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Archonate wrote:
I know this is how DE used to be portrayed, but having read the new codex, I don't get this vibe from them anymore. Commorragh is more dangerous than ever, but that's why individuals are best served by being loyal to whatever Gang/Coven/Aerie/Sect/Kabal they belong to. If your family dislikes you, they might not be inclined to turn your remains over to the homunculus for resurrection. There is a time for a little manipulation, but it's all very subtle. Outwardly, they appear always loyal. Their cruelty is inflicted primarily upon other races, secondarily upon rival Kabals and such. Something like the Houses of Necromunda only on a larger scale. To overtly betray the group that sustains you is the fast track to a horrible death.

The backstabbing begins with ambitious aristocrats coveting positions of power, and retaliation for failed attempts to arrest that power. But most DE just want their tasty soul fix.

This is a good summary.

The overall principle running throughout Dark Eldar society is selfishness and self-interest. However it is this same self-interest that prevents total anarchy. Banding together and staying as part of the group improves one's chances of survival. This is even discussed by Phil Kelly in the WD articles on Kabals, around the time of the Dark Eldar Codex release. In that article he states that is why a Kabalite would take the dead fellow Kabalites back for resurrection. If they just abandoned the dead, the Kabal would weaken, or have to take in new untested potentially unreliable recruits. Likewise a haemonculus has to fulfill the resurrection contracts at least most of the time, otherwise nobody would bother to sign up for any and the haemonculus would run out of customers.
This kind of mutual self-interest is also how Kabals maintain members in the first place, as shown in the Dark Eldar Codex. The Kabals give patronage to Wych Cults and in return the Wyches set up spectacles that feed the Kabal with energy.

So the key question in any relationship in Commorragh is: "What is in it for me?"

If the reward to risk ratio is great enough, then people will follow you. A disadvantaged individual is going to have to offer more generous terms to attract followers away from established institutions.

This is just a maybe. But I'am considering putting the first piece fanfic up on the site; I think I saw a forum heading dealing with that. Just wanted to know what is the acceptable level of violence, gore and sexual references allowed on this site before I consider doing so? Theres nothing graphic IMO and I tried to keep it around what most 40k novels are like anyway. Just I think I heard that this is called a family site and well; you know.

Far enough. I decided against it during today anyway.

I have considered Dark Eldar in a way to by analogous to some of the Fey/Dark Fey mythologies, primarly in the boons of the Unseelie. The currency of power is the boon or favor that is owed. Powerful Dark Eldar grant favors to those weaker then they; be it protection, loot, authority, souls, slaves, a place in a kabal or in a raid and even/especially survival.

To take a favor though makes you indebted to the boon giver, and as they are already stronger then you, they have the power to enforce that debt. To flee such a debt is a fate worse then death because the giver will not show mercy. The more one owes, the lessor the status in the dark city. The most cunning though will find ways to put others in their debts and remove the debts they owe, be it by knife and poison or through payment (probably via a debt they themselves are owed). Success may pay off some boons, but others might require nothing less then life and death.

Those like Vect that rise to the very top will have a vast network of debts owed to them, sometimes debts on top of debts. One could never know who might owe a debt they might discharge by eliminating a fellow plotter, or by blackmailing them (another form of favor) and putting them in your debt. To hold such a debt though, one must be wary because one must also have the strength to enforce it.

Of course, this would all get insanely complex in short order, so that only the most exceptional would gain power, and then only as long as they stayed sharp enough to keep it.