# Slaughter at Giants Coffin by L.J.Goulding



## Brother Lucian (Apr 22, 2011)

Black Library & Warhammer Digital - Slaughter at Giant's Coffin (eBook)









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*Slaughter at Giant's Coffin*

*A Space Marine Battles novel*
Devastated by the tyranids, remnants of the Scythes of the Emperor Chapter gather at a Chapter outpost to regroup. But the relentless menace of the hive fleets is close, and the battered Space Marines must rally for what might be their final stand…

*READ IT BECAUSE*
It's something quite unusual – a story about battered and bloodied Space Marines on the back foot. Their world lost, their command structure demolished, can they hold themselves together in the face of utterly destructive aliens?


 *THE STORY*

Mere days after the loss of their home world Sotha, the Scythes of the Emperor stagger to the Chapter outpost at Miral Prime to lick their wounds and formulate a campaign of vengeance against the tyranids of Hive Fleet Kraken. Devastated and leaderless, these Space Marines now look to their only surviving officer, the reluctant Captain Thracian, for guidance. But the psychic shadow of the xenos is growing in the warp once more, and the bastion atop the Giant’s Coffin mesa may yet become the site of a most ignoble last stand...

Written by L J Goulding




Looks interesting, may have to get it.


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## Brother Lucian (Apr 22, 2011)

Finished it, i rate it 7.5. Quite interesting characters and a rahter rare situation for a chapter to be in. I do wish a certain plotline got properly concluded, instead of being left hanging. I think too many questions hinges on exactly -that- one.


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## darkreever (Apr 3, 2008)

Brother Lucian said:


> *READ IT BECAUSE*
> It's something quite unusual – a story about battered and bloodied Space Marines on the back foot. Their world lost, their command structure demolished, can they hold themselves together in the face of utterly destructive aliens?


I think I read this exact blurb when they came out with Rynn's World, for very obvious reasons. Whether they altered it or not since then wouldn't surprise me. (They did)



Brother Lucian said:


> Looks interesting, may have to get it.


Guess you made the decision pretty quickly, it barely took you two hours to read the thing.:laugh:

The to many unanswered questions you found by the end of the story, @Brother Lucian, seems to be a not uncommon trend in space marine battles books. I mean, it is rather difficult to put in the level of character/plot development of other stories when the point here is to cram an entire major event into one or two average length novels. At least in my opinion, writing novels is not my profession.


What kinda gets me is the thought of Thracian being a reluctant captain. Is he so because he was elevated to that status by dint of deed or honorific? Is he a brand new captain given the rank because he was there, not because he earned it? Is he reluctant to commit the remnants of his chapter because they are crippled? It feels like there are quite a few other words that could have been used there.


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## Brother Lucian (Apr 22, 2011)

darkreever said:


> I think I read this exact blurb when they came out with Rynn's World, for very obvious reasons. Whether they altered it or not since then wouldn't surprise me. (They did)
> 
> 
> Guess you made the decision pretty quickly, it barely took you two hours to read the thing.:laugh:
> ...


Regarding the unanswered question, read at your own peril: 

A mysterious brother Hadrios claims to have major information about the fall of sotha, hinting at treachery that sends Thracian into a rage when he is told, but we the readers dont get the info. And Hadrios commits acts that makes me question his allegiance and wondering if -he- is the traitor and leading the chapter astray.


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## darkreever (Apr 3, 2008)

Oh I certainly hope not, that would mean altering the only other existing source of information regarding the Scythes (from Orphans of the Kraken.)

He is supposed to go on and help lead/found the salvation teams. But if what you think they are hinting at comes to pass then thats the rewriting of a good character.


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## Brother Lucian (Apr 22, 2011)

Hrm, Been re-reading Orphans of the Kraken. Looks like a major editor fail. OotK names the last captain as Thrasius, whom succeeded Thorcyra post the Slaughter. When in Slaughter he is called Thracian.

Ootk also says the salvation teams is Thrasius' idea. Hadrios had a couple lines as a messenger, nothing more.

Spoiler related to Slaughter and a thread to OotK.



In Slaughter Hadrios is responsible for the vanishing of the geneseed cache and the murder of at least one astartes. Though in OotK, theres musing about a sudden source of geneseed appearing. Surely it can only be the missing cache. But why these antics?


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## darkreever (Apr 3, 2008)

Brother Lucian said:


> Hrm, Been re-reading Orphans of the Kraken. Looks like a major editor fail. OotK names the last captain as Thrasius, whom succeeded Thorcyra post the Slaughter. When in Slaughter he is called Thracian.


Personally I want to chalk that up as a chapter tradition, taking a different name.



Brother Lucian said:


> Ootk also says the salvation teams is Thrasius' idea. Hadrios had a couple lines as a messenger, nothing more.


Thats true, though Hadrios is also supposed to be Thrasius/Thracian's subordinate. So when setting the teams up some of that work would have had to fall to Hadrios, since Thracian had the remnants of a chapter to look to and guide.



Brother Lucian said:


> Spoiler related to Slaughter and a thread to OotK.


While I can't say anything towards the book, it is possible that the cache going missing might have something to do with the deathwatch. The Scythes do gain a significant amount of geneseed at some point and one of the two major rumours pertaining to how is that it was given to them following permanent seconding of a significant number of their own to the deathwatch.

Its possible that this rumour gets expanded on and it turns out that Hadrios has it given to the inquisition to keep the chapter legacy safe and then the inquisition turns around and blackmails the chapter.

Kinda like that better than the other rumour anyway.


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## Brother Lucian (Apr 22, 2011)

darkreever said:


> Personally I want to chalk that up as a chapter tradition, taking a different name.
> 
> 
> Thats true, though Hadrios is also supposed to be Thrasius/Thracian's subordinate. So when setting the teams up some of that work would have had to fall to Hadrios, since Thracian had the remnants of a chapter to look to and guide.
> ...





Hadrios makes it clear he is planning to do things to the geneseed cache as he speaks to the dying apeotecary, having killed him because he would have interfered otherwise. And in the next chapter, the epilogue, we learn that the geneseed cache was lost in the evacuation.


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## darkreever (Apr 3, 2008)

Well then fuck me, definitely looks like they are going to take him down the less honourable route.


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## Lord of the Night (Nov 18, 2009)

I was half impressed and half disappointed by SaGC for a number of reasons.

What I Liked:
-Culmonios was a great character whose increasing rage and bitterness towards the universe, and dislike of the future he sees his Chapter is now bound to, really made the highlight of the novel. His disdain for the "trogs" like Hwygir showed the typical Sothan arrogance, but unlike Tiresias he developed a bit of respect for them after witnessing their capabilities. Still it wasn't enough to give him hope for the future, and it was interesting to see through him the perspective of a Space Marine who has lost everything and doesn't see the point anymore.

-Thracian was an interesting character let down only by his association with Hadrios. But it was cool to see a Scythe who realised what a total and complete f*ckup Thorcyra was and took matters into his own hands. His interactions with the lieutenant of the Heart of Cronus were quite interesting as well, showing a real humanity and connection to the people of his homeworld that most Space Marines do not have, a real contrast to the end where it's clear that he is essentially condemning the remnants of the Sothan people into slavery for his Chapter.

-The battle scenes against the Tyranids really captured the futility of the entire Miral campaign. It was doomed from the get-go and you can see it in every battle where the Tyranids just keep coming, no amount of casualties inflicted stopping them or even really being worthy of note. The Tyranids won Miral the very instant they decided to move towards it, the Scythes were merely a bump in the road. By the end it was clear that the entire slaughter was caused by vanity and an unwillingness to admit defeat, which cost the Scythes dearly at a time when they could not afford to lose anything more.

What I Disliked:
-Chapter Master Thorcyra. In his entirety. A poor character with zero leadership skills, and a bad depiction of a Chapter Master overall. I find it hard to believe that this idiot could have risen to the Sergeant rank, let alone leading an entire Chapter. He learned nothing from the Fall of Sotha, regardless of whether or not he was there he should have seen the ravaged remnants of the Scythes and realised that they needed to do stuff differently, like Thracian did. And the worst part, for most of the novel he doesn't even lead. He lets Culmonios do it?! What the hell?! Marneus Calgar didn't let random Brother Donatos lead the Chapter during the Battle for Macragge, there was no conceivable or believable reason that a Chapter Master would let a random battle-brother lead his Chapter in a good situation, let alone the extinction event that the Scythes were facing.

-Everything about Brother Hadrios. He came out of nowhere, made no sense about anything, brought a nonsensical and pointless side-plot into the story, and had no real characterisation beyond being mysterious and willing to kill battle-brothers, if he was even a Scythe. This was the weakest aspect of the story because it was utterly meaningless, Hadrios comes in and the reader learns there is a mystery afoot, something happened at Sotha and it's connected to secrets in the Chapter. Ok, cool. What might have happened there, what hints can we be given?? Uh, well... nothing. Something happened at Sotha, and a random marine is the only one who knows. The reader doesn't get a hint, or even a clue as to what might have gone down, why on earth the gene-seed was connected to it, why Hadrios does anything that he does in the book. A mystery for the sake of a mystery with no real meat to it, supremely disappointing.

-The shortness of the book and the lack of short stories. Not only was SaGC half the size of a regular SMB book, which on it's own would have been a real shame, it was coupled by the fact that some time ago it was mentioned that SaGC would contain some of the Scythes short stories that LJ Goulding penned, like Helios, to add some more story to the book. That did not happen, and it just means that SaGC feels short and the events feel rushed. Never a good thing.


Can only really say this book was average, it had good parts and bad parts.


LotN


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## Scrad (Apr 4, 2014)

I looked forward to this novel and while it wasn't written horribly by any degree, it simply wasn't good. Learning curves and stepping stones. Definitely better than anything i could create, but more work was needed with the entire story feeling very rushed.





Lord of the Night said:


> What I Disliked:
> -Chapter Master Thorcyra. In his entirety. A poor character with zero leadership skills, and a bad depiction of a Chapter Master overall. I find it hard to believe that this idiot could have risen to the Sergeant rank, let alone leading an entire Chapter. He learned nothing from the Fall of Sotha, regardless of whether or not he was there he should have seen the ravaged remnants of the Scythes and realised that they needed to do stuff differently, like Thracian did. And the worst part, for most of the novel he doesn't even lead. He lets Culmonios do it?! What the hell?! Marneus Calgar didn't let random Brother Donatos lead the Chapter during the Battle for Macragge, there was no conceivable or believable reason that a Chapter Master would let a random battle-brother lead his Chapter in a good situation, let alone the extinction event that the Scythes were facing.


This was wildly confusing. I could understand if the Chapter Master was given a bit of depth to be anguished/not coping with the near-destruction of the chapter - any development to show he was on edge and fraying at the seams. But it was only explained in a few tidbits. If this is explained in future Scythes novels then all well and good, but its a standalone novel. Culmonios becoming base commander over the veteran sergeants (i know there weren't a lot of them, but a few, and a Captain) and the like around the place? I'm not a stickler by any means for this stuff, but this simply made no sense. It felt weird and ambiguous. The CM barely even registered knowing him prior to the defence of Miral.



Lord of the Night said:


> -Everything about Brother Hadrios. He came out of nowhere, made no sense about anything, brought a nonsensical and pointless side-plot into the story, and had no real characterisation beyond being mysterious and willing to kill battle-brothers, if he was even a Scythe. This was the weakest aspect of the story because it was utterly meaningless, Hadrios comes in and the reader learns there is a mystery afoot, something happened at Sotha and it's connected to secrets in the Chapter. Ok, cool. What might have happened there, what hints can we be given?? Uh, well... nothing. Something happened at Sotha, and a random marine is the only one who knows. The reader doesn't get a hint, or even a clue as to what might have gone down, why on earth the gene-seed was connected to it, why Hadrios does anything that he does in the book. A mystery for the sake of a mystery with no real meat to it, supremely disappointing.


Very Get Smart/Inspector Gadget bad guys being sneaky and mysterious and not a damn clue what was going on. Utterly pointless. This did not further the story, only hindered. More info needed.


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## Lord of the Night (Nov 18, 2009)

Scrad said:


> Very Get Smart/Inspector Gadget bad guys being sneaky and mysterious and not a damn clue what was going on. Utterly pointless. This did not further the story, only hindered. More info needed.


Exactly. There was no substance behind the mystery that Hadrios presented, just the writer's attempt to shake up the event and make it more interesting than it already was, which it didn't need to be. The Fall of Sotha doesn't need a mystery attached to it, it's already an awesome and tragic event that has enough weight to it that it could be told straight with no additions to it at all and it would still be compelling just to read such an epic and doomed defence against such an incredible nightmare that is a Tyranid invasion, which made little to no sense from an in-universe perspective as well as who the hell would be stupid enough to open the gates to a Tyranid invasion apart from Genestealers, the presence of whom does NOT constitute a mystery and has not been part of the lore on Sotha at any point.

Goulding can do some good stuff, and he's laid some good groundwork alongside Richard Williams, but I think the Scythes need somebody else to tell their story. Here's hoping that the Fall of Sotha gets its own telling one day. A better telling than Miral got.


LotN


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## Entarion (Oct 25, 2009)

I am confused here a bit because there was planned release for some kind of anthology named Scythes of the Emperor including short story of the same name + Slaughter + other stories. But that did not happen?

And now it seems even Lexicanum list is now outdated. It is quite hard to keep track of all those novels, anthologies etc in this series.


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