[Koval]

Why is it that every book that comes out of Black Library has to be weighed and measured against some invisible tome of ancient knowledge possessed only by people who have been in the hobby for X amount of years? Isn't that a bit stifling? Choking the creativity so often pushed as the main drive on this very forum?

Probably because there's a difference between something novel and interesting, and something that just goes a bit too far. Abnett already plays free and easy with both canon and common sense, and has done since at least Xenos, so people like Marco and myself are naturally predisposed to be skeptical about his work.

[Dullmohawk]

So I see.

[MarcoSkoll]

Isn't that a bit stifling? Choking the creativity so often pushed as the main drive on this very forum?

That's a bit like standing in an aircraft hangar and complaining there's not enough room to swing a cat.

The setting is vast, and the number of things that can legitimately exist within it are innumerable. There's no need at all to break the "rules" of the universe to make something original or interesting.