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 Vector Strike wrote:

 EnTyme wrote:
The other is an Aeonic Orb. Basically, they steal your sun and use it to power a massive, Death Star-like weapon to destroy all your neighboring star systems (yours is already spiraling off into the void as a collection of frozen ice balls). This is, of course, assuming they didn't just decide to convert your planet into a World Engine and take if for a joyride.

Wait... there's been a high-successful movie, the seventh part of probably the biggest sci-fi franchise with a pretty similar idea...

I never said the idea was original . . .

chaos45 wrote:
The most ridiculous thing in 40k is the space marine lore after the Heresy.

1000 marine chapters that constantly lose marines to even lasgun and autogun fire from how massively they are outnumbered could never truly affect planetary scale warfare.

Its all heroic war BS that isnt grounded at all in real warfare unless they take on troops that are so poorly armed they cant hurt those 1000 marines.

That the worst part of the fluff they need to change. To have an empire of the scale the game has---they would need like 10s of thousands of marine chapters to put a dent in maintaining it lol.

The Legions are closer to realistic but still to small for warfare on the scale the game portrays.

Somehow the game designers have never studied real war to realize even on earth the most elite forces that can do anything that affects something as much as a country typically require 100,000+ troops.

So if they want the history/scale of the game to make sense the marines need many more numbers to even be passable as realistic lol. Esp considering how easy they die in the game lol.

1000 marines in the scale of a planetary assault would be like ohh how nice you brought a small commando force to the fight lol.....also commandos arent near as effective in real life as they are in movies/games....they can pull off some nice effects on studied and prepared for targets that rely on stealth and surprise to win. In general however most major studies of warfare have shown that their effects are limited compared to real conventional armed forces that can conquer/occupy and hold ground.

Dont get me wrong special forces have their place but they arent the answer to winning a war, they are combat force multiplier to make it easier for the conventional forces to achieve victory.

That's not true. The most elite of units can take down power plants and other special forces missions of high value that only they could do and you don't need an army of people like that and you don't use them all time for everything. Still they don't win wars since you need to occupy the area or have some method of controlling the area and populace which is usually boots on the ground in today's world, but who knows in the future.

Every tool has its use in war and the victor is usually the most adaptable and versatile army that knows how to use all of its elements to their fullest while adapting and inventing new weapons of war.

I'll give it my best shot to be unbiased if a Warhammer 42k world existed for each faction.

Imperium of Mankind: Would have lose significant ground. I know people will hate me for this but the whole setting is the decline of man. If time is to realistically progress and things have to get worse then for the firs ttime ever the Imperium of Mankind is going to see real territorial loss on its eastern fringes.

Ultramarines: A combination of Tau, Necron, and Tyranid threats see the Realm of Ultramar shattered. Massive punitive and retaliatory crusades are launched on all parties and gain some success. They succeed in in killing names characters for every faction involved and manage to destroy a Hive Fleet after its been weakened, but the cost is so high the Ultramarines are no longer large enough to be considered a full chapter. It will take a large time of regrowth as they need to resettle a new realm to hold. The Ultramarines succeed in killing one of these Tau Farsight, Shadowsun, or their hypothetical child and numerous Ethereals.

I'm not too familiar with Necron lore to say who would die but it would need to be someone substantial that sets the courts at each others throat in the eastern fringe and delays the Necrons true unification. Perhaps even the Silent King himself can't command these rambunctious upstarts and a full out Necron schism happens. Or the Necrons have a new sub faction introduced based around the fluff of the original killers. The Space Marines/Tau/Eldar work on a way to destroy the personality routines of Necrons in a series of tomb worlds which regresses them to their original horde of sentient machines who want to wipe out all life. They include the new Necrons under this umbrella. gak gets real.

Other Big Space Marine Chapter: ??? I don't know their lore well enough to comment with any certainty sorry guys. Blood Ravens become a full codex and the power creep is real as they can field tons of psykers. Ha. (that last one was a joke).

Eye of Terror: Abadon launches a new black crusade and this one is successful. Cadia is swept from the stars. In a desparate act of survival Cadians are valued enough as a stock of soldier that many regiments are recalled to form a new planet to hold the line. Luckily Chaos is dealing with its own problems so this is one of the few lucky breaks for the Imperium as it has time to regroup. New Cadia strives to hold the line and uphold the traditions of its past but without the pylons of Cadia wakening chaos incursions its going to be a tougher fight than ever.

Chaos successfully manages to star to create a large number of deamon worlds and warp worlds within the Eye of Terror and Cadia becomes a breeding ground for not only Deamons but traitors of all species and mutations to celebrate their dark victory.

With the recent acquisition of so much material the Dark Mechanicum can be teased into opening their techno-heresy stores for the Legions and in exchange for newly bequeathed worlds to practice their techno-sorcerery they begin to equip the traitor legions with new weaponry (look up the Black Crusade for some awesome Chaos Marine only weapons).

Chaos raids begin to raid everywhere accross the entire galaxy and with a new tear in the warp opening in the Eastern Fringes there is more heresy than ever. However there is also dissent.

The Eldar/Dark Eldar/Harlequins have succeeded in finding a way to create a new Chaos God or restore a former one. He is extremely pissed off at his weak and sissy followers and will do what needs ot be done to exact death and vengeance upon his foes. The new Cult of X (not too familiar with Eldar) arises and preaches the word that to make their god stronger all the Eldar must be destroyed if he is to ascend. Dark Eldar, Eldar, and Harlequins are ambushed by their own god who will use their souls to power himself up DBZ style to kick some Chaos ass. He manages to kill Slaanesh and in a twist of irony likes becoming powerful so much he continues ot hunt down Eldar and Foes of the Eldar alike. His new Chaos Eldar begin to help him in these plans.

The Exodites realizes all of their kin are fething morons for doing the same thing twice and decide that for other reasons all the Eldar other than themselves must be destroyed or preferably converted to their non-heresy ways since killing too much of their own kind would play into X gods hand. They get added to the game and begin to plot how best to do this while trying to create new technology not tied to the warp.

The Dark Eldar are forced to realize they are no longer safe. The gate bursts and a full blown deamon army invades the dark city and gak goes down. Vect seen this coming but what he didn't see coming was the new Eldar God of death truning on all of them as the webway begins to malfunction and sometimes not work. For the first time since its inception Cammoroagh is not safe and the Dark Eldar have to hold off a brutal tide of two chaos armies who are also at each others throat. Their deaths only bolster the X gods strength and they have to abandoned cammoragh. They also realize that their souls are still being sucked away and devoured by X the dark god because of course he would betray them.

For the first time in an age the Dark Eldar need an upstanding army and not just a raiding force. Vect tasks all of his top engineers to devise new weapons of war and machinery. They even begin to create autonomous drones and bio monstrosities to fight for them but ultimately it is a losing battle. On top of all this they still need to feast on pain and terror so it's a losing battle. The Dark Eldar begin to destroy vast swatches of the webway connecting Cammoragh to buy time to colonize new worlds in real space.

The webway is now almost certainly a death sentence to traverse in many areas. It's not uncommon for people to not reach their destinations because of passages being destroyed, ceasing to exist, or worse. The Deamons begin to find the gates leading back into real space and spread through the galaxy fast helped by the new cult of the living dead Eldar (insert new name of cult faction here).

Since so many of the Eldar caused this to happen more Eldar join their new god who bestows upon them powerful warp abilities and mutations they willingly accept. These new potent forces are insane marauding bands of death. Killing alone can sustain these cultists and Khorne is pissed.

The old Chaos gods are mad their baby brother god got wreckt by this Eldar Punk god. Granted with chaos there is never unity and the appearance of another new god is received differently by all of them. However it leads to one thing more fighting. With the God of Skulls vs the God of Death to see who can out kill one another.

Chaos openly attacks its own forces as no one is sure what the new hierarchy will be. the Chaos Space marines and their black crusade are suddenly attacked by the new cult and pretty pissed off. The one aspect that sets the new chaos god apart from the others is their followers are more ordered than your typical chaos god since everything eventually dies. The Eldar speed with their new chaos powers makes them a formidable threat enough to stymie the black crusade.

The god of death is vexing to all the Eldar since he only gets stronger the more he is fought directly. They are now seriously hurting with many of their craftworld joining or being overwhelmed by the dark cult. They strike an accord with the Exodites to learn from them and improve their technology without needing so much warp power. A small group composed of Eldar from any background believe they must learn the secrets to removing their psychic abilities and they are regarded as insane but in these desperate times they are at least willing to see what comes from this in due time.

With the knowledge of how to create a chaos god at their fingertips again they begin to wonder if there is a way to create a positive emotion Eldar God. With the remnants of the current dark god X it was easy since they were working from a baseline. Now they would need to rediscover ancient technology to find out how to complete a completely new chaos entity born out of less destructive emotions or to find remains of existing ones to undo the mess they created. They set out at great cost into the universe to find a way or another shattered Eldar god to work from.

At every turn the Eldar are stymied by their Exodite kin. The Eldar regret succeeding in their mission and must find a way to undo it.

Tyranids love pyschic power. The beacon of Terra is like a gigantic bug light in their mind and it attracts them.... Tyranids beyond number and size. The first Tyranid hive fleet is now on course to Terra itself it will be many years until it gets there, but they have been watching and learning from dark space. The Hive mind has been adapting its forces from outside of the galaxy and now its time to strike. Their scout fleets have been unsuccessful in taking the eastern fringe of this delicious disc so they will strike where least expected. The Heart of the Imperium.

Yet among the Tyranids hive-mind there is dissent. They say it's too soon to send a fleet into the unknown like this. This galaxy has proven to be extremely resistant and if they lost this synapses-fleet it would be a devastating loss requiring thousands of years of consumption or waiting for a larger fleet to reroute to this galaxy.

All obey the hive-mind and it sends the main fleet in. The perfect strategy. For now it would harass them with a splinter fleet in the eastern fringe. They only barely managed to successfully defeat Ultramar at the cost of the splinter fleet. They would have devoured the system and more if not for one tiny blip of a species. Against all odds this species despite being an insignificant fleck of dust. No lesser than an insignificant fleck of dust in the universe has foiled them more than any other. A species known as the Tau, they would be destroyed this time. Before they become too dangerous.

The dissenting voices try their best to convince the rest but it is not enough. When the Slaanesh is destroyed and the new god born for a brief glimmer a beacon burns brighter than the golden throne for a short time. It sets course for Terra.

In the aftermath of defeating the hive fleet the Ultramarines are weak. The fledglign Tau Empire sees its opportunity. Bolstered with new allies in the Demiurge and their mining consortiums and frontline space fleet and troops the Tau and their auxillaries are even more numerous. Against all odds they developed artifical intelligence and it doesn't want to immiedately destroy them. The Fire Cast is now a potent military force as they continuously invent new technology.

Through sheer technological advantage they take the Damocles Gulf back. The Imperium is stretched too far thin to respond in any real force and Ultramar is left mostly undefended since they are fighting the traitor legions. The Hive Fleet once against darkens the sky. In an unblikely alliance the Imperial Guard, Space Marines, and Tau form an alliance to deploy an updated virus created by the Farsight Enclaves.

In causes the synaptic nerves to break down turning the creatures on each other and preventing them from acting as a warp conduit to send a warning of this new horrific genophage. It also adapts with the Tyranids own mutations in the gene pools so it is a virus that adapts and stays within their genepool. Infected splinter fleets turn on their own and begin to eat their own which turn on more of their own and perpetuates a cannibalistic cycle.

Even with this advantage a Hive Fleet is billions strong and it takes everything to stop them and Ultramar is spent. The new conniving Ethereal Z has held back his new reserves of advanced suits, Demiurge, and AI soldiers for this moment. They seize the realms of Ultramar. Is is a brutal and bloody fight and the Tau take 60% of their forces as casualties but it is theirs. They begin to immediately make use of the worlds and enforce strict forced labor laws on the humans. They fortify it beyond all imagination but they don't know the wrath of the Emperor's finest. The Ultramarines are furious and the Imperium is in a frothing rage at this treachery. The Inquisition begins to plot its vengeance.

In a data vault of the Inquistion a prophecy is fulfilled. The Ultramarines ancient foe is awakening. The enemy in the ghoul stars is waking. The Inquistion is thankful the brunt of this new foe will be on the Tau Empires doorstep. If the Eastern Fringe was still under their control they would have been able to stop it, but the foolish Tau have brought an ancient foe to the galaxy.

The Tau Empire is now on its 5th sphere of expansion and they are in control of a huge swathe of the Eastern fringe. Prototype warp ships allow them to scout most of the galaxy and truly understand how vast the Imperium is, and now Etherel Z stick up his ass is assured they have reached a size they can't fail against the Imperium.

The Inquistion leads a series of assassinations and they succeed in killing one of the Tau's greatest heroes which sends the western Empire into an upheaval. Farsight intervenes again and saves them his Enclaves have been growing strong and even begin to make their own suits and technology to suit their needs. He is close to reverse engineering the blade he found centuries ago and is keen to replicate it for their army.

The counter attack fails and the Tau now look east to finishing their conquest of the Eastern fringe. Much of it is damaged by the Tyranids from a thousand years ago but there is much still usable. It's a token effort for C to conquer it and reach an area of space the Imperials call the Ghoul Stars.

Farsight needs access to something called the Black Library to finish his knowledge of the blade. He agrees to exchange information on the Tau to the Inquisition for access to this strange place. Or how to get to it. The Inquisition warns him that something is about to change the Tau forever. Two things, but will say no more. He tells the Inquistion the Tau conquered a region of space called the Jericho reach way back (present 40k). They have been ferrying reinforcements back across the gulf ever since then.

Further investigation shows the crusade into the Jericho warp gate failed and its records hushed up. Why did the Imperium give the Tau this area so easily? They were even the ones to destroy the gate. Had the Deathwatch learned something? An investigation is undertaken to determine that something bad was foreseen to happen there and the Deathwatch uncovered this prophecy at great cost to itself. They hid this heretical knowledge from the Imperium to save their minds.

Shas'o C is conquering from the Tau's eastern fringe to the Jericho reach and succeeds. The Tau Empire is now huge and controls a large chunk of space. Farsight is warned by some of the Eldar in the black library that he is the only one who can save his people. He is the only one who can stop the forces of Chaos. Farsight learns many things to combat chaos and he finds out a plot to infect the Tau. He rushes back as fast as he can but is too late as the Black Library is shaken from the birth of a new god.

Then the Eldar God of Death arises and the Damocles gulf turns into he Damocles Rift. The Jericho reach hadex anomaly also rips open into a full warp breach. The Tau Empire is now fighting off Chaos forces on both sides and yet another Imperial crusade. They are holding their ground when much of the remaining Ethereals begin to subtly alter their orders to their soldiers.

Farsight returns to see the majority of the Ethereals are secumbing to corruption. They start small by ordering their soldiers to consume the dead or to hack and slash their foes in a frenzy. The second Malk'la is about to dawn on the Tau and Farsight is too late to stop it. The rotten core of the Tau Empire now begin to corrupt the rest of the Tau. Auxiliaries with psychic powers go insane or explode into warp blasts at at the birth of the new god and warp travel is temporarily down.

Farsight uses this time to create new weapons of war to defeat the forces of Chaos. He understands his blade is a unique specimen even for an alien blade. It seems to exhibit deamon slaying properties. The Enclaves and non-corrupted Tau begin to load their ammo with this and other weapons. The FSE has developed melee mecha suits. Crazy cool new stuff.

Back to the Ultramarines and their retreat. They begin to make a new realm to rule. The relentless Tau are consuming themselves for the moment and they need to recover. Then it happens. Their primarch returns... frayed and wounded but he lives! Deep under Ultramar (or wherever people think he rests) the Tau found him and awoke him. They explained much to him and while he was tempted to kill them he had to thank them for healing him with their advanced machines.

As a matter of fact he is surprised by how advanced the Xenos are and he began to ask them questions. With the mysterious knowledge he gained he returns to the Ultramarines. He says that for now the Tau are to be left alive because they're technology might be the only way. A truce is formed between the two mighty Empires... for now.

Part 2....

Later. Wot no gakkin orks in dis dumb stories? Youz know wot? Dis tenshi... unz is only goin to make da reveal dat much betta! You betta you dum umie git writa. I also want a fancy hat like dat un youz got. Or else.

Edit
If Farsight dies it his son/daughter he had with Shadowsun. You know its going to happe folks.

The necrons unite under the silent king and negate both themselves and the tyranids. Remember new lore is that silent King has the master control over ALL necrons.

Tau are eventually ground down to steam engine era tech after a few centuries of facing off against the largest waaagh ever in which the orcs almost entirely unit and after going to stalemate with the tau are scattered to feral tribes.

The eldar are destroyed by themselves again. Combination of dark eldar meddling and sorcery gone really wrong, ya know the things that killed them the first time cause despite them being able to see the future they can't learn from the past.

13th crusade relaunches and abbadon strikes down terra only to have...shocker the emperor reincarnate. He promptly says wtf happened to my empire lets abbadon destroy a lot of it so the emperor can take the space marines and adeptus mechanicus they go rebuild in the ultima segmentum. With legions reinstated only under the emperor he smotes abbadon and his chaos forces. The imperium is destroyed and over the course of a millennium the emperor slowly retakes the Galaxy. He doesn't make new primarchs. The emperor actually fathers a child names him/her the heir who is the most powerful null/blanker/pariah ever. It becomes the mark of the new royals lineage for they are powerful enough to permanently take away someone's psyker powers. The emperor then sacrifices himself to ascend into the warp, sealing all of the permanent warp rifts, and his powers and knowledge are spread across the remaining humans causing them to ascend. Thus humans ascend to a eldar like level but instead of moar powerful psykers leading humans get a leader against whom psyker powers are meaningless humans > eldar

Of course humans would win in the end. We are the ones writing the damn story.

Will you? Death and Nagaash and Chaos won Fantasy.