HaloHammer Series Discussion

[CinnabarManx421]

Hey all, recently I can across these 2 videos by a YouTuber called PancreasNoWork. In them he discusses how certain factions from Halo would work if they were put into the universe of Warhammer 40k. Everything from how their tech and weapons compare, to how they would interact with other factions. I’ve found the videos really fascinating and honestly they’ve shown me more information on the factions than I had before, and I wanted to see what others thought about these vids. The first video goes over the Covenant and the second over the Forerunners, and he has a third video coming to talk about the Flood. Happy discussing!

 

[Crabwhale]

I have now watched the videos. Couple of points I'd like to mention.

For the Covenant:
-While the plasma point is something that keeps being brought up, I don't think the SCALE of plasma weaponry is being considered here. Plasma weapons in 40k release miniature suns that burns through armor (and sometimes themselves AND their user) because they are incredibly powerful. Plasma weapons in Halo meanwhile seem much smaller scale, at least when used by infantry. Burning through someone's chest? Yeah a lasgun can do that just fine. A 40k plasma weapon can ATOMIZE larger targets. So overall considering comparable effects, I don't think the plasma would be any more effective than regular las weaponry, which do dickall to Space Marines in full armor.

-The scale of Titans in lore has always been wack, but generally speaking don't take the official figures at face value. There's depictions of Titans that would dwarf the Scarab both in scale and weaponry, and furthermore the only Titan model that is NOT capable of being built anymore is the Emperor. All the other ones may take a long time to build, but that's mostly because of sanctity rituals and whatnot.

-In general, he does make a good argument for the Covenant holding out and doing okay for itself in the galaxy. But I'd suspect they wouldn't be doing nearly as well as he thinks, only continuing to stay alive thanks to the T'au clause, a.k.a. too small of a problem in practical terms to deliver too many resources to handle. In a ground war, the armies might be matched teeth for teeth, but if the Imperium gets roused properly the Covenant would get absolutely drowned in bodies.

In a space war, the Covenant just gets merked. The video might say what it might say, but Imperial ships have the advantage in range and firepower. Covenant ships use plasma weaponry to burn a world in hours to days. With Imperial ships you're looking at anywhere from gigaton level firepower to being able to burn a world in minutes ON THEIR OWN. Imperial ships also frequently have lances, which are gigantic lasers which go at SoL (duh) and would outrange and strip apart anything a Covenant fleet could bring to bear.

They also have the advantage in shielding, as void shields are capable of sustaining themselves even after barrages of fire from comparable ships, and can very quickly be rebooted if brought down. And just to emphasize the sheer manpower fuckage, Imperial ships frequently have crews that ALONE number in the hundreds of thousands. An Imperial battleship with its entire complement, auxiliary and staff might number more than there are Space Marines in the galaxy.

Also it'd be important to note that Space Marines have comparable tactical and strategic importance to Spartans. Only, you're dealing with hundreds of thousands of them in the worst possible scenario, and personally I don't think the Covenant is prepared for that, even if some of the Chapters that would be involved would be much less smart about it than Spartans were.

Furthermore, the standard Covenant tactic of burning planets down might not even work on key Imperial worlds, worlds that if brought down could ensure victories that would save them a lot of pain moving forward. The reason 40k wars frequently devolve into grounded slugfests is because ground defenses are insane. Void shields arrayed over cities and fortresses can withhold the barrage of thousands of warships for nigh-indefinitely. And the Covenant, as established, is not winning any ground battles due to sheer attrition capabilities that humans possess.

I haven't even touched on how Chaos corruption isn't as easy to avoid (especially if you don't know anything about it) as the video paints, or how the Orks and Tyranids could absolutely smash through any Covenant holdings if they were found on the wrong side of a Hive Fleet or a WAAAAAAAGH! As a conclusion while the video makes a fair point about it carving out a niche in the 40k universe similar to the T'au, I'd say the odds wouldn't be nearly as optimistic as the video paints them.

I'll go over Forerunners in a bit.

 

[Crabwhale]

Alright I'm back.

Now he presents a very good argument for why the Forerunners would likely present a serious threat in current 40k. I'll go over the elephant in the room in a sec, but first I'd like to point out the weird ass handwave for Chaos. I don't doubt the Forerunners would be smart enough to see the obvious bullshit there, but to say none of them would fall is a gross underestimation of the forces of the Empyrean. Also he sleeps on Nurgle far too much. Like yeah buddy I'm sure your genetic engineering is gonna be able to overcome plagues that have brought genetically perfect specimens like Primarchs to their knees. The Destroyer Plague and Nurgle's Rot are not things you can just cure with science alone, you need to have an intricate understanding of the Warp and more than a little psychic power to even have a chance of surviving a close encounter with them. If the Forerunners didn't take the necessary measures, I don't see how this scenario ends any better for them than the Flood (and at least you can burn the flood into nothing, with Nurgle's Rot and the Destroyer Plague even that will probably not be enough).

To address the biggest point of contention I have here, I believe the person in the video is vastly underselling the capabilities of the ancient 40k civilizations. His analysis of modern day 40k going up against the Forerunners seems largely accurate (again, aside from the Chaos problems I pointed out), however the Forerunners would be vastly outclassed by any million year+ civilization in the Milky Way.

By my estimates they'd be about on par with Dark Age humanity. Humans back then had legions of Men of Iron that probably numbered in the quadrillions at least. They had an empire that vastly dwarfed the modern Imperium of Man. They could create works like the Phalanx (which is a moon-sized space fortress) and the Speranza, an Ark Mechanicus that's a gigantic secret STC factory, with a hyper-advanced A.I. that can crap out black holes, use a time gun to make the future and past versions of a target destroy each-other by colliding, and literally Ctrl Alt Delete space itself.

The battles of the final golden days of humanity were fought with sun-snuffers and mechanivores which could not only eat space-time and everything therein, but information itself. That whole point about Master Chief's armor being like a hazmat suit? Guess what Terminator armor, the be-all end-all of traditional Imperial armor was based on. That's right, nuclear reactor maintenance suits from the Dark Age. And knowing the Dark Age, Termie armor is likely still scaled down from its original capabilities as civilian job wear.

To claim that the Forerunners are comparable to the Necrons and C'tan at the height of their power is laughable. C'tan Shards alone are like focused stars, and possess a mastery over the material universe afforded to no other species at their prime. The Old Ones, beings who engineered an entire infinite dimensional construct inside the Warp, the Webway, had to create or uplift entire vassal races to fight against the C'tan and the Necrons. And they still lost.

The ancient Eldar created horrifyingly powerful Warp-based weapons that would come to be seen as the Eldar gods to combat the C'tan and Necrons, and they still couldn't prevent their victory. The Necrons technology alone is beyond anything the Forerunners could hope to match: they can reset the entire timeline if things don't go their way, skilled Necron technicians can play with the fabric of the universe like children. The Celestial Orrey, a Necron construct that has a map of every star in the galaxy and can snuff any of them with a flip of a switch, and potentially lead to a gargantuan chain reaction that might destroy the entire galaxy, is regarded as a Necron piece of ART. Not a weapon, art. One of the greatest works of art ever accomplished by the species yes, but still, that should give an idea what level the civilizations in the War of Heaven were operating at.

Hell one of the best theories for why there seems to be no life in the universe aside from the Milky Way is that the War in Heaven ****** up reality so hard there's only one place left with any notable life. The other theory is the Tyranids, but then me thinks they were just scavenging what was left after that whole shebang.

Side note, and this is really petty, but I'm still gonna bring it up: I don't like the shade he throws at Necron tech for failing to turn on properly, while praising Forerunner tech for running just fine, even though he quotes it as having been 100,000 years. Like, the Necrons were asleep for 60 million years. That's a 600 fold discrepancy. The Forerunners are not impressive lol

 

[PsychoWarper]

Halo and 40k has always been an interesting discussion tho I have always given the edge to 40k (Tho I am biased admittedly).

Despite that many of the Halo factions could carve out a space/niche for themselves that the very least which could definitely be interesting.

Forerunners and Flood have the best chances obviously tho I wouldn’t say they “rekt” house.

 

[CinnabarManx421]

I mean I think it would be pretty hard for most of the civilizations to contend with a Halo Ring getting slip spaced into their faces.

 

[Crabwhale]

That's why I agreed with what he said about current 40k. Past 40k though? Eh, not so much.

 

[PsychoWarper]

40k is essentially about a bunch of long past their primes and formerly great factions, only yhr Tau are really exempt from that.

 

[CinnabarManx421]

I’m only recently learning about 40k myself but I also did agree with what he said about 40k not being the most powerful sci-fi verse just cause everyone used to have powerful stuff. I’ve seen quite a few people that tried to use the argument of 40k winning cause it’s 40k.

 

[Sir_sun_man]

Alright I'm back.

thank you took the words straight out me mouth
the fact that he compered the forerunners to the bloody old ones ticked me off a little

like honestly the closest thing to necrons in halo are the precursors and even then necrons would pummle the poor bastards much less the old ones

 

[Crabwhale]

I’m only recently learning about 40k myself but I also did agree with what he said about 40k not being the most powerful sci-fi verse just cause everyone used to have powerful stuff. I’ve seen quite a few people that tried to use the argument of 40k winning cause it’s 40k.

That argument is indeed stupid, and 40k is indeed not the most powerful sci-fi verse. That being said, it is near the top of the pack, and for VERY good reasons.

There's a good few verses that can hold their own just fine in the current setting of 40k, maybe even dominate. But if you roll time back? Very few sci-fi verses survive 40k at the peak of its power.

 

[First_Witch]

Snip

Nerd

 

[Crabwhale]

You have an anime profile picture, you are the pottle calling the ket black.

 

[First_Witch]

It take ones kind to see another. That being said, you huge, bulging nerd.

Necrons are cool though

 

[CinnabarManx421]

Also what do you guys think about his point on the Forerunners vs the Imperium? Do you think they’d be able to wipe the Imperium out or would the Emperor be able to hold them off from completely destroying?

 

[Crabwhale]

Depending on how badly the Imperium is pushed and how quickly, they could potentially go full ape mode and unleash whatever horrible tech they have in storage. The Grey Knight vaults of Titan would be opened up, as would the Dark Cells of the Custodians. We have no idea what they're harboring in there exactly, but what I can guarantee you is that it would give even the Forerunners pause.

That being said there's pretty good chances the Imperium would be overwhelmed. However, once the Forerunners get to Terra, it'll be game over for them if they so much as touch the Throne. Vulkan had a killswitch installed that would take the entire planet along with it if the Warp rift under Terra ever became disturbed again, and the severing of the Emperor's last physical tether would likely result in a new Eye of Terror that might just tip the galaxy over into abyss.

Tl; dr nobody wins in 40k. This extends to other franchises trying to take over 40k as well.

 

[CinnabarManx421]

Well hopefully the Forrunners don’t do that lol. And tbh they probably wouldn’t, they’d probably just do the same thing they did to Ancient Humanity and force them back into their home worlds and de evolve them so they could never be a threat again.

 

[Crabwhale]

That could still **** them over. The Emperor is sustained by his subjects. If he is left alone without the necessary psyker sacrifices and whatever maintenance they can pull off on the Golden Throne these days, that could still lead to a cascade that could mess up the galaxy.

 

[Crabwhale]

And it should be noted that besides physical destruction the Forerunners have no way to attack Chaos. Going through the Eye of Terror or doing something that would irrevocably change the presence of the Warp on a galaxy-wide scale would still end very badly for them. They could theoretically learn how to push it back by discovering the secrets of Blackstone, but that's old Necron tech, and as I've pointed out old Necron tech far outstrips anything the Forerunners possessed. It might take them a while.

 

[PsychoWarper]

The problem is if this was normal 40k if the Forerunners tried to focus sololy on the Imperium other forces in the berses to start to nip at them from the sides and behind its similar to why the Tau still exist cause the Imperium cannot put all their attention into nuking them without getting attacked.

If this was sololy Imperium vs Forerunners well… having the entirety of the Imperium’s resources put to killing you without any sort of holding back would definitely not be a fun time, the Imperium in such a scenario would probably have a numbers advantage (Tho I guess I don’t know the Forerunners numbers) and definitely has some heavy hitting shit from a personal level (Primarchs, Custodes, LotD and Saints) up to mega ships like Blackstone Fortresses.

 

[CinnabarManx421]

I think the Forerunners would have more population than the Imperium cause like he said they did have triple the territory of the Imperium. Plus the Forrunners also have a ton of tech that would reck the Imperium’s day.

 

[PsychoWarper]

I mean tbf the Imperium has Psykers who on a personal scale could be hell to deal with for people like the Forerunners and then theres the Legion if the Damned who the Forerunners have no answer to afaik.

While the Forerunners would definitely do pretty damn good obviously against especially current Imperium alot of their tech doesn’t seem like something the Imperium might not have some experience with in regards due to factions like the Necrons and Dark Eldar.

Hell the Imperium does have aome Blackstone Fortresses which seem at least comparable to the Forerunners top stuff.

As for population its hard to say if the Forerunners do have triple the territory thats big but the Imperium does have things like Hive Worlds where you’ll find trillions upon trillions of people on a single planet.

 

[Sir_sun_man]

Hell the Imperium does have aome Blackstone Fortresses which seem at least comparable to the Forerunners top stuff.

actually the current imperium can't actually use the fortresses to their fullest they use em more like big space hubs or space ports since the mechanicum has no clue how to actually turn them on that was kinda the reason as to why it was such a big deal when abaddon got one to function

 

[PsychoWarper]

actually the current imperium can't actually use the fortresses to their fullest they use em more like big space hubs or space ports since the mechanicum has no clue how to actually turn them on that was kinda the reason as to why it was such a big deal when abaddon got one to function

I had thought multiple had turned on after Abaddon got his to turn on but I haven’t read those stories myself yet so if im wrong fair enough.

 

[CinnabarManx421]

Hey guys, PancreasNoWork just dropped the third episode of HaloHammer, it’s here if ya wanna check it out.

 

[Crabwhale]

I am not writing another essay.

 

[CinnabarManx421]

I am not writing another essay.

Wasn’t gonna ask you to lol

 

[Qawsedf234]

Generally speaking I think the idea of smashing together the franchises is pretty neat. If I were to head canon the franchises together (albeit more Warhammer focused since they're thr base universe in this situation) I'd probably do something like

• The Precursors and Old Ones are the same race
• The Forerunners were one of the vassal races raised by the Old Ones to fight the Necrons
• Slipspace is the generic tech used by factions without warp drives. It's safer but in-universe significantly slower to the point that it's not worth the risk (barring Forerunner slipspace drives). So for example a week long Warp trip might take a month or more with a slipspace engine and it can't go as far.
• The Flood invasion involved them fighting the Krorks, Forerunners and Aledrai. Eventually the Flood's numbers and corruption of reality got to much and the alliance couldn't stop them anymore. The Aledrai retreated to the Webway while the Forerunners detonated the Halo array. The resulting blast stopped the Flood, but created the Halo/Ghoul stars and mentally reduced the Krorks into Orks
• Dunno how to handle the Flood / Tyranids. Maybe the surviving Flood evolved into the Tyranids (so the Grave Mind became the Hive Mind) or maybe the Flood was a large specialized Hive Fleet. If we want tk just remove the Flood then the easiest handwave would be it was just a legitimate Tyranid invasion and the current Hive Fleets are just the second attempt after they refound the Milky Way
• The UNSC would be a minor breakaway faction. The UNSC soliders would be slightly weaker guard units but have generally better tactics. They lack STCs so they instead focus on kinetic weapons and their own built stuff rather than repurposed old stuff
• SPARTANs like some of Crawl's mutations are comparable to Space Marine's physically (maybe physically inferior to a minor degree), but lack the mass production of a Space Marine and their genetic augmentation isn't as good. The big thing is that like the T'au they're not crippled in terms of technological progression
• The Covenant is the more extreme T'au. They hate the IoM due to destroying Forerunners artifacts (such as the Emperor recognizing the Halo rings and having them crippled).

For it to work the modern Halo stuff would have to be buffed but I find that it could work out. Could also be used as like, a dark joke. In most franchises the Imperium would be the extremist isolated faction thst a modern person would look at in horror, but in 40k the UNSC would be considered the backwards and radical faction from the IoM.

But idk. To me the hardest part would be explaining Old Ones/Precursors and Flood/Tyranids for fluff lore. Since the vastness of the galaxy allow the Covenant or UNSC to exist pretty easily with minimal retooling.

 

[PsychoWarper]

The Imperium would offer the UNSC a chance to join, if they refused well… the IoM would seek to do what he had to many other human civilisations throughout its history. Decimate until they joined or died.

 

[Qawsedf234]

Yeah. Imperium vs UNSC would be like Imperium vs Tau in this situation imo.

Where if they sent a full force to defeat them, they would win rather handily. But they can't spare the manpower so they're forced to just contain them.

The biggest thing though is that they may be more focused on killing the UNSC, since they may directly go against Imperial ideas more so than the Tau or Covenant. Maybe put them beyond the Great Rift/Segmentum Obscurus? Would make accessing the UNSC harder if nothing else.

 

[Crabwhale]

The Imperium would offer the UNSC a chance to join, if they refused well… the IoM would seek to do what he had to many other human civilisations throughout its history. Decimate until they joined or died.

Or just forge uneasy alliance of convenience with them like they do with the Leagues of Votann. Though it should be noted that said Leagues are far more advanced than humanity.

 

[CinnabarManx421]

Yeah like he said in the Covenant vid a lot of the species that Halo introduces would be good for Warhammer, especially the tabletop game ~~especially since the Halo tabletop game is dead~~

 

[PsychoWarper]

Or just forge uneasy alliance of convenience with them like they do with the Leagues of Votann. Though it should be noted that said Leagues are far more advanced than humanity.

Hmm perhaps, the IoM just generally has a pretty gung-ho attitude with other Human Civs but I suppose it might depend on who exactly finds the UMSC.

 

[PsychoWarper]

Yeah. Imperium vs UNSC would be like Imperium vs Tau in this situation imo.

Where if they sent a full force to defeat them, they would win rather handily. But they can't spare the manpower so they're forced to just contain them.

The biggest thing though is that they may be more focused on killing the UNSC, since they may directly go against Imperial ideas more so than the Tau or Covenant. Maybe put them beyond the Great Rift/Segmentum Obscurus? Would make accessing the UNSC harder if nothing else.

This is fair, I think as a mentioned with Crab who in the Imperium finds the UNSC can heavily effect how exactly they handle the situation.

Some Rogue Traders would be fairly inclined on at least an alliance while some Inquisitors are uh… far more hard core on the “Join or ******* burn” front.

 

[Crabwhale]

Radical Inquisitors exist, and they do far more heretical things than allying with vaguely acceptable human civilizations on the regular.

 

[PsychoWarper]

Radical Inquisitors exist, and they do far more heretical things than allying with vaguely acceptable human civilizations on the regular.

Yes thats why I said some Inquisitors,

 

[Qawsedf234]

This is fair, I think as a mentioned with Crab who in the Imperium finds the UNSC can heavily effect how exactly they handle the situation.

It could also work as a proxy. Like the UNSC is a vassal state of the Imperium or something.

Wonder how the Mechancius would react to human brain based AIs.

 

[PsychoWarper]

Wonder how the Mechancius would react to human brain based AIs.

Poorly, thats literal heresy to them

 

[Qawsedf234]

Pure AI is, but is a human flash copied into a machine heresy? Idk, I feel their could be some splits ideologically on if it counts or not.

 

[PsychoWarper]

Pure AI is, but is a human flash copied into a machine heresy? Idk, I feel their could be some splits ideologically on if it counts or not.

Hmm im not entirely certain, it would take them finding that out tho as at first they would likely view it as pure AI which could make it hard to convince them otherwise.

 

[CinnabarManx421]

Welp the fourth and final episode of HaloHammer dropped. He wasn’t originally gonna do this cause he already said in the previous vids that the UNSC would get stomped, but that’s no fun, so he went a bit more wild and had more fun creating some scenarios about how the UNSC could survive in the 40k galaxy and comparing their tech and stuff. His comparison of Spartans being better than most Space Marines is definitely the most controversial imo