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Hello all!

This is my first time posting in Dakka, i hope i'm not overstepping my bounds by asking for information on the first post. Sorry if i am...

Anyway, i was wondering something about the Dark Eldar. From what i know of them (granted, i only know a very small amount and don't know how much changed in the new codex), Slaanesh continually gnaws away on a Dark Eldar's Life force until they're dead, and they stave that off by giving her/him/it something else to eat instead (hence the sacrfices and such in the main DE city), so she'll stay off their backs.

My question is.. why don't the Dark Eldar employ something along the lines of the soulstones that the Eldar use, to protect themselves after they die? They must have won their share of battles against the Eldar and discovered them.. or at the very least, an uppity Eldar prisoner must have mouthed off something along the lines of "You might kill me, but I'm protected from slaanesh while you're doomed to pain for eternity", or something like that.

I've just never understood that even though they're the same race, they don't seem to try to apply the same technology as the their brethren. I'm sure that even if they can't build an exact copy, they could make something of their own based on it, especially when the DE aren't "new things are bad" like the imperium.

First of all: welcome to Dakka!

and to answer your question, I believe it is because the souls that they take are not used to feed slannesh directly: they are used to prolong the lives of the Dark Eldar in question and as slaanesh constantly feeds on their souls, the continue to need more, thus requiring more slaves, etc.
As for the soul stones, I think it is because they see craftworld eldar as weaklings who have abandoned their true "calling" if you will. The dark eldar are what the eldar used to be: selfish hedonists and they see the craftworld eldar (and most likely their technology also) as being almost traitorus. And due to the hedonistic nature of them, the generally only think of the present and not the future of preserving their souls.

Hope this helped!

Actually are psykers required for soulstones? I think de don't use psykers, maybe because they are so f---ed up that a slaaneshi daemon would possess them in no time.

otherwise I see no reason not to use soulstones

Another way to look at it is this:

Dark Eldar dies and soul gets trapped in soul stone, which then gets into the possesion of another dark Eldar. Nothing would stop that Dark Eldar using it to prolong his/her own life further.

And in a society of selfish xenos, why would you do anything that could actually benefit your fellows?

frostmagemari wrote:Hello all!

This is my first time posting in Dakka, i hope i'm not overstepping my bounds by asking for information on the first post. Sorry if i am...

Anyway, i was wondering something about the Dark Eldar. From what i know of them (granted, i only know a very small amount and don't know how much changed in the new codex), Slaanesh continually gnaws away on a Dark Eldar's Life force until they're dead, and they stave that off by giving her/him/it something else to eat instead (hence the sacrfices and such in the main DE city), so she'll stay off their backs.

My question is.. why don't the Dark Eldar employ something along the lines of the soulstones that the Eldar use, to protect themselves after they die? They must have won their share of battles against the Eldar and discovered them.. or at the very least, an uppity Eldar prisoner must have mouthed off something along the lines of "You might kill me, but I'm protected from slaanesh while you're doomed to pain for eternity", or something like that.

I've just never understood that even though they're the same race, they don't seem to try to apply the same technology as the their brethren. I'm sure that even if they can't build an exact copy, they could make something of their own based on it, especially when the DE aren't "new things are bad" like the imperium.

I know this is off topic, but you said Slaanesh is a she. Is he?

(S)he is both male and female.

Slaanesh is a he ( the 4 Chaos gods are called brothere's in Codex Chaos Daemons ) and can take the form of a male or female.

Slannesh can assume male, female and haemaphroditic form, I like the she part better

The Chaos Gods are essentially genderless, though they often embody or make use of gender characteristics at will.

Remember that they are not material beings at all, and gender is defined by physical traits.

Viper217 wrote:The Chaos Gods are essentially genderless, though they often embody or make use of gender characteristics at will.

Remember that they are not material beings at all, and gender is defined by physical traits.

lol not to argue semantics or get off topic but gender is not physical but genetic. xy=male xx=female Idk what you change or look like on the outside, you cant fight biology.

But anyway I agree with all previous posts. Its really really not practical or possible (I.E. no psykers) for DE to use soulstones.

1.) There is no more a secret Slaanesh/DE deal anymore in the new Codex. The DE are at home in the webway, a layer between the real world and the warp. Livng there causes a constant soul leech, which can be countered by strength from pain.

2.) A Spirit Stone catches the Eldar soul in the moment of death. If the soul is leeched to death, there is nothing left for the Spirit Stone to catch, so it doesn't help if you live in the webway. Craftworlders live in the real world and travel the webway only for very short periods of time if at all, so they are practically not affected by soul leech, so the Spirit Stone catches the whole soul.

BTW, DE can easily take away the Spirit Stone from an Eldar prisoner (or simply destroy it) and watch his soul going off to a painfull death in the warp (if they don't use the soul themselves).

Kroothawk wrote:1.) There is no more a secret Slaanesh/DE deal anymore in the new Codex. The DE are at home in the webway, a layer between the real world and the warp. Livng there causes a constant soul leech, which can be countered by strength from pain.

2.) A Spirit Stone catches the Eldar soul in the moment of death. If the soul is leeched to death, there is nothing left for the Spirit Stone to catch, so it doesn't help if you live in the webway. Craftworlders live in the real world and travel the webway only for very short periods of time if at all, so they are practically not affected by soul leech, so the Spirit Stone catches the whole soul.

BTW, DE can easily take away the Spirit Stone from an Eldar prisoner (or simply destroy it) and watch his soul going off to a painfull death in the warp (if they don't use the soul themselves).

If this is true then what about the craftworld that resides in the webway luggathe or some such name? I thought the webway actually slowed down the soul leech of slaanesh. Soulstones are a buffer between eldar souls and slaaneshes mouth, if you have a soulstone ur soul cant be drained and will be captured after death.

Maybe they changed the fluff, idk thats they way it used to be. Damn you GW for being so flaky about fluff.

Laughing God wrote:(...) if you have a soulstone ur soul cant be drained and will be captured after death.

If the spirit stone tries to capture any soul essence after death from a soul leech victim, what will it get? Right, nothing.

Craftworld Lugganath is still in the real world. They might plan to enter the webway in the future, but they seem unaware of the soul leech which is only a problem for Eldar being in the webway for a long time. But I agree that Harlequins (guardians of the Black Lbrary in the webway) have to watch out as well, maybe that's why they travel in the real world so much.

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Lugganath

Kroothawk wrote:

Laughing God wrote:(...) if you have a soulstone ur soul cant be drained and will be captured after death.

If the spirit stone tries to capture any soul essence after death from a soul leech victim, what will it get? Right, nothing.

Craftworld Lugganath is still in the real world. They might plan to enter the webway in the future, but they seem unaware of the soul leech which is only a problem for Eldar being in the webway for a long time. But I agree that Harlequins (guardians of the Black Lbrary in the webway) have to watch out as well, maybe that's why they travel in the real world so much.

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Lugganath

Actually the harlequins souls belong to the laughing god so they are untouchable by slaaneshes drain.

And all eldar experience the soul drain not just the dark eldar, but craftworld eldar prevent it with thier soulstones. And the old fluff went that after and eldar died he went strait to slaanesh if he didnt have his soulstone.

Laughing God wrote:Actually the harlequins souls belong to the laughing god so they are untouchable by slaaneshes drain.

The Solitaire fluff has at times indicated that this doesn't apply to Solitaires. The fluff has also at times indicated that Solitaires can be found as part of a troupe - albeit one that the rest of the troupe treats as a pariah (this contrasts with the very first fluff story involving a solitaire, in which the solitaire turned out to be a humble technician on a craftworld that a Harlequin troupe just happened to be visiting).