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Decrepit Dakkanaut




UK

Genestealers can infest more than just humans, Eldar, Tau and other races can fall to them. It's just with the Imperium so widespread and so haphazard in monitoring its own populations, you get more critical mass stealer outbreaks there than anywhere else.

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Eh. It’s the human breeding cycle and our society that makes us ideal.

Tau? Congratulations, you’ve infected say, a Water Caste Tau. Due to the Caste system, their particular infection will be stuck in that caste, until a Purestrain can infect someone from Earth, Fire or Air etc. And given (by my understanding) the Castes are largely forbidden from mingling even socially? It’s a crimp in your plans.

Eldar? Too slow man, too slow. You’ll basically never reach critical mass.

Orks? Well outside of a decent WD conversion article, it’s presently up in the air whether it’s even possible. And when it was? Other Orks recognised the Brood Brothers and Hybrids as inherently unorky, leading them to be shunned. Again, not ideal for hitting critical mass.

Necrons? Yeah not a problem at all.

Humans? We’re pretty anarchic, and a Hive World in particular is ideal. Stupid numbers of potential hosts, lots of suitable hiding places, relatively easy access to military grade gear etc.

   
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Decrepit Dakkanaut




UK

Don't forget Zoats


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mrFickle wrote:
Don’t GSC perpetuate the star child prophecy? So maybe presenting themselves as a cult of the emperor


No, GW rehashed the Star child term used to refer to the tyranids dressed up as the imperial cult, like the term four armed emperor. The star child prophecy is very different.
   
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FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
Can a powerful Psyker, ala Bitey McNotaVampire of the Blood Angels, be able to counter or "resist" the psychic attack of the GSC? How powerful is the Cult? I mean mind raping pleeb human trash is one thing, but can they take over eldar or Blanks? Is it a psychic thing?


Theoretically, yes. But the psyker would have to be extremely powerful, and also not have been discovered and taken away by the Black Ships. Powerful psykers aren't just walking around the Imperium in public spaces where a genestealer might catch one. Latent psykers would be, but latent psykers are no match for a broodlord. The Tyranids are a hive mind that exists on a psychic level, their psychic abilities are much more powerful than all but the most powerful human psykers that have trained for decades.

For this reason, Blanks would probably be extremely disrupting for genestealers and the hive mind. A prospective broodlord would almost certainly ignore a blank or just kill it. But Blanks are just about the rarest thing you could encounter, even rarer than the most powerful of psykers.

Self-proclaimed evil Cat-person. Dues Ex Felines

Cato Sicarius, after force feeding Captain Ventris a copy of the Codex Astartes for having the audacity to play Deathwatch, chokes to death on his own D-baggery after finding Calgar assembling his new Eldar army.

MURICA!!! IN SPESS!!! 
   
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 Grey Templar wrote:
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
Can a powerful Psyker, ala Bitey McNotaVampire of the Blood Angels, be able to counter or "resist" the psychic attack of the GSC? How powerful is the Cult? I mean mind raping pleeb human trash is one thing, but can they take over eldar or Blanks? Is it a psychic thing?


Theoretically, yes. But the psyker would have to be extremely powerful, and also not have been discovered and taken away by the Black Ships. Powerful psykers aren't just walking around the Imperium in public spaces where a genestealer might catch one. Latent psykers would be, but latent psykers are no match for a broodlord. The Tyranids are a hive mind that exists on a psychic level, their psychic abilities are much more powerful than all but the most powerful human psykers that have trained for decades.

For this reason, Blanks would probably be extremely disrupting for genestealers and the hive mind. A prospective broodlord would almost certainly ignore a blank or just kill it. But Blanks are just about the rarest thing you could encounter, even rarer than the most powerful of psykers.


I don't get the term "Rare" in 40k. It's like "Peaceful". In a universe of 7google people, there is only one Tiggy, and only 1 Mephiston, but there are entire convents and armies of SoS and Culexus. But Blanks are "Rare".
   
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Decrepit Dakkanaut




UK

Rare is indeed a hard term to fathom when the scale is so insanely huge and when the stories we encounter focus on the rares. There was even a whole coven of Blanks that was conscripted and that was within a limited scope of the Imperium (due to the fact that space travel does take time)

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 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Eh. It’s the human breeding cycle and our society that makes us ideal.

Tau? Congratulations, you’ve infected say, a Water Caste Tau. Due to the Caste system, their particular infection will be stuck in that caste, until a Purestrain can infect someone from Earth, Fire or Air etc. And given (by my understanding) the Castes are largely forbidden from mingling even socially? It’s a crimp in your plans.

Eldar? Too slow man, too slow. You’ll basically never reach critical mass.

Orks? Well outside of a decent WD conversion article, it’s presently up in the air whether it’s even possible. And when it was? Other Orks recognised the Brood Brothers and Hybrids as inherently unorky, leading them to be shunned. Again, not ideal for hitting critical mass.

Necrons? Yeah not a problem at all.

Humans? We’re pretty anarchic, and a Hive World in particular is ideal. Stupid numbers of potential hosts, lots of suitable hiding places, relatively easy access to military grade gear etc.


The original fluff for ORK genestealer cults states that ORKS a a poor host for the cult because their breeding cycle doesn’t support it and they are only used when there’s no alternative. Those that do manage to get going are then shunned or killed.
   
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Less effective does not mean impossible. Ork Genestealers were evidently still successful enough in enough numbers to lure the hive fleets to Octarius.
   
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Genestealers lure the Hive Mind anyway. The Cults act as defence mechanisms and as a way to make the conquest and consumption of a target world easier. The less biomass expended the better, so get the locals to do the Hive Minds dirty work.
   
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The Hive Fleets go by the strength of the signal. The more Genestealers and Cult members, the stronger the signal. This is hypothesized to be how the hive fleets select the richest feeding grounds. So the Genestealers were still successful enough in infecting Orks as to provide a strong enough signal for the hive fleets to decide upon Octarius.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2022/01/14 02:24:32


 
   
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FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
 Grey Templar wrote:
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
Can a powerful Psyker, ala Bitey McNotaVampire of the Blood Angels, be able to counter or "resist" the psychic attack of the GSC? How powerful is the Cult? I mean mind raping pleeb human trash is one thing, but can they take over eldar or Blanks? Is it a psychic thing?


Theoretically, yes. But the psyker would have to be extremely powerful, and also not have been discovered and taken away by the Black Ships. Powerful psykers aren't just walking around the Imperium in public spaces where a genestealer might catch one. Latent psykers would be, but latent psykers are no match for a broodlord. The Tyranids are a hive mind that exists on a psychic level, their psychic abilities are much more powerful than all but the most powerful human psykers that have trained for decades.

For this reason, Blanks would probably be extremely disrupting for genestealers and the hive mind. A prospective broodlord would almost certainly ignore a blank or just kill it. But Blanks are just about the rarest thing you could encounter, even rarer than the most powerful of psykers.


I don't get the term "Rare" in 40k. It's like "Peaceful". In a universe of 7google people, there is only one Tiggy, and only 1 Mephiston, but there are entire convents and armies of SoS and Culexus. But Blanks are "Rare".


It does somewhat lose some of its gravity when you have something of the scale of the Imperium. If blanks are a 1 in a trillion, that still means there would be tens of thousands of them. But they're jumbled up with the countless trillions of humanity and the probability of 1 being on a planet that just so happens to have a genestealer cult is an unlikely, but possible, scenario. At the same time, people with resources like the Inquisition can potentially gather dozens of blanks together by combing through hundreds of planets to find that 1 trillionth of the population.

Also, while Psykers can mask their presence, Blanks cannot. They emit a palpable aura of discomfort that effects even non-psykers so they tend to be discovered fairly quickly by someone who knows to keep a lookout. They are quite valuable and just like psykers the Imperium actively looks for them.

Self-proclaimed evil Cat-person. Dues Ex Felines

Cato Sicarius, after force feeding Captain Ventris a copy of the Codex Astartes for having the audacity to play Deathwatch, chokes to death on his own D-baggery after finding Calgar assembling his new Eldar army.

MURICA!!! IN SPESS!!! 
   
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Wait, did they change the infestation process with the revamp? It used to be an actual egg being implanted by a genestealer *cough alien rip-off cough*. That'd work on any marine, no matter how psychic or not-vampiric they are. Blanks might be difficult since they'd possibly not be able to join the brood mind?

Edit: for the initial infestation, the rest was regular breeding as described above

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2022/01/14 08:48:21


 
   
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Iracundus wrote:
Less effective does not mean impossible. Ork Genestealers were evidently still successful enough in enough numbers to lure the hive fleets to Octarius.


2 issues with this,

Firstly: is it even suggested that they were lured by cults to Octarius? My understanding was that kryptman lead them there through a scorched Earth campaign, but I am not up to date on the fluff so am happy to be proven wrong.

Secondly: the fluff i and mad doc are referring to predates genestealer a being part of the tyranids race and the cults didn’t lure anyone like they do now the the hive mind, they were just there to propagate more genstealers. So by “less effective” it means only that they were less effective at spread the genes through a population than with other races.

Remember this is a time when ORKS bread by aging to a point they go off being feral, and at that late stage of life they grow a pouch and sire a young ORK who they raise to adolescence, where they become a wild boy and eventually adopted by an ORK household. It was different times.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
shortymcnostrill wrote:
Wait, did they change the infestation process with the revamp? It used to be an actual egg being implanted by a genestealer *cough alien rip-off cough*. That'd work on any marine, no matter how psychic or not-vampiric they are. Blanks might be difficult since they'd possibly not be able to join the brood mind?

Edit: for the initial infestation, the rest was regular breeding as described above


The egg bit was there originally but it didn’t produce young, the egg was described as more a cancer that changed the hosts genetic make up. They didn’t lay genestealer in to people like facehuggers, they laid their genetics into a host who went off to bread. So no change I don’t think.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2022/01/14 13:41:52


 
   
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There are other considerations too.

The Cult doesn’t just want to take over the one world. They need to spread the infection as far as possible.

In a Galaxy as hostile and near universally xenophobic as 40K, that can be a problem.

Eldar and Tau are, comparatively, few and far between. Unless you can infect an early sphere area of space, Tau may prove a bit of a dead end,

Orks? Kinda tricky to infect other species, because the Orks first instinct as a species is to kick poo out of it. And you’d ideally need to carry a Purestrain with you.

Humans? Well, it’s possible for the infection to be spread by an infected but non-hybrid host. A male would probably be preferable in such extreme circumstances, given in terms of makin’ bacon, we’re less limited than women. A single female infected? Hmm. Honestly? That depends almost entirely upon whether the mother often survives the birth of a Hybrid. I mean human childbirth is risky enough. But add in some additional limbs? Who knows. Though I would concede it’s likely any exoskeleton would be soft and pliable at birth, only hardening upon exposure to the environment. I suppose one could also argue (though without clear evidence) that the gene infection itself might aid there, tweaking the mother’s immune system and ability to heal. Such a tweak would make sense, as each mother would be a more precious commodity (yes I feel dirty and incel writing this way) than the average male, so them being “one and done” feels like a waste of resources.

It’s also possible the infection might speed up gestation times.

Right, having used some frankly questionable terms I’m off to rinse my brain.

   
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 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Tau? Congratulations, you’ve infected say, a Water Caste Tau. Due to the Caste system, their particular infection will be stuck in that caste, until a Purestrain can infect someone from Earth, Fire or Air etc. And given (by my understanding) the Castes are largely forbidden from mingling even socially? It’s a crimp in your plans.


They achieve it by isolating a T'au outpost, infecting everyone in it and then 'inviting' the Empire back in. The short story The Greater Evil covers this (although they do seem to go after the gue'vesa auxiliaries first).

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2022/01/14 14:53:06


 
   
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shortymcnostrill wrote:
Wait, did they change the infestation process with the revamp? It used to be an actual egg being implanted by a genestealer *cough alien rip-off cough*. That'd work on any marine, no matter how psychic or not-vampiric they are. Blanks might be difficult since they'd possibly not be able to join the brood mind?

Edit: for the initial infestation, the rest was regular breeding as described above


No, it was always an implantation that changed the hosts genetic makeup and mentally caused it to want to breed.

https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Genestealer#Infiltration_Cycle

The first individuals who are infected, are called Contagii. They go off and find mates, who also become infected and have their genes altered(so technically Genestealers are an STD). They can be mind controlled by the Patriarch genestealer who infected them.

The offspring of Contagii are 1st Generation, or Maelignaci. They are horribly deformed hybrids of the host species and genestealers.

2nd generation offspring of Maelignaci are called Hybrids. They are more like the host species but still look like crossbreeds.

3rd generation are true hybrids, looking mostly like the host species and can pass for members with minimal disguises.

4th generation are the Primarchii. They are almost indistinguishable from the host species, often possess psychic powers, and are used to further infiltrate the host civilization.

5th generation is when more true genestealers emerge and the cult can spread to new planets by sending out a new wave.

Self-proclaimed evil Cat-person. Dues Ex Felines

Cato Sicarius, after force feeding Captain Ventris a copy of the Codex Astartes for having the audacity to play Deathwatch, chokes to death on his own D-baggery after finding Calgar assembling his new Eldar army.

MURICA!!! IN SPESS!!! 
   
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 Gert wrote:
When a child is born, especially in the earlier generations, it will be a hybrid with many Genestealer characteristics. These are the Aberrants and Hybrids. However, the hybrid maintains its progenitor's mind manipulation powers and the parents of the child will see a being to be loved and cared for. Eventually, the Cult grows as more hybrids are born and more people come to worship the Patriarch/Sky Gods. Eventually, the Genestealer DNA is diluted to the point where children are born with at most slight forehead ridges and pass as "normal" humans.

See, that bit never made any sense to me. You'd think cult would want 'normal' looking humans first to not rouse suspicion, and the combat focused forms (that are otherwise just a massive risk and resource drag on early cult) when they are close to revolt. If it was reversed, it would make more sense to me - genestealer genes slowly corrupting the host ones until eventually only purestrain ones are left. As it is, how exactly 'dilution' suddenly produces jump to a pure initial species? And why 4 stages? If it was gradual corruption, patriarch could regulate the 'speed' of the process depending on circumstances, current description pretty much means cult has no chance of winning until 80+ years pass...
   
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 Irbis wrote:
See, that bit never made any sense to me. You'd think cult would want 'normal' looking humans first to not rouse suspicion, and the combat focused forms (that are otherwise just a massive risk and resource drag on early cult) when they are close to revolt. If it was reversed, it would make more sense to me - genestealer genes slowly corrupting the host ones until eventually only purestrain ones are left. As it is, how exactly 'dilution' suddenly produces jump to a pure initial species? And why 4 stages? If it was gradual corruption, patriarch could regulate the 'speed' of the process depending on circumstances, current description pretty much means cult has no chance of winning until 80+ years pass...

There's quite a bit here so I'll try and break it down.
Looks - Genestealers don't choose to make Hybrids, they just happen. That's just how the mixing of genetics works out and as the gene pool becomes more diluted with human DNA the resulting generations look more human. Hybrids can still interbreed with humans and mind control is one hell of a drug. In the novel Cult of the Spiral Dawn, we see a young woman married off to the Iconward of the Cult fully unaware that it's a Xenos monster because her mind has been utterly warped by the Cult. You're also forgetting that the places where Genestealer Cults thrive are Hive Worlds where mutation is rampant and many of its citizens will never see the light of day. If you're in a dark, cramped Underhive, you aren't really concerned that Kev from two Habs has a weird-looking kid because Brian and Jeff also have weird-looking kids. The Imperium also uses a lot of mutant labour in its mines, hence why the miner aesthetic was chosen for the models. If some human within acceptable "regular" looks shows up with 200 weird-looking mutants to dig your tunnels for naff all wages, what foreman is saying no? And if they do then comes the mind control/murder.
Evolution Cycle - Dunno why it's 4 generations, ask GW.
Speed and Time - The whole point of a GSC is to slowly corrupt and infiltrate a planet's systems and populace to the point where when the Hive Fleets arrive there is no resistance to the consumption of the planet. The Tyranids don't care if a Cult takes five weeks or fifty years to become effective because everything is getting consumed anyway. It's rare the Cults are even caught before they rise up because the public face is people who look like your average Joe and go to Church every day like everyone else, it just so happens that the Church worships the Emperor differently to you but that's nothing out of the ordinary. The Aberrants, Hybrids, and Purestrains are revealed until the uprising is well underway or they are desperately needed. If someone gets a little too close to discovering the true nature of the Cult then they either get forcefully inducted or murdered. That's actually why the Cult on Ghosar Quintus was discovered after an Inquisitor suddenly went from investigating a Cult to saying everything was fine.
   
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 Irbis wrote:
 Gert wrote:
When a child is born, especially in the earlier generations, it will be a hybrid with many Genestealer characteristics. These are the Aberrants and Hybrids. However, the hybrid maintains its progenitor's mind manipulation powers and the parents of the child will see a being to be loved and cared for. Eventually, the Cult grows as more hybrids are born and more people come to worship the Patriarch/Sky Gods. Eventually, the Genestealer DNA is diluted to the point where children are born with at most slight forehead ridges and pass as "normal" humans.

See, that bit never made any sense to me. You'd think cult would want 'normal' looking humans first to not rouse suspicion, and the combat focused forms (that are otherwise just a massive risk and resource drag on early cult) when they are close to revolt. If it was reversed, it would make more sense to me - genestealer genes slowly corrupting the host ones until eventually only purestrain ones are left. As it is, how exactly 'dilution' suddenly produces jump to a pure initial species? And why 4 stages? If it was gradual corruption, patriarch could regulate the 'speed' of the process depending on circumstances, current description pretty much means cult has no chance of winning until 80+ years pass...


I think the idea is that the initial hosts get their DNA really screwed up, so their offspring are obviously crossbred genestealers. However, the Cult keeps these individuals hidden from all but its own members. Until they have 4th generation members, the only members who the outside world will see are the initial hosts who still look human. But yeah, the point is that genestealer cults take decades, or potentially centuries, to bear fruit.

The aberrant looking 1st-3rd generations are really just breeding stock/eventual cannon fodder not meant to go out in broad daylight except in areas where the cult is in control. The broodlord will attempt to infect lots of humans so they can build/find a safe space for the cult to inhabit.

Maybe the broodlord infiltrates a small shanty town in the lower hive and over the course of a few months infects the entire town. Any humans who aren't infected get disposed of and then the town gets sealed off ensuring that no normies see all the mutant offspring, only the initial humans and any 4th generation offspring. The 1st-3rd generations are used as labor gathering whatever resources the cult needs while the normal looking members are used to infiltrate other areas of the planet. Luring important local figures to places where the broodlord can infect them and then using their power to secure more space for the cult till eventually they control massive areas and number tens of thousands of members.

Self-proclaimed evil Cat-person. Dues Ex Felines

Cato Sicarius, after force feeding Captain Ventris a copy of the Codex Astartes for having the audacity to play Deathwatch, chokes to death on his own D-baggery after finding Calgar assembling his new Eldar army.

MURICA!!! IN SPESS!!! 
   
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Andykp wrote:
Iracundus wrote:
Less effective does not mean impossible. Ork Genestealers were evidently still successful enough in enough numbers to lure the hive fleets to Octarius.


2 issues with this,

Firstly: is it even suggested that they were lured by cults to Octarius? My understanding was that kryptman lead them there through a scorched Earth campaign, but I am not up to date on the fluff so am happy to be proven wrong.


Not quite right. Kryptman had adopted a scorched earth campaign of conducting Exterminatus on worlds that had fallen but that were still in the process of consumption by Tyranids. The point was to make the Tyranids expend energy and biomass fighting to take a world, only to have their reward destroyed before they could eat it. Some 300 worlds were destroyed but the uproar this caused in the Inquisition led to Kryptman being cast out, despite this strategy slowing Leviathan's advance.

Unwilling to give up, Kryptman, through his Deathwatch, got ahold of live Genestealers and sent them to Octarius aboard a hulk, knowing that Orks would board the hulk to scavenge. The initial infestation spread and seeded secondary infestations. The Orks eventually discover the primary infestation and wipe it out, but it was too late. The other infestations had spread and grown to sufficient numbers to lure the hive fleets to Octarius. So clearly, while Orks may not be as ideal a host as humans, they still work.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 Grey Templar wrote:

Maybe the broodlord infiltrates a small shanty town in the lower hive and over the course of a few months infects the entire town. Any humans who aren't infected get disposed of and then the town gets sealed off ensuring that no normies see all the mutant offspring, only the initial humans and any 4th generation offspring. The 1st-3rd generations are used as labor gathering whatever resources the cult needs while the normal looking members are used to infiltrate other areas of the planet. Luring important local figures to places where the broodlord can infect them and then using their power to secure more space for the cult till eventually they control massive areas and number tens of thousands of members.


That seems to be the standard operating procedure for the Genestealers. They target isolated communities that the people in power are likely to not pay attention to, so the initial hybrids can be more easily hidden. So insular mining clans, isolated farming villages, shantytowns, the downtrodden mutant workforces of lower hives, etc... All places where few people are going to go looking and probing, so long as any required quotas continue to be met. They take over these communities and the individuals in positions of power within them help sustain the cover, such as local doctors saying all tests are normal.

As productivity is sustained or even rises, those higher up find it in their interests not to ask too many questions, or to help this community out because it becomes advantageous to them. That's how the mining workers of Ghosar Quintus got exported around (spreading the infection as purestrains were also smuggled). The Imperial authorities were pleased by these miners that worked so productively for the bare minimum amount of food. Considering how the Imperium is always described as under siege and always wanting more resources, what Imperial bureaucrat is going to mess with a good thing that allows them to meet or even exceed quotas at less cost?

The Twisted Helix is a departure from this standard template by being more a from top down infection.

This message was edited 5 times. Last update was at 2022/01/14 22:41:37


 
   
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Iracundus. Thanks for the clarity, like I said not a bit I am well versed in. I am more of an old-fluff-aphile.
   
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Just remembered this snippet from the GSC codex:

Xenos War
A Genestealer Cult rises in the shadows of the Octarius Sector’s Scrapworld Dakka. The Orks of Mount Mekaniak are impressed by the massive gargant Clawbeast, a purple monstrosity of beaten metal built with six limbs. When the Vostroyan Firstborn descend to kill the planet’s ruler, Gurnmek of the Iron Fist, Clawbeast is deployed to terrifying effect. The Vostroyans send in whole companies of Devil Dog tanks to carve up the gargant, and succeed in stopping it in its tracks – until the Gargant’s great belly hinges open, spilling hundreds of Genestealers into the ranks of the Astra Militarum. They tear open the tanks and feast on the fleshy bounty within.


The cult must have been pretty large and organised to build a gargant...
   
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beast_gts wrote:
Just remembered this snippet from the GSC codex:

Xenos War
A Genestealer Cult rises in the shadows of the Octarius Sector’s Scrapworld Dakka. The Orks of Mount Mekaniak are impressed by the massive gargant Clawbeast, a purple monstrosity of beaten metal built with six limbs. When the Vostroyan Firstborn descend to kill the planet’s ruler, Gurnmek of the Iron Fist, Clawbeast is deployed to terrifying effect. The Vostroyans send in whole companies of Devil Dog tanks to carve up the gargant, and succeed in stopping it in its tracks – until the Gargant’s great belly hinges open, spilling hundreds of Genestealers into the ranks of the Astra Militarum. They tear open the tanks and feast on the fleshy bounty within.


The cult must have been pretty large and organised to build a gargant...


Yep, sounds pretty well established there. Especially as the old fluff describes most ORK cults producing few purestrain genestealers due to the way ORKS reproduced. I suppose with the newer version of ORK reproduction, that is more accepted but still not passed as fact, it would work well with genestealers, each spore would be a generation, so the numbers would be increased.
   
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"Yes sir I do!"

 Galef wrote:
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Our God is an awesome God
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Always felt like GSC was stepping on the toes of the chaos cults, they're too similar in concept for my taste or at least the lore should focus on non human infections and see what they do to Tau or Orks.
   
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 00001 wrote:
Always felt like GSC was stepping on the toes of the chaos cults
Well, you used to be able to Chaos up your GSC:

Spoiler:


 00001 wrote:
see what they do to Tau or Orks.
There's been a couple of stories dealing with Tau Cults, and they might work alongside humans on the tabletop (with the humans being auxilla).
   
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This is the kind of icky detail GW mightn't touch with a ten-foot-pole, but I wonder if multiple offspring from one set of infected parents could then reproduce with each other (and if it would degrade the resultant offspring). If so, that'd be a good basis for a Warhammer Horror novel -- the isolated remnants of a defeated cult movement, in which the Broodlord was killed, who isolate/reproduce for multiple generations in order to generate another purestrain who can restart the cult cycle en masse.

 00001 wrote:
Always felt like GSC was stepping on the toes of the chaos cults, they're too similar in concept for my taste or at least the lore should focus on non human infections and see what they do to Tau or Orks.

I find GSC far more interesting, because they're an actual asymmetrical guerilla organization that has to persist for generations, and can't just "summon daemon, solve problem."
   
Made in us
The Conquerer






Waiting for my shill money from Spiral Arm Studios

Well yeah, the offspring are meant to reproduce with each other. The initially infected humans will produce Gen 1 offspring. Gen 1 offspring breed with other Gen 1 to create Gen 2. If a Gen 1 breeds with a normal human, they infect the human and the offspring of that union will be more Gen 1. I don't think shagging your sibling is off the table if that's all you got to work with.

Now without the Broodlord, the infected humans/any offspring wouldn't be mind controlled anymore. But they would still have the urge to reproduce and be secretive with their mutant children. There also wouldn't be anyone directing the breeding to deliberately move down the generation track so it would be much more random, but they could totally over time eventually make a new generation of purestrain Genestealers. It just might take a few extra generations because it'll be trial and error instead of the Broodlord being able to oversee the process.

Self-proclaimed evil Cat-person. Dues Ex Felines

Cato Sicarius, after force feeding Captain Ventris a copy of the Codex Astartes for having the audacity to play Deathwatch, chokes to death on his own D-baggery after finding Calgar assembling his new Eldar army.

MURICA!!! IN SPESS!!! 
   
 
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