User blog:Spider40000/Realistically Surreal

Alright.

So, there's something that's always been somewhat pushed aside (to great effect) in the universe that is Warhammer 40,000. Realism. And that's one of it's greatest strengths! Stories about thousands of planets being exterminated because daemons decided they would exist are not only bizarre, but considered in-universe to be called "Tuesday". A once technologically advanced empire that we would consider to be the more common sort of vision for Humanity in science fiction crumbled long ago, and now that empire (if it could be considered the same Empire) is a crumbled shadow of the past. Humanity forgot how to do all it once did for the sole reason that we decided we didn't have to do it anymore thanks to AI; and after it rebelled (who coulda guessed!), we lost everything, and regressed into tech-barbarians before a cult of technophiles and some random guy  decided to use what little we did remember and bring us back into a somewhat okay position in the Galaxy again... before that Empire fell thanks to the literal daemons that actually exist, despite that one guy promising they totally didn't. Now that guy is dead, those technophiles are scrambling to get back what little information they had after lots of it got lost again, and everyone else is just trying to live in a Bizzare, Dystopian, governance that is cruel for the simple fact that it has to be.

...BUT,

One thing I like about that is that, despite how illogical that universe is, it's still... logical.

As in, it's the "same" universe as our own, just with added events many dozens of Millennia (both forward and backward), and parallel universes for good measure (but with more daemons and made-physical emotions and less dinosaurs and mushrooms- actually wait a second-). And what's more is that it's our galaxy too. See that big spiral-of-a-map? Hey, I recognize that. Those people running around with two legs, squishy organs, and an occasional head of hair? Hey, what's up Larry!

Basically, it's something real that we know to be real- but with a healthy dose of speculation and fantasy. Because at it's core, 40K still has that science to it's science fantasy. And, as that saying goes, sometimes reality is a lot stranger than fiction.

...

Well, even then, literal daemons leaking out from a horrible nightmarish counter-universe into our own through the metaphorical fears and torments of posthumans castrated from society might be more of a stretch than most elements of our own reality (hopefully). But nonetheless, real things and events that take place in the cosmos that we know about are very interesting! Everyone knows about stars that orbit one another, but did you know that stars that interact with at least one other account for more than half of the stars that we know about? You might have heard of gas giants that orbit their star around the same distance as Mercury does our own, but did you also know that for the other planets in those kinds of systems, traveling to one's neighbor worlds would take far less time than it would for, say, a venture from Earth to Mars? (and with the added benefit that there's no need to meddle with the warp in doing so!)  And these kinds of systems are some of the most common types out there!

....Maybe you did, but the point stays the same!

It's stories like these that inspire me to write up fictional planets. And what more interactive universe than Warhammer 40,000 could you use to see how an almost illogical entity like the Imperium of Mankind acts to colonize and survive on these sorts of planets?

And, since you're here reading this on this wiki (and not, say, this one or that one ), I'm sure it's more or less the same for you! And I'm sure you have your own prefered level of just how much realism you're comfortable with picking up, examining, and tossing out of the window. Totally cool! There are tons of awesome articles who's writers vary with that level- equally "part of" the same universe.

I don't know what the point of this post was anymore- I guess really I just wanted to express my thoughts on the matter, but I hope it inspires anyone reading to explore many possibilities when it comes to writing about Chapters, Warbands, planets- whathaveyou! If you get more inspired by either the established lore or the conclusions of our own cosmos, I hope you nonetheless continue to flesh out those weird ideas! You may not be the best writer on Terra (I know I'm certainly not), but even then, if you have an idea, go ahead and make it! That's what this wiki is for!

...Well, yeah, try and polish those articles as best you can for the sake of prosperity, and ensure those articles still don't conflict established lore; but you have plenty of help on those regards! Best of luck!

~Spider40K