Fluff wise who would come out on top or benefit the most from an ork vs tyranids war of just those 2 species? Just wondering 'cause im curious

I'd go with "late game" Ork WAAGHS!, which have advanced to the point they have tellyportas, or can even loot a planetoid.

Orks cuz they produce matter out of nothing. (Spores)

'Nids cuz they're smarter, plus they should just out-evolve the orks

It will be a brutal war of attrition, with the Nids constantly consuming Ork biomatter, as the Orks constantly "spawn" , and the surviving Orks getting bigger and bigger. All that is known is that whoever wins will be the biggest threat the Imperium will ever have to face.

Orks, cuz' emz gonna hav funz!

Orks.... Vehicles are killer...

Thats going to either be one short and messy fight or one long and bloody one.

Unstoppable force vs immovable object ©

All we know for sure is that orkses are gona be happy.

Inquisitor what's his face has engineered a situation where the Orks/Tyranids are fighting (he redirected a hive fleet I believe?). As of now, it looks like the war just is going to end. The Orkses are getting bigger and stronger as the fighting goes on, with more and more arriving. By contrast, the Tyranids are assimilating Orky DNA/learning as it progresses. Either way, the winner will end up stronger than when it went in.

Tyranids won't out evolve. They are just producing variations on what they have with minor improvements.

 PhillyT wrote:
Tyranids won't out evolve. They are just producing variations on what they have with minor improvements.

That is the definition of evolving. The background says that the tyranids do it very quickly though, much more quickly than orks.

If the two were evenly matched in terms of size I'd say that tyranids would come out on top.

Except that the changes the Tyranids make never really make that big a difference. It is variation in form.

Also I disagree. Equal part ork and Tyranids has been shown to be a stale mate, and microbial orks are the first hard counter to the Tyranids conversion process. They are quite similar really.

Orks looting tyranids, now that would be funny, the only thing is ortk spores, they spread and not so reliant on bio mass to fuel production

According to planet strike ork spores were a counter to microbial tyranids and visa versa.

It would be an eternal stalemate, which means the Orks would win, as they will have accomplished their ultimate existential goal.

Altough, come to think of it, such a huge battle likely would eventually draw every single Ork in the galaxy to it...

 Iron_Captain wrote:
It would be an eternal stalemate, which means the Orks would win, as they will have accomplished their ultimate existential goal.

Altough, come to think of it, such a huge battle likely would eventually draw every single Ork in the galaxy to it...

thats why the orks win.

You know what I want to see? I want to see something like an Imperium experiment between Orks and Tyranids, right?

So, how's 'bout we stick a load of Orks on a planet, they're savages, no access to technology, they're running around stabbing things and shouting at eachother in gibberish.
Then send in a load of Carnifexes. You still with me?
So we've got a load of Orks, let's say, 10,000, they're all multiplying quickly where they go, leaving behind spores. Then we've got Carnifexes constantly trying to hunt them down, like Predator. And by a load of Carnifexes, I mean 100.

So we've got 100 Carnifexes on a planet with 10,000 Orks multiplying very quickly.

How many Orks will the Carnifexes kill before being killed themselves?

Here's something to ponder. Squigs. Fluff has them being found as orkoid rippers on a derelict, with the orks finding something downright orky about them, and taking them home. Now, think about that. Now, think about the fact that orkoid fungi grows into the various orkoid lifeforms. Including squigs. So what does that make the orks now?

This question pops up from time to time, and I submit my answer, as I always do:

Tyranorks.

Orks get bigger. Tyranids eat them and morph. Eventually, they will be a super-race of Tyranorks.

Now that Ghazghkull has joined the Octarius war, the orks may tip the scale.

 Wazdakka! wrote:
Now that Ghazghkull has joined the Octarius war, the orks may tip the scale.

I'm hoping for a showdown between the Swarmlord and Ghazzy now that both are involved, could be an interesting way to see how it advances depending on who krumps who.

Orks would come out on top, as they have no tactically important targets - killing the boss would just mean that another ork would be 'promoted'. If the orks take out the norn queen, it would be an easy victory.

 Unyielding Hunger wrote:
Here's something to ponder. Squigs. Fluff has them being found as orkoid rippers on a derelict, with the orks finding something downright orky about them, and taking them home. Now, think about that. Now, think about the fact that orkoid fungi grows into the various orkoid lifeforms. Including squigs. So what does that make the orks now?

That's really old lore, not the new lore. It's been retconned, though you're still well within your rights to ignore the retcon if you want.

Instead, right now, Squigs are just an early form of Orkoid life in the Orkoid life cycle.

Goes like this:

Spores cause fungus to grow, eventually with enough fungus, Squigs begin to grow from the spores instead to eat the mushrooms and provide a food source for later Orkoids, eventually with enough squigs, snotlings begin to grow to herd the squigs, and then with enough snotlings, grots begin to grow now that there's the infrastructure needed to support them, and they create the infrastructure needed for the last portion of hte Orkoid life cycle, the Orks, whom become dominant as time goes on, but still rely on (and produce spores for) the other kinds of Orkoids.

jhe90 wrote:
Orks looting tyranids, now that would be funny

Dude... you know it happens!

 Grimskul wrote:

 Wazdakka! wrote:
Now that Ghazghkull has joined the Octarius war, the orks may tip the scale.

I'm hoping for a showdown between the Swarmlord and Ghazzy now that both are involved, could be an interesting way to see how it advances depending on who krumps who.

Yeah that would be cool, but probably it would be that Ghazghkull crumps the Swarmlord with either massive force, or some tactics shenanigans, or both.
Then the Swarmlord would reincarnate and it would be like loading a quick save and trying again, knowing what to expect, and maybe defeating Ghazzie, but not killing him, seeing as how much Gork and Mork actually protect him actively now, they would save him in the last second.

 Melissia wrote:
That's really old lore, not the new lore. It's been retconned, though you're still well within your rights to ignore the retcon if you want.

Instead, right now, Squigs are just an early form of Orkoid life in the Orkoid life cycle.

Goes like this:

Spores cause fungus to grow, eventually with enough fungus, Squigs begin to grow from the spores instead to eat the mushrooms and provide a food source for later Orkoids, eventually with enough squigs, snotlings begin to grow to herd the squigs, and then with enough snotlings, grots begin to grow now that there's the infrastructure needed to support them, and they create the infrastructure needed for the last portion of hte Orkoid life cycle, the Orks, whom become dominant as time goes on, but still rely on (and produce spores for) the other kinds of Orkoids.

I never heard they retconned that...I am actually kind of sad about that. It made me laugh at the early inconsistency of Orks. That being said, I like the sound of this new version as well.

 YourIntestines wrote:
Orks would come out on top, as they have no tactically important targets - killing the boss would just mean that another ork would be 'promoted'. If the orks take out the norn queen, it would be an easy victory.

Except that killing the Warboss has a demonstrably extreme impact on an Ork Waaagh(!!). Yes, another Ork will assume control eventually, but only after a period of chaos and infighting. There is a reason why Imperial campaigns make "finding and killing the Warboss" top priority when the Orks invade their systems.

The Tyranids figured this out in short order on the planet Ghorala, and the loss of the Ork Warlord on that world was enough to allow the Tyranid infection to go from a small number of beasts fighting a shadow war (after their fleet was destroyed in space) to consuming the planet and birthing a whole new fleet in short order.

Both Tyranids and Orks suffer severely from the collapse of their respective control webs. The problem for the Orks is their their leaders like to lead from the front, where as the Tyranid "leaders" (such as they are' even the Norn Queens are just puppets) live in space and are encased in vessels thousands of kilometers long (not that this stopped the Orks in the Ghorala story above; they destroyed the entire fleet with a combination of a huge mine field and a lot of ships).

 Melissia wrote:

 Unyielding Hunger wrote:
Here's something to ponder. Squigs. Fluff has them being found as orkoid rippers on a derelict, with the orks finding something downright orky about them, and taking them home. Now, think about that. Now, think about the fact that orkoid fungi grows into the various orkoid lifeforms. Including squigs. So what does that make the orks now?

That's really old lore, not the new lore. It's been retconned, though you're still well within your rights to ignore the retcon if you want.

Instead, right now, Squigs are just an early form of Orkoid life in the Orkoid life cycle.

Goes like this:

Spores cause fungus to grow, eventually with enough fungus, Squigs begin to grow from the spores instead to eat the mushrooms and provide a food source for later Orkoids, eventually with enough squigs, snotlings begin to grow to herd the squigs, and then with enough snotlings, grots begin to grow now that there's the infrastructure needed to support them, and they create the infrastructure needed for the last portion of hte Orkoid life cycle, the Orks, whom become dominant as time goes on, but still rely on (and produce spores for) the other kinds of Orkoids.

Adding onto this, the Orks at this stage are usually Feral, and are content to roam around beating each other with sticks. It takes some external influence (usually) to introduce higher technology and to trigger the mass migration of a Waaagh(!!!!!).

 Dashofpepper wrote:
This question pops up from time to time, and I submit my answer, as I always do:

Tyranorks.

Orks get bigger. Tyranids eat them and morph. Eventually, they will be a super-race of Tyranorks.

The Valedor novel suggests that this may actually be (more or less) the reason behind the vanguard Tyranid fleets we have at the moment. They arrive in the galaxy, consume worlds and document resistance. They then link up, combine genetic resources and build a crop of Tyranids specifically designed using the genetics of the opposition to beat the enemy at their own game.

Quite what Tyranids inspired by Eldar, Ork and human genetics taken to eleven would look like... I have no idea :p

Whats the Valedor novel?

Has there been any advance in the plot since the 4th edition ork codex?

I would love to see some novels come out detailing the octarian war! Make a great 3 novel series

The whole "ultra genetic evolution" thing is still ridiculous. Unless the Tyranids make up some new form of movement, they are pretty much what they are going to be. They can tweak a couple things, but genestealers will always be what they are, homagaunts are what they are, etc.

yes, the "genetic evolution" is making hormagaunts skin tougher, or, wetter, so as to resist flame weapons better. or giving genestealers acid on there scythes to cut through power armor easier. Or some form of this.

 raiden wrote:
yes, the "genetic evolution" is making hormagaunts skin tougher, or, wetter, so as to resist flame weapons better. or giving genestealers acid on there scythes to cut through power armor easier. Or some form of this.

Not really, because the nids can not waste a lot of bio-resources on evolution. if you look at the nid tendril that attacked the tau, it starved itself to evolve. Same thing will happen at almost any battle that the nids turn to evolution to win their fights. Besides, no matter what they do, orks themselves will grow, to combat the nids evolution. A gaunt now has a tougher shell, ork boys will then start to hit them harder, yes there will be more casualties on the ork side initially but in the long run, then entire ork force will grow stronger from this, thus making them harder to kill, and harder hitters, thus the nids have to pour in more bio resources to either give their troops more muscle, or give them tougher skin. Which will make the orks grow bigger, and hit harder.

Honestly it becomes a slow downhill battle for the nids if they lose one major battle. Nids need to win big victories at a constant rate to keep evolving, if not then they will kill themselves. Thus evolutionary tactics are out of the battle.

Nid's would only win if they could assimilate the Orks ability to grow via combat. If they can get that, then eventually the average Nob will be able to beat the snot out of a Carnifex.

but thats assuming the Orks survive the battle, when you loose a battle to the Nids dont they eat any survivors?

Tyranids.

They're smarter than Orks are, but also as numerous. Battles between the two generally go as a bloody stalemate for a period of time until the Hive Mind recognizes Ork nature and uses it against them, securing the critical victory.

I.E. Skarfang.

 BlaxicanX wrote:
Tyranids.

They're smarter than Orks are, but also as numerous. Battles between the two generally go as a bloody stalemate for a period of time until the Hive Mind recognizes Ork nature and uses it against them, securing the critical victory.

I.E. Skarfang.

Either that or the Tyranids figure out an airborne spore of their own that targets and eliminates Ork spores.

They already release all sorts of nastiness into the atmosphere (to the point where late on in a Tyranid invasion if a human doesn't have breathing gear his lungs will be liquid within hours of exposure), so it's not too much of a stretch. This would deny the Orks the only thing that lets them compete with the Tyranids, and lead to their extinction.

Face it, with a foe like the Orks that's about the only hope you have of actually winning outright. Proper scorched earth "not even one cell survives" tactics. The Necrons could do a good job of this too if left to their own devices, as they are more than capable of sterilizing a world in full.

If Tyranids scorch the earth, they'd not have much less to eat later, thus - a wasteful battle.

More orks arrive at OCtarius than are "born" there. Orks are streaming into the battlezone by the millions. The genetic stalemate on the ground is exactly that.

As far as Tyranids being smarter, where does anyone get that impression? They are instinct based with a Hivemind that is brilliant on the genetic level, but hasn't shown itself to be terribly effective in battles where the opposition has comparable or even fewer numbers. The hivefleets that have been defeated so far vastly outnumbered the defenders.

 koooaei wrote:
If Tyranids scorch the earth, they'd not have much less to eat later, thus - a wasteful battle.

The Tyranids already do a scorched earth policy on every planet they visit. When the Tyranids leave a planet, all that remains is a small barren rock, devoid of everything, including atmosphere. Here's a good little quote.

 morganfreeman wrote:
I mean Tyranids leave -nothing- behind. No precious metals, no water, no atmosphere, no dirt, no nothing. There's literally just rock; they take everything else.

Orks are hardy, but I'm skeptical of their ability to ekk out a living on literally rock alone. At absolute best they'd be able to salvage and re-use what they came to the planet with, but the fact that they have nothing on the planet to use means that they'd eventually just be stuck there bashing eachothers heads in whilst running around butt naked.

Basically they wouldn't be common Orkish low tech, they'd be no tech. Not even rock weapons; just rocks.

 PhillyT wrote:
More orks arrive at OCtarius than are "born" there. Orks are streaming into the battlezone by the millions. The genetic stalemate on the ground is exactly that.

As far as Tyranids being smarter, where does anyone get that impression? They are instinct based with a Hivemind that is brilliant on the genetic level, but hasn't shown itself to be terribly effective in battles where the opposition has comparable or even fewer numbers. The hivefleets that have been defeated so far vastly outnumbered the defenders.

Think of the stalemate of the setting. You really think we are allowed to truly win? #TyranidVictories=GrandSweepingChangesAndPlotProgression. Tyranid victory at Macragge? No more Ultramarines and loss of most used space marine model line and end of GW, Way to go. Tyranid victory in the T'au Septs? End of the Tau Empire. Tyranid victory at Octarius after the stalemate? End of existence as Tyranids officially have beaten the Orks in a resounding route. We aren't allowed to win. Tyranid players don't play for grand stories of victory and massacres. We play to watch the galaxy get eaten.

Xyptc wrote:The Valedor novel suggests that this may actually be (more or less) the reason behind the vanguard Tyranid fleets we have at the moment. They arrive in the galaxy, consume worlds and document resistance. They then link up, combine genetic resources and build a crop of Tyranids specifically designed using the genetics of the opposition to beat the enemy at their own game.

Quite what Tyranids inspired by Eldar, Ork and human genetics taken to eleven would look like... I have no idea :p

Outdated fluff, but the 3rd and 4th edition codices had assumptions that the Zoanthrope was grown from Eldar genes, the Biovore from Ork genes and the Tyrant Guard from Space Marine genes. Humans have nothing special to give them really, they're just gruel for the masses. The idea was they would grow a bioform from each race they conquered to do one special thing. Eldar - be hugely psychic. Space Marines - be tough fethers and guard our leaders. Orks... be artillery? They kind of just threw that one in, I think. Though the 4th edition Biovore definitely had the physiolog of an Ork.

Then Cruddace went and gak all over it, giving Tyranids everything they have now way back at Tyran, and rarely creating new bioforms since. If they needed a new bioform, it was retconned all the way to Tyran or was a one off super bug.

feth I hate what Cruddace did to the fluff.

 -Loki- wrote:
Then Cruddace went and gak all over it, giving Tyranids everything they have now way back at Tyran, and rarely creating new bioforms since. If they needed a new bioform, it was retconned all the way to Tyran or was a one off super bug.

feth I hate what Cruddace did to the fluff.

I don't recall the newer codices firmly stating that the Zoanthrope, Biovore, or Tyrant Guard originated from before Tyran's doom. So hopefully, that bit of fluff should still be considered firmly accurate.

 Unyielding Hunger wrote:

 koooaei wrote:
If Tyranids scorch the earth, they'd not have much less to eat later, thus - a wasteful battle.

The Tyranids already do a scorched earth policy on every planet they visit. When the Tyranids leave a planet, all that remains is a small barren rock, devoid of everything, including atmosphere.

That happens after they feed. Not before. In this case it was assumed that Tyranids 'scorch the earth' as a means of battle without gaining anything out of it.

 PhillyT wrote:
As far as Tyranids being smarter, where does anyone get that impression? They are instinct based with a Hivemind that is brilliant on the genetic level, but hasn't shown itself to be terribly effective in battles where the opposition has comparable or even fewer numbers. The hivefleets that have been defeated so far vastly outnumbered the defenders.

Yeah, never seen the hive mind as some kind of peerless tactician myself.

It has like two tricks, and either of those are unique.

 Unyielding Hunger wrote:

 koooaei wrote:
If Tyranids scorch the earth, they'd not have much less to eat later, thus - a wasteful battle.

The Tyranids already do a scorched earth policy on every planet they visit. When the Tyranids leave a planet, all that remains is a small barren rock, devoid of everything, including atmosphere. Here's a good little quote.

 morganfreeman wrote:
I mean Tyranids leave -nothing- behind. No precious metals, no water, no atmosphere, no dirt, no nothing. There's literally just rock; they take everything else.

Orks are hardy, but I'm skeptical of their ability to ekk out a living on literally rock alone. At absolute best they'd be able to salvage and re-use what they came to the planet with, but the fact that they have nothing on the planet to use means that they'd eventually just be stuck there bashing eachothers heads in whilst running around butt naked.

Basically they wouldn't be common Orkish low tech, they'd be no tech. Not even rock weapons; just rocks.

 PhillyT wrote:
More orks arrive at OCtarius than are "born" there. Orks are streaming into the battlezone by the millions. The genetic stalemate on the ground is exactly that.

As far as Tyranids being smarter, where does anyone get that impression? They are instinct based with a Hivemind that is brilliant on the genetic level, but hasn't shown itself to be terribly effective in battles where the opposition has comparable or even fewer numbers. The hivefleets that have been defeated so far vastly outnumbered the defenders.

Think of the stalemate of the setting. You really think we are allowed to truly win? #TyranidVictories=GrandSweepingChangesAndPlotProgression. Tyranid victory at Macragge? No more Ultramarines and loss of most used space marine model line and end of GW, Way to go. Tyranid victory in the T'au Septs? End of the Tau Empire. Tyranid victory at Octarius after the stalemate? End of existence as Tyranids officially have beaten the Orks in a resounding route. We aren't allowed to win. Tyranid players don't play for grand stories of victory and massacres. We play to watch the galaxy get eaten.

How is that any different from any other "evil" race? This isn't a woe is me issue for Tyranids. But within the setting, you can still discuss the how and why. CLaiming it is a storyline issue isn't fair or accurate, nor is it all that useful. Most evil races have their "but wait, if they all get their act together the Galaxy burns/gets eaten!"

It is like the lazy evolution concept. There are only so many ways you can evolve a set of claws or a bio gun. The idea that there are endless opportunities to create new ways to kill things ignores basic laws of biology. Claws are claws. But the evolutionary conceit explains the different biomorphs available to the tyranids. The other portions of the fluff about evoultionary processes isn't really much other than the same hyperbolic fluff that says orks have potentially no limit to their size.

 PhillyT wrote:
It is like the lazy evolution concept. There are only so many ways you can evolve a set of claws or a bio gun. The idea that there are endless opportunities to create new ways to kill things ignores basic laws of biology. Claws are claws. But the evolutionary conceit explains the different biomorphs available to the tyranids. The other portions of the fluff about evoultionary processes isn't really much other than the same hyperbolic fluff that says orks have potentially no limit to their size.

I have always imagined Tyranid "evolution" on the battlefield to simply mean the fine tuning of the organisms deployed in successive waves to better suit the battlefield at hand. A good example in the fluff itself would be the Hierodule Bio-titan. Initially it was deployed as a line-breaker unit, a sort of extreme Carnifex to plough through the heaviest of enemy fortifications. As Kraken rampaged around, the Imperium started to deploy their own Titans and super-tanks, and the melee-focused Hierodules were often brought down before they could get into combat. In response, the Hive Mind started to develop long-ranged versions of the Hierodule that could engage enemy super-heavies at range. The Biovore and Exocrine follow this trend as well; facing an enemy gunline means bringing your own gunline to pound it from range (while you find ways to circumvent it if possible).

Going back to Octarius and the Orks, what are the possible options for the Tyranids?

Spore-based reproduction is key for Orks, so finding a way to prevent that is a good start. Venomthropes with necrotising spore clouds that seek and kill Ork spores? That could be worked into any Tyranid with the toxic vents on its back. Tyranid toxins on claws and inside bio-weapons could be developed with the same sort of thing as well.

Orks come on in great masses, but often break and fall apart if their leaders are killed in front of them. Solution? Hard melee monsters like the Dimachaeron that can take the Orks in melee, single out a leader, kill him violently and then decimate the survivors.



All this really translates into is looking at your enemy, understanding said enemy and bringing the right tools to the field. It's no different than a squad of Sternguard bringing the right sort of ammo.

 Unyielding Hunger wrote:


Think of the stalemate of the setting. You really think we are allowed to truly win?

You can say that about everyone. Everyone either get's victories and is then defeated (Tyranids, sometimes Orks), get victories and then don't do much (Eldar, Tau, Necrons, Imperium) or get just don't get victories (Orks and Eldar quite a bit).

Tyranid victory at Octarius after the stalemate? End of existence as Tyranids officially have beaten the Orks in a resounding route. We aren't allowed to win.

Octarius is only one Ork empire. It's defeat does not mean that the Tyranids would win.

 PhillyT wrote:
More orks arrive at OCtarius than are "born" there. Orks are streaming into the battlezone by the millions. The genetic stalemate on the ground is exactly that.

As far as Tyranids being smarter, where does anyone get that impression? They are instinct based with a Hivemind that is brilliant on the genetic level, but hasn't shown itself to be terribly effective in battles where the opposition has comparable or even fewer numbers. The hivefleets that have been defeated so far vastly outnumbered the defenders.

Didn't some space marine chapter challenge the Swarmlord to a duel once, then blow it up with a bunch of terminators and tanks lying in ambush?

 Wyzilla wrote:
Didn't some space marine chapter challenge the Swarmlord to a duel once, then blow it up with a bunch of terminators and tanks lying in ambush?

The only match that has ever included the swarmlord was between Calgar and the Swarmlord after Calgar healed up and headed back to Macragge. I believe the end result was that he did defeat it.

 Wyzilla wrote:

 PhillyT wrote:
More orks arrive at OCtarius than are "born" there. Orks are streaming into the battlezone by the millions. The genetic stalemate on the ground is exactly that.

As far as Tyranids being smarter, where does anyone get that impression? They are instinct based with a Hivemind that is brilliant on the genetic level, but hasn't shown itself to be terribly effective in battles where the opposition has comparable or even fewer numbers. The hivefleets that have been defeated so far vastly outnumbered the defenders.

Didn't some space marine chapter challenge the Swarmlord to a duel once, then blow it up with a bunch of terminators and tanks lying in ambush?

Some tyrants have shown an ability to execute at a limited capacity, but they aren't terribly sophisticated with their execution on the battle field. It is more of a paper rock scissor. They also require a serious numerical advantage to win. They can't/Don't have that on Octarius.

As far as orks requiring spores to repopulate, I think the rate of reproduction is so slow that it isn't really the manner by which they are replenishing on Octarius. It is a slow process. Octarius is being replenished by the millions of orks rushing to the planet for a good fight.

I can't recall where it was stated, but the rate or production from spore to ork isn't a fast process. It would require a pretty stable, untouched area for the orks to mature, be "educated" and move into the class of boyz. If I recall, Octarius doesn't really afford much of an opportunity for that, nor are the spores really able to take hold because they are fighting tyranid spores.

Another thing to keep in mind, as tyranids try to kill ork spores, the ork spores get bigger/better as they "fight" which is the natural progression of orks. It isn't as though tyranids are the only ones who change through the conflict. Nobz are being produced on Octarius at an absurd rate.

 PhillyT wrote:

 Wyzilla wrote:

 PhillyT wrote:
More orks arrive at OCtarius than are "born" there. Orks are streaming into the battlezone by the millions. The genetic stalemate on the ground is exactly that.

As far as Tyranids being smarter, where does anyone get that impression? They are instinct based with a Hivemind that is brilliant on the genetic level, but hasn't shown itself to be terribly effective in battles where the opposition has comparable or even fewer numbers. The hivefleets that have been defeated so far vastly outnumbered the defenders.

Didn't some space marine chapter challenge the Swarmlord to a duel once, then blow it up with a bunch of terminators and tanks lying in ambush?

Some tyrants have shown an ability to execute at a limited capacity, but they aren't terribly sophisticated with their execution on the battle field. It is more of a paper rock scissor. They also require a serious numerical advantage to win. They can't/Don't have that on Octarius.

As far as orks requiring spores to repopulate, I think the rate of reproduction is so slow that it isn't really the manner by which they are replenishing on Octarius. It is a slow process. Octarius is being replenished by the millions of orks rushing to the planet for a good fight.

I can't recall where it was stated, but the rate or production from spore to ork isn't a fast process. It would require a pretty stable, untouched area for the orks to mature, be "educated" and move into the class of boyz. If I recall, Octarius doesn't really afford much of an opportunity for that, nor are the spores really able to take hold because they are fighting tyranid spores.

Another thing to keep in mind, as tyranids try to kill ork spores, the ork spores get bigger/better as they "fight" which is the natural progression of orks. It isn't as though tyranids are the only ones who change through the conflict. Nobz are being produced on Octarius at an absurd rate.

Actually the Book Shadow Captain of the Overfiend trilogy has the Ravenguard fighting orks that are from Octavius. Their Tanks are tougher and almost unstoppable in the book, and the Orks are also bigger and tougher. There is even a part where Ork Boys are seen being able to almost keep up with Bikers. Although they do say it might be because of something on the plant, it's not clear and I think it's just the orks that have been fighting against tyranids

Exactly. This idea that Tyranids are out evolving ignores the fact that all of the fluff for the conflict gives as many examples of orks becoming super powered by it as Tyranids become super nasty.

The fluff also seems to implies that the huge quantities of biomass from all the orks is at least as big a deal as any evolutionary advantage tyranids would gain from the experience.

Many an IG commander has made the fatal mistake of thinking that Orks being simple minded is the same thing ad them being stupid. Orks are far from stupid, there are many examples of their tactical flexability and inginuity taking enemy commanders by surprise. Its not that Orks don't or are incapable of things like pincer movements, but why bother when a full frontal attack usually works and is hella fun to boot.

Just think about what happens if the Orks win that conflict...
How large can Orks get? Do they grow infinitely? Otherwise we might get Orks the size of Titans coming out of Octavius 0_0

The largest ork WH40K fluff knows was a size of a deff dread and almost murderized Emps + Horus. Only Horus's desperate: "NO, DON'T KILL MY DADDY" move and Emperror's surprise strike managed to stop him.

Orks can get really big and nasty but they're limited to their surroundings. An ork can get as big as he needs to be to kill the largest things around. But not bigger. At least the growth is hugely diminished by that time.

In a new ork book there's some reference to whyrmkillaz who are snakebites that love fighting tyranids.

Btw, do you know that the largest Earth's organism is a mushroom. It's root system covers almost 900 akres - 5.6 km wide.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/oregons-monster-mushroom-is-worlds-biggest-living-thing-710278.html

I'm glad our mushrooms ain't too orky. Yet.

I think Tyranids win. They actually seem like the perfect counter to Orks, since they strip worlds of all organic matter and atmosphere. I doubt spores would survive, and if they did the planet would be inhospitable to life.

Orks do hordes and fighting pretty well, but Tyranids are like 'every inch of your planet covered in razor sharp scythes and flailing hooks'. I think Orks would just get chopped up. They probably don't even have fun.

Draw unless GW bothers to advance the fluff.

 Smacks wrote:
I think Tyranids win. They actually seem like the perfect counter to Orks, since they strip worlds of all organic matter and atmosphere. I doubt spores would survive, and if they did the planet would be inhospitable to life.

Orks do hordes and fighting pretty well, but Tyranids are like 'every inch of your planet covered in razor sharp scythes and flailing hooks'. I think Orks would just get chopped up. They probably don't even have fun.

I think it is the opposite. Even a scrubbed dead world will be terra formed by ork spores. As the hive moves through, orks will replenish the dead worlds, making them ork worlds. Granted, the tyranids could then turn around and re consume the galaxy, but it would sort of be a perpetual motion machine. And that is of course assuming that tyranids could win in the first place.

I think the addition of Ghaz indicates the balance will switch.

Goes like this:

Spores cause fungus to grow, eventually with enough fungus, Squigs begin to grow from the spores instead to eat the mushrooms and provide a food source for later Orkoids, eventually with enough squigs, snotlings begin to grow to herd the squigs, and then with enough snotlings, grots begin to grow now that there's the infrastructure needed to support them, and they create the infrastructure needed for the last portion of hte Orkoid life cycle, the Orks, whom become dominant as time goes on, but still rely on (and produce spores for) the other kinds of Orkoids.

Orks, the green Nids. They are their own food chain.

 Frazzled wrote:

Goes like this:

Spores cause fungus to grow, eventually with enough fungus, Squigs begin to grow from the spores instead to eat the mushrooms and provide a food source for later Orkoids, eventually with enough squigs, snotlings begin to grow to herd the squigs, and then with enough snotlings, grots begin to grow now that there's the infrastructure needed to support them, and they create the infrastructure needed for the last portion of hte Orkoid life cycle, the Orks, whom become dominant as time goes on, but still rely on (and produce spores for) the other kinds of Orkoids.

Orks, the green Nids. They are their own food chain.

They may be able to repopulate a world to a degree, but they will be worse than feral. They cannot reseed a world with the raw materials of industry. At which case, the orks auto-lose from lack of materials.

Except who says the orks are using the octavius sector to repopulate?

what if they conquer a nearby planet and use that to get more and more orks to join the fight as a steady stream of reinforcements? They already have millions of orks joining the fight.

and you talk like Tyranids only have physical stuff to outmatch. Orks have strange and random tech that allows the construction of almost anything they can think of, wether it be a bigger gun or a crazy giant mega dread train thing. even if they run out of supplies they can just bring said super weapons to planets that never saw the things and conquer to get more supplies

 PhillyT wrote:

 Smacks wrote:
I think Tyranids win. They actually seem like the perfect counter to Orks, since they strip worlds of all organic matter and atmosphere. I doubt spores would survive, and if they did the planet would be inhospitable to life.

Orks do hordes and fighting pretty well, but Tyranids are like 'every inch of your planet covered in razor sharp scythes and flailing hooks'. I think Orks would just get chopped up. They probably don't even have fun.

I think it is the opposite. Even a scrubbed dead world will be terra formed by ork spores. As the hive moves through, orks will replenish the dead worlds, making them ork worlds. Granted, the tyranids could then turn around and re consume the galaxy, but it would sort of be a perpetual motion machine. And that is of course assuming that tyranids could win in the first place.

I think the addition of Ghaz indicates the balance will switch.

Don't fungi, like Nids, require dead biomass?

 Frazzled wrote:

 PhillyT wrote:

 Smacks wrote:
I think Tyranids win. They actually seem like the perfect counter to Orks, since they strip worlds of all organic matter and atmosphere. I doubt spores would survive, and if they did the planet would be inhospitable to life.

Orks do hordes and fighting pretty well, but Tyranids are like 'every inch of your planet covered in razor sharp scythes and flailing hooks'. I think Orks would just get chopped up. They probably don't even have fun.

I think it is the opposite. Even a scrubbed dead world will be terra formed by ork spores. As the hive moves through, orks will replenish the dead worlds, making them ork worlds. Granted, the tyranids could then turn around and re consume the galaxy, but it would sort of be a perpetual motion machine. And that is of course assuming that tyranids could win in the first place.

I think the addition of Ghaz indicates the balance will switch.

Don't fungi, like Nids, require dead biomass?

Orks seem to break physics and create their own.

Yeah pretty much. It has something to do with the way the Old Ones engineered them. They were sort of developed as the Final Solution to the Necron menace but were left somewhat unfinished.

They can be spored on a dead world and create a completely self contained ecosystem. Effectively terraforming anything.

The easiest way to make sense of it is likely magic/warp energy. The same reason or way orks grow through conflict and not as a factor of food consumption or activity.

 PhillyT wrote:
Even a scrubbed dead world will be terra formed by ork spores.

I admit I don't actually know what the official line is on that, but it doesn't sound very scientific. For a start, how do the spores get there? Planets are pretty small and far apart. Space would literally have to be saturated with spores for them to cross contaminate each other. That doesn't really make sense to me as we would see every planet, moon and asteroid already terraformed by Orks. They could arrive by Hulk, but that sounds slow. Without an atmosphere the surface of an earth like planet would be exposed to a lot of radiation and some quite extreme temperatures. The spores would have to survive that in a hard vacuum without water. This is all starting to sound a bit far fetched, but even if it were possible it would take thousands (maybe millions) of years for microscopic spores to restore the atmosphere.

I can see that Orks might never be quite extinct from the Galaxy, and their numbers might slowly recover after the Tyranids move on, but I would still call that a win a for the nids.

Hey man, you aren't going to find scientific explanations for anything in 40k Smacks!

Ork space hulks and ships are actually really fast. They are warp capable craft that "find" rifts in the warp and fly through them, then come out "where there is something to kill."

In the fluff it seems as though the implication is the gestalt psyker energy of the orks involved opens the rifts and their desire to find something to kill deposits them where they need to be to get in a fight. Like you said, if it was all random, they would never find anything in a galaxy as big as ours.

As far as the terraforming portion, the Old Ones made the Eldar into a psyker powerhouse through their engineering. Orks are latent psykers, with most of their power being a component of their unique physiology. None of it makes realistic sense.

Then again, with the way fluff evolves, I don't really know how accurate some portions of the above still are. I don't think many has been specifically invalidated.

 Wyzilla wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:

 PhillyT wrote:

 Smacks wrote:
I think Tyranids win. They actually seem like the perfect counter to Orks, since they strip worlds of all organic matter and atmosphere. I doubt spores would survive, and if they did the planet would be inhospitable to life.

Orks do hordes and fighting pretty well, but Tyranids are like 'every inch of your planet covered in razor sharp scythes and flailing hooks'. I think Orks would just get chopped up. They probably don't even have fun.

I think it is the opposite. Even a scrubbed dead world will be terra formed by ork spores. As the hive moves through, orks will replenish the dead worlds, making them ork worlds. Granted, the tyranids could then turn around and re consume the galaxy, but it would sort of be a perpetual motion machine. And that is of course assuming that tyranids could win in the first place.

I think the addition of Ghaz indicates the balance will switch.

Don't fungi, like Nids, require dead biomass?

Orks seem to break physics and create their own.

That is an actual question on my part. Is there canonical proof for your statement? Otherwise, fungi can't live on a dead world.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 PhillyT wrote:
Yeah pretty much. It has something to do with the way the Old Ones engineered them. They were sort of developed as the Final Solution to the Necron menace but were left somewhat unfinished.

They can be spored on a dead world and create a completely self contained ecosystem. Effectively terraforming anything.

The easiest way to make sense of it is likely magic/warp energy. The same reason or way orks grow through conflict and not as a factor of food consumption or activity.

I liked it better when they were plants with chlorophyll in their bloodstream.

It is specifically stated that the first stages of the ork process creates an atmosphere that allows orks to thrive.

There is nothing normal about orks. Also, they are not fungi in any sense we understand. We aren't even sure that bacteria or fungi-like organism CAN'T live on dead planets, we just have no evidence at this point.

Orks are able to create habitable zones on Spacehulks and Rokks through their very presence. The ork life cycle is pretty cool and interesting.

Ok. Thanks for the clarification.

 PhillyT wrote:
It is specifically stated that the first stages of the ork process creates an atmosphere that allows orks to thrive.

There is nothing normal about orks. Also, they are not fungi in any sense we understand. We aren't even sure that bacteria or fungi-like organism CAN'T live on dead planets, we just have no evidence at this point.

Orks are able to create habitable zones on Spacehulks and Rokks through their very presence. The ork life cycle is pretty cool and interesting.

The Imperium should keep Ork pets to use as cheap terraformers

Thats a good idea actually.

 Unyielding Hunger wrote:
They cannot reseed a world with the raw materials of industry.

"The raw materials of industry" != biomass.

 Frazzled wrote:

 PhillyT wrote:

 Smacks wrote:
I think Tyranids win. They actually seem like the perfect counter to Orks, since they strip worlds of all organic matter and atmosphere. I doubt spores would survive, and if they did the planet would be inhospitable to life.

Orks do hordes and fighting pretty well, but Tyranids are like 'every inch of your planet covered in razor sharp scythes and flailing hooks'. I think Orks would just get chopped up. They probably don't even have fun.

I think it is the opposite. Even a scrubbed dead world will be terra formed by ork spores. As the hive moves through, orks will replenish the dead worlds, making them ork worlds. Granted, the tyranids could then turn around and re consume the galaxy, but it would sort of be a perpetual motion machine. And that is of course assuming that tyranids could win in the first place.

I think the addition of Ghaz indicates the balance will switch.

Don't fungi, like Nids, require dead biomass?

Regular fungi yes, I believe so. But we do not know if the same is true for ork spores. There are stories of orks losing space battles next to asteroid belts, then years later orks appear with roks and are attacking from those same asteroid belts. Which might mean that orks can repopulate almost anywhere. Also, I believe I read somewhere where ork spores can survive space, which means that they don't need an atmosphere to live on. Thus re population of dead worlds are possible for the orkoid races.

Tyranids suck the water and nutrition from the ground AND the very atmosphere.

I don't care how tough and magical Orks are. They can't grow out of nothing.

 Frazzled wrote:
Thats a good idea actually. Deleted from Imperial records

HERETIC!!!

Broly wrote:
Tyranids suck the water and nutrition from the ground AND the very atmosphere.

I don't care how tough and magical Orks are. They can't grow out of nothing.

Warp energy.

 Smacks wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Thats a good idea actually. Deleted from Imperial records

HERETIC!!!

 Frazzled wrote:
Thats a good idea actually.

No, no it isn't. All of those things running around with Orks is some variant of the Orkoid species.

 PhillyT wrote:
As far as Tyranids being smarter, where does anyone get that impression? They are instinct based with a Hivemind that is brilliant on the genetic level, but hasn't shown itself to be terribly effective in battles where the opposition has comparable or even fewer numbers. The hivefleets that have been defeated so far vastly outnumbered the defenders.

S-skarfang?

 Melissia wrote:

 Unyielding Hunger wrote:
They cannot reseed a world with the raw materials of industry.

"The raw materials of industry" != biomass.

The Tyranids also eat the raw materials as a supplement to their biomass based diet.

 Psienesis wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Thats a good idea actually.

No, no it isn't. All of those things running around with Orks is some variant of the Orkoid species.

Pets and future workers for the glory of the Imperium muahahah!

IN order to do that they'd have to devour the entire planet. They do not. Therefor, they do not do that.

 Smacks wrote:

 PhillyT wrote:
Even a scrubbed dead world will be terra formed by ork spores.

I admit I don't actually know what the official line is on that, but it doesn't sound very scientific. For a start, how do the spores get there? Planets are pretty small and far apart. Space would literally have to be saturated with spores for them to cross contaminate each other. That doesn't really make sense to me as we would see every planet, moon and asteroid already terraformed by Orks.

Orks can sometimes shoot an unshootable gun. Or eat uneadible things. Or live on drifting asteroids in the open space...I'm not making this up - it's all in the dex. But the thing is that sometimes they can, sometimes they can't and there's no real logics in it.

The oficial line is: "ANYTHING can happen when orks are involved, no logical explanation needed".

How do they get dragged into WAAAGHS?! How do this mellages spread? Not that orkses have some Daily News or stuff like that. Though, i'd imagine it to look awesome.



It's just that there's somehow always a huge number of orks when WAAAAAGH! rages on. No need to think bout where they come from. They're just there and ready for krumpin'

 BlaxicanX wrote:

 PhillyT wrote:
As far as Tyranids being smarter, where does anyone get that impression? They are instinct based with a Hivemind that is brilliant on the genetic level, but hasn't shown itself to be terribly effective in battles where the opposition has comparable or even fewer numbers. The hivefleets that have been defeated so far vastly outnumbered the defenders.

S-skarfang?

Clever boy!

There are exceptions to the norm. The other side of it is the fact that they need to out number opposition by huge magnitudes to win.

 Melissia wrote:
IN order to do that they'd have to devour the entire planet. They do not. Therefor, they do not do that.

True, although they do reduce the planet's radius by like a 5 percent iirc. In the process of nomnoming the planet, the Tyranids move more matter than the entirety of the Adeptus Mechanicus can in 20 years.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 PhillyT wrote:

 BlaxicanX wrote:

 PhillyT wrote:
As far as Tyranids being smarter, where does anyone get that impression? They are instinct based with a Hivemind that is brilliant on the genetic level, but hasn't shown itself to be terribly effective in battles where the opposition has comparable or even fewer numbers. The hivefleets that have been defeated so far vastly outnumbered the defenders.

S-skarfang?

Clever boy!

There are exceptions to the norm. The other side of it is the fact that they need to out number opposition by huge magnitudes to win.

Which its not hard to do, as gaunts are cheaper than lasbolts.

Well the Hive Fleets have been beaten so far.

 PhillyT wrote:
Well the Hive Fleets have been beaten so far.

By huge amounts of troops.

Fewer troops than tyranids. It isn't an overly complicated calculus = Tyranids overcome the ranged technology through attrition and vast numbers, similar to orks. With some extremely rare exceptions, they must vastly out number their opponents to win.

 PhillyT wrote:
Fewer troops than tyranids. It isn't an overly complicated calculus = Tyranids overcome the ranged technology through attrition and vast numbers, similar to orks. With some extremely rare exceptions, they must vastly out number their opponents to win.

And then when they win, they win your world and everything on it, as well as any other edible planets in the system.

There is a reason why both Kryptman and now the Eldar have adopted scorched earth policies, waiting for the Tyranids to invade a world and then burning the world taking as many Tyranids as possible with them. The risk of losing to the Tyranids on the ground is too great; if you lose, all the damage you inflict upon them might as well count for nothing because almost all of the lost Tyranid organisms are recovered, along with an enormous amount of extra resources.

90% casualties doesn't matter when you get the resources at the end to walk away from the planet with more than you arrived with. The only practical solution is to a) deny the planet itself and b) destroy the fleet in space to stop it moving on to an easier target (that undefended agri-world two systems over?) and coming back with even greater strength while you are badly mauled from the last fight.

Except that nids are not 100% efecient. So lose a lot of that biomass. If a fex was slain and burned you wouldn't get back 100% that was there. Even if you did you lose a % of the biomass to remake him... Again.

willhman wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:

 PhillyT wrote:

 Smacks wrote:
I think Tyranids win. They actually seem like the perfect counter to Orks, since they strip worlds of all organic matter and atmosphere. I doubt spores would survive, and if they did the planet would be inhospitable to life.

Orks do hordes and fighting pretty well, but Tyranids are like 'every inch of your planet covered in razor sharp scythes and flailing hooks'. I think Orks would just get chopped up. They probably don't even have fun.

I think it is the opposite. Even a scrubbed dead world will be terra formed by ork spores. As the hive moves through, orks will replenish the dead worlds, making them ork worlds. Granted, the tyranids could then turn around and re consume the galaxy, but it would sort of be a perpetual motion machine. And that is of course assuming that tyranids could win in the first place.

I think the addition of Ghaz indicates the balance will switch.

Don't fungi, like Nids, require dead biomass?

Regular fungi yes, I believe so. But we do not know if the same is true for ork spores. There are stories of orks losing space battles next to asteroid belts, then years later orks appear with roks and are attacking from those same asteroid belts. Which might mean that orks can repopulate almost anywhere. Also, I believe I read somewhere where ork spores can survive space, which means that they don't need an atmosphere to live on. Thus re population of dead worlds are possible for the orkoid races.

Not just Ork spores can survive space. Actual, real-world spores can survive space.

 raiden wrote:
Except that nids are not 100% efecient. So lose a lot of that biomass. If a fex was slain and burned you wouldn't get back 100% that was there. Even if you did you lose a % of the biomass to remake him... Again.

That doesn't matter because the huge amounts of resources they can get from a planet.

Xyptc wrote:

 PhillyT wrote:
Fewer troops than tyranids. It isn't an overly complicated calculus = Tyranids overcome the ranged technology through attrition and vast numbers, similar to orks. With some extremely rare exceptions, they must vastly out number their opponents to win.

And then when they win, they win your world and everything on it, as well as any other edible planets in the system.

There is a reason why both Kryptman and now the Eldar have adopted scorched earth policies, waiting for the Tyranids to invade a world and then burning the world taking as many Tyranids as possible with them. The risk of losing to the Tyranids on the ground is too great; if you lose, all the damage you inflict upon them might as well count for nothing because almost all of the lost Tyranid organisms are recovered, along with an enormous amount of extra resources.

90% casualties doesn't matter when you get the resources at the end to walk away from the planet with more than you arrived with. The only practical solution is to a) deny the planet itself and b) destroy the fleet in space to stop it moving on to an easier target (that undefended agri-world two systems over?) and coming back with even greater strength while you are badly mauled from the last fight.

Yes, completely true. But the Hive Fleets have been getting beaten for the most part. When the Tyranids aren't able to recoup their expenditures, they falter and fail.

They still need to actually win.

Well it is a war, obviously you need to win, if not you are dead.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 PhillyT wrote:
The whole "ultra genetic evolution" thing is still ridiculous. Unless the Tyranids make up some new form of movement, they are pretty much what they are going to be. They can tweak a couple things, but genestealers will always be what they are, homagaunts are what they are, etc.

You are confusing Tyranid adaptation with Tyranid evolution.
Adaptation is the creation of counter-measures in the form of biomorphs, new creatures and new strategies. For example, problems with enemy vehicles? throw Tyrannofexes at the problem.


Meanwhile Tyranid evolution comes from their prey DNA.
Hive Fleets like Kraken that have consumed huge amounts of Eldar DNA have stronger psychic abilities. Meanwhile the constant stream of Ork DNA is making Leviathan's creatures tougher than average because they are gaining Ork traits.

 raiden wrote:
Except that nids are not 100% efecient. So lose a lot of that biomass. If a fex was slain and burned you wouldn't get back 100% that was there. Even if you did you lose a % of the biomass to remake him... Again.

The vast, vast majority of the biomass the Tyranids take comes from the planet itself, not from consumed armies.

 Tyran wrote:
In the process of nomnoming the planet, the Tyranids move more matter than the entirety of the Adeptus Mechanicus can in 20 years.

No, this is not even a remotely true or believable statement.

 Melissia wrote:

 Tyran wrote:
In the process of nomnoming the planet, the Tyranids move more matter than the entirety of the Adeptus Mechanicus can in 20 years.

No, this is not even a remotely true or believable statement.

Ups, it was a decade, not 20 years. This quote comes from a White Dwarf 254:

Lord Commanders,

I bring you grave news. The threat we face may be far more vast than we ever dreamed. Technical analysis of Dalki-Prime pre Tyranid consumption survey information when cross-referenced with the data from Dalki-Mons post Tyranid consumption shows some startling information.

Dalki-Prime was an agricultural planet with a diameter of 12,500 km, slightly smaller than Terra. The Tyranid fleet was able to remove the following quantities of material from the planet within 100 days [Terran Standard].

1.55 billion cubic km water, one cubic km of sea water weighs over 1 trillion kg.
8.67 billion cubic km gases, at STP theoretically they could reduce this to 1 tenth its volume by super cooling and pressure (3 atm, and 0ºC).
72 million cubic km soil and minerals, weighing 1.4 trillion kg per cubic km.

It is nearly inconceivable how they were able to accomplish this in such a short time, much less explain where the materials were taken, as the typical hive fleets encountered historically are not capable of transporting even a fraction of this volume. Over 10 billion cubic kilometres of material was removed from the planet. This would require untold millions of ships and is far beyond the scope of the entire Adeptus Mechanicus to accomplish given a decade. Most astonishing is that this is insufficient to sate their hunger and they strike again and again, often within months. We must somehow determine if these fleets are somehow sending material back to their home systems for it seems obvious that they are not using all the materials.

Detailed analysis of devastated worlds have yielded the following data in conjunction with orbital surveillance satellite and data recordings which were recovered.

Magos Biologis Salk,
Draco Legion Biomedical Research station, New Hallefuss

 Tyran wrote:

 Melissia wrote:

 Tyran wrote:
In the process of nomnoming the planet, the Tyranids move more matter than the entirety of the Adeptus Mechanicus can in 20 years.

No, this is not even a remotely true or believable statement.

Ups, it was a decade, not 20 years. This quote comes from a White Dwarf 254:

Lord Commanders,

I bring you grave news. The threat we face may be far more vast than we ever dreamed. Technical analysis of Dalki-Prime pre Tyranid consumption survey information when cross-referenced with the data from Dalki-Mons post Tyranid consumption shows some startling information.

Dalki-Prime was an agricultural planet with a diameter of 12,500 km, slightly smaller than Terra. The Tyranid fleet was able to remove the following quantities of material from the planet within 100 days [Terran Standard].

1.55 billion cubic km water, one cubic km of sea water weighs over 1 trillion kg.
8.67 billion cubic km gases, at STP theoretically they could reduce this to 1 tenth its volume by super cooling and pressure (3 atm, and 0ºC).
72 million cubic km soil and minerals, weighing 1.4 trillion kg per cubic km.

It is nearly inconceivable how they were able to accomplish this in such a short time, much less explain where the materials were taken, as the typical hive fleets encountered historically are not capable of transporting even a fraction of this volume. Over 10 billion cubic kilometres of material was removed from the planet. This would require untold millions of ships and is far beyond the scope of the entire Adeptus Mechanicus to accomplish given a decade. Most astonishing is that this is insufficient to sate their hunger and they strike again and again, often within months. We must somehow determine if these fleets are somehow sending material back to their home systems for it seems obvious that they are not using all the materials.

Detailed analysis of devastated worlds have yielded the following data in conjunction with orbital surveillance satellite and data recordings which were recovered.

Magos Biologis Salk,
Draco Legion Biomedical Research station, New Hallefuss

Regretfully anytime any GW publication gives actual numbers they are grossly inflated beyond reason. Even giving a health suspension of disbelief.

 Jayden63 wrote:


Regretfully anytime any GW publication gives actual numbers they are grossly inflated beyond reason. Even giving a health suspension of disbelief.

The sea water number is consistent with the amount of water on an Earth-like planet, and we know the Tyranids drink all of it. We also know that they eat all the atmosphere so I guess the gases number is also consistent. The only weird part is the amount of soil and minerals consumed, but if the Hive Fleet is capable of moving 1.55 billion cubic km water, then 72 million cubic km should be also be possible.

That's still not believable. The Mechanicus operates on over a million planets and planetoids and asteroids and other such places-- including many places where the Mechanicus does deep core mining, obtaining uncounted amounts of resources that the Tyranids don't or can't get with their usual harvesting methods.

That the Imperium/Mechanicus does not strip worlds of biomass doesn't mean that they do not harvest immense amounts of wealth and production from the worlds in which they control. They do. They just simply find farming to be more productive than simply stripping everything and moving on (and it is, because farming allows for far more energy from the planet's star to be converted in to food).

 Melissia wrote:
That's still not believable. The Mechanicus operates on over a million planets and planetoids and asteroids and other such places-- including many places where the Mechanicus does deep core mining, obtaining uncounted amounts of resources that the Tyranids don't or can't get with their usual harvesting methods.

Of those million planets, a good portion are less advanced than 20th century Earth. The Mechanicus, for all its power, is limited to the relatively few Forge Worlds. Hell, it takes decades for a Forge World to build a Battleship, meanwhile Leviathan spawned a fleet from Ghorala in months.

That the Imperium/Mechanicus does not strip worlds of biomass doesn't mean that they do not harvest immense amounts of wealth and production from the worlds in which they control. They do. They just simply find farming to be more productive than simply stripping everything and moving on (and it is, because farming allows for far more energy from the planet's star to be converted in to food).

Farming is also limited by the amount of nutrients in the soil.

 Tyran wrote:
Of those million planets, a good portion are less advanced than 20th century Earth. The Mechanicus, for all its power, is limited to the relatively few Forge Worlds.

No they're not. There's factories all of the Imperium, that supply goods to the trillions of Imperial citizens and guardsmen and Space Marines every day.

All controlled, to greater or lesser extent, by the Mechanicus.

If Tyranids were actually masters of genetic manipulation and smart about it, they would virus-bomb planets with genetically tailored organisms, then come down and eat the trillions of corpses.

Instead they use variants of "run at things and eat them," clearly instinctive.

 Melissia wrote:

 Tyran wrote:
Of those million planets, a good portion are less advanced than 20th century Earth. The Mechanicus, for all its power, is limited to the relatively few Forge Worlds.

No they're not. There's factories all of the Imperium, that supply goods to the trillions of Imperial citizens and guardsmen and Space Marines every day.

All controlled, to greater or lesser extent, by the Mechanicus.

I put up some basic calcs somehwere, but for just like a thousand words with a hundred billion on each hive world, would require the imperium ship a nonillion calories per day.

EDIT, found it-

OK, unless I screwed up my math somewhere, going with the idea that the Imperium has 30,000 massive hive worlds with ~100 billion each, this means there's around three quadrillion citizens alone there. Going by an average calorie consumption, and assuming that the Imperium is a gakky ass place to live as stated several times in the lore, thus would be giving their citizens only 1800 calories a day, this means that the Imperium, to sustain these 30,000 hive worlds out of their million plus planets, would have to generate 15,243,604,656,924,933,407,477,640,462,336 calories each day to sustain those planets. That's 15 nonillion. Assuming only 30,000 planets have hit the population cap.

Definitely. Especially when looking at the healthy 2500 calorie number would require 5,637,710,113,660,432,398,319,244,384,765,625 calories per day. Which is 6 Decilion.

Also note to that for just one 100 billion person hive world, the Imperium would need to ship one hundred million tons of food per day.

Didn't the Tyranids create the Lictor (and specifically Deathleaper) to kill the Ork warbosses in order to have a Waaaaagh collapse?

Alcibiades wrote:
If Tyranids were actually masters of genetic manipulation and smart about it, they would virus-bomb planets with genetically tailored organisms, then come down and eat the trillions of corpses.

Instead they use variants of "run at things and eat them," clearly instinctive.

Yeah, that would actually make much more sense. But I guess that's not as awesome as nom-noming.

 Hansisaf wrote:
Didn't the Tyranids create the Lictor (and specifically Deathleaper) to kill the Ork warbosses in order to have a Waaaaagh collapse?

Well they failed miserably if that's the case

 Hansisaf wrote:
Didn't the Tyranids create the Lictor (and specifically Deathleaper) to kill the Ork warbosses in order to have a Waaaaagh collapse?

Unlikely, Octavia is the first Ork empire that has managed to stand against Nids, and the Lictor precedes that conflict by a lot.

 Hansisaf wrote:
Didn't the Tyranids create the Lictor (and specifically Deathleaper) to kill the Ork warbosses in order to have a Waaaaagh collapse?

Sort of correct. This is the Ghorala system campaign again. The Tyranids were vastly outnumbered their fleet in orbit was destroyed completely), and the Orks were led by a particularly brilliant warlord. The Tyranids worked out that he was the cause of the Orks being so successful during the war, and set a trap for him. Ultimately he was lured into a toxic cloud and butchered by a large Lictor brood. The Ork armies on the surface and in space fell into infighting, and the Tyranids conquered and devoured the planet shortly afterwards.

 Tyran wrote:

 Melissia wrote:

 Tyran wrote:
In the process of nomnoming the planet, the Tyranids move more matter than the entirety of the Adeptus Mechanicus can in 20 years.

No, this is not even a remotely true or believable statement.

Ups, it was a decade, not 20 years. This quote comes from a White Dwarf 254:

Lord Commanders,

I bring you grave news. The threat we face may be far more vast than we ever dreamed. Technical analysis of Dalki-Prime pre Tyranid consumption survey information when cross-referenced with the data from Dalki-Mons post Tyranid consumption shows some startling information.

Dalki-Prime was an agricultural planet with a diameter of 12,500 km, slightly smaller than Terra. The Tyranid fleet was able to remove the following quantities of material from the planet within 100 days [Terran Standard].

1.55 billion cubic km water, one cubic km of sea water weighs over 1 trillion kg.
8.67 billion cubic km gases, at STP theoretically they could reduce this to 1 tenth its volume by super cooling and pressure (3 atm, and 0ºC).
72 million cubic km soil and minerals, weighing 1.4 trillion kg per cubic km.

It is nearly inconceivable how they were able to accomplish this in such a short time, much less explain where the materials were taken, as the typical hive fleets encountered historically are not capable of transporting even a fraction of this volume. Over 10 billion cubic kilometres of material was removed from the planet. This would require untold millions of ships and is far beyond the scope of the entire Adeptus Mechanicus to accomplish given a decade. Most astonishing is that this is insufficient to sate their hunger and they strike again and again, often within months. We must somehow determine if these fleets are somehow sending material back to their home systems for it seems obvious that they are not using all the materials.

Detailed analysis of devastated worlds have yielded the following data in conjunction with orbital surveillance satellite and data recordings which were recovered.

Magos Biologis Salk,
Draco Legion Biomedical Research station, New Hallefuss

That is actually some home-brew fluff from a guy named Sherman Bishop, who ran a really (really) great website for his Hive Fleet Harbinger army (distinctive purple flesh and gold armour). He did all of this around second edition, through into the void when third was launched but before the third edition Tyranid codex was released. GW liked his fluff so much that they used large chunks of it in the third edition codex, printed more in a few White Dwarf magazines at the time and generally embraced his ideas. The whole thing is from the POV of a cadre of Imperial Magos Biologis, so it is not "word of god". Discrepancies can be written off as the Magos in question being ill-informed, or perhaps merely judging what the Tyranids were doing on that one world against his experience of the Mechanicus in the local sector.