks to control the Imperium, which it shows visions of grandeur and the Inquisitor believes wholeheartedly. My biggest gripe with this is that we don't know how the device will destroy the Tyranids, so whatever plotting between these two is just nonsensical at the moment. I hate it when authors tease at something, make it sound important, and then refuse to explain. It's absolutely incompetent.

So a spirit known for warping the decision making abilities of mortals made a mortal act irrationally? And alluded to the existence of a doomsday weapon in a setting that is, in fact, full of doomsday weapons?

 Wyldhunt wrote:

bibotot wrote:

+ Konrad Curze is haunted by visions of the Emperor assassinating him. And then he let it come true by not fighting back when the assassin came. Curze has the IQ at the level of a pre-schooler for this one. Nothing tragic. Absolutely lame. He who fears his own death is not fit to be a warrior. Curze brought it upon himself due to his gakky personality and sheer stupidity.

Forseeing his own death isn't why he went traitor. The tragedy of allowing himself is that, in the moments leading up to it, he basically saw that he could choose to change his future/behavior, but then refused to believe it basically because the idea that the nightmarish visions that had driven him weren't inevitable was too much for him to handle.

The one I don't agree with is this and the above sums up why. If Curze could change this, it meant the other visions weren't set in stone, and everything was a lie. Despite the horror and descent into his own hell, he couldn't lose the last thing he clung too which was none of this was him, it was all forced by fate. Nope. Turns out he was wrong and caused untold horror for no good reason. Hard to face.

Especially with the revelation that not all the premonitions were true, Curze had his resolve to die hardened as now he truly deserved punishment for his crimes.
His death was still vindication of his ultimate method, order through fear.

bibotot wrote:
+ Horus is convinced that he (and half of the Primarchs) would be forgotten by the Imperium while the Emperor would ascend to godhood and the other half of the Primarchs would become saints. This is one of the reasons for his betrayal. Why does he take it seriously the first time he sees it? Who knows. We have been told of his insecurities, but a demigod with hundreds of years of experience should have known better.

+ Alpharius is stupid for thinking he is doing a service to the Emperor by... betraying the Emperor and letting Horus win. This is one of my biggest gripe with the setting: the misanthropic nature of Warhammer 40k. It's not the Imperium of Men that is anti-human, the writers of Warhammer 40k are guilty of this and I hate them for it. Chaos existed for millions of years and I have an interesting theory about Khrone being created by the Krorks (resulting in that race degenerating to the Orks), Nurgle being created by the remnants of the Necrontyr who didn't undergo biotransference (resulting in that race's extinction), and Tzeentch being created by humanity during the Dark Age of Technology (resulting in the Age of Strife). Somehow, humanity's extinction will starve Chaos, even though Chaos has existed for millions of years. This one makes me want to kill myself. Alpharius never goes with the plan anyway and even though he joined the Traitors, he is killed and the Traitors still lost in the end. Would have been much better if he just stayed loyal.

+ Konrad Curze is haunted by visions of the Emperor assassinating him. And then he let it come true by not fighting back when the assassin came. Curze has the IQ at the level of a pre-schooler for this one. Nothing tragic. Absolutely lame. He who fears his own death is not fit to be a warrior. Curze brought it upon himself due to his gakky personality and sheer stupidity.

+ Some glimpses into the future can be done well, especially when they are kept vague and the characters don't make too much of a fuss about it, and the focus is on how the vision turns out rather than people desperately trying to prevent it from happening/making it come true. There are genuinely good cases such as the case of Erebus upsetting everyone by ingloriously killing Argel Tal, thus fulfilling the latter's death prophecy in an unexpected way, or the case of Sanguinuis fighting to the bitter end despite his dark vision.

+ The Aeldari's ability to see into the future is completely butchered. Most of the time, it just makes no sense at all. Gav Thorpe really destroyed the Aeldari by having them charge into battles head-on like Space Marines. But unlike Space Marines, the space elves don't have super endurance or plot armor, so they just die very fast. Like, a dozen Aeldari die by the time it takes for a Space Marine to fall. How could you ever let this happen if you knew the different future scenarios? Why not pick better fighting spots? Why not pick better counter units (like skirmishers against slow-moving blobs or infiltrators against artillery or plasma/power melee weapons against heavy armor)? The story also ends with a peace treaty. If peace is possible, then why not open negotiation in the first place instead of fighting first and then suddenly realize you can just talk?

+ Dawn of War 3. The Spear of Khaine turns out to be a Khornate plot device. The Autarch is so obsessed with it even though the prophecy is from a Farseer who is both already dead and from another Craftworld. Yeah, right.

+ In Shadow Breaker, the Inquisitor is manipulated by a demon into using a device that will destroy the Tyranids. The demon wants the Inquisitor to rise through the ranks to control the Imperium, which it shows visions of grandeur and the Inquisitor believes wholeheartedly. My biggest gripe with this is that we don't know how the device will destroy the Tyranids, so whatever plotting between these two is just nonsensical at the moment. I hate it when authors tease at something, make it sound important, and then refuse to explain. It's absolutely incompetent.

Visions into future are basically a form of time travel, and they are difficult to do well.

It is basically an issue of predestination. Do you believe in it or not?

If you do, then such visions are possible - but it also means that they WILL happen no matter what you do.

If you do not, then vision may never come true in the first place, or you may bring about the future while trying to prevent it. As Galadriel says upon showing Frodo and Sam visions in the mirror, "this mirror is a dangerous guide for one's actions" (or something to that effect).

I thought Horus' vision was really clever. I may have misinterpreted it, but didn't chaos show him the 40k future where the Horus Heresy does happen and just lied to him? Thus making it into a self fulfilling prophecy?

Nope.

Imagine being able to see the future. That’s….terrifying. To know with reasonable certainty what’s coming, and being powerless to stop it. To change it. To influence it. To maybe nudge things to a better outcome.

To know all your work will come to naught, in the case of Nighthaunter. Yet you’re destined to carry out that failure.

Eldar Seers of course work differently. They peer into possibilities, and seek to understand where the pebble that starts the landslide is, and whether you want to trigger it, or prevent it. And they know there is no Perfect Future. They instead look to minimise impacts, tread the path that costs the fewest Eldar lives. And if that means an entire Battlehost will be lost, because that prevents utter catastrophe and the loss of their Craftworld at a future date? That’s the path they have to take.


Future sight is not something I would ever want. Because it would drive you insane.

Isn't it pretty much canon that the future is not predetermined in 40k? We get a pretty good look at the details of how eldar seers work. There seem to be certain events that are heavily likely to happen or hard to avoid after a certain point, but I don't recall any prophecies from a reliable narrator that basically say, "X will happen no matter what."

Rather, prophecies seem to be more of an If-Then situation. If you can collect the crone swords, then Ynnead will awaken and probably beat up Slaanesh. If the harlequins follow the steps for Cegorach's big trick, then the trick will work. If Horus defeats the Emperor, then humanity dies and takes chaos with it.

And on top of that, we know that phoenix lords are observably prone to messing with the existing patterns of fate.

Prophecies and visions in 40k can still be really informative, but they're more something to keep in mind rather than something to be treated as a foregone conclusion.

 Mr Nobody wrote:
I thought Horus' vision was really clever. I may have misinterpreted it, but didn't chaos show him the 40k future where the Horus Heresy does happen and just lied to him? Thus making it into a self fulfilling prophecy?

Yes, that's exactly what happened. But also, Horus wasn't thinking straight at the time, due to being stabbed by a daemon weapon. The corruption was already taking root, and the vision was just an extra push.


Which is also a factor in most Chaos related things... Chaos is sneaky, and once it has an initial foothold, people stop making completely rational decisions.

bibotot wrote:
In many settings, there are prophecies and people have a variety of reactions to them. Warhammer 40k, particularly the Horus Heresy, contains many future visions. Aside from being an overused plot device, even though they are extremely unreliable without looking into the whole context rather than just a few scenes, too many characters are just complete dumbasses for buying into these without question. Some are actually cool, but 90% of them are completely unjustifiable.

This is more a feature of "visions of the future" as a trope in general and not a bug.

Pretty much any story where there is a prophecy that ends up victimizing someone, we the outside observer can always point to how dumb the character is for doing what they did in reaction to it.

Characters in these situations have to be dumbasses because if they weren't they wouldn't fall victim to it. This isn't necessarily a problem. It becomes one if the writer fails to contrive a reason why they're being dumb. As long as you can maintain internal consistency for the character its ok for them to do dumb things, everybody does dumb things sometimes.

Where most writers fail is if they have a character do something out of character for the express purpose of plot convenience. So if you are going to have a character fall victim to a prophecy where they end up tripping over themselves you have to make it believable that they'd actually trip over themselves, use a character flaw or misinformation to cause them to make a mistake.

Horus is tricked mostly because he had his entire worldview shattered and didn't know what to believe.

Prior to the whole event, he didn't believe that supernatural forces existed and actively denied their existence. This belief is shattered during his coma, along with any trust he had in the Emperor. If you had a bunch of daemonic entities suddenly destroy everything you believe in and then show you a vision of the future you might not think straight either. In a vacuum its easy to think Hey, how can you possibly see the future with any reliability because there are so many possible outcomes and yadda yadda..., but when you're dying and have daemons dancing around your mind it would be very easy to just accept what they say are true.

 AldarionTelcontar wrote:

Visions into future are basically a form of time travel, and they are difficult to do well.

It is basically an issue of predestination. Do you believe in it or not?

If you do, then such visions are possible - but it also means that they WILL happen no matter what you do.

If you do not, then the vision may never come true in the first place, or you may bring about the future while trying to prevent it. As Galadriel says upon showing Frodo and Sam visions in the mirror, "this mirror is a dangerous guide for one's actions" (or something to that effect).

Except in Lord of the Rings, the vision:

+ Does not play a major role in Frodo's corruption. It's not like his decisions are influenced because he saw the event in the Scouring of the Shire.

+ Does come true at the end. However, Frodo rallies and defeats Saruman in battle.

Another good example is Anakin Skywalker falling to the Dark Side. The prophecy about him being the Chosen One did play a major role in how people treat Anakin, but Anakin himself is never bothered by it. Anakin also sees a vision of Padme dying, but that is something much more personal and easy to understand than Horus seeing a vision 10,000 years later and thinking he is forgotten. The fact Anakin and Palpatine are close and have many scenes together also makes Anakin's corruption more understandable compared to Horus who chooses to believe in gods he knows very little about.

40k treatment of these future visions basically lead to characters having massive mood swing and development very quickly.

The thing with Horus though is that it was predestined even before the books were written. The lore established the Heresy as a thing and all the novels are just joining some dots.

 Wyldhunt wrote:
Isn't it pretty much canon that the future is not predetermined in 40k? We get a pretty good look at the details of how eldar seers work. There seem to be certain events that are heavily likely to happen or hard to avoid after a certain point, but I don't recall any prophecies from a reliable narrator that basically say, "X will happen no matter what."

Rather, prophecies seem to be more of an If-Then situation. If you can collect the crone swords, then Ynnead will awaken and probably beat up Slaanesh. If the harlequins follow the steps for Cegorach's big trick, then the trick will work. If Horus defeats the Emperor, then humanity dies and takes chaos with it.

And on top of that, we know that phoenix lords are observably prone to messing with the existing patterns of fate.

Prophecies and visions in 40k can still be really informative, but they're more something to keep in mind rather than something to be treated as a foregone conclusion.

Not all visions are the same, as it seems to depend on the viewer.

Eldar know they’re only seeing possible futures. The entire art there is going carefully to try to ensure the best possible outcome, whilst knowing your efforts may not work. And it takes many human lifetimes to become anything like competent.

The Primarchs? Seemed to lack that core knowledge. And as with Horus, we can’t rule out it was Chaos providing the visions, and purposefully blinding them to other possibilities, and so we can’t even safely say Eldar and Primarch visions are the same experience.

I still like the story where an Ork warboss traveled back in time, encountered his younger self, then killed his younger self to get a better choppa, resulting in the collapse of his WAAAGH.

 insaniak wrote:

 Mr Nobody wrote:
I thought Horus' vision was really clever. I may have misinterpreted it, but didn't chaos show him the 40k future where the Horus Heresy does happen and just lied to him? Thus making it into a self fulfilling prophecy?

Yes, that's exactly what happened. But also, Horus wasn't thinking straight at the time, due to being stabbed by a daemon weapon. The corruption was already taking root, and the vision was just an extra push.


Which is also a factor in most Chaos related things... Chaos is sneaky, and once it has an initial foothold, people stop making completely rational decisions.

That vision also plays on Horus's fears of being forgotten and discarded once the Emperor completes his plan. It's manipulating his ego, pride and doubts all at the same time. I think it's fairly well done given the relative lack of character development for Horus up to that point.

Prophecies and visions are my most disliked fantasy tropes. I can hardly recall any instance where they aren't just a Deus Ex Machina solution to push the plot forward when the author is clueless on how to do it in a logical and plausible way.

Cyel wrote:
Prophecies and visions are my most disliked fantasy tropes. I can hardly recall any instance where they aren't just a Deus Ex Machina solution to push the plot forward when the author is clueless on how to do it in a logical and plausible way.

Yeah. A big, capital P Prophecy is usually more interesting when being subverted than played straight. Although I have no problem with eldar seers and how they work. Less "prophecy." More, "Hey, I was able to scry for some specific pieces of information, and it looks probable that a specific outcome is going to happen if we don't intervene." It's more like fact finding and probability forecasting than a Prophecy.

bibotot wrote:

+ In Shadow Breaker, the Inquisitor is manipulated by a demon into using a device that will destroy the Tyranids. The demon wants the Inquisitor to rise through the ranks to control the Imperium, which it shows visions of grandeur and the Inquisitor believes wholeheartedly. My biggest gripe with this is that we don't know how the device will destroy the Tyranids, so whatever plotting between these two is just nonsensical at the moment. I hate it when authors tease at something, make it sound important, and then refuse to explain. It's absolutely incompetent.

The super weapon could be anything. It doesn't matter what it is, just that it exists (or perhaps doesn't, but it does because of what I'm about to say).
Any super-duper-mega-ultra-doomsday-weapon you can think of exists in 40k.
Clearly you take what is written as canon and enjoy extrapolating the connections and deeper meaning from the lore.
So let me refer you to "Into the Maelstrom" one of Black Librarys older publications. It has a lot of fun stuff in it. Most Dark Angels players should read it for the story I'm referring to now.
In that book a Dark Angel fights Khorne berzerkers on a spinning asteroid without their helmets on. One of the Dark Angles is knocked loose and spins off into space. He ends up on a ship or drifting (it's been decades) and makes his way to a rose shaped planet in a rose shaped nebula. On the way to the planet he passes a vast tube floating in space that is vomiting weapons out of each end. When he arrives on the planet he finds it is covered in roses... And followers of Khorne and Tzeentch. Among the multitudes of chaos worshipers he finds a Fallen Angel.
They have a conversation behind an infinity large horde of heretics and demons and traitors and mutants while two greater demons give a speech about their great alliance and plan to destroy the galaxy. They're gonna get that big old weapon tube... Because it just craps out weapons of any and all kinds. Everything from sharpened sticks to tachyon warheads mounted in mega-Votann-Gundam toads with frickin laser beams on their heads.
That would include a box with a red button on it labeled "All Tyranid go *Thanos snap*".
It's dumb... But so isn't 40k lore lol.
Oh and the Dark Angel saved the day by shouting "Blood for the blood God!" From the back of the crowd and everyone starts killing each other.

 Wyldhunt wrote:

Cyel wrote:
Prophecies and visions are my most disliked fantasy tropes. I can hardly recall any instance where they aren't just a Deus Ex Machina solution to push the plot forward when the author is clueless on how to do it in a logical and plausible way.

Yeah. A big, capital P Prophecy is usually more interesting when being subverted than played straight. Although I have no problem with eldar seers and how they work. Less "prophecy." More, "Hey, I was able to scry for some specific pieces of information, and it looks probable that a specific outcome is going to happen if we don't intervene." It's more like fact finding and probability forecasting than a Prophecy.

Yeah - good vision of the future should be akin to weather forecasting. "Here are possibilities, here are the most likely outcomes, but nothing is 100% certain".

 Wyldhunt wrote:
Isn't it pretty much canon that the future is not predetermined in 40k? We get a pretty good look at the details of how eldar seers work. There seem to be certain events that are heavily likely to happen or hard to avoid after a certain point, but I don't recall any prophecies from a reliable narrator that basically say, "X will happen no matter what."

Rather, prophecies seem to be more of an If-Then situation. If you can collect the crone swords, then Ynnead will awaken and probably beat up Slaanesh. If the harlequins follow the steps for Cegorach's big trick, then the trick will work. If Horus defeats the Emperor, then humanity dies and takes chaos with it.

And on top of that, we know that phoenix lords are observably prone to messing with the existing patterns of fate.

Prophecies and visions in 40k can still be really informative, but they're more something to keep in mind rather than something to be treated as a foregone conclusion.

Well 40K is not great at stating how the universe(s) works. Chaos spesifically can not be grasped by logic. Certain things certanly seems to be predetermined, like Slaneesh is birthed and thus Slaneesh has always existed. This sort of thing is "cryptic language", makes no sense, could just be talking metaphorically, or literally. The later meaning certain things certanly are pre-determined.

Look, 40K plays it fast and loose with these terms.

It’s not sci fi, it’s science fantasy. You just gotta roll with it and accept that no one will be able to work out how it all works.

It doesn’t excuse poor story telling. I think the idea that the alpha legion were going to help Horus win to cull humanity and in turn starve chaos was a good idea and if they had kept it going could have been interesting but probably it was too hard so they gave up.

If they were going to give up on that it would have been better if alpharius and omegon had fallen to Tzeench somehow. Maybe thinking they could balance the galaxy using tricks and schemes

(Deep nerdish navel gazing metaphysic ahead- You were warned.)
40k has the cop-out of the warp timey-wimey wibbly wobbly spaghetti that the lore gurus love to use at their leisure, but my theory/ headcannon is that of the multi-dimensional aspect of reality. GW borrowed a LOT from Moorcock in the form of Chaos, but they never explicitly stated wether or not 40k has it's own multi-dimensions. We've got the warp, and the tunnels in it of the webway- but can you get Dr. Strange to take you to shattered Ditkovese? Who knows. But- to me, if the whole "All instances create branching universes" is a thing, it'd explain the future visions- they're just glimpses into worlds that for some reason time is sped up or choices happened faster. And since the universe you're looking into isn't the one you exist in, obvs there will be deviation.
This could explain why Emps never saw (Fill in baddy naughty no-no here), he's basically THE lord of Order, and could see outcomes based on choices and all available information ala the Adjustment Bureau guys- but he can't account for the inherit chaos in all things and free will of mortals. He saw into the seperate dimension where he'd cowed the galaxy, built the human webway and each human born would be alpha-plus stable psyker and the Chaos gods were beaten into oblivion. And for him this was THE way, and couldn't accept any other so he ignored or couldn't see any other.

I agree- the "meta" answer for why future sight is basically foreshadowing, but also harkens back to Greek epics and irony. Ex: "Hey, Oedipus- you're going to kill your father and commit incest!" "No I won't!" Kurze is basically a tragic story of knowing A future, and working to make it a self-fulfilled prophecy, and Sanguinius is also tragic in that he more than likely knew he was going to die sacrificing himself but being noble and whatnot, he'd still make that choice.

Necrons seem to have access to other dimensions. As perhaps do Mandrakes (though the Mandrakes may just be in a specific pocket of the Webway).

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Necrons seem to have access to other dimensions. As perhaps do Mandrakes (though the Mandrakes may just be in a specific pocket of the Webway).

Huh. Is Aelindrach part of the webway? Is it technically the same as the "shadow dimension" mandrakes use to travel?

Mandrakes seem to be able to pop out of the shadows anywhere, both in realspace and in Commorragh. Their assassin skills would be limited if the enemy's base had to be located right next to a portal to Aelindrach, and we see them actively popping in and out of shadows on Fenris in Lukas the Trickster. On the other hand, Kheradruakh has to do his whole skull collecting project in order to expand Aelindrach's boarders, and doing so seems to have caused part of Commorragh to fall within Aelindrach's boarders. Which suggests that Aelindrach's reach is limited in some way.

So is Aelindrach (limited boarders, finite) not the same as the shadow dimension (present everywhere) even though it's a shadowy dimension that mandrakes hang out in?

EDIT: I guess expanding Aelindrach's boundaries into not-Aelindrach could have some sort of significance. Adding non-shadow buildings and people to Aelindrach for... reasons.

Who knows? 🤣🤣🤣

But between Necrons who most definitely have access to other dimensions (not just for Deathmarks, but for Tesseract stuff and even powering certain weapons), and Mandrakes who might be?

Other dimensions absolutely exist. As ever, it’s just a question of first detecting them, then accessing them safely.

 Wyldhunt wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Necrons seem to have access to other dimensions. As perhaps do Mandrakes (though the Mandrakes may just be in a specific pocket of the Webway).

Huh. Is Aelindrach part of the webway? Is it technically the same as the "shadow dimension" mandrakes use to travel?

Mandrakes seem to be able to pop out of the shadows anywhere, both in realspace and in Commorragh. Their assassin skills would be limited if the enemy's base had to be located right next to a portal to Aelindrach, and we see them actively popping in and out of shadows on Fenris in Lukas the Trickster. On the other hand, Kheradruakh has to do his whole skull collecting project in order to expand Aelindrach's boarders, and doing so seems to have caused part of Commorragh to fall within Aelindrach's boarders. Which suggests that Aelindrach's reach is limited in some way.

So is Aelindrach (limited boarders, finite) not the same as the shadow dimension (present everywhere) even though it's a shadowy dimension that mandrakes hang out in?

EDIT: I guess expanding Aelindrach's boundaries into not-Aelindrach could have some sort of significance. Adding non-shadow buildings and people to Aelindrach for... reasons.

In the Warhammer Horror short ‘The Oubliette’ (from the anthology ’Unholy’)

Lord Zarkov wrote:

 Wyldhunt wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Necrons seem to have access to other dimensions. As perhaps do Mandrakes (though the Mandrakes may just be in a specific pocket of the Webway).

Huh. Is Aelindrach part of the webway? Is it technically the same as the "shadow dimension" mandrakes use to travel?

Mandrakes seem to be able to pop out of the shadows anywhere, both in realspace and in Commorragh. Their assassin skills would be limited if the enemy's base had to be located right next to a portal to Aelindrach, and we see them actively popping in and out of shadows on Fenris in Lukas the Trickster. On the other hand, Kheradruakh has to do his whole skull collecting project in order to expand Aelindrach's boarders, and doing so seems to have caused part of Commorragh to fall within Aelindrach's boarders. Which suggests that Aelindrach's reach is limited in some way.

So is Aelindrach (limited boarders, finite) not the same as the shadow dimension (present everywhere) even though it's a shadowy dimension that mandrakes hang out in?

EDIT: I guess expanding Aelindrach's boundaries into not-Aelindrach could have some sort of significance. Adding non-shadow buildings and people to Aelindrach for... reasons.

In the Warhammer Horror short ‘The Oubliette’ (from the anthology ’Unholy’)

Spoiler:

the mandrakes had to enter the planet via an actual portal to Aelindrach (which *might* have been a defaced Webway gate) but once they were there they could shadow hop about to their hearts content.

So it seems it’s borders are actually relevant in some way.

Wait, can you clarify that? So it sounds like you can shadow hop around a given location freely, but you still have to webway to the planet? I wondre if opening the portal basically connected the local shadow dimension to Aelindrach proper? Like... opening the gate let the "water" of Aelindrach connect to the"water" of the local planet, and thus mandrakes could swim between them?

 Wyldhunt wrote:

Lord Zarkov wrote:

 Wyldhunt wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Necrons seem to have access to other dimensions. As perhaps do Mandrakes (though the Mandrakes may just be in a specific pocket of the Webway).

Huh. Is Aelindrach part of the webway? Is it technically the same as the "shadow dimension" mandrakes use to travel?

Mandrakes seem to be able to pop out of the shadows anywhere, both in realspace and in Commorragh. Their assassin skills would be limited if the enemy's base had to be located right next to a portal to Aelindrach, and we see them actively popping in and out of shadows on Fenris in Lukas the Trickster. On the other hand, Kheradruakh has to do his whole skull collecting project in order to expand Aelindrach's boarders, and doing so seems to have caused part of Commorragh to fall within Aelindrach's boarders. Which suggests that Aelindrach's reach is limited in some way.

So is Aelindrach (limited boarders, finite) not the same as the shadow dimension (present everywhere) even though it's a shadowy dimension that mandrakes hang out in?

EDIT: I guess expanding Aelindrach's boundaries into not-Aelindrach could have some sort of significance. Adding non-shadow buildings and people to Aelindrach for... reasons.

In the Warhammer Horror short ‘The Oubliette’ (from the anthology ’Unholy’)

Spoiler:

the mandrakes had to enter the planet via an actual portal to Aelindrach (which *might* have been a defaced Webway gate) but once they were there they could shadow hop about to their hearts content.

So it seems it’s borders are actually relevant in some way.

Wait, can you clarify that? So it sounds like you can shadow hop around a given location freely, but you still have to webway to the planet? I wondre if opening the portal basically connected the local shadow dimension to Aelindrach proper? Like... opening the gate let the "water" of Aelindrach connect to the"water" of the local planet, and thus mandrakes could swim between them?

In the story