YMMV / When In Doubt, Blame the Eldar

• Adorkable: Larrissa. Her first reaction to meeting Sekhareth is to offer him tea, then to freak out because she just offered tea to a Necron.
• Arc Fatigue: Several readers have admitted that they really wish that Black would find something that lets him leave the 40k universe, because he's spent almost all of the story in it. To elaborate, he's spent 35 chapters in the 40k universe. For reference, Battleship Fusou spent around 50 in the Halo universe. However, Black's chapters are MUCH longer than Fusou's, so he it feels like he's been in the 40k universe for longer.
• Broken Base: Readers keep getting into arguments over whether or not Black is wrong when he tries applying a 21st century set of morals to the 40k universe.
• Fanon: It's often assumed that the part of the Emperor that Thomas represents is rationality.
• Growing the Beard: While all of the chapters before it were of good quality, the events of Chapter 29 really show off the author's writing skills and feature both an epic battle AND an epic verbal smackdown by Black toward the Governor of the Kaurava system. It's telling that some of the posters have noted that they feel the that integrating The Shape of the Nightmare to Come into this story may be difficult, but that Blackhole1 is certainly capable of it.
• Heartwarming Moments:
  • In Chapter 17, the end of the meeting between Orkanis and Sekhareth. For reference, Orkanis is an Eldar Wraithseer from the War in Heaven and Sekhareth is the Necron Lord who took his still-living(?) wraithbone body as a trophy. Both have more reason than any other being in the entire galaxy to hate each other. And yet... after sharing a few harsh words with each other and bemoaning the fates of their respective species... they make peace with one another. AN ELDAR AND A NECRON MADE PEACE WITH EACH OTHER!
  • It gets better: among Black's companions, Sekhareth and Orkanis are the ones who get along the most, which is practically every time they are seen together. In spite of all reason, two beings who should have the most reasons to hate each other are the closest of friends.
• Jerkass Woobie:
  • Taldeer: As much of a smug space elf as she is, you can't help but feel sorry for her when she is possessed by a daemon during the Scream.
  • Selena Agna: While it is still possible to hate her in Chapter 29, because of the crap the Sisters pulled earlier in the story, she becomes pitiable in her interlude, where we see how broken she is, compounded by the events of the chapter, where she loses all of her Sororitas to the Star Father.
• Moral Event Horizon: In Chapter 23, the priests assigned with the Sisters of Battle convert several settlements into mobs that burn down multiple villages and kill several people in extremely brutal and graphic ways. Frustratingly for Black, he is unable to just kill them because that would escalate things with the Ecclesiarchy (and by extension, the Imperium).
• Too Bleak, Stopped Caring: At times. While Black does try to make the universe better, the universe seems to try to make all of these efforts pointless. Black is actually aware of this, which is why his main goal is to get out of the 40k universe ASAP.
• The Woobie:
  • Thomas. The boy loses his parents to a crazed mob, ends up rejected by his actual father (the God Emperor of Mankind), and eventually loses his second father figure, Ozman, due to the Scream. Also, according to Word of God, his years on Kaurava weren't kind to him either, as Thomas had to constantly be on guard in regards to hiding his differences, while suffering from crippling anxiety over being discovered and condemned as a mutant.
  • Black himself straddles the line between this and Butt-Monkey: while it IS amusing to watch his suffering, at times, he ends up genuinely pitiable.

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