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Nah, just a far, far better understanding of science and technology than we are ever likely to have. That's the Necrons' schtick: "because Science!"

They have access to the Web-Way, via Dolmen Gates. They have inertialess drives that make their ships the fastest in the galaxy. They have a "reset" button for every star in the galaxy. They have an active time-traveler. They have a guy who, except against Orks (who's lack of tactics is an effective tactic against this guy), is the greatest tactical mind the galaxy has ever seen. They have another guy who creates hard-light sculptures in his garden in his spare time and just pops up when and wherever he likes to steal interesting tidbits from other factions. Like Sebastian Thor's head.

danny1995 wrote:
I don't think the Necrons are really all that advanced, their technological abilities are not their own, simply what the C'Tan did to them. So my vote goes to Eldar, based on their weapons technology, their Craftworlds, and their psychic technology. I mean come on, they capture souls and turn them into giant death robots.

Actually, that's not true. About the Necrons, I mean.

Oldcron fluff, Necrons had a space-age society and initiated contact with the C'tan, upon which point the C'tan taught them to put their souls in robot bodies.

Newcron fluff, Necrons had a galaxy-spanning Empire and got into a war with the Eldar before they ever bothered with the C'tan, and only got Biotransference as a method of fighting against the Eldar warp-powers.

That too, what Furyo said.

In the Newcrons, the Necrons were an *advanced* society that ruled a galactic empire that beggars both the Ork empires and the Imperium in size. They had mastered the arts of physical sciences so thoroughly that they then turned their attentions to metaphysical sciences, just to have something new to think about.

Then they decided to go to war against the magic-using Old Ones, and got butt-spanked. The C'Tan show up (actually, had been there awhile, the Necrons finally notice the thing eating a star is sentient) and they make contact. The C'Tan feed them some line of BS (or might be true, but probably isn't) about also having been wtf-spanked by the Old Ones, and so they join up.

War cranks up again... and still, they start losing. So the Necrons decided to Bio-transfer themselves (as they had already done it to the C'Tan... Biotransference is a Necron science!) and then return to the war. Now, being as effectively immortal as possible, things go much better, and they destroy the C'Tan. Then, being pissed that they have destroyed their culture for the C'Tan, they turn their weapons against the star-gods and shatter almost all of them, outright killing one.

Necrons might claim they defeated the Old Ones, but the Old Ones destroyed themselves via the Warp (demons or something similar). After that happened, the Eldar still went on to win the War in Heaven, forcing the Necrons to go into hiding and sleep.

Necrons did have better technology, but the Eldar had the Warp. Not just Psykers, but Asuran, Khaine (not just the shard they have now), Vaul, and more.

The Eldar are so advanced that their civilization collapsed in on itself and the remnants of the old Eldar lifestyle are hiding out.

At least the Tau are actively advancing (says so in the Codex!) whereas everyone else is in either stagnation (Imperium) or decline (Eldar). Chaos feeds on the remnants of Imperial technology, what they can get, so they're even a few paces behind the Imperium and it's tough to argue otherwise.

And regarding the Orks, well:

Uthan the Perverse, Eldar Philosopher wrote:The Orks are the pinnacle of creation. For them, the great struggle is won. They have evolved a society which knows no stress or angst. Who are we to judge them? We Eldar who have failed, or the Humans, on the road to ruin in their turn? And why? Because we sought answers to questions that an Ork wouldn't even bother to ask! We see a culture that is strong and despise it as crude.

 TedNugent wrote:
The Eldar are so advanced that their civilization collapsed in on itself and the remnants of the old Eldar lifestyle are hiding out.

At least the Tau are actively advancing (says so in the Codex!) whereas everyone else is in either stagnation (Imperium) or decline (Eldar). Chaos feeds on the remnants of Imperial technology, what they can get, so they're even a few paces behind the Imperium and it's tough to argue otherwise.

And regarding the Orks, well:

Uthan the Perverse, Eldar Philosopher wrote:The Orks are the pinnacle of creation. For them, the great struggle is won. They have evolved a society which knows no stress or angst. Who are we to judge them? We Eldar who have failed, or the Humans, on the road to ruin in their turn? And why? Because we sought answers to questions that an Ork wouldn't even bother to ask! We see a culture that is strong and despise it as crude.

Chaos has dark age of technology tech out the wazoo. Remember half of the Founding space marine chapters joined them, and a good portion of Adaptes Mechanis. And on top of that they have demon engines that rival even the most advanced tech of other races. Chaos has tech, just because they psychic it into existence doesn't mean it isn't advanced.

Tycho wrote:

It's *sort of* covered in the fluff but basically, yeah, everything goes dormant during transit until they can find a new source of bio-mass (which could even include other nids). They can't really produce energy the way the other races can.

Those are some of the things you listed as wanting to be meaningful.

So for the 'Nids the chart would look like this:

efficiency of power plants -
debatable but certainly not on par with the other races and in no way able to compete with the top tier societies. Also requires fairly rediculous quantities of bio mass to fuel them.

They can consume all the biosphere and a considerable chunk of the crust of a planet in a few months. That takes a lot of energy. In fact the Tyranids as described in fluff shouldn't be able to exist solely on biomass' energy. So either they have another energy source or they broke thermodynamics.

Size of empire-
because of the above there technically is no "nid empire". Just hive fleets and the floating husks left in their wake. If you want to say the fleets are their empire then fair enough but now you're back to needing to consume to live and they are operating on the zero sum game again. That's not much of an "empire".

I'm not sure what you mean by that.

Transportation Tech.-
They have the weakest form of it when compared to all the other main races

While their FTL is the slowest, it is also the most reliable one.

So looking at them in terms of that, still not seeing 'Nids as number two.

Tyranids also have the advantage of numbers and sheer production.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 BrotherOfBone wrote:

 OzTeG8ndPwRfl wrote:
Their ships produce vast amounts of energy, as do many of their biomorphs, their entire civilization is a massive energy generator, and the energy produced is sued to spawn more hive ships and soldiers. And their social political system is so thoroughly evolved they suffer no revolutions or internal struggles and work solely for the hive mind. It is in many ways the perfect political system. And as every tyranid dex has stated, the fleets that have struck here are only scouts. Future fleets will include biomorphs designed solely to crush the lifeforms of our galaxy. They have all the time in the world.

And to say none of that is actually tech is to argue semantics again. See previously posted statements for details.

And no, each Tyranid Codex has hinted at this, none of them have said it.

IIRC the rough thing they said was that they could be scout fleets or this could be it, a shattered fragment of a forgotten race.

Actually it was the 6th edition Rulebook what said it:
"Unbeknownst to the Imperium, the threat is of an even greater magnitude, for the bulk of the Tyranids have not yet reached the Imperium's galaxy, their masses still strewn out across the void. So immeasurably large is the invasion fleet that its furthest stretched tentacles alone have entered the Imperium's space. Each of the identified Hive Fleets is but a splinter of that single monstrous host, the Hive Mind. what horrors await, only time will tell."

And, no. They don't have revolutions because they're mindless animals controlled by the greatest psyker (bar one) in the galaxy.

Its a single super organism. I even doubt that the Hive Mind exist in a single body, but rather it is a immense web of synapse creatures. Also parts of it are quite autonomous. The synapse creatures have different levels of autonomy and self awareness. And the vanguard creatures are fully autonomous.

So...freaking... awesome...

I love Geekuments man. I made that word up just now. Note the time and date!

Necrons. They can even make see through green plastic.

*Wonders if there is more popcor*

Bharring wrote:
Necrons might claim they defeated the Old Ones, but the Old Ones destroyed themselves via the Warp (demons or something similar). After that happened, the Eldar still went on to win the War in Heaven, forcing the Necrons to go into hiding and sleep.

Necrons did have better technology, but the Eldar had the Warp. Not just Psykers, but Asuran, Khaine (not just the shard they have now), Vaul, and more.

The Enslaver Plague was retconned away.

The Necrons genocided the Old Ones fair and square despite the Old Ones throwing everything and the kitchen sink at them.

Because there could only be one fascistic galactic hegemony.

 Jancoran wrote:
So...freaking... awesome...

I love Geekuments man. I made that word up just now. Note the time and date!

Copyright it before someone else does! Geekuments©

As to the Tyranids, I doubt they can be rated against actual civilisations like the Necrons or IoM because they lack a civilisation entirely.
There is no such thing as 'the Tyranids'. There is only one, single Tyranid: The Hive Mind. All other organisms are just animals, possessing only instincts and lacking sentience and self-awareness.
Arguably, even the Hive Mind itself acts only according to its instincts.
I say Tyranids can not be rated until they develop a civilisation.

The Eldar. Their advancement of their own society was so great that it lead to their downfall and current situation. Their Tech utilizes not only scientific technology that brilliant minds are required to create, but a mind even so far evolved that the race as a whole is a minor psycher.

Dark Eldar / Eldar... Webway portals, reanimation, their darklight weapons...

Still no one has given me a reason to change my rubric's decision. As it stands we still have this order:

1st: Chaos
2nd: Eldar
3rd: Necrons
4th: Tau/Humanity
5th: Tyranids
6th: Orks

Feel free to go back and make arguments as to where races should stand. Most of the above conversation was covered and accounted for in my rubric.

I still think that's a terrible way of scoring them. The individual categories should have weightings, and your weightings just end up being biased. You might as well just say "x race is more advanced because y".

 OzTeG8ndPwRfl wrote:
Still no one has given me a reason to change my rubric's decision. As it stands we still have this order:

1st: Chaos
2nd: Eldar
3rd: Necrons
4th: Tau/Humanity
5th: Tyranids
6th: Orks

Feel free to go back and make arguments as to where races should stand. Most of the above conversation was covered and accounted for in my rubric.

I would move the Tyranids above Tau/Humanity and the Necrons on the same level as the Eldar. Also I would add C'tans on the same level as Chaos.

Bharring wrote:
Necrons might claim they defeated the Old Ones, but the Old Ones destroyed themselves via the Warp (demons or something similar). After that happened, the Eldar still went on to win the War in Heaven, forcing the Necrons to go into hiding and sleep.

Necrons did have better technology, but the Eldar had the Warp. Not just Psykers, but Asuran, Khaine (not just the shard they have now), Vaul, and more.

You may want to re-read Codex Necrons- the Necrons were solidly kicking the Old One's asses along with their Eldar lackies and have invaded the webway to besiege them even there. In their desperation the Old Ones resorted to such abuse of the warp that it ended up backfiring horribly and effectively finished them off.

At that point the War in Heaven was basically won and the Necrons turned on the C'tan in a massive uprising that saw their empire shattered and reduced to but a shadow of its former self, which is why they couldn't handle the resurgent Eldar at the time.

Regarding the OP, the Necrons are clearly by far the most technologically advanced race in the 40k setting. Let us review some of their technological capabilities:

Gauss Weapons: The most common of Necron weapon systems, Gauss weapons work by creating a ridiculously powerful electromagnetic field (as near as anyone can tell) that literally rips apart the target's subatomic structure and pulls the resulting elementry particles back towards the barrel of the weapon in the form of a green lightning bolt, literally flaying the victim apart at the subatomic level. The smallest and weakest of these weapons, the Gauss Flayer, wielded by the lowest of Necron infantry, is capable of vaporizing a Space Marine in Terminator armor with a single shot and is a credible threat to Imperial tanks. Imperial scientists are particularly baffled by the fact that the weapon does not reduce the gun's immediate vicinity into molten rock with its waste heat, as by all laws of thermodynamics as understood by Imperial scientists the waste heat they should produce even under ideal conditions should be utterly stupendous. As an added bonus, these weapons also seem to ignore most forms of energy shielding. Whenever a Necron fires one of these guns he's basically bending physics over like a cheap whore and then slaps her and laughs when she turns around and asks for her money.

Communication: All Necrons are connected into a hierarchical quantum entenglement communication network, giving them instant lag-free communication that is completely unaffected by range.

Doomsday cannons: sizable Necron field artillery pieces with titan level firepower who's power cores are powerful enough to destroy entire planets when overloaded.

Engines: The Inertialess Drive allows Necron fleets to go from 0 to .99c in the blink of an eye and turn on a dime while maneuvering at those speeds. These engined rape physics to such an extent that they can also serve as FTL drives. The largest Necron capital ships can pull off maneuvers that would leave Imperial fighter pilots crying themselves to sleep in envy.

Tessaract Arks: Basically a Necron heavy weapons platform, this vehicle is built around a black hole which serves as its primary weapon, unleashing gravity waves and radiation bursts to destroy its targets. Imperial intelligence assesments rate it as a terminus level threat that should only ever be engaged at long range with saturation ordnance and superheavy battlefield assets, "if forced into close ranged engagement viictory is unassured regardless of battlefield advantage".

Aeonic Orbs: Take a sun, compress it into a superheavy tank sized containment device and then deploy it as a ground combat vehicle that fights by selectively loosening containment in the enemy's general direction.

World Engines: this is what you get when a Necron Lord decides to take his Tomb World on a joy ride. These things put the Death Stars to shame and laugh at massed use of exterminatus grade weaponry.

Stellar manipulation tech: The Celestial Orrary and its ability to make every star in the galaxy go nova has already been mentioned, but that is far from the only method of stellar manipulation available to the Necrons- Cairn class tombships have been known to drain away energy from stars to boost their own power reserves or those of nearby Tombworlds, taking mere moment to leach off hundreds of thousands of years worth of a star's output in a single go (and it takes many such power draining cycles to feed a "dry" tombworld). Moreover, Necron invasion fleets have been known to trigger super massive solar flares as their equivalent of a flash bang when invading a system and in one instance had outright turned off a system's star as a planetary siege tactic.

Temporal manipulation tech: Everything from stasis tech through handheld gadgets that slow down time for anyone who gets too close to the user to full blown reliable time travel. Other notable applications include temporal vision, reading temporal flows to predict the future and the used of temporal manipulation tech to repair vehicles by selectively rewinding time around damaged parts.

Warp manipulation: the Necrons are capable of technologically affecting the immaterium in several ways- first and foremost is their warp repelling tech seen on Cadia that is actively preventing the Eye of Terror from swallowing up the Cadian system. Other prime examples include the Dolmen Gates that allow them to breach the Webway and pull off insane stunts such as translating a supernova into the warp (basically screwed over anything warp related across an entire sector for well over a year), the ability to block, intercept and/or otherwise hack into warp based communication and the ability to somehow intercept vessels traveling through the Warp.

Dimensional manipulation: Tomb worlds are bigger on the inside, high grade Necron armor boasts non-euclidean molecular structure, Necron Lords often walk around with pocket dimension prisons in their utility belt, Necron maintenance drones can selectively phase portions of their bodies in and out of reality to affect repairs without having to first open up the device they're repairing and their snipers can hang around in Hyperspace while marking their intended targets and can even kill them without ever bothering to set foot in the material plane.

Teleportation: even the lowliest Necron warrior possesses the ability to "phase out" and teleport itself back to the nearest Tombworld (usually to affect repairs against damage that is beyond what his on board reanimation protocols are capable of handling). The Necrons are also masters of teleport assaults, often beaming boarding parties onto enemy vessels in battle and utilizing portable wormholes to deploy troops onto the battlefield instead of using "conventional" transports.

Electronic warfare: Necrons have proven time and again to be masters of this particular field, taking over Imperial vehicles with a gesture, effortlessly hacking through any security protocol known to man, releasing superluminal pulses of malicious signals that infect systems with maleware so potent it drives AIs mad, locks up cogenitors, messes up any system it comes into contact with and cannot be removed in any way known to the Imperium or the Admech short of basically frying the circuits and rebooting the system with fresh electronics. Necron ECM is nothing short of phenomenal, remotely turning off Imperial torpedoes or making them go haywire, draining away the power from nearby strike craft and ordnance and even driving mad the pilots of fighters that draw too near.

I could go on, but I feel this list should do for now.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
I still think that's a terrible way of scoring them. The individual categories should have weightings, and your weightings just end up being biased. You might as well just say "x race is more advanced because y".

How would you weight them? I am very curious, I am trying to come up with a no bias scoring system.

Also as far as bias each category has rules for me at least.

Culture:
1=(No cultural interaction) 2=(interaction of some kind, but unorganized) 3=(Organized interaction driven primarily by biological impulses) 4=Cultural interaction that has overcome basic biological impulses) 5=(Society is dependent on cultural interaction and overcome all biological impulses striving for a shared goal)

Transportation:
1=(No ftl) 2=(ftl) 3=(ftl with stasis) 4= (warp drive) 5=(an almost instantaneous transport to any location)

Power Creation:
1=(relies on fissile fuels with low efficiency) 2=(high efficiency fuel tech) 3=(type one society) 4=(type two society) 5=(type three society)
*(Type one societies can tap into 100% of a planets power creation, type two can do this to a sun, type three can do this to a galaxy)

Weapons tech:
1=(Spears and swords) 2=(some kind of guns) 3=(advanced weaponry featuring electricity most likely) 4=(super weapons that can destroy whole planets with ease) 5=(the ability to destroy whole systems with ease)

Evolution:
1=(can not evolve) 2=(slower than current human evolution) 3=(current human rates) 4=(faster than human rate) 5=(evolves at will)

Reproduction:
1=(can not reproduce) 2=(slower than human reproduction) 3=(human reproduction rates) 4=(faster than human reproduction) 5=(reproduces at will or constantly)

Item creation:
1=(items made by hand by those who plan to use them) 2=(items made by artisans for specific individuals) 3=(Items mass produced by industry) 4=(Advanced materials of insane strength or abilities made by an industrial complex) 5=(Items made at will and instantly usable)

I tried to let the fluff do the talking for me in these categories, but if you feel one is wrong, or one is missing, tell me so I will try to make adjustments accordingly.

 OzTeG8ndPwRfl wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
I still think that's a terrible way of scoring them. The individual categories should have weightings, and your weightings just end up being biased. You might as well just say "x race is more advanced because y".

How would you weight them? I am very curious, I am trying to come up with a no bias scoring system.

Also as far as bias each category has rules for me at least.

Culture:
1=(No cultural interaction) 2=(interaction of some kind, but unorganized) 3=(Organized interaction driven primarily by biological impulses) 4=Cultural interaction that has overcome basic biological impulses) 5=(Society is dependent on cultural interaction and overcome all biological impulses striving for a shared goal)

The way you define culture is really weird. You should rename it to interaction or diplomacy instead depending on what you mean with 'interaction'.
Culture is stuff like art, customs, belief, way of life, values, social practices etc.

 Iron_Captain wrote:

 OzTeG8ndPwRfl wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
I still think that's a terrible way of scoring them. The individual categories should have weightings, and your weightings just end up being biased. You might as well just say "x race is more advanced because y".

How would you weight them? I am very curious, I am trying to come up with a no bias scoring system.

Also as far as bias each category has rules for me at least.

Culture:
1=(No cultural interaction) 2=(interaction of some kind, but unorganized) 3=(Organized interaction driven primarily by biological impulses) 4=Cultural interaction that has overcome basic biological impulses) 5=(Society is dependent on cultural interaction and overcome all biological impulses striving for a shared goal)

The way you define culture is really weird. You should rename it to interaction or diplomacy instead depending on what you mean with 'interaction'.

Culture necessarily requires interaction, but the category also takes art and literature into consideration, art and literature are usually tools to achieve a biological end, such as safety, material gain, or a mate. This category is meant to overcome the messy process of determining who's art is better and get down to the bare essentials of the process. Why did you do this, for a creed or principle, or to get laid.

 OzTeG8ndPwRfl wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:

 OzTeG8ndPwRfl wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
I still think that's a terrible way of scoring them. The individual categories should have weightings, and your weightings just end up being biased. You might as well just say "x race is more advanced because y".

How would you weight them? I am very curious, I am trying to come up with a no bias scoring system.

Also as far as bias each category has rules for me at least.

Culture:
1=(No cultural interaction) 2=(interaction of some kind, but unorganized) 3=(Organized interaction driven primarily by biological impulses) 4=Cultural interaction that has overcome basic biological impulses) 5=(Society is dependent on cultural interaction and overcome all biological impulses striving for a shared goal)

The way you define culture is really weird. You should rename it to interaction or diplomacy instead depending on what you mean with 'interaction'.

Culture necessarily requires interaction, but the category also takes art and literature into consideration, art and literature are usually tools to achieve a biological end, such as safety, material gain, or a mate. This category is meant to overcome the messy process of determining who's art is better and get down to the bare essentials of the process. Why did you do this, for a creed or principle, or to get laid.

Than why is 'interaction driven by biological impulses' better than 'unorganized interaction'? And what is actually meant by 'unorganized interaction'?
Culture requires interaction, yes, but you can't rate culture just by the method of interaction. The Tyranids for example, have quite an advanced way of interacting, but they do not have any kind of culture at all.
Imo, culture should be rated based on things like social structure, language, writing system and literature, art, social customs, interaction and other things that determine civilisation.

 Iron_Captain wrote:

Than why is 'interaction driven by biological impulses' better than 'unorganized interaction'? And what is actually meant by 'unorganized interaction'?
Culture requires interaction, yes, but you can't rate culture just by the method of interaction. The Tyranids for example, have quite an advanced way of interacting, but they do not have any kind of culture at all.
Imo, culture should be rated based on things like social structure, language, writing system and literature, art, social customs, interaction and other things that determine civilisation.

I was trying to avoid a lengthened explanation like this, but here I go:

No cultural Interaction; The inability to interact with other members of the same species; The hive mind is a single entity and therefor can not interact with itself.

Some cultural interaction that is unorganized; Interacting with one another in specific ways, but seeking no organized society of any kind, or resulting in physical altercations and even murder when prolonged; Worms and colonies on insects fit this description, they interact, but barely.

Organized interaction driven primarily by biological impulses; Interaction that includes a highly organized even ritualistic system of motions, sounds(such as language), or even art. Can include architecture and complex political systems.; Current human society is a means to a biological end, the ultimate goal of all human interaction on earth is to gain better security, or mating rights. Some humans are close to or even have passed beyond this level, like the Buddha, but most hardly think beyond their wants and needs.

Cultural interactions that have overcome biological impulses; A society not driven by the need for security or reproduction, but rather lives in a completely enlightened state.; Think an entire civilization of Buddhist monks, I believe the Eldar have definitely reached this level, well Craft World Eldar anyway. Vulcans are a good example as well.

Society is dependent on cultural interaction and overcome all biological impulses striving for a shared goal; The entire species has forgone their individuality and all petty mortal desires to strive for a single overarching goal, the good of their species.; In my opinion Tau, but to further explain, this requires each member of the species to consciously overcome their desires, without conscious decision the species is instead a level 1 or 2 at most.

Tau aren't like that when we consider stuff happening like the breakoff to the Farsight Enclaves, and I'm sure a number of other events we're simply not told about. Tau should be a 4, not a 5, they aren't infallible unlike the Necrons.

 BrotherOfBone wrote:
Tau aren't like that when we consider stuff happening like the breakoff to the Farsight Enclaves, and I'm sure a number of other events we're simply not told about. Tau should be a 4, not a 5, they aren't infallible unlike the Necrons.

I agree entirely and did make them a 4 in my latest update of my rubric. There is a reason the tau and humans are tied for 4th place.

 Murdius Maximus wrote:
*Wonders if there is more popcor*

**passes it, with a stash of gummi bears I was holding out on you**

 Jancoran wrote:

 Murdius Maximus wrote:
*Wonders if there is more popcor*

**passes it, with a stash of gummi bears I was holding out on you**

Dammit man! I knew it!

 Murdius Maximus wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:

 Murdius Maximus wrote:
*Wonders if there is more popcor*

**passes it, with a stash of gummi bears I was holding out on you**

Dammit man! I knew it!

This is amazing, can't stop laughing.

 OzTeG8ndPwRfl wrote:

 BrotherOfBone wrote:
Tau aren't like that when we consider stuff happening like the breakoff to the Farsight Enclaves, and I'm sure a number of other events we're simply not told about. Tau should be a 4, not a 5, they aren't infallible unlike the Necrons.

I agree entirely and did make them a 4 in my latest update of my rubric. There is a reason the tau and humans are tied for 4th place.

Ah awesome, thought you were working towards a 5 with your description of the weighting system.
I also agree on the point that Tyranids have no social structure, they're just animals.

 BrotherOfBone wrote:

Ah awesome, thought you were working towards a 5 with your description of the weighting system.
I also agree on the point that Tyranids have no social structure, they're just animals.

I think you will be hard pressed to describe Tyranids as "Simply animals."

The only reason I rate the Hive Mind as a one for culture is the fact that it is, but one entity. Pre-Hive Mind I imagine the Nids as one of the most advanced species one could imagine. The entire species developed such a strong co-existence and lack of care for their individual well being that they are willing to die at any time to allow others to be born in their stead. Also we have the Hive Mind itself to consider, again a super internet that allows each of the larger creatures to instantly transfer commands, thoughts, and even feelings to other bugs over vast ranges. This is by no means a lack of cultural interaction, but rather the most in depth and complex form of culture one could imagine. If it were not for their single entity status I would count the Nids as a five on my rubric.

If this still seems to difficult to accept, they regularly travel from galaxy to galaxy, and as others have said they do this while dormant. Please go forth and look up the physics equation to calculate where a galaxy will be at a given time millions of years from now based on its gravitational interactions with its local group and your own interaction with fluctuating gravitational systems on your way there. Do this then come back and say they are mindless animals... Because I find that to be the most incredulous statement one could make.