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Where are you getting the day from, Iracundus? I thought that they gave their ultimatum, the governor requested that they fornicate elsewhere and so hilarity ensued. I don’t remember a timeframe stated, have I missed a sidebar or misinterpreted something? Or is it an external source that I haven’t read?

Personally I think if there is a Ritual of Cleansing, it is solely so they can keep telling themselves that they’re better than Biel-Tan, because they only took out the world’s defences, the civvies were still alive when they returned home, it’s not their fault their Drukhari allies didn’t leave as well...

Pilum wrote:
Where are you getting the day from, Iracundus? I thought that they gave their ultimatum, the governor requested that they fornicate elsewhere and so hilarity ensued. I don’t remember a timeframe stated, have I missed a sidebar or misinterpreted something? Or is it an external source that I haven’t read?

Personally I think if there is a Ritual of Cleansing, it is solely so they can keep telling themselves that they’re better than Biel-Tan, because they only took out the world’s defences, the civvies were still alive when they returned home, it’s not their fault their Drukhari allies didn’t leave as well...

The day time limit comes from the initial source for Gnosis Prime, Planetstrike. It was also a combined attack by Saim-Hann, Biel-Tan, and the Dark Eldar. The full details and map of the Eldar campaign are in that source.

Thanks!

Neat I'm liking all of this more detailed characterisation of the Craftworlds. I've been writing some of my own stuff doing a similar thing (but with a bit of a more dystopian bent) and it's nice to try and make it an evolution of what's written about them in the official fluff.

There's also a lot of narrative potential in the whole 'deciding things by honour duel' thing. For a start I don't believe for a second that 'all parties then accept and support the result'. That sounds like a party line from a pro-ritual duel advocate, trying to convince his sceptical kin

Anyone who's seen the story arc in Game of Thrones involving Tyrion vs Cersei and the duel with the Mountain should know what I'm getting at

The Craftworlds seem remarkably calm about Biel Tan being gutted and a new demi-god spawned from their death. Even after they witness the power of this new 'Death Cult' in action, they are all like 'meh.' Guess that's the only reaction you can have when you are nearly immortal.

 Tamwulf wrote:
The Craftworlds seem remarkably calm about Biel Tan being gutted and a new demi-god spawned from their death. Even after they witness the power of this new 'Death Cult' in action, they are all like 'meh.' Guess that's the only reaction you can have when you are nearly immortal.

Yeah I found that odd too.

As far as my headcanon goes the top brass of the Craftworlds are freaked the f*ck out, but because they need to try and stop their citizens from deserting en masse to join these radical death-nutters they're having to play it like they're completely in control and know what they're doing and what's going on.

I was talking elsewhere about what the other Craftworlds (and most eldar in general) must think of Yvraine. The eldar don't have a traditional communications network like we do, so a lot of stuff will be leaking out in hearsay and rumours spreading via outcasts and refugees in the webway. All this Ynnari stuff is a pretty big deal so Yvraine's going to have a pretty big reputation for herself.

Just what would that reputation be though, given how rumours like to play on the more sensational aspects of a story?

1. Caused a dysjunction in Commorragh, wrecking a significant proportion of the city and killing countless eldar
2. Deprived Iyanden of a significant proportion of its Wraiths, which is the only thing standing between them and oblivion (and Slaanesh consuming the millions upon millions of souls within its Infinity Circuit)
3. Destroyed Biel Tan, the most militarily powerful craftworld and one of the last remaining strongholds of the eldar.
4. Provided the Imperium (which has destroyed exactly as many craftworlds as Chaos has, so I don't know why people think the eldar view them as allies) with a sodding Primarch

So yeah, Yvraine's reputation is definitely shaking up to be something every craftworld should be sh*t-scared of, especially given that her entire faith and plan is based on the hunch that Ynnead (an unfathomable lovecraftian warp-god) isn't going to kill all eldar when every prophesy relating to her suggests that she will.

Eldar think the Imperium are allies because one in a million of them listen to them and the rest can be shoved under the bus.

pm713 wrote:
Eldar think the Imperium are allies because one in a million of them listen to them and the rest can be shoved under the bus.

That's a recipe for meatshield mooks rather than allies

 Ynneadwraith wrote:

4. Provided the Imperium (which has destroyed exactly as many craftworlds as Chaos has, so I don't know why people think the eldar view them as allies) with a sodding Primarch

They actually do view them as allies, though, at least, they do now. There is an actual alliance in place that involves at least two of the major craftworlds - Iyanden as the ones who helped Yvraine come up with the plan in the first place and Alaitoc, who we see sending forces to assist the Imperium in the short story Shadows of Heaven, explicitly as part of the 'new alliance with the humans'. We also see Iyanden work with the White Scars in The Last Hunt, though this is more of a one-off 'help us wipe out a mutual enemy and we'll help you save your planet' deal, which is still a far more open level of co-operation than they ever had before.

It may not have been the case before, but it's definitely true to some extent now.

I suppose it's personal preference but I can't help feel that's vomit-inducing, and a bit of a bowing of GW to tired and played out tropes of how elves and humans interact in nearly every damn IP you come across since Tolkein.

I suppose I find the notion of eldar just up and allying with mankind after 10,000 years of mutual persecution to be not only tedious but also completely unrealistic.

Completely personal opinion mind you, and I do tend to get borderline vitriolic about it so please feel free to ignore me on that!

Unless of course the eldar are simply playing mankind for the puppets they are as the eldar can see the future but humans cannot. Then i'm fine with it

just 2 little points about Yvraine reputation and the *alliance* with the imperium.

As far we know Yvraine acts showing Ynnead powers, seems to be (from an outside view ) similar to what Exarch experience when a new Eldar merge with them.

Worth to remember Exarchs are revered heroes of the Craftworlds but not something the Eldar desire to become under any circunstance as they feel it's an undesired fate.


While i still need to read Ghost Warrior (Rise of the Ynnari) the Gathering storm book says the Eldar only seek to ally with the Imperium in order to stall or defeat Chaos wich seems quite similar to being another puppet for the Eldar needs. Albeit a bit more willing one as they seems to be quite upfront about their intentions regards to Chaos but neither side still fully trust each other.

Humans and Eldar have always historically had short term transactional alliances, usually against Chaos, which poses a far more of an existential soul devouring threat to the Eldar than humanity. They may disagree over who should rule the galaxy but a galaxy swamped by the warp and turned into the Eye of Terror writ large is in neither race's interests. I see the craftworlds and the Imperium as like nations: interests, sometimes mutual interests, but not friends. Some deal making and transactional cooperation is more realistic IMO than endless eternal "Kill the xenos!"/"Mon-keigh!" zealotry. There are zealots to be sure, but there are also pragmatists. The Inquisition unfortunately recently seems to be more and more typecast as zealots out of an Ecclesiarchy propaganda video, flinging around Exterminatus as a first resort, when of all people in the Imperium, the Inquisition is likely to be the most filled with pragmatists as flexibility of mind is necessary if one is to investigate and root out conspiracies. Cooperation in the name of pragmatism (and "I'll kill you last" doctrinal justifications) is more believable and less facepalming than for example the Deathwatch Marine that spoiled Eldrad's plan on Coheria, saying something along the lines of preferring the galaxy fall to Chaos rather than be saved through cooperation with an alien. There is a point when such zealotry goes from grimdark to grimderp.

The original purpose of resurrecting Guilliman was supposedly to ensure the Imperium did not collapse, as the Eldar needed a meatshield. I suspect GW will have the Marines and the Imperium not so easily manipulated. However I also do not want the Eldar to be merely the chaperone of an Imperial renaissance. I wish the Eldar to be shown more as a possibly resurgent ancient empire (or is it a final blaze of glory before dying out?), so that they get seen as a real potential threat or contender for the galaxy. Any faction that gets a Codex is pretty much a major player on the galactic stage, but the Eldar have for many editions in fluff at least been either the beat-up toy for other factions to show how good they are or mostly at best a chaperone guiding others to greatness.

Mostly I am tired of the "Humanity F*** Yeah" stories, particularly those involving Marines, because the universe is less dark and threatening if humanity comes out on top repeatedly.

In fairness with the Eldrad Incident, that would have meant asking someone probably raised from birth to fear and abhor the alien, recruited at a young and impression age and taught how to kill the alien, spending many years doing just that and being so good at it he’s seconded to an organisation devoted to slaughtering the alien .... to suddenly stop in the middle of his mission to disrupt the vile alien plot and listen to the alien.

But then I do subscribe more to the ‘marines are waking, talking, breathing weapons’ side of the fluff.

Regarding the Imperium, I think that the Eldar are in an interesting place right now. The whole race, actually. There’s a very good chance that they could well be living in the period leading to the Rhana Dandra, and there’s a good chunk of non-Ynnari who may go along with humanity not so much because they support them vs Chaos as such, but because it gets them that much closer to The Rapture (I choose that word deliberately; I am very much thinking of an analogy to the support to Israel - and why - of a certain mindset of (mainly) American christianity - or perhaps the impression of such that we get from across The Pond). There are some who will carry on with business as usual because We’re Alive And So It Works. And there will be some who may well actively go after the humans because they’re not Ynnari; that this new belief is so dangerous, they must actively work against this deluded soul who’s already broken one of the Big 5 and denuded their society of much-needed Eldar bodies as they flock to her idiotic cause (Yes Biel-Tan, I’m looking at you...)

Pilum wrote:
In fairness with the Eldrad Incident, that would have meant asking someone probably raised from birth to fear and abhor the alien, recruited at a young and impression age and taught how to kill the alien, spending many years doing just that and being so good at it he’s seconded to an organisation devoted to slaughtering the alien .... to suddenly stop in the middle of his mission to disrupt the vile alien plot and listen to the alien.

But then I do subscribe more to the ‘marines are waking, talking, breathing weapons’ side of the fluff.

At the same time though, Chaos and Horus are the embodiment of Evil and a Satan figure respectively in the Imperial religion/mythology. For the Deathwatch marine to say he would prefer the entire galaxy, including humanity, to fail and fall to Chaos rather than be saved by even an instance of cooperation with an alien is what I was facepalming over. It was the way it was said and the choice of words, invoking what should be anathema to any right-thinking Imperial. An Ordo Hereticus Inquisitor might even say such words would be evidence of collusion with Chaos and therefore deem the Marine corrupted and in need of purging.

Fair enough, if they’re the words used then... Something more like “as the good book says, the alien is ever false, heed him not” *blam* would have been better. It could be an instance of the marine ‘going native’, so to speak, evidence that the Ordo Xenos is becoming overly focussed and that Inquisition Wars are on the way (or given the time skip, should have been), or that he was simply looking for the strongest way he could to say ; “Better dead than red” and all that jazz.

I’ll admit that all this is desperately searching for a way to reconcile it! Not the best writing there, really.

Edit to add: there is one way to do it; go back to much, much older background, where what we the players know of Chaos is not what even a space marine captain ‘knows’. Daemons = blamming, only the Grey Knights can see daemonic incursions and live, so even to a marine Chaos is sad little cults praying to false gods and opening themselves up to psychic possession by ‘Warp Entities’ like Enslavers and such, or at worst some Traitor Marines in oddly outdated kit who raid and then run once the might of the Imperial war machine finally swings into action. So for a Xenos to swear that this ritual - which looks suspiciously like those you’ve broken up before when purging those sad little cults - is vital to stop an amorphous threat could get a reaction of “yeah yeah, heard it all before, oooh devil worship aren’t you an edge-lord?”

I don’t really subscribe to this view myself, again it’s trying to find that Devil’s Advocacy, but it is one way it could be read.

On a different note, there is the issue of the seeming Eldar-human alliance or even the accusation supposedly in the new Ynnari novel of Yvraine being a lapdog of the humans (since her actions since Guilliman's return seem more about aiding the humans than pursuing Eldar goals).

Part of the issue historically IRL has been the need to show the Eldar as manipulators, usually by showing them to be disastrously bad ones. Let's face it, if things were made too subtle (like conspiracy theories and chasing down circumstantial clues and references) many readers would fail to draw the links between cause and effect and would never see evidence of the manipulation. Thus we end up with blunt force arrogant statements by Eldar Farseers showing not even the slightest subtlety or understanding how such statements would sound to the Imperial humans spoken to.

Truly successful Eldar manipulations would have the manipulated never ever aware of it. Of course that also opens the way for the Eldar to claim to be responsible for many events whether or not they really were responsible.