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I did read about Necrons and their background. But my question is, the soldiers are obviously soulless. But what about their leaders ? Are they also soulless ? If so, whose orders are they following ? And whats a regular Necron's foot soldier motivation ? thanks, sorry if im quite noobish

None of them have a soul, their souls were fed to the C'tan when they were tricked into exchanging their natural bodies for that of steel. That was the price of their evolution. The leaders were obviously more wealthy and influential and therefore received better bodies that could hold their conscience, memories and with a AI advanced enough to work as their old brains. The numberless legions of commoners and warriors however did not have these luxuries and are more or less mindless automatons, controlled by their superiors.

They lack souls since they no longer have a connection to the warp. But the leaders still have minds, and they're the ones giving orders to the Necrons. These are usually the Overlords, Lords, and Crypteks. The soldiers of the former Necrontyr became the Immortals, still have minds, but lost emotions. Necron Warriors, the majority of the Necrontyr, are now little better than robots.

As I understand from the codex, the Silent King himself lost his soul in the transition to a Necron existence. If their #1 top leader lost his soul, that suggest they all lost them.

As far as I know, necrons don't have souls, but the higher ranks definitely have personalities, such as trazyn the infinite and Imotekh the stormlord.

From what I recall the Necrons are generally believed to be soulless. Oddly enough in 'Fall of Damnos' Tigurius was able to sense something of the Voidbringer, if I remember things correctly. Whether its possible to be soulless and still sense emotions and such I dont know, but it could mean something.

With regards to questions two and three:

They follow the orders of the Phaeron or Overlord of their respective dynasty. It is suggested in the codex that this loyalty can be manipulated through the complex computer programs at work on a tomb world, particularly before the residents have come out of stasis.

Normal Necron warriors have no tangible motivation. They are simply automatons that are guided forward by their leaders. The codex states that in the absence of any other orders, a Necron warrior will simply take up a defensive stance and fire at any enemy who intrudes within range. Immortals and especially Lychguard are much more self-aware in battle and can make tactical decisions on their own.

Thatguy91 wrote:None of them have a soul, their souls were fed to the C'tan when they were tricked into exchanging their natural bodies for that of steel. That was the price of their evolution. The leaders were obviously more wealthy and influential and therefore received better bodies that could hold their conscience, memories and with a AI advanced enough to work as their old brains. The numberless legions of commoners and warriors however did not have these luxuries and are more or less mindless automatons, controlled by their superiors.

None of the C'tan ever ate souls according to the previous Necron Codex. The C'tan fed on the life energy of the Necrontyr, while their souls were released into the warp. A sidebar in the old Necron Codex depicts Abaddon viewing a daemonic vision showing supplicants to the Dragon on Mars sacrificing to it. He sees daemons in the warp flocking to that area as the souls are cast adrift into the warp.

The problem with all of this is that A) what is a soul? and B) what is the "life force" that the C'tan fed on as the bio-transference occurred? How does having a soul affect your life or death? Do Necrons not get to go to Necron Valhalla now? If the Necrons Lords/Overlord/Crypteks/etc are conscious, where does that consciousness go when they die (or rather, when they can no longer reanimate). I'm fairly certain that the people who "became" Necron Warriors all died, as they have no individual thought. Or are all Necron Warriors trapped wihtin their own minds, furious about their forced servitude, but unable to do anything about it?

And if you can maintain your life while having no soul, whats the problem with being soulless?

McNinja wrote:The problem with all of this is that A) what is a soul? and B) what is the "life force" that the C'tan fed on as the bio-transference occurred? How does having a soul affect your life or death? Do Necrons not get to go to Necron Valhalla now? If the Necrons Lords/Overlord/Crypteks/etc are conscious, where does that consciousness go when they die (or rather, when they can no longer reanimate). I'm fairly certain that the people who "became" Necron Warriors all died, as they have no individual thought. Or are all Necron Warriors trapped wihtin their own minds, furious about their forced servitude, but unable to do anything about it?

And if you can maintain your life while having no soul, whats the problem with being soulless?

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The soul in 40K appears to be what is defined in the old 2nd ed. Eldar Codex: psychic energy that carries a large part of a being's personality and memories, that is released upon death.

The life energy that the C'tan fed on as described in the old Necron Codex is a purely physical universe phenomenon, apparently comprised of the bio-electrical activity of the organism. Compared to the output of stars, such energy is incomparably feebler yet the C'tan for some reason find it much more delicious. The C'tan from the old Necron Codex were like drug addicts, willing to have tiny crumbs of this instead of the far more plentiful and nutritious (though blander) energy of a star.

Questionable how, the C'tan, purely physical beings with no connection or understanding of the warp, could devour souls...

Ronin-Sage wrote:Questionable how, the C'tan, purely physical beings with no connection or understanding of the warp, could devour souls...

I think they have some understanding of the Warp considering how it was a C'tan who was able to breach the Webway.

The way I see it, is that, as the Necrontyr were transfering to there new bodies, the C'tan ate there "lifeforce". What was left as they entered there bodies, withered and decayed over centuries of fighting and dying Because of this they became the souless automaton they are.

Those with stronger wills, and those quicker to accept the gift of the C'tan were able to get better bodies and retain more of there minds and personality.

Its quite possible that before and for a short time after they still had a signature in the warp (lets say to the strenght of the tau, so not enought for warp gods to spawn). But with century of dying and respawning lost that "life energy". Only
those with a strong mind kept a replica of there inteligene, and to a rarer case, there personality in there robot

The only problem I have with the bio-transference thing is that the language used to describe what is basically transferring a Necrontyr consciousness into a Necron body makes it sound all archaic and "bio-furnace"-y when in reality it's technology we'll have in like a few decades. I know it's warhammer 40,000, but Ward really needs to spend some time outside of the "our technology is all ancient and bad compared to what it used to be" Imperium/Space Marines.

Basically, the fluff indicates that the Necrons, who have the technology to detonate stars, didn't figure out transference of consciousness until the star-gods told them about it. If I were the Silent King, I would have a huge Homer Simpson "d'oh" moment.

I for one, do not agree with the new codex fluff. I think they (the lords), are WAY to emotional now. I preferred the old ways.

*sigh*

They have independent minds as the hierarchy continues but no they have no souls

Ronin-Sage wrote:Questionable how, the C'tan, purely physical beings with no connection or understanding of the warp, could devour souls...

It's because in the old fluff, they couldn't.

I don't know about the new fluff.

Void__Dragon wrote:

Ronin-Sage wrote:Questionable how, the C'tan, purely physical beings with no connection or understanding of the warp, could devour souls...

It's because in the old fluff, they couldn't.

I don't know about the new fluff.

New fluff indicates that they DO have some understanding of the Warp as one of the C'tan is the reason why the Necrons could breach the webway and finish off the Old Ones.

In strict words, they did lose their souls, but the most ranked kept their personality as far as their Tomb Worlds didn't have any critical failures while sleeping. In the new codex, for example, Inmortals can speak and give precise action reports, but try to have a philosophical discussion with they and they'll probably not even hear you XD