Garro: Oath of moment (Horus Heresy Audio) Spoilers!

[Bedlam]

I've just finished listening to this CD. As always I enjoy the Games Workshop audio offerings, it’s a bit of a guilty pleasure to me, none of them are exactly great drama but spoken descriptions of combat always bring out the 13 year old fan boy in me. That said I'd think this is probably the weakest of the Horus Heresy audios so far, the action is there but it seems a bit aimless and inconsequential to me.

The general plot is that Nathaniel Garro is recruited by Malcador the Sigillite to travel to Calth where the Ultramarines and the Word bearers are fighting it out. There he locates a specific group of Ultramarines and fights alongside them observing them. One of the group is an ex-librarian now bound not to use his powers he feels that this restriction is preventing him saving his brothers but who will not break the emperor’s law. In the end the psyker uses his powers to allow the surviving Ultramarines to escape but is ostracised by his brothers and leaves with Garro.

One of two interesting fluff bits: -
The Word bearers bombard the planet and in some way cause the atmosphere to become depleted. It’s made to sound almost like the entire planet was inside dome or something but there’s no sign that the place was artificial and mention is made of native lifeforms. So either some sort of super weapon was used or the writer doesn't have a good grip of science.

The I symbol used by the Inquisition seems to be the personal sigil of Malcador suggesting the organisation started as a group of his servants (I don’t know if this has been mentioned before).

Garro (formally of the Death guard) has been outfitted in grey armour with no legion insignia, he’s sent out by Malcador to recruit marines from 'both the loyalist and traitor' legions. To me this seems to be the formation of the Grey Knights, the first recruit is a Psyker but there's no comment if the other members will be. Garro fights what seem to be Demons without much difficulty so he may have been equipped with specific anti demon kit already.

Malcador is apparently the second most powerful pskyer alive the most powerful is of course the Emperor.

I don't know if it was a conscious decision but Malcador was made to sound almost exactly like the Emperor from Star Wars so that I'm always going to visualise Ian MacDiarmid when I read anything about him in the future.

[IvanTih]

There are rumours that James Swallows only finished elementary school.

[Juubi Karakuchi]

I was personally under the impression that Garro was the founder of the Death Watch, they being ordinary Astartes rather than whatever it is the Grey Knights are.

Also, I found it interesting how crazy the Word Bearers were, in light of 'The First Heretic.' There, it is revealed that Lorgar didn't like to fight, and as such tended to spend his time thoroughly converting planets to Emperor-worship instead of conquering new ones, meaning his Legion didn't do much fighting. Yet in 'Oath of Moment,' the Word Bearers are bloodthirsty psychotics who fire their guns into already dead enemies for the fun of it.

[Manus Celer Dei]

That Chaos-machine they fought is peculiar; it sounds pretty much like a Defiler but as far as I know they were specifically comissioned by Abbadon for one of the Black Crusades so it's a bit weird one would turn up during the Heresy.

Garro (formally of the Death guard) has been outfitted in grey armour with no legion insignia, he’s sent out by Malcador to recruit marines from 'both the loyalist and traitor' legions. To me this seems to be the formation of the Grey Knights, the first recruit is a Psyker but there's no comment if the other members will be. Garro fights what seem to be Demons without much difficulty so he may have been equipped with specific anti demon kit already.

The end of The Flight of the Eisenstein seemed to imply to me that Garro would be part of the formation of the Inquistion, given that that Sister of Silence was there (and the Sisters end up staffing the Inquisition's Black Ships) and Malcador says something about needing inquisitive people. Oath of Moment definitely makes it seem like he's specifically going to be helping form the Grey Knights though.

Malcador is apparently the second most powerful pskyer alive the most powerful is of course the Emperor.

Which goes to show how much more powerful the Emperor is; Malcador was powerful enough to be able to take his place on the Throne while the Emperor confronted Horus, but while the Emperor was able to withstand it Malcador was basically nothing but a husk by the time he came back.

I don't know if it was a conscious decision but Malcador was made to sound almost exactly like the Emperor from Star Wars so that I'm always going to visualise Ian MacDiarmid when I read anything about him in the future.

It's really distracting, I don't remember him being voiced like that in The Lightning Tower.

I was personally under the impression that Garro was the founder of the Death Watch, they being ordinary Astartes rather than whatever it is the Grey Knights are.

That's true, but it'd be a bit weird to suddenly start recruiting guys for the anti-alien squad in the middle of the Horus Heresy.

There are rumours that James Swallows only finished elementary school.

Who gives a shit?

[IvanTih]

Who gives a shit?

No one.

[Connor MacLeod]

Having finished Horus Heresy, collected visions, thought I'd just comment...

One of two interesting fluff bits: -
The Word bearers bombard the planet and in some way cause the atmosphere to become depleted. It’s made to sound almost like the entire planet was inside dome or something but there’s no sign that the place was artificial and mention is made of native lifeforms. So either some sort of super weapon was used or the writer doesn't have a good grip of science.

Lots of worlds during the DAoT and events preceding could allow for that possibility (The Old ones or Necrons, or whatever.) Although it can also depend on how the weapon is described. THe virus bombing of Isstvaan III was weird to to me for number of reasons (the possibility of large amounts of energy mysteriously disappearing). Then again I remember the Collected visions bit having the Word Bearers doing alot of odd ways of destruction (Geo nulcear whatsits and fucking around with the star and suchnot) so this may not be a surprise.

Without having heard/seen the actual description its hard to really judge waht it may or may not be.

Garro (formally of the Death guard) has been outfitted in grey armour with no legion insignia, he’s sent out by Malcador to recruit marines from 'both the loyalist and traitor' legions. To me this seems to be the formation of the Grey Knights, the first recruit is a Psyker but there's no comment if the other members will be. Garro fights what seem to be Demons without much difficulty so he may have been equipped with specific anti demon kit already.

Collected Visions has a bit just before The Emperor goes to battle Horus, and he brings a group of 12 men before the Emperor, including a fair bit of Space Marines including Garro. All IIRC were mentioned to be psychically gifted. This may be what that is implying.

Malcador is apparently the second most powerful pskyer alive the most powerful is of course the Emperor.

Dunno. Magnus is psychic, and he was intended to take the Emperor's place in the AStronomican (without dying I think) so he probably is more powerful than Malcador. That would mean Malcador is third most powerful, and perhaps the most powerful human psyker (the GEoM and Primarchs don't really qualify as human.. human based perhaps.)

[Bob the Gunslinger]

Keep in mind that during the time period of the audio drama, Magnus is assumed to be dead, or is even a daemon primarch by now.

[Imperial Overlord]

Also, I found it interesting how crazy the Word Bearers were, in light of 'The First Heretic.' There, it is revealed that Lorgar didn't like to fight, and as such tended to spend his time thoroughly converting planets to Emperor-worship instead of conquering new ones, meaning his Legion didn't do much fighting. Yet in 'Oath of Moment,' the Word Bearers are bloodthirsty psychotics who fire their guns into already dead enemies for the fun of it.

Remember that the Word Bearers become much more ferocious after they are chastized. The First Heretic doesn't dwell too much on it, but they go on a conquest rampage and vent their fury on the worlds they attack, destroying many of them. This shows up not just in The First Heretic, but Thousand Sons, and in some of the short stories.