Board Thread:Warhammer 40k General Discussion/@comment-25618639-20150118044502/@comment-25177957-20150121091522

The Lord of Silence wrote: About Abaddon getting points for being able to unite so many chaos forces. Yes I'll admit that that's a pretty amazing feat, but it close to nothing to do with being a general. Hitler was a pretty good dam speaker too, but he wasn't best leader of military ever now was he? D-day was partially a success due to Hitler's lack of leadership skills in military terms. Just because Abaddon can get lots of people together does not make him a good general. He has yet to make any real progress against the Imperium at all.

Although, speaking in general most of the generals in 40k are not really the greatest tacticians of all time. I mean most necron generals win because they're necrons, not from any particularly brilliant feet of command. Most Imperial guard leaders have little grand scale command ability either besides meat grinder tactics. Not even the Tau are that great, although I'd say they probably are the best in general.

Personally I think if I was leading Abaddon's armies I would have taken Terra by now but whatever. Like I said @Lord of Silence, you cannot exactly compare real-world generals to 40k generals by any means. Being a general of World War 2 was one thing, but being a general leading a galactic campaign is entierly another, and as someone else had pointed out, Abaddon has lesser generals which are left to carry out his orders, and some traitor legions are still carrying out the Long War on their own.

Saying that you would have taken Terra by now as Abaddon is something I find rather laughable, I'm not sure how your skills are in tabletop games (the story behind the 13th Black Crusae was determined by a major tournament held by GW over the course of a few months by the players) so if the professional Chaos players have only gotten as far as they have with the traitor armies, then I doubt the average player could do much better. Now if you are saying that in a realistic situation, it's even more hilarious, since Abaddon has to deal with everything the average 40k general must deal with (logistics, casualties, tactics, morale, and intelligence) but since Abaddon is a warmaster he must also command, in addition to the ground armies and chaos cults on planets, the massed fleets of Chaos, and commanding a fleet I imagine would be no easy task at all. Commanding a fleet would be akin to being governer of a planet with ships being as towns, cities, and villages. Abaddon's armies are also clashing with various xenos such as the Eldar and Orks, making his task all the more difficult. It's a miracle of the Dark Gods that he managed to unite so much of the Forces of Chaos in the first place.

Huron Blackheart is definently a good Chaos general, but could he exactly keep the traitor legions and daemon hordes under his belt for long? The Traitor Legions' Daemon Primarchs barely like Abaddon as it is, and although he is stronger than them by now, some of them are likely planning a coup on him. Huron Blackheart wouldn't be able to fight the Imperium if he took control of the Traitor Legions since the infighting would be enourmous, most of the Daemon Primarchs would sneer at a recent convert to Chaos who wasen't even distantly around during the time of the Horus Heresy commanding elements of the Traitor Legions and the Black Legion. It'd be best for Huron to continue building his forces in the Maelstorm and conquer the surrounding area until he is powerful enough to challenge Terra, because destroying the Anathema personally would insure his favor with the Chaos Gods.