'GAUNT WAS SHAKING, and breathing hard. He'd lost his cap somewhere, his jacket was torn and he was spattered with blood. Something flickered behind him and he wheeled, his blade flashing as it made contact. A tall, black figure lurched backwards. It was thin but powerful, and much taller than him, dressed in glossy black armour and a hooded cape. The visage under the hood was feral and non-human, like the snarling skull of a great wolfhound with the skin scraped off. It clutched a sabre bladed power sword in its gloved hands. The cold blue energies of his own power sword clashed against the sparking, blood red fires of the Darkwatcher's weapon.'
*****
The first post in the Loremaster series was set in motion the other day. I asked for peoples favourite lore/stories from the GW universes and I was going to begin with my own choice, but I was sent this piece and it happens to be from one of my favourite books and one of my favourite novel series Black Library have produced;
"So, the Sabbat Worlds Crusades.
I was always a big fan of the Tanith books, and the much wider universe they inhabit. I know the guard are often portrayed as mindless and human-wave style armies but the whole Sabbat Background really, for me, showed the guard how I imagined them to be. I always think humanity couldn’t survive if the guard were that useless, but in the Tanith books, they are professional soldiers, drawn from a thousand different places and backgrounds.
I really love the little touches - the regiments that get a quick mention. The monstrous aliens that the guard find a way to overcome and general “real” feel of it all. I can’t really think of any major changes I’d make. I’d love it to be fleshed out abit more, but I suppose the fact you don’t know every single detail is half the appeal.
My favourite though is definitely Necropolis, I love the urban fighting environment in that book and the fact that you really feel the ghosts are up against it in that one".
'ON THE SHATTERED world of Verghast, Gaunt and his Ghosts find themselves embroiled within an ancient and deadly civil was as a mighty huve-city is besieged by an unrelenting foe. When treachery from within brings the city's defences crashing down, rivalry and corruption threaten to bring the Tanith Ghosts to the brink of defeat. Imperial Commissar Ibram Gaunt must find new allies and new Ghosts if he is to save Vervunhive from the deadliest threat of all - the dread legions of Chaos.'
Gaunts Ghosts, what a series and what a gateway for many into Warhammer 40k, it's about the only series which has run concurrently with 40k since the Black Library started, and it still producing stories.
The series follows the so called "Gaunts Ghosts", a regiment of stealth/light infantry in the Imperial Guard led by the Colonel-Commissar Ibram Gaunt, who has battles with higher command as often as with the Archenemy of Mankind. Taking place during the Sabbat World Crusade, the books recount the Imperial push to reclaim an area of space originally conquered by Saint Sabbat, and subsequently overtaken by a professional Chaos force from the Sanguinary World's. Again, the Chaos forces, and there are a lot of them, are depicted as being a lot more of a professional fighting force then the game background normally projects them. Using equivalent tactics and equipment as the Imperial guard, often they are traitor guard units or officers who have been corrupted and trained the chaos forces.
The ghosts started off with short stories in the old "Inferno" magazine, way back about twenty five years ago*, as one of the first commissioned pieces of writing to begin to flesh out the universe of 40k. A lot of Imperial Guard slang and nomenclature came from these novels, likewise, some of my favourite parts of the series take part away from the battlefield, when Dan Abnett started to introduce the Regiment Train, with the vendors, families and other "hangers on" a regiment gathers over time.
Back onto Necropolis though, and as the fighting in the hive gets fiercer and fiercer, betrayal strikes and the defences are brought crashing down, allowing the besieging chaos forces to forces several breaches in the city walls and true city fighting to take over the last third of the book, this is when the Ghosts are really up against the wall, troopers are dying every couple of pages, guerilla fighters are launching counter attacks on the invaders, a lot of these characters are introduced and become the new wave of Ghost's after this novel.
During this, one of my favourite sections takes place (and it doesn't even involve the regiment!);
'THE TANKS WERE closing now, hammering the station, blowing sections of the overhead track down. Sheets of fire leapt through the terminus hall.
"Throne of Earth" Soric gasped, pointing.
Mustard-drab battle tanks, moving at full power across the rubble scarps, some of them bursting through sections of wall, were thundering forward from the west. They were firing freely, with huge accuracy, maintaing a cycle rate of fire that the Zoican armour, turning to the flank to greet them, couldn't even begin to match.
Neither Bulwar or Soric had ever seen a mass armour charge before, certainly not one undertaken by a crack Imperial tank brigade like the Narmenians. They opened their mouths in awe, and nothing but wild cheers came out.'
After a desperate few passages with Soric and his guerilla fighters hiding from the assaulting tanks, Grizmund and the Narmenian armour charge forth in grand style. In the coming pages you get a feel for the presence of the tanks thundering past, really inspirational the first time you read it and want to recreate something like that**.
Influential in the extreme, there are fifteen books in the main series, two or three compilation books, a series of short stories, a novel set at the beginning of the regiment, a background book detailing the Sabbat World's, and two novels set during the same was penned by Dan Abnett, Double Eagle and Titanicus respectively. There are now also books branching off covering the Iron Snakes during the crusade and the Saint herself, as well as one about the Ghosts main antagonist loyalist regiment, the Colonel Blue Bloods.
By anyone's standard thats a lot of words about a fictional regiment in a sci-fi planet hopping war!
This has been the first post of this series, and I ask if you want to participate, leave me a comment on the post and I'll detail what I ask for involvement from readers.
Until next time, have nice day...
(Italicized sections of text are quoted from the novel).
*Fuck me!
** The reality hits and you realise you'd need a 28mm scale ruined city the size of a tennis court, and all the terrain and miniatures to recreate...let's not talk about how much that would cost.
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