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So as far as I can tell Humanity's actual Golden Age was around M15-M25. Now called the Dark Age by The Imperium because they're the actual Dark Age and they're just funny that. It would appear Humanity managed to settle an astounding million worlds so my question is what the heck were The Eldar doing at this time? The Fall wasn't till M30. It supposedly was still their Galaxy and the let this usurper race take a million planets without doing anything?

The galaxy is vast and there is no reason to belief that the Eldar are as expansionist as the human species.
Perhaps the spaceelfs were simply content to live a life of luxury on the crownworlds without fancying any contact with
some strange smelling, evolved apes

This is pretty hard to ignore. This upstart race would have been expanding like a plague. Near the end there Humanity may have had more planets than the Eldar. I guess they were really, really distracted by those "pleasure cults".

Ya at this time eldar didnt realy care about anything. The way they saw it is hey we could either go fight these guys or we could have a ton of sex wich would you choose?

The Eldar Empire was extremely powerful, but quite small (Mostly centred around where the Eye of Terror now exists). Sure, there were Maiden Worlds and other Eldar expanding at their whim, which would probably bring them into conflict with humans, but I don't think the Eldar Empire ever mobilised to take on the expanding mon-keigh. After the first few encounters (likely ending in fantastic victory for the Eldar) humans would have learnt to leave it well enough alone, which might explain why they expanded so far into the Galactic East.

Eldrad wrote:Ya at this time eldar didnt realy care about anything. The way they saw it is hey we could either go fight these guys or we could have a ton of sex wich would you choose?

I suspect it is somthing like this. However that means "The Fall" as we know it was happening for over 15,000 years. Eldar, are long lived so that's not as long for them but still that's a whole lot of not giving a for anyone.


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Emperors Faithful wrote:The Eldar Empire was extremely powerful, but quite small (Mostly centred around where the Eye of Terror now exists). Sure, there were Maiden Worlds and other Eldar expanding at their whim, which would probably bring them into conflict with humans, but I don't think the Eldar Empire ever mobilised to take on the expanding mon-keigh. After the first few encounters (likely ending in fantastic victory for the Eldar) humans would have learnt to leave it well enough alone, which might explain why they expanded so far into the Galactic East.

Or was it the other way around? Humanity's expansion can't be described as anything but "unchecked". The level of human technology at this point is considerd mythical and magical by later humans. It was probably eldar like in comparison.
Pehaps the power of The Eldar empire was always overexaggerated.

KamikazeCanuck wrote:

Emperors Faithful wrote:The Eldar Empire was extremely powerful, but quite small (Mostly centred around where the Eye of Terror now exists). Sure, there were Maiden Worlds and other Eldar expanding at their whim, which would probably bring them into conflict with humans, but I don't think the Eldar Empire ever mobilised to take on the expanding mon-keigh. After the first few encounters (likely ending in fantastic victory for the Eldar) humans would have learnt to leave it well enough alone, which might explain why they expanded so far into the Galactic East.

Or was it the other way around? Humanity's expansion can't be described as anything but "unchecked". The level of human technology at this point is considerd mythical and magical by later humans. It was probably eldar like in comparison.
Pehaps the power of The Eldar empire was always overexaggerated.

Unlikely, the Humans of that Era had amazing technology yes, but nothing that stood up to Pre-Fall Eldar (who may possibly been a source of some of that tech). If the Eldar really did have serious competition with the Humans then their society wouldn't have fallen to that level of decadence. The whole reason behind the fall was that the Eldar race had proved their supremacy and had nothing left to but take the path of self-indulgance. A real threat, such as the humans, would have snapped them out of it if occuring earlier on.

That said, if the Fall ended the Age of Strife amongst humanity (by calming the Warp Storms), what caused it?

Even at it's current size,a war between IoM and Eldar would end in MAD.Now imagine pre-fall Eldar Empire with their full tech base.

IvanTih wrote:Even at it's current size,a war between IoM and Eldar would end in MAD.Now imagine pre-fall Eldar Empire with their full tech base.

You mean this ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutual_assured_destruction ) right? Not this. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mad_(magazine)

I think you overestimate the capabilities of the Craftworld Eldar. They really are on their last legs, the only reason that the Imperium doesn't pursue a rigid stance of exterminate on sight is becuase the Eldar leave them alone for the most part, and at other times help them just as much as they kill them.

and because they can't find them.

Emperors Faithful wrote:

IvanTih wrote:Even at it's current size,a war between IoM and Eldar would end in MAD.Now imagine pre-fall Eldar Empire with their full tech base.

You mean this ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutual_assured_destruction ) right? Not this. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mad_(magazine)

I think you overestimate the capabilities of the Craftworld Eldar. They really are on their last legs, the only reason that the Imperium doesn't pursue a rigid stance of exterminate on sight is becuase the Eldar leave them alone for the most part, and at other times help them just as much as they kill them.

Guess you forgot how a Sector fleet got ass rap** by a Craftworld(although a Chapter has managed to destroy one),but again one novel mentions MAD and another says that Eldar are only alive because of their stealth so we can't be sure.

Also note that in one of the e-mails to Andy Chambers when concerned with the size of the IoM's fleet he said that 375,000 fits nicely,taking that 9 in 10 ships merchant and taking millions of commercial spacecraft from 3rd edition rulebook we get absolute minimum of 200,000,upper limit can be anything since millions can be anything from 2 million to 999 milion(fits nicely for Sabbath's World crusade,10,000 ships for a relatively backwater subsector).

Keep in mind that most of the Eldar empire was in the current Eye of Terror. Humanity probably kept out of there and left the Eldar alone.

If humans had proved slightly irritating the Eldar could've dispatched them on but a whim.

It must be remembered that the (still formidable) Eldar are only at the tiniest fraction of their former strength.

Harriticus wrote:Keep in mind that most of the Eldar empire was in the current Eye of Terror. Humanity probably kept out of there and left the Eldar alone.

Well, at that point of time the EoT hadnt been formed yet. It only formed when the Fall begin and Slaanesh was created.

KamikazeCanuck wrote:So as far as I can tell Humanity's actual Golden Age was around M15-M25. Now called the Dark Age by The Imperium because they're the actual Dark Age and they're just funny that. It would appear Humanity managed to settle an astounding million worlds so my question is what the heck were The Eldar doing at this time? The Fall wasn't till M30. It supposedly was still their Galaxy and the let this usurper race take a million planets without doing anything?

I remember reading somewhere in a Codex or BL book, that back then(Pre-Age of Strife) the long lived Eldar still recalled the war with the Necrons and their C'tan masters and couldn't find it in their hearts to eradicate another race. After so many races were destroyed in the galaxy spanning war that laid the Old Ones and their servants low (as well as brought about an Enslaver plague, too, I think), and brought the galaxy to near extinction, there was probably still plenty of space for both. Its certain that the Eldar defended their interests when needed, but all out war was probably unnecessary and a low priority for the pre-Fall Eldar which had turned inward by this time.

Edit: Yeah, its the Necrons codex, the 2 page short story Shadow Games, wherein a Farseer laments not destroying humanity earlier, as the pariah gene has dire consequences for his kind.

IvanTih wrote:Guess you forgot how a Sector fleet got ass rap** by a Craftworld(although a Chapter has managed to destroy one),but again one novel mentions MAD and another says that Eldar are only alive because of their stealth so we can't be sure.

I didn't forget it, but I do love how in the BRB every justification is given and then that little footnote is thrown on. The Eldar are formidable yes, but in a war (full-scale war, not repeated incursions and raids) the Imperium wins by an atrocious margin.

Also note that in one of the e-mails to Andy Chambers when concerned with the size of the IoM's fleet he said that 375,000 fits nicely,taking that 9 in 10 ships merchant and taking millions of commercial spacecraft from 3rd edition rulebook we get absolute minimum of 200,000,upper limit can be anything since millions can be anything from 2 million to 999 milion(fits nicely for Sabbath's World crusade,10,000 ships for a relatively backwater subsector).

There's clearly no stadardised figure for a Sector Fleet, and they are almost always split up to guard convoys and ports against pirates and raiders both xenos and human. That, and GW is also well known for at times pulling figures straight out of their arse.

(Why do you think the Sabbat Worlds are a backwater subsector?)

The Sabbat Worlds? Given that there is a massive crusadeg going on involving a billion Guardsmen, Space Marines and Titan Legions, I'd be hard pressed to say that it's a 'backwater'. Is it as important as some other sectors? Well, no. But it's definitely not a backwater. In a modern analogy, the Sabbat Worls are something like the state of Washington. It isn't the most important region, but it's definitely not a backwater.

Now, as to the question...... Well, looking at a map of the Milky Way as it stands in the 41st Millenium (http://www.joachim-adomeit.de/wh40k/spacemap/map.html) We can see that the biggest concentration of human worlds is in and around the Segmentum Solar, with trails of worlds going off into the Ultima Segmentum, Segmentum Pacificus, and Segmentum Tempestus. Human civilization to the galatic north of Terra seems to be much less concentrated, and a bit more spread out.

I'm a fan of the theory that while humans were expanding, they had some conflicts with the Eldar, and basically gave up expanding towards their empire, and the vast majority of the Eldar race just didn't care enough to mobilize to crush humanity. Hell, I'm willing to bet that some of the warnings the Eldar who fled on the craftworlds were giving was that the Eldar needed to DO something about these stupid apes spreading all over the galaxy.

ChrisWWII wrote: In a modern analogy, the Sabbat Worls are something like the state of Washington. It isn't the most important region, but it's definitely not a backwater.

Given that Washington is home to the capital of the US, that may not be the best example.

Emperors Faithful wrote:

IvanTih wrote:Guess you forgot how a Sector fleet got ass rap** by a Craftworld(although a Chapter has managed to destroy one),but again one novel mentions MAD and another says that Eldar are only alive because of their stealth so we can't be sure.

I didn't forget it, but I do love how in the BRB every justification is given and then that little footnote is thrown on. The Eldar are formidable yes, but in a war (full-scale war, not repeated incursions and raids) the Imperium wins by an atrocious margin.

Also note that in one of the e-mails to Andy Chambers when concerned with the size of the IoM's fleet he said that 375,000 fits nicely,taking that 9 in 10 ships merchant and taking millions of commercial spacecraft from 3rd edition rulebook we get absolute minimum of 200,000,upper limit can be anything since millions can be anything from 2 million to 999 milion(fits nicely for Sabbath's World crusade,10,000 ships for a relatively backwater subsector).

There's clearly no stadardised figure for a Sector Fleet, and they are almost always split up to guard convoys and ports against pirates and raiders both xenos and human. That, and GW is also well known for at times pulling figures straight out of their arse.

(Why do you think the Sabbat Worlds are a backwater subsector?)

Andy Chamers said so.

om: HDS
Sent: Sunday, February 2, 2003 9:07 PM
To: Andy Chambers
Subject: A quick question about the Imperium of Man's fleets

I was speaking to Gordon Rennie once on the BFG-list on yahoogroups, to make it short he came up with some rough approximations for the IoM's total fleet, somewhere inbetween 275.000 to 375.000 ships

I was wondering what you feel about that figure, is it plausible? Too high? Too low?

Thanks for your time


Gordons estimates do fit well with the patrolling approaching, which is exactly how it works. However I should point out that in all likelihood the Imperium itslef doesn't have an accurate idea of fleet strength, galactic communication being what it is

AndyC
40K Overfiend
Wars mongered,
civilisations crushed

It was relatively backwater.Also it was a subsector,pretty small.Plus if it comes from GW it's canon deal with it.
Compare that to the Damocles crusade which wasn't even a full crusade,plus it happened on the edge of the Imperium while the Sabbath's World crusade is the example of the full Imperial offensive.

IvanTih wrote:It was relatively backwater.Also it was a subsector,pretty small.Plus if it comes from GW it's canon deal with it.

It's not from GW. It's from a guy who works there. BIG difference. And even he has admitted the Imperium doesn't really have any idea what their fleet size is.

Compare that to the Damocles crusade which wasn't even a full crusade,plus it happened on the edge of the Imperium while the Sabbath's World crusade is the example of the full Imperial offensive.

The Damocles Crusade was a full crusade, but it was called off to combat the Tyranid threat.

NELS1031 wrote:

KamikazeCanuck wrote:

Edit: Yeah, its the Necrons codex, the 2 page short story Shadow Games, wherein a Farseer laments not destroying humanity earlier, as the pariah gene has dire consequences for his kind.

THAts where he sees the vision of destroying the assains temple but as a result the strands of fate all point towards his craftworld dying.


to be honest the eldar probaly wouldn't of directly attck the expanded domain of man but would of defende their borders if the huamns tried to invade

Emperors Faithful wrote:

IvanTih wrote:It was relatively backwater.Also it was a subsector,pretty small.Plus if it comes from GW it's canon deal with it.

It's not from GW. It's from a guy who works there. BIG difference. And even he has admitted the Imperium doesn't really have any idea what their fleet size is.

Compare that to the Damocles crusade which wasn't even a full crusade,plus it happened on the edge of the Imperium while the Sabbath's World crusade is the example of the full Imperial offensive.

The Damocles Crusade was a full crusade, but it was called off to combat the Tyranid threat.

Even so taking 3rd edition quote we have low end of 200,000.

The psychic beam stretches across 70,000 light years of space, a focus for the millions of commercial craft and warships that navigate through the tumultuous waves of the warp.

It is a given fact that through the might and valour of the Imperial Navy, the raging tides of foul aliens and vile heretics that infest the galaxy have been stayed from overrunning the millions of worlds that over the millennia have come under the Emperors beneficient rule. While these hulking, powerful warships are the most visible representation of Mankind's command of the stars, it is actually through the millions of humble merchant freighters, lumbering heavy transports and sleek fast clippers that make up the vast majority of Mankind's interstellar spacecraft by which its vast domain is held together. -Fabric of the Imperium

At that time, according to War Council logs, there were four thousand two hundred and eighty-seven primary expedition fleets engaged upon the business of the crusade, as well as sixty thousand odd secondary deployment groups involved in compliance or occupation endeavours, with a further three hundred and seventy-two primary expeditions in regroup and refit, or resupplying as they awaited new tasking orders. -Horus Rising

At 50 ships each, ignoring the difference between primary and secondary, that would give 3.25 million.

The central thrust of the Sabbat Worlds Crusade Fleet - those units under Warmaster Macaroth's personal and immediate command - comprises 10,000+ ships of Battlefleet Pacificus. There is no mention at all, anywhere, that this denuded the rest of the Segmentum of defences, and it is not the entirety of the Crusade Fleet.

As to the original question, I liked old fluff more.

I know it's been retconned, but it used to be that the height (and fall) of the Eldar empire occurred a loooooooooong time before humanity even evolved, and that the Fall was the cause of the Warp storms that kept Humanity confined to the Solar System until the Dark Age of Technology.
In my mind, that's still how it is.

I'll be the douche whose only further contribution to this thread will be pointing out failz:

Conservationist wrote:

Harriticus wrote:Keep in mind that most of the Eldar empire was in the current Eye of Terror. Humanity probably kept out of there and left the Eldar alone.

Well, at that point of time the EoT hadnt been formed yet. It only formed when the Fall begin and Slaanesh was created.

"Current Eye of Terror"; in other words, the space that was there before the warp spilled through. Go look up Crone Worlds, they now exist in the EoT but were originally in normal space.

Emperors Faithful wrote:

ChrisWWII wrote: In a modern analogy, the Sabbat Worls are something like the state of Washington. It isn't the most important region, but it's definitely not a backwater.

Given that Washington is home to the capital of the US, that may not be the best example.

I believe he meant Washington STATE. Y'know, that huge one on the west coast with that little-known city Seattle in it?

Emperors Faithful wrote:

ChrisWWII wrote: In a modern analogy, the Sabbat Worls are something like the state of Washington. It isn't the most important region, but it's definitely not a backwater.

Given that Washington is home to the capital of the US, that may not be the best example.

Wrong coast.

You're thinking of District of Columbia (IE, Washington D.C.).

Conservationist wrote:

Harriticus wrote:Keep in mind that most of the Eldar empire was in the current Eye of Terror. Humanity probably kept out of there and left the Eldar alone.

Well, at that point of time the EoT hadnt been formed yet. It only formed when the Fall begin and Slaanesh was created.

Thats why he used the word 'current'.

It does seem that most of the pre crusade human worlds are on the whole to the east of Terra so they probably wouldn't have butted heads.

The fact that the Eldar had the vessels that would become the craftworlds leads to the conclusion that the Eldar Empire wasn't like the IoM. They had a very powerful but small empire and would rather trade with other races than destroy them.

The craftworlds were developed in the later era of the Eldar history IIRC, as a response to the debauchery they decided to basically form massive societies and ship away in the craftworlds before it was too late.

Alot of the craftworlds are older than the debauchery, they were originally long distance trade vessels (that were later expanded a hundred fold over).

Due to the fact that the trade vessels only returned to Eldar core worlds once every hundred or so years they were able to see the fall into decadence and violence that befell their the main body of Eldar.

As i said these long distance trade vessels and the fact that the Eldar have been shown to work with other races, would present their empire as one of trade and commerce than the xeno-phodic expansionists that is the IoM.

Melissia wrote:The craftworlds were developed in the later era of the Eldar history IIRC, as a response to the debauchery they decided to basically form massive societies and ship away in the craftworlds before it was too late.

IIRC the ships that became the Craftworlds were long-distance trade ships that took hundreds, maybe even thousands, of years to reach their destinations... So when the crews returned to Eldar space they'd be really amazed by the massive leaps in decadence that would have happened over the long periods of time the crews were away.

The Craftworlds as they currently are are amalgamations of these older ships merged into giant super-vessels.

IvanTih wrote:
At 50 ships each, ignoring the difference between primary and secondary, that would give 3.25 million.

Ivan, please, just admit you've pulled this number from thin air.

The central thrust of the Sabbat Worlds Crusade Fleet - those units under Warmaster Macaroth's personal and immediate command - comprises 10,000+ ships of Battlefleet Pacificus. There is no mention at all, anywhere, that this denuded the rest of the Segmentum of defences, and it is not the entirety of the Crusade Fleet.

Where are you going with this? If these figures are accurate, what does that prove exactly?


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Melissia wrote:

Emperors Faithful wrote:

ChrisWWII wrote: In a modern analogy, the Sabbat Worls are something like the state of Washington. It isn't the most important region, but it's definitely not a backwater.

Given that Washington is home to the capital of the US, that may not be the best example.

Wrong coast.

You're thinking of District of Columbia (IE, Washington D.C.).

Bugger it.

Oi, mates! We're gonna have to call off the invasion, we've got the bloody place all mucked up.