Speaking of Eldar books, I'm currently reading Path of the Warrior. This is the most beautiful character description I've ever read. I weep at his beauty.

He's an artist, it's ok.
Actually, I love descriptions of the stuff in the Path of the Warrior. And since you mentioned it.. The book is a pretty good read, I didn't expect it to be this good, actually, for I have read many action sci-fi in my time, including some BL books.. This one is quite informative and lore-friendly for the most part, the story arc is great to say the least, there are jewels of historical or mythological interjections, but I don't like the style. Sometimes it's ok, sometimes I hate it Path of the Seer I like 30% less, and Path of the Outcast is outright awful to my taste.

I thought Path of the Outcast was terrible except for Lecthennian and the construct in the free port. I didn't like Path of the Warrior very much, and I really wanted to. I mean really. I ... haven't the heart to try Path of the Seer. But the cover pictures are nice. It would be quite cool to have those available as a poster (not just endless Marines, hint hint GW ].

I'll just pretend they're pictures of someone else

Of all three books i enjoyed Path of the Warrior the most. Yes, they might all not be the best or most exciting books in the 40k Universe, but i really love the way Gav Thorpe paints the Eldar. Quite deep and likeable and yet very alien.
But - i have to ask: Am i the only one who doesn't really like the entire warmask concept and how it is portrayed? While it certainly makes sense for them to protect their minds this way, the fact that they are so cold and detached during battle somehow made reading about it less enjoyable for me.

Really likeable? I wanted to strangle every one of them. They were less hot blooded and wise and more angsty teenagers with sticks up their ass. Didn't help they were laughably incompetent and stupid. I was actually cheering for the bloody space marines to kill that twat ranger.

As for the warmask it might have helped if Thorpe remembered it was even a thing. At no point in any of the battles did they ever act is if they had one. The Scorpion gets distracted constantly and never behaves as if he has a warrior self in control. He's the same with or without it, and despite writing at one point that "Korlandril was no more" when donning his mask within the same page he then goes on to refer to himself as Korlandril and in the same scene starts joking around about wanking. Way to write a focused and dedicated Warrior-self.

The war-mask/civilian duality could have been such an interesting internal drama, but instead it ended up a fluff raping and internally inconsistent mess. Instead of a gradual overwhelming of his previous personality by his war-mask persona, he becomes an exarch overnight and any potential character development or conflict is tossed out the window.

wow this art is so boss!!

Well, Eldar are way more emotional than humans and Korlandril is actually still pretty young, so it makes a bit of sense, but it's still silly.

And I really don't like the war masks either, I'd much prefer Eldar staying themselves in combat instead of Khornate Elves lite. And yeah the war masks are terribly written, they put on their masks then continue to laugh and have fun on the ship, I couldn't see any difference between pre and post mask Korlandril.

Also because of his war mask, the Exarch tells Korlandril he could have killed him if he annoyed him and he didn't restrain himself. How is even the smallest possibility of this happening acceptable in a society where every person is extremely valuable?

I love the idea of warmask, but I totally agree that Gav Thorpe failed at writing it properly, and yes, character development suffered greatly. Still I liked the story in the PotW for the most part, though it could be written much better and be more consistent.

By the way, can anyone tell me, how do Outcasts and Exodites fare without warmasks in battle? It's not that their psyche is in any way sturdier than that of their Craftworld peers.

I wonder the same thing about guardians. Warmasks are an Aspect Warrior thing and everyone is supposed to be trained as a guardian if I recall correctly(Except for Korlandril for some reason)

You sum up what I thought perfectly. As if you were in my head, in fact. Are you a Seer ...?

I can't exactly, as there isn't really anything in the lore about the first two directly. But Outcasts are thought of as endangering themselves for this very reason (among others) - they have to basically make their own way in the Universe without the structure of the Path to guide them. I would say that this indicates that they either have to be very strong-willed individuals with an iron sense of self, or that they join with someone else who has this and is forging their own way, e.g. charismatic Corsair Captain. I see the more prosperous and numerous Pirate bands as being led by someone like this and essentially making their own code to live by.

Exodites are supposed to be armoured from the temptations of the Eldar psyche by hard work and simple living, so I think their controls are more social - one does not indulge in war for its own sake, but as a necessity. Discipline is key. It's not that other Eldar necessarily lack discipline, but for Exodites self-discipline is inherent in what they do, and I see peer pressure as a force here as well. One has to behave like a proper Exodite. There's no real background on this but I can't see them tolerating the excesses of murder cults and so on. Also, there's little time for such murderous jollies if you have to spend all day fighting off ravenous pterodactyls.