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View Full Version : 40k and WHF are really, really similar



Kahoolin
05-20-2010, 06:16 PM
Ah, thread no. 2 for today. I don't know if this is totally appropriate in this forum but buggered if I know where to put it :)

I've just been thinking, the difference between WHF and 40k as works of fiction is not that great. 40k Rogue Trader was created as fantasy in space as you all probably know, but since then, 40k has arguably become more popular than WHFB. Still, they are almost the same thing, and I think not in the way the writers back in the 80s intended. I'd classify them both as forms of dark science-fantasy with steampunk elements.

They both have demons and magic, which are major tropes of fantasy fiction. They both have guns, which signal science fantasy. The guns are clunky, unreliable, and poorly understood by our standards, which is a common trope of steampunk. The guns even look old-fashioned (guns in WHF are black powder, Guard tanks in 40k look like they are from a hundred years ago).
They both have non-human intelligent bipedal species (fantasy again, or at best science-fantasy), They both have mythologies essentially based on polytheistic creator gods and a war in heaven, more fantasy tropes. They both place humanity on the back foot, facing unspeakable threats using weapons and magic that they barely understand (dark fantasy). I'm sure the list could go on.

My point (yes, I do in fact have one) is that really, the major GW universes do not just share similarities, they are virtually the same thing. Even the dark tone is the same. The only real difference between them is the outer clothing of the tropes: 40k wears a dark future dress, and WHF is dressed up all medieval.

Sorry if everyone already knows this, I was just kind of shocked to realize that we normally think 40k is scifi, fantasy is fantasy, but I think it's more accurate to say they are both science-fantasy, just different.

Nabterayl
05-20-2010, 06:43 PM
The only real difference between them is the outer clothing of the tropes: 40k wears a dark future dress, and WHF is dressed up all medieval.
You mean 40K wears a medieval dress, and WHF is dressed up all Renaissance.

murrburger
05-20-2010, 07:35 PM
"They both have demons and magic, which are major tropes of fantasy fiction. They both have guns, which signal science fantasy. The guns are clunky, unreliable, and poorly understood by our standards, which is a common trope of steampunk. The guns even look old-fashioned (guns in WHF are black powder, Guard tanks in 40k look like they are from a hundred years ago).
They both have non-human intelligent bipedal species (fantasy again, or at best science-fantasy), They both have mythologies essentially based on polytheistic creator gods and a war in heaven, more fantasy tropes. They both place humanity on the back foot, facing unspeakable threats using weapons and magic that they barely understand (dark fantasy). I'm sure the list could go on."

Guns doesn't always mean sci-fi. In fact, all the guns in WFB have nothing to do with sc-fi...The guns are part of the Empire aren't really 'old-fashioned' because The Empire is at around the same era that actually would have those guns.

Guard tanks all look like they're from WW1/WW2. So I dunno about several hundred years ago.

I will argue that probably only Empire and Dwarves have anything to do with steampunk. And 40K, probably none. There's really no innovation at all. Nothing is being invented, and there's pretty much no hope for advancement. Another reason is because for Steampunk. there needs to be uhh.. steam.

40K does not use magic that often. It has the warp, and psykers are in fact, mutants with a certain gene. Sorcery and chaos is probably the closest it comes to magic. There's even a 'scientific' explanation behind Chaos and the like, but, there is also a more mythical explanation.

You're forgetting that there is some leeway between Fantasy and Sci Fi. I think the major differences is that Warhammer 40K takes place in the future (Could be our future. A very dystopian one at that) and WFB takes place in some sort of alternate reality.

Last thing, I don't think RT is Fantasy in Space. It is very much sci-fi, but a lot less dark than 40K. There's aliens, mutants, criminals turned super-soldiers, lots of punk themes... Sure there are Space Elves, but they're aliens. I know that's weak, but check out the original Star Trek sometime. It's just a miss-mash of things. Basically whatever ideas the creators wanted to explore, whatever cultures or time periods they wanted to include, they could. Star Trek was always pushing the boundaries of what we considered believable, and more than anything, it was a commentary on the times. It's the same with Rogue Trader, and I believe it reflects the time it was made in: it was a new gaming system, so they wanted to have a huge scope.

Fantasy hasn't evolved much, except for getting darker. :rolleyes:

Freefall945
05-20-2010, 07:35 PM
I wonder at what point it became popular for people to reclassify what we classically think of Sci-fi as Fantasy. I'm reasonably sure it started with Star Wars - and I wouldn't be surprised if TV tropes pushed it along.

You're right, there are marked similarities in the overall thematic elements of the settings, but looking at any single item - the dominant empire/imperium for example, the life of the common citizen, etc. - will reveal differences, typically a greater edge of severity in 40k.

Incidentally, can anyone remind me what is the difference (that is presently accepted :rolleyes: ) between what we would call science fiction and science fantasy?

Nabterayl
05-20-2010, 08:01 PM
Science fantasy, I think, is a story or milieu which in essence is a fantasy story, clad in the circumstances of science fiction. Science fiction, I think, is simply a story or milieu in which technology is advanced from its historical equivalent or is set in the future. You can be science fiction without being science fantasy, but I don't think you can be science fantasy without being science fiction.

To the OP's original point, I don't think that 40K is just fantasy in space, but I do agree that what makes it distinctive is that it's fantasy in space. Space marines aren't just Mobile Infantry crossed with the United States Colonial Marines. Everybody post-1986 does that. They're Mobile Infantry crossed with the USCM crossed with Bretonnians and a bit of the Empire's knightly Orders.

The major difference I see between them is that Fantasy is fundamentally a Renaissance world. A Renaissance world under siege, to be sure, but a Renaissance world nonetheless - things are moving forward, even in spite of the various problems that beset the Empire. 40K is fundamentally a medieval world, and specifically a "dark ages" vision of the medieval world - things are falling apart, and the Imperium is beset by various problems.

Kahoolin
05-20-2010, 08:01 PM
Incidentally, can anyone remind me what is the difference (that is presently accepted :rolleyes: ) between what we would call science fiction and science fantasy?As I understand it science fiction is realistic - it is speculative, focussing on the "real" universe with our laws of physics, but if things were different. It also of course includes speculation about the future.

Science fantasy is Star Wars and 40k. It is basically fantasy (i.e. the setting has similar but not the same physical laws as our own), but in space with guns and stuff so you don't immediately think of it as being fantasy. It's fantasy set in the future, or a world like ours would be in the future if there was magic. Technology works, but so does magic (although in science fantasy it's often called psychic powers, the Force, etc).

That's why I classify WHF and 40k both as science fantasy. Psykers are really fantasy, not sci-fi. And in WHF battle, magic and tech are side by side; hence, science fantasy.

Nabterayl
05-20-2010, 08:10 PM
Wikipedia suggests that the difference is one of degree - how much effort is spent to explain the fantastical elements? If you're writing in the Honorverse, there are very specific formulae that tell you how fast you're traveling through a specific band of hyperspace relative to normalspace, and you're expected to take account of time dilation effects. That's science fiction. If you're writing in the 40K universe, there are very specifically no formulae that tell you how fast you're traveling through the Warp. That's science fantasy.

Kahoolin
05-20-2010, 08:13 PM
I will argue that probably only Empire and Dwarves have anything to do with steampunk. And 40K, probably none. There's really no innovation at all. Nothing is being invented, and there's pretty much no hope for advancement. Another reason is because for Steampunk. there needs to be uhh.. steam.Yeah OK, I spose the defining thing about steampunk is that it is alternate universe sci-fi. The stuff looks old fashioned to us but isn't in that world. So yeah, 40k doesn't qualify, and fantasy not reeeaally, but it does have steam and Skaven are definitely influenced by the steampunk aesthetic.


To the OP's original point, I don't think that 40K is just fantasy in space, but I do agree that what makes it distinctive is that it's fantasy in space. Space marines aren't just Mobile Infantry crossed with the United States Colonial Marines. Everybody post-1986 does that. They're Mobile Infantry crossed with the USCM crossed with Bretonnians and a bit of the Empire's knightly Orders.

The major difference I see between them is that Fantasy is fundamentally a Renaissance world. A Renaissance world under siege, to be sure, but a Renaissance world nonetheless - things are moving forward, even in spite of the various problems that beset the Empire. 40K is fundamentally a medieval world, and specifically a "dark ages" vision of the medieval world - things are falling apart, and the Imperium is beset by various problems.Ah, I didn't say 40k is fantasy in space, I said it was originally developed to be WHF in space. It's not now.

As to your second point, that's true, WHF is moving forward whereas 40k (the imperium anyway) is declining, but that doesn't change the fact that they are both universes where magic and technology co-exist. Neither of them is fantasy or science fiction as traditionally conceived (e.g. Tolkein or Asimov, respectively). They are both science fantasy, just one has a teaspoon of future added, the other a teaspoon of history.

Nabterayl
05-20-2010, 08:16 PM
Ah, I didn't say 40k is fantasy in space, I said it was originally developed to be WHF in space. It's not now.
That's what I meant to say, yeah.


As to your second point, that's true, WHF is moving forward whereas 40k (the imperium anyway) is declining, but that doesn't change the fact that they are both universes where magic and technology co-exist. Neither of them is fantasy or science fiction as traditionally conceived (e.g. Tolkein or Asimov, respectively). They are both science fantasy, just one has a teaspoon of future added, the other a teaspoon of history.
I quite agree.

murrburger
05-20-2010, 08:17 PM
How are pyskers fantasy, and not sci-fi? My argument is one word.

Dune.

Kahoolin
05-20-2010, 08:19 PM
How are pyskers fantasy, and not sci-fi? My argument is one word.

Dune.Unfortunately I can't give you one word. What I can say is that the psychic powers in Dune are explained as being the product of genetics and drugs, so yes, that's technically science fiction. The psykers in 40k use power from "the warp," a nebulous other dimension made of raw chaos and full of hell-beasts. That's fantasy.

EDIT: Hey! I think I have a good rule of thumb. If you look at the explanation for something and you think "well yeah, I believe that could happen, resulting in something that seems impossible right now," then you have science fiction. If you look at it and think "yeah but in the real world that's pretty much never going to be the case unless the universe goes mad" then you have fantasy.

So Dune, people practice eugenics for hundreds of years and synthesize mental-enhancement drugs, resulting in what we would call impossible psychic powers but which are perfectly explicable - that's sci fi.

In 40k, a parallel universe full of Daemons and chaos exists beside our own, which can be tapped into by certain random individuals to do things that we would think are impossible - that's fantasy. The fact that the random people share a gene just makes it science-fantasy.

How's that? I think it ties in well with the wikipedia explanation of the difference being one of degree, based on how much the author bothers to explain using science.

Nabterayl
05-20-2010, 08:34 PM
To be honest, I'm not sure I would classify Dune as science fiction, if the distinguishing characteristic of science fiction is the desire to explain the fantastical elements in the story. But regardless, I'd point to the following factors that cause me to classify 40K psykers and psychic powers as magic rather than technology:

The denizens of the universe themselves think of psychic powers in magical terms. For instance, unsanctioned psykers are referred to as "witches," and their practice as "witchcraft." Some particularly bigoted individuals refer even to sanctioned psykers as witches. Chaos psykers are frequently referred to as "sorcerors," and their practice as "sorcery" or "magic," despite the fact that what they are doing is fundamentally no different than what a sanctioned psyker does.
Although machines may be constructed that interact with psychic powers, the actions of a psyker in utilizing his psychic powers cannot be replicated from start to finish by a machine - or if they can, there is never any hint of it.
Some of the physical objects that affect psychic powers are pretty clearly not machines, such as hexagrammatic wards (which, as physical objects, are simply bits of metal arranged in a particular way).
Psychic powers draw upon a power source that is external to the psyker, without which even the most gifted psyker cannot utilize his powers.
EDIT: There is such a thing as a "psyker gene." Pegging such a complex phenomenon to a single gene (arguably, pegging into to purely genetic factors at all) is tantamount to hand-waving from the perspective of somebody who has even a high school education in genetics.

Kahoolin
05-20-2010, 08:47 PM
To be honest, I'm not sure I would classify Dune as science fiction, if the distinguishing characteristic of science fiction is the desire to explain the fantastical elements in the story.Yeah me neither, but I didn't want to open that can of worms.

40k I think is like Harry Potter. Some people are wizards, some people are muggles. I'm sure you could say that wizards in Harry Potter are a mutation, but that doesn't make magic science.

murrburger
05-20-2010, 09:15 PM
To be honest, I'm not sure I would classify Dune as science fiction, if the distinguishing characteristic of science fiction is the desire to explain the fantastical elements in the story. But regardless, I'd point to the following factors that cause me to classify 40K psykers and psychic powers as magic rather than technology:


First thing. Dune is a seminal science fiction work, I'm not sure how you can argue otherwise. Not everything needs to be explained in science fiction, there's always the unknown element. It's not necessarily magical, but it shows that science can't explain everything, it may have theories or hypothesis, but never anything completely concrete.



The denizens of the universe themselves think of psychic powers in magical terms. For instance, unsanctioned psykers are referred to as "witches," and their practice as "witchcraft." Some particularly bigoted individuals refer even to sanctioned psykers as witches. Chaos psykers are frequently referred to as "sorcerors," and their practice as "sorcery" or "magic," despite the fact that what they are doing is fundamentally no different than what a sanctioned psyker does.


This is in-universe. Of course they are referred to as witches, or sorcerers. But we know better. The Emperor knows that they are really the next step in evolution for humanity. However, It's a nice twist that these actually are dangerous individuals, and they need to be controlled/killed for mankind's survival.



Although machines may be constructed that interact with psychic powers, the actions of a psyker in utilizing his psychic powers cannot be replicated from start to finish by a machine - or if they can, there is never any hint of it.

Some of the physical objects that affect psychic powers are pretty clearly not machines, such as hexagrammatic wards (which, as physical objects, are simply bits of metal arranged in a particular way).
Psychic powers draw upon a power source that is external to the psyker, without which even the most gifted psyker cannot utilize his powers.


It's the users belief in the device that makes it work, or his 'faith in the Emperor (Both can be argued)'. Before you call the Emperor a god, remember 2001: A Space Odyssey, and if you want to, Dune. A dude ascending to 'godhood' is a big sci-fi trope.



EDIT: There is such a thing as a "psyker gene." Pegging such a complex phenomenon to a single gene (arguably, pegging into to purely genetic factors at all) is tantamount to hand-waving from the perspective of somebody who has even a high school education in genetics.


Remember, it's science fiction. If you pull apart every little thing like that, you'll soon realise nothing in most sci-fi works like it should.

This is all my opinion, I'm not to dissect the logistics of an Imperial Navy group, or half that crap that Eldar do. I think that should just be left up for debate, because I think the unknown element is very important.

Oh, well. That's my two cents. I'll probably watch the thread, but I don't think I have many big posts left in me. ;)

Nabterayl
05-20-2010, 09:32 PM
First thing. Dune is a seminal science fiction work, I'm not sure how you can argue otherwise. Not everything needs to be explained in science fiction, there's always the unknown element. It's not necessarily magical, but it shows that science can't explain everything, it may have theories or hypothesis, but never anything completely concrete.
I'm not arguing it. I'm arguing that if the definition of science fiction is the desire to explain things, Dune's status as science fiction would be iffy. At the end of the day, all fantastical elements in even the hardest science fiction boil down to hand-waving - the quality I'm talking about is how "buried" you want the hand-waving to be. Herbert was not very concerned with the plausibility of some elements of his universe, but he lavished quite a bit of work on the plausibility of others.


It's the users belief in the device that makes it work, or his 'faith in the Emperor (Both can be argued)'.
That's exactly my point. If faith is actually what makes a hexagrammatic ward work, then I don't see how you can call a hexagrammatic ward technology. If you can't build a machine that does what a psyker does, I don't see how you can call what a psyker does natural (contrast navigating the Warp, which can't be done without a psyker, with Dune navigators, which can be replaced by machines). If a psyker's power comes not from his mind but an external dimension, I don't see how you can call what he does psionics (the traditional science fiction substitute for "magic").


Remember, it's science fiction. If you pull apart every little thing like that, you'll soon realise nothing in most sci-fi works like it should.
That's true, of course. What I'm trying to point out is that one of the differences between science fiction and science fantasy is in the effort put into obfuscating the fact that it doesn't work. For instance, neither Star Wars hyperdrives nor Star Trek warp drives actually work. Both are based on bad science, or at best unverified speculation. But Star Trek expends a great deal more energy than does Star Wars in trying to make its FTL technology sound plausible and describe exactly how it works, at least in-universe. That is [one of] the thing[s] that makes Star Trek science fiction while Star Wars is science fantasy.

To put it another way, Star Trek cares a great deal about how its warp drives work, as evidenced by the reams of paper spent "explaining" it. Star Wars cares only a little about how its hyperdrives work - there's an explanation, yes, but it's nowhere near as lavish as Star Trek's. Similarly, the fact that 40K explains the psychic mutation as the work of a single gene indicates to me that 40K doesn't actually care very much about how the mutation works, which to me is more indicative of a science fantasy attitude than a science fiction one.

Melissia
05-20-2010, 09:39 PM
That's because 40k was an "IN SPAAAAAAAAACE!" rip of WFB when it started. It's drifted away as time goes on, for which I am thankful.

Lerra
05-20-2010, 09:51 PM
Isn't WHF supposed to exist within the world of 40k? I remember reading something about the WFB world being inside the eye of terror, or an unknown world on the edge of the galaxy, or something like that.

That would explain some of the similarities, though.

Kahoolin
05-20-2010, 09:53 PM
First thing. Dune is a seminal science fiction work, I'm not sure how you can argue otherwise. Not everything needs to be explained in science fiction, there's always the unknown element. It's not necessarily magical, but it shows that science can't explain everything, it may have theories or hypothesis, but never anything completely concrete.I think what we're touching on here is that science fiction is not a very useful term these days. Dune is a seminal science fiction work because that's what it was historically called, and that's what most people would think of it as being. However . . . it is more like Tolkein than Asimov in that the magic and the mythic themes are more important than the explanation as to how FTL travel is possible. The science is not the point in Dune, the science is there to explain the fantasy (e.g. psionics, navigators bending space with their minds) in a way that helps suspension of disbelief. I think most of what people think of as sci-fi is actually sci-fantasy.


Remember, it's science fiction. If you pull apart every little thing like that, you'll soon realise nothing in most sci-fi works like it should.Yeah but if it doesn't work like it should then it is either bad sci-fi or science fantasy. The point of (actual) sci-fi as opposed to science fantasy is that it is realistic: it is a what-if, set in the real universe with everything that that entails.

Asimov and other classic sci-fi writers tried really hard to make their science accurate and their speculations realistic, and explore the realistic implications of their realistic speculations. Basically they were doing science as rigorously as they would in a lab, but in a story. Hence the name science fiction. What they did not do was think of something cool that fantastically violated the laws of the real universe and then try to justify it with science-talk. That's science fantasy.

I guess there has always been tension between sci-fi written by and for people interested in science, and lite sci-fi written by and for people interested in a cool story with space ships and lasers. I think critics and such usually call the first kind hard SF and the second kind science fantasy nowadays because to call them both sci-fi creates confusion :)

Kahoolin
05-20-2010, 10:16 PM
Here's a useful definition from wikipedia:

A definition, offered by Rod Serling, is that "science fiction makes the implausible possible, while science fantasy makes the impossible plausible." The meaning is that science fiction describes unlikely things that could possibly take place in the real world under certain conditions, while science fantasy gives a veneer of realism to things that simply could not happen in the real world under any circumstances. Another interpretation is that science fiction does not permit the existence of supernatural elements; science fantasy does. Even the usage of this definition is difficult, however, as some science fiction makes use of apparently supernatural elements such as telepathy.
For many users of the term, however, "science fantasy" is either a science fiction story that has drifted far enough from reality to "feel" like a fantasy, or a fantasy story that is attempting to be science fiction. While these are in theory classifiable as different approaches, and thus different genres (fantastic science fiction vs. scientific fantasy), the end products are sometimes indistinguishable.
So by this standard, 40k is definitely science fantasy not science fiction. And so is Dune. WHF is not, it is just straight-up fantasy. I'm willing to admit now that technology doesn't make a fantasy a science fantasy, only when the science is used to excuse the fantasy. That doesn't happen in WHF - magic has nothing to do with steam tanks.

It's interesting though, the parts of the WHF world that aren't to do with magic are surprisingly historical for a fantasy setting. A lot of their tech is stuff envisaged in the renaissance but never built . . . which makes it sort of an alternate history.

Freefall945
05-20-2010, 11:36 PM
Isn't WHF supposed to exist within the world of 40k? I remember reading something about the WFB world being inside the eye of terror, or an unknown world on the edge of the galaxy, or something like that.

That would explain some of the similarities, though.

This was once a prevailing and winked at theory by Games Workshop - its evidences include the periodic presence (particularly in blood bowl) of 40k items like chainswords, and bolters.

Melissa's right (though a little turned around - if I understand, Rogue Trader was first an "original" idea of using fantasy tropes in a Sci-Fi setting which were then subsequently projected back into their fantasy forms when WFB arrived), the settings were previously linked by virtue of goofy common authorship, but this all happened before GW started taking their IP's seriously.

Many a hardened forum veteran shudders at the idea of launching into the "Is Sigmar a Primarch" debate again. Other speculative evidence includes concurrent uses of terms like "Old Ones", and a massive explosion of "Old One" technology in WFB resulting in the Chaos wastes being vaguely reminiscent of the explosion of warp power which wiped out the Eldar Empire and created Slaanesh.

That said, it has been officially and vigorously stated that the universes, while similar, are not directly connected. Some folks enjoy speculating that the Warp is a kind of nucleus dimension around which alternate realities revolve, and in this way both W40K and WFB share the very same instances of the Chaos Gods.

Really though - you'd think if that was the case, the Black Legion would just maraud through the Old World at some point, eradicating their opposition which their advanced tactics and weaponry. And powerfists.

Having the WFB world as a world in the W40k galaxy has a certain amount of attractive elegance to it, but it makes every event and adventure within that world seem insignificant. Best to keep 'em apart, I reckon.

Madness
05-23-2010, 01:32 AM
I had a personal theory that is not backed up by anything, to me WHF earth is sort of a sandbox where old ones threw stuff to see how it worked before going full production, or before releasing "patches" for the races they created. A sort of PTR server.

Also, Dune is Sci-fi, fiction and fantasy are pretty similar, but I get you see a difference between hard sci-fi and more liberal stuff. Also, iinm navigators don't do the space folding, they only plot the course, and they wouldn't even be necessary if there wasn't a computer ban in act.

gorepants
05-24-2010, 01:13 AM
Wikipedia's entry on sci-fi is a little missleading, since the second sentence talks about 'scientifically established or scientifically postulated laws of nature'. This is a bit of diversion, since sci-fi's science content can be whatever, so long as it is (mostly) internally consistent. The key element is that it is a "literature of ideas", that is it is idea (sometimes technological, but more commonly psycho- or sociological) that drives the story. Sci-fantasy and space opera tend to be driven by action, romance, adventure and (especially in bad 70s sci-fantasy) follow similar plots to swords-and-sorcery fantacty novels. This is why sci-fi lends itself so we to short stories (using the formal defination of being driven by idea rather than character - also why most of Phil Dick's early novels seem too long: they are very long short stories with very poor character development). A lot of modern sci-fi treads a fine line between space opera and hard (eg Asimov robots) sci-fi.

I'd argue that in this context Dune is sci-fi - it is the story of a man given the ability to predict the future and how his fear of who he feels he must become constrains him. The later books do get a little silly (and Herbet just isn't a very good writer). The modality of the fantasty (or if you prefer the modern parlance, speculative) elements is not that relevent. In the original book Paul's (and the navigators') powers are described as precience, but are also a function of probabilty analysis, so are not actually seeing the future, but being very good at predicting it. This gets muddy in later books. But in the end it doesn't actually matter to the message of the book, since it is a device to cause him to be trapped.

So do I think 40K is WHF in space?

Yes and no. It shares the same themes (eg, Man vs. Himself, thak you wikipedia), the same factions and races, and psuedoscience (give or take). Not surprising given it was made by the same people. But, even from the beginning it had its own character, since many of the designers worked with AD comics (this explains why 40K is hella more dystopian the WHF). But given that 40K was concieved as fantasy in space, there are lot of similarities too. But once you strip away a few of the cosmetic and short term plot differences, most sci-fi and fantasy stuff starts looking pretty similar since there are only so many things to write about. And if you strip away a bit more, all fiction starts to look the same (just some stuff about people and stuff).

That and reducing the product divergence to make the brand image more cohesive (hmm... undead in space anyone?).

Is it sci-fi?

No, I'd put it in the sci-fantasty bucket - it certainly isn't hard sci-fi, and lacks any great cohesiveness of ideas. Some of the black library stuff kind of make pretence to this, but I don't think it quite has the polish to come through with the goods.

Is this good or bad?

Personally (and as much as I like good sci-fi), I think having 40K presented in the sci-fantasty mode is a good thing. It doesn't get too bogged down in ideas, though it makes it obvious when the designers try too hard when the designers attempt to explain too much (*cough* sensei knights *cough* old ones *cough*). It does make it easy to push little men around and make up stories and pretend to blow things up without worrying too much about the moral issues, or how come they haven't explained the economic model of the Imperium with enough clarity for it to make sense.