Hello, gentlemen. We all know that 40k lore is a complex subject and a lot of people seem to have a lot of opinions that don't have a lot to do with actual background but are spread nonetheless.
So I've decided to list some of those in my blog along with some actual fluff to clear thing up.
Let me know what you think - maybe I'm wrong somewhere, or something need to be added.

PART 1


Myth #1: In 40k there's literally nothing but war - refutation
Myth #2: In the grim darkness of the far future there is no logic - refutation
Myth #3: The 40k wargame accurately represents the fluff of the universe - refutation
Myth #4: Human worlds divided during the Age of Strife only started to be unified by the Emperor after the beginning of the Great Crusade - refutation
Myth #5: During the Horus Heresy each Astartes Legion chose its side as half of them stayed loyal while the other half sided with Horus - refutation
Myth #6: After the last duel with Horus and ascension to a Golden Throne, the Emperor never contacted the outside world - refutation
Myth #7: Warhammer 40000 timeline ends at 999.M41 - refutation
Myth #8: 40k is set in our Milky Way galaxy - refutation
Myth #9: Space battles are fought at the distances of kilometers - refutation
Myth #10: All 40k spaceships are extremely big - refutation
Myth #11: All Space Hulks are inhabited by Genestealers - refutation
Myth #12: Warp-travel is the same as hyperdrive - refutation
Myth #13: Machine Spirit is the same as AI/Machine Spirit doesn't exist - refutation
Myth #14: All technology in the Imperium is based on STC and has its roots in the Dark Age of Technology - refutation
Myth #15: Lasgun is an ineffective weapon, unable to inflict real damage - refutation
Myth #16: Boltguns use caseless ammunition - refutation
Myth #17: Hive-cities only exist on Hive Worlds - refutation
Myth #18: Abhuman means Ogryn or Ratling - refutation
Myth #19: Squat race was cut from the fluff - refutation
Myth #20: Mutant equals Chaos - refutation
Myth #21: Humanity is divided to Imperials and followers of Chaos - refutation
Myth #22: Canon of Warhammer 40000 universe is set in stone - refutation

PART 2


Myth #23: Imperium is a united and solid human empire - refutation
Myth #24: Imperium controls most of the galaxy - refutation
Myth #25: Adeptus Terra are present on each and every one of the imperial worlds, and each totally controls a certain aspect of life in the Imperium - refutation
Myth #26: Imperium doesn't colonise new worlds, just loses old ones - refutation
Myth #27: Mechanicus are just an Adeptus and forge worlds are just heavily industrialised imperial planets - refutation
Myth #28: Adeptus Mechanicus do not understand the tech they produce and can only remake the technology of old - refutation
Myth #29: All tech in Imperium is produced on forge worlds and is attended to by Mechanicus - refutation
Myth #30: Collegia Titanica only includes Titans - refutation
Myth #31: Imperial Guard is the most numerous, but the most ill-trained and equipped military organisation in the Imperium - refutation
Myth #32: Astartes Chapters are required to follow the tenets of Codex Astartes - refutation
Myth #33: Astartes Chapters wage war like a regular army does - refutation
Myth #34: Astartes worship the Emperor like a god - refutation
Myth #35: Imperial Creed is a strict religion, and smallest deviations from it's teachings are routinely branded as heresy - refutation
Myth #36: All Adepta Sorroritas are Sisters of Battle - refutation
Myth #37: Inquisition is a united organisation - refutation
Myth #38: Inquisition is divided into three Ordoses - refutation
Myth #39: Exterminatus can only be declared by Inquisition - refutation
Myth #40: Adeptus Arbites is the primary police of the Imperium - refutation
Myth #41: All people in the Imperium live in a horrifying tyranny - refutation
Myth #42: 40k-era humans beleve in the ideals of 21st century - refutation
Myth #43: Everybody in the Imperium speaks the same language known as Low Gothic - refutation
Myth #44: Imperial Adeptus X has more authority then the Adeptus Y - refutation
Myth #45: There were never any traitors among Adeptus X - refutation
Myth #46: Imperium never holds negotiations with xenos races - refutation

UPD So the third part is finished, check it out:

PART 3


Myth #48: Orks are a race - refutation
Myth #49: Orkoids are intellectually and/or technologically inferior to other races - refutation
Myth #50: All ork tech and weapons are constructed in mekboys' workshops - refutation
Myth #51: Ork tech only works because orks believe it should - refutation
Myth #52: All orks prefer red colour to any other - refutation
Myth #53: Orks don't use navigation when making Warp-jumps - refutation
Myth #54: Orks are immune to the influence of Chaos and genestealer cults - refutation
Myth #55: Only tactic Tyranids use is zerg rush - refutation
Myth #56: Kroot race is fully integrated into Tau Empire - refutation
Myth #57: Tau is one of the major races - refutation
Myth #58: Philosophy of Greater Good is analogous to communism - refutation
Myth #59: All Tau are pheromone-controlled by Ethereals - refutation
Myth #60: Many Aspects and other eldar war formations only consist of members of a single sex - refutation
Myth #61: The only reason Imperium can't have peace with tau and eldar it it's own unjustified xenophobia - refutation
Myth #62: Dark eldar are a twisted version of Craftworlders - refutation
Myth #63: Commoragh is a single city in a specific location in the Webway - refutation
Myth #64: All Dark Gods' efforts are devoted to corrupting and destroying mortals - refutation
Myth #65: Chaos equals evil - refutation
Myth #66: Slaanesh is just a god of lust - refutation
Myth #67: Nurgle is just a god of diseases - refutation
Myth #68: All Khorne worshipers prefer close combat - refutation
Myth #69: All Tzeentch worshipers are sorcerers - refutation
Myth #70: First instance of Zombie Plague happened in Time of Ending due to Typhus efforts - refutation
Myth #71: All Chaos Space Marines are ten thousand years old - refutation
Myth #72: Chaos Astartes Legions still exist unchanged in M41 - refutation
Myth #73: Chaos Astartes dominate the Eye of Terror - refutation
Myth #74: All Chaos forces are based in Warp-anomalies - refutation
Myth #75: Possessed, Daemon Princes and Obliterators are all former Chaos Space Marines - refutation

I can't say I follow every WH40K forum, but I don't think I've ever heard any of those things as myths. Like who really thinks Myth 32 is real? And Myth 11, I've never thought that each and every single Space Hulk contains genestealers.

I'm writing this as I read your list...

Myth #4 is largely correct. The Forge Worlds seeded by the Mechanicus WERE lost during the Age of Strife. The Mechanicus fleets were sent out whenever pockets opened up during the Warp Storm...but contact was inevitably lost when the Warp Storms reemerged.

The Great Crusade reestablished contact with many lost Forge Worlds. M'Pandex would be an example.

Myth #10 isn't wrong...since not all ships are large. But you have to keep in mind that large is relative. Even a fury fighter is some 70 meters long.

The Rogue Trader Core Rulebook states the Vagabond-class merchant trader is a "common....small, multi-purpose merchant vessel". It's a modest 2000 meters with a crew of 18,000.

The smallest of ships used listed in the book, used by "corsairs and pirates", are at least 1.5 kilometers long with a crew of 22,000.

Are all ships gigantic monstrosities? Of course not, as you have said.

But even WH40k frigates are one and a half times the length of a Star Destroyer.

Myth #13...I haven't seen direct evidence that what the Mechanicus understand as a Machine Spirit is in fact somehow some latent psychic force.

We know that with the aid of a psyker some things can be drawn out of an item...but that's very much different than the Machine Spirit being psychic in nature. Do you have some sources for this?

Myth #22

I'm not sure if there's a real canon policy. I shudder if I think some of Goto's stuff was ever considered canon.

Likewise, somethings happen in books and most of us shrug our shoulders and pretend it didn't happen. (Like a lot of McNeil's stuff.)

We don't have a real canon system. Just stuff we find that gets less contradicted than others.

On a side note, (at least before its purchase by Disney) there was an easy canon distinction for Star Wars: The movies (which are canon) and everything else (EU books, comics, games, ect. weren't) Lucas has said at least twice, very clearly, that the EU had nothing to do with "his" universe. It was a, to use his own word, parallel universe to his own canon-movie Universe.

Myth #26

Where did you get the information the Imperium conquers more worlds more than it colonizes? I don't have proof either way, but I'd like to see the source that states it one way or another.

Most of the other stuff seemed reasonable enough. Though I'm surprised some of these "myths" are believed at all...

But God knows how many people have died looking for Nessy and Big Foot, so who knows?

Well people are.....they.......fuck it people are retarded and belive any damn near brain dead conspiracy theory someone craps out. i.e. recently learned of a myth that medieval weapons were all blunt.

Talking of which what has happened to *voice drops to a whisper* L... *changes mind and mouths out the letters* L... U...X...



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Seems a pretty pointless list. Anyone with more than a passing knowledge of the 40k background would not think of a lot of those things to be true.

Yeah, I wound say the vast majority of that list aren't myths that anyone believes, and the ones that are, are misconceptions more than myths or just things you wouldn't know if you only had a passing interest, such as the Inquisition only having three branches.

cool stuff. altough i agree that many of those "myths" are just easily removed from a journey trough a wiki and not so widespread

NOOOOoooooo! You have damned us all! You have called the mad goddess woa unto the forums! Nier llahs ssendam fo sraey dnasouht a!

These refutations are mainly written for people who are not too familiar with the lore, so veterans are unlikely to find something new, really.
But I've heard most of those assumed to be true, so I felt that there is a target audience for this. Oh well.

2 hailene

Myth #4 is largely correct. The Forge Worlds seeded by the Mechanicus WERE lost during the Age of Strife. The Mechanicus fleets were sent out whenever pockets opened up during the Warp Storm...but contact was inevitably lost when the Warp Storms reemerged.
Year, I should probably rephrase this one to make it more clear.

Myth #10 isn't wrong...since not all ships are large.
The Rogue Trader Core Rulebook states the Vagabond-class merchant trader is a "common....small, multi-purpose merchant vessel". It's a modest 2000 meters with a crew of 18,000.
Small for a warp-capable craft, sure. It's no surprise the book doesn't describe small inter-system craft since there are no great adventures to be had around a single star.
But the same book lists a lot of smaller vessels, even if it doesn't give their measurements:


Myth #13...I haven't seen direct evidence that what the Mechanicus understand as a Machine Spirit is in fact somehow some latent psychic force.
We know that with the aid of a psyker some things can be drawn out of an item...but that's very much different than the Machine Spirit being psychic in nature. Do you have some sources for this?
Unfortunately, all I have is too many sources, all of which only leave hints, which I put into a single picture. In other words, this refutation is just an opinion that I got after years of fluff-reading. The matter is never explained in detail, and this is only explanation I find compatible with all canon regarding the topic. Fell free to point out the inconsistencies.

Myth #22 I'm not sure if there's a real canon policy.
Likewise, somethings happen in books and most of us shrug our shoulders and pretend it didn't happen. (Like a lot of McNeil's stuff.)
We don't have a real canon system. Just stuff we find that gets less contradicted than others.
Yep, that's pretty much sums up my position too.
SW is much more organised when the canon levels are considered.

Myth #26 Where did you get the information the Imperium conquers more worlds more than it colonizes? I don't have proof either way, but I'd like to see the source that states it one way or another.
This one is not really lore-supported I'm afraid. Obviously, conquests are described much more ofthen than colonisations, but, admittedly, that doesn't mean much. Maybe I better correct this one.

Overall - thanks, that was helpful.