I have been reading through alot of fluff lately and noticed one thing.
The bad guys never win. By bad guys I mean chaos, daemons get spanked every time they come from the warp. Chaos space maries also get spanked around whenever they leave the eye of terror.
So am i missing anything? do the bad guys ever win? why are they even still trying? gak even when they are in the warp they get spanked around by one man(Draigo).
The short story anthology Dark Imperium, which provides a set of glimpses into nearly every aspect of the setting, includes a few stories where you could say that evil won, I guess.
Or are you referring to studio canon? Don't the respective armies always contain a few victories in their Codices?
13th BC - Cadia lie in a shatter ruin of its former self.
Taros - IoM suffers a terrible loss against both Tau and renegade PDF.
Macragge - Population was killed to the last few defenders... Planet's population - wiped.
Hell, even the Horus Heresy was actually a massive defeat of the IoM. The Emperor was nearly killed by his own son, and had waged a war against his OWN forces in a terrible conflict that crippled the Human Empire.
Bad guy victories are usually shown from a good guy perspective in 40K. But keep in mind that Daemons define victories in bloodshed, Tau define them in expanding, DE define them in raids, Eldar define them in survival and Nids define them in eating etc etc... So for the intent of victories, the enemies of man have quite a few solid wins.
It's easy to lose sight of that when you focus on one enemy of the IoM, but keep in mind that they are fighting a ton of enemies and losing as many battles as they are winning. For evey planet that has Cadian Storm Troopers and Space Marine support, dozens are holding out with average Guard and PDF forces.
- The Cadian Gate lies in ruins ( altough the fighting still goes on )
- The worlds of the Boros Gate, once the pride of the White Consuls, lie burned and broken
- The Black Consuls have been wiped out/ almost wiped out by the Word Bearers
- Hivefleet Leviathan has yet to be stoped
- The important armory world of Vraks was neutralized by the forces of Chaos
- The war for Armageddon binds ever greater resources since the orks there have, despite monumental efforts by the Imperium of Man, yet to be defeated
- The Bakka shipyards, naval base for segmentum tempestus, have been criticaly damaged by the Dark Eldar
- Gryphonne IV, one of only two worlds to produce the Vanquisher canon, has been devoured by Leviathan
to mention just a few ocassions where "evil" did win.
Kilkrazy wrote:Why assume the IM is the good guys?
-Without the Imperium entire galaxy would be one big Eye of Terror. So the other alien races live only because of Humanity sacrifice.
-Imperial is somewhat responsible for continued survival of "less-violent alien races" ( Eldar and Tau ) by fighting of Chaos, Orks, Tyranids and Necrons.
-Because the Imperium is using pure psychic energy against the pure chaotic energies of Chaos.
-Because they are know to work with aliens, hence even to help them regain their possessions ( Malan' tai ).
-Because some of them care about Imperium's citizens and they are fighting to the death to protect them ( Ultramrines, Space Wolves, Sisters of Battle... ).
Now to recon some of the mistakes made here:
-Taros was small campaign ( No heavy armor, no true fleet support, no Astartes, no Sisters ) about the Imperium doesn't care ( like Tartarus ). And I am sure that they will one day try to retake it again, this time with larger ( and proper ) force.
-Index Astartes III tells us that Tyranids DIDN'T kill the entire population of Macragge. Most in the population was in the capital while the main Tyranid invasion force was on the Northern Fortress. When the fortress was overrun only then the Tyranids marched toward capital. But the space above them was already controlled by Imperial Navy so...they bombed the gak out of them.
-13BC, even if most of Cadia is undre Chaos control. The rest of the planet is NOT in ruins. And Chaos forces are losing ground every day since Imperial Navy controls the sky above the planet. Reinforcements are coming but it will be a while because of newly formed warp storm's around Cadia.
-abaddon wiped out the hive world of Antecanis which was supplying a vital shipyard.
-an ork warlord supplied with tau technology is bashing the crap out of Farsight as we speak (not imperial, but tau count
-those bloody smurfs got defeated at damnos by the necrons
-abaddon stole the blackstone fortresses and the rest were destroyed. they were the only weapon able to kill the c'tan as well.
Actually there are no good guys in the 40k universe. There's just the slightly questionable type of evil, such as the IoM, then the greater evils, such as Chaos, Dark Eldar, etc. Also the instinctual races, Orks and Tyranids, where their morality is even more questionable as they do not seem to even have an understanding of the difference and do as their instincts instruct.
IoM is also the biggest contributor to Chaos, their existence fuels it basically. Fighting it powers Khorne, diseases and sickness power nurgle, pride powers Slaneesh, scheming powers Tzeentch; and that's just the negative aspects as honor would also fuel Khorne for example. If Chaos ever did manage to defeat the IoM they would probably have to find more beings capable of providing them with energy or fade back into the immaterium, ceasing to be a real threat.
Main reason being, if any of the races would be the current definition of good, then they would be too weak and fail the thrive in the 40k's grim dark universe. Mostly because they would likely hesitate to go the extra bit further to ensure their survival.
KingDeath wrote:- The Cadian Gate lies in ruins ( altough the fighting still goes on )
- The worlds of the Boros Gate, once the pride of the White Consuls, lie burned and broken
- The Black Consuls have been wiped out/ almost wiped out by the Word Bearers
- Hivefleet Leviathan has yet to be stoped
- The important armory world of Vraks was neutralized by the forces of Chaos
- The war for Armageddon binds ever greater resources since the orks there have, despite monumental efforts by the Imperium of Man, yet to be defeated
- The Bakka shipyards, naval base for segmentum tempestus, have been criticaly damaged by the Dark Eldar
- Gryphonne IV, one of only two worlds to produce the Vanquisher canon, has been devoured by Leviathan
to mention just a few ocassions where "evil" did win.
-true. But Imperium won regardless and large number of Chaos marines were killed there.
-true.
-there is no info to confirm that, neither to confirm that they survived ( Fire Hawks ).
-true, since the last 2 tendrils are going toward Baal and Terra they will met quite the resistance.
-true, but the world is again under Imperial control and they are rebuilding.
-true, but the Orks that left there are feral at most. And they are being picked down by Armageddon Ork hunters.
-true, but the attacked was stooped and repairs are ongoing.
-true.
Now for the good guys:
-Maugan Ra alone defeated entire Tyranid invasion force.
-One Hive fleet destroyed at Macragge, other at Iyanden ( heavy losses but still... )
-1/3 of Leviathan destroyed at Tarsis Ultra.
-Imperials and Tau destroyed Hive Fleet Gorgon.
-Eldar and Imperials destroyed remains of Kraken.
-Grey Knights stooped numerous Daemon incursions and killed unknown name of Grater Daemons.
-Sabbat Worlds, Nimbosa, Zeist and many other returned to Imperial control.
-Eldar destroy Abadon's planet killer ( heavy losses but still... ).
-Mephiston alone tear trough Tyranid main force.
-Draigo makes show in the warp: "How to piss off Chaos Gods".
evil so fail in comparison to this...
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Blackhoof wrote:
-those bloody smurfs got defeated at damnos by the necrons
Actually, they were just holding the line until civilians evac. That was in some sort victory for them ( no matter the world was lost ). Did you mentioned that they killed Necron Lord as well....?
Really, despite what Brother Coa says, any instance where the Imperium is forced to resort to an Exterminatus is a loss for the Imperium. Damnos was a loss, there's no way around that.
I also have no idea what you are talking about when you say the Imperium is:
1) Preventing the whole galaxy being a single Eye of Terra
2) Protecting the Tau and Eldar from other Xenos. They will ussually actively try to kill both these races any real chance they get.
You seem to be wearing rose-tinted glasses when you look at the Imperium, Coa.
Brother Coa wrote:
-Without the Imperium entire galaxy would be one big Eye of Terror. So the other alien races live only because of Humanity sacrifice.
-Imperial is somewhat responsible for continued survival of "less-violent alien races" ( Eldar and Tau ) by fighting of Chaos, Orks, Tyranids and Necrons.
-Because the Imperium is using pure psychic energy against the pure chaotic energies of Chaos.
-Because they are know to work with aliens, hence even to help them regain their possessions ( Malan' tai ).
-Because some of them care about Imperium's citizens and they are fighting to the death to protect them ( Ultramrines, Space Wolves, Sisters of Battle... ).
- Where did you read this?? If you refer to the age of strife, its end has othing to do with mankind. It reached its climax at Slaanesh's birth and the warp storms then subsided. If anything it is spectualted that humanity will be responsible for a second Fall, culminating in the birth of a fifth Chaos god and another Eye of Terror covering the entire imperium.
- Well, as much as they fight those races as well. Tau are no less violent than the Imperium, having the Fire Caste dedicated to warfare, and the foundations of their survival and success being through compliance and violence. The Eldar survive through violence as well; the craftworlds being massive fortresses. They have an entirer path dedicated to bloodshed, embodying Khaine, the god of war. They are not so much peaceful as dedicated to aesthetisism.
- Chaos is composed of psychic energy, and if you mean the Emporer, he is one of the very few benign elements of the IoM, which has fallen from the Emporer's ideal vision of mankind long ago.
- Imperials? Aliens? BURN THE HERETIC!!! They will only work alongside xenos for their own benifit, otherwise any interaction is not tolerated.
- The Astartes are seperate organisations to the Adeptus Terra, Inquisition, etc. and do not represent the views of the greater Imperium. The goal of most governments is to benifit their people by enforcing law and order and ensuring the continued survival of that government. The methods by which they do so however, are a different matter. A benificial government will work on the economy of the entire nation, and the imperium does not do so, however difficult it may be. It would not be uncommon to purposefully maintain poor conditions on some planets in order to attract recruits for the IG, factories, etc.
Emperors Faithful wrote:Really, despite what Brother Coa says, any instance where the Imperium is forced to resort to an Exterminatus is a loss for the Imperium. Damnos was a loss, there's no way around that.
I also have no idea what you are talking about when you say the Imperium is:
1) Preventing the whole galaxy being a single Eye of Terra 2) Protecting the Tau and Eldar from other Xenos. They will ussually actively try to kill both these races any real chance they get.
You seem to be wearing rose-tinted glasses when you look at the Imperium, Coa.
It's not like that. really..... Just look like this.
1)People said that if Horus win the Horus Heresy Milky Way would be one big Eye of Terror. Not that I believe that but, seing what Horus planes were, he would eventually make every world worship Chaos Gods and in the end whole Imperium would be covered in Warp storms. And the rest of the galaxy would just follow.
2) Just see at and tell me that Behemoth and Kraken wouldn't invade Tau Empire if not stooped. Also Imperial s and Tau work together to stop Tyranids. and as it was under 1, by Killing Horus the Emperor limit Chaos dominance in the galaxy to Eye of Terror. Thus saving the life of every living creature in Milky Way and enabling the Evolution of the Tau and others ( not their attention but this is the result ).
This is how I see the Imperium's "good" side, don't know about the others...
Brother Coa wrote:
1)People said that if Horus win the Horus Heresy Milky Way would be one big Eye of Terror. Not that I believe that but, seing what Horus planes were, he would eventually make every world worship Chaos Gods and in the end whole Imperium would be covered in Warp storms. And the rest of the galaxy would just follow.
I fail to see what Horus' sucess or failure has to do with the Imperium's continued existence. Everyone knows that Horus winning would not have been a really happy event. This doesn't really make the Imperium (as it exists now) 'good'.
2) Just see at and tell me that Behemoth and Kraken wouldn't invade Tau Empire if not stooped. Also Imperial s and Tau work together to stop Tyranids. and as it was under 1, by Killing Horus the Emperor limit Chaos dominance in the galaxy to Eye of Terror. Thus saving the life of every living creature in Milky Way and enabling the Evolution of the Tau and others ( not their attention but this is the result ).
Exactly. Not their intention. If the Imperium had it's way every single Eldar and Tau (insert xenos here) man, woman and child would be put to the sword. Unless they could find some real use for them, then it would only be slavery.
Deathly Angel wrote:
- Where did you read this?? If you refer to the age of strife, its end has othing to do with mankind. It reached its climax at Slaanesh's birth and the warp storms then subsided. If anything it is spectualted that humanity will be responsible for a second Fall, culminating in the birth of a fifth Chaos god and another Eye of Terror covering the entire imperium.
If nothing else, the Emperor stalled the Chaos Gods when killing Horus. For he would without doubt convert every Human world in the service of Chaos, Daemons would appear, Warp Storms also...galaxy would be one big Eye of Terror. That would be the opinion of neutral side, and don't believe some apocalyptic group talking nonsense about the end of the galaxy. It's heresy.
- Well, as much as they fight those races as well. Tau are no less violent than the Imperium, having the Fire Caste dedicated to warfare, and the foundations of their survival and success being through compliance and violence. The Eldar survive through violence as well; the craftworlds being massive fortresses. They have an entirer path dedicated to bloodshed, embodying Khaine, the god of war. They are not so much peaceful as dedicated to aesthetisism.
what? Every country in the world has it's military forces ( even Vatican ) so does that mean that they are violent? Tau are in peace with the Imperium ( officialy ) and don't attack Imperial worlds all the time, Eldar to. And both factions sometimes work with the Humanity. So your point was disproved.
- Chaos is composed of psychic energy, and if you mean the Emporer, he is one of the very few benign elements of the IoM, which has fallen from the Emporer's ideal vision of mankind long ago.
I really don't know what that has to do with Sisters of Battle using the act's of Faith or Grey Knights using their devastating psychic powers.
- Imperials? Aliens? BURN THE HERETIC!!! They will only work alongside xenos for their own benifit, otherwise any interaction is not tolerated.
True, but they all work together in a time of need. + the Inquisition have secret pact's and alliances with certain Eldar Craftworlds. Adn Imperium is in peace with Tau, so....
- The Astartes are seperate organisations to the Adeptus Terra, Inquisition, etc. and do not represent the views of the greater Imperium. The goal of most governments is to benifit their people by enforcing law and order and ensuring the continued survival of that government. The methods by which they do so however, are a different matter. A benificial government will work on the economy of the entire nation, and the imperium does not do so, however difficult it may be. It would not be uncommon to purposefully maintain poor conditions on some planets in order to attract recruits for the IG, factories, etc.
Ok, but you are missing the point, today's Governments don't have a problem of our entire race going extinct. And, in my opinion, none can say otherwise if not being in their situation. All that organizations are looking toward the protection of Mankind as a whole, Imperial Guard on top of them all. But sometimes they have to make tough decisions ( if I had to chose between my life and 10.000.000 people I would gladly step forward and take a bullet in the head for them to live ). And talking about worlds and their tech people on Dakka have concluded - the grater the distances the grater would be difference in tech ( just look at the STC ).
( talking about not reading fluff )...
Likewise
I am a fool, arguing with Chaos fan about Imperial fluff, even if I proven all my points...
I deserve double *BLAM*
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Emperors Faithful wrote:
I fail to see what Horus' sucess or failure has to do with the Imperium's continued existence. Everyone knows that Horus winning would not have been a really happy event. This doesn't really make the Imperium (as it exists now) 'good'.
This.......is a question I really don't have the answer....
We must ask Eldar about this.....
KingDeath wrote:- The Cadian Gate lies in ruins ( altough the fighting still goes on )
- The worlds of the Boros Gate, once the pride of the White Consuls, lie burned and broken
- The Black Consuls have been wiped out/ almost wiped out by the Word Bearers
- Hivefleet Leviathan has yet to be stoped
- The important armory world of Vraks was neutralized by the forces of Chaos
- The war for Armageddon binds ever greater resources since the orks there have, despite monumental efforts by the Imperium of Man, yet to be defeated
- The Bakka shipyards, naval base for segmentum tempestus, have been criticaly damaged by the Dark Eldar
- Gryphonne IV, one of only two worlds to produce the Vanquisher canon, has been devoured by Leviathan
to mention just a few ocassions where "evil" did win.
-true. But Imperium won regardless and large number of Chaos marines were killed there.
-true.
-there is no info to confirm that, neither to confirm that they survived ( Fire Hawks ).
-true, since the last 2 tendrils are going toward Baal and Terra they will met quite the resistance.
-true, but the world is again under Imperial control and they are rebuilding.
-true, but the Orks that left there are feral at most. And they are being picked down by Armageddon Ork hunters.
-true, but the attacked was stooped and repairs are ongoing.
-true.
- The Imperium of Man hasn't won the 13. Black Crusade, at least not for the time being. I know it's hard to grasp for some, but both the backgroundbook and the campaign results ( which were eloborated in the Background book, so the usual excused why The Imperium still wins: "But the Emprah's ships will nuke em from orbit/ send reinforcements/ a miracle happens" do not apply ) make it quite clear that the war will go on for decades and victory might not be possible for the Imperium of Man.
- Both the Word Bearers and the White Consuls assume that the Black Consuls have been wiped out. There might be remnants, but for all we know the chapter is extinct.
- Vraks isn't rebuilt. The entire system is under an inquisitorial interdict and nothing of the planet's once vast stockpiles of weapons remained.
- Those are but two tendrils of Leviathan and it is unclear if they can be stoped at all ( at least when it comes to Baal, which unlike the much more powerful Ultramar lacks the population for largescale warfare ). The bulk of Leviathan seems to be quite sucessful at ravaging the orkempire of Octarius.
- We do not know enough about the raid on Bakka to truly determine if repairs are already ongoing. The only pieces of fluff we have are from the 5. edition book and the Duke Sliscus entry in the Dark Eldar book.
All we know is that for the time being the shipyards of Bakka are not fully operationable/ heavily damaged.
- There are more than just feral Orks on Armageddon. Indeed the ork species seems to regard the place as some kind of valhalla and "visits" it in large numbers, as described in the 4. edition ork codex.
Emperors Faithful wrote:
I fail to see what Horus' sucess or failure has to do with the Imperium's continued existence. Everyone knows that Horus winning would not have been a really happy event. This doesn't really make the Imperium (as it exists now) 'good'.
This.......is a question I really don't have the answer....
We must ask Eldar about this.....
Eldrad did, if this is still cannon, try to warn the Emperor about Horus. Didn't go down well.
Emperors Faithful wrote: I fail to see what Horus' sucess or failure has to do with the Imperium's continued existence. Everyone knows that Horus winning would not have been a really happy event. This doesn't really make the Imperium (as it exists now) 'good'.
This.......is a question I really don't have the answer.... We must ask Eldar about this.....
Eldrad did, if this is still cannon, try to warn the Emperor about Horus. Didn't go down well.
By meeting with another fallen Primarch....how smart indeed for such "enlightened" species... ( I still don't get it how he failed to see that coming? )
And you still haven't addressed my other bit.
Because you are right. Not their attention, but it was the result. And if the things didn't get that way...we all know what would happened. ( PURGE THE ALIEN!!!! ).
Brother Coa wrote:By meeting with another fallen Primarch....how smart indeed for such "enlightened" species... ( I still don't get it how he failed to see that coming? )
Give the poor xenos a break. At the time he was only just starting out with that 'prophecy and twisting fate' stuff after all.
German Empire supported AustroHungary. They saw Serbs as "lonely peasants good only to be killed and their land conquered". So to my point of view German Empire = evil.
As for America, bringing to order to the world by choking the s*** out of it. People living there are good, country is beautiful and you can always succeed if you want. But their politicians are only concerned in ruling the world and telling other countries what to do, that's somewhat "evil" by common standards ( in fact, when I see America today I see many similarity's with former USSR when it comes to telling other countries what to do and to take shape in their politics ).
Brother Coa wrote:German Empire supported AustroHungary. They saw Serbs as "lonely peasants good only to be killed and their land conquered". So to my point of view German Empire = evil.
My Bias Sense is tingling.
I understand that you're Serbian, but you have to get that your teaching of history is bound to be skewed by your upbringing. Believe me I have a Bolivian friend and there is no love lost between you two.
Basically, I don't know enough about it to so much as touch it with a 10-foot pole.
As for America, bringing to order to the world by choking the s*** out of it. People living there are good, country is beautiful and you can always succeed if you want. But their politicians are only concerned in ruling the world and telling other countries what to do, that's somewhat "evil" by common standards ( in fact, when I see America today I see many similarity's with former USSR when it comes to telling other countries what to do and to take shape in their politics ).
Corrupt/Douchebag Politicians? Tick.
Skewed worldview that places them at the centre of the universe? Tick.
I could go on, but you've basically described any given country in the world.
Brother Coa wrote:German Empire supported AustroHungary. They saw Serbs as "lonely peasants good only to be killed and their land conquered". So to my point of view German Empire = evil.
My Bias Sense is tingling.
I understand that you're Serbian, but you have to get that your teaching of history is bound to be skewed by your upbringing. Believe me I have a Bolivian friend and there is no love lost between you two.
Basically, I don't know enough about it to so much as touch it with a 10-foot pole.
As for America, bringing to order to the world by choking the s*** out of it. People living there are good, country is beautiful and you can always succeed if you want. But their politicians are only concerned in ruling the world and telling other countries what to do, that's somewhat "evil" by common standards ( in fact, when I see America today I see many similarity's with former USSR when it comes to telling other countries what to do and to take shape in their politics ).
Corrupt/Douchebag Politicians? Tick. Skewed worldview that places them at the centre of the universe? Tick.
I could go on, but you've basically described any given country in the world.
You are right, this is no place for such things... Let's return to OP....
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Henners91 wrote:Read a non-IoM codex and you'll get a few examples
This is a very good point. If you want to see Chaos, Dark Eldar, Ork, Necron and Tyranid victories ( official "bad" guys ) just read their codex.
If I remember correctly aren't the high lords of Terra for the most part corrupt? (not all of them) I mean surely even just one corrupt high lord of Terra is a massive loss for the IOM is it not? And I guess when wazdakka I believe rammed his bike through a titan and destroyed it (it was a warlord titan right?) im pretty sure that is a loss (and embarrassing)
then the swarmlord ruining peoples days
997.M41 - Holdur Sector - The Swarmlord returned to attack the Imperium, leading the swiftest and greatest planetary invasions of Hive Fleet Leviathan. In the space of four months the Swarmlord oversaw the absorption of two dozen worlds including Talon, Chapter planet of the Storm Falcons, and Endragiga, a major shipyard of the region. Latest Imperial reports indicate the Swarmlord is assaulting the Orks of Octarius.
n0t_u wrote:IoM is also the biggest contributor to Chaos, their existence fuels it basically. Fighting it powers Khorne, diseases and sickness power nurgle, pride powers Slaneesh, scheming powers Tzeentch; and that's just the negative aspects as honor would also fuel Khorne for example. If Chaos ever did manage to defeat the IoM they would probably have to find more beings capable of providing them with energy or fade back into the immaterium, ceasing to be a real threat.
A very good point - and an important part of the reasons behind why there is "eternal war". The pawns might not like it (if they knew!), but the Chaos Gods themselves don't seem to actually care about the end result. They're just there for the party.
The same could be said about the Tyranids. What will happen after they've eaten everything?
Lynata wrote:
The same could be said about the Tyranids. What will happen after they've eaten everything?
Tyranids are less of a threat than Tau. Leviathan is all that remains of them.
I think you are under selling them. When a tyranid fleet shows up, several worlds get burned just to form a defense line. When the tau show up, you lose maybe one two worlds, but they are also left intact, so you can take them back when your ready.
ShadowZetki wrote:Find another IOM to eat or eat each other? Or go vegetarian and start eating necrons.
And die of course. Tyranids always get exterminated when they fight Necrons.
"Evil" (Although really, all factions short of maybe the Tau are largely evil) wins sometimes.
Off the top of my head, Necrons won at Damnos (Although less of a victory now, before it was retconned, it was a decisive victory over the Black Templars and Ultramarines), they wiped out the Emperor's Swords chapter, after exterminating the Tyranids that were attacking Tau, they then exterminated the Tau at Ka'mais I think the planet was called, just to name a few.
Huron Blackheart defeated the Space Wolves, captured their ship, and converted the remaining Wolves to Chaos. He also took down Vilamus. Abaddon had Antecanis massacred. The Imperium had to Exterminatus Gheistos after Chaos irrevocably tainted it (Exterminatus is always a loss). Chaos destroyed Toreus as well. At least one Craftworld, Kher-Ys, has fallen before Chaos too.
Tyranids have of course devoured countless worlds, and most of their losses are Pyrrhic Victories on the part of the Imperium, or Eldar. Malanthai and Iyanden in particular standing out as losses for the Eldar.
Dark Eldar win with every successful raid, they do not fight prolonged wars, partially because they could not, and partially because they don't need to.
Admittedly cannot think of any Ork victories at the moment. Except Kaptin Badrukk killing a Void Whale. Heroic.
So yeah, the more "villainous" factions have victories, especially in their own codices.
n0t_u wrote:IoM is also the biggest contributor to Chaos, their existence fuels it basically. Fighting it powers Khorne, diseases and sickness power nurgle, pride powers Slaneesh, scheming powers Tzeentch; and that's just the negative aspects as honor would also fuel Khorne for example. If Chaos ever did manage to defeat the IoM they would probably have to find more beings capable of providing them with energy or fade back into the immaterium, ceasing to be a real threat.
A very good point - and an important part of the reasons behind why there is "eternal war". The pawns might not like it (if they knew!), but the Chaos Gods themselves don't seem to actually care about the end result. They're just there for the party.
The same could be said about the Tyranids. What will happen after they've eaten everything?
Tyranids come from beyond the Imperium's galaxy, don't they? I assume they'd move on to look for another galaxy or two, if they ever finished with this one.
Chaos is slowly winning. Remember the prophecy from Legion? By losing the Heresy the IoM has been condemned to a slow but steady decline into ruin, fueling the Chaos gods as it decays.
Pretty much any time Tyrannids attack a planet in force, they win. Either they devour the planet or force the Imperium to use Externinatus or lose horrible amounts of troops and civilians, which I'd classify as a loss.
Any time Dark Eldar can successfully take slaves, they win.
Necrons are still awakening, but they will eventually have the strength to take whatever they want, when they want.
I believe I've covered all the "evil" races there, although I believe the Imperium is the most evil faction of all.
Only Chaos and the C'tan/Necrons are evil, and no race is good. The rest just do what they do because its in their genes, in the case of the Orkz, or to survive, in the case of everyone else.
MandalorynOranj wrote:I believe I've covered all the "evil" races there, although I believe the Imperium is the most evil faction of all.
Don't know what makes you say that.
The Dark Eldar are certainly worse. The followers of Chaos are worse. Is hard to say with the Necrons, but their masters, the C'Tan, are arguably the most evil, malevolent beings in the entire setting.
Evil will never win while pragmatic nazi-commie's use the lives of billions of the IoM sons and daughters as cheap and expendable resources to fuel their war marchines in a never-ending war based on pride, greed, and a derranged violent nature. Wait. Maybe they've already lost?
Void__Dragon wrote:
The Dark Eldar are certainly worse. The followers of Chaos are worse. Is hard to say with the Necrons, but their masters, the C'Tan, are arguably the most evil, malevolent beings in the entire setting.
I agree with this. Morals are not black and white in the real world or in 40k as there are "levels" of evil. Some bad deeds are worse than others, thus our different punishments our justice system uses. Parking ticket /= lethal injection, for example, but murder does (unless you're O.J. or Casey Anthony).
Saying the IoM is as evil as the Dark Eldar would mean at some point a chaos god was invented out of their debauchery.
Of course, who knows the true nature of the Big E....
MandalorynOranj wrote:I believe I've covered all the "evil" races there, although I believe the Imperium is the most evil faction of all.
Don't know what makes you say that.
The Dark Eldar are certainly worse. The followers of Chaos are worse. Is hard to say with the Necrons, but their masters, the C'Tan, are arguably the most evil, malevolent beings in the entire setting.
Every "evil" faction is evil for a reason. Dark Eldar need slaves totorture so their own souls aren't eaten by Slaanesh, Chaos wants to control the galaxy, same for the C'tan, but the IoM is evil by pure negligence and ignorance. They are perfectly content to let millions of their citizens die, they are corrupt to the point of ridiculousness, they refuse to accept any views that conflict with their own even when it would be to their benefit to do so. I could list more reasons (and I will later if you want) but I've gotta go for now.
MandalorynOranj wrote:Every "evil" faction is evil for a reason. Dark Eldar need slaves totorture so their own souls aren't eaten by Slaanesh, Chaos wants to control the galaxy, same for the C'tan, but the IoM is evil by pure negligence and ignorance. They are perfectly content to let millions of their citizens die, they are corrupt to the point of ridiculousness, they refuse to accept any views that conflict with their own even when it would be to their benefit to do so. I could list more reasons (and I will later if you want) but I've gotta go for now.
The Dark Eldar created Slaanesh. They were monsters before Slaanesh was even around, and them being that way is the reason for the damnation of their own souls at She Who Thirsts hands. Yet they have, not once, considered changing the way they are, despite what it caused. The Craftworld Eldar would have taken them back, viewing survival as being of the utmost importance, and gaining Commorragh would be invaluable for them. But no, they do not, yes, they need to do what they do, but only because they chose to be that way, and they enjoy it.
Depends on the follower of Chaos, I probably should have specified that, Fabius Bile in particular is monstrous even by Chaos standards. Though I will admit, it varies. Abaddon and the Black Legion are undoubtedly largely pure evil though.
Uh, no, the C'Tan, upon gaining physical bodies, for no reason, decided they wanted to enslave the galaxy and turn it into the universe's largest fast-food restaurant for them, because them living things taste better than stars. The Nightbringer is described as even more sadistic than the Dark Eldar, and indeed, loves nothing more than inflicting misery, suffering, and death upon mortals, to satiate its own twisted hunger.
The Imperium does much of what it does because it HAS to, and contrary to popular belief, most do not view wasting millions upon billions or annihilating their planets as anything but a bad thing, yes, the Imperium's rulers are evil for the most part, but they are necessarily evil. Now, that does not excuse their deeds, but they pale compared to the shameless debauchery of the Dark Eldar, or the unrepetent sadism and greed of the C'tan. I don't know why you seem to think "They do what they do because they want to take over the galaxy" makes them less evil. And they are evil for a reason to. It's called the Horus Heresy. Though, I would honestly label the Emperor as evil as well.
Kilkrazy wrote:I didn't make a statement. I asked a question.
I answer it and you said that that is not true.
Do you have sources to prove that that is not true?
Actually Kilkrazy just pointed out what was very evident, that your premise is based on an assumption, and you provided insufficient proof for your premise.
Nowhere did Kilkrazy say that your premise was incorrect, only that your reasoning was flawed, your evidence nonexistent.
Kilkrazy wrote:I didn't make a statement. I asked a question.
I answer it and you said that that is not true.
Do you have sources to prove that that is not true?
Actually Kilkrazy just pointed out what was very evident, that your premise is based on an assumption, and you provided insufficient proof for your premise.
Nowhere did Kilkrazy say that your premise was incorrect, only that your reasoning was flawed, your evidence nonexistent.
Just saying.
All right, prompt me evidence that Imperium is "evil"?
Kilkrazy wrote:I didn't make a statement. I asked a question.
I answer it and you said that that is not true.
Do you have sources to prove that that is not true?
Actually Kilkrazy just pointed out what was very evident, that your premise is based on an assumption, and you provided insufficient proof for your premise.
Nowhere did Kilkrazy say that your premise was incorrect, only that your reasoning was flawed, your evidence nonexistent.
Just saying.
All right, prompt me evidence that Imperium is "evil"?
Their entire belief is that mankind alone has a right to own the galaxy, and any non human race has to be exterminated to realize this dream. Yes they tolerate some like Eldar, but only because it is necessary or they can not spread their resources enough to eliminate them.
That's not wild speculation, that's what the Imperium believes. Does it make them evil? No, it makes them arrogant. Every species in 40k has their own beliefs and Ideologies, that doesn't make them evil. Although evil is a difficult thing to define, I would say we are dealing with absolute evil, which probably would be committing acts for the pleasure of committing the act or it's outcome. When an Inquisitor dooms a Daemon infested planet to Exterminatus, he does it because the planet is lost, and the Daemons must be killed else they cause more suffering. It's realism. The C'tan, they are evil by my definition. They order their minions to scour life from the galaxy simply because souls taste better than stars.
Exactly. Imperium are not the bad guys, they are not the good guys either, but they are quite neutral to good guys.
And I understand them: every other race and "thing" was trying to kill us since we get up on our feet and spread beyond the boundaries of Sol. After ~20.000 - 30.000 years of that ( Humanity developed Warp drive in ~M20-M30 right? ) I would shot the first non-human on sight to.
Basically every other faction is neutral. Except Chaos ( obvious ), Dark Eldar ( do I really need to explain ) and Necrons ( killing everything because their good needs to feed ).
Brother Coa wrote:Exactly. Imperium are not the bad guys, they are not the good guys either, but they are quite neutral to good guys.
And I understand them: every other race and "thing" was trying to kill us since we get up on our feet and spread beyond the boundaries of Sol. After ~20.000 - 30.000 years of that ( Humanity developed Warp drive in ~M20-M30 right? ) I would shot the first non-human on sight to.
Basically every other faction is neutral. Except Chaos ( obvious ), Dark Eldar ( do I really need to explain ) and Necrons ( killing everything because their good needs to feed ).
No faction is neutral... every faction is trying to keep themselves alive and expand their power.
The IoM is evil it's just that everything else is either far more evil or trying to conquer humanity. The evil is worth it until those threats have been eliminated.
iproxtaco wrote:That's not wild speculation, that's what the Imperium believes. Does it make them evil? No, it makes them arrogant.
When your arrogance creates a belief that promotes genocide of other races and cultures, and you act on it, that is evil.
Granted, the Imperium is not pure evil, there is neutrality and even good to be found in it, and as I said, much of what they do is necessary. They can even be considered sympathetic, considering their plight.
They are certainly nowhere near as vile as the C'Tan or Dark Eldar.
MandalorynOranj wrote:Every "evil" faction is evil for a reason. Dark Eldar need slaves totorture so their own souls aren't eaten by Slaanesh, Chaos wants to control the galaxy, same for the C'tan, but the IoM is evil by pure negligence and ignorance. They are perfectly content to let millions of their citizens die, they are corrupt to the point of ridiculousness, they refuse to accept any views that conflict with their own even when it would be to their benefit to do so. I could list more reasons (and I will later if you want) but I've gotta go for now.
The Dark Eldar created Slaanesh. They were monsters before Slaanesh was even around, and them being that way is the reason for the damnation of their own souls at She Who Thirsts hands. Yet they have, not once, considered changing the way they are, despite what it caused. The Craftworld Eldar would have taken them back, viewing survival as being of the utmost importance, and gaining Commorragh would be invaluable for them. But no, they do not, yes, they need to do what they do, but only because they chose to be that way, and they enjoy it.
Depends on the follower of Chaos, I probably should have specified that, Fabius Bile in particular is monstrous even by Chaos standards. Though I will admit, it varies. Abaddon and the Black Legion are undoubtedly largely pure evil though.
Uh, no, the C'Tan, upon gaining physical bodies, for no reason, decided they wanted to enslave the galaxy and turn it into the universe's largest fast-food restaurant for them, because them living things taste better than stars. The Nightbringer is described as even more sadistic than the Dark Eldar, and indeed, loves nothing more than inflicting misery, suffering, and death upon mortals, to satiate its own twisted hunger.
The Imperium does much of what it does because it HAS to, and contrary to popular belief, most do not view wasting millions upon billions or annihilating their planets as anything but a bad thing, yes, the Imperium's rulers are evil for the most part, but they are necessarily evil. Now, that does not excuse their deeds, but they pale compared to the shameless debauchery of the Dark Eldar, or the unrepetent sadism and greed of the C'tan. I don't know why you seem to think "They do what they do because they want to take over the galaxy" makes them less evil. And they are evil for a reason to. It's called the Horus Heresy. Though, I would honestly label the Emperor as evil as well.
Yeah I guess you're right that they aren't quite as evil as the rest, sometimes my Imperium-hate clouds my objectivity.
Here's how I would rank the factions in order of evil from most to least.
1. Necron
-Necrons are well hidden and have the forces to defend their locations. They could choose to live in peace but instead have decided to declare war on everything and anything.
2. Dark Eldar
-Well duh. But they've been forced to it which is why they aren't at the Number one spot.
3. Chaos/Chaos Space Marines
-Chaos and Chaos Space Marines are extremely diverse, but its quite obvious that most are extremely cruel and selfish and far worse than the Imperium.
4. The Imperium of Man
-Xenophobic, cruel and extremest, the Imperium of Man is not good at all. They are a totalitarian government that barely values civilian life in favor of their insane principles. The Eldar and Tau face the same threats as them all the time yet remain far more moral (heh).
5. Eldar
-Jesus these guys are arrogant and racist and elitist. However, they aren't unnecessarily cruel or totalitarian.
6. Orks
Similar to the Tyranids, the Orks are largely following instincts due to being created as a Warrior caste. However, not all of it is instincts and they are extremely violent and selfish, so these guys definately aren't good.
7. Tau
The Tau are extremely arrogant, but not very xenophobic and they do believe in helping eachother. They're still somewhat evil of course, but not as much as some others.
8. Tyranids
They're just following basic instincts. The only intelligent Tyranids have it about out to outwit, catch and eat things.
I would put the IOM in the top spot, above the Necrons.
The necrons are an evil bunch, no doubt, and are led by some of the vilest creatures to ever walk the universe. They chose to worship these critters, and eventually became automaton slaves to them (barring the lords adn a few that still have a vestige of self-awareness.) Moribund guys whose culture/society was created by creatures of ultimate evil.
The IOM are just as nasty to everyone else as the Necrons, barring the occasional brief treaty, and are also amazingly crappy to their own people. Their culture was built by someone that was supposedly the ultimate paladin of shiny goodness. To have fallen to their current state requires far more of a fall to evil than the Necrons had.
Ascalam wrote:Pretty much as the above, with one exception.
I would put the IOM in the top spot, above the Necrons.
The necrons are an evil bunch, no doubt, and are led by some of the vilest creatures to ever walk the universe. They chose to worship these critters, and eventually became automaton slaves to them (barring the lords adn a few that still have a vestige of self-awareness.) Moribund guys whose culture/society was created by creatures of ultimate evil.
The IOM are just as nasty to everyone else as the Necrons, barring the occasional brief treaty, and are also amazingly crappy to their own people. Their culture was built by someone that was supposedly the ultimate paladin of shiny goodness. To have fallen to their current state requires far more of a fall to evil than the Necrons had.
The Emperor was not as nice a guy as most people would have you believe.
He was arrogant, and a fool, demanding unquestioning obedience, without ever explaining his plans, or really anything to his sons, not even the Primarchs.
He brought the Horus Heresy upon himself.
The Necrontyr hate life. Their motivation is really that simple, and to that end, the upper echelons of their race, the Lords and Immortals, sold their race into slavery... All for the purpose of completely eradicating another race. I repeat: They sold their own race to slavery, to commit genocide on another. That's a particularly vile brand of evil.
Check out the chaos section in the rulebook. I forget the details, but Chaos scores a win when attacking imperial naval dockyards or something like that.
snake wrote:Check out the chaos section in the rulebook. I forget the details, but Chaos scores a win when attacking imperial naval dockyards or something like that.
You're talking about the Antecanis Massacre, I think.
Actually, the dockyard was not what was attacked. Abaddon, in a rare display of competence, decided that to cripple the dockyard, Cancephalus, he would not attack the heavily defended world, but rather, Antecanis, where its workers came from. Once Cancephalus could no longer have workers supplied to it to run the world, the Imperial Navy left it relatively unguarded, and Abaddon proceeded to destroy it.
Brother Coa wrote:Exactly. Imperium are not the bad guys, they are not the good guys either, but they are quite neutral to good guys.
And I understand them: every other race and "thing" was trying to kill us since we get up on our feet and spread beyond the boundaries of Sol. After ~20.000 - 30.000 years of that ( Humanity developed Warp drive in ~M20-M30 right? ) I would shot the first non-human on sight to.
Basically every other faction is neutral. Except Chaos ( obvious ), Dark Eldar ( do I really need to explain ) and Necrons ( killing everything because their good needs to feed ).
It's all a matter of perspective. If you live in the IOM everyone else is evil, if you join the Greater Good everyone else is evil. But from our perspective we realize that it's not as black and white as this. Nothing ever is.
snake wrote:Check out the chaos section in the rulebook. I forget the details, but Chaos scores a win when attacking imperial naval dockyards or something like that.
You're talking about the Antecanis Massacre, I think.
Actually, the dockyard was not what was attacked. Abaddon, in a rare display of competence, decided that to cripple the dockyard, Cancephalus, he would not attack the heavily defended world, but rather, Antecanis, where its workers came from. Once Cancephalus could no longer have workers supplied to it to run the world, the Imperial Navy left it relatively unguarded, and Abaddon proceeded to destroy it.
Yes, that's it. I was pretty impressed with the description of the chaos planning and execution in this account tbh.
Lynata wrote:
The same could be said about the Tyranids. What will happen after they've eaten everything?
Tyranids are less of a threat than Tau. Leviathan is all that remains of them.
Oh, so that's why the Tyranid codex says that there's been more hive fleets entering the system since Leviathan. Because they don't exist?
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LoneLictor wrote:8. Tyranids
They're just following basic instincts. The only intelligent Tyranids have it about out to outwit, catch and eat things.
Completely false. The Tyranids as a whole (ie the hive Mind), are very intelligent. The overall goal of which is to consume, but that just means they dont colonise planets, not that they lack intelligence.
LoneLictor wrote:8. Tyranids
They're just following basic instincts. The only intelligent Tyranids have it about out to outwit, catch and eat things.
Completely false. The Tyranids as a whole (ie the hive Mind), are very intelligent. The overall goal of which is to consume, but that just means they dont colonise planets, not that they lack intelligence.
Tyranids are smart, but only smart about eating and reproducing and the things they need to do to accomplish those. They are animals. They aren't like the other factions. Unless you can cite a specific book and page number that says that Tyranids are smart about things other than basic survival despite the fact that they have never displayed it, please go ahead and tell me.
They also show evidence of tactics at Macragge, i think it was, pretending to be dead to fool the Ultras and so on.
They also show enough tactical accumen to choke defence lasers into uselessness during invasions and to use wave after wave of expendable gaunts to use up all the enemy's ammunition before sending in more valuable critters
Deathleaper was created to demoralize and terrify the enemy, not to just eat indiscriminately and hide.
It's in the Nid codex, but i don't have it on me to quote vertabim.
Kilkrazy wrote:I didn't make a statement. I asked a question.
I answer it and you said that that is not true.
Do you have sources to prove that that is not true?
Actually Kilkrazy just pointed out what was very evident, that your premise is based on an assumption, and you provided insufficient proof for your premise.
Nowhere did Kilkrazy say that your premise was incorrect, only that your reasoning was flawed, your evidence nonexistent.
Just saying.
All right, prompt me evidence that Imperium is "evil"?
To give an example, you said
Brother Coa wrote:-Without the Imperium entire galaxy would be one big Eye of Terror. So the other alien races live only because of Humanity sacrifice.
In other words, the Imperium is not evil because it prevents the Chaos from coming out of the Eye of Terror and attacking all the Aliens.
We know, though, that it is part of the IoM's basic programme to attack all the Aliens. Only the presence of the Chaos prevents the Imperium from moving away from the Eye of Terror to do thiss. Thus the Imperium is evil.
Kilkrazy wrote:I didn't make a statement. I asked a question.
I answer it and you said that that is not true.
Do you have sources to prove that that is not true?
Actually Kilkrazy just pointed out what was very evident, that your premise is based on an assumption, and you provided insufficient proof for your premise.
Nowhere did Kilkrazy say that your premise was incorrect, only that your reasoning was flawed, your evidence nonexistent.
Just saying.
All right, prompt me evidence that Imperium is "evil"?
To give an example, you said
Brother Coa wrote:-Without the Imperium entire galaxy would be one big Eye of Terror. So the other alien races live only because of Humanity sacrifice.
In other words, the Imperium is not evil because it prevents the Chaos from coming out of the Eye of Terror and attacking all the Aliens.
We know, though, that it is part of the IoM's basic programme to attack all the Aliens. Only the presence of the Chaos prevents the Imperium from moving away from the Eye of Terror to do this. Thus the Imperium is evil.
So they are evil because of that?
And what happened to need to survive?
And what Aliens? The only aliens existing pre-Heresy was Orks, Eldar, Dark Eldar and Laer.
After heresy, they exterminated few races and they even trade with few others?
And you are saying that aliens are not evil?
Orks want to kill everyone and everything, Necrons to. Eldar want's to rule the galaxy, Tau want's to rule the galaxy and Tyranids want's to eat all.
You call them evil I call them neutral, since they must do harsh things to protect themselves from extinction.
Brother Coa wrote:
So they are evil because of that?
And what happened to need to survive?
And what Aliens? The only aliens existing pre-Heresy was Orks, Eldar, Dark Eldar and Laer.
After heresy, they exterminated few races and they even trade with few others?
And you are saying that aliens are not evil?
Orks want to kill everyone and everything, Necrons to. Eldar want's to rule the galaxy, Tau want's to rule the galaxy and Tyranids want's to eat all.
You call them evil I call them neutral, since they must do harsh things to protect themselves from extinction.
so.... theo nly aliens pre-heresy were the orks, eldar, dark eldar and laer?
so, you are saying that the hrud, the benghesi, the Cabal, the araklinoid, the kroot, the caradochinoid, the vespids, the cythor fiends, the demiurg, the drax and all the countless races that exist in the millions of star systems through out the galaxy somehow evolved in 10,000 years? the tau i grant would have been ape-like or worse at this stage but still.... this is a big galaxy.
i think that killkrazy was referring to mankind's genocidal urge to exterminate all non-humans they come across. even unaggrassive ones are exterminated without thought. that is bad, and a perceived need for survival. if they simply allied with the tau and eldar long enough to defeat or at least beat back some of the other bad guys, they would stand a better chancve of survival. but no...
Peaceful aliens: we coem in peace, we come with offer of great technology!
Imperium: EXTERMINATUS!
LoneLictor wrote:Here's how I would rank the factions in order of evil from most to least.
1. Necron
-Necrons are well hidden and have the forces to defend their locations. They could choose to live in peace but instead have decided to declare war on everything and anything.
2. Dark Eldar
-Well duh. But they've been forced to it which is why they aren't at the Number one spot.
3. Chaos/Chaos Space Marines
-Chaos and Chaos Space Marines are extremely diverse, but its quite obvious that most are extremely cruel and selfish and far worse than the Imperium.
4. The Imperium of Man
-Xenophobic, cruel and extremest, the Imperium of Man is not good at all. They are a totalitarian government that barely values civilian life in favor of their insane principles. The Eldar and Tau face the same threats as them all the time yet remain far more moral (heh).
5. Eldar
-Jesus these guys are arrogant and racist and elitist. However, they aren't unnecessarily cruel or totalitarian.
6. Orks
Similar to the Tyranids, the Orks are largely following instincts due to being created as a Warrior caste. However, not all of it is instincts and they are extremely violent and selfish, so these guys definately aren't good.
7. Tau
The Tau are extremely arrogant, but not very xenophobic and they do believe in helping eachother. They're still somewhat evil of course, but not as much as some others.
8. Tyranids
They're just following basic instincts. The only intelligent Tyranids have it about out to outwit, catch and eat things.
I'd put Dark Eldar at the top of that list. They created Slaanesh through their actions (which were pretty awful), are completely un-repentant and continue to act in a debauched and depraved manner, even when alternatives are open to them. Such as the Cratworlds. And even if their torture was the only way to stave off Slaanesh, they still very much enjoy doing it.
With Necrons, it's more of a job/chore/nuisance.
Tyranids (Hive Mind) and Orks should either be put right behind DE and Necrons on the evil scale, or removed from the list of morality altogether. Either they are blood-crazed lunatics that sadistically enjoy bullying anything weaker than themselves (Orks) or they take a view that compares other sentient beings to cattle (Tyranids).
The Imperium is evil based not only on its external but also internal policies. It is a totalitarian regime that favours class division, the suppression of freedom and even the most basic rights as well as the persecution of large parts of the population based solely on genetical traits (whilst not caring that a non-existence of health & safety regulations in industrial centers makes for even more mutant births amidst the local workforce) or on accounts of religion.
Now, it should be pointed out that many bad things happen only because of the local nobility, which the Imperium as a whole has granted a rather large amount of leeway as long as the various rulers keep paying the tithes, up to not even interfering with local uprisings as long as they do not threaten to spread and follow certain basic rules (i.e. it can be assumed that the new leaders keep paying obedience and make sure that Imperial laws are followed). Still, in these cases the Imperium is at least guilty by association and by allowing this to go on.
At the end, however, the Imperium's evil can be justified, even if one had to pull arguments such as "fighting fire with fire", "doing what has to be done" or "for the greater good". There are reasons for the policies, nothing happens just because Imperial leaders are a bunch of supervillains. Some may be corrupt, but on the grand scale of things they are merely hardline pragmatists born into a very f...d up galaxy.
In relation to most other factions in 40k, they are certainly one of the "lesser evils".
And in context of the thread, I guess everyone knew who the OP meant when he was talking about "the good guys". Pointing out that the Imperium isn't so good is a valid comment, but somewhat off-topic.
Brother Coa wrote:So they are evil because of that?
And what happened to need to survive?
And what Aliens? The only aliens existing pre-Heresy was Orks, Eldar, Dark Eldar and Laer.
After heresy, they exterminated few races and they even trade with few others?
And you are saying that aliens are not evil?
Orks want to kill everyone and everything, Necrons to. Eldar want's to rule the galaxy, Tau want's to rule the galaxy and Tyranids want's to eat all.
You call them evil I call them neutral, since they must do harsh things to protect themselves from extinction.
Uh, no, there were other aliens that existed pre-Heresy.
I notice how you call the Eldar and Tau evil for wanting to rule the galaxy.
Just like how the Imperium does.
The Eldar actually don't want to rule the galaxy, their only goal is to survive, sometimes they commit atrocities to do this, but the Imperium commits atrocities for far less noble causes. Even on their own people, something the Eldar never do. The Imperium is far more evil than the Eldar, and definitely the Tau, who at least tried to use diplomacy.
Ironically, your closing sentence, "You call them evil I call them neutral, since they must do harsh things to protect themselves from extinction," describes the Eldar even better than the Imperium.
The Imperium's evil is sometimes necessary, but sometimes it is not.
Oh, and just so you know, wanna know the real reason the Eye of Terror has not continued to envelop the galaxy? The Necrons, with their pylons serving to contain it, to keep it from spreading.
Emperors Faithful wrote:I'd put Dark Eldar at the top of that list. They created Slaanesh through their actions (which were pretty awful), are completely un-repentant and continue to act in a debauched and depraved manner, even when alternatives are open to them. Such as the Cratworlds. And even if their torture was the only way to stave off Slaanesh, they still very much enjoy doing it.
With Necrons, it's more of a job/chore/nuisance.
Tyranids (Hive Mind) and Orks should either be put right behind DE and Necrons on the evil scale, or removed from the list of morality altogether. Either they are blood-crazed lunatics that sadistically enjoy bullying anything weaker than themselves (Orks) or they take a view that compares other sentient beings to cattle (Tyranids).
Dark Eldar are certainly bad, yeah. Though, would argue the C'tan, and perhaps the upper echelons of the Necrontyr hierarchy are worse.
I agree that Orkz and Hive Mind should be removed from the issue of morality. The Hive Mind is essentially instinct, that is driven by a powerful intellect. The Orkz are... Orkz.
Void__Dragon wrote:I agree that Orkz and Hive Mind should be removed from the issue of morality. The Hive Mind is essentially instinct, that is driven by a powerful intellect. The Orkz are... Orkz.
Orks are driven by instinct - but if you let that count, doesn't that apply to all the other races as well, to some degree? One might argue that the Imperium's evil is merely the result out of certain combinations of human traits, namely fear and a powerful drive to stick together and follow a leader. Also reminds me of the Milgram experiment.
Many of these things are certainly the result of Imperial culture, yet that culture also has to have a reason to have developed like it did. Similarly, there are individual Orks who are somewhat more cooperative and less destructive than the common horde, indicating that they too have the potential to be different, if only to a certain degree.
The C'tan aren't much worse than modern day humans. They kill people for food, same as we do to other animals. Our justification is that it's natural and humans have priority because we are more intelligent/special. Exactly the same reasons will support the C'tan, they have to eat and they are superior in everyway to any other creatures we have seen in the 40k setting. The Necrons on the other hand are evil- they joined the C'tan because of jealousy and now fight because they hate life.
-Taros was small campaign ( No heavy armor, no true fleet support, no Astartes, no Sisters ) about the Imperium doesn't care ( like Tartarus ). And I am sure that they will one day try to retake it again, this time with larger ( and proper ) force.
( talking about not reading fluff )...
The Raptors and the Adeptus Mechanicus would like to speak with you about the Taros Campaign...
Kilkrazy wrote:Why assume the IM is the good guys?
That is exaclty how the 40k universe is supposed to be taken
That may be so but it doesn't make the idea correct.
It's perfectly clear that IoM (the notional "good guys") and Chaos (their enemy, i.e. the "bad guys) are the two faces of the same coin. There is little difference between their general behaviour.
4M2A wrote:The C'tan aren't much worse than modern day humans. They kill people for food, same as we do to other animals. Our justification is that it's natural and humans have priority because we are more intelligent/special. Exactly the same reasons will support the C'tan, they have to eat and they are superior in everyway to any other creatures we have seen in the 40k setting. The Necrons on the other hand are evil- they joined the C'tan because of jealousy and now fight because they hate life.
When a farmer kills a pig for food, does it torture it for sadistic pleasure, feeding off its fear and misery, and when it gives up hope, devour it?
The Nightbringer does. The Outsider does similar, driving its food insane, mad beyond reason, but still preserving a semblance of sanity, hope that they could escape or survive, just to prolong their suffering. The Deceiver enjoys nothing more than manipulating mortals and immortals alike, being partially responsible for the decline of his own species, largely because, well, I guess because he's a dick really, since I don't see what he had to gain from nearly exterminating his species. The Void Dragon is harder to place admittedly.
It's not that they are cosmic horrors that eat mortals for sustenance, despite a less malevolent food-source being readily available.
It's the personal touch they give it, the personal sadistic interest they give to their food.
Kilkrazy wrote:It's perfectly clear that IoM (the notional "good guys") and Chaos (their enemy, i.e. the "bad guys) are the two faces of the same coin. There is little difference between their general behaviour.
Here I must disagree - from our perspective, the Imperium may not be "the good guys", but they are still a much better alternative than Chaos. The latter is an ultimately destructive force, whereas the Imperium aims to preserve. They only think about preserving mankind as a whole without caring for the individual. But still you can lead a rather peaceful live on some agri-farm or as some noble's servant or a worker in some factory ... sure, you can also draw the short straw and be a mutant or a psyker or just some poor guy who's living under the yoke of a particularly cruel feudal lord.
The difference is that if you're living in Chaos-controlled space, you're fu**ed either way. Regardless of whether you're some slave that gets tortured for fun or a cultist sacrificed to the gods or a Blood Pact cannonfodder .. even if you're a CSM you're bound to get shat on simply on the premise of Chaos working on the principle of "might makes right". Enjoy getting stabbed in the back or left behind by your own people. In the Imperium you'd have at least a chance of finding some cameraderie with IG buddies or mercy at the hands of a gentle Sister Hospitaller or lead a peaceful civilian live on a planet completely untouched by violence.
Lynata wrote:Orks are driven by instinct - but if you let that count, doesn't that apply to all the other races as well, to some degree? One might argue that the Imperium's evil is merely the result out of certain combinations of human traits, namely fear and a powerful drive to stick together and follow a leader. Also reminds me of the Milgram experiment.
Many of these things are certainly the result of Imperial culture, yet that culture also has to have a reason to have developed like it did. Similarly, there are individual Orks who are somewhat more cooperative and less destructive than the common horde, indicating that they too have the potential to be different, if only to a certain degree.
While it is true that human concept of morality gives us some sort of bias when looking at other races who may be more inclined towards such behavior, as for your reference to the Milgram experiment, that is actually a pretty good point.
I would actually say most Imperial citizens and guardsmen are not evil, but much of the leadership of the Imperium is, although it is often justified.
The Necrontyr's leaders were not. Most of their race did not want to be encased in Necrodermis and made into undead automotons, but they went along with the Deceiver's trickery, enslaving their race to the C'tan so they may commit genocide on another race out of jealousy.
The Dark Eldar are similar, the Craftworld Eldar knew what they were doing was wrong and would lead to devastation, and even after it did, they don't care, and continue their cruel ways.
Orkz follow a fairly alien code of honor. For instance, most Imperials view mounting the head of an enemy on a pike and waving it around as a barbaric insult. For the Orkz, there is no greater show of respect for a non-Ork.
But I feel like we have seriously digressed from the topic of this thread.
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Lynata wrote:
Kilkrazy wrote:It's perfectly clear that IoM (the notional "good guys") and Chaos (their enemy, i.e. the "bad guys) are the two faces of the same coin. There is little difference between their general behaviour.
Here I must disagree - from our perspective, the Imperium may not be "the good guys", but they are still a much better alternative than Chaos. The latter is an ultimately destructive force, whereas the Imperium aims to preserve. They only think about preserving mankind as a whole without caring for the individual. But still you can lead a rather peaceful live on some agri-farm or as some noble's servant or a worker in some factory ... sure, you can also draw the short straw and be a mutant or a psyker or just some poor guy who's living under the yoke of a particularly cruel feudal lord.
The difference is that if you're living in Chaos-controlled space, you're fu**ed either way. Regardless of whether you're some slave that gets tortured for fun or a cultist sacrificed to the gods or a Blood Pact cannonfodder .. even if you're a CSM you're bound to get shat on simply on the premise of Chaos working on the principle of "might makes right". Enjoy getting stabbed in the back or left behind by your own people. In the Imperium you'd have at least a chance of finding some cameraderie with IG buddies or mercy at the hands of a gentle Sister Hospitaller or lead a peaceful civilian live on a planet completely untouched by violence.
I dunno, I can see the benefit in being a Daemon Prince. That could happen. It doesn't happen "often," but at least there is a chance you can get a pretty okay deal out of working for Chaos.
But yeah, the Imperium is overall much more preferable to Chaos.
Ascalam wrote:They're smart enough to avoid the Outsider's home
They also show evidence of tactics at Macragge, i think it was, pretending to be dead to fool the Ultras and so on.
They also show enough tactical accumen to choke defence lasers into uselessness during invasions and to use wave after wave of expendable gaunts to use up all the enemy's ammunition before sending in more valuable critters
Deathleaper was created to demoralize and terrify the enemy, not to just eat indiscriminately and hide.
It's in the Nid codex, but i don't have it on me to quote vertabim.
That's what I was talking about when I said they had intelligence regarding catchings and eating prey. The only intelligence Tyranids have is regarding survival (the point I've been trying to make). They don't think about other creature's feelings or survival, they only think about them relative to their own survival because that's how Tyranids are made. I dread the day when someone changes the fluff and adds in personalities and infighting and that sort of crap.
at least 10 - 15 Space Marine Chapters, 40 - 50 Imperial Guard Regiments ( over 100 if the sector is REALLY important like Cadia ), at least 1 entire Imperial Navy battle force, 1 or 2 Sisters of Battle orders, 1 full Titan Legion ( talking about several Warhaounds, Warlords, and maybe 1 -2 Imperators ). Of course the Guard would have access to Baneblades, Stormblades, Hydras, Vanquishers.... Space Marines would have access to Terminators and Land Raiders, Sisters would bring Living Saint...
As for Adeptus Mechanicus, with Titans they would get Legio Cybernetica forces + Skitarii.
And what have we seen at Taros from all this? 1 Space Marine chapter ( who barely attacked ) and 10 - 15 Guard Regiments with 4 Warhounds and light armor support ( some Leman Russ, Basilisk... ).
When a farmer kills a pig for food, does it torture it for sadistic pleasure, feeding off its fear and misery, and when it gives up hope, devour it?
The Nightbringer does. The Outsider does similar, driving its food insane, mad beyond reason, but still preserving a semblance of sanity, hope that they could escape or survive, just to prolong their suffering. The Deceiver enjoys nothing more than manipulating mortals and immortals alike, being partially responsible for the decline of his own species, largely because, well, I guess because he's a dick really, since I don't see what he had to gain from nearly exterminating his species. The Void Dragon is harder to place admittedly.
It's not that they are cosmic horrors that eat mortals for sustenance, despite a less malevolent food-source being readily available.
It's the personal touch they give it, the personal sadistic interest they give to their food.
They inflict suffering because it's required. The more pain the creature feels the better it is for food. If causing pain was the only way for us to eat meat we would still do it. We try to reduce the pain because we can but the animals death isn't completely painless, yet we still do it. To them humans are the equivilant of insects. If we had any reason to cause pain to an insect we would do it without thought.
That is exaclty how the 40k universe is supposed to be taken
That may be so but it doesn't make the idea correct.
It's perfectly clear that IoM (the notional "good guys") and Chaos (their enemy, i.e. the "bad guys) are the two faces of the same coin. There is little difference between their general behavior.
This.....is the point. They are not the evil, nor good - they are grey. Telling that Imperium are not the "good guys" is telling that the Chaos are not the "bad guys". In fact, forget that. There are people here who thinks that Chaos are the good guys, no matter if they are based on Satan...
4M2A wrote:They inflict suffering because it's required. The more pain the creature feels the better it is for food. If causing pain was the only way for us to eat meat we would still do it. We try to reduce the pain because we can but the animals death isn't completely painless, yet we still do it. To them humans are the equivilant of insects. If we had any reason to cause pain to an insect we would do it without thought.
It is most certainly not required, nor is eating sentient life (The sentient part is important).
But let us say you are right.
This is still a race of beings who found nothing wrong with cannabilizing their entire race, because the Deceiver told them that C'tan taste better than anything. It is blatant that the C'tan are each narcissistic, utterly self-serving beings, even to their own race, they ate themselves without thinking through the ramifications. No other faction was so eager to turn on itself, putting their own greed and hunger before the survival of their species, something even the Dark Eldar do not do.
to OP: Dude, this is 40k. Evil doesn't have to win. To win hints at some kind of finality, and no "evil" faction wants that. the Orks want constant fightin', Chaos just wants to corrupt and destroy, and the Dark Eldar want to torture and enslave.
And the majority of the Necrons and Nids aren't even "evil", as being evil implies choice. Honestly, The evil factions are having the time of their lives, and they've been "winning" for a good 10,000+ years
Brother Coa wrote:This.....is the point.
They are not the evil, nor good - they are grey.
Telling that Imperium are not the "good guys" is telling that the Chaos are not the "bad guys".
In fact, forget that. There are people here who thinks that Chaos are the good guys, no matter if they are based on Satan...
I don't think anyone said the Chaos are good guys.
Although the Gods themselves are not evil, I would argue they aren't even sentient. They are defined by mortals, any freedom of will on their part is an illusion, all they are is decided by mortals.
carbonpillow wrote:to OP: Dude, this is 40k. Evil doesn't have to win. To win hints at some kind of finality, and no "evil" faction wants that. the Orks want constant fightin', Chaos just wants to corrupt and destroy, and the Dark Eldar want to torture and enslave.
And the majority of the Necrons and Nids aren't even "evil", as being evil implies choice. Honestly, The evil factions are having the time of their lives, and they've been "winning" for a good 10,000+ years
Good point, definition of evil in 40k depend's majorly form the side you have taken.
KillKrazy is for the Tau, for her the Imperium is evil. I support Humanity, for me the Tau are evil. Someone who support the Necron don't give a damn, he just want their souls
IMO the criteria for a race being good or evil should be how they treat their own and not other races, specially in a setting where everyone is xenophobic to the extreme and think the universe is theirs by right.
That being said, I think the imperium IS evil in that they butcher their own people for sometimes silly reasons, treat them like crap and don't value life at all.
Polvilhovoador wrote:IMO the criteria for a race being good or evil should be how they treat their own and not other races, specially in a setting where everyone is xenophobic to the extreme and think the universe is theirs by right.
That being said, I think the imperium IS evil in that they butcher their own people for sometimes silly reasons, treat them like crap and don't value life at all.
Yeah silly reason like: "if we don't kill them they will open a rift in the warp and we are talking about 10 planetary systems with 10.000.000.000 people on each."
And when you have ~number of population life can be harsh because advanced tech can't be present everywhere, and because we Humans like our-self very much ( just see the number of states today ) Imperium has disband some civil rights for the grater good of all species. And how can you take the value of life in that kind of situation? In world with 7 billion people it's not easy but it is valued. In world with countless billions, individual is gone - only populations exist.
The criteria of good and evil are overall actions of the entire race. And some of them are worse then the Imperium.
Without the imperium feeding the dark gods it would be less of a threat.
The imperium has NO civil rights, and it's not exactly for the good of the species. If they gave a damn about their people the Imperium would not be the totalitarian theocracy it is in the fluff. Humannity didn't have to try to conquer the whole galaxy in the name of manifest destiny. They could have as easily built a smaller, tighter knit empire with defenses as good as Sol system in every colony system, and expanded slowly. They could also have made alliances with the various xeno races they ran into that didn't imediately try to eat them, instead of wiping them out in the name of false religion
The Imperium is evil. Face it.
Whatever their reasons, whatever the results of the 'end justifies the means' argument the IOM is evil. Possibly the lesser of two evils, bt still far from Good.
Ascalam wrote:If they gave a damn about their people the Imperium would not be the totalitarian theocracy it is in the fluff.
Actually, a totalitarian regime has it much easier to protect its people because it can enact "necessary" policies without getting bogged down by elections and squabbling parties more intent on making each other look bad than actually deal with a problem. Of course, a totalitarian regime is also somewhat more likely to get abused for personal gain of the ruler, so it depends on who's in charge. I'd just ask to drop the idea that totalitarian regimes are about evil and liberalism is always good. We're not in the Cold War era anymore and there are plenty current examples on why such a thought is just plain wrong.
Also, humanity didn't conquer the whole galaxy as the Imperium - they did that way before. When the Emperor came into power, the colonies already existed and mankind experienced a kind of "racial obligation" to liberate the worlds that have been isolated for so long. From this perspective, the Imperium is merely trying to protect and save what already existed and reconnect the "lost brothers and sisters" amidst the stars with their origin.
As for the xeno races: Paranoia and bad experience. I won't justify genocide here, but the Imperium doesn't just eradicate other species because they have fun doing so. At the end of the day, I would agree that the Imperium's external policy is an "evil aspect", but there's good and neutral ones as well, as much as you may want to dismiss them. It's what slightly lessens the impact of the most atrocious acts and allows the Imperium to remain a "lesser evil" with lots of shades of grey as opposed to a comicbook villain organization.
Ascalam wrote:Without the imperium feeding the dark gods it would be less of a threat.
The imperium has NO civil rights, and it's not exactly for the good of the species. If they gave a damn about their people the Imperium would not be the totalitarian theocracy it is in the fluff. Humannity didn't have to try to conquer the whole galaxy in the name of manifest destiny. They could have as easily built a smaller, tighter knit empire with defenses as good as Sol system in every colony system, and expanded slowly. They could also have made alliances with the various xeno races they ran into that didn't imediately try to eat them, instead of wiping them out in the name of false religion ( HERESY!!! *BLAM* )
The Imperium is evil. Face it.
Whatever their reasons, whatever the results of the 'end justifies the means' argument the IOM is evil. Possibly the lesser of two evils, bt still far from Good.
Hearing it from the mouth of the Ork fan.... Now go and play war and let the philosophy to wiser beings
My arrogance is justified because everyone else is arrogant when it comes to: "my race is the best, the other suck balls".
And Ork fans don't like the Imperium, neither do Tau fans, Chaos fans...
You are Necron fan so you don't like it either. And since noone is neutral, everyone will make their side look good and other look bad.
I am just defending the Imperium because no one else want's. Because Imperium is not evil as other suggest, true some of their methods are harsh but they are good in general ( Chaos and Imperium are same side of the same coin, what KillKrazy said. Chaos = evil side, Imperium = good side ).
And now, because he is an Ork fan, he will just adress the worst ofd the Imperium and ignore all the rest, like I would say everything worse about the Ork and ignore all the rest. And each fan is truly dedicated to his race fluff, and do real little about other ( this point was proven in numerous threads ). I know 90% of Imperium fluff but know only about 30 - 40% of Ork fluff, same I can say for him about Imperial fluff.
Now, let us return to OP before this thread goes under lock-down.
Brother Coa wrote:My arrogance is justified because everyone else is arrogant when it comes to: "my race is the best, the other suck balls".
And Ork fans don't like the Imperium, neither do Tau fans, Chaos fans...
You are Necron fan so you don't like it either. And since noone is neutral, everyone will make their side look good and other look bad.
I am just defending the Imperium because no one else want's. Because Imperium is not evil as other suggest, true some of their methods are harsh but they are good in general ( Chaos and Imperium are same side of the same coin, what KillKrazy said. Chaos = evil side, Imperium = good side ).
And now, because he is an Ork fan, he will just adress the worst ofd the Imperium and ignore all the rest, like I would say everything worse about the Ork and ignore all the rest. And each fan is truly dedicated to his race fluff, and do real little about other ( this point was proven in numerous threads ). I know 90% of Imperium fluff but know only about 30 - 40% of Ork fluff, same I can say for him about Imperial fluff.
Now, let us return to OP before this thread goes under lock-down.
That's not justified. Even assuming that is true, why stoop to that level?
Am I a Necron fan? Absolutely, they are my favorite faction. I am also an Ork fan. I like Chaos, Daemons and Marines. I like the Dark Eldar. Hell, I actually like the Tau too, and some of the Eldar.
But wanna know something else? I like the Imperium. I like the Imperial Guard, the Grey Knights, the Black Templars, the Inquisition in general, there are even Ultramarines I like, Scout Sgt. Torias Telion is a badass. Don't assume that because I am a fan of one faction, that I don't like another. Don't make that assumption at all, really.
The Imperium is not "good," it is morally grey, it commits even sometimes because it really has to, yet there are times they don't, and many leaders of the Imperium are corrupt besides that. Now, the Imperium are certainly more sympathetic and good than the Necrons (Notice how, despite them being my favorite faction, I readily admit they are evil), C'tan, Dark Eldar, most followers of Chaos, Daemons, the Orkz (Although evil is a term that arguably does not apply to them), and the Tyranids (It certainly does not apply to them). Also, I like to think, although I probably know more about Necron fluff than any other, I try to keep up with current fluff with the other factions. Like I said, stop assuming things about people and dismissing their arguments based on your own assumption.
Well I already addressed the RP. Evil does win at times. Or, all the time.
Brother Coa wrote:My arrogance is justified because everyone else is arrogant when it comes to: "my race is the best, the other suck balls".
And Ork fans don't like the Imperium, neither do Tau fans, Chaos fans...
You are Necron fan so you don't like it either. And since noone is neutral, everyone will make their side look good and other look bad.
I am just defending the Imperium because no one else want's. Because Imperium is not evil as other suggest, true some of their methods are harsh but they are good in general ( Chaos and Imperium are same side of the same coin, what KillKrazy said. Chaos = evil side, Imperium = good side ).
And now, because he is an Ork fan, he will just adress the worst ofd the Imperium and ignore all the rest, like I would say everything worse about the Ork and ignore all the rest. And each fan is truly dedicated to his race fluff, and do real little about other ( this point was proven in numerous threads ). I know 90% of Imperium fluff but know only about 30 - 40% of Ork fluff, same I can say for him about Imperial fluff.
"You are an X fan so you don't like the Y or Z. Since you are an X fan you will address the best of the X and ignore the rest."
This debate can be applied to anything and everything. It seems lazy to me. Rather than using specific evidence you decide to take the generic "My opponent is biased" approach. Hopefully I can dispel that by pointing out I am a Chaos Space Marine player that complains that Games Workshop has too many Imperial Codexes, yet I admitted that Chaos and Chaos Space Marines are waaaay more evil and selfish than the Imperium.
Here are some reasons that I think the Imperium is evil.
1. They kill people that don't worship the God Emperor, despite the fact that he has been mostly dead for the past 10,000 years.
2. They destroyed a democratic, peaceful human society because it interacted with Xenos.
3. This one is subtle, but notice that the High Lords of Terra, Tech Priests and most Chapter Masters are white males.
4. They are willing to kill all of the inhabitants of a planet and destroy all of its resources just so that the enemy doesn't get it.
5. They believe all humans are superior to Xenos.
6. The Eldar and Tau are willing to be peaceful but most of the time the Imperium refuses and fights them.
Back on topic, the Imperium wins the most because it has the most fans. If another race got too large of a victory they'd get upset. Look at how many people claim the Imperium is winning the 13th Black Crusade. If the Tyranids had the most fans you'd see a bunch of posts claimed Hive Fleet Behemoth was still around and powerful threat. Also, if the Tyranids had the most fans they'd have destroyed Armageddon or some major but not too major planet.
And that is what I am telling people: Imperium is not black and white - it's grey ( not my own assumption - but a fact ).
And I am glad that you are not like: "One our solder can totally kill million your's" people. And even if I am Imperium fan I admit that Imperium can't defeat it's enemies at it's current strength ( they can't even hold down their territories because they spread to thin and recruit to few military groups ). And I read almost all of other faction's fluff ( but I don't know much about Dark Eldar ) and I like Eldar and Tau to. But to many people read only fluff for their won selected race.
And that evil win all the times. Maybe, but good always triumph at the end. Or unless GW decide that Chaos won anyway and this debate is for nothing
Brother Coa wrote:And that is what I am telling people: Imperium is not black and white - it's grey ( not my own assumption - but a fact ).
And I am glad that you are not like: "One our solder can totally kill million your's" people. And even if I am Imperium fan I admit that Imperium can't defeat it's enemies at it's current strength ( they can't even hold down their territories because they spread to thin and recruit to few military groups ). And I read almost all of other faction's fluff ( but I don't know much about Dark Eldar ) and I like Eldar and Tau to. But to many people read only fluff for their won selected race.
And that evil win all the times. Maybe, but good always triumph at the end. Or unless GW decide that Chaos won anyway and this debate is for nothing
Yes, compared to the more villainous factions, it is indeed grey (Although, worshippers of Chaos tend to be somewhat grey at times, although that is de-emphasized in the fluff).
Well, one Necron is kind of much better than a single guardsman though.
That is kind of the point, the Imperium is the strongest unified fighting force in the galaxy at the moment, but it is still fighting a losing war, assailed by too many enemies on all fronts, and spread too thin as you said.
I would highly recommend giving the 5e Dark Eldar codex a read, the fluff is really good.
Well, there are at least two Eldar prophecies giving the nod in terms of the long-term victory to Chaos and the Necrons respectively. But Farseers have been wrong before.
A happy ending is virtually impossible in 40k though, it's kind of the point. All dat grimdark.
LoneLictor wrote:
"You are an X fan so you don't like the Y or Z. Since you are an X fan you will address the best of the X and ignore the rest."
This debate can be applied to anything and everything. It seems lazy to me. Rather than using specific evidence you decide to take the generic "My opponent is biased" approach. Hopefully I can dispel that by pointing out I am a Chaos Space Marine player that complains that Games Workshop has too many Imperial Codexes, yet I admitted that Chaos and Chaos Space Marines are waaaay more evil and selfish than the Imperium.
Here are some reasons that I think the Imperium is evil.
1. They kill people that don't worship the God Emperor, despite the fact that he has been mostly dead for the past 10,000 years.
2. They destroyed a democratic, peaceful human society because it interacted with Xenos.
3. This one is subtle, but notice that the High Lords of Terra, Tech Priests and most Chapter Masters are white males.
4. They are willing to kill all of the inhabitants of a planet and destroy all of its resources just so that the enemy doesn't get it.
5. They believe all humans are superior to Xenos.
6. The Eldar and Tau are willing to be peaceful but most of the time the Imperium refuses and fights them.
Really I need to get to sleep...
And in case you didn't know it is rumored that people in GW really believe in the Imperial Creed so don't be to much surprised.
1. True, but as every other fanatics today. Tau also kill those who don't embrace the grater good ( just see Crusades, Yugoslav civil war... ).
2. Because they are traitors. This is the most important time in history for our entire race and we can't afford that every planet has it's own empire, republic or xeno alliance. And people often run toward aliens because the aliens trick them or because their Governor want's more power for himself ( Fire and Honor ).
3. This is true, there are no blacks in 40k ( besides 1 Inquisitor ) and we rarely see Asians. I read somewhere on this site that this is explained via Human evolution. That all will one day bew only Caucasians. But there are Salamanders who are all black. Maybe GW don't like blacks? Maybe it is something else? Either way, this doesn't have anything to do with Imperium being evil.
4. They do that VERY rarely, only if planet is beyond saving ( like massive Chaos, Ork and Tyranid invasion ). Because even Imperium doesn't destroy useful worlds. And they only leave population to die when extract is impossible or when they are all tainted by Chaos.
5. And what is wrong with that? Do they need to think that they are weak and cannot oppose anyone? Please, every race and faction believe that they are superior in every way again other ones...
6. WTF are you saying, did you take LSD or something? Eldar: "Let's left billion of Humans to die to save 10 our's. No matter, they are anyway just animals to be slaughtered." As for Eldar Helping just see Aurelian Crusade how helpful they were: "Let us destroy the 3 Human worlds and then the Tyranids will evade our Craftworld. - But Farseer, why don't we ally with Humans and beat the Tyranids together? -Because they are animals and we have nothing to do with them.". Or Tau: "We are in peace with the Imperium. No matter, let us attack their worlds, annex and slaughtered their populations and then sing another peace treaty so we can do it again. ( Nimbosa )". Tau are allowing Humans to live with them, but we simply don't know anything about them to speculate that Humans are living well ( there are even rumors about sterilization and such, but again - just rumors ).
And good that you saw that Chaos are evil, I was afraid you will present them as "good" guys...
LoneLictor wrote:
"You are an X fan so you don't like the Y or Z. Since you are an X fan you will address the best of the X and ignore the rest."
This debate can be applied to anything and everything. It seems lazy to me. Rather than using specific evidence you decide to take the generic "My opponent is biased" approach. Hopefully I can dispel that by pointing out I am a Chaos Space Marine player that complains that Games Workshop has too many Imperial Codexes, yet I admitted that Chaos and Chaos Space Marines are waaaay more evil and selfish than the Imperium.
Here are some reasons that I think the Imperium is evil.
1. They kill people that don't worship the God Emperor, despite the fact that he has been mostly dead for the past 10,000 years.
2. They destroyed a democratic, peaceful human society because it interacted with Xenos.
3. This one is subtle, but notice that the High Lords of Terra, Tech Priests and most Chapter Masters are white males.
4. They are willing to kill all of the inhabitants of a planet and destroy all of its resources just so that the enemy doesn't get it.
5. They believe all humans are superior to Xenos.
6. The Eldar and Tau are willing to be peaceful but most of the time the Imperium refuses and fights them.
Really I need to get to sleep...
And in case you didn't know it is rumored that people in GW really believe in the Imperial Creed so don't be to much surprised.
1. True, but as every other fanatics today. Tau also kill those who don't embrace the grater good ( just see Crusades, Yugoslav civil war... ).
2. Because they are traitors. This is the most important time in history for our entire race and we can't afford that every planet has it's own empire, republic or xeno alliance. And people often run toward aliens because the aliens trick them or because their Governor want's more power for himself ( Fire and Honor ).
3. This is true, there are no blacks in 40k ( besides 1 Inquisitor ) and we rarely see Asians. I read somewhere on this site that this is explained via Human evolution. That all will one day bew only Caucasians. But there are Salamanders who are all black. Maybe GW don't like blacks? Maybe it is something else? Either way, this doesn't have anything to do with Imperium being evil.
4. They do that VERY rarely, only if planet is beyond saving ( like massive Chaos, Ork and Tyranid invasion ). Because even Imperium doesn't destroy useful worlds. And they only leave population to die when extract is impossible or when they are all tainted by Chaos.
5. And what is wrong with that? Do they need to think that they are weak and cannot oppose anyone? Please, every race and faction believe that they are superior in every way again other ones...
6. WTF are you saying, did you take LSD or something? Eldar: "Let's left billion of Humans to die to save 10 our's. No matter, they are anyway just animals to be slaughtered." As for Eldar Helping just see Aurelian Crusade how helpful they were: "Let us destroy the 3 Human worlds and then the Tyranids will evade our Craftworld. - But Farseer, why don't we ally with Humans and beat the Tyranids together? -Because they are animals and we have nothing to do with them.". Or Tau: "We are in peace with the Imperium. No matter, let us attack their worlds, annex and slaughtered their populations and then sing another peace treaty so we can do it again. ( Nimbosa )". Tau are allowing Humans to live with them, but we simply don't know anything about them to speculate that Humans are living well ( there are even rumors about sterilization and such, but again - just rumors ).
And good that you saw that Chaos are evil, I was afraid you will present them as "good" guys...
About Chaos being evil, I'm not an idiot. That's actually why I play as Chaos Space Marines. Evil is fun. That's also why I think I might start an Imperial army.
1. Yeah, but not every race is a fanatic. That's like saying its okay to be a murderer because there are multiple murderers.
2. Those aliens lived in peace with them and the society was democratic, therefore the governor couldn't be trying to steal power. They destroyed them because they wanted more power. That's all.
3. Yes it does. You can't ignore fluff on the grounds that "There might be a reason that someone on this forum thought of." Its clearly racist and sexist.
4. Source please.
5. I'm not talking about factions, I'm talking about RACES. They believe they are racially superior and smarter and the galaxy belongs to them because of this. I hope you understand that this is not a good thing. This is a bad thing.
6. This is the one thing I was actually wrong on, I'll admit. The rest of my points are still valid. However I think I read somewhere (I believe the Tau codex, I'll have to check) that the Tau initially tried to be peaceful to humans and the Imperium responded badly, which caused the Tau to view them as enemies. Nevertheless I'm not completely sure about this so I'll have to check.
Evil already has won in 40k and humanity is doomed to die out thanks to the ignorance and corruption of it's leaders.
For now and perhaps the next few millenia ( or even just decades if the Golden Throne actually fails ) the Imperium of Man will subsist on an ever decreasing amount of knowledge
but one day this will no longer be enough and the Realm of Man will fall, and with it the entire galaxy ( or at least those parts which aren't Orks, Tyranids or Necrons ).
I saw it approached in a few posts but no one actually came out and said it- the OP is flawed because of the subjective nature of opinion. The concepts of "good" and "evil" are created by personal values, but those definitions become invalidated when presented by opinions to the contrary. I have cats as pets. Other people eat cats. Are those people evil? I may think so, but is my opinion unequivocal? No.
Skalk Bloodaxe wrote:I just read this entire thread. Wow.
I saw it approached in a few posts but no one actually came out and said it- the OP is flawed because of the subjective nature of opinion. The concepts of "good" and "evil" are created by personal values, but those definitions become invalidated when presented by opinions to the contrary. I have cats as pets. Other people eat cats. Are those people evil? I may think so, but is my opinion unequivocal? No.
Ah, the pleasures of moral relativism. Able to defend even the worst depravity with a hint towards the suposed subjectivity of morals.
The Imperium is evil by necessity, it acts according to realism and can't really be judged when compared to its peers.
Automatically Appended Next Post: A lot of the suffering it creates is not needless and I'd say much 'evil' that is perpetrated by the Imperium can be justified; few die needlessly.
An action ( rape, murder, robbery to name just some extreme forms ) which violates the universal morals and values on which all civilisation, independent of any specific culture, depend on.
You will find no culture on earth which condones the mentioned crimes outside of extreme situations ( mostly war ) because those who do would quickly fall apart.
If you are willing to eat cats, dogs, or ants is largely dependent on your cultural background. But the idea that you shouldn't murder/rape/rob your neighbour because you feel like it is pretty much universal.
Henners91 wrote:The Imperium is evil by necessity, it acts according to realism and can't really be judged when compared to its peers.
Automatically Appended Next Post: A lot of the suffering it creates is not needless and I'd say much 'evil' that is perpetrated by the Imperium can be justified; few die needlessly.
Chenkov.
"What's that? Creating strategies? Naw, too much work, I'm going to be remarkably inefficient and throw men at it until the problem goes away, and probably get a bunch of medals for it."
Henners91 wrote:The Imperium is evil by necessity, it acts according to realism and can't really be judged when compared to its peers.
Automatically Appended Next Post: A lot of the suffering it creates is not needless and I'd say much 'evil' that is perpetrated by the Imperium can be justified; few die needlessly.
I actualy deny the necessity of many of the Imperium's policies, especialy those born out of ignorance. Restricting knowledge and science to a small and highly conservative cast for example is detrimental to humanity's survival simply because this cast has not only failed to truly advance Imperial Technology in 10000 years ( with the exception of some minor "breaktroughs" like new ammo or a new tank variant or even a new warship design, if it isn't scrapped because some of it's kind were nicked by the forces of Chaos, which are without a doubt useful) but also, thanks to it's inherent jealousy and failure to spread knowledge so that it may never be lost, because it is not even able to protect the entirety of human knowledge as it was during the Emprah's rule.
Keeping entire populations in perpetual poverty with very little chance of any advancement does not make your society more efficient or stable. On the contrary, in a world where pretty seductive gods with a very real promises of very real power exist it will only create the foundation for unrest, civil war and, in the worst case, total destruction, which is bad for your production quotas.
I am going to say that evil wins some battles, but never wins the war.
Taking the Battle of the Fang into account. The plot by Magnus succeeds, the vengeance of the Thousand Sons is not. The Thousand Sons are so badly mauled afterwards, they never recover from their expenditure of manpower and equipment.
Let me rephrase my example to make it less a cultural issue and more of a clear definition of conceptual morality. I have cats as pets. Other people enjoy smashing kittens with large mallets as musical expression. Is it evil? I think so, but does my opinion make it so? No.
Let me rephrase my example to make it less a cultural issue and more of a clear definition of conceptual morality. I have cats as pets. Other people enjoy smashing kittens with large mallets as musical expression. Is it evil? I think so, but does my opinion make it so? No.
The only reason why you could ever argue that subjective is because kittens are, frankly, inferior creatures to humans.
To kill/rape/whatever a human, an "equal," is more objectively evil. Although, sometimes killing is arguably justified (Though not a good deed), rape never is.
Let me rephrase my example to make it less a cultural issue and more of a clear definition of conceptual morality. I have cats as pets. Other people enjoy smashing kittens with large mallets as musical expression. Is it evil? I think so, but does my opinion make it so? No.
The only reason why you could ever argue that subjective is because kittens are, frankly, inferior creatures to humans.
To kill/rape/whatever a human, an "equal," is more objectively evil. Although, sometimes killing is arguably justified (Though not a good deed), rape never is.
Aztecs routinely murdered captured members of other tribes, with the 'greater good' being that the blood sacrifice made the sun rise everyday.
Rape has, generally, always being viewed as a bad thing, but not always because it violated a woman's rights. Sometimes it was more concerned with how another man's "property" was treated.
Automatically Appended Next Post: And killing kittens, or any creature, could be seen as universally evil. I can't recall any civilisation throughout history where inflicting pain for the joy of inflicting pain, rather than justice/revenge/greed/information/purgation was ever accepted.
An action ( rape, murder, robbery to name just some extreme forms ) which violates the universal morals and values on which all civilisation, independent of any specific culture, depend on.
You will find no culture on earth which condones the mentioned crimes outside of extreme situations ( mostly war ) because those who do would quickly fall apart.
If you are willing to eat cats, dogs, or ants is largely dependent on your cultural background. But the idea that you shouldn't murder/rape/rob your neighbour because you feel like it is pretty much universal.
I think the important part of that statement is on earth. Given that there's no evidence that objective morality exists in 40k (as opposed to something like, say, D&D, where Good is something you can point to & experience), maybe it'd be worth examining the races according to their own moral codes. To the Eldar, for example, the survival of the race is the highest good (and really, that's not all that different from the people in this thread saying the Imperium's actions are justified by their circumstances), so every Eldar who picks up a gun against his Dark Eldar cousins is the worst sort of criminal. To the C'Tan, whose perspective is so removed from our own as to make them incompatible, killing (and yes, torturing) humans to feed isn't evil because, to mis-quote Dr Manhattan, the world's smartest human means no more to them than the world's smartest ant. The only faction we can really comment on the morality of is the Imperium, and in terms of making the galaxy good for humanity, they've failed for reasons articulated elsewhere in this thread. (As a thought-experiment, imagine if the Imperium weren't human - say, we were dealing with the Tau Imperium or whatever - but they acted exactly the same. There'd be no question as to whether or not they were evil.)
The C'tan aren't much worse than modern day humans. They kill people for food, same as we do to other animals. Our justification is that it's natural and humans have priority because we are more intelligent/special. Exactly the same reasons will support the C'tan, they have to eat and they are superior in everyway to any other creatures we have seen in the 40k setting. The Necrons on the other hand are evil- they joined the C'tan because of jealousy and now fight because they hate life.
quote for truth. They are just as bad as us saying, "oh i will have the steak rather than the cabbage because the steak tastes better."
Skalk Bloodaxe wrote:I just read this entire thread. Wow.
I saw it approached in a few posts but no one actually came out and said it- the OP is flawed because of the subjective nature of opinion. The concepts of "good" and "evil" are created by personal values, but those definitions become invalidated when presented by opinions to the contrary. I have cats as pets. Other people eat cats. Are those people evil? I may think so, but is my opinion unequivocal? No.
Concepts of good and evil are created by social values deriving from history, religion and the weight of opinion of the great majority of the population.
It is meaningless to talk about good and evil without consideration of the existing moral and ethical framework.
LoneLictor wrote:
About Chaos being evil, I'm not an idiot. That's actually why I play as Chaos Space Marines. Evil is fun. That's also why I think I might start an Imperial army.
1. Yeah, but not every race is a fanatic. That's like saying its okay to be a murderer because there are multiple murderers.
2. Those aliens lived in peace with them and the society was democratic, therefore the governor couldn't be trying to steal power. They destroyed them because they wanted more power. That's all.
3. Yes it does. You can't ignore fluff on the grounds that "There might be a reason that someone on this forum thought of." Its clearly racist and sexist.
4. Source please. ( Grey Knight codex, Fire and Honor, Courage and Honor, Warriors of Ultramar - you can find stories about defending already lost wolrd there )
5. I'm not talking about factions, I'm talking about RACES. They believe they are racially superior and smarter and the galaxy belongs to them because of this. I hope you understand that this is not a good thing. This is a bad thing.
6. This is the one thing I was actually wrong on, I'll admit. The rest of my points are still valid. However I think I read somewhere (I believe the Tau codex, I'll have to check) that the Tau initially tried to be peaceful to humans and the Imperium responded badly, which caused the Tau to view them as enemies. Nevertheless I'm not completely sure about this so I'll have to check.
The C'tan aren't much worse than modern day humans. They kill people for food, same as we do to other animals. Our justification is that it's natural and humans have priority because we are more intelligent/special. Exactly the same reasons will support the C'tan, they have to eat and they are superior in everyway to any other creatures we have seen in the 40k setting. The Necrons on the other hand are evil- they joined the C'tan because of jealousy and now fight because they hate life.
quote for truth. They are just as bad as us saying, "oh i will have the steak rather than the cabbage because the steak tastes better."
But a sun isn't Sentient, or even living really. There's a much larger gap between the two.
haloreach4ever wrote:A sun gives life to all planets in its system. destroy a sun and every world near it that relies on it dies.
True, but it doesn't really say how long it takes for a Ctan to drain a sun, or if this could be limited to unhinbited systems. What is know, is that they swapped to sentient species becuase they 'taste better'.
Ascalam wrote:
We are evil. Humanity as a whole are an evil, venal and self-serving race.
Not true, we can do amazing things also...
Like building the most beautiful things that exist ( Great Wall of China, Great Pyramids etc... ).
We can also prevent other lesser species to go into extermination ( Panda, Great Blue Whale, Gorillas...).
We can make mistakes, like draining the oil into the sea... But we can also correct most of them ( like Recycling used things or start using renewable energies instead of gas, oil and coal ).
If you basis of "we are evil" only goes for wars, individual requests and striping this planet of recourse....let me tell you - no race is perfect. But we are the one who can repair it's mistakes. And we are not evil as a whole as you think. If we are them our race would disappear in 1963 when both Gorbachev and Kennedy hold their fingers on the big red button.
And remember Vietnam war, how many people protest against it in US alone? In the end, US retreated because they lost people support in their own land, meaning that even average American is able to stand up and to protest against evil things his country is doing. Problem with Humanity as a whole is - we are race that follows it's leaders, regardless who they are ( just see Hitler and Stalin ). So we can be good, but that depends on how moral we are and who is leading us.
They are also part of Humanity. You want to say that they are evil as a whole to?
Brother Coa wrote:They are also part of Humanity. You want to say that they are evil as a whole to?
By the logic of this thread, yeah. There are Dark Eldar out there who weren't around for the Fall and who just want to get high all day. There are World Eaters who signed up with Khorne because all their battle-brothers were doing it. There are Tau who genuinely believe in the Greater Good and would be horrified if they found out about the whole widespread-mind-control thing. My understanding of the premise of the thread is we're judging species by their worst members.
And as for achievements, so what? The Eldar & Dark Eldar have all sorts of sophisticated tech and culture, does that justify their actions?
Brother Coa wrote:They are also part of Humanity. You want to say that they are evil as a whole to?
By the logic of this thread, yeah. There are Dark Eldar out there who weren't around for the Fall and who just want to get high all day.
There actually isn't any fluff to support that, so far as I can recall. Any pleasures that the Dark Eldar take part in eventually gets old and becomes mundane, which drives them to move on and commit ever more depraved and vile acts to get their rocks off.
There are World Eaters who signed up with Khorne because all their battle-brothers were doing it.
Given that the World Eaters were mind-fethed/surgically lobotomised when they joined so that they only found pleasure in killing, I actually feel sorry for a lot of them.
There are Tau who genuinely believe in the Greater Good and would be horrified if they found out about the whole widespread-mind-control thing.
The mind-control theory is not solid canon, by any real stretch, but it is a fun pet theory that does explain a fair bit.
Then again, no one is calling 'Humans' as an entire race evil. The proposed point was that the Imperium is evil, so it would be the Tau Empire, rather than every single Tau that would be adressed the same way. Same goes for the Chaos Legions, excluding the brothers that signed up becuase they were just going with the flow (though I still don't think that in itself is an excuse).
There are Tau who genuinely believe in the Greater Good and would be horrified if they found out about the whole widespread-mind-control thing.
The mind-control theory is not solid canon, by any real stretch, but it is a fun pet theory that does explain a fair bit.
I agree. Big time.
The mind control thing is based on like... 2 sentences that don't really say that, and tons upon tons of internet Tau hate shenanigans. The imperial dissection of a desceased Ethereal resolved that they have no psyker qualities, no additional pheromone glands... nothing. It may be hard to imagine to their puny human brains but... the Tau might actually like co-existing in relative peace.
There are Tau who genuinely believe in the Greater Good and would be horrified if they found out about the whole widespread-mind-control thing.
The mind-control theory is not solid canon, by any real stretch, but it is a fun pet theory that does explain a fair bit.
I agree. Big time.
The mind control thing is based on like... 2 sentences that don't really say that, and tons upon tons of internet Tau hate shenanigans. The imperial dissection of a desceased Ethereal resolved that they have no psyker qualities, no additional pheromone glands... nothing. It may be hard to imagine to their puny human brains but... the Tau might actually like co-existing in relative peace.
Yeah, fair enough, I was just trying to think of the worst thing we see the Tau doing.
There are Tau who genuinely believe in the Greater Good and would be horrified if they found out about the whole widespread-mind-control thing.
The mind-control theory is not solid canon, by any real stretch, but it is a fun pet theory that does explain a fair bit.
I agree. Big time.
The mind control thing is based on like... 2 sentences that don't really say that, and tons upon tons of internet Tau hate shenanigans. The imperial dissection of a desceased Ethereal resolved that they have no psyker qualities, no additional pheromone glands... nothing. It may be hard to imagine to their puny human brains but... the Tau might actually like co-existing in relative peace.
Actually, the dissection did quite the opposite. The initial conclusion of the person behind the dissection, and this was only a thoery on his part as he certainly never got a chance to confirm it, was that the unidentified glands could be phermone glands that extert or influence others. The Inquisitor ran with the half-baked theory and decided it was solid fact.
I like the confusion and lack of confirmation surrounding the area, depending on your personal preference Tau can be the thin ray of hope and sunshine in the Grimdark galaxy, or just another evil empire.
Additionally, it is implied that the Vespid leaders may be influenced by the tau helmets they wear.
On that note I would also have to point out that this particular book wants you to think Tau have feet instead of hooves, when the miniatures clearly tell a different story.
BL = not really canon.
Though I'm a fan of the mind control theory myself. Why? Because grimdark. I'm not a Tau hater (quite the opposite!), I just think it's more "interesting" if the Greater Good had this rather creepy aspect to it instead of the Tau being a bunch of interstellar whiteknights in a galaxy of terror.
Also, as far as I remember those vespid control helmets are Codex stuff, lending credence to the idea that the Tau generally are not averse to this idea. It's worth noting that something like this does not exist for, say, the Kroot, though, so I guess this partnership is a bit more honest (but still based on colonialism - think Europeans in Africa raising local troops for their wars).
KingDeath wrote:Keeping entire populations in perpetual poverty with very little chance of any advancement does not make your society more efficient or stable.
Local politics. The Imperium does not care whether or not the governor of a world invests in humanitarian advancements or not. Also, I actually believe the opposite is true. The more free-thinking/educated and bored (by not having to work all day) a society is, the more likely it is to rebel against a regime they're not entirely content with. It's all about hitting that precarious balance between "keeping them busy" and "letting millions die of hunger" that prevents revolt.
Especially concerning Chaos. Look at the Horus Heresy or the Birth of Slaanesh - both events happening in a society that was far more openminded than the Imperium we know today. Because Chaos knows how to exploit such things.
Lynata wrote:On that note I would also have to point out that this particular book wants you to think Tau have feet instead of hooves, when the miniatures clearly tell a different story.
BL = not really canon.
Though I'm a fan of the mind control theory myself. Why? Because grimdark. I'm not a Tau hater (quite the opposite!), I just think it's more "interesting" if the Greater Good had this rather creepy aspect to it instead of the Tau being a bunch of interstellar whiteknights in a galaxy of terror.
Also, as far as I remember those vespid control helmets are Codex stuff, lending credence to the idea that the Tau generally are not averse to this idea. It's worth noting that something like this does not exist for, say, the Kroot, though, so I guess this partnership is a bit more honest (but still based on colonialism - think Europeans in Africa raising local troops for their wars).
The relationship with the Kroot is a strange one, seeing that Kroot may fight for the Tau (pretty much for free) but will hire themselves out as mercenaries to pretty much everyone (that doesn't corrupt/enslave/eat/shoot on sight anyway).
Furthermore it is suggested that the pheremone glands of the Ethereals (if they do have them) may affect Tau, but are limited on their effect to other species. This explains why it was only a handful of fringe Imperial Words that defected, rather than a swathe of sectors.
Emperors Faithful wrote:The relationship with the Kroot is a strange one, seeing that Kroot may fight for the Tau (pretty much for free) but will hire themselves out as mercenaries to pretty much everyone (that doesn't corrupt/enslave/eat/shoot on sight anyway).
I think this could be explained by different tribes of the same species - some living under protection of the Tau, whilst others prefer to stay independent or have simply not been inducted into a sept yet. The ones fighting for the Tau may not do it for free as well, but rather than immediate "per mission" payment they might do it as some sort of honour debt because the Tau gave them weapons, food and other supplies?
Brother Coa wrote:German Empire supported AustroHungary. They saw Serbs as "lonely peasants good only to be killed and their land conquered". So to my point of view German Empire = evil.
My Bias Sense is tingling.
I understand that you're Serbian, but you have to get that your teaching of history is bound to be skewed by your upbringing. Believe me I have a Bolivian friend and there is no love lost between you two.
Basically, I don't know enough about it to so much as touch it with a 10-foot pole.
As for America, bringing to order to the world by choking the s*** out of it. People living there are good, country is beautiful and you can always succeed if you want. But their politicians are only concerned in ruling the world and telling other countries what to do, that's somewhat "evil" by common standards ( in fact, when I see America today I see many similarity's with former USSR when it comes to telling other countries what to do and to take shape in their politics ).
Corrupt/Douchebag Politicians? Tick.
Skewed worldview that places them at the centre of the universe? Tick.
I could go on, but you've basically described any given country in the world.
I really don't want to start a political debate in this thread, but the idea that Germany in 1914 was an innocent victim of circumstances outside its control is totally bunk. The Kaiser was an incompetent and the army and politicians were chomping at the bit to kick France and Russia in. Germany's alliance with Austria was entirely defensive, and they very well could've defused the situation or contained it to a much smaller war if they were not so intent on a second 1871. The idea that every country was equally intent on the war is wrong as well. Russia was in the process of modernizing and had no desire to fight in war it couldn't win, Britain was concerned pretty much with safeguarding its own holdings and ensuring free trade. Only France had any desire to war with Germany, and it was born primarily from the beating they had received 50 years previously and the desire to retake the stolen territory of Alsace. And no, Alsace-Lorraine was not "german" in 1870, they spoke a German dialect but they were by nationality French and had no desire to be incorporated into any German state. After its conquest, Alsace-Lorraine was, unlike every other German state, ruled as a conquered territory, directly from Berlin, and was even colonized by Germans from elsewhere in the Reich. Alsatians in 1913 were harshly reprimanded for so much as using "bonjour" as a greeting rather than "guten tag", and tellingly, after the war broke out they were almost entirely barred from serving anywhere where they might encounter French troops. My family was from and many still live in Wissembourg, I'm not just making things up here.
Basically, after the ousting of Bismarck, Germany was totally intent on making itself master of Europe and yes, is quite to blame for the bloodshed the was to follow. It wasn't "evil" in the sense that the Nazi state was, but a favorable comparison to Nazis isn't really much to take pride in.
the color purple wrote:
I'm not just making things up here.
Sorry, you did exactly that.
the color purple wrote:
Basically, after the ousting of Bismarck, Germany was totally intent on making itself master of Europe and yes, is quite to blame for the bloodshed the was to follow. It wasn't "evil" in the sense that the Nazi state was, but a favorable comparison to Nazis isn't really much to take pride in.
I see. Were back to the craPPy idea of "innocent" factions in a world war..
There is lots of evidence to point at the reasons behind those 2 wars and none of it suggests it was the doing of a single Nation.
But hey, easier to throw such black&white view in than really sticking with the topic that is 40k background / can evil win ?
Because you know, 40k isn't real life earth +38k years.
That's the best example of someone re-writing history (somehow ending up blaming Germany solely for WWI) that I've ever seen. And it happened immediately after a Mod gave a warning that things were drifting too far off topic.
Not true, we can do amazing things also...
Like building the most beautiful things that exist ( Great Wall of China, Great Pyramids etc... ). You must have some idea how many people died building those things. The pyramids are essentialy pointless- thousands died so pharoah could have a nice burial
We can also prevent other lesser species to go into extermination ( Panda, Great Blue Whale, Gorillas...). "lesser species" shows exactly what he was saying. We have no reason to believe we can claim whatever we like but we arrogantly believe it's our right to this planet. Look at why those species became endangered- hint it's usually us.
We can make mistakes, like draining the oil into the sea... But we can also correct most of them ( like Recycling used things or start using renewable energies instead of gas, oil and coal ). Resolving problems we cause isn't really a positive. It's just being less bad
If you basis of "we are evil" only goes for wars, individual requests and striping this planet of recourse....let me tell you - no race is perfect. But we are the one who can repair it's mistakes. And we are not evil as a whole as you think. If we are them our race would disappear in 1963 when both Gorbachev and Kennedy hold their fingers on the big red button.
And remember Vietnam war, how many people protest against it in US alone? In the end, US retreated because they lost people support in their own land, meaning that even average American is able to stand up and to protest against evil things his country is doing. Problem with Humanity as a whole is - we are race that follows it's leaders, regardless who they are ( just see Hitler and Stalin ). So we can be good, but that depends on how moral we are and who is leading us. Which species are you comapring us to? We are the only sapient species- you have nothing to compare us to. People protest against "evil" when it suits them, as soon as it negatively impacts them they conviently look the other way. How many people suffer so we can heave cheaper clothes/food? Even when people know they are using immorral means to get what they want if they can't see it with their own eyes they can ignore it.
Also those who suffer making cheap clothes are often not making cheap clothes but making £70 shoes of which only 20p goes to the maker! These people are having to make items of clothing every two minuets or so for tiny amounts of pay. This is not right, do the world a favor and buy fairtrade clothing!
I am just saying that dogs still kill cats, cat;s still kill mouse and Lions still eat zebras and let baby Zebras to die over their parent's bodies. And then you have Elephant crushing the anthills, spider immobilizing then sucking it's victim alive and numerous other examples of race not being perfect...
And why don't we have the rights to this planet? Is there someone else with copyrights
Automatically Appended Next Post:
4M2A wrote:
Not true, we can do amazing things also...
Like building the most beautiful things that exist ( Great Wall of China, Great Pyramids etc... ). You must have some idea how many people died building those things. The pyramids are essentialy pointless- thousands died so pharoah could have a nice burial Ok, bad example. How about: Statue of Liberty, Hovers Dam, Big Ben, Eiffel Tower, Voyager 10...
We can also prevent other lesser species to go into extermination ( Panda, Great Blue Whale, Gorillas...). "lesser species" shows exactly what he was saying. We have no reason to believe we can claim whatever we like but we arrogantly believe it's our right to this planet. Look at why those species became endangered- hint it's usually us. They are "lesser" because they have no sentience and can't do anything to prevent their extinction, we can.
We can make mistakes, like draining the oil into the sea... But we can also correct most of them ( like Recycling used things or start using renewable energies instead of gas, oil and coal ). Resolving problems we cause isn't really a positive. It's just being less bad No, that's just taking the responsibility for our mistakes and trying to correct it.
If you basis of "we are evil" only goes for wars, individual requests and striping this planet of recourse....let me tell you - no race is perfect. But we are the one who can repair it's mistakes. And we are not evil as a whole as you think. If we are them our race would disappear in 1963 when both Gorbachev and Kennedy hold their fingers on the big red button.
And remember Vietnam war, how many people protest against it in US alone? In the end, US retreated because they lost people support in their own land, meaning that even average American is able to stand up and to protest against evil things his country is doing. Problem with Humanity as a whole is - we are race that follows it's leaders, regardless who they are ( just see Hitler and Stalin ). So we can be good, but that depends on how moral we are and who is leading us. Which species are you comapring us to? We are the only sapient species- you have nothing to compare us to. People protest against "evil" when it suits them, as soon as it negatively impacts them they conviently look the other way. How many people suffer so we can heave cheaper clothes/food? Even when people know they are using immortal means to get what they want if they can't see it with their own eyes they can ignore it. Sentience have nothing to do with instincts, and all instincts are evil - Human ones included. But we can chose not to go that way and instead try the different one. And people can also choose to decide the outcome of something big. And our moral concence usually make us to go in the less "evil" way possible.
Animals have to eat. How is an elephant treading on an anthill evil- it doesn't have any idea what it's doing. Evil isn't about what you have to do, it's about what you choose to do. Most animals (there are exceptions) only kill for food, or in accidents. Even if animals could live without killing they couldn't choose to. They behave on instinct- they don't understand what killing something means other than that it gives them a meal. The difference is that we have both the ability to comprehend the sufering we cause and the means to stop it but still don't.
When you call animals lesser you are focusing on qualities that make us look better. We could equaly focus on physical ability, lack of destruction cause, ect.. That would put us nowhere near the top. Just because our favoured traits suit us doesn't make us better.
Taking repsonsibility isn't good - it's expected. If I kill someone then plead guilty and go to prison for it i'm not being nice i'm just not so bad.
Instincts aren't bad they just are. Morals can only be applied to choices. Without instincts there would be less evil action but there would also be no living species. Instinct keeps us alive.
4M2A wrote:Animals have to eat. How is an elephant treading on an anthill evil- it doesn't have any idea what it's doing. Evil isn't about what you have to do, it's about what you choose to do. Most animals (there are exceptions) only kill for food, or in accidents. Even if animals could live without killing they couldn't choose to. They behave on instinct- they don't understand what killing something means other than that it gives them a meal. The difference is that we have both the ability to comprehend the sufering we cause and the means to stop it but still don't.
Exactly my point, we can chose not to do that while animals can't. In the end it's all up to the individual, if one redneck torture bunny to death you can't say: "Humanity is evil as a whole". We kill for the food to but some adapt and eat only vegetables. We even have our own animals to eat ( still less evil then eat down the whole ecosystem ). And we protect endangered species by law. And so on...
And can you truly say that Humans are still evil as a whole?
Brother Coa wrote:
And why don't we have the rights to this planet? Is there someone else with copyrights
+1
We ARE the superior race. And we ARE the most evil. To my knowledge no other species commits acts of cruelty for fun and no other species has killed trillions of life forms (other than insects).
We will either Destroy ourselves or Expand and grow into space.
4M2A wrote:
When you call animals lesser you are focusing on qualities that make us look better. We could equaly focus on physical ability, lack of destruction cause, ect.. That would put us nowhere near the top. Just because our favoured traits suit us doesn't make us better.
Taking repsonsibility isn't good - it's expected. If I kill someone then plead guilty and go to prison for it i'm not being nice i'm just not so bad. That's our law system and we have nothing to argue about that.
Instincts aren't bad they just are. Morals can only be applied to choices. Without instincts there would be less evil action but there would also be no living species. Instinct keeps us alive.
Still, this doesn't sing the entire race as "evil" - only individuals. And majority of people alive today will do the quite oposite of our "evil" instincts. No matter if we know we will die.
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ChocolateGork wrote:
+1
We ARE the superior race. And we ARE the most evil. To my knowledge no other species commits acts of cruelty for fun and no other species has killed trillions of life forms (other than insects).
We will either Destroy ourselves or Expand and grow into space.
I think that other option is more plausible... since our "good" side won't let us destroy ourselves...
And yes, individuals are evil while majority is trying to comprehend. We have done all that but that is the price of sentience.
4M2A wrote:Animals have to eat. How is an elephant treading on an anthill evil- it doesn't have any idea what it's doing. Evil isn't about what you have to do, it's about what you choose to do. Most animals (there are exceptions) only kill for food, or in accidents. Even if animals could live without killing they couldn't choose to. They behave on instinct- they don't understand what killing something means other than that it gives them a meal. The difference is that we have both the ability to comprehend the sufering we cause and the means to stop it but still don't.
Exactly my point, we can chose not to do that while animals can't. In the end it's all up to the individual, if one redneck torture bunny to death you can't say: "Humanity is evil as a whole". We kill for the food to but some adapt and eat only vegetables. We even have our own animals to eat ( still less evil then eat down the whole ecosystem ). And we protect endangered species by law. And so on...
And can you truly say that Humans are still evil as a whole?
We COULD live entirely sustainably and kill only the necessary amount of lifeforms. But we DONT. We CHOOSE to kill trillions of lifeforms in excess. Those who don't actively participate in this still CHOOSE to use the luxurys that needlessly cost the lives of creatures and the health of our planet. Every evil figure in history has made a choice to do what they did. And so did many of there followers.
ChocolateGork wrote:
Humans ARE the only EVIL in the world.
Your point?
Like I said, with sentience comes a price. Every other animal would do the same if they have sentience. Other do the same thing with other animals but they are forgiven because they have no sentience...
We are EVIL but we can do GOOD things. And we usually do more GOOD then EVIL.
I think that other option is more plausible... since our "good" side won't let us destroy ourselves...
And yes, individuals are evil while majority is trying to comprehend. We have done all that but that is the price of sentience.
We have proven countless times that our ''good side'' is not the dominant side. It is FAR more likely that we will blow ourselves up (possibly literally) and the race will fail without intergalactic expansion.
I can see that you are the one of those: "the doom is near" guys...
We have that chance in 1963 and we chose not to...
And instead of sitting down and typing : "We are so evil that even Satan is a little kid compared to us" why don't you do to make our race look better? Like voluntarism or apply for "save the nature" jobs...?
ChocolateGork wrote:
Humans ARE the only EVIL in the world.
Your point?
Like I said, with sentience comes a price. Every other animal would do the same if they have sentience. Other do the same thing with other animals but they are forgiven because they have no sentience...
We are EVIL but we can do GOOD things. And we usually do more GOOD then EVIL.
Example? What POSITIVE influences have we had on anyone but OURSELVES.
And if other creatures were FULLY sentient then none of them would have the physical capabilities to do what we have done. So NO-ONE has any idea how they would evolve.
Even if we do expand intp space it isn't proof of our good side. We will expand into space because it has some resource we want. So far all we have succeeded in doing is surviving our bad side.
Brother Coa wrote:I can see that you are the one of those: "the doom is near" guys...
We have that chance in 1963 and we chose not to...
And instead of sitting down and typing : "We are so evil that even Satan is a little kid compared to us" why don't you do to make our race look better? Like voluntarism or apply for "save the nature" jobs...?
I cant make our race look better when we don't do anything good. Like 4M2A said repairing (and only a TINY bit in most cases) doesnt make us good. It makes us less evil.
We did not choose to blow ourselves up in the 60's becuase no-one involved wanted to die. The negatives of launching missiles FAR outweighed the positives for both sides.
You so far have provided no evidence to show my beliefs and statements are not fact.
Not does point to that we are evil and we are going to destroy the universe...
We would expand because we must. Because this planet is beginning to be to small for us.
And the faster we get into it the better....
They are better but they aren't undoing all of the damage one by the energy used, all the suffering of people in other countries caused by their society, ect...
4M2A wrote:Even if we do expand intp space it isn't proof of our good side. We will expand into space because it has some resource we want. So far all we have succeeded in doing is surviving our bad side.
Surviving ourselves and giving All we have to the galaxy.
ChocolateGork wrote:
I cant make our race look better when we don't do anything good. Like 4M2A said repairing (and only a TINY bit in most cases) doesnt make us good. It makes us less evil.
We did not choose to blow ourselves up in the 60's becuase no-one involved wanted to die. The negatives of launching missiles FAR outweighed the positives for both sides.
You so far have provided no evidence to show my beliefs and statements are not fact.
I did, you told me that this was just "Resolving problems we cause isn't really a positive. It's just being less bad." So by you 2 we are "evil" even when we are trying to bew "good".
Why am I then debating with you when I can't prove to you anything? And if you hate Humans so much, then do us all a favor and shoot yourself and try to be a bunny or a fish in your next life...
Brother Coa wrote:Not does point to that we are evil and we are going to destroy the universe...
We would expand because we must. Because this planet is beginning to be to small for us.
And the faster we get into it the better....
The faster we get into it the faster we will do the exact same thing to everything we can.
And the only way we will be stopped after enough successful expansion is through the encountering of a BIGGER BETTER alien race (which statistically SHOULD be out there) or through our genetic code evolving and mutating in a BAD way that we cant fix.
ChocolateGork wrote:
I cant make our race look better when we don't do anything good. Like 4M2A said repairing (and only a TINY bit in most cases) doesnt make us good. It makes us less evil.
We did not choose to blow ourselves up in the 60's becuase no-one involved wanted to die. The negatives of launching missiles FAR outweighed the positives for both sides.
You so far have provided no evidence to show my beliefs and statements are not fact.
I did, you told me that this was just "Resolving problems we cause isn't really a positive. It's just being less bad." So by you 2 we are "evil" even when we are trying to bew "good".
Why am I then debating with you when I can't prove to you anything? And if you hate Humans so much, then do us all a favor and shoot yourself and try to be a bunny or a fish in your next life...
I don't hate humans. I love my life and and perfectly happy contributing to the destruction of my planet and the races around me becuase i know that MY decision would change NOTHING in the grand scheme of things.
You just cant seem to accept that you are more evil than any life form on the planet other than some humans. You KILL by choosing to use the internet and sleep in a bed and wear clothes and eat meat. Through doing these things you ARE committing acts of evil.
Maybe not acts of GREAT of evil but evil all the same. And i doubt you have done NEARLY enough good to make up for the bad you have done, although even if you had it still wouldn't make you good.
I just hope i can live my life and have fun (And never die but that's not so likely ) without having to go through the world adjusting to the depletion of oil or having to live through a great war. Sadly i will probably be present in this world for both these events.
I don't hate humans. I love my life and and perfectly happy contributing to the destruction of my planet and the races around me becuase i know that MY decision would change NOTHING in the grand scheme of things.
You just cant seem to accept that you are more evil than any life form on the planet other than some humans. You KILL by choosing to use the internet and sleep in a bed and wear clothes and eat meat. Through doing these things you ARE committing acts of evil.
Maybe not acts of GREAT of evil but evil all the same. And i doubt you have done NEARLY enough good to make up for the bad you have done, although even if you had it still wouldn't make you good.
I just hope i can live my life and have fun (And never die but that's not so likely ) without having to go through the world adjusting to the depletion of oil or having to live through a great war. Sadly i will probably be present in this world for both these events.
Thank you very much, now nothing good exist in this existence since EVERY LIVING THING is done something evil in it's life. You are taking this bad - good thinkg WAY seriously. And don't vorry, we will live in either Fallout or in Madmax or in Star Trek byt heend of this century...
Back to the topic:
It depends on which factions you view as evil. The IoM could be considered evil, in which case evil has won trillions of times, but is now losing. You could see Orks as evil, in which case evil is winning. You could think Orks are simply victims of their nature, and are neutral, and DE are evil. Therefore evil is winning or losing, depending on how you see their situation.
It all depends on who's writing it.
Has kicked the planet Armagheddon in the goolies multiple times, entire chapters of space marines and legions of titans and billions of imperial guard are trying to hold him back from swamping the Imperium... because he already won and decided to play the game over again!
He let his nemesis live, to provide more sport. Yarrick was defeated and then released again because it pleased The Profit (waaagh be upon Him) of Gork n Mork to keep at it.
Has kicked the planet Armagheddon in the goolies multiple times, entire chapters of space marines and legions of titans and billions of imperial guard are trying to hold him back from swamping the Imperium... because he already won and decided to play the game over again!
He let his nemesis live, to provide more sport. Yarrick was defeated and then released again because it pleased The Profit (waaagh be upon Him) of Gork n Mork to keep at it.
But Ghazghkull is an Ork and is doing only what his instincts tell him to do. Ork society is based around war and is the only thing they know. Is it really evil of them to follow what their genetics teach them?
TrollPie wrote:But Ghazghkull is an Ork and is doing only what his instincts tell him to do. Ork society is based around war and is the only thing they know. Is it really evil of them to follow what their genetics teach them?
"Evil" often lies in the eye of the beholder - given that we as readers are humans, I'm assuming we're applying our own morality.
Also, I don't think it is just instinct that tells the Orks to gouge out their prisoners' eyes and hack off their hands just to send a message... There's a certain sadistic methodology behind that. Else we can also excuse everything the IoM does because fear is an instinct as well.
TrollPie wrote:But Ghazghkull is an Ork and is doing only what his instincts tell him to do. Ork society is based around war and is the only thing they know. Is it really evil of them to follow what their genetics teach them?
Ghazghkuull is a bit exceptional, Ork instinct essentially makes them want to foit all the time, but Ghaz has greater ambition than that, he wants to crush the galaxy under his heel, and under Orky rule. So, Ghazghkuull could possibly be considered "evil."
Also, can this stupid pseudo-philosophical morality debate end? It was kind of amusing for a short while, now it's just boring. And please don't let religion into it.
ChocolateGork wrote:
I cant make our race look better when we don't do anything good. Like 4M2A said repairing (and only a TINY bit in most cases) doesnt make us good. It makes us less evil.
We did not choose to blow ourselves up in the 60's becuase no-one involved wanted to die. The negatives of launching missiles FAR outweighed the positives for both sides.
You so far have provided no evidence to show my beliefs and statements are not fact.
I did, you told me that this was just "Resolving problems we cause isn't really a positive. It's just being less bad." So by you 2 we are "evil" even when we are trying to bew "good".
Why am I then debating with you when I can't prove to you anything? And if you hate Humans so much, then do us all a favor and shoot yourself and try to be a bunny or a fish in your next life...
I don't hate humans. I love my life and and perfectly happy contributing to the destruction of my planet and the races around me becuase i know that MY decision would change NOTHING in the grand scheme of things.
You just cant seem to accept that you are more evil than any life form on the planet other than some humans. You KILL by choosing to use the internet and sleep in a bed and wear clothes and eat meat. Through doing these things you ARE committing acts of evil.
Maybe not acts of GREAT of evil but evil all the same. And i doubt you have done NEARLY enough good to make up for the bad you have done, although even if you had it still wouldn't make you good.
I just hope i can live my life and have fun (And never die but that's not so likely ) without having to go through the world adjusting to the depletion of oil or having to live through a great war. Sadly i will probably be present in this world for both these events.
You do realize that this in bold is the mentality that what is killing our race, because so many people think this way. They are content with being insignificant enough not to matter even though they realize something is wrong. This underscoring of your actual value will only lead to the stagnation of the things around you. You call your race evil and see a problem, but instead of working against it you embrace and become it. This attitude disgusts me.
To be fair there isn't much he could do. I do my best but it's pretty hard to sell the idea that we need to disregard all the "advancements" we have made in the last 300 years or we are going to die.
One thing we humans are good at is closing our eyes are pretending we didn't notice when presented with a choice where neither option is good. It's all good recycling and reducing our energy uses but it isn't ever going to make that much of a difference (not to take it away from people who do- at least you try). There isn't much the normal person can do while people burn acres of rainforest each day and others search for new ways to kill each other more efficiently. It's human nature to be selfish there isn't much we can do about it- our instincts tell us to care for ourselves and those we relate to over others. As I said I do try to point out to people what they are doing but they don't want to hear it. They either say i'm lying or claim it's our right to up this world and that they don't care. People will only care when it starts to affect them by which time it's too late.
Well this thread is remarkable... some people seem to believe everything they say is absolute truth, and won't take "maybe it isn't" for an answer
On topic: every codex includes instances where 'good' (I'll get to that in a minute) guys lose. Hell, so do a lot of the novels.
Now, defining ANY race as 'good' in 40k really is just absolute nonsense. IoM? No way anyone could consider them the good guys. That would involve ignoring pretty much everything they do, attempted genocide being the least of it.
Eldar? The Eldar do what they do to get what they want, and will do seemingly anything to achieve their own ends. They want the Imperium to leave that sacred planet of theirs? It's not like they ask them politely to leave every few years.
Tau? Nice "join us or else" philosophy they generally have, not to mention suspected use of mind control (vespid, ethereals) and other rather unpleasant things.
Seriously, there is no good or evil only a point of view. Especially so in the 40k universe. And in the 40k universe, everyone loses
Beregond wrote:Well this thread is remarkable... some people seem to believe everything they say is absolute truth, and won't take "maybe it isn't" for an answer
On topic: every codex includes instances where 'good' (I'll get to that in a minute) guys lose. Hell, so do a lot of the novels.
Now, defining ANY race as 'good' in 40k really is just absolute nonsense. IoM? No way anyone could consider them the good guys. That would involve ignoring pretty much everything they do, attempted genocide being the least of it.
Eldar? The Eldar do what they do to get what they want, and will do seemingly anything to achieve their own ends. They want the Imperium to leave that sacred planet of theirs? It's not like they ask them politely to leave every few years.
Tau? Nice "join us or else" philosophy they generally have, not to mention suspected use of mind control (vespid, ethereals) and other rather unpleasant things.
Seriously, there is no good or evil only a point of view. Especially so in the 40k universe. And in the 40k universe, everyone loses
I hope the irony was intentional. I thought "Oh look, it's one of those guys who thinks he has a higher understanding, and he's going to repeat the arguments other people have made to appear clever". I think I was on the money.
Although, I have to agree with the "there is no good or evil" belief. If both are absolutes at either ends of a scale, with neutral in the middle, then the Tau, Eldar, and Imperium are on that scale, perhaps with the Tau closer to Good than all others. You have Orkz and Tyranids in the middle in my opinion, and you Chaos and the C'tan on the Evil side. The Dark Eldar are different from the others. They drain the souls of others to keep theirs topped up, so to speak, but they also torture and kill for their own pleasure.
I will honestly say I didn't read the entire thread and I am not trying to appear clever - I am stating my opinion and pointing out that people should be open to the views of others. This was mainly intended as a response to some of the things I've seen being said on the last couple of pages that are, simply put, people being incredibly offensive over what amounts to a difference of opinion
I just think sometimes people need to calm down, sit back and actually read what people are saying to them.
I agree with you on roughly where you place them in the good-evil scheme of things, but also think people need to understand that these are all pretty much biased views
iproxtaco wrote:Chaos, the primordial force in the Warp, has won the setting. Eternal War to feed them.
Orks have won. To quote an Ork, translated in normal English:
We always win. When we win a fight, we win. If we run away, we run away so we can go back another time to win, see? If we die, it doesnt count, because we die fighting!
And mind, Orks have won from the warp IMHO. They can fire Snotlings trough the warp and back in a few seconds? Awsome!
iproxtaco wrote:Chaos, the primordial force in the Warp, has won the setting. Eternal War to feed them.
I wouldn't say won, more like winning. They haven't won because it's still possible for them to lose, say if the Necrons close the warp. Or Gray Knights start using Draigos DNA for Geneseeds instead of Big E's
Ok, trying to avoid the pseudo-philosophy and just answer the question...
Has anyone mentioned the Word Bearers series? The first book is a total curbstomp in favor of chaos.
Picked it up because i was playing Word Bearers at the time, thought it would be nice to see them win a few battles. Eventually it became so one-sided, that i learned not to get too attached to any of the imperial characters.
And it sometimes lets you briefly think that the imperials are going to accomplish something, which just makes it worse when they die horribly.
The imperial commander personally takes out a defiler with a meltagun? Awesome! Oh, but five seconds later a terminator stomps him to death, presumably taking the time to skin him and make a fashionable hat.
Alright, time to get serious. The imperials are making a counter charge with a line of leman russes. Nope, a land raider runs over them like a monster truck.
My opinion, about 40k is there are no "good" guys. All of them kill,burn and again kill. Kill for the Emperor, kill for the Greater Good, Kill for Chaos and so on...
Emperors Faithful wrote:I don't see why Necrons are on the side of Disorder. After all, what could be more neat and organised than a complete absence of all life?
I guess it is because they want to kill every living cell in the galaxy...
And that is pretty evil...
Emperors Faithful wrote:I don't see why Necrons are on the side of Disorder. After all, what could be more neat and organised than a complete absence of all life?
I guess it is because they want to kill every living cell in the galaxy...
And that is pretty evil...
Oh evil, most certainly.
But very well ordered at least. We have enough clutter around the galaxy as it is.
Added to which, the Imperiums only sort of a force of Order. I always assumed there was massive corruption in the Imperium, to the point where while they talk about law and order, a lot of the time the law is what the local authorities say it is.
1. Coa where did you see that?
2. Imperium is very loosely available to Order. If they draw good and evil lines so poorly for that MMO gaks going to sink fast.
Varrick wrote:1. Coa where did you see that?
2. Imperium is very loosely available to Order. If they draw good and evil lines so poorly for that MMO gaks going to sink fast.
They should nto draw the lines. Every faction think ther are good according to their belief. And in the apocalyptic world of 40k, that means taht those who do not beleive are meant to be either turned or destroyed (or eaten alive by tyrranids). If you like the IoM than they are good and all other races are evil-ish. The evil level of the other races is jsut not as high.
so for the IoM point of view
evil: eldar, necron, tyrranids, orks, and other non warp rpeaching faction
super evil never talk to them except to smack talk them: Traitor legions, Dark eldar
So, the "evil" races can be talked to (except tyrranids but they arent evil, they just eat ..., everything). Necrons, eldar and even ork IIRC have been seen fighting alongside to killa common enemy. But NEVER will you see a traitor legion fight alongside a loyalist chapter.
So for eldar, the super evil would be dark eldars and so on (orks just dont care, a fight is a fight, lol)
Varrick wrote:1. Coa where did you see that?
2. Imperium is very loosely available to Order. If they draw good and evil lines so poorly for that MMO gaks going to sink fast.
They should nto draw the lines. Every faction think ther are good according to their belief. And in the apocalyptic world of 40k, that means taht those who do not beleive are meant to be either turned or destroyed (or eaten alive by tyrranids). If you like the IoM than they are good and all other races are evil-ish. The evil level of the other races is jsut not as high.
so for the IoM point of view
evil: eldar, necron, tyrranids, orks, and other non warp rpeaching faction
super evil never talk to them except to smack talk them: Traitor legions, Dark eldar
So, the "evil" races can be talked to (except tyrranids but they arent evil, they just eat ..., everything). Necrons, eldar and even ork IIRC have been seen fighting alongside to killa common enemy. But NEVER will you see a traitor legion fight alongside a loyalist chapter.
So for eldar, the super evil would be dark eldars and so on (orks just dont care, a fight is a fight, lol)
For the game I think they will have to draw a line, or the game will be frantic with too many factions. They also never said good vs. evil. It's Order VS. Disorder with those descriptions it is easier to explain temporary alliances which are plausible in 40K.
For the game I think they will have to draw a line, or the game will be frantic with too many factions. They also never said good vs. evil. It's Order VS. Disorder with those descriptions it is easier to explain temporary alliances which are plausible in 40K.
yeah but they are temporary, an IG commander just wait for the common enemy to be defeated to back stab his temporary ally. I just would not see it working with the 40k fans
I believe every single BL book begins with "to live in these times is to live in the most brutal regime imaginable". Imperium sounds like a happy place to me.
Yes, Ultramar is the best place to live and exists soley to be a contrast for the hellhole that is the rest of the IoM. That way they can know how crappy they are.
They win quite a lot.
Every battle entry for Sisterhoods on Lexicanum is full of their victories. Except the Order of Our Martyred lady, who get almost their entire order killed defending a Catedral on Armageddon.
Good wins all the time but evil wins in a different way - by growing stronger due to battle emotions, tactics and everything...
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coolyo294 wrote:
Brother Coa wrote:Oh com one guys, it's not that bad...
I would like to live on Cadia if I could.
... WHY?!
2 things:
1. I love military, I would certainly enjoy at Cadia...
2. If I get bored I can go across the street and fight Daemons and traitors
coolyo294 wrote:So you would enjoy Cultists, Mutants, Titans, Demons, and Chaos Marines trying to kill you all day, every day for the rest of your life?
No, I would enjoy killing THEM in the Emperor's name every day until the rest of my life.
You should read Eisenhorn. Cadia is not the place to go to avoid boredom. You can get stuck on guard duty for 50 years. As much as movies make wars exciting real military life is full of loooooong stretches of boredom.
KamikazeCanuck wrote:You should read Eisenhorn. Cadia is not the place to go to avoid boredom. You can get stuck on guard duty for 50 years. As much as movies make wars exciting real military life is full of loooooong stretches of boredom.
Melissia wrote:Evil wins all the time. A better question: Do Sisters ever win?
There was this one time in Faith and Fire...
Other than that, they tend to be the Redshirt Army for whatever scenario if guardsmen don't apply. Even their codex is full of their matyrdom/failure-by-awesome.
Emperors Faithful wrote:
Other than that, they tend to be the Redshirt Army for whatever scenario if guardsmen don't apply. Even their codex is full of their matyrdom/failure-by-awesome.
And this is just the opposite of the way they are presenting them: "Last to come, but most to be feared were the Sisters of Battle. Holy maidens and barres of the God-Emperor's faith."
Even I am afraid when playing against them because those Celestians are HARD to kill and they make vehicles like Baneblade a child's play...not to mention that they kill infantry with erase with those melta's.
But people hate them simply because they are all WOMAN. Because people think that the only place for woman in this world is kitchen...
I so LOL-ed when I hear that the Tau were searching for "Sister's technology" , Silly Tau....
Well according to Relic Imperial Guard kicked them ( Stubbs finally found those lose 100 Baneblades ), and I am sure that surviving Sisters were taken care by Guardsman and then sent to the nearest Shrine world.
I just heard the Blood Ravens are considered to have lost the game (revealed in DoW2?), but not who actually won it. I don't think Stubbs - as cool as he was - ever really had a chance. Sisters showing up basically means that whoever beats them draws the ire of the entire Ministorum, and the Blood Ravens are the only Imperials I could see of standing the heat on account of having the usual Astartes "get out of pyre free"-card. But some smalltime border world IG regiment? Well, I guess they could still hope that the matter gets buried in Red Tape.
(not that I expect the DoW story having any larger relevance on GW canon - though I think the Blood Ravens are considered a canon Chapter now - but it'd be nice if its history would reflect the way how Imperial politics work)
And yeah, that bit about looking for technology made me snicker. :]
KamikazeCanuck wrote:You should read Eisenhorn. Cadia is not the place to go to avoid boredom. You can get stuck on guard duty for 50 years. As much as movies make wars exciting real military life is full of loooooong stretches of boredom.
Yeah......
I wouldn't call that boring
Do you really think that you're going to have enough extra time to do stuff like that on Cadia?
In the original Starship Troopers, the Mobile Infantry wore power armor. It was, in fact, the very first time the concept of power armor (as we would recognize it) was presented in science fiction.
Emperors Faithful wrote:
Other than that, they tend to be the Redshirt Army for whatever scenario if guardsmen don't apply. Even their codex is full of their matyrdom/failure-by-awesome.
And this is just the opposite of the way they are presenting them: "Last to come, but most to be feared were the Sisters of Battle. Holy maidens and barres of the God-Emperor's faith."
Please point out to me somewhere were the Sisters actually outright won in fluff.
"Saint Aspira, eighteenth Canoness of the Order, led them against the heretic Denescura and liberated almost a hundred worlds from his power with only a thousand warriors. The Cloak of St. Aspira, worn by the Canoness in life, remains as a holy relic of the order"
"Order of the Sacred Rose - During a War of Faith against the Demagogues of the Second Halo Schism, the order broke the defenses at the Palace of Radiance, securing a victory which saw heretics burning on pyres twenty meters high."
"Order of Our Martyred Lady - Though records are incomplete, it is believed that the Order of Our Martyred Lady was the force that invaded the Saint Garrat Scriptorum at the order of Inquisitor Tannenburg and brought hundreds of Adeptus Terra scribes to Nemesis Tessera excruciation chambers before razing the scriptorum with fire. Complaints lodged were quickly withdrawn when Tannenburg produced the scribes, dead, in specimen jars with their mutations laid bare and easily apparent."
"Order of the Valorous Heart - Several squads of the Order suppressed a mutant rebellion on Sepheris Secundus at the behest of the Inquisition."
"Order of the Argent Shroud - Canoness Preceptor Chrisima led a Preceptory of the order on Charak to cleanse its streets of mutants by Flamer at the command of the Confessor Petasus."
See also 3'rd war for Armageddon...and they lost in Soulstorm to Imperial Guard ( 100 Baneblades are 100 Baneblades ).
Generally though the SoB are like Orks. They always win, if they "lose" they're just martyred in the Emperor's name leading to improved morale in other SoB who will return to fight later.
"Saint Aspira, eighteenth Canoness of the Order, led them against the heretic Denescura and liberated almost a hundred worlds from his power with only a thousand warriors. The Cloak of St. Aspira, worn by the Canoness in life, remains as a holy relic of the order"
"Order of the Sacred Rose - During a War of Faith against the Demagogues of the Second Halo Schism, the order broke the defenses at the Palace of Radiance, securing a victory which saw heretics burning on pyres twenty meters high."
"Order of Our Martyred Lady - Though records are incomplete, it is believed that the Order of Our Martyred Lady was the force that invaded the Saint Garrat Scriptorum at the order of Inquisitor Tannenburg and brought hundreds of Adeptus Terra scribes to Nemesis Tessera excruciation chambers before razing the scriptorum with fire. Complaints lodged were quickly withdrawn when Tannenburg produced the scribes, dead, in specimen jars with their mutations laid bare and easily apparent."
"Order of the Valorous Heart - Several squads of the Order suppressed a mutant rebellion on Sepheris Secundus at the behest of the Inquisition."
"Order of the Argent Shroud - Canoness Preceptor Chrisima led a Preceptory of the order on Charak to cleanse its streets of mutants by Flamer at the command of the Confessor Petasus."
I know all these examples. And they're all of them beating the crap out of rebels, something the Guard barely has any sort of problem with. Not once did they defeat any of the other factions at play in the Imperium. Frankly I didn't even think these counted.
Orks? They curbstomped a shrineworld with sisters present(two if you include Imperial Armour).
Deamons? They kill sisters in one piece of fluff, in another they do half the job and Grey Knights mop up the rest.
Grey Knights? See above.
Necrons? First victim.
Tyranids. Eat several shrineworlds, two of which had a mission present. Also eaten in the Caiphas Cain novel. In a short story about the last Chancers some sisters are mentioned, and they actually end up surviving. But this is only due to the last chancer's badassery, and Sisters are painted out to be... less than fantastic at fighting.
Chaos Space Marines? I don't even want to talk about the BL novels. Please don't talk about the BL novels.
Eldar? Apparently sisters aren't important enough for Eldar to manipulate and change fate.
Dark Eldar? Sisters Minoris convent taken in a single night.
Tau? Not much there either.
See also 3'rd war for Armageddon...and they lost in Soulstorm to Imperial Guard ( 100 Baneblades are 100 Baneblades ).
Yeah, sisters had their teeth kicked in on both occassions.
n0t_u wrote:Generally though the SoB are like Orks. They always win, if they "lose" they're just martyred in the Emperor's name leading to improved morale in other SoB who will return to fight later.
Good comparison.
There are bits of fluff that sound suitably awesome, though - like Canoness Praxedes who single-handedly busted a Hive Tyrant, then went MIA as she took her small force right into the maw of the 'nid fleet. Have to admit, the myth that she's still fighting them is much cooler than the alternative of her just returning to die of old age.
But I wouldn't count rounding up a few hundred unarmed Adeptus Terra scribes as a victorious battle.
I'm not even averse to the Sisters "running" from the Flesh Tearers - only that nothing ever resulted out of it. The Canoness petitioned for the Chapter being purged and ... that's it.
Would the setting not pander to Marines all the time but rather treat such obvious transgressions with a little more consequence, the very same Sisters would have returned at a later date to attack the Chapter on its home world after it had been excommunicated.
Really hoping that stuff like this will change in the upcoming years with this "relaunch" of the SoB.
That particular bit of fluff honestly gets overexagerrated.
The Necrons are known to leave battle when their numbers are depleted, which they were.
Admittedly Dante finding it distasteful to fire on Necrons after allying with them is pretty stupid, most Imperial commanders would not be so chivalrous, especially to Necrons.
To be honest, the biggest transgression in fluff is the Tyranids attacking a Tomb World at all.
Although one could argue the presence of the Blood Angels made it a more appealing target.
Also, is Ward really that bad about killing off Sisters of Battle? I recently read the Grey Knights, Blood Angels, and Space Marine codices in their entirety, and for some reason can only recall the Bloodtide incident.
Look at it this way; Every exterminatus applied, every man silenced to stop knowledge of the Grey knights, every single raid from a plague marine, every notion of heresy put into the Imperium population; is victory for "Evil" how ever you wish to draw the arbitrary and convoluted line.
Void__Dragon wrote:Also, is Ward really that bad about killing off Sisters of Battle? I recently read the Grey Knights, Blood Angels, and Space Marine codices in their entirety, and for some reason can only recall the Bloodtide incident.
I think that bit often gets blown out of proportions as well. GK's have no scruples about killing anyone - regardless of whether it's IG, SoB or other Marines - if they deem it necessary. It's part of their grimdark modus operandi. They are not paladin whiteknights big on chivalry and honour.
What gets me, though, is that it seems as if some of the SoB got corrupted, which violates the unique incident of Miriael Sabathiel. Unless that Bloodtide corruption was "just" insanity, but in that case the wording is somewhat poor/misleading.
Lynata wrote:I think that bit often gets blown out of proportions as well. GK's have no scruples about killing anyone - regardless of whether it's IG, SoB or other Marines - if they deem it necessary. It's part of their grimdark modus operandi. They are not paladin whiteknights big on chivalry and honour.
What gets me, though, is that it seems as if some of the SoB got corrupted, which violates the unique incident of Miriael Sabathiel. Unless that Bloodtide corruption was "just" insanity, but in that case the wording is somewhat poor/misleading.
I know Grey Knights are not super nice paladin guise. Admittedly, the only thing that bothers me about the Bloodtide incident, is that it implies that the Grey Knights are not incorruptible. I don't care for Purifiers for a similar reason. Either they are incorruptible or they are not, there are not levels of incorruptibility.
Yeah, it is kind of vague. Actually, that may be what bothers me most about Ward's writing, so much of it is so blatantly vague it's annoying.
Kanluwen wrote:You can be corrupted and be unwilling.
Falling requires more of a conscious decision.
Can't agree there.
You may be unwilling when the corruption starts, but you end up "falling" by your own will. That's what corruption is all about: it twists your mind and perception of what you thought was the truth.
Void__Dragon wrote:Admittedly, the only thing that bothers me about the Bloodtide incident, is that it implies that the Grey Knights are not incorruptible. I don't care for Purifiers for a similar reason. Either they are incorruptible or they are not, there are not levels of incorruptibility.
Aye, I understand that this must seem like a very big change, and quite annoying for GK players. It could be seen not as a retcon but as an expansion of the previous fluff (basically "they are incorruptible - because they have knowledge of certain rituals") ... but as you said, it's annoyingly vague.
Kanluwen wrote:You can be corrupted and be unwilling.
Falling requires more of a conscious decision.
Can't agree there.
You may be unwilling when the corruption starts, but you end up "falling" by your own will. That's what corruption is all about: it twists your mind and perception of what you thought was the truth.
Huron wasn't corrupted. He fell, of his own will.
Corruption can certainly lead to falling, but the two are not mutually exclusive.
Lynata wrote:Aye, I understand that this must seem like a very big change, and quite annoying for GK players. It could be seen not as a retcon but as an expansion of the previous fluff (basically "they are incorruptible - because they have knowledge of certain rituals") ... but as you said, it's annoyingly vague.
It could be, only the codex itself is inconsistent on the matter, the seventh page credits their incorruptibility with their psychic presence, that is anathema to Chaos.
Kanluwen wrote:Huron wasn't corrupted. He fell, of his own will.
Says who? The pictures and descriptions I see of him certainly look corrupted.
How do you define "falling" anyways?
The corruption came AFTER he'd fallen and retreated into the Maelstrom.
Read up on your lore. Huron, before the Badab War, was one of the Imperium's staunchest enforcers. He was the warden of the Maelstrom and was responsible for putting down the pirates, xenos, etc all within the Maelstrom.
The "corruption" you're mentioning from looking at him came after he'd had half his body blown off by a meltagun shot at close range.
There's Huron, before being forcibly given reconstructive surgery. I'm going to assume your idea of "corruption" is the talon, huh?
Kanluwen wrote:Corruption can certainly lead to falling, but the two are not mutually exclusive.
You can be corrupted without falling, but you cannot fall without being corrupted.
...It's like you're parroting what I already said.
"You can be corrupted and be unwilling" is not really as farfetched as "You can be corrupted without falling". Most people exposed to "corruption" are exposed without willingly going to the corrupting source.
Huron was not corrupted, at all, before he proclaimed the areas under his protection his own little empire.
Kanluwen wrote:Read up on your lore. Huron, before the Badab War, was one of the Imperium's staunchest enforcers.
That's not how it sounds like on Lexicanum.
"Huron lacked the selfless dedication to humanity necessary in an Imperial commander. Huron's megalomania became apparent as he steadily distanced himself from the Imperium, hoarding planetary tithes for himself."
Now, I know that Lexicanum isn't exactly reliable, given that it treats licensed publications as being on the same level of canonicity as GW stuff, and as it is a community-driven project anyways, but it sounds pretty obvious in this case. If you have information that would negate the above quote, however, feel free to provide it.
Kanluwen wrote:I'm going to assume your idea of "corruption" is the talon, huh?
Nope, mainly I was referring to the description of his character/personality (and obviously the fact that he went rogue in the first place). The visual impression is but one part of it - that it apparently does not apply before his retreat, which I indeed did not know, does not render the other void, so please don't discard it.
Kanluwen wrote:"You can be corrupted and be unwilling" is not really as farfetched as "You can be corrupted without falling". Most people exposed to "corruption" are exposed without willingly going to the corrupting source.
Uh? I believe we're talking past each other here - I was challenging your statement about "falling" happening without previous corruption. A "conscious choice" leading to such a drastic change that someone turns from being one of the Imperium's most faithful to an unscrupulous servant of Chaos certainly cannot happen just like that, and I guarantee you that Miriael's fall did involve corruption. It just wouldn't make any sense otherwise.
Kanluwen wrote:Huron was not corrupted, at all, before he proclaimed the areas under his protection his own little empire.
Kanluwen wrote:Read up on your lore. Huron, before the Badab War, was one of the Imperium's staunchest enforcers.
That's not how it sounds like on Lexicanum.
"Huron lacked the selfless dedication to humanity necessary in an Imperial commander. Huron's megalomania became apparent as he steadily distanced himself from the Imperium, hoarding planetary tithes for himself."
Now, I know that Lexicanum isn't exactly reliable, given that it treats licensed publications as being on the same level of canonicity as GW stuff, and as it is a community-driven project anyways, but it sounds pretty obvious in this case. If you have information that would negate the above quote, however, feel free to provide it.
Huron's "megalomania" was the result of the Imperium not giving him the resources to do the job he was assigned. Read the Badab War books from FW and you'll see what I'm talking about.
Kanluwen wrote:I'm going to assume your idea of "corruption" is the talon, huh?
Nope, mainly I was referring to the description of his character/personality (and obviously the fact that he went rogue in the first place). The visual impression is but one part of it - that it apparently does not apply before his retreat, which I indeed did not know, does not render the other void, so please don't discard it.
His character and personality was no different than that of any Inquisitor, Marine Commander, or Guard Commander.
The only difference is that when push came to shove, he decided to stop listening to the High Lords of Terra and set up shop on his own. He created the Ring of Steel, he turned the Badab Sector into a manufacturing and resource harvesting powerhouse.
Kanluwen wrote:"You can be corrupted and be unwilling" is not really as farfetched as "You can be corrupted without falling". Most people exposed to "corruption" are exposed without willingly going to the corrupting source.
Uh? I believe we're talking past each other here - I was challenging your statement about "falling" happening without previous corruption. A "conscious choice" leading to such a drastic change that someone turns from being one of the Imperium's most faithful to an unscrupulous servant of Chaos certainly cannot happen just like that, and I guarantee you that Miriael's fall did involve corruption. It just wouldn't make any sense otherwise.
Miriael's fall, while involving corruption, could also have gone the other way. She could have offed herself, gone to the Repentia, or any number of things.
Kanluwen wrote:Huron was not corrupted, at all, before he proclaimed the areas under his protection his own little empire.
Ahh. And why did he do that?
Because the Imperium would not give him the tools necessary to do the job he was given.
Psienesis wrote:You don't need to be corrupted by Chaos to want to turn away from the Imperium to be your own little kingdom or join the Tau Collecti- er, Empire.
Agreed, but when you end up joining Chaos there's a strong indication it already had a hand in "arranging" things (see Horus Heresy), and given Huron's "reputation" he does not exactly appear to be too interested in the well-being of his subjects in the first place. And when Space Marines turn from hypno-indoctrinated loyalists into self-serving tyrants ... well, same road as the one where a faithful veteran SoB suddenly becomes a Champion of Slaanesh, imo.
Though the very meaning of "corruption" is a bit ambiguous by itself, given that - depending on one's personal interpretation - it can be limited to Chaos magicks or also extend to simple "ideas" inspiring doubt and heretical thoughts. In many cases throughout 40k, it's very difficult if not impossible to completely differentiate between the two (as Chaos likes to infiltrate a lot, see Vraks), but I am quite certain that Miriael Sabathiel did not fall of her own voluntary choice whilst in the captivity of the Emperor's Children.
Kanluwen wrote:Miriael's fall, while involving corruption, [...]
When you agree now that the incident concerning Miriael involved corruption, why are we even argueing?
Kanluwen wrote:[...] could also have gone the other way. She could have offed herself, gone to the Repentia, or any number of things.
Her captors only stopped when she was "turned". Normally Sisters of Battle don't allow themselves to get captured in the first place. Once in their hands I doubt there was anything she could do, and only a matter of time until she succumbed to whatever they did to her.
Probably not, specifically in the case of Sabathiel. I imagine it was something along the lines of "say these magic words, bind your soul to Slaanesh forever, and the pain will stop..." and she, at first, refused. However, the servants of the Prince of Pleasure are extremely adept at the infliction of pain as well... and everyone has a breaking point.
Psienesis wrote:Probably not, specifically in the case of Sabathiel. I imagine it was something along the lines of "say these magic words, bind your soul to Slaanesh forever, and the pain will stop..." and she, at first, refused. However, the servants of the Prince of Pleasure are extremely adept at the infliction of pain as well... and everyone has a breaking point.
Aye. I imagine she must've went half-mad, too. Probably still is. I guess she only had two options: go insane in a way that renders herself useless to Chaos, or break.
There's a couple creepy lines in her short story about singing daemon princes and healing. Could be a hint. That said, there's shameful little to no information about what really happened or became of her - but this only makes speculations all the more interesting.
Kanluwen wrote:And that's why I say you can be corrupted and be unwilling, but you have to make the choice to fall.
Ah, so that's the point of our contention. I maintain it isn't a choice when external powers are influencing you (regardless of whether by torture or daemonic whispers or a Nurgle plague or whatever it is that is weakening your resolve), that's why I said you cannot fall without corruption. Matter of interpretation, I guess?
While true, in an academic sense, human beings are, after all, only human. Generally speaking, their wills and minds will break long before their bodies are broken to the point that their life ends.
Kanluwen wrote:You ALWAYS have a choice about falling, even with corruption. You CAN say no, even if it's a symbolic 'no' by killing yourself.
But for that symbolic "no" you'd still have to be in possession of your wits and your mind would have to be in its original state. I'm just saying that, with corruption, this does not apply. One's mind has been warped and twisted into believing something else, one may even develop an entirely new personality - that's how Chaos works, and I believe that this takes the factor of "voluntariness" out of the decision.
Apart from that, I doubt that Miriael had a chance to kill herself. I'd expect a Sister to do so as soon as she can when facing imprisonment by the arch-enemy, and find it far more likely that she would have simply been constrained in a manner that would allow the Emperor's Children to "work on her" without obstructions. Not that we'd know what exactly happened there, but it would make sense.
Both she and the Night Lords do lots of unpleasent things.....
I thought she would kill herself - but the NL spent a lot ot time, planning and effort to capture her - I guess they took precautions
Even in her agonies - which apparently she endures the longest Talon has seen by a long way, its arguable given later events whether she breaks completely?
Hrm, maybe... but they get what they came for, though whether it's *exactly* what they thought it would be is... really not the Huntress' doing. After 17 days (yes, a record) she breaks and tells them everything they want to know, about the Temple, its defenses, its location, etc... which is, of course, how the NL find the video log of Curze's assassination.
And, yeah, this probably prompted the inclusion of a hidden compartment inside a false tooth into every Callidus augmentation package, with an insta-kill pill inside.
And she really didn't actually 'give them what they wanted'. They wanted a training facility that the Callidus operated. They wanted a place where the Callidus' Master was secreted.
She gave them the location of a Callidus training facility...that had been abandoned for centuries. They didn't get what they wanted, they got a damaged and incomplete record that took a lot of work to get you a manner of seconds of video.
I've seen Kan put through this argument before and I must say he is right. The SoBs are one of the best examples: only one has ever fallen but many have been corrupted. The terminology may vary but basically you may "fall" from a character flaw but you can also be corrupted by warp energy.
what? Every country in the world has it's military forces ( even Vatican ) so does that mean that they are violent? Tau are in peace with the Imperium ( officialy ) and don't attack Imperial worlds all the time, Eldar to. And both factions sometimes work with the Humanity. So your point was disproved.
up this world and that they don't care. People will only care when it starts to affect them by which time it's too late.
Thanks a lot for adding that option to...
