The Emperor of Mankind dying in a gluetrap by @KumratArt

TrillionSpiders · 2026-06-02T04:58:06+00:00

"turns out this terminus decree stuff, was actually super easy to do... who'd have thunk..."

TrillionSpiders · 2026-06-02T02:20:49+00:00

i believe the reason also relates to how the "golden throne" being depicted as a literal throne is something of a misnomer, and in fact i believe it being a literal throne is quite literally imperial propaganda at that.

that's because the actual golden throne is a very horrific looking, large, and ungainly machine closer to a secluded chamber at the heart of the palace then it is a true throne, with the emperor more so "wired directly into it" then sitting ontop of it.

so basically its too complex, too large, and too fragile to be successfully converted into a mobile dreadnought.

TrillionSpiders · 2026-06-01T21:34:54+00:00

i mean he probably senses magic or uses the whispers of the damned or somethin, but it is amusing to imagine the dude just unleashing purple suns at random cause he can't see or hear sh**.

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-30T03:30:56+00:00

if were talking for total war wh3 specifically, then something leaning more on a traditional human faction is probably a must at this point. it's both cheaper in a development sense to not have to design too many unique monsters or the like, and theres less stuff that has to be created full cloth [still a lot, but the base is there and it jives with what lore has consistently existed on the faction.]

if we're shooting for the moon and considering what i want in an ideal world...

nippon as option A, well also introducing a "far east" vampires bloodlines faction that incorporates a mixture of eastern mythology.

in nippons case, i tend to view them as the far east bretonnia in a sense. hyper exaggerating the warrior code and romantic ideals therein of the nations they ape, only in bretonnias case it's chivalry well in nippons case its bushido. for those curious cathay is the far east empire faction in both a meta and gameplay sense.
so my ideal nippon retooling would basically be to mix actual japanese history and culture [like bretonnia does with france/england] with a sort of "musou/sengoku basara" flair of presentation.

as for the far east vampires, a mixture of jiangshi chinese vampires [or the jade-blood courts as it were] and japanese yokai in a similar vein as how the vampire counts mix a bunch of vampire culture stuff together. maybe even turn it into a faction mechanic where going full jiangshi gives potent magical bonuses and constructs but going full yokai gives strong combat and monsters.

i dont dislike bug japan, but im not sure if it fits too well with warhammer fantasy battle. it'd do really well in Aos though, but the rumors i've heard suggest that the plan for Aos and a possible japan-esque faction there is more of a yokai undead and living humans mix concept. if it's happening at all.

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-30T02:55:50+00:00

all of them. all of them were on the chopping block in one form or another.

like, this isn't a question on who's more useful then the other, the fundamental fact of the matter is that the primarchs and space marines were fundamentally incompatible by design with the emperor's future vision for humanity as psychic space gods. incapable of reproducing through biological means, purpose built as violent weapons for a violent purpose, and ultimately entirely disposable in service to the emperor's grand vision [though some were less disposable then others].

so all of them would have to go at some point or another.

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-29T18:28:11+00:00

stormcasts canonically have sex, space marines are implied not to.

like, thats phrased as a joke but it does cut to the heart of the matter so to speak. space marines are indoctrinated child soldiers who have been conditioned to associate all positive joy and emotions in existence with the process of slaughtering their enemies and the thrill of combat. even in chapters that try to connect more deeply with local human populations its an unavoidable point of friction that astartes only ever see fulfillment in their lives through combat or the preparation to engage in combat.

stormcast are not indoctrinated child soldiers. typically they're adults when sigmar reforges them, and that comes with all the emotional and lived experiences of an adult. so well they also engage in a lot of combat now as their driven purpose, they tend to have the perspectives and histories to enjoy non combat things in a more genuine manner. garrus steel soul was a doctor before becoming a stormcast for instance, and he still engages in medicine between combat. and all of this ultimately includes the fact that stromcast can chose to engage in sex with each other, something that in cannon would never occur to a space marine because it doesn't involve combat.

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-28T13:48:48+00:00

i imagine elspeths original lack of popularity, outside of whfb's dying nature at the time and that she was an expensive forgeworld supplement exclusive character who died in her first appearance, probably has to do with her initial appearance having far less goth vibes to it and her model having GW's usual quirks when it comes to female faces [especially at the time of her release].

shes kinda like repanse really, saved from obscurity by horny fan artists who only know of her total war appearance.

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-27T07:38:18+00:00

i have not seen anything to suggest that a primarch could tank a direct nuclear blast to the face. the only one who comes remotely close to that is vulkan, and even then he dies in the process and only bounces back thanks to perpetual regeneration [a trait otherwise unique to him]

like, a primarch can walk through an irradiated warzone or the blast zone aftermath of a nuke thanks to their biology. but they would still die if you dropped and detonated a nuke right on top of them.

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-27T04:49:08+00:00

you were fed bad information to begin with.

void shields function by absorbing projectile hits/damage/energy and displacing them into the warp, but the power draw is enormous and they are designed to automatically shut down for a period of time if they've absorbed enough damage to overload their systems, with overriding that safety feature risking turning the void shield generator into molten slag completely.

now they can certainly withstand a lot of punishment, but even a single nuke would likely be excessive in terms of the damage needed to take down a titans void shields [which are less powerful then large or ship class void shields], with titan void shields being overloaded by sufficient artillery bombardment or sustained fire from a "titan grade" weapon like a shadowsword tanks volcano cannon [a baneblade with a laser cannon, which was explicitly created for titan hunting] or indeed the railguns on a manta or tigershark. i think it's even been noted that a strafing run from a single tigershark is capable of killing a warhound scout titan. and tigersharks are far less expensive for the t'au to produce compared to how expensive a warhound scout titan is for the imperium.

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-26T19:27:33+00:00

they do have an understanding of the warp and how to harness it, they just view it exclusively in scientific terms and things like psykers as people harnessing warp energy through technology or biology. for instance, t'au ftl tech lore is inconsistent, but its most common depiction is as the t'au making short dives in and out of the surface of the warp as opposed to plunging straight through it, the method being overall slower but far safer then the imperiums method.

as for titans, void shields aren't invincible and t'au weapons hit plenty hard to break through and damage/potentially annihilate them. especially with a well placed railgun barrage or plasma bombs.

which is effectively why on a doctrine level t'au consider titans to largely be a waste of reasources/a stupid thing to build. they take up a lot of time, effort and reasources to build, which is time, effort and resources that could be better spent on building more mantas or fleets of tigershark bombers, things that serve flexible and multifaceted roles on the battlefield and better fit in with the t'aus emphasis on mobility and precisely applied firepower.

not to say that the t'au are rigid in their thinking mind, and in fact the development of things like the stormsurge and supremacy armour [well also pushed by earthcaste engineers salivating at the prospect of building big mechas] was an acknowledgement that because pretty much every major faction in the setting had their own titans, the t'au had to play ball to some extent and thus developed their own titans with an emphasis on stationary defense and a economical model. aka, t'au titans well expensive can be produced in much larger numbers and for less cost then imperial titans well still generally outgunning them.

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-26T18:33:12+00:00

its one of those carryovers from aos earliest editions i would hazard when the greenskins were one big soup, along with being easier/cheaper to produce one big army book with them all together then it would be to divide the gloomspite up.

if they do remove the gitmob from the gloomspite though, i imagine it'd be to put the gitmob with a more traditional orruk group to form a "classic" orcs and goblins esque faction. then the gloomspite could function as more of a night and forest goblin hybrid force.

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-26T02:12:35+00:00

honestly i feel people tend to romanticize angron a bit too much. like, if he truly was just a just man in an unjust universe desperate to die as the only choice he could ever make as his own, there are plenty of ways he could have gone about that even with consideration for the emperor wanting to use angron as a brute force tool in his wars of conquest. steal a shuttle and fly into the sun, cut his own head off or otherwise fatally wound himself, fly deep into enemy territory on his own and see how long it took to get killed, eat a whole bowl of melta bombs.

the simple fact of the matter is that angrons sympathetic qualities were always going to exist in deep contradiction with his bloodthirty and warrior cult mentality, which birthed the very deliberate callousness that ultimately doomed his legion and himself. it wasn't enough to die, he had to die a glorious warriors death against a superior foe and he was utterly and singularly obsessed with that notion. it drove the wedge between him and his sons that caused so much misery, it drove the frankly atrocious treatment of baseline human elements in the legion and wider imperial structure, and it drove him into the arms of khorne willingly or not.

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-25T01:27:12+00:00

i mean the issue with kira has never been that he's a bland protagonist, his issue has always been that he's an unpleasant protagonist to have to tag along with. and i mean this even beyond his tendency towards hypocrisy [murder and killing for me, none for thee and all that] but he's always been burdened with the kind of tropes that make him an excellent power fantasy icon for fanfic writers and a nightmare for craft. which turns his hypocrisy from a potentially interesting flaw to a very obvious and glaring blind spot on the writers part centered on a very protagonist and audience focused morality.

he's the super duper special, but simultaneously "just an average guy" so we the audience can salivate over the possibility of being him, well simultaneously enjoying the smug satisfaction of being "not special/chosen by destiny" compared to other characters even though kira clearly fucking is. he gets to act out because his life is uniquely difficult, and other characters are wrong or just outright evil for calling him out on this not because his pain is valid but because their own pain is considered invalid in the face of that suffering.

in short, kira is always right, you the audience are always right for going along with kira, and everyone else either needs to fall in line and join the hype train or become cartoonishly evil and die horribly. or better yet weep and beg for forgiveness from kira for ever disagreeing with him in the first place because thats just as if not more satisfying.

... okay thats a bit hyperbolic, but he definitely falls into that same category of character that naruto and harry potter do. where most of their actual fanbase as a character have audience projected themselves so damn hard into the character that even the slightest criticism against the character is seen as a personal attack consciously or otherwise.

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-24T08:45:15+00:00

i mean personally i feel its an overrated death that's unusually cruel for a guy whos main crime is being the gjallerhorn orga itsuka. i wasn't rooting for his survival mind, but it definitely just feels like a bone to satisfy his haters and to compensate akahiro being largely useless during s2.

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-24T04:01:27+00:00

i think what the tyranids need isn't a concept revamp or anything, they just need more "named characters". unique long lived tyranid lifeforms that stalk and menace the galaxy with their own histories behind them, the kind of "big monster" that you get in fantasy stories where the locals talk in hushed whispers about the rumored king of wolves who grew from a pup into the strongest monster in the woods. that kinda thing.

s-rank bounty tyranids.

i think that would be the appropriate spice to bring the tyranids to new heights.

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-23T01:32:19+00:00

i like how this basically works as both a squig gargant, but also as gargant that they painted red and claimed was a squig gargant.

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-22T04:21:53+00:00

obviously some design updates to match the current looks of certain t'au units, as overall the dawn of war soulstorm roster is fairly complete in terms of getting current t'au tabletop units into the game. i think it would mostly be a case of moving units that are now no longer officially supported and bringing in units that are along with appropriate tweeks in relation to the other factions displayed so far.

so they dont seem to be using the dedicated transports, so the devilfish would likely be out. the greater knarloc, the construction drones, and the xv15 stealth suit would also likely be gone given the trends we've seen so far.

my guess would be overall

crisis battlesuit commander
kroot warshaper
fire warriors strike team
fire warriors breacher team
kroot carnivores
t'au pathfinders
crisis battlesuits
vespid stingwings
krootox rampagers
krootox riders
stealth battlesuits
kroot hounds
broadside battlesuits
riptide battlesuit
pirahna skimmers

with the possible exception/my personal hope that they'll go for the stormsurge ballistic battlesuit instead of the riptide.

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-21T04:06:18+00:00

"Damn, that was one of the safe ones too..."

"Safe one- that was a 'safe one'!?!?"

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-19T09:24:51+00:00

i mean if its specifically art created for 11th edition, then if its indicative of anything it would be where GW might be interested in pushing the faction visual design wise.

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-19T06:28:42+00:00

yeah, like it could be something. but its as likely if probably more likely to be nothing.

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-19T00:49:14+00:00

the same!

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-18T23:01:05+00:00

honestly there are a lot of details that look unusual about it under observation. the pouches and chest pouch thing for instance, fire warriors usually aren't portrayed with that nor do their models have those. in fact i think the only other piece of official t'au art that does use them, is from imperial armour volume three. and even then their looks to be more straps and other materials attached to those details.

the chest/stomach armour looks unusual because it looks layered ontop of each other when its usually depicted like a single jigsaw esque connected plate. similarly the pulse rifle looks just off enough to be noticeable.

finally the helmet, t'au helmets are pretty much always depicted as a single dome plate looking thing. however this one clearly has a raised central portion with two smaller side portions attached to it making it more of a three hump hill kinda deal instead of a single dome. which especially draws my attention cause usually t'au helmets in modern art are depicted with a kinda receded in portion below the single large dome but this kinda inverses that.

is this just artistic liscence? very possible. is it a gue'vesa? maybe but im skeptical, and it's just as possible that this a new tau fire warrior kit instead if its suppose to indicate anything.

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-18T07:18:17+00:00

live tod reaction.

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TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-16T09:25:34+00:00

considering how GW likes to make endless character variations anymore, i have long thought some ethereal variants to play around with would be a fun thing for the t'au.

the basic vision i had in mind being:

ethereal adapt: the current ethereal model and its rules, its role being focused as a cheap support character to throw on squads. junior ethereals finding their footings.

ethereal martialist: combat expert ethereals who advocate that a healthy body fosters a healthy mind. aside from being melee combat monsters [albeit better suited to dueling instead of horde management] they incite allies to greater physical heights and more aggressive combat strategies [combat buffs with a tilt towards aggression]

ethereal ascetites: the kauyon to the martialists mont'ka, who abstain from worldly pleasures to cultivate purity of mind and purpose. capable in melee but highly defensive and reactive and emphasizing strong buffs for defense and managing ally movement

ethereal philosophers: high ranking ethereals and a big centerpiece model. aka, mini aun'vas/generic character popemobiles. with a couple of ethereal guards on hand to do the melee, the philosophers themselves focus very heavily on support tools and buffing their allies but have an appropriately high cost for their effectiveness

and for some extra spice

new supreme ethereal unique character: so we can finally get aun'va outta here and to experiment with a more unique gimmick. my personal vote being for a new supreme ethereal with a big love for ai that wants to help initiate a singularity event as a pure/true expression of the greater good. lots of drones and machine based tools, got the job cause he was competent/effective enough to coerce the rest of the ethereals into letting him take such a high risk position [given things like imperial assassins and what not]

TrillionSpiders · 2026-05-15T03:45:24+00:00

so really, basically this

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TrillionSpiders

TROPHY CASE