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My friend(who is a veteran Necron player) told me that its impossible to invade a necron tomb as a space marine chapter did so only to collect some data and it resulted in the death of so many marines that only 5 came back out alive and were only able to destroy that tomb world via destruction of the entire planet.

But then in Dawn of War, it seemed relatively successful for the Imperial guard and the space marines to invade the Necrons and destroy their tombs

So how does a full scale invasion to destroy a tomb world work out better then a simple chapter wide scouting mission?

I think you're friend has mixed up a Tomb World with a very powerful Necron ship that did indeed pretty much kill a Chapter to a man when they took it down.

Also, Tomb Worlds vary in size.

Technically, The World Engine was a Tomb World, just a Tomb World that could destroy planets. Invading a Tomb World is very, very difficult, but it can be done as demonstrated in "Hellforged". The reason it was easy in DOW is because they couldn't put an unstoppable enemy into an RTS. Also, only a small amount of the Necrons had actually woken up, for instance there's a "Monolith Graveyard" that you have to destroy, but if you don't do it in time then they have an effectively unlimited supply of teleporting transport vehicles with biiiig guns.

It also depends on the Tomb Worlds. Some of them are much stronger than others, and some are damaged. I seem to recall some fluff in one of the codexes, or maybe the BRB, about how an Imperial Guard regiment often uses the Necron forces on there world as target practice, because the Lord resposible for controlling there millitary forces was permanently destroyed and so the warriors are no longer really being guided. As such, they show up in exactly the same way at exact intervals, and the Guard simply form a shooting gallery for them.

The main strenght of the Necrons are that they can get new bodies if there current ones are destroyed, so long as there Tomb Worlds are still working right. If that facility gets damaged or destroyed then, and only then, do they run into serious problems. And even there facilities aren't immune to time, so there is more than one Tomb World full of essentially senile robots.

Until a C'tan shows up to give them some orders, at least...

Jon Garrett wrote:It also depends on the Tomb Worlds. Some of them are much stronger than others, and some are damaged. I seem to recall some fluff in one of the codexes, or maybe the BRB, about how an Imperial Guard regiment often uses the Necron forces on there world as target practice, because the Lord resposible for controlling there millitary forces was permanently destroyed and so the warriors are no longer really being guided. As such, they show up in exactly the same way at exact intervals, and the Guard simply form a shooting gallery for them.

I remember that in the same passage it made some mention of primitive worlds using encounters with the scavenger units as rites-of-passage. So yeah, there is definitely a wide berth between fully functional tomb worlds and those that have fallen into partial or extensive disrepair.

The World engine was destroyed by the AstralKnights though the entire strike force died.
The Emperor's Swords were destroyed when the tomb under their homeworld woke up, later the fire Lords dstroyed the tomb avenging the Emperor's Swords.
In other instances exterminatus seems to work...
Tomb Worlds have been destroyed usually at great cost but every now and again the IoM gets lucky and finds a weakness to exploit.

I'm gonna toss out there that Very rarely will anyone invade a Tombworld, as only Tyranids seem to actually know where they all are. Most of the time battles occur it's because some poor saps who dug to deep into the bowls of a planet and awakened to Necrons slumbering beneath. That being said, when one Was invaded by a group of marines who were able to track the Necrons it was considered a highly costly venture, and ended with the marines still not even knowing if they destroyed the Tomb or just merely wounding it abit.

And what if Tyranids invade Necron tomb world?

Brother Coa wrote:And what if Tyranids invade Necron tomb world?

They don't. Tyranids make massive course adjustments to avoid going near a Tomb World, because Necrons are a blank in the Warp, and Tyranids can't gain anything by attacking a Tomb World, as they are devoid of all life and Tyranids can't digest Living Metal.

But Tyranids are known to avoid them, why would they willingly and knowingly attack a tomb world? Most of these Tomb Worlds are dead worlds anyway.

Do we know how the nids are able to "feel" or detect the necron tomb worlds? Do they use genestealer broods to check if the worlds on their path are not infected by the necrons?

Their ships see by sensing life, which there is none of on a Necron Tomb World. Or seeing into the Warp, or something.

There could definitely be some life on a necron tomb world. Sometimes, imperials can settle on a world without being aware that legions of immortal warriors rest deep beneath the surface. Thus, if nids avoid worlds touched by the necrons, it would mean that they can detect the necrons from an incredible distance (but how could they do that?). Or that the Hive Mind somehow knows the location of all the necron tomb worlds (it could be possible if the nids were created by an Old One in exile).

I believe that Tyranids sense Necrons through the disruption in the warp necrons cause, so that would mess with the hive mind. I doubt they'd' care about the amount of resources there if it was capable of messing up the hive mind.

Perlia was a tomb world, and it got hit by a Tyranid splinter fleet prior to the events of Cain's Last Stand, though the brunt of the fleets avoided it. So it would seem that Tyranids don't entirely avoid Tomb Worlds, they just don't attack en masse like they do with other worlds.

I'm not sure if Tyranids avoid Tomb Worlds becuase they detect a Necron presence, or if these worlds tend to be devoid of life anyway and are simply bypassed. Could be either or, though for it to be the former there would have to be at least one instance of Tyranids attacking Necrons en masse for them to decide they weren't worth the effort.