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The Horus Heresy #Audio Drama
Dark Compliance
For more than two hundred years, the armies of the Emperor of Mankind fought to reconquer the galaxy – led by the superhuman primarchs, the Space Marine Legions brought countless worlds back under the rule of ancient Terra. Now Horus, once honoured Warmaster and favoured son of the Emperor, has been corrupted by the whispered promises of Chaos. At his command the Imperium is torn apart by a terrible and bloody civil war, the likes of which the galaxy has never seen... As Horus’s rebellion gains momentum, more and more worlds flock to his banner. For some, it is through fear of annihilation; for others, it is out of malicious desire. Any that consider resistance are given one chance to swear fealty. To do anything other is to court disaster and worse. Accazzar-Beta is one such defier, but in bringing this heavily-fortified Mechanicum world to heel, just how far is the Warmaster willing to go and what truly is the meaning of a dark compliance? As two fleets engage across the gulf of the void, Accazzar-Beta will find out.
1 pages, Audiobook
First published July 1, 2017
3 people are currently reading
77 people want to read
About the author
John French
154 books298 followersJohn French is a writer and freelance game designer from Nottingham, England. His novels include the Ahriman series from Black Library, and The Lord of Nightmares trilogy for Fantasy Flight. The rest of his work can be seen scattered through a number of other books, including the New York Times bestselling anthology Age of Darkness. When he is not thinking of ways that dark and corrupting beings could destroy reality and space, John enjoys talking about why it would be a good idea... that and drinking good wine.
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
May 25, 2019
Read prose version in the Heralds of the Siege anthology
A nice horrifying tale about the doom waiting who dares to deny the Warmaster.
It gives a great insight about how the Sons of Horus' way of fighting is now close to the one of their future incarnation, the Black Legion.
A nice horrifying tale about the doom waiting who dares to deny the Warmaster.
It gives a great insight about how the Sons of Horus' way of fighting is now close to the one of their future incarnation, the Black Legion.
May 16, 2024
May 2024 Re-Read using the Horus Heresy Omnibus Project Reading Order Omnibus XX Shadows of the Warmaster IV The Dead and the Dying (https://www.heresyomnibus.com/omnibus...) as part of my Oath of Moment to complete the Horus Heresy series and extras.
Coming in hot with my hardest 180 and correcting my past self's awful takes since thinking James Swallow wasn't a good author and tying myself in a pretzel thinking Honour to the Dead was all oorah Marvel and bad, actually, is my second experience of Dark Compliance and it jumping from a wild 2/5 to full marks.
I said this gave Phantom Menace trade negotiations...I couldn't be more wrong and as ever I'm leaving the old review up because I don't think we should hide our shame.
Horus really does look like a Behlolder on the cover art though.
Horus sends an emmissary to a world that he knows isn't going to joins him so he can show them what he did to the last world to mess with them before he messes them up.
On the face of it, that's a very simple and seemingly pointless premise, right? But this is John French and he's an evil wizard!
This audio drama is an incredibly orchestrated dark mirror of the trickier Compliances of the Great Crusade. In fact, it's essentially one for one with what a difficult Compliance looks like, complete with Night Lords Terrifiers and absolute destruction with a scorched earth policy, as the Night Lords and World Eaters were originally used for. The politics and negotiations are equally theatrics and for the sole purpose of making those with the temerity to refuse the proffered hand of subjugation suffer and serve as a lesson for the next civilisation willing to defend its way of life. The only real difference is that Horus is using the fear and suffering in a more material way to feed his Dark Patrons and grow his power, while the Emperor's way was equally awful, simply more metaphorical in its use of suffering.
The writing is incredible from the characterisations, which include some of the best Horus moments in a while, to the planting of the dark seed and the stop-motion Daemonic horrors unleashed that are so vivid and creepy that I, a person with hypoaphantasia, had nightmare images projected into my head.
Look, I know I am a huge John French fangirl and this is absolutely not essential reading for the main plot, but it is all flavour and immaculately horrifying vibes and warped logic, and I love it.
There's just something about this story in particular that I feel really captures some of the old and really, really weird nightmare fuel Chaos imagery and combined it with incredible prose and a wonderfully realised monster in Horus as he spouts his banal evil, even as it is just the negative of the Imperium.
Through the Horus Heresy Omnibus Project and my own additions, I have currently read 43 Horus Heresy novels (inc. 1 repeat and 5 anthologies), 24 novellas (inc. 2 repeats), 132 short stories/ audio dramas (inc. 10+ repeats), as well as the Macragge's Honour graphic novel, all 17 Primarchs novels, 4 Primarchs short stories/ audio dramas, 3 Characters novels, and 2 Warhammer 40K further reading novels and 1 short story...this run, as well as writing 1 short story myself.
I couldn't be more appreciative of the phenomenal work of the Horus Heresy Omnibus Project, which has made this ridiculous endeavour all the better and has inspired me to create and collate a collection of Horus Heresy and Warhammer 40,000 documents and checklists (http://tiny.cc/im00yz). There are now too many items to list here, but there is a contents and explainer document here (http://tiny.cc/nj00yz).
***
Initial Review: 2/5
My brain is absolute mush today and could have impacted my enjoyment.
My two favourite things about this audio drama is that Horus sounds like Ian McShane and I can't stop thinking about him saying all Al's lines from Deadwood. Imagine Horus just bellowing, 'cocksucker!' and the fact that in the cover art he looks like a beholder. Lupercal serving Greyhawk (1975) realness: https://media.wizards.com/2014/images...
Horus' new emissary is sent off to secure a compliance, but the Planetary Governor is resistant, so he tell him the story of the time the Sons of Horus went hogwild on a while system because a governor said no with the might of the Legion and the Warp. While the story is used to persuade Planetary Governors, the events within were a teaching moment for the emissary.
Again, it might be the no brain thing, but I kinda found this audio drama rather dry and boring. I might even say tedious. I think it's the length of an hour that makes it drag. If it was one of the 25-30 minutes ones, you'd be forced to trim the fat and make it more punchy or if it was a larger story, novella, etc. there would be space for stakes, tension, characters with their own internal lives and plot lines. Whereas, this is essentially just one long description of the pressing the 'absolutely fuck all of their shit up' button without anything else really going on.
Like, I'm interested in all the weird and wacky procedures, politics, and machinations, from the Administrstum to the Mournival, but there has to be more of a hook and story. The story of this is Horus obliterated a system and has all sorts of Chaos elements he can now draw on, including infernal ordinance and Daemons. While obviously this is written more competently, it's giving a little Phantom Menace Trade Federation in terms of being boring due to the way it's handled, the context of the galaxy and story, and not being meaningfully related to anything important, beyond rather surface level things. Speaking of completely unfair comparisons that occurr in my brain and I'm very sorry if they make people angry, the destruction of the system is not not akin to the Hosnian Prime System getting the Starkiller base treatment.
It's John French, so the prose and everything is great. This just wasn't for me and I'm in the least best frame of mind to have enjoyed it.
I love me some action and colossal devastation in this fictional universe, but I need it to mean a little more than look how powerful we are and we got chaos stuff now baybee. Not a lot, but something.
Coming in hot with my hardest 180 and correcting my past self's awful takes since thinking James Swallow wasn't a good author and tying myself in a pretzel thinking Honour to the Dead was all oorah Marvel and bad, actually, is my second experience of Dark Compliance and it jumping from a wild 2/5 to full marks.
I said this gave Phantom Menace trade negotiations...I couldn't be more wrong and as ever I'm leaving the old review up because I don't think we should hide our shame.
Horus really does look like a Behlolder on the cover art though.
Horus sends an emmissary to a world that he knows isn't going to joins him so he can show them what he did to the last world to mess with them before he messes them up.
On the face of it, that's a very simple and seemingly pointless premise, right? But this is John French and he's an evil wizard!
This audio drama is an incredibly orchestrated dark mirror of the trickier Compliances of the Great Crusade. In fact, it's essentially one for one with what a difficult Compliance looks like, complete with Night Lords Terrifiers and absolute destruction with a scorched earth policy, as the Night Lords and World Eaters were originally used for. The politics and negotiations are equally theatrics and for the sole purpose of making those with the temerity to refuse the proffered hand of subjugation suffer and serve as a lesson for the next civilisation willing to defend its way of life. The only real difference is that Horus is using the fear and suffering in a more material way to feed his Dark Patrons and grow his power, while the Emperor's way was equally awful, simply more metaphorical in its use of suffering.
The writing is incredible from the characterisations, which include some of the best Horus moments in a while, to the planting of the dark seed and the stop-motion Daemonic horrors unleashed that are so vivid and creepy that I, a person with hypoaphantasia, had nightmare images projected into my head.
Look, I know I am a huge John French fangirl and this is absolutely not essential reading for the main plot, but it is all flavour and immaculately horrifying vibes and warped logic, and I love it.
There's just something about this story in particular that I feel really captures some of the old and really, really weird nightmare fuel Chaos imagery and combined it with incredible prose and a wonderfully realised monster in Horus as he spouts his banal evil, even as it is just the negative of the Imperium.
Through the Horus Heresy Omnibus Project and my own additions, I have currently read 43 Horus Heresy novels (inc. 1 repeat and 5 anthologies), 24 novellas (inc. 2 repeats), 132 short stories/ audio dramas (inc. 10+ repeats), as well as the Macragge's Honour graphic novel, all 17 Primarchs novels, 4 Primarchs short stories/ audio dramas, 3 Characters novels, and 2 Warhammer 40K further reading novels and 1 short story...this run, as well as writing 1 short story myself.
I couldn't be more appreciative of the phenomenal work of the Horus Heresy Omnibus Project, which has made this ridiculous endeavour all the better and has inspired me to create and collate a collection of Horus Heresy and Warhammer 40,000 documents and checklists (http://tiny.cc/im00yz). There are now too many items to list here, but there is a contents and explainer document here (http://tiny.cc/nj00yz).
***
Initial Review: 2/5
My brain is absolute mush today and could have impacted my enjoyment.
My two favourite things about this audio drama is that Horus sounds like Ian McShane and I can't stop thinking about him saying all Al's lines from Deadwood. Imagine Horus just bellowing, 'cocksucker!' and the fact that in the cover art he looks like a beholder. Lupercal serving Greyhawk (1975) realness: https://media.wizards.com/2014/images...
Horus' new emissary is sent off to secure a compliance, but the Planetary Governor is resistant, so he tell him the story of the time the Sons of Horus went hogwild on a while system because a governor said no with the might of the Legion and the Warp. While the story is used to persuade Planetary Governors, the events within were a teaching moment for the emissary.
Again, it might be the no brain thing, but I kinda found this audio drama rather dry and boring. I might even say tedious. I think it's the length of an hour that makes it drag. If it was one of the 25-30 minutes ones, you'd be forced to trim the fat and make it more punchy or if it was a larger story, novella, etc. there would be space for stakes, tension, characters with their own internal lives and plot lines. Whereas, this is essentially just one long description of the pressing the 'absolutely fuck all of their shit up' button without anything else really going on.
Like, I'm interested in all the weird and wacky procedures, politics, and machinations, from the Administrstum to the Mournival, but there has to be more of a hook and story. The story of this is Horus obliterated a system and has all sorts of Chaos elements he can now draw on, including infernal ordinance and Daemons. While obviously this is written more competently, it's giving a little Phantom Menace Trade Federation in terms of being boring due to the way it's handled, the context of the galaxy and story, and not being meaningfully related to anything important, beyond rather surface level things. Speaking of completely unfair comparisons that occurr in my brain and I'm very sorry if they make people angry, the destruction of the system is not not akin to the Hosnian Prime System getting the Starkiller base treatment.
It's John French, so the prose and everything is great. This just wasn't for me and I'm in the least best frame of mind to have enjoyed it.
I love me some action and colossal devastation in this fictional universe, but I need it to mean a little more than look how powerful we are and we got chaos stuff now baybee. Not a lot, but something.
January 29, 2022
Very simple story. Horus uses the power of Chaos to make an example of a defiant forgeworld, and the story of their demise is used to demand compliance from another. The meat of the book is Horus smugly walking one of his underlings through each of his tactical decisions in real-time as the battle unfolds. It's a bit bland, but it's short and also fairly characteristic of Horus to do this in my opinion, so I can forgive it.
July 8, 2017
A simple but effective portmanteau, this sees the ruler of one planetary system – defiant in the face of Horus’ demands – regaled with the horrifying tale of another system’s demise…over a single day. A statement of Horus’ intent as much as his military power, the story of Accazzar-Beta’s destruction, as told by Sons of Horus emissary Argonis, demonstrates the fate awaiting those who defy the Warmaster.
Does this story move the timeline of the Heresy forward, or highlight something absolutely essential in the grand scheme of things? No, not at all. Is that question, of how Horus achieves compliance, actually a really interesting – and, yes, important – one when you look at the Heresy as a whole? Absolutely.
Read the full review at http://www.trackofwords.com/2017/07/0...
Does this story move the timeline of the Heresy forward, or highlight something absolutely essential in the grand scheme of things? No, not at all. Is that question, of how Horus achieves compliance, actually a really interesting – and, yes, important – one when you look at the Heresy as a whole? Absolutely.
Read the full review at http://www.trackofwords.com/2017/07/0...
March 8, 2021
A properly produced audio drama with multiple actors and sound effects. A short story to be read after you have gone through the first three Horus Heresy novels, I guess. Although the general story is probably known by everybody who has heard of Warhammer 40k.
This one describes how Horus uses conventional military strategy along with some Chaos "magic". The story is kind of one track mind, but the feeling of the whole production made it a nice listen.
Part of the Horus Heresy Humblebundle a while back https://www.humblebundle.com/books/ho...
This one describes how Horus uses conventional military strategy along with some Chaos "magic". The story is kind of one track mind, but the feeling of the whole production made it a nice listen.
Part of the Horus Heresy Humblebundle a while back https://www.humblebundle.com/books/ho...
February 24, 2018
good audio novel, after a while all these short stories sound the same.
February 26, 2018
Nice to see Doombreed finally show up.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 13, 2019
If you don't pledge allegiance to Horus, well, this drama goes through it.
March 5, 2020
The audio drama was pretty cool, but I do believe the ending was a little lacking. Otherwise pretty great!
May 15, 2020
It has Horus and Mechanicus - win-win
August 4, 2025
I really enjoyed this one, something fun about the dark and unsettling nature of Horus as he has fully turned to the power of Chaos to fuel his ambitions. The world's that refuse compliance being made an example of had great nightmarish imagery.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews