Do you think the Orks or the Tyranids are going to win?

'Nids because they devour the biomass of both sides, but Orks need their own dead to reproduce (fungal spores released upon death) so they'd eventually lose through attrition unless someone knocked out a Tyranid hive control thingy.

Nids. > All but demons.

I predict a massive stalemate until the Hive Fleet actually runs out.

More and more orks are pouring in from accross the galaxy, but the Hive Fleet has finite resources.

The orks will win eventually, the Nids can't consume the dead because they are still fighting the Orks. So the Ork spores can still mature.

 Grey Templar wrote:
More and more orks are pouring in from accross the galaxy, but the Hive Fleet has finite resources.

That would be true if all of Leviathan was in the fight. It's not. It's only one tendril of Leviathan. The rest is out kciking all kinds of ass in other places (really, go look at the galactic map in the Tyranid codex. Leviathan is doing all kinds of damage). That tendril has the biomass of the others to call on if it needs it, since it's part of the same hive fleet.

Not to mention if Leviathan decided to concentrate all of its recourses on the fight, it would literally drown the system in bodies. The whole Leviathan fleet is absolutely immense.

 Grey Templar wrote:
I predict a massive stalemate until the Hive Fleet actually runs out.

More and more orks are pouring in from accross the galaxy, but the Hive Fleet has finite resources.

The orks will win eventually, the Nids can't consume the dead because they are still fighting the Orks. So the Ork spores can still mature.

Nomming things is fairly easy. As mentioned in some Ig book, the 'Nids smash things down, plow through stuff so even while they'r eup at the front, smaller Nomming nids mop up the scraps as fast as possible before high-tailing it back to whatever hive procesor unit they can find.

In addition, most of the acidics and grubbys that the 'nids use in battle would probably deteriorate the Ork bodies into raw bio-sludge or burnt husks, or birthing grounds for Rippers

I personally find myself siding with the Tyranids especially with the arrival of the Swarmlord.

1) They are just so much more advanced than the Ork
2) Tyranid adapation. The Orks make up for a lack of technology with a biology designed from the ground up for war. However, the Tyranid are geared very much the same way and will only adapt more and more as they fight the Orks.

The only conceivable way I could see the Orks winning is if they got a decisive leader that could take out the Tyranid synapse or if the number of Orks pouring in grows exponentially higher. Both are plausible as the Orks do possess some devastating leaders and there are more than enough Ork in the Milky Way Galaxy to utterly obliterate all of Leviathan.

But I would put my money on the Swarmlord over any Ork leader. And the notion of overwhelming Ork reinforcements is completely up to chance.

I'm going to back the orks.

Nids can't digest until they win. As noted previously the other tendril is still out kicking bottom. That doesn't mean they can instantly re direct hive ships resources any more than the Orks can.

Orks get bigger and stronger the more they fight. Gaunts don't.
Orks do have technology to back them up. You can trust Gargant production will be ramped up no end.
Ork physiology has already been discussed. But as I said Orks gain reinforcements during the fight nid have to win before they reclaim.
But we also have to take into account the ork 'reinforcements' who come spoiling for a fight. And on hearing of 'Da neva endung foight' they WILL come.

Personally I see the Nids depleting before they take down the orks.

 Shlazaor wrote:
Do you think the Orks or the Tyranids are going to win?

HIT THE DECK! *takes cover from nid flame wars*

For those curious though, for every ork who dies approximately 12 orks replace him through spores this works even for orkish children, squigs, gretchin and snotlings as the lowest of the food chain and shed spore to produce the highest ESPECIALLY in areas wracked with war more orks turn up.

Since it is getting reinforcements from outside orkish freebooters and waaagh bands this turns into an ugly situation which is why the Swarmlord needed to stop potentially advancing the plot against Marnus Calgar to fight the orks and try and tip the scales this is a clear sign they needed all the effort they could because this stopped the Swarmlord from finishing Calgar according to the fluff it also effectively halted the invasion of Ultramar so this gambit worked flawlessly in the IOM favor because they do have exterminatus payloads waiting on that planet after a victor becomes assured.

Ultimately this represents endless war it has become intimately obvious no race as a way to garantee orks will not reproduce until their final moments. If the average life span of the Orks is less than 2 years now because of Octarius' ar conditions that is still plenty of time to shed spores for an unknown level of "passive reinforcement" and then plenty of time for those orks to mature which only takes approximately 3-4 months. And then upon their death reinforce even more. Considering orks are too unpredictable to perfectly develope and evolve to fight them perfectly (due to their wacky and fearless nature) This halts even the mighty nids in their tracks, this is an ork empire world making it excellent terrian for Ork spores to grow all over the planet enough that even the Ultramarines found futility in engaging them on this world and could never brind a ship close enough to create a Exterminatus payload without threat of orkish space counter attack and looting.

I think the Nids are on the back of the biomass equation because that is the last thing they can claim and they can only claim it once a battlefield is over with even in the heat of battle biomass isn't accurately consumed because rippers and the other nid bodies which gather this will be wiped out for showing up to the battle. It is something without a shadow of doubt they are doing but something that is more or less "the Spoils of war" For every victory the nids receieve an immediate new force or orks might be making skyfall from roks or kommandoes rush out to burn and bomb ripper swarms

This is literally an exercise in futility the only thing that has been noted is that the nids have made some advances upon the planet but could be pushed back at the drop of a hat. I highly doubt it is advantageous for GW to conclude the battle in anyone's favor but the IOM

For the record this is why i laugh when people say the Nids are tactically clever... the Nids test something a simple as orkish empires that the IOM knows isn't going anywhere and would be a waste of resources. But the nids don't retreat once you "trick them into combat" they'll just stay stupidly allowing their resources as a roving cancer within the galaxy to be combated at every turn by every enemy the IOM has because the ultimate goal of this hive fleet was to make it to the Astronomicon... which they are flunking at greatly...

 Shlazaor wrote:
I personally find myself siding with the Tyranids especially with the arrival of the Swarmlord.

1) They are just so much more advanced than the Ork
2) Tyranid adapation. The Orks make up for a lack of technology with a biology designed from the ground up for war. However, the Tyranid are geared very much the same way and will only adapt more and more as they fight the Orks.

The only conceivable way I could see the Orks winning is if they got a decisive leader that could take out the Tyranid synapse or if the number of Orks pouring in grows exponentially higher. Both are plausible as the Orks do possess some devastating leaders and there are more than enough Ork in the Milky Way Galaxy to utterly obliterate all of Leviathan.

But I would put my money on the Swarmlord over any Ork leader. And the notion of overwhelming Ork reinforcements is completely up to chance.

1. So tyranids can teleport, create miniatuarized wormhole guns, make planet anhiliating nukes...?

2. This just doesn't make sense. When tyranids meet new things they adapt to kill them. Are you really saying that this is the first time tyranids hae met orks? IoM sent a drove over 10 thousand years ago to find a place where there is peace. No peace has been found just a bunch of ork signals.

Ultaramarines managed to fight off a tyranid hivefleet tendril. There are 1000 ultramarines in the galaxy. Ghargull Blackfang and his bodyguard was killed by 3 space marine legions, 3 primarchs (Horus, Dorn and Mortarion) and even that wasn't enough. The emprah managed to come just intime to save his sons.

It took joint forces of Armagedon and 10 space marines chapters just to slow down Ghazzy and his WAAAGH!.

If they could get enough burna boyz then the nids might be on the retreat. As it is going currently, all the orks need to do is hold an area for a week or so and wait for more orks to spawn.

 illuknisaa wrote:

 Shlazaor wrote:


1) They are just so much more advanced than the Ork

1. So tyranids can teleport, create miniatuarized wormhole guns, make planet anhiliating nukes...?

To be fair, most of the Ork stuff doesn't work or inflicts more harm on themselves than the enemy. At least Tyranids Rippers consume their dead. So I wouldn't put alot of faith in "Orky Tech".

Ultramarines managed to fight off a tyranid hivefleet tendril. There are 1000 ultramarines in the galaxy. Ghargull Blackfang and his bodyguard was killed by 3 space marine legions, 3 primarchs (Horus, Dorn and Mortarion) and even that wasn't enough. The emprah managed to come just intime to save his sons.

It took joint forces of Armagedon and 10 space marines chapters just to slow down Ghazzy and his WAAAGH!.

Correction, they only defeated that tendril due to a Inquistorial Virus and infecting the Norn Queen, much like an Orc WAAGH! when you kill its Warboss. And Tyranids have almost annihilated two Space Marine Chapters, including the largest Chapter, the Ultramarines, and that's from the BRB Fluff, not some preppy Horus Heresy Book...

 Shlazaor wrote:


To be fair, most of the Ork stuff doesn't work or inflicts more harm on themselves than the enemy. At least Tyranids Rippers consume their dead. So I wouldn't put alot of faith in "Orky Tech".

You ... I ... just going to say you're very very VERY wrong and i will gladly let you assume orks don't know how to make things like titans or kustom mega blastas or snazzguns or cybernetics or ...

Correction, they only defeated that tendril due to a Inquistorial Virus and infecting the Norn Queen, much like an Orc WAAGH! when you kill its Warboss. And Tyranids have almost annihilated two Space Marine Chapters, including the largest Chapter, the Ultramarines, and that's from the BRB Fluff, not some preppy Horus Heresy Book...

So a completely valid tactic that worked on halting the unstoppable nids which is very heroic to push their way into the Nid defenses and inject the virus into it? seriously assassinating bosses and Nid hive mind officials are what Space Marines do. Also Ultramaines are NOT the largest chapter they are the most well known and nothing more. Most Space Marine Chapters adhere to a doctrine which limits their chapters to 1000 space marines or less, the Ultramarines being the honorable sons and poster boys of the Imperium follow these rules since it was implemented after the Horus Heresy to prevent chapters growing too large. The loyalist chapters not known for following this order are Space Wolves and Black Templar. The Templar are assumed to be 11,000 strong but they are dispersed throughout the galaxy in smaller numbers than most chapters so they consider it still honoring the code. So if only 2 chapters is what the Ndis have managed in all this time... I've lost respect for them.

a singular waaagh of no importance has wiped entire space marine chapters before. It's only when the Imperium meets us with overwhelming presence that we don't rip them assunder.

They know how make their weapons, doesn't mean it doesn't blow up often.

 Eetion wrote:
Nids can't digest until they win.

Tyranids are constantly digesting. As long as they have a foothold on a planet, there's a place for a digestion pool. There's a constant carpet of rippers wherever Tyranids are, which are constantly eating anything in the area - dead from both ides as well as the hyper-reproductive vegetation that the Tyranid spores choking the air cause.

 Eetion wrote:
As noted previously the other tendril is still out kicking bottom. That doesn't mean they can instantly re direct hive ships resources any more than the Orks can.

The best way to think of a Hive Fleet is a trail of ants. It's a tendril from a big fleet in the void running ships forward and back - they actually consume far too much from a single planet for just the 'fighting front' of the tendril to use. This was mentioned in an old fluff article. So if you consider the 'tendril' as a stream of ships, then yeah, it would be quite easy to redirect forces. It wouldn't be instant, however.

 Eetion wrote:
Orks get bigger and stronger the more they fight. Gaunts don't.

Tyranids adapt between each fight. There's fluff with them becoming immediately more resiliant to certain weapons between two battles.

 Eetion wrote:
Orks do have technology to back them up. You can trust Gargant production will be ramped up no end.

You can trust Heirophant production to be ramped up to compensate. Don't forget that while Tyranids are reliant on biomass, Orks are reliant on metals. Metals will run out before biomass will.

 Eetion wrote:
Ork physiology has already been discussed. But as I said Orks gain reinforcements during the fight nid have to win before they reclaim.

Tyranids already have self reproducing warriors - Hormagaunts. Their life cycle is: be born, lay eggs, fight. By the time that wave is dead, those eggs have hatched, laid their own eggs, and are on their way to the fight. Tyranids, again, also constantly gain biomass from the dead from both sides and the planet itself. It just doesn't get transferred to the hive ships until the planet is won - they still have Dominatrixes and Tervigons on the ground to spawn the ground forces.

 Eetion wrote:
But we also have to take into account the ork 'reinforcements' who come spoiling for a fight. And on hearing of 'Da neva endung foight' they WILL come.

And Tyranids come because there's a surprising amount of food. Neither will lack for reinforcments.

 Eetion wrote:
Personally I see the Nids depleting before they take down the orks.

Three continents of Octarius have already been taken by the Tyranids. Fluff disagrees with you.

Nids, but I see the IoM blasting the who area after the victor is seen.

Big Mek Wurrzog you quoted the wrong person. Not a big deal but worth pointing out.

But to return to the evidence for Tyranid victory. I understand that the fluff states if all the Orks were united together they would wipe out any force in the galaxy so I don't doubt that they have the numbers to eliminate Leviathan. I simply don't see them getting enough Orks to come to Octarius before the Tyranids win. During drawn out campaigns the IoM burns Ork bodies as a way of combating the Ork numbers and clearly have had some success in that arena. But Tyranids take the disposing of corpses to a completely new extreme. It's far more refined and efficient method. The arrival of the Swarmlord also indicates that Leviathan is turning its attention to Octarius. Even if you call the rate of intergalactic reinforcements to the planet as roughly equal, the Tyranids will manage to win out in the reinforcement category because of on-planet reinforcements, as they actively eat the Orks own potential reinforcements and add them to their own.

As for the arguement that the Tyranids can't adapt to the Orks crazy hooliganism that has been empirically denied. I might be willing to involve that they can't adapt to all of their crazy technology the way they did with the Tau but strategically they have already proven capable of obliterating notable Ork warlords and with inferior numbers AND without the Swarmlord. The arrival of the Swarmlord dramatically increases the strategic capital of the Tyranids and provides them a key advantage.

Grey Templar wrote:More and more orks are pouring in from accross the galaxy, but the Hive Fleet has finite resources.

And this is why orks will win. There are a bunch of orks and nids at the site already. There are a bunch of new orks and a bunch of new nids piling in every day as reinforcements.

The difference is that orks reproduce, while the tyranid do not. The tyranid can only reproduce by conquering new worlds. If the tyranid aren't winning, they aren't getting new biomass. Meanwhile, there are orks frigging everywhere, reproducing all the time.

As such, the burden is on tyranid. The tyranid need to win, the orks just need not not lose. In this stalemate, the orks are in a much, much better position, long game.

Now yes, the hive fleet COULD start diverting forces away from the battle to collect more resources, but said resource collection won't go unchallenged (and as such is not guaranteed success), and will expand the nid's list of enemies (the imperium was content with orks fighting nids, but if nids attack imperium worlds for resources, then space marines are going to be sent in), and, most importantly, any bugs not being sent into the battle means that the orks are going to slowly outnumber their opponents in the actual battle itself, allowing them the win.

The only way that the nids can escape this eventual malthusian collapse is if they stop attacking the orks and go back to picking on weaker targets until they have the strength to wipe out the orks for real.

Honestly i think the Orks would win this fight, they have the numbers and the craziness to fight and fight and fight, non-stop. I may not know all that much about the nids but looking at the map in the ork codex the orks have 3 WAAAGH!s fighting Leviathan, Urgok, Ovtavius, and Calverna. Also I think that ghazz and nazdreg are smart enough to see the nid threat before its to late after all ghazz didnt become the prophet of the waaaagh for nothing and nazdreg is the smartest and richest bad moon.

Nids are winning now and will win in the end. There is an Eldar/Imperium blockade surrounding the entire system, which means that Ork reinforcements, as typically ununited as they are, are reduced to a trickle. If the Tyranids can whip Ork ass even when the Orks have an entire planet sized army at their backs and outnumber the Nids a thousand to one, the Nids can win now.

What is this???? Im gone for a week and already another ork vs tyranid article is up?? I got one word to say to y'all...
WWAAAAAAAAGGGGGGHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!

BlaxicanX wrote:
Nids are winning now and will win in the end. There is an Eldar/Imperium blockade surrounding the entire system, which means that Ork reinforcements, as typically ununited as they are, are reduced to a trickle. If the Tyranids can whip Ork ass even when the Orks have an entire planet sized army at their backs and outnumber the Nids a thousand to one, the Nids can win now.

Sir The eldar are attacking the imperial worlds around the war AS well as sending in forces to attack both sides. The Iom has several chapters hunting the eldar. Its not "Eldar and Spaze marhines are bud bud and are protecting the Iom from both baddies." No its "Eldar goin in and killing everthing for honour and glory!!"

Space marines cant enter the battlefeild. Its to chaotic. Literally. Only the orks can stand toe-to-toe with and tyranid hive fleet even if its a tendril. Remeber they can make Roks at an incredible rate. Literally everyworld has roks around them protecting them Im betting.

Ok now then, if this fight keeps growing (as I suspect it will...) then ghazzy is going to enter the war. Now then it has takin alot of time and resources for the bugzes to get this far into the Empire. Now you nid players are going "But we came back from a near defeat!! And almost killed the empire." Im telling you that that warboss was a free-booter. Not a blood axe warboss who SPECIALIZE IN TACTICS! These are the orks that out smart space marines and imperial guard. They have been able to hold off the Nids for a long time and have been doing it pretty well. So well that the swarmlord has arrived and its BARLEY I repeat BARLEY tipped the scales of fate into the nids favor. Even now its hard fighting for the nids. Its still close. If ghazzy came in it would probably end in a stand still.

Now then the ripper crap. I just have to say Umm... gretchin... snotlings and ummm..... Oh yeah squigs. Ok so what if they kill alot. There will be gretchin snotlings and squigs to fight back. Sure you'll get a couple of hundred of guys back but really once a counter charge happens rippers will be busy fighting and dieing.

Tech vs bio. We are talking about orks here people... really Couple of roks outta the sky and a couple of bio-titans orkyfied and walla great big army. Plus bio-titans are not the best use of bioresources. Gargants are literally scratched toghter If one is destroyed then they will put it back toghter in a matter of months. If not that tanks and bikes and guns then.

So far I still cant see the orks losing can you?

You don't loot biotitans

You assume Thrakka's going to show his, so anybody could assume the Tyranids will send more bugs, don't go there.

 Bobthehero wrote:
You don't loot biotitans

You assume Thrakka's going to show his, so anybody could assume the Tyranids will send more bugs, don't go there.

Thats like sayin you dont loot carnifexes and Ive seen the pics. I Think that the orks COULD Loot biotitans. If they donts then they will use its armor for weapons/armor for vehicles and boys. Its meat for food. saving the squigs and such for rippers. and everything else imaginable. These are the orks. They leave nothing to waste. Its been said that they are the most resourceful race in the galaxy. They have proven it time and again. In the end They will loot it one way or another.

As for ghazzy. If he does come. Im not sayin he will but really, this probably will become a huge war. He will bring a huge fleet of orks with him. Billions of orks follow the prophet. If not trillions. He is respected by all orks who are smart enough to think that way. You might think that he is just another ork but He has proven to be the chosen of the ork gods.... Or to be just plain out lucky.

I'm still not sure why people are saying orks resources are infinite. While they reproduce Orks readily enough, the metals they use for their technology definitely isn't infinite. In fact, metals, on the scale things are made in 40k, would be far more finite than biomass.

Its pictures, and frankly I always though it was a terrible idea to begin with, stuff invented by people, hey I read a game report where Thrakka got killed, so he's obviously dead, right?

The 'nids can also recycle their bio-titans too, and ork spores are bio-stuff, so I am fairly sure at least some spores would get nommed before they hatch.

 Ailaros wrote:
The difference is that orks reproduce, while the tyranid do not. The tyranid can only reproduce by conquering new worlds. If the tyranid aren't winning, they aren't getting new biomass. Meanwhile, there are orks frigging everywhere, reproducing all the time.

Hormagaunts lay eggs. Tervigons are walking reproducing egg sacs for Termagants. Dominatrixes are walking bio-factories which spawn pretty much everything.

Tyranids also choke planets with spores that cause the flora on the planet to hyperactively reproduce.

They don't need to conquer a planet to take biomass or generate reinforcments. Their attacks are plenty sustainable on the ground.

*sigh* i hate these debates... no one ever looks at the bigger picture that this is a nerd debate of epic size which was meant to have no winners.

I don't really think it's so much a debate as a discussion. It's all theoretical. No one is setting out to "prove" once and for all they are right. Sure people believe one side will win and give evidence to that side but it's just fun to think about.

willhman wrote:

Sir The eldar are attacking the imperial worlds around the war AS well as sending in forces to attack both sides. The Iom has several chapters hunting the eldar. Its not "Eldar and Spaze marhines are bud bud and are protecting the Iom from both baddies." No its "Eldar goin in and killing everthing for honour and glory!!"

Means nothing to me. Yes, they're attacking each other. Doesn't mean they don't both still have blockades around the system. The ork reinforcements aren't going to pass up fighting with the Imperium and the Eldar just to join their fellows on the ground against the Tyranids- orks are too stupid for that- so you've still got the majority of ork reinforcements getting tied up with the Imperium and Eldar.

Tyranids will win the same way they always do, through attrition. That they're also smarter and more deadly than the Orks is just icing on the cake.

BlaxicanX wrote:

willhman wrote:

Sir The eldar are attacking the imperial worlds around the war AS well as sending in forces to attack both sides. The Iom has several chapters hunting the eldar. Its not "Eldar and Spaze marhines are bud bud and are protecting the Iom from both baddies." No its "Eldar goin in and killing everthing for honour and glory!!"

Means nothing to me. Yes, they're attacking each other. Doesn't mean they don't both still have blockades around the system. The ork reinforcements aren't going to pass up fighting with the Imperium and the Eldar just to join their fellows on the ground against the Tyranids- orks are too stupid for that- so you've still got the majority of ork reinforcements getting tied up with the Imperium and Eldar.

Tyranids will win the same way they always do, through attrition. That they're also smarter and more deadly than the Orks is just icing on the cake.

In the middle of an ork empire, no blockade is absolute. Besides I'm pretty sure the blockade had the nothing gets 'OUT' to escape. If the orks or nids want to go 'IN' to the cauldron then what is the purpose of stopping them? Just means you get to perform Exterminatus andmore enemy when the victor is achieved.
To block every Kill Kroozer and Hulk that goes in, all your going to do is take casualties and jeopordise your capability to delivet the Exterminatus.
Explain to how it serves the imperium of Manto block forces going in to the fight, forces which could be attacking human worlds.

In fact I would expect an Admiral to be absolutely delighted that 2 hulks and 15 orc cruisers along with a nid hive ship and 3 drones have entered the system.... As long as they never leave.

Y-you're seriously insinuating that Orks would fly right through an Eldar/Imperium blockade and no fighting would break out?

Your logic doesn't work out. Allowing the armies to get huger and huger is counter-productive to keeping them from getting out. If either army gets too big, they'll be too large to contain. Thus, preventing more Orks from joining the fight, and thus preventing the Tyranids from gaining more biomass, works to both of their advantages.

Unless of course the tyranids actually win. They have more than enough biomass there.

What I'm suggesting is that attempting to maintain a blockade fleet is a untenable situation, reinforcements especially orks and nids won't reliably arrive in outerspace but instead may completely bypsss the fleet and arrive in system anyway.

To maintain a fleet you have to total coverage. If orks arrive and want to go in system, they will go there. Its an entirety of an ork reinforcement fleet, you may be able to block a few, but once you start taking casualties your blockade begins to crumble, and it WILL crumble in the middle of an ork empire.
Some orks Captains may find it more fun to hunt down the the imperial than sit in orbit. If that starts to happen the entire plan of launching an exterminatus is in extreme jeopardy.
The only way to ensure your still in a position to complete your primary objective of exterminatus is to contain. Allow incoming forces through, contain anything leaving.

Of course if orks begin to hear that oomies sare getting involved in the big scrap then ork reinforcements will come thicker and faster.

Containing the nids and orks isn't a problem as long the fight rages on the surface. Orkses don't run from a scrap.

If the Tyranids win the Imperium will have the same problem.

The point is that the notion that the Imperium and Eldar won't be engaging Orks as they pop in-system makes zero sense. They couldn't not engage them, even if they wanted too. As soon as Orks pop up, they'll be engaging the first thing they see, whether it be Tyranids, Eldar or Imperial ships. Thus, the blockade is going to be up to its boots in dead Orks.

Sure, some of the orks will pop in close enough to the planets themselves to avoid getting embroiled in the battle, but most of them will not, if the fluff descriptions of the blockades are any indication. Thus, having a blockade around the system is going to result in tons of ork reinforcements that should be going to the battle on the ground, simply getting caught up fighting Eldar/Imperial forces.

-Loki- wrote:I'm still not sure why people are saying orks resources are infinite. While they reproduce Orks readily enough, the metals they use for their technology definitely isn't infinite. In fact, metals, on the scale things are made in 40k, would be far more finite than biomass.

Well nids have those talon things. Thye seem to be good enough for chopping stuff.

Bobthehero wrote:Its pictures, and frankly I always though it was a terrible idea to begin with, stuff invented by people, hey I read a game report where Thrakka got killed, so he's obviously dead, right?

The 'nids can also recycle their bio-titans too, and ork spores are bio-stuff, so I am fairly sure at least some spores would get nommed before they hatch.

Well Thrakka was clearly fixed by the dok afterwards.

BlaxicanX wrote:
If the Tyranids win the Imperium will have the same problem.

The point is that the notion that the Imperium and Eldar won't be engaging Orks as they pop in-system makes zero sense. They couldn't not engage them, even if they wanted too. As soon as Orks pop up, they'll be engaging the first thing they see, whether it be Tyranids, Eldar or Imperial ships. Thus, the blockade is going to be up to its boots in dead Orks.

Sure, some of the orks will pop in close enough to the planets themselves to avoid getting embroiled in the battle, but most of them will not, if the fluff descriptions of the blockades are any indication. Thus, having a blockade around the system is going to result in tons of ork reinforcements that should be going to the battle on the ground, simply getting caught up fighting Eldar/Imperial forces.

And if orks start engaging imperials and eldar, there will be only 1 winner. Orks. In the middle of an ork empire, maintaining a blockade fleet is untenable. If the fight does happen the orks will break the blockade after going through the imperials.

The imperials cannot hope to stop all those reinforcements, but must survive to perform the exterminatus. Ideally a strike fleet ready to delve in at short notice would be better than whittling away your resources trying to maintain an impossible blockade.

 Eetion wrote:

BlaxicanX wrote:
If the Tyranids win the Imperium will have the same problem.

The point is that the notion that the Imperium and Eldar won't be engaging Orks as they pop in-system makes zero sense. They couldn't not engage them, even if they wanted too. As soon as Orks pop up, they'll be engaging the first thing they see, whether it be Tyranids, Eldar or Imperial ships. Thus, the blockade is going to be up to its boots in dead Orks.

Sure, some of the orks will pop in close enough to the planets themselves to avoid getting embroiled in the battle, but most of them will not, if the fluff descriptions of the blockades are any indication. Thus, having a blockade around the system is going to result in tons of ork reinforcements that should be going to the battle on the ground, simply getting caught up fighting Eldar/Imperial forces.

And if orks start engaging imperials and eldar, there will be only 1 winner. Orks. In the middle of an ork empire, maintaining a blockade fleet is untenable. If the fight does happen the orks will break the blockade after going through the imperials.

The imperials cannot hope to stop all those reinforcements, but must survive to perform the exterminatus. Ideally a strike fleet ready to delve in at short notice would be better than whittling away your resources trying to maintain an impossible blockade.

From what I understand the Imperium troops are just there to guard the territory that is being threatened from the violence spilling over from the war. The whole point was for the Nids and Orks to waste as many resources as possible killing each other. I understand wanting a presence there to enact orbital bombardment once a clear winner is apparent but why would they be attempting to blockade anything when the war was their plan all along?

 Shlazaor wrote:

 Eetion wrote:

BlaxicanX wrote:
If the Tyranids win the Imperium will have the same problem.

The point is that the notion that the Imperium and Eldar won't be engaging Orks as they pop in-system makes zero sense. They couldn't not engage them, even if they wanted too. As soon as Orks pop up, they'll be engaging the first thing they see, whether it be Tyranids, Eldar or Imperial ships. Thus, the blockade is going to be up to its boots in dead Orks.

Sure, some of the orks will pop in close enough to the planets themselves to avoid getting embroiled in the battle, but most of them will not, if the fluff descriptions of the blockades are any indication. Thus, having a blockade around the system is going to result in tons of ork reinforcements that should be going to the battle on the ground, simply getting caught up fighting Eldar/Imperial forces.

And if orks start engaging imperials and eldar, there will be only 1 winner. Orks. In the middle of an ork empire, maintaining a blockade fleet is untenable. If the fight does happen the orks will break the blockade after going through the imperials.

The imperials cannot hope to stop all those reinforcements, but must survive to perform the exterminatus. Ideally a strike fleet ready to delve in at short notice would be better than whittling away your resources trying to maintain an impossible blockade.

From what I understand the Imperium troops are just there to guard the territory that is being threatened from the violence spilling over from the war. The whole point was for the Nids and Orks to waste as many resources as possible killing each other. I understand wanting a presence there to enact orbital bombardment once a clear winner is apparent but why would they be attempting to blockade anything when the war was their plan all along?

I agree wholeheartedly, but I lack the fluff to back it up. I'd imagined it as a force to contain the enemy there.

 Eetion wrote:

And if orks start engaging imperials and eldar, there will be only 1 winner. Orks. In the middle of an ork empire, maintaining a blockade fleet is untenable. If the fight does happen the orks will break the blockade after going through the imperials.

The Ork empire's already been destroyed. The capital of the Empire, with its leaders, was the first thing the Tyranids ate, and the Nid codex states that the Ork armies within the system basically collapsed into in-fighting once their commanders were dead. So now you have orks randomly spilling into the system with zero cohesion or organization, engaging the first thing they see, even if its other Orks, as that's their nature. They aren't wiping out Eldar or Imperium fleets any time soon,especially considering that the Imperial and Eldar navy is far superior to Ork navies anyway.

No the warboss at ghorla was killed by lictors, and then started infighting due to the leviathan fleet been decimated, the small hidden nids acted cautiosly.
Orks won that battle not the nids.

Lexicanum: The war eventually spread to Octarius, the central world of the Empire. Never before had Octarius seen such bloodshed, and the war soon spread from the planet out to the entirety of the Octarius Sector. Other Ork worlds lost to the Tyranids include Orrok, Derragon and Keltor.

4 worlds lost does not an Empire make.

lexicanum
The Octarius war contines to escalate. Recent reports indicate that the Tyranid Swarmlord has joined the assault on the Orks of Octarius. Kryptman's plan to have both xenos species destroy each other at first appeared to be successful. However, his plan backfired. Orks from lightyears around are flocking to Octarius, and are growing bigger and stronger on their diet of conflict. And every Ork devoured gives more biomass to the growing Tyranid swarm, which is constantly learning and adapting new ways to defeat their foes. Kryptman started a series of events that is making both sides stronger. Whichever race wins the war will emerge stronger than before

Orks from light years around are flocking are they, neither side is gainig an advantage, neither side is stated as definatively as loosing. Its not one system the orks and nids are fighting in. Your seriously suggesting the imperium can actively engage and blockade an empire? The Empire was kicking imperial forces in the teeth, The imperium was loosing that conflict. The fight brewing between the orks and nids is something the imperium can't get involved in. Keep imperial planets safe, but its escalated out of their control.

As for imperial fleets being better, sure, their ships of the line may be better, but ork ships are numerous, hearvily armed and armoured and able to take a hell of a beating.
And more than capable of giving an imperial admiral a headache.
Let's not forget octarius is almost the size of ultramar, that's no small number of vessels and planets, and only 4 are cited as overrun (I'm sure there are more however) but the orks are Far from finished. And whomever does win will run through the imeprials with almost contemptuous ease.

And whomever does win will run through the imeprials with almost contemptuous ease.

Too bad the Imperium has Exterminatus.

I like how you suggest that the imperial ships manage to get close enough to perform exterminatus.

I like how you suggest that survivors of the war actually are on a single planet.

I like how you suggest that the emprah is still on your side
http://www.gamereplays.org/community/uploads/post-97980-1211756095.jpg

BlaxicanX wrote:

 Eetion wrote:

And if orks start engaging imperials and eldar, there will be only 1 winner. Orks. In the middle of an ork empire, maintaining a blockade fleet is untenable. If the fight does happen the orks will break the blockade after going through the imperials.

The Ork empire's already been destroyed. The capital of the Empire, with its leaders, was the first thing the Tyranids ate, and the Nid codex states that the Ork armies within the system basically collapsed into in-fighting once their commanders were dead. So now you have orks randomly spilling into the system with zero cohesion or organization, engaging the first thing they see, even if its other Orks, as that's their nature. They aren't wiping out Eldar or Imperium fleets any time soon,especially considering that the Imperial and Eldar navy is far superior to Ork navies anyway.

got a reference or pulling that out your sporemaker?

 illuknisaa wrote:
I like how you suggest that the imperial ships manage to get close enough to perform exterminatus.

I like how you suggest that survivors of the war actually are on a single planet.

I like how you suggest that the emprah is still on your side
http://www.gamereplays.org/community/uploads/post-97980-1211756095.jpg

Look, he or she did not say that all the survivors were on one planet. And yeah, the imperial ships would get close enough to Exterminatus.
Not sure about the Emprah though lol.

They could nuke ALL the planets with enough fleets. Take some SM Chapter fleets, a bunch o' Imperial Navy ships, and a few Inquisition ships and you're good to go.

 Eetion wrote:
No the warboss at ghorla was killed by lictors, and then started infighting due to the leviathan fleet been decimated, the small hidden nids acted cautiosly.
Orks won that battle not the nids.

>Ork warboss gets eaten alive by lictors.
>Ork chieftains start fighting among themselves.
> Tyranids eat all of the Orks on the planet and leave it a desolate, baren rock with no living life left on it.

In your mind, that's a victory for the Orks. LOL

4 worlds lost does not an Empire make.

Provide your fluff evidence that defines how many planets are within the Empire. Oh right, you have none. You're relying on a wiki for all your information... lol

Codex: Tyranids states that despite the combined efforts of the Imperium, Eldar, and Orks, it alone is thriving on the conflict. Orks are not stalemating the Tyranids, they're fighting for their lives, whereas the Tyranids are only getting stronger.

With reinforcements slowed down to a trickle by the blockade, it's only a matter of time until the Orks are wiped out.

Im surprised that no one has brougth this up yet but do you really think Gork and Mork would let their race or ONE of their races die off? I would think that they would interfere because they are real. Im not saying that the godz are going to go out of their way to wipe out the nidzies but would maybe eventually snap off a certain tentacle of Leviathan??

BlaxicanX wrote:

 Eetion wrote:
No the warboss at ghorla was killed by lictors, and then started infighting due to the leviathan fleet been decimated, the small hidden nids acted cautiosly.
Orks won that battle not the nids.

>Ork warboss gets eaten alive by lictors.
>Ork chieftains start fighting among themselves.
> Tyranids eat all of the Orks on the planet and leave it a desolate, baren rock with no living life left on it.

In your mind, that's a victory for the Orks. LOL

4 worlds lost does not an Empire make.

Provide your fluff evidence that defines how many planets are within the Empire. Oh right, you have none. You're relying on a wiki for all your information... lol

Codex: Tyranids states that despite the combined efforts of the Imperium, Eldar, and Orks, it alone is thriving on the conflict. Orks are not stalemating the Tyranids, they're fighting for their lives, whereas the Tyranids are only getting stronger.

With reinforcements slowed down to a trickle by the blockade, it's only a matter of time until the Orks are wiped out.

First Lictors have to go through hella defences, and scans, not to mention squig hounds and kommandos. Lictors are hard to see but they have a scent that. Also They have to fight the warboss and if they do manage to kill him then there is a chance the dok can save him. To many things can go wrong. That tactic is fool proof, I mean the hasnt stopped yet or anything its just keep going. If the that tactic is as fool proof as you say why havent they won yet?

Also wtf is there a Eldar and Iom fleet??? Ok and when the new ork codex comes out there is gonna be a shift and the orks are gonna win point? Its the codex its supposed to make them seem unstoppable. Where does it says reinforcements are slowed down to a trickle???? If there is a blockade around the system then wouldnt that speed up the amount of reinforcments going to system? Really orks just want to fight a foe worth fighting. Orks wont fight orks if other foes are around in a short distance. Or else we wouldnt have waaaagghhhs.

Exterminatus wont work Im afraid. Too many planets. Plus how will they know when the war ends? When a huge wave of enemys come rushing at them. They cant receive any warp transmissions cause shadow of the warp. so no faster then light communications. Also They will have plenty of ships allover space. Who ever wins will be used to be attacking from space to tactics will be set up to automaticly deal with these enemies in space. Either or victor will be xenos Loser Iom.



Automatically Appended Next Post:
@Boss grot, Shadow of the warp blocks them. They count as warp entities Im afraid. So they can only sit and watch and have fun with it

The Shadow of the Warp is not infallible.

willhman wrote:

First Lictors have to go through hella defences, and scans, not to mention squig hounds and kommandos. Lictors are hard to see but they have a scent that. Also They have to fight the warboss and if they do manage to kill him then there is a chance the dok can save him. To many things can go wrong. That tactic is fool proof, I mean the hasnt stopped yet or anything its just keep going. If the that tactic is as fool proof as you say why havent they won yet?

It is hard to have any sort of debate when people (of both sides) are mis-remembering or simply pulling things out of the air and making things up instead of looking or citing any actual information.

The Tyranids have already won at Ghorala, as stated by GW, so arguing about that particular world is pointless:

It was shortly after the planet Orrok fell to the advance of Leviathan that the Tyranids approached Ghorala, base to Skarfang, Pirate-Warboss of the dreaded Skar Fleet.

...

WIth Skarfang dead, it did not take the Orks long until vying bosses started fighting amongst themselves to determine who would fill the power vacuum. The tribes were soon divided and infighting ran ak.. the now disparate forcof Orks were easy prey to the united Tyranid swarm and each was isolated and destroyed in quick succession. Within weeks the Orks on Ghorala had been slaughtered like cattle and the Tyranids gorged on their flesh.

From the digested remains of the prey world the swarm created new Hive Ships. Using Ghorala as a stepping stone, the Tyranid infestation quickly began to spread once more. The Ork worlds of Derragon and Keltor fell shortly after and even Octarius itself, centre of the Ork Empire, found itself embroiled in war.

p. 30-31, 5th edition Tyranid Codex

Skarfang died. He wasn't revived. No dok saved him. Orks are tough and resilient but not immortal.

Four worlds of the Octarius Empire therefore have already fallen and been stripped bare, as stated by GW. No amount of wishful thinking by Ork supporters is going to change that fact. The very fact that Ork worlds have already been overwhelmed and consumed also shows such a feat is possible for the Tyranids. The Ork method of reproduction and the squig ecosystem is not some sort of invulnerable shield or impassable obstacle that would stop the Tyranids cold.

The conflict on Octarius itself is still undecided, but it isn't some shoe in for the Orks if they have already lost 4 worlds to the Tyranids. Debate about Octarius, not Ghorala.

That said, all is not necessarily in favor of the Tyranids. The Eldar for example have intervened (though against both Orks and Tyranids):

Several Eldar craftworlds have begun to burn entire worlds to a cinder, employing ancient weapons of destruction not used in millennia.

p. 31, 5th edition Tyranid Codex

Eldar from the Biel Tan and Saim Hann Craftworlds devastate Imperial and Ork-held worlds surrounding the Octavius (sic) system with the intent of denying crucial bio-resources to Hive Fleet Leviathan.

p. 129, 5th edition 40K rulebook

Eldar from the Biel-Tan and Saim-Hann Craftworlds devastate many worlds sruonddiOcrius system with the intent denying crucial biological resources to Hive Fleet Leviathan. Many are Ork-held planets, but quite a few are colonised by the Imperium.

p. 127, 6th edition 40K rulebook

Also, I doubt those worlds are already stripped, I though the proccess took almost year.

If I am right, then it means the 'nids have plenty of reserves, otherwise, they have a huge army.

 Bobthehero wrote:
Also, I doubt those worlds are already stripped, I though the proccess took almost year.

If I am right, then it means the 'nids have plenty of reserves, otherwise, they have a huge army.

Read the quoted section from the Tyranid Codex. It took weeks to digest the Orks of Ghorala. The other subsequent worlds have also been digested. Past tense.

The evidence for a lot of the suppositions and what ifs people keep flinging around is actually already given by GW.

willhman wrote:

BlaxicanX wrote:

 Eetion wrote:
No the warboss at ghorla was killed by lictors, and then started infighting due to the leviathan fleet been decimated, the small hidden nids acted cautiosly.
Orks won that battle not the nids.

>Ork warboss gets eaten alive by lictors.
>Ork chieftains start fighting among themselves.
> Tyranids eat all of the Orks on the planet and leave it a desolate, baren rock with no living life left on it.

In your mind, that's a victory for the Orks. LOL

4 worlds lost does not an Empire make.

Provide your fluff evidence that defines how many planets are within the Empire. Oh right, you have none. You're relying on a wiki for all your information... lol

Codex: Tyranids states that despite the combined efforts of the Imperium, Eldar, and Orks, it alone is thriving on the conflict. Orks are not stalemating the Tyranids, they're fighting for their lives, whereas the Tyranids are only getting stronger.

With reinforcements slowed down to a trickle by the blockade, it's only a matter of time until the Orks are wiped out.

First Lictors have to go through hella defences, and scans, not to mention squig hounds and kommandos. Lictors are hard to see but they have a scent that. Also They have to fight the warboss and if they do manage to kill him then there is a chance the dok can save him. To many things can go wrong. That tactic is fool proof, I mean the hasnt stopped yet or anything its just keep going. If the that tactic is as fool proof as you say why havent they won yet?

Also wtf is there a Eldar and Iom fleet??? Ok and when the new ork codex comes out there is gonna be a shift and the orks are gonna win point? Its the codex its supposed to make them seem unstoppable. Where does it says reinforcements are slowed down to a trickle???? If there is a blockade around the system then wouldnt that speed up the amount of reinforcments going to system? Really orks just want to fight a foe worth fighting. Orks wont fight orks if other foes are around in a short distance. Or else we wouldnt have waaaagghhhs.

Exterminatus wont work Im afraid. Too many planets. Plus how will they know when the war ends? When a huge wave of enemys come rushing at them. They cant receive any warp transmissions cause shadow of the warp. so no faster then light communications. Also They will have plenty of ships allover space. Who ever wins will be used to be attacking from space to tactics will be set up to automaticly deal with these enemies in space. Either or victor will be xenos Loser Iom.



Automatically Appended Next Post:
@Boss grot, Shadow of the warp blocks them. They count as warp entities Im afraid. So they can only sit and watch and have fun with it

What are you talking about? As Ircandus pointed out above, this already happened in the fluff. The Lictors isolated the warboss, assassinated him, and the entire Ork army on the planet proceeded to tear itself apart, allowing the Nids to kill them all and eat the planet.

You might want to follow the conversation better in the future, and read up on your fluff, my friend.

BlaxicanX wrote:

 Eetion wrote:
No the warboss at ghorla was killed by lictors, and then started infighting due to the leviathan fleet been decimated, the small hidden nids acted cautiosly.
Orks won that battle not the nids.

>Ork warboss gets eaten alive by lictors.
>Ork chieftains start fighting among themselves.
> Tyranids eat all of the Orks on the planet and leave it a desolate, baren rock with no living life left on it.

In your mind, that's a victory for the Orks. LOL

4 worlds lost does not an Empire make.

Provide your fluff evidence that defines how many planets are within the Empire. Oh right, you have none. You're relying on a wiki for all your information... lol

Codex: Tyranids states that despite the combined efforts of the Imperium, Eldar, and Orks, it alone is thriving on the conflict. Orks are not stalemating the Tyranids, they're fighting for their lives, whereas the Tyranids are only getting stronger.

With reinforcements slowed down to a trickle by the blockade, it's only a matter of time until the Orks are wiped out.

Well with the proving the size of the Empie, its stated to be nearly the size of ultramar, only a few worlds have been named. A certain degree and common sense is needed. Ultramar is at least 8 systems and I'm sure that in 'know no fear' there were refernces to the 100 worlds of Ultramar. To assume that 'nearly' the size of ultramar and only 4-5 worlds requires common sense applying to the expexted number of worlds and not dependent on a canon source where lacking one.

At Ghorla the entirety of the nid hive fleet was almost annhilated, with only 1 vessel making a mycetic spore landing. That fight was lost by the orks, rather than an overwhelming victory.

And every other source mentions how krypttsmans planb is escalating as whomever wins will be more dangerous because of it.

 Eetion wrote:
Well with the proving the size of the Empie, its stated to be nearly the size of ultramar

The actual quote is that the Octarius sector is the size of Ultramar. That doesn't mean that all of the systems within it are packed with Orks. It means that they're the only faction with a functioning military to control the sector.

At Ghorla the entirety of the nid hive fleet was almost annhilated, with only 1 vessel making a mycetic spore landing. That fight was lost by the orks, rather than an overwhelming victory.

That an entire planet's worth of Orks couldn't destroy one single ship's worth of Tyranids reflects how moronic the Orks are, as well as how bad they are tactics. Not a good showing for them.

Yeah. I know what you mean.
Single organisms infiltrating and destroying a command structure, of course only orks are susceptable to that kind of attack, and command functions havnt been crippled by lictors.
Its a good job genestealer cults can't achieve the same efefct and corrupt higher echelons of command on imperial worlds isn't it.

Lictors did what lictors do best, hunt and assasinate. Now I do believe the nids are a genuine threat and the orks lost that battle for themselves. But that's orks for ya.

Ork almost stopped the invasion in its tracks annhilating the nid hive ships. Something the imperium hasn't even come close to with their tendril.

Orks can and are holding their own, they win some and lose some. Reinforcements are flooding in on ships, as well as the spores, as well as slapping on the muscle.
This conflict will keep on escalating, and if octarius keeps on going the way its going you will end up with boys the size of nid warriors.
Gaunts just won't cut it as orks get bigger, in that sort of fight forcing the nids to go bigger and bigger expending more resources to do so, and so the pattern repeats.

Its too close to call, but when the space battle really starts and a hive ship goes down, or 2... Then the nid effort is severely compromised. Orks don't have that liability.

I'd wish this thing had a poll.

Please read the "The Swarm Survives" and "Divide and Consume" entries in the Tyranid codex.

I don't have it. Can you summarise.

It's hard to say who will win here.

The Tyranids gain the upper hand for munching 4 out of 5 worlds of Octarius empire. Btu it seems that there is a stalemate on the last Ork world - Octarius. The Tyranids pile in new creatures and think out new strategies to defeat Orks but Orks are getting boyz from all over the sector. I don't know who will win because both sides are tough now, if Tyranids kill Ork Warboss they win adn if Orks drag this war for long enough they will win. Tyranids have Swarmlord on their side so they might have an edge agaisnt the Orks.

But as the title say: whoever win this war it will fight the nearby Imperial planets next. And with 3 quite famous Astartes Chapters and Eldar from Saim-Hann the resulting fight could be more entertaining than Octarius war.

The battle for Ocatiarius isn't even a stalemate, the Tyranids are winning. In the March WD (I believe it was March) It had an article about how three full continents had fallen fully to the Tyranids, along with several warbosses being killed. The fact that the Attacking Force has gained such a massive foothold on the primary planet, is extremely significant.

Also, while we don't know how man planets constitute this system, we do know that every named planet in the system, besides Octarius, has been consumed by the Hive fleet.

Yet in planetstrike octarius is described as a mountain world with a single mega continent.
Now assuming its a retcon, how many continents does it have? 4? 7? 12?
I'd expect the nids to make serious inroads, wouldn't be much of a fight otherwise if they couldn't.

Given that the fluff for octarius primarily comes from nid codex, and even through most of that is described as awaiting who will come out on top. Its not really surprising that only defeated worlds are mentioned.

 -Loki- wrote:
I'm still not sure why people are saying orks resources are infinite. While they reproduce Orks readily enough, the metals they use for their technology definitely isn't infinite. In fact, metals, on the scale things are made in 40k, would be far more finite than biomass.

You're the second person who has said that... No, just no. No, metal is way, way, way more abundant than 'biomass'. By a factor so large that the ratio just approaches 1 on the metal side. Iron is the most stable material produced by stars, in the UNIVERSE. Not amino acids. Look at Earth, what do we have more of, Iron or biomass? Iron by a huge factor. A planet that is geologically dead, like most in the galaxy, would have even more accessible iron. You need to get a refund from wherever you learned about universal composition.

Plus- the whole idea of biomass is a crock. Do you know how much energy is released by breaking the bonds of an organic molecule? Even one with a stupid-high energy density? Less than it took to form it, so no matter what, you are on the loosing side of the energy equation. Orks can use fusion/fission/blackmajik to produce energy discrepancies that the nids can't even begin to compete with. Plus, think about how big of an ork you would need to produce a nid warrior, which is about the same size. Because you loose energy when you break it down, and then loose much more energy when you reassemble it into whatever you want. All in situ. Ork reinforcements can come in-situ, but the bulk will come from off world. The science bones nids so hard that no amount of handwavvium can revive them.

Iracundus wrote:

 Bobthehero wrote:
Also, I doubt those worlds are already stripped, I though the proccess took almost year.

If I am right, then it means the 'nids have plenty of reserves, otherwise, they have a huge army.

Read the quoted section from the Tyranid Codex. It took weeks to digest the Orks of Ghorala. The other subsequent worlds have also been digested. Past tense.


The evidence for a lot of the suppositions and what ifs people keep flinging around is actually already given by GW.

Don'T have the dex, but okay, I'll remember that for the next time this thread pops up.

BlaxicanX wrote:

 Eetion wrote:
No the warboss at ghorla was killed by lictors, and then started infighting due to the leviathan fleet been decimated, the small hidden nids acted cautiosly.
Orks won that battle not the nids.

>Ork warboss gets eaten alive by lictors.
>Ork chieftains start fighting among themselves.
> Tyranids eat all of the Orks on the planet and leave it a desolate, baren rock with no living life left on it.

In your mind, that's a victory for the Orks. LOL

And the sad part is, in your mind you think that is how it works in 40k. One subpar boogey-man assassin. you realize the offico Assassinorum which, if you aren't familiar are the best of the best when it comes to assassinations they are able to approach the nearly unapproachable like Eldar Farseers, Dark eldar Archons, Tau Ethereals upon caste worlds. depending on their circumstance these assassins do what they are suppose to. the only assassins in history that have successfully dealt with Orkish Warbosses is first temple of assassins the Eversors.

So you have assassins which are hardwired to have a solar star explode out of their chest in the event of their death, liquifaction needle guns, lightning talons and hardcore frenzy drugs... and you think your squidbilly wannabe alien can just sneak though hundreds of thousands of orks, detections, orkish veterans, grots and then just walk up and kill a warboss? HA you are clearly the most delusional of all Nid players i have seen post of the Octarius Empire topic in quite some time so allow me to give you some wisdom on the topic of warbosses.

A Warboss will not die in his home, he will die on the battlefield if your nids have already made it planet side... which oh lookie!... they have. You might be of the opinion that warboss means singular ... it doesn't a Warboss is merely an ork who has become big enough to lead thousands of orks uncontested... it means Octarius has multiple leaders like you even said, when one boss dies someone else will take his spot because they have been wanting to. So We'll call this chode warboss you think that can be killed by a lictor WARBOSS BUGSUCKA. So Boss Bugsucka is killed... somehow by ninja lictors... meanwhile Nob Newspaper and nob Roach Motel vie for power by fighting one another Boom suddenly a leader is determined and the orks have rallyed under Nob NEWSPAPER. A battlefield might have one warboss... a empire will have many many more. Orkish leadership is an aggressive sport but it doesn't cause orks to implode when their are bugs to smash.

Infact the stupidest thing about the nids is they are given this orkish empire every excuse NOT to infight, we only fight one another when no one else is around you yourself are saying the nids are this thriving power upon their planet? What part of that makes you think the orks will suddenly not want to fight the new guy? Your post is willful ignorance of the operations of Ork Kulture and you strike me as someone who never does their homework before posting this dribble you think is truth. A small ocassion of orkish infighting without a perceived threat is not a empire conqured even if you catch the orks on a bad day good luck with your simple 3 step plan for conquering the orks.

Lastly, it isn't the burden of people disputing your claims to find evidence for you. If you say their is evidence that supports your claims you should produce them yourself for others. One does not accept a truth less it is provided.

Long story short, 1 warboss who isn't aware a war has begun isn't exactly a exploit to write home about. Nor is beating 1 entire planet of orks when your army is the fabeled great devourer who seems to be struggling and pouring EVERY resource from ultramar just to make a dent in the orks massive empire which somely is building to crash back. I garantee that the Orks aren't staying down for long, and (our lack of tactics) as you put it will be turning the nids on their head soon enough you don't realize that this entire thing will turn into a "New Armageddon" only with less than spectacular killcounts; a planet gridlocked until it loses all significance and falls to the wayside of 40k history with no definitive winner.

I'm gonna have to back the nids this time.

Lictors did kill the warboss on ghorla, but that is just 1 warboss, killed by stealth, the orks did start to infight. But it is a tactic used because of the poor resources the nids had available.

As much as we don't like the Orks handed the nids victory on that occasion.

But on octaria your point is valid, whacking 1 warboss doesn't eliminate the orksn while the nids are a large and accessable threat, all Orks will hit gribbly over green first and foremost.

Of course if the hivemind ever figures out that having green coloured carapace means they can get the drop on the orks... Well theorks are in trouble.

 Eetion wrote:
I'm gonna have to back the nids this time.

Lictors did kill the warboss on ghorla, but that is just 1 warboss, killed by stealth, the orks did start to infight. But it is a tactic used because of the poor resources the nids had available.

As much as we don't like the Orks handed the nids victory on that occasion.

But on octaria your point is valid, whacking 1 warboss doesn't eliminate the orksn while the nids are a large and accessable threat, all Orks will hit gribbly over green first and foremost.

Of course if the hivemind ever figures out that having green coloured carapace means they can get the drop on the orks... Well theorks are in trouble.

Green is best but it ain't orky... I say we stomp em flat!

Drawing from 2 earlier posts about the orks growing and Octarius becoming new Armageddon:
First: Ork Codex page 8 Life of Conflict orks are seen being twice the size of humans who are not that much smaller than regular terma/horma guants or genestealers i BELIVE, please correct me if im wrong.
Second: Big Mek Wurzzog was correct saying that the Octarius fight will grow and grow and escalate un til will be similar to Armageddon. Orks are ATTRACTED to war so Orks will be coming from all over the universe. Also with this many reinforcements the blockade could probably be broken OR if the IoM holds strong then all the orks need to do is get a single ship through. That ship, you guessed it!, will be holding a Tellyporta.And if this ship is destroyed oh well there are more than one tellyportas. Im not sure how the orks CAN'T win this except for if the nids turn more tentacles towards Octarius.

I thought tellyportas were relatively rare, with only Gazzy having used them on mass in Armageddon.

 Big Mek Wurrzog wrote:

BlaxicanX wrote:

 Eetion wrote:
No the warboss at ghorla was killed by lictors, and then started infighting due to the leviathan fleet been decimated, the small hidden nids acted cautiosly.
Orks won that battle not the nids.

>Ork warboss gets eaten alive by lictors.
>Ork chieftains start fighting among themselves.
> Tyranids eat all of the Orks on the planet and leave it a desolate, baren rock with no living life left on it.

In your mind, that's a victory for the Orks. LOL

And the sad part is, in your mind you think that is how it works in 40k. One subpar boogey-man assassin. you realize the offico Assassinorum which, if you aren't familiar are the best of the best when it comes to assassinations they are able to approach the nearly unapproachable like Eldar Farseers, Dark eldar Archons, Tau Ethereals upon caste worlds. depending on their circumstance these assassins do what they are suppose to. the only assassins in history that have successfully dealt with Orkish Warbosses is first temple of assassins the Eversors.

So you have assassins which are hardwired to have a solar star explode out of their chest in the event of their death, liquifaction needle guns, lightning talons and hardcore frenzy drugs... and you think your squidbilly wannabe alien can just sneak though hundreds of thousands of orks, detections, orkish veterans, grots and then just walk up and kill a warboss? HA you are clearly the most delusional of all Nid players i have seen post of the Octarius Empire topic in quite some time so allow me to give you some wisdom on the topic of warbosses.

A Warboss will not die in his home, he will die on the battlefield if your nids have already made it planet side... which oh lookie!... they have. You might be of the opinion that warboss means singular ... it doesn't a Warboss is merely an ork who has become big enough to lead thousands of orks uncontested... it means Octarius has multiple leaders like you even said, when one boss dies someone else will take his spot because they have been wanting to. So We'll call this chode warboss you think that can be killed by a lictor WARBOSS BUGSUCKA. So Boss Bugsucka is killed... somehow by ninja lictors... meanwhile Nob Newspaper and nob Roach Motel vie for power by fighting one another Boom suddenly a leader is determined and the orks have rallyed under Nob NEWSPAPER. A battlefield might have one warboss... a empire will have many many more. Orkish leadership is an aggressive sport but it doesn't cause orks to implode when their are bugs to smash.

Infact the stupidest thing about the nids is they are given this orkish empire every excuse NOT to infight, we only fight one another when no one else is around you yourself are saying the nids are this thriving power upon their planet? What part of that makes you think the orks will suddenly not want to fight the new guy? Your post is willful ignorance of the operations of Ork Kulture and you strike me as someone who never does their homework before posting this dribble you think is truth. A small ocassion of orkish infighting without a perceived threat is not a empire conqured even if you catch the orks on a bad day good luck with your simple 3 step plan for conquering the orks.

Lastly, it isn't the burden of people disputing your claims to find evidence for you. If you say their is evidence that supports your claims you should produce them yourself for others. One does not accept a truth less it is provided.

Long story short, 1 warboss who isn't aware a war has begun isn't exactly a exploit to write home about. Nor is beating 1 entire planet of orks when your army is the fabeled great devourer who seems to be struggling and pouring EVERY resource from ultramar just to make a dent in the orks massive empire which somely is building to crash back. I garantee that the Orks aren't staying down for long, and (our lack of tactics) as you put it will be turning the nids on their head soon enough you don't realize that this entire thing will turn into a "New Armageddon" only with less than spectacular killcounts; a planet gridlocked until it loses all significance and falls to the wayside of 40k history with no definitive winner.

You need to actually read fluff before commenting on it. It's sort of a pre-requisite of commenting in the fluff section.

Skarfang was already in the war. Tyranids were making no gains. They employed a new tactic - kill the warboss. They lured Skarfang and his entire retinue into an area choked with spores created by Venomthropes and launched an ambush. When the spores cleared, Skarfang found himself surrounded by Lictors which tore him apart. This caused the entire planets Ork population to start up infighting to determine a new Warboss, which in turn gave Leviathan the opening it needed to win.

It wasn't one Lictor finding Skarfang in bed with his wife. It wasn't some unawares Warboss unsure of an invasion. It wasn't some super-Lictor defying fluff and doing what an Imperial Assassin could not. Ghorala was at war with the Tyranids, and the Tyranids used better tactics to ambush and assassinate their Warlord, using his hubris against him.

As per fluff, the Tyranids are winning at Octarius, for every reason already pointed out. Tyranid players have been supporting their statements with fluff references from official GW publications which state the victories of the Tyranids. While it has been said they are struggling with Octarius itself, updated fluff from White Dwarf (which is still 100% official) has shown they're making strides towards winning there as well.

As for 'pouring EVERY resource from ultramar just to make a dent in the orks massive empire', they're not. While the Octarius war has been going on, the rest of Leviathan has been out kicking ass. Go check the galactic map in the 5th edition codex.

Basically, start citing fluff references to Ork victories on Octarius to counter the fluff references of Tyranids victories, and you might be getting somewhere.

 -Loki- wrote:

 Big Mek Wurrzog wrote:

BlaxicanX wrote:

 Eetion wrote:
No the warboss at ghorla was killed by lictors, and then started infighting due to the leviathan fleet been decimated, the small hidden nids acted cautiosly.
Orks won that battle not the nids.

>Ork warboss gets eaten alive by lictors.
>Ork chieftains start fighting among themselves.
> Tyranids eat all of the Orks on the planet and leave it a desolate, baren rock with no living life left on it.

In your mind, that's a victory for the Orks. LOL

And the sad part is, in your mind you think that is how it works in 40k. One subpar boogey-man assassin. you realize the offico Assassinorum which, if you aren't familiar are the best of the best when it comes to assassinations they are able to approach the nearly unapproachable like Eldar Farseers, Dark eldar Archons, Tau Ethereals upon caste worlds. depending on their circumstance these assassins do what they are suppose to. the only assassins in history that have successfully dealt with Orkish Warbosses is first temple of assassins the Eversors.

So you have assassins which are hardwired to have a solar star explode out of their chest in the event of their death, liquifaction needle guns, lightning talons and hardcore frenzy drugs... and you think your squidbilly wannabe alien can just sneak though hundreds of thousands of orks, detections, orkish veterans, grots and then just walk up and kill a warboss? HA you are clearly the most delusional of all Nid players i have seen post of the Octarius Empire topic in quite some time so allow me to give you some wisdom on the topic of warbosses.

A Warboss will not die in his home, he will die on the battlefield if your nids have already made it planet side... which oh lookie!... they have. You might be of the opinion that warboss means singular ... it doesn't a Warboss is merely an ork who has become big enough to lead thousands of orks uncontested... it means Octarius has multiple leaders like you even said, when one boss dies someone else will take his spot because they have been wanting to. So We'll call this chode warboss you think that can be killed by a lictor WARBOSS BUGSUCKA. So Boss Bugsucka is killed... somehow by ninja lictors... meanwhile Nob Newspaper and nob Roach Motel vie for power by fighting one another Boom suddenly a leader is determined and the orks have rallyed under Nob NEWSPAPER. A battlefield might have one warboss... a empire will have many many more. Orkish leadership is an aggressive sport but it doesn't cause orks to implode when their are bugs to smash.

Infact the stupidest thing about the nids is they are given this orkish empire every excuse NOT to infight, we only fight one another when no one else is around you yourself are saying the nids are this thriving power upon their planet? What part of that makes you think the orks will suddenly not want to fight the new guy? Your post is willful ignorance of the operations of Ork Kulture and you strike me as someone who never does their homework before posting this dribble you think is truth. A small ocassion of orkish infighting without a perceived threat is not a empire conqured even if you catch the orks on a bad day good luck with your simple 3 step plan for conquering the orks.

Lastly, it isn't the burden of people disputing your claims to find evidence for you. If you say their is evidence that supports your claims you should produce them yourself for others. One does not accept a truth less it is provided.

Long story short, 1 warboss who isn't aware a war has begun isn't exactly a exploit to write home about. Nor is beating 1 entire planet of orks when your army is the fabeled great devourer who seems to be struggling and pouring EVERY resource from ultramar just to make a dent in the orks massive empire which somely is building to crash back. I garantee that the Orks aren't staying down for long, and (our lack of tactics) as you put it will be turning the nids on their head soon enough you don't realize that this entire thing will turn into a "New Armageddon" only with less than spectacular killcounts; a planet gridlocked until it loses all significance and falls to the wayside of 40k history with no definitive winner.

You need to actually read fluff before commenting on it. It's sort of a pre-requisite of commenting in the fluff section.

Skarfang was already in the war. Tyranids were making no gains. They employed a new tactic - kill the warboss. They lured Skarfang and his entire retinue into an area choked with spores created by Venomthropes and launched an ambush. When the spores cleared, Skarfang found himself surrounded by Lictors which tore him apart. This caused the entire planets Ork population to start up infighting to determine a new Warboss, which in turn gave Leviathan the opening it needed to win.

It wasn't one Lictor finding Skarfang in bed with his wife. It wasn't some unawares Warboss unsure of an invasion. It wasn't some super-Lictor defying fluff and doing what an Imperial Assassin could not. Ghorala was at war with the Tyranids, and the Tyranids used better tactics to ambush and assassinate their Warlord, using his hubris against him.

As per fluff, the Tyranids are winning at Octarius, for every reason already pointed out. Tyranid players have been supporting their statements with fluff references from official GW publications which state the victories of the Tyranids. While it has been said they are struggling with Octarius itself, updated fluff from White Dwarf (which is still 100% official) has shown they're making strides towards winning there as well.

As for 'pouring EVERY resource from ultramar just to make a dent in the orks massive empire', they're not. While the Octarius war has been going on, the rest of Leviathan has been out kicking ass. Go check the galactic map in the 5th edition codex.

Basically, start citing fluff references to Ork victories on Octarius to counter the fluff references of Tyranids victories, and you might be getting somewhere.

Did you see what I said about the resource situation? Got buried in another page.

There will be no winner to octavia.
Given the time line is frozen, its the confluct to end all conflicts.

I don't expect much will get published on it until the next ork dex.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
As a side note, I don't believe the orks are winning. I believe its a stalemate, and the Orks just havnt won yet.
As iv been typing these arguments from the childrens hospital while my daughter sleeps with no reference material other than what I can pull up on my phone, lexicanum will have to do.

But here we go at providing your references

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Swarmlord

Stormlord is a stress induced response, so by its vey nature and appearence the nids are being held/loosing.


http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Octarius

Has a single mega continent, to retcon a planet to have Orks loose 3 continents is poor research at best and a throw away comment to buff tyranids at best. Some advancements are expected at the appearence of the Swarm lord however, yet the war rages on.

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Octarius_War
Here is a transcript of the conflict thus far. Feel like updating it with your tyranids are winning on octarius WD be my guest if you can cite the source.

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Blaktoof
Blaktoof is the overfiend, and launched a Waaagh into the Hivefleet, status unknown. At a guess that's a stalemate also. But Who knows, maybe dead, maybe kicking bottom.

As it is, I believe that a Stalemate is in order on octavia. But more Orks will keep on arriving, its what Orks do.
And when a Hive ship goes down in space, then things will start to go sour for the nids, the very fact the storm lord is needed shows that things are not. Going swimmingly for the nids.

In essence I believe the Orks will out last the nids, they will dig their heels in and grind out a victory... Eventually.

Eetion i believe that tellyportas were not very rare but the design was. Although only Ghazzy and Nazdreg have them , but also although they are not rare they are not common but somewhere in between. If you read the A Galaxy at War story from Ork Codex page 21 the section Descent it talks about how the Ork Roks land with giant tellyportasthat are able to brind Gargants and heavy artillery. So Ghazz or Nazdreg just need to send a horde of transport ships surround one transport ship carrying tellyportas, then the reinforcements will come and the nids will lose.

 Eetion wrote:
But here we go at providing your references

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Swarmlord

Stormlord is a stress induced response, so by its vey nature and appearence the nids are being held/loosing.

And that stress induced reaction has caused the Tyranids to make significant strides to taking Octaria. So that means it worked. How does this show they're losing?

 Eetion wrote:
http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Octarius

Has a single mega continent, to retcon a planet to have Orks loose 3 continents is poor research at best and a throw away comment to buff tyranids at best. Some advancements are expected at the appearence of the Swarm lord however, yet the war rages on.

Poor research or not, it's now official fluff. Octarius now has multiple continents, the number of which we don't know. We do know Tyranids have taken 3 now. We've heard nothing about how many the Orks have taken.

 Eetion wrote:
http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Octarius_War
Here is a transcript of the conflict thus far. Feel like updating it with your tyranids are winning on octarius WD be my guest if you can cite the source.

Never said White Dwarf said they're winning. I said there's more references to Tyranids winning on Octarius than Orks. Since they're neglecting to mention Ork victories, you can only assume there are none officially. This is the problem with a fluff debate over something as poorly written and thought out as the Octarius war.

 Eetion wrote:
http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Blaktoof
Blaktoof is the overfiend, and launched a Waaagh into the Hivefleet, status unknown. At a guess that's a stalemate also. But Who knows, maybe dead, maybe kicking bottom.

So what are the results of his Waaagh? Tyranids launched an attack into Octarius, we know it has taken multiple planets, killed multiple Warbosses, and is on its way to taking Octarius itself. Where are the references to Blaktoofs successes?

 Eetion wrote:
As it is, I believe that a Stalemate is in order on octavia. But more Orks will keep on arriving, its what Orks do.

And more Tyranids arrive as a fight drags on, and more are made during the fight. It's what Tyranids do.

 Eetion wrote:
And when a Hive ship goes down in space, then things will start to go sour for the nids, the very fact the storm lord is needed shows that things are not. Going swimmingly for the nids.

And the Swarmlord has caused them to make significant strides to victory. Not going swimmingly for the Orks since he turned up.

As for Hive Ships going down - it simply causes multiple other hive ships to birth new ones. 4th edition Tyranid codex. The Hydra Effect.

 Eetion wrote:
In essence I believe the Orks will out last the nids, they will dig their heels in and grind out a victory... Eventually.

Again, no fluff references point to them winning. They've all pointed to losses. In fact, it's the only part of the 5th edition fluff that mentions Tyranid victories and not their opponents victories, which is quite refreshing.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Silverthorne wrote:
Did you see what I said about the resource situation? Got buried in another page.

Yes I did. The thing is, Tyranids also use metals, along with everything else. This was mentioned in an old article about the amount of biomass removed from a planet. It included all metals and minerals.

So, if a Gargant is lost behind Tyranid lines, the Orks have lost that. The Tyranids have gained it. They're gaining everything else from that area from the hyper-reproductive flora as well, and anything else the Tyranids are eating (natural gases, soil, water, etc).

Orks use metal to make their things. Tyanids use it, plus far more. Metal is going to run out quicker due to both sides using it. Any more the Orks bring with them is potential biomass for the Tyranids.

Except, you are thinking that is orks run out of metal theya re done. the millions of orks fighting... can resupply the other millions of orks, guess what else orks master in? Ingenuity, Guess what a Hormaguant makes... 6 choppas (2 long 4 short) Their chitin makes eavy armor and fast repairs and their massive claws make excellent replacement parts for a power klaw....

Orks are going to find a way everytime, from the ruins of their homes, to scavenging off the dead and putting the corpses of the enemy to use the orks will still stomp the universe flat! Also you make it sound like hollowing out an entire planet is something fast... despite the billions of bullets earth has provided, or the steel columns for our houses, or metal for our cars... I highly doubt this war is going to exhaust a planet that fast and the nids will gobble up battlefields that stupidly knowing how hard it is to kill orks and not expect the battlefields to be more or less boobie trapped by wounded orks, mischevious gretchin looters or indigenous life.

Resources are a very negotiable term for orks... I'm shocked Nids would even suggest this as a viable outcome, for the Imperium perhaps... but never for an ork.

Nids can nom on the carapace of their 'gaunts too?

Chitin is pretty much flak armor, doesn't make good heavy armor.

I find it hard to believe that the orks havent had a single victory.

Do nids absorb metal and minerals. As far as I was aware its bio mass, atmosphere and water.

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Tyranid#Planetary_Assimilation

Makes no mention of minerals on the reclamation schedual. Can't really see how the access unmined minerals.

And of course orks have won. If they had it wouldn't be a stale mate.

I'm fully prepared to admit the Swarmlord resulted in a gain for nids, Just not enough, as you said we have no idea how many continents there are now. It might be a quarter of the world. It might be half? 3/4? Who knows.

As for the WD, still likely a throw away Blurb unresearched.

The problem is that most fluff comes from the nid dex so Ork exploits are hard to come by.


As for more nids coming. Really. The whole of leviathan seperated into tendrils, maybe some follow up behind. Orks have a much easier time to reinforce, nids need to reinforce themselves. And until ork resistance is eliminated that capability is a finite resource and they can get at the planet itself.

So know comes the long wait for the new Ork Codex to come out before the forum is revived so there will be more info on Octarius fights and Ork victories.

 Eetion wrote:
Do nids absorb metal and minerals. As far as I was aware its bio mass, atmosphere and water.

They use metal:

The Venom cannon is a long, powerful bio-weapon which fires salvoes of highly corrosive poison crystals encrusted with a metallic residue.

p. 30, 4th edition Tyranid Codex

Curving tusks of adamantium-laced chitin sprout from the Tyranid's head, allowing it to effect a devastating charge.

p. 33, 4th edition Tyranid Codex

I highly doubt this war is going to exhaust a planet that fast and the nids will gobble up battlefields that stupidly knowing how hard it is to kill orks and not expect the battlefields to be more or less boobie trapped by wounded orks, mischevious gretchin looters or indigenous life.

Once again, for there to be a debate, people have to actually have proof. Simply making up hyperbolic statements for your fan favorite is NOT proof or support for your position. This above position is further disproved by the fact that on Ghorala, the Tyranids did scavenge resources from battlefields and harvest bodies of both sides quite successfully, so all these supposed obstacles being made up to shore up the Ork position don't exist or are not the serious obstacles they are made out to be:

In the dead of night, synapse creatures re-mustered the scattered swarm to the corpse-choked battlefield. There the Tyranids fed on Ork cadaver and Tyranid carcass alike before returning to digestion pools secreted in the planet's rocky mesas. Slowly but surely, the Tyranid's numbers started to grow.

p. 30, 5th edition Tyranid Codex

Seriously, I am not particularly cheering on either of the factions on Octarius but from just review of the evidence, I see a lot more made up stuff coming from the players trying to argue for the Orks. Find evidence for your position. Whipping out personal statements of what you believe the Orks can do isn't proof. Quote and cite proof, from GW sources, not a Wiki, or some random "I remember reading somewhere that I cannot recall or name". Yes the evidence so far seems to show Tyranid victories, but that may change with the Ork Codex. However in the absence of evidence thus far, we cannot make any definitive conclusions about any Ork victories.

The only stuff we can definitively conclude is what is given by GW, and it shows so far that the Tyranids were attracted by a Genestealer cult/infestation planted by the Inquisition that spread in the Octarius Empire, 4 Ork worlds have fallen so far, the Tyranids have made planetfall on Octarius, and that the Eldar have started striking worlds, some Ork-held, for the purpose of denying resources to the Tyranids.

For that matter though, a citation and quote of the retcon of Octarius's geography and the claim that several continents have fallen would also be nice, as that is a Tyranid claim so far that is also unsourced.

Boss Grot Punt wrote:
So know comes the long wait for the new Ork Codex to come out before the forum is revived so there will be more info on Octarius fights and Ork victories.

Orkses are nothing if not paitient. (Can't believe I said that_

Slowly slowly swatty gribbly.

Also orks are bound to win, its an eventual certainty,
Orkses is never defeated in battle. If we win we win, if we die we die fighting so it don't count. If we runs for it we don't die neither, cos we can come back for annuver go, see!


Automatically Appended Next Post:
The problem with citation is that the war has very little coverage beyond the tyranid codex, and giving little in the way of Ork exploits.

Up until now it was granted as a stalemate, with neither side of the obvious victor.
Being asked who you think will winn comes with a certain ammount of assumption and interpretation.

Now I'm happy with the state of affairs, my personal belief is orks will prevail, just as I don't begrudge or generally frustrated with opposing points of view.

However an ill thought out blurb in a WD saying Nids are winning (they are allowed to make serious inroads initially wouldn't be a stalemate otherwise)/have the orks on the run. Change the continents of the planet upsets this balance.

The stalemate should be maintained. To give the impeium a enemy after. Personally I think it will be a Waaagh they have to contend with.

So by the nature of the question of 'who do you think will win' requires a certain ammount of hypothesis and assumption as the citations are entirely lacking.

Probably when new Ork Codex comes out the info will be the Orks are winning.

Ugh... that quote again...

After scrupulous checking, the quote about the continents seems to actually be a mis-remembered bit of information from p. 16 of the 5th edition Tyranid Codex, describing the attack on the planet of Crimsonfall. Unless someone can provide proof from this alleged WD source, I don't think there is evidence for any retcon of Octarius's geography.

This is why I am so particular about asking for proof because there are all sorts of errors that creep in when people start mixing details from memory.

 -Loki- wrote:


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Silverthorne wrote:
Did you see what I said about the resource situation? Got buried in another page.

Yes I did. The thing is, Tyranids also use metals, along with everything else. This was mentioned in an old article about the amount of biomass removed from a planet. It included all metals and minerals.

So, if a Gargant is lost behind Tyranid lines, the Orks have lost that. The Tyranids have gained it. They're gaining everything else from that area from the hyper-reproductive flora as well, and anything else the Tyranids are eating (natural gases, soil, water, etc).

Orks use metal to make their things. Tyanids use it, plus far more. Metal is going to run out quicker due to both sides using it. Any more the Orks bring with them is potential biomass for the Tyranids.

If you took all the metals, minerals, and volatiles off a planet, as you suggest the Nids do, there would be nothing left. All planets are just groupings of minerals metals and volatiles, usually in the pretty set ratio of 1/6 metals, 1% unbound volatiles, and the rest minerals. So you are talking about just removing a planet so that there is nothing left at all, where i think they actually leave a scoured ball behind, with most of the crust removed, the atmosphere gone or poisoned, and any free water gobbled up.

As an aside, there is no way that the orks will run out of metal to make war material before the nids will exhaust biomass. Think about every single solitary scrap of metal ever collected and used by mankind. That isn't even considered part of the planet's metal composition, it is just the remnants of the 'late heavy bombardment', asteroid carcasses. And consider how, even after the amount that we have used of what is essentially a trace element, iron is still cheaper than potatoes pound for pound. We know that there are quarries of such size in the 40 millenium that they destabilize the entire gravity of the planet. Once you start getting into mantle and core metal (impossible on earth since we are a rare, geologically active rocky planet) the supply of metal is inexhaustible. That's not even getting into the quicker and easier method of mining an asteroid.

The nid path to victory just doesn't exist it's
step 1-- spend a lot of energy travelling to planet using biologically derived fuels of far less efficiency than fusion or fission.
step 2-- spend more energy hatching a bunch of bugs to drop down on the planet
step 3-- spend more energy eventually overcoming resistance
step 4-- spend yet more energy gathering everything up and putting it into digestion towers which require staggering amounts of power to pump the material skyward.
step 5-- use even more energy to convert the simple volatiles captured into new, more complex forms

They have an energy gap that is impossible to explain away. Their whole MO is just a slap in the face to anyone who has leafed through a biology or chemistry book before. I don't even mean read, just like browsed the pictures.

Plus, if they make all the plants go into crazy turbo growth mode, wouldn't that make every ork on the planet into some kind of super nob within hours?

Frankly, does it even matter who wins? I thought that Kryptman or whatever his name was planned on supernuking the planet once one side had been wiped out. I doubt that the imperium of man will let the leviathan win though, it is an existential threat, unlike the orks. Either way, there won't be a lot of time to pass around the fungus beer before the atmosphere turns into hot sexy fire. Tigurus mind-melded with the swarm lord, so it should be easy for the imperium to know when victory for one side is imminent, and then slide a battle cruiser in there and barbecue whatever is left.

That seems the inevitability, so as I said "We are just turning into an Armageddon" Since the Octarius empire is more than just a few worlds, and orkish starmap says it holds many worlds in the sector near Ultramar this would be assumed primarily Octarius empire's Claim for a multitude of reasons

1) if you are going to pit your greatest enemies against one another make sure they are evenly matched to maximize both sides losses and since it's nids the only way to garantee that is through fiding the LARGEST foe you can.
2) The orks have fought the Ultramarines there for sometime and thus are use to those tactics in a few years it will turn into them use to fighting nids unless the Exterminatus ships are guided in by the blockade to deliver their payload but both armies aren't garanteed to die out completely due to volume of ork ships and durability of carnies and the like per their codex example
3) if IOM and eldar are working together it wasn't so the nids could emerge victorious... it was so it could be a winning strategy.

In short, It'll be fun while it lasts Bring it on BUGGIES!

 Silverthorne wrote:
They have an energy gap that is impossible to explain away. Their whole MO is just a slap in the face to anyone who has leafed through a biology or chemistry book before

Why does this bother you so much? You've mentioned it twice thus far.

I could see the nids having some metalic element to them, after all humans, orks, astartes, usually have some form of mettalic element on them as armour or weapons before they get launched into digestion pools, but mining it out or disassembling a gargant into said pools, I'd imagine detritus and ruined warmaterials and cities adorn the dead worlds the tyranids capture.
Biomass remains their primary resource.

But physics asides for the nids, it is what it is, and we can only attribute it to hand wavium.

 Eetion wrote:
I could see the nids having some metalic element to them, after all humans, orks, astartes, usually have some form of mettalic element on them as armour or weapons before they get launched into digestion pools, but mining it out or disassembling a gargant into said pools, I'd imagine detritus and ruined warmaterials and cities adorn the dead worlds the tyranids capture.
Biomass remains their primary resource.

War detritus is also digested. See the following about an Imperial world fallen to the Tyranids:

Strangle-vines tightened their grip on the ruins of an Imperial outpost, rendering steel and plastic down to their constituent parts ready for absorption.

p. 42, 3rd edition Tyranid Codex

If the Tyranids actively digested the Imperial ruins, they can actively digest a Gargant.

But physics asides for the nids, it is what it is, and we can only attribute it to hand wavium.

The previous critique about energy is flawed because it rests on the false assumption that planetary ecosystems are closed energy systems, which they are not. Energy inputs exist, such as from the local sun, and geothermal sources. We know the Tyranids make use of hypertrophic vegetation, which requires sunlight for photosynthesis. We also know the Tyranids utilize geothermal:

Tyranid Magma Vents:
...
These vitrified tubes are bored down past the Mohorovicic Discontinuity (between the crust and the mantle) to allow gases trapped deep within the planet to escape into the atmosphere...
...
Magma vents are also utilized as a geothermal energy source for the Tyranid broodhive complexes. Dozens of these types of vents are utilized to heat the entire hive and provide thermal energy to incubating broods.

"Tyranid Planetary Assimilation Analysis", Sherman Bishop, WD 254

A lot of the issues raised with the Tyranids are really non-issues due to lack of knowledge of the background as the answers are already given by GW.

Plus, if they make all the plants go into crazy turbo growth mode, wouldn't that make every ork on the planet into some kind of super nob within hours?

No, because Orks are not plants. Fungi are not plants. Orks are a hybrid creature composed of animal, algae, and fungus. In any case, nothing of the sort is mentioned happening for Ghorala, or any of the other Ork worlds that have already fallen to the Tyranids.

Again the very fact that Ork worlds have fallen shows that neither the Ork life cycle or individual Ork growth is any foolproof defense against the Tyranids, as otherwise these worlds would not have fallen and been stripped bare.

Over and over again people are proposing new made up "what if" scenarios involving the Orks and their biology as if it were some sort of magical defense that would prevent the Tyranids making any headway. Yet if that were the case, no Ork worlds would ever have fallen, yet we know from GW multiple worlds have fallen.

Lets take a step back here.

What do we know as fact?

We know a tendril of Leviathan has invaded the Octarius Sector. We know this sector is one of the largest and most densely populated Ork held areas of space.

We know the Swarmlord has appeared in the warzone. We know that the Tyranids have taken 4 worlds. We can assume there are many more as the Sector is equated to Ultramar which has at least 8 systems.

So that's what we know and it's not much is it?

What can we reasonably assume then?

We can give the Orks the technological advantage. They're capable of producing more advanced weaponry, have teleportation, better inter-stellar travel and thrive on conflict.

The Orks are able to better resupply and re-enforce themselves; warp travel is faster than the Tyranids conventional space travel.

Given their warp advantage the orks also posses the advantage of mobility and will be able to better exploit breakthroughs and respond to emergencies. Such behaviour requires a level of co-ordination only possilbe through an intact command structure- a struggle for the orks. As long as the Overfiend is alive he can likely co-ordinate his forces to an adequate degree, he wouldn't have made it to Overfiend if he was an idiot.

The Tyranids however have a psychic command chain, an unbreakable willpower and the strategic genius of the Swarmlord. We can give them the advantage in leadership.

Knowing that the Tyranids have conquered 4 named worlds and having documented victories is no reason to suggest they're winning. Given that most of the information about the war comes from the Tyranid codex it's no surprise it's slanted. Furthermore the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, by which i mean you can't assume the ork's don't have a victory because none are mentioned, if they were always losing the war wouldn't be described as a stalemate.

As to who's going to win, that's a tough question. Both sides thrive on continued conflict. Both utilize unconventional technology and tactics. Both are able to rapidly replenish their ranks and resources.

I would posit it's going to come down to which sides builds up the greatest momentum. If one sides starts winning by a significant margin they're then going to continue picking up speed and steamroll over the opposition; they're both suited to this. Each sides force would increase in quality and quantity after every victory (the nids consuming every more biomass and spawning every more organisms and the orks getting bigger and stronger and more numerous too) and eventually that would tip the scale.

Mostly because its t documented. The conflicts are generally quick. But even the ork phsiology isn't going to grown in a vaccuum if the planet is stripped bare.
If resistance remains then its feasable that orks grow more quickly, its also feasable they don't grow at all due to the tyranid phage cells.
At present we don't know what effect the nid rapid eco systems has on ork spores, if any.

It may simply be a case of the planet stripped before the gesatation period for the ork is complete, it may be sped up, it may be same duration, it may not grow at all.

There simply is a lack of evidence either way.

Strangle vines being the case for utilising detritus, bio energy is still their primary resource.

There is also the question of just what is happening in Space, have the nids commenced absorption? Are they delayed due to a war in space with the orks and unable to harvest properly until it is resolved?

Iracundus wrote:


The previous critique about energy is flawed because it rests on the false assumption that planetary ecosystems are closed energy systems, which they are not. Energy inputs exist, such as from the local sun, and geothermal sources. We know the Tyranids make use of hypertrophic vegetation, which requires sunlight for photosynthesis. We also know the Tyranids utilize geothermal:

Tyranid Magma Vents:
...
These vitrified tubes are bored down past the Mohorovicic Discontinuity (between the crust and the mantle) to allow gases trapped deep within the planet to escape into the atmosphere...
...
Magma vents are also utilized as a geothermal energy source for the Tyranid broodhive complexes. Dozens of these types of vents are utilized to heat the entire hive and provide thermal energy to incubating broods.

"Tyranid Planetary Assimilation Analysis", Sherman Bishop, WD 254

A lot of the issues raised with the Tyranids are really non-issues due to lack of knowledge of the background as the answers are already given by GW.
.

Not really. If you are assuming that they have a photosynthetic function (not a crazy thought) what efficiency are we looking at? Because plants process the energy from the sun at a rate even less efficient than the pitiful 9-11% that we can squeeze out of solar cells today, in this century. You can hand wave around that to some extent, for example by saying that the hive mind evolved partitions around the mitochondria of the cells allowing the local CO2 concentration to be sky high and bump up the efficiency, but it doesn't matter since a common trend of almost all literature on the nid invasions stipulates that the skies turn black within hours, and after the first day the entire planet is shrouded in darkness. Kinda bones the whole photosynthesis paradigm.

There are pockets of gas that are trapped in the mantle, sure. If some bug had a major deathwish, they could pop them open and take a krakatoa to the face. I'm sure a lot of nid fans like to think that covering your basecamp with forty or fifty cubic miles of granitic magma is a great plan, but um, maybe they should reconsider that. If they need gas so bad, wouldn't it make more sense to, i don't know, nosh a gas giant then try to extract a tiny bit of it out of the mantle using what can only be a suicidal extraction technique? And geothermal only helps you while you are wherever it is available. After the planet is digested in however many days ( I thought it took like 10 days), you're boned again. Again that is assuming the planet has an active core (huge assumption) and that the contour is such that heat energy is close to the surface (another huge assumption).

Why can't the devs just say 'Um yeah they can draw power from the warp'. It's their solution to every other loose end they can't tie up. Based on the background of the nids, all our nuclear subs should be run on hamburgers instead of uranium, because hamburgers work so much better as a power source.

 Eetion wrote:
Mostly because its t documented. The conflicts are generally quick. But even the ork phsiology isn't going to grown in a vaccuum if the planet is stripped bare.
If resistance remains then its feasable that orks grow more quickly, its also feasable they don't grow at all due to the tyranid phage cells.
At present we don't know what effect the nid rapid eco systems has on ork spores, if any.

It may simply be a case of the planet stripped before the gesatation period for the ork is complete, it may be sped up, it may be same duration, it may not grow at all.

There simply is a lack of evidence either way.

Actually we do know what happens. Phage cells and Ork spores fight on the microscopic level.

At a microscopic level, Tyranid phage cells fought to consume the aggressive expansions of Orkoid spores.

...

By the time night fell, every single greenskin upon Orrok was dead, their bodies reconstituted and channelled back to the bio-ships to create yet more Tyranids.

p. 58, Planetstrike

Thus we know that they engage in direct conflict, and that Tyranid phage cells are capable of dealing with Ork spores as Orrok was one of the 4 worlds stripped and consumed. Ork spores therefore are not an insurmountable obstacle.

Using evidence from Codex, to Planetstrike, to White Dwarf, multiple assumptions about Tyranid capability or lack of capability have been proven wrong.

Strangle vines being the case for utilising detritus, bio energy is still their primary resource.

"Bio energy" is not a term that makes any sense. If you mean by actual heterotrophic metabolizing of surface biomass to fuel Tyranid activities, then yes that is a likely occurrence, but we already know that from descriptions of rippers defoliating and stripping the landscape. However the issue and question was whether Tyranids can and do make use of metals and other inorganics. The answer to that is YES, as they have been shown by GW to actively break down war detritus for consumption. One of the assumptions about Tyranids raised earlier in this thread was the assertion that they could not make use of metals or leftover Ork equipment, and that assumption has been shown to be false, through GW sources.

There is also the question of just what is happening in Space, have the nids commenced absorption? Are they delayed due to a war in space with the orks and unable to harvest properly until it is resolved?

Consumption is continuous as per:

Strictly speaking the consumption of the planet under attack is continuous from the moment the hiveships achieve low orbit and release organisms into the atmosphere. However the point upon which the hiveships begin to replenish their reserves of bio-mass from the planet is a discrete phase which forms the culmination of the Tyranid assault.

p. 41, 3rd edition Tyranid Codex

People seem to be confusing the issue of the ships with the Tyranids as a whole. The Tyranid consumption eco-system of rippers, mutated flora, spores, etc... is all underway from the moment of Tyranid invasion. However the Tyranid ships, which only form the space component of the Tyranids, do not feed until the end. That however does not mean the ground swarms are not replenishing their reserves or incapable of reproducing.

Upon making a kill, a Hormagaunt will hungrily feed upon its prey's remains...

Furthermore unlike most other Tyranid bioforms, Hormagaunts are able to reproduce indepently, and lay hundreds of eggs just below the surface of a planet before their short, hyperactive lifespan is over.

p. 38, 5th edition Tyranid Codex

Therefore the issue of asking about the Tyranid ships misses half the issue. The issue is one of the ground swarms, which have made planetfall already after Octarius's anti-air defenses were neutralized (see p.59, Planetstrike).

Again I am not specifically trying to argue in favor of the Tyranids but a lot of the Ork posters in this thread seem to be just completely off base when it comes to what Tyranids do, do not do, or what they have done, as given by GW. If there is going to be any discussion or debate, both sides have to be in possession of the facts. Without agreement on the facts as given by GW, things just become nonsensical, analogous to someone for example claiming bolter fire can be reflected by mirrors because they fire laser beams. Such a person would be wrong because it is a given fact in the 40K universe that bolters do not fire laser beams. The same applies for this situation. The capabilities of both sides need to be looked at, with reference to sources, not just random spouting of personal opinion or made up hyperbole about what can or cannot be done.

There is limited evidence at times but in such circumstances the only real conclusion that can be made is that there is insufficient evidence.

Higher level thinking has left this forum... Tryanid Instinctive behavior and Orkish Squabbling is taking place. I hate to sound like a broken record here people but GW only stands to lose by determining a victory in this story by anyone but the Imperium... do you know why? because it was the Imperium that forced the hand of the Nids in the first place... this isn't a story about how cool the orks are... or how creepy nids are... it's a testament to the tactics the IOM employs to pit it's enemies against one another so they can survive a small vestige longer awaiting the arise of the Emperor.

Please get this through your heads, No one is going to agree so it is left to the idea that it is a MOOT DISCUSSION. I swear i think mods need to ban this topic for awhile....

No matter who wins the Imperium will win more and probably be a jerk and nuke us to boot. And similar to the IOM tactics the Octarius skirmishes is really a way of pitting fanboys against one another in futile combat to envitably prove dominance in the game... the purpose of the fluff in the first place technically speaking. So please please please, just leave this thread to die and agree no one is changing one another's mind and that this story line is cool

I'm fine with desperate war of defense for orks but it feels like no nid player is happy less they are COMPLETELY UNSTOPPABLE. if you don't want to agree to disagree that is fine but I am pulling out of this gakstorm like all the ones before it. Bye boyz!

I don't think anybody has been trying to claim the Tyranids are utterly unstoppable. They have suffered multiple defeats in their own Codex. If anything from skimming these threads it seems to be more Ork fans that refuse to consider anything other than Orks being under no threat whatsoever and curb stomping the Tyranids.

The evidence cited just shows that is far from the case and that Ork physiology and spores are no immunity to the Tyranid consumption eco-system. The full example of Ghorala appears also to serve the point of illustrating the use of tactics on the part of the Hive Mind when the usual Tyranid advantage of numbers is absent. The example in Planetstrike on Octarius itself appears to show how the Tyranids neutralized Ork anti-air defenses in order to allow for a full planetary assault. The Tyranids cannot be dismissed as being stupid or only capable of using numbers to win.

That and again the aforementioned fact of the Orks of Octarius having already lost 4 worlds to the Tyranids shows the Orks are in for a fight.

As I have stated before, there is insufficient evidence really to reach any conclusion about the future and the timeline is frozen. As others have pointed out, most of the evidence is Tyranid focused, and shows their victories. Will an Ork Codex or the future show more Ork victories? Maybe, maybe not. We cannot tell. All we can tell however from the GW given evidence is that the Orks are not going to walkover the Tyranids as they have already lost 4 worlds and failed to prevent the Tyranids from landing in full force on Octarius. If 4 Ork worlds have already fallen, then the fall of Octarius is not an impossibility.

I hope the Orks win because anyone is an underdog to the Nids

So happy to come back and see such spirited discussion on the topic. Chief reason I registered on this site. To be a part of all the great discussions I'd read while lurking. Particularly love the resource discussion - even if some people seem to be a bit condescending for no reason. Still a lot of great information though. I agree with Iracundus that when it comes to cited evidence the Tyranids are winning which is one of the reasons I personally side with them. But I agree that since it is a theoretical conversation we can deal with the hypothetical. My biggest issue so far is that the Tyranids just seem to be winning with superior tactics despite the lack of resources. I mean they brought down an entire Ork planet, with enough naval firepower to devastate a Tyranid tendril fleet, with one ship (admittedly this really bugged me when I read). But it seems to speak to the fact that while the Orks are way more effective at defeating the Tyranids in a straight up fight then most 40k armies - logistically and tactically they are just outmatched. I agree with Big Mek Wurrzog about the idea that there are multiple warlords on Octarius so they can't be as decisive as they were earlier in the war but it doesn't change the fact that the Tyranids are still employing better tactics than their opponents. When you chuck in the Swarmlord (which means there will be a lot more reinforcements as Leviathan refocuses on Octarius) it seems as if we are looking to a Tyranid advantage. I'm not saying they will roflstomp the Orks by any stretch of the imagination but the edge does seem to belong to them currently.

Ghorala is something that gw should never have published imho. Its too vague and it makes it sound like the easiest way to stop the orks is to kill the warboss, then infighting will start. This doesnt always happen. The reason it happened on ghorola is because (once again this is my opinion) the orks outnumbered the nids like 100-to-1. Plus Im willing to bet that the nids were on just one continent.

The breakout into infighting is because the orks were confident that the nids were beat. Since they had no other foes to test there mettle they fought each other for leadership. Since the orks were no longer unified they were pretty weak targets. It is no surprise that the nids killed them cause the orks thought they had already won. Pride and overconfidence were the things that really let the tyranids win.

Now the nids cant use that same tactice cause they are big again and they are the perfect enemy for the orks to test their mettle against.

Iracundus wrote:

 Eetion wrote:
Mostly because its t documented. The conflicts are generally quick. But even the ork phsiology isn't going to grown in a vaccuum if the planet is stripped bare.
If resistance remains then its feasable that orks grow more quickly, its also feasable they don't grow at all due to the tyranid phage cells.
At present we don't know what effect the nid rapid eco systems has on ork spores, if any.

It may simply be a case of the planet stripped before the gesatation period for the ork is complete, it may be sped up, it may be same duration, it may not grow at all.

There simply is a lack of evidence either way.

Actually we do know what happens. Phage cells and Ork spores fight on the microscopic level.

At a microscopic level, Tyranid phage cells fought to consume the aggressive expansions of Orkoid spores.

...

By the time night fell, every single greenskin upon Orrok was dead, their bodies reconstituted and channelled back to the bio-ships to create yet more Tyranids.

p. 58, Planetstrike

Thus we know that they engage in direct conflict, and that Tyranid phage cells are capable of dealing with Ork spores as Orrok was one of the 4 worlds stripped and consumed. Ork spores therefore are not an insurmountable obstacle.

Using evidence from Codex, to Planetstrike, to White Dwarf, multiple assumptions about Tyranid capability or lack of capability have been proven wrong.

Actually that really doesn't solve the issue at all.

It does tell us that phage cells 'fight' to combat the aggressive expansions of spores. So yes phage cells can affect the spores, but why are they aggressive expansions? Are they enhanced in potency/growth as other plant life is. Were the spores partially resistant?
As for orrock, that doesn't prove phage cells nullify orksgrowth. It simply proves that orrock fell and was stripped before they a) completed their gestational cycle, b) cycle completed too late for it to have an affect.
It is also likely ork gestation can be destroyed by rippers during harvesting.

Gestational growth may not be entirely stopped, probably hindered, but the growth of the ork may be accelerated, it may not be, all we can say is that in the 4 cited examples, no recorded effects of ork gestation were documented. So we have somethingbetween hage cells entirely stop ork spores, to Ork spores thrive, with the likely answer being that it was neglected to mention in the cited references.

I personally feel that there will be some hindering in spore growth, but orrock may be that gestation takes longer than it takes to harvest the planet: around 100 days from first contact with vanguard organisms.

But phage cells by no means guarntee interruption in the ork reproduction cycle.


But I'm willing to give nids the edge but still feel orks will win out as more and more reinforcements arrive, and the veterans get bigger and bigger.

Stepping back and looking at the big picture even if the Orks lose on Octarius that may be the most densely poplated ork empire but by no means is that the whole or even the majority of the whole ork race. I forget where i read this but im pretty sure the orks are spread quiet far out into space. So assuming that the Orks lose (unlikely) then the IoM Exterminatuses the nids (Is Levaithan the major tendril??) THEN the orks are still around and will eventually repopulate i a different area and form new empires while the nids are stuck with a stunted Leviathan tendril with a hat tip from the IoM.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Yah about my earlier post the orks seem to be everywhere (of course this is from the codex so take it with a grain of salt).

Boss Grot Punt wrote:
Is Levaithan the major tendril??

Leviathan is the the whole hive fleet. The tendril attacking Octarius is part of that hive fleet.

Is Leviathan the only tendril with the hive fleet??

No, the only Hive Fleet that moved as a single fleet was Behemoth. All other Hive Fleets have had 'tendrils' branching from a singlular point of entry into the galaxy. Think of it like a hand. The 'tendril' attacking Octarius is one of its fingers. The other fingers are off doing their own thing.

Also, is it Octarius or Octavius?

Both. It started as Octavius, but then one of the design team misspelled it as Octarius (I think it was first Cruddace that did it in the 5e codex).

If the nids win, Im pretty sure that the iom wont be able to break in and do exterminatus. Chances are they will just flow out of the sector bigger then ever.

willhman wrote:
If the nids win, Im pretty sure that the iom wont be able to break in and do exterminatus. Chances are they will just flow out of the sector bigger then ever.

It's not a matter of exterminatus while they win as much as while they are winning.

On another note, if Nid supporters are wrong and the Orks ending up not losing then I think that would be the best scenario because it would mean the war would have lasted a lot longer.

 Shlazaor wrote:

willhman wrote:
If the nids win, Im pretty sure that the iom wont be able to break in and do exterminatus. Chances are they will just flow out of the sector bigger then ever.

It's not a matter of exterminatus while they win as much as while they are winning.

On another note, if Nid supporters are wrong and the Orks ending up not losing then I think that would be the best scenario because it would mean the war would have lasted a lot longer.

It would be even worse cause then they would be getting hit from both orks and nids... I dont think you understand that exterminatus isnt a just a single nuke but a bombardment. To completly wipe out a world full of life it will take several hundred missles of a certain type. These take effort to load and cant be fired all at once. If they could then every single defeat the iom had would have exterminatus at the end. plus they would need a huge ship to do it. There are already two fleets of both orks and nids around space. One ship would die instantly. That means a fleet. But the iom cant really spare a fleet for someplace that isnt helping the iom. if the fight continues while they enter then even a fleet would be obliterated. or at least the ship with exterminatus missles targeted or crippled or cant get close enough to destroy. Either or exterminatus is highly unlikly

willhman wrote:

 Shlazaor wrote:

willhman wrote:
If the nids win, Im pretty sure that the iom wont be able to break in and do exterminatus. Chances are they will just flow out of the sector bigger then ever.

It's not a matter of exterminatus while they win as much as while they are winning.

On another note, if Nid supporters are wrong and the Orks ending up not losing then I think that would be the best scenario because it would mean the war would have lasted a lot longer.

It would be even worse cause then they would be getting hit from both orks and nids... I dont think you understand that exterminatus isnt a just a single nuke but a bombardment. To completly wipe out a world full of life it will take several hundred missles of a certain type. These take effort to load and cant be fired all at once. If they could then every single defeat the iom had would have exterminatus at the end. plus they would need a huge ship to do it. There are already two fleets of both orks and nids around space. One ship would die instantly. That means a fleet. But the iom cant really spare a fleet for someplace that isnt helping the iom. if the fight continues while they enter then even a fleet would be obliterated. or at least the ship with exterminatus missles targeted or crippled or cant get close enough to destroy. Either or exterminatus is highly unlikly

I agree with most of what you are saying with the exception of your last two statements. The whole point of the redirect was to save the IoM from fighting the Orks and the Nids themselves so that they can build up their strength. This was successful. At some point one side is going to be weakened to the point that they can't recover and that is when the IoM strikes. They attack and destroy or fend off the already damaged opposing fleets and destroy everything on the surface. Saying they don't have a fleet to spare defeats the whole point of Octarius. It was done for the sole purpose of allowing the IoM time to rebuild its strength. Will the IoM suffer losses when they initiate Exterminatus? Almost assuredly. But remember the point of Exterminatus is to destroy planets with enemy forces that are so overwhelming that the only option is to glass the planet. I don't know about you but that sounds like Octarius to me.

 Shlazaor wrote:
At some point one side is going to be weakened to the point that they can't recover and that is when the IoM strikes. They attack and destroy or fend off the already damaged opposing fleets and destroy everything on the surface.

Except that's not happening due to how Orks and Tyranids work. Orks are simply feeding biomass into the Tyranids, while Tyranids are providing the Orks with a long war, which makes Orks stronger physically. Whatever side wins is going to be stronger - and this is even stated in the fluff. If the Imperium can't get in now to launch an Exterminatus, they won't stand a chance of doing it when there's a victor.

Not to mention that if the victor is the Tyranids, Exterminatus after the fact won't do anything anyway - Tyranids don't stay on a planet. By the time the Imperium marshalls forces to do an Exterminatus, the Tyranids will have sucked the planets in the system dry and moved on. Exterminatus during the consumption of one of the planets is also very unlikely, as stated in the Apocalypse book, no Imperial fleet has gotten near a planet in the final days of consumption. So it's not like there's precedent for them being able to do it.

 Shlazaor wrote:

willhman wrote:

 Shlazaor wrote:

willhman wrote:
If the nids win, Im pretty sure that the iom wont be able to break in and do exterminatus. Chances are they will just flow out of the sector bigger then ever.

It's not a matter of exterminatus while they win as much as while they are winning.

On another note, if Nid supporters are wrong and the Orks ending up not losing then I think that would be the best scenario because it would mean the war would have lasted a lot longer.

It would be even worse cause then they would be getting hit from both orks and nids... I dont think you understand that exterminatus isnt a just a single nuke but a bombardment. To completly wipe out a world full of life it will take several hundred missles of a certain type. These take effort to load and cant be fired all at once. If they could then every single defeat the iom had would have exterminatus at the end. plus they would need a huge ship to do it. There are already two fleets of both orks and nids around space. One ship would die instantly. That means a fleet. But the iom cant really spare a fleet for someplace that isnt helping the iom. if the fight continues while they enter then even a fleet would be obliterated. or at least the ship with exterminatus missles targeted or crippled or cant get close enough to destroy. Either or exterminatus is highly unlikly

I agree with most of what you are saying with the exception of your last two statements. The whole point of the redirect was to save the IoM from fighting the Orks and the Nids themselves so that they can build up their strength. This was successful. At some point one side is going to be weakened to the point that they can't recover and that is when the IoM strikes. They attack and destroy or fend off the already damaged opposing fleets and destroy everything on the surface. Saying they don't have a fleet to spare defeats the whole point of Octarius. It was done for the sole purpose of allowing the IoM time to rebuild its strength. Will the IoM suffer losses when they initiate Exterminatus? Almost assuredly. But remember the point of Exterminatus is to destroy planets with enemy forces that are so overwhelming that the only option is to glass the planet. I don't know about you but that sounds like Octarius to me.

Yes but kryptman planed this to be short, A couple years at most. Not full blown war like it is now. They literally cant get close enough to the sureface cause of all the dead carcasses\hulks. Not to mention all the ork surivivors who could be hiding in both mixed in with the surviving nids. And the remaining ships on both sides would most likely turn to face this new enemy. They would still blow eachother up but they would turn some attenching to the new enemy. If nids are winning they would see more bio-mass coming at them and would send more ships at them, since the orks are pretty much defeated or sliding down to defeat then they could turn their attention on the humans. If orks are winnig then the ships closest to them would change course straght to them and ram them and start bourding actions. Givin the amount of ships in there there would be alot of bourding parties too much for any crew to handle probably and then the orks would have shiny new ships to run around fightin the bugs!!

Exterminatus still not a viable option since all then can do is strengthen the remaining sectors around the area and hope for the best

I have always wondered if the whole Octarius Empire was indeed the Hive Fleet's method of dealing with the Ork problem. Seeing all that the Orks had going for it, they lacked the general intelligence of a galactic battle. So they draw them into one place, and keep them in a position that nobody will ever win on purpose. As any other good tactician, the Hive Fleet than starts probing the areas around the main line for weak points. Slowly the Hive Fleet will be able to take out surrounding space, growing all the time. Eventually, pending this tactic worked (which it seems to be working, from the amount of destruction hey have caused) they would be able to surround the Orks galactically, cut off all reinforcements, and than grind the Orks down until they win through attrition. Even if they don't, the Hive Fleet can contain a large portion of Orks there and push outwards into the rest of the Galaxy.

Who knows truly who will win the Octarius Battle, but I feel Leviathan has already won the War.

 Farseer Mael Dannan wrote:
I have always wondered if the whole Octarius Empire was indeed the Hive Fleet's method of dealing with the Ork problem.

Leviathan wasn't deliberately going there. Inquisitor Kryptmann lured that tendril there due to the known strength of the Ork population.

Plus its a tendril not the entire hive fleet. Not to mention They cant cut the orks reineforcements off since they are coming through the warp.

 -Loki- wrote:

 Shlazaor wrote:
At some point one side is going to be weakened to the point that they can't recover and that is when the IoM strikes. They attack and destroy or fend off the already damaged opposing fleets and destroy everything on the surface.

Except that's not happening due to how Orks and Tyranids work. Orks are simply feeding biomass into the Tyranids, while Tyranids are providing the Orks with a long war, which makes Orks stronger physically. Whatever side wins is going to be stronger - and this is even stated in the fluff. If the Imperium can't get in now to launch an Exterminatus, they won't stand a chance of doing it when there's a victor.

Not to mention that if the victor is the Tyranids, Exterminatus after the fact won't do anything anyway - Tyranids don't stay on a planet. By the time the Imperium marshalls forces to do an Exterminatus, the Tyranids will have sucked the planets in the system dry and moved on. Exterminatus during the consumption of one of the planets is also very unlikely, as stated in the Apocalypse book, no Imperial fleet has gotten near a planet in the final days of consumption. So it's not like there's precedent for them being able to do it.

The whole point of Exterminatus was to destroy enemies when the planet is completely overun. By definition that will mean planets with a lot of enemies. The IoM just fights through them and commits to orbital bombardment. There is also the assumption that there are massive fleet fighting at Octarius (not saying there isn't but I have yet to see any citation of that fact). It doesn't matter if thousands of orcs have grown to the size of a five story building. A cyclone torpedo will blow them all away just the same.

 Shlazaor wrote:
The whole point of Exterminatus was to destroy enemies when the planet is completely overun. By definition that will mean planets with a lot of enemies. The IoM just fights through them and commits to orbital bombardment. There is also the assumption that there are massive fleet fighting at Octarius (not saying there isn't but I have yet to see any citation of that fact). It doesn't matter if thousands of orcs have grown to the size of a five story building. A cyclone torpedo will blow them all away just the same.

Shadow in the Warp. They wouldn't be able to get close enough to make a good fight through the hive fleet surrounding the planet. It halts warp travel for Imperial forces due to them being reliant on the Astronomican, which it blocks. Orks don't use that, which is why they are able to turn up and fight (albeit randomly).

The issue with 'just fire one cyclonic torpedo' is what the Imperium would have to fire it from such a long distance that the Tyranids would just throw up a spore shield in its way (read the Battlefleet Gothic fluff about Tyranid fleets). They're not without defenses in space.

Basically, 'Exterminatus after they win' won't work, because going by actual fluff (in the Apocalypse book), no Imperial forces have even gotten close enough to see the consumption of a planet, let alone close enough to do anything about it.

Granted, this is only on the result of a Tyranid win. But even while the fight is going, the Shadow would stop Imperial forces getting close as well.

 -Loki- wrote:

 Shlazaor wrote:
The whole point of Exterminatus was to destroy enemies when the planet is completely overun. By definition that will mean planets with a lot of enemies. The IoM just fights through them and commits to orbital bombardment. There is also the assumption that there are massive fleet fighting at Octarius (not saying there isn't but I have yet to see any citation of that fact). It doesn't matter if thousands of orcs have grown to the size of a five story building. A cyclone torpedo will blow them all away just the same.

Shadow in the Warp. They wouldn't be able to get close enough to make a good fight through the hive fleet surrounding the planet. It halts warp travel for Imperial forces due to them being reliant on the Astronomican, which it blocks. Orks don't use that, which is why they are able to turn up and fight (albeit randomly).

The issue with 'just fire one cyclonic torpedo' is what the Imperium would have to fire it from such a long distance that the Tyranids would just throw up a spore shield in its way (read the Battlefleet Gothic fluff about Tyranid fleets). They're not without defenses in space.

Basically, 'Exterminatus after they win' won't work, because going by actual fluff (in the Apocalypse book), no Imperial forces have even gotten close enough to see the consumption of a planet, let alone close enough to do anything about it.

Granted, this is only on the result of a Tyranid win. But even while the fight is going, the Shadow would stop Imperial forces getting close as well.

Actually I agree that the Shadow is a major disadvantage to the Exterminatus option but it's my understanding that IoM has committed Exterminatus on Tyranid held infested worlds before so I see no reason that can't do it again. Also this is presumably going to occur way before the Nids have completely wiped out the Ork and are proceeding with total consumption of the planet biomass.

@Both sides getting stronger over the course of the war

It always bothered me how the Tyranids crap over thermodynamics. I know I shouldn't be worried about it when we're in a universe with psychics and Space Marines, but it's still silly, especially when Tyranid fluff has things like hive fleet tendrils attacking each other because they don't lose any biomass...

I thought we had already stated that the IoM would be defeated by the winner, i say we forget bout exterminatus and go back to debate about the battle at hand.

 Shlazaor wrote:
Actually I agree that the Shadow is a major disadvantage to the Exterminatus option but it's my understanding that IoM has committed Exterminatus on Tyranid held infested worlds before so I see no reason that can't do it again. Also this is presumably going to occur way before the Nids have completely wiped out the Ork and are proceeding with total consumption of the planet biomass.

While the attack is ongoing. Like, the Imperial fleet is there already, and they're doing a fighting withdrawal. They launch some cyclonic torpedos while retreating. Even in the case of when they launched Exterminatus on the daemon world that was being eaten by the Tyranids - both sides were pre occupied, and the Imperial Fleet got in, and Exterminated it.

Octarius is a totally different situation. They're not there. They're happy to let the Tyranids and Orks slug it out. If the Tyranids win, there will be no way to actually get a fleet in position to launch the cyclonic torpedo, or whatever other type of Exterminatus they want to do. It's different when the Tyranids have won, and are sucking the planet dry, because their attention is simply on defending from space-borne threats.

Im not going to read all the post but I do have to put my money on the Tyranids.

The way the codex talked about the battle (or was it BRB, I dont remember now) it clearly made it out as the Tyranids had the upper hand.


However I do disagree with Codex/BRB, whoever emerges from the battle, the Imperium will indeed come out better for it as long as they play it smartly. If the Orks win its not an issue too much (ya the Orks are stronger than before but that strength came from else where and the Tyranids are gone now)

If the Tyranids win than you have a small window of opportunity to react with your own assault while the Tyranids are recovering, ie. licking their wounds.

If the Imperium takes too long to react however the IoM will loose its advantage

 Galdos wrote:
Im not going to read all the post but I do have to put my money on the Tyranids.

The way the codex talked about the battle (or was it BRB, I dont remember now) it clearly made it out as the Tyranids had the upper hand.


However I do disagree with Codex/BRB, whoever emerges from the battle, the Imperium will indeed come out better for it as long as they play it smartly. If the Orks win its not an issue too much (ya the Orks are stronger than before but that strength came from else where and the Tyranids are gone now)

If the Tyranids win than you have a small window of opportunity to react with your own assault while the Tyranids are recovering, ie. licking their wounds.

If the Imperium takes too long to react however the IoM will loose its advantage

Agreed.

both sides were pre occupied, and the Imperial Fleet got in, and Exterminated it.

That is the exact same situation as Octarius. I think this effectively negates your first point about how they don't have the capacity to unleash Exterminatus.

However, I still agree with your second point biggest challenge is overcoming the time lag induced by the Shadow so that they can still strike at the opportune moment.

 Shlazaor wrote:

both sides were pre occupied, and the Imperial Fleet got in, and Exterminated it.

That is the exact same situation as Octarius. I think this effectively negates your first point about how they don't have the capacity to unleash Exterminatus.

However, I still agree with your second point biggest challenge is overcoming the time lag induced by the Shadow so that they can still strike at the opportune moment.

No it's not. In that case, then they arrived, both sides were in full conflict on the surface. Right now? The IoM is ignoring Octarius. They didn't even like that Kryptman set it up - he was rejected from the Inquisition for doing it. There's no indication that they have a battlegroup ready to launch - and that kind of thing takes years for the Imperium just to mobilize.

That's assuming said battlegroup can get to the planet in time, and fight its way past at least 1 maybe 2 opposing fleets.

 -Loki- wrote:

 Shlazaor wrote:

both sides were pre occupied, and the Imperial Fleet got in, and Exterminated it.

That is the exact same situation as Octarius. I think this effectively negates your first point about how they don't have the capacity to unleash Exterminatus.

However, I still agree with your second point biggest challenge is overcoming the time lag induced by the Shadow so that they can still strike at the opportune moment.

No it's not. In that case, then they arrived, both sides were in full conflict on the surface. Right now? The IoM is ignoring Octarius. They didn't even like that Kryptman set it up - he was rejected from the Inquisition for doing it. There's no indication that they have a battlegroup ready to launch - and that kind of thing takes years for the Imperium just to mobilize.

Again you bring up a point I'd concede to but I definitely need citation of that. But another point in favor of Exterminatus are those solo planet wrecker ships with super shields and stealth that destroy planets on their own. Though not to be a hypocrit I don't remember where I found that information. Does anyone have citations for that?

re the 1 Imperial Ship can exterminatus a planet:

Tactica Imperialis p69 describes a " A single vessel, equipped with the fastest drives and the most arcane of shielding devices"

It slips past the orbiting bio fleet, fires a single cyclonic torpedo and destroys the Tryanid infested world.

The Imperium could do this again if you accept this and other similar fluff.

Thats if the ship survies the first planet. This isnt just the Nids though this is both nids and orks so it will be taking doulbe the damage as usually plus ork ramming it is possible.

If they lose that ship at all doesnt matter cause they have just showed who the next oppenet for the winner is. Plus a huge lose of ancient tech.

willhman wrote:
Thats if the ship survies the first planet. This isnt just the Nids though this is both nids and orks so it will be taking doulbe the damage as usually plus ork ramming it is possible.

If they lose that ship at all doesnt matter cause they have just showed who the next oppenet for the winner is. Plus a huge lose of ancient tech.

Its not fighting its way through - its a submarine style attack run - get in, fire and (hopefully) get out. It took no damage from the Nids last time as it was not seen or fired upon.
It worked against the Nids last time without them detecting it, so unless the Orks actually notice it - which is possible but unlikely it should work just fine.

Now its got to be rare as otherwise the Imperium would use them alot but its effective.

If it worked last time against the Nids... I wouldn't bpput too much faith in it working a 2nd time. The hive mind is nothing if not adaptable.

I'll be banking on a warp storm to wipe out the whole region of space, should GW ever decide to end the storyline.

 Eetion wrote:
If it worked last time against the Nids... I wouldn't bpput too much faith in it working a 2nd time. The hive mind is nothing if not adaptable.

Very true - if it is aware of exaclty what happened and how

It is highly adapatable but like any other organism is faliable and lets face it the whole blow up the planet whist the fleet is feeding keeps being used on them?

If the stealthy Kill Ship was detected and / or destroyed - then the Hive Fleet can adapt and overcome - but at present it may lack hard data to act on?

Plus it will be foccussed on destroying and consuming the Orks not looking for Imperial threats - granted once it discovers Imperial style weapons are being used - then it will try to counter. I would think it will work a few times before serious problems arise for the Kill Ship/s.

 Mr Morden wrote:

 Eetion wrote:
If it worked last time against the Nids... I wouldn't bpput too much faith in it working a 2nd time. The hive mind is nothing if not adaptable.

Very true - if it is aware of exaclty what happened and how



If the stealthy Kill Ship was detected and / or destroyed - then the Hive Fleet can adapt and overcome - but at present it may lack hard data to act on?

Plus it will be foccussed on destroying and consuming the Orks not looking for Imperial threats - granted once it discovers Imperial style weapons are being used - then it will try to counter. I would think it will work a few times before serious problems arise for the Kill Ship/s.

This. The Hive Mind is not omnipotent. In fact stealthy retrieval of Kroot rifles was one of the key reasons the Tau were able to defeat the Tyranids invasion of one of their Septs. I'd say stealth has proven to be one of the biggest assets against the Tyranids. Does it mean it will work everytime? No. But I don't seem them stopping the kill-ship this time around considering the only information that they have from last time was "o gak the planet is blow- ugfhfgdfgrtdgrd."

Yes but the thing with nids ships is they are focused on one task only which either eat or defend. We have orks here, yes you might say they are focused only on killing but They are also on the look out of for more enemy ships in the area. Chances are one ork ship will be like "Move in der and-- Ehh wot dat ship dere??" *BOOM* "Woah me wants it. Eh warphead follow that ship time for Boarding actions. hehehe"

Plus after awhile Im pretty sure nids will just put up defences around planets that they are eating. You making them sound like they are computers. The hive mind is a living thing. It will create strategies to protect its food.

yes it will defend - if it knows there is a threat - same with the Orks - the whole point of the Stealthed Kill ship is it sneaks in and kills before its noticed and slips away - job done.

It might not work every time but its got a very good chance of worknig several times.

Ok I agree that it willl work the first few times. But if it dies on the second planet completly by accident then there goes a ship with ancient tech never to be seen again. There is just two big of a chance of it failing and to small of a chance that it will work

I'm not familiar with the steaalth ship fluff.

But if they plan on executing this there going to have to be close as it doesn't take that long for the nids to gobble a planet.
100days from first contact to imperial ship arriving and finding a husk.
About 30 days for a planet to be stripped once the main fleet starts and resistance crumbles.

That may be longer than the warp jorney.

So they would have to be watching close, so they can pull the trick, and as its not finished fighting then it can be assumed they are going to have to be there for quite some time.

That's a long time not to be discovered, or a real rush assuming you know when the fights over.

willhman wrote:

 Bobthehero wrote:
You don't loot biotitans

You assume Thrakka's going to show his, so anybody could assume the Tyranids will send more bugs, don't go there.

Thats like sayin you dont loot carnifexes and Ive seen the pics. I Think that the orks COULD Loot biotitans. If they donts then they will use its armor for weapons/armor for vehicles and boys. Its meat for food. saving the squigs and such for rippers. and everything else imaginable. These are the orks. They leave nothing to waste. Its been said that they are the most resourceful race in the galaxy. They have proven it time and again. In the end They will loot it one way or another.

As for ghazzy. If he does come. Im not sayin he will but really, this probably will become a huge war. He will bring a huge fleet of orks with him. Billions of orks follow the prophet. If not trillions. He is respected by all orks who are smart enough to think that way. You might think that he is just another ork but He has proven to be the chosen of the ork gods.... Or to be just plain out lucky.

As for the nids ending more bugs , that frees up the Imperium on multiple fronts to move arms and troops to strengthen the blockade , eventually if the IoM sees it getting out of hand they will launch a strike and possibly spear head and allie .......yes allie with orks ........imagine Yarrack and Thrakka side by side fighing nids.... But anyway , currently ( if i recall the numbers right ) there is something like 25 Billion Guardsmen engaged in fighting Tyranids at the moment , now imagine if those 25B troops just suddenly were free to deploy as needed ? yeah we would Crush your little Space cockroachs .............. burn it with fire

As long as the Orks get the memo about the alliance... And have the capacity to read it.

Ummm... Yeah no. Why would the orks want to win the war with the humies help? no If the Iom did anything they would just be a third armada to join the war thats it. The orks are enjoying themselves to much for anything else.

 Mr Morden wrote:
re the 1 Imperial Ship can exterminatus a planet:

Tactica Imperialis p69 describes a " A single vessel, equipped with the fastest drives and the most arcane of shielding devices"

It slips past the orbiting bio fleet, fires a single cyclonic torpedo and destroys the Tryanid infested world.

The Imperium could do this again if you accept this and other similar fluff.

Are we sure that destroying the planet will really help that much? The orks, they have ships, and so do the nids. You can swipe the planets out from under them, but all that dose is give the forces a reason to move on.

Both sides have the capability to churn out reinforcements and bring more in. If the deadlock is broken, the winning side will be the one GW want to win (assuming no exterminatus) to move the plot on a bit.

Gotta agree that either way the fluff may be moved forward a tiny amount just hinting toward what the winning race is going to do, and thats at best, most likely the story wont be moved forward.

I just like imagining the battles on each planet. It has to be a huge fight.

willhman wrote:
I just like imagining the battles on each planet. It has to be a huge fight.

Which is kinda the point of the Story and in fact most fluff in Codexes

re blowing up the planet - the Imperium does want to do this as its one of the few things that is effective against the Tryanids and if the Orks win - well again the Imeprium does not want the scarily powerful survivors going on a rampage.

 Mr Morden wrote:
the Imeprium does not want the scarily powerful survivors going on a rampage.

Unless they can lead them by the nose to the EoT/Maelstrom.

But how would they lead the survivors?? The eot is on the other side of the galaxy I believe.

Some sort of gambit involving Space Hulks and Genestealers or summat. There's weirder stuff in the fluff.

 lindsay40k wrote:
Some sort of gambit involving Space Hulks and Genestealers or summat. There's weirder stuff in the fluff.

Yes, it's been done. Kryptman sent a Space Hulk full of Genestealers to Octarius and Exterminatus'd any planets Leviathans tendril might have found along the way to ensure they reached Octarius.

It's worth noting that Kryptman was expelled from the Unquisition for that, as the cost was deemed too high, and the fact that it might just well make that tendril even stronger. It's not like to be done again.

Yeah that isnt going to happen again... Cost the iom alot of valuable resources and manpower to start this bad idea. Not gonna happen again. If it does happen again then there goes a tendril of hive fleet leviathon