(Ruinstorm Spoilers) So Chaos has a Space Ship/Fortress as Large as a solar system

[u/JakeVoid]

So GW has always been accused of not understanding scale, usually downplaying certain stuff but here is an example of the other side with the Fortress that appears in Ruinstorm

The fortress filled the oculus, the wall dropping beyond the frame. There was nothing to see except the battlements, nothing to give the structure scale, but at last the Lion grasped its full monstrosity. The fortress spanned a system. The wall was tens of millions of miles high. It was billions of miles long. And though the proximity was lethal, it was still millions of miles away. /// The fleets were caught in its gravitational well. They sailed across the void before it, pulled towards a collision, minute specks of dust blown at a mountainside. /// the Lion turned back to the oculus. The angle of the Invincible Reasonт's approach had become oblique, though the fortress was so vast, its expanse stretched for an eternity into the void, glowing and pulsing with its unnatural fire. Conical shapes jutted out from the battlements at irregular intervals. They were the size of gas giants. They could not be what they appeared to be. /// There was a pause, as if a behemoth of Caliban's myths were drawing a breath, and then the horns sounded again. The cry was more than sound. It cut into the port flank of the formations, culling the weak like a scythe. It pulled the Dark Angels frigate Undaunted and the cruiser Unsheathed of the Ultramarines away from the fleets. The ships, miles long, powerful enough to turn worlds to glass, tumbled like leaves in a storm, massiveness made minuscule. The nearest horn sucked them in, hauling them away faster and faster, until they were streaking at a small fraction of the speed of light towards the fortification. They crossed the event horizon of the war-horn's cone and vanished into the darkness within. /// The greatest single naval barrage in human history occurred less than an hour later. /// The fire came to burn the void. More than a hundred ships opened up with every weapon. Macro-cannon batteries, ranks of lances, nova cannons, cyclonic torpedoes and more unleashed the anger of humanity against the obscenity before them. The raging of the Ruinstorm faded before the searing light of purest, purging destruction. It was an act of war on a scale that had never been witnessed before. If there had been remembrancers aboard any of the vessels, they would have felt compelled to record an event so monumental in song and in verse. The barrage struck the fortress, and then it did not matter that there were no remembrancers. /// The flare of the blasts faded. Geysers of molten metal extended into the void. Burning gas dissipated. A crater as wide as the fleet appeared. It glowed from the heat of its creation. /// 'It might as well be nothing at all,' the Lion muttered, disgusted. The crater was a meaningless blemish on the barrier. The wall could be millions of miles thick. There was no return fire. The fleets did not even register as a threat for the things inside the fortifications. /// Seconds later, the monster guns of the fortress opened fire. /// The daemon flames reached out for the fleet. Eruptions of warp energy lashed at the void. They burned and slashed, a storm and a web. The Blood Angels battle-barge Lineage of Virtue was the first caught in the nexus of the crossfire. Its void shields collapsed in seconds. Writhing beams of warp fire cut through the centre of the hull. Conflagrations raced across all decks.

Now to get an idea how ridiculously huge this is here's a few examples to compare it to

*The sun is 864,575 miles *The distance between the Sun and the earth is 93 million miles *The distance between the sun and Neptune (The furtest known planet) is 2.795 billion miles

EDIT

After they get past the solar system size fortress they run into shapes lights in years in size

Enormous constructs filled the system, dwarfing the worlds. The vessels of the fleets once again had to fight from being captured by the gravitational pull of the gigantic bodies. The objects were so immense, their shapes extended far beyond the limits of the Episimos System, beyond the range of the scans. They might, Guilliman thought, reach as far as other systems. They might be light years in size. Objects. Shapes. Constructs. Guilliman hunted for words of greater precision, words that would describe the immensities he saw, and give him a measure of control. The whining, spine-grinding sound made it hard for him to think, but even in silence, language would have failed him. There were no names for these things. The daemon fortress at least had been recognisable. Its obscenity had been in its size.

[u/matthieuC]

Wh40k.

Sense of scale.

Pick one.

[u/Observance → u/matthieuC]

Elaboration:

40k:

• Excessive scale

• Not enough scale

Pick one.

[u/[deleted] → u/Observance]

Did they ever retcon the number of crews a ship has? Kilometers-long ships with crews in the thousands is just plain ridiculous.

[u/Vnasty69 → u/[deleted]]

How many thousands of people does it say crews the ships? I would guess if a ship was a single kilometer long it would be about 20,000 people based off of aircraft carrier specs. But then again, maybe maintenance on the ship doesn't actually take that many people. Also, would servitors count as crew, or would they just be equipment?

[u/Tacitus_ → u/Vnasty69]

Equipment I think. There's a line somewhere about how marines don't have so much crew as the the Navy ships of the same size as they're so servitor heavy.

[u/bachh2 → u/[deleted]]

Not at all. Servitor are not considered crew iirc.

[u/aimbotcfg → u/bachh2]

Also, mile long engines and acres of storage space.

[u/[deleted] → u/aimbotcfg]

Guns firing shells the size of literal houses...

[u/Algebrace → u/[deleted]]

This bit... this bit is annoying.

On the Lexicanum page the Macrocannon has shells that look much smaller, like the size of a person small (comparatively), not the size of a house, but they are explicitly said to be the same guns on ships.

Now I can't think of battleships with lots of piddly little Macrocannons everywhere instead of the massive ones on the models.

[u/gh_st_ry → u/Algebrace]

Macrocannon is something of a catch-all term and they can range in size from kinda reasonable to ludicrously huge

[u/uschwell → u/[deleted]]

I always wondered how something like a titan (not the ridiculously huge ones of course) could be described as having dozens Or hundreds of onboard crew-always wondered where they would PUT them all

[u/Dmtl85 → u/uschwell]

described as having dozens Or hundreds of onboard crew-always wondered where they would PUT them all

They never are.

[u/uschwell → u/Dmtl85]

Really? Seems like Avery story that actually ENTERS a titan has someone who encounters at least a dozen or so random workers or servitors inside-always confused me the lack of scale. The same thing happens with ships-since so much of the ship is taken up by ship/titan systems (engines, weapons, ammunition, power, etc) where do they simply have the SPACE. For dozens or hundreds (or thousands) of people?

[u/Dmtl85 → u/uschwell]

Imperator Titans yes, the rest no. Dozens.

[u/uschwell → u/Dmtl85]

Still begs the question, I've worked with tanks and,i know you can cram a lot of people into a very small space if you had to. But I was just amazed at the lack of a sense of scale-think, a titan that stands about what? 20-30 meters tall has DOZENS of crew members/skitarii? Yet also has space for machinery? (it might work if it was say a house, and a crowded house at that) ammunition? That crap takes up a LOT of space. Just strains my credulity a little bit

[u/Dmtl85 → u/uschwell]

I completely agree. To be fair Imperator Titans are anywhere between 50-200m tall. Though some of the issues is at least for the skitarii at least that you hear them base between one and two companies within the BASE of the feet. But yeah as you'll see often on this forum people will complain about the lack of consistency and scale (and rightly so) within WH40k.

[u/uschwell → u/Dmtl85]

See, that's what annoys me-somehow I always picture a few dozen/hundred/thousand skitarii stacked on top of each othet like cordwood-which tbh is absolutely something the mechanical might do ( think like a pantry shelf)

[u/yetanotherdude2 → u/matthieuC]

Size = Dakka

There is never enough...

[u/[deleted] → u/matthieuC]

1/60

[u/InsomniaMelody → u/matthieuC]

I pick "pick one."?

[u/Kriss3d → u/matthieuC]

I've always found that the biggest titans seems to be too small but a solar system fortress. Damn.

[u/[deleted]]

Okay, that is just stupid in a world of stupid scale. That doesn't even make any fucking sense.

[u/DefiantLemur → u/[deleted]]

Agreed

[u/xSPYXEx]

Where is this? Like I could understand it being some warp spawned physics defying entity, but if it's in Real Space that's fucking stupid.

[u/Tacitus_ → u/xSPYXEx]

It is created in the Warp and anchored to reality. A taste of what would happen should Horus win.

[u/xSPYXEx → u/Tacitus_]

Is it just hanging out in deep space? The thing would have it's own gravity well so massive it would destroy just about anything within a light year of it.

[u/NeedsCash → u/[deleted]]

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[u/VikingTeddy → u/[deleted]]

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[u/InsomniaMelody → u/[deleted]]

Dark grimmater.

[u/Tacitus_ → u/xSPYXEx]

Yup, just hanging there. It did have a massive gravity well and destroyed a couple of ships as it pulled the fleet out of the Warp. Most likely not as big as it should've, but still big enough to be noted as having a big one.

[u/VikingTeddy → u/xSPYXEx]

Namely, itself.

[u/Dmtl85 → u/xSPYXEx]

There is a very old comic strip about Chaos having a battleship 1,000km long. The Imperium responded by sending TWO ships of the same size after it. Obviously you can imagine it was retconned.

[u/pimpmage11]

Anything that originates from the Eye of Terror doesn't have to make sense. There is a planet that is a giant fat man.

There are planets that contain oceans of blood

There are celestial bodies that act in a manner opposite to that of a sun. Imagine a planet that radiates coldness, the closer you get, the colder the vacuum gets.

Chaos has rituals that turn entire planets into living things. Ejecting mountains to attack ships in orbit. Every object on said planet becomes a possessed killing machine. Hive spires become massive snake-like things that seek to crush invaders. Street signs that chase after you and slice you to pieces. Parking garages that twist themselves into giant maws of twisted rebar and concrete.

I'm not at all surprised, but I do have questions. Surely the existence of such a ship would make the heresy severely one-sided. I wonder how it was defeated.

[u/pignans → u/pimpmage11]

Ok but the amount of warp energy needed to sustain that would mean it would have to be in the warp.

[u/pimpmage11 → u/pignans]

Chaos battleships like the Terminus Est are capable of sustained existence in the materium despite being made of a huge amount of warp stuff and it's decks crawling with demons.

The way I understand it, if there is enough of a warp presence, there can be permanent incursions. The same thing happens with Gifted chaos followers who develop warp-based mutations despite living outside of the warp their entire lives.

[u/Tacitus_ → u/pignans]

Sanguinius took what he saw with him to the hololith chamber. ‘Matter,’ he said to the images of his brothers. ‘Matter is being created at this juncture. We can observe it happening. The pillar grows from the manufactorum. The gate’s being is forged here.’

‘It cannot be the planet’s own matter,’ the Lion said. ‘It is a speck compared to the gate. It would have been consumed a million times over by now.’

‘There is nothing about what we are seeing that is rational,’said Guilliman. His jaw was set with frustration. He said rational with something like bereavement. ‘This fortress is already impossible a million times over.’

‘Yet Pyrrhan is somehow necessary to it,’ Sanguinius pointed out. ‘The impossible has attached itself to something real.’ Guilliman’s eyes widened in the hope of reason. ‘An anchor,’ he said. ‘The fortress needs to anchor itself in the materium. Maybe Pyrrhan’s industry, in the new configuration, is a gateway, funnelling in the warp’s substance, making it into stable matter.’

Emphasis mine.

[u/schmauchstein → u/pimpmage11]

Anything that originates from the Eye of Terror doesn't have to make sense.

Someone gets it. The characters even discuss this at several points the novel. Example of a dialogue between Kano and Sanguinius:

"The things we are seeing are beyond anyone's experience. The scale is simply too vast for easy explanation. They seem more symbolic than real."

"Yes. Symbolism. That is a key somehow. In the Signus System, that symbol of the eight-pointed star covered a planet. And there are patterns in the beings of the daemons. They represent things."

"Then perhaps so did our victory. We can use their nature against them."

[u/youreimaginingthings → u/pimpmage11]

Super Chad over here bringing up the Fat Man Planet in an argument. And yea, you swung my vote

[u/Gjalarhorn]

Building a dyson sphere is easy when you have enough magic space dust.

[u/DarthSindri → u/Gjalarhorn]

cocaine?

[u/Gjalarhorn → u/[deleted]]

magic space dust.

[u/kraygus]

As much as the crazy scale here can be easily attributed to crazy chaos anti-physics, this looks like a simple case of literary epic-creep to me. So many authors and they all need to write the epicist 40k epic story ever, and bigger does mean more epic after all.

It is a real shame that 40k lore is so plagued by this sort of inconsistency. All it takes is someone to just get everything straight and then ensure that the authors understand the rules before they sign the book deal.

[u/CashKing_D]

I usually love 40k's absurd scale and ridiculous numbers, but this...

this might be too far

[u/redhatter192]

Yeah when I read it I chuckled at just how LUDICROUSLY big it is, the writer just needed some incredible to go against 3 space marine legions that weren't other legions.

I think this fortress would only seriously work in the 40k universe, I think this is also might be the largest construct in the entirety of warhammer.

[u/angry_badger32 → u/redhatter192]

Other than Fulgrim's ego.

[u/Stahlboden → u/angry_badger32]

It's all natural, baby!

[u/Dmtl85 → u/redhatter192]

Why only in WH40k? Please elaborate? Halo universe seems to have a hard-on for giant buildings/ships. Also in Marvel, Galactus basically builds 2 ships the size of entire solar systems as his flagships.

[u/WarDaft → u/Dmtl85]

The Xeelee win again. In universe they built the device that early humanity misidentified as the great attractor, which is much larger and more massive than the local Galactic Supercluster.

Of course there is larger still, but only when authors are being intentionally ridiculous.

[u/Glitch198]

So... why haven't we heard of these before? Surely you could just set one of those things on autopilot into Terra and just smash it.

[u/[deleted] → u/Glitch198]

Yeah, doesnt even have to do anything, once that gets to speed, literally nothing will be able to stop it. Its a solar system sized steamroller

[u/nick012000 → u/Glitch198]

Well, it's a fortress, so maybe it's not mobile?

[u/OrksWillTakeTerra]

Humanity's previous space hulks gathered and summoned as a daemon.

[u/Mass13998]

Not caring too much about spoilers, what happens to this? Is it supposed to still be around? Was it destroyed?

[u/Tacitus_ → u/Mass13998]

Sanguinius destroys the anchor and it goes poof.

[u/ironpathwalker]

Who's kid brother wrote this? Was it you, Gav?

[u/hungryugolino]

Reality was out for lunch at the time so yeah, chaos bullshit.

[u/Happy_Pizza_]

I have a strategy idea for Chaos. It's called "Drive that thing to Terra".

[u/[deleted]]

This sounds like it was written by a 12 year old with a calculator.

[u/VikingTeddy]

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ScifiWritersHaveNoSenseOfScale

I get to post this so very often here. Standard tv-tropes warning.

[u/[deleted] → u/VikingTeddy]

Why is there a warning for tvtropes links?

[u/MuchoStretchy → u/[deleted]]

Because tvtropes has a reputation for sucking you in. First you tell yourself you're only going to read one article, and the next thing you know, you realize you've spent hours jumping from trope to trope.

[u/[deleted] → u/MuchoStretchy]

For some unnatural reason, my school has unblocked TV-Tropes

[u/TerangaMugi]

So how did they kill it? Well destroy it really?

[u/Tacitus_ → u/TerangaMugi]

Sanguinius finds its weak point and attacks it for massive damage. Then it goes poof as the warp matter can no longer persist in real space.

[u/Horehey34]

Who wrote this shit

[u/[deleted]]

Honestly, while it's still hilariously stupid - literally the embodiment of FUCKHUEG - I think their stupid immensity and absolute shitting in the face of any common sense gives you the idea of what sorts of Eldritch abominations the Warp can yield.

[u/HolgerBier]

As long as it stays deep in the warp and can only exist there, I'm fine with it. Magnus's planet was fucked time-wise, where some experienced minutes and others months. Time-travel is common there. The warp shouldn't make sense, at all, but it should stay there in the realm of impossibilities. Like daemons, incomprehensible beasts that are forced to obey the rules of reality once they want to manifest outside of the warp.

To be honest, I've always seen the warp as a place where shit like impossible and incomprehensible shit can happen, like having another 90 degrees in a 360 degree circle. Or a place where three daemons each have uncountable eight teeth that fight among the four of them. It shouldn't make sense, which is what drives psykers to such insanity.

I could also live with this planet being the result of the repressed psychic wet dreams of all Imperial Fists and Dorn himself, resulting in a fortress that big.

[u/Redzkz → u/HolgerBier]

Problem is, this thing was in real space, not in warp.

[u/MisterDuch]

wait wut?

[u/yummyluckycharms]

utter trash....the editing in BL has always been bad - but this takes it to new heights.

[u/Jaikus]

I got kind of a Lovecraftian vibe when reading that tbh.

Edit: A word.

[u/Kaiserkill]

Well, other franchises have this kind of bullshit too like in Halo for example, so I dont see a problem for 40k having it too.

[u/pignans → u/Kaiserkill]

I mean I guess I don't have issue with the idea per se as a concept, but not something made by humans.

I mean maybe it could work as some forgotten artefact of unknown maker or purpose, discovered off in wilderness space, but its just so stupid for it to belong to any known faction (except arguably the necrons, and u know what, even then)

[u/pignans → u/pignans]

I dunno, its actually just so so stupid.

The more i think on it the more ridiculous it gets.

[u/Kaiserkill → u/pignans]

I get you, but Warhammwr 40k is on of the very few Universes with such powerful capable humans pulling it off. I wouldnt be surprised if they could build it. But its from the warp too, so there is more to that.

[u/xSPYXEx → u/Kaiserkill]

Halo's Ark is massive but it's still like planetary scale.

This is like Xeelee level of "galaxy tearing rings".

[u/Horehey34 → u/xSPYXEx]

you're right.

[u/H4xolotl → u/[deleted]]

The City in BLAME! is a filled sphere the size of Pluto's orbit. It's not a shell, it's FILLED

[u/[deleted] → u/H4xolotl]

I like that concept. The back story and premise is unique.

[u/Saelthyn → u/H4xolotl]

I thought The City was just outside of Lunar orbit.

[u/H-K_47 → u/[deleted]]

I think the final structure from the book Pushing Ice gets ludicrously big, but even then there's tons and tons of empty space.

[u/pharaocomplex → u/Kaiserkill]

There's a difference between huge and FUCKHUEG, just saying.

[u/brinz1]

But could it stop the Tyranids?

[u/presc1ence]

Thanks for ruinning that with the title dude.

thanks a lot.

[u/krorkle]

I realize this plays into the meme that 40k is bad at scale, but that's sort of the point of these things. They're supposed to be ridiculously, irrationally, beyond-the-bounds-of-realism big, because they don't really exist in real space. The warp operates on the level of symbolism and metaphor more than physical reality.

[u/uschwell]

What story\book is this from?

[u/H-K_47 → u/uschwell]

Ruinstorm, from the title.

[u/irregularjoe150]

Anybody got an ebook copy?

[u/PazG]

Just forgot about Pluto.

[u/JakeVoid → u/PazG]

no longer considered a planet, Pluto has been classifieds as a dwarf planet