I was giving some thought to the manner in which things are manufactured in the City of Fire and Desolation, and it seemed that the division of the city and its layers into personal fiefdoms of the sorcerers and warlords is similar to the manner in which the Forgeworld of Mars is described in the attendant Horus Heresy book, and similar references are made in other books focusing on the Adeptus Mechanicus.
I am going to embark on an investigation of Mechanicus fluff as soon as the leisure presents itself, but thought that I’d get some commentary on whether such an investigation was worthwhile.
Absolutely! A mechanicus army is one of my perenial projects. I can’t say i have ever read a warhammer novel, but i am a fan of the Adeptus Mechanicus fluff that I have come across. Incidently, for literature about rebuilding a destroyed civilisation you could read “A canticle for Leibowitz” by Walter M Miller Jnr.
I also continually toyed with the idea of a Mechanicus army. Alas, my less-than-consensual exit from 40,000 more or less put paid to that idea. I still hold out hope for Battlefleet Gothic, however.
Do you know of any stories concerning the Dark Mechanicum? I have read the Horus Heresy stuff, which was excellent, and then the books on Mechanicus and Titan Legions, but there must be a few, at least short stories, bouncing around. Though the far-flung and diffuse nature of their resources is less a match for Chaos Dwarf sorcerers than the ludicrous concentration of capacity Zharr-Naggrund represents.
Given that my involvement in the hobby is chiefly modeling and painting now, with limited opportunities to game, I think I should start making an investment in art books like that. I presume the HH art book is a satisfactory investment?
On a similar note, when you come up with those concept drawings that were kicking around GW or Forgeworld, were those from some older art collection book, or did you have them straight from the source?
Not sure which drawings you mean. The CD concept ones? Those photos were from the 2011 open day I believe. From Mark Bedford’s sketchbook. Not my photos though.
The Horus Heresy art book is a good investment for people who want the whole story in one place, with art to explain certain things. I’d say about 40% of the art is good, the rest is average to poor. All inspirational though.
Beyond what you mentioned there isn’t very much material on the DAM.
I’ve not run into much and I’m fairly extensively read on the 40k stuff, mainly missed out on some of the Space Marine Idolatry Literature.
Before the HH book there’s really just passing mentions in short flavour text about tech-heresy, Chaos Forgeworlds and Chaos AM.
There’s precious little touching upon 40k Chaos from some other viewpoint than “Spce Marinz just pwned your a$$”.
“Loyal” AM is hardly better served really. There is marginally more because they feature as secondary characters to what is usually the main protagonist and as such get a little loving. Again it’s really minor stuff spread very widely among the different publications.
It’s a bit funny when the “mythological past” of HH gives us more solid info on some of the main factions than does current fluff.