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A fresh take on a popular topic (How long would we last against the imperials).

So, would we survive?

Edit: Sorry about that, thought I had less time than I do.

So, assuming a Tyranid swarm descended upon Earth right now, using our current technology, how long do you think we would survive against the Guants, Warriors, and Carnifexes of the the Tyranid Hive Fleet?

Personally, I wouldn't give us much longer than a month.

I'd say a couple hours to a week depending on which. If it was like, leviathan oh yeah we'd be goners. If it was behemoth we might be able to last a week if we expended all our nukes.

3 hours, then we get completly nommed by the Hive Fleet. If the current Imperium have difficulty handling them, then we have no chance at all!

We won't survive, but we would proboably nuke oursleves to spite them.

Organized resistance wouldn't last more then a few days.

small bands of humans might survive for a few weeks, but eventually all will be destroyed by Rippers as they harvest the Biomass.

I’m not saying that modern-day earth is completely amazing or anything but we’re pretty adaptable and the, for the most part, our Industrialized/militarized nations are educated. Where the Tyranids can adapt biologically, we can adapt technologically – very quickly.

When most people think of the 40k universe, they tend to think of bombs and nukes and the sort of bloody conflict reminiscent of World War 2 and World War 1 set in a Dark Ages analogy. That’s not how we fight any more – and it certainly wouldn’t be how we would fight against an invading alien species.

First you have to consider that in 40k, the PDF is a single organization that’s lead by a single (often incompetent) leader. On earth there are over one hundred nations, each with their own fighting doctrine and command structure. There are between five and ten nations who wield nuclear weapons and would certainly be ready to use them in the name of self preservation. While the Nuclear Non-proliferation treaty has certainly depleted the worlds arsenal of nuclear weapons, there are still estimated to be over 20,000 nuclear weapons worldwide locked, cocked, and ready to rock at the drop of a hat – and between Russia and the US alone there are an estimated additional 60,000 cold-war era weapons that can be mobilized in a situation as dire as a Tyranid invasion.

They Tyranid lore paints them as quite a nasty and horrifying threat but if you REALLY think about the nuclear weapons available to the nations of the world, we have quite a bite of our own.

Now, we should also consider that the Biological Weapons convention prohibits the development and use of such weapons. I’d imagine it wouldn’t take long for those weapons that lay dormant in secret vaults all over the world to make an appearance. Likewise, I’d imagine it wouldn’t take long to develop a virus/toxin that attacks Tyranid-specific biology. I think it’d be about ten days after the capture of the first Tyranid body for Dicks Sporting Goods shelves to be stocked with instant-acting Tyranid Ebola/AIDS/Plague mace right next to their gaunt-shaped target dummies.

Which brings up another important point… The universe of 40k commonly depicts the rank-and-file civilian as an ignorant and helpless fool standing feebly behind marginally better equipped PDF. Many (not all) nations (particularly the U.S., many Middle Eastern countries, and some Asian countries) have an armed population ready and willing to fight off would-be invaders. I myself have numerous (that’s NUMEROUS, not one, or a few) friends and relatives who are unintentionally equipped to look a zombie apocalypse straight and the eye, spit in its face, sleep with its girlfriend, and eat its lunch before putting a bullet straight through its brain. The U.S. LITERALLY had truckloads of armed civilians driving around looking for trouble because of a FAKE War of the Worlds radio broadcast. It wouldn’t take long for history to repeat itself in the event of a REAL invasion.

Lastly, I’ll mention the X-factor of technological development that the general populace is unaware of. Remember, that Hiroshima and Nagasaki happened in an era where the most powerful computer on earth was about half as powerful and one tenth as fast as the cellular phone I carry in my pocket. I have been in college math classes where the conversation shifted to modern mathematics application to weapons – the professor said that he really couldn’t discuss it but nuclear weapons may as well be bow and arrow in today’s modern technological world, that he had personally seen and worked on mathematics that could obliterate a mountain range and that math was being used to develop the weapons of the future. This was about 12 years ago, before 9-11, and war has a tendency to speed weapons development exponentially. I’m not sure this is really “optimism” per-se, but I’m willing to bet that there are some mind-boggling weapons the governments of the world have at their disposal that we’ve never seen that would come in handy during an alien invasion.

They Tyranids, as they’re depicted in the lore, wouldn’t have as easy a go at modern-day earth as one might expect.

Tyranids begin their invasion with spores that alter the chemical composition of the Atmosphere.

and 20,000 nukes might not be enough.

Well, humanity would pretty much just bio-bomb the hell out of it. And then nuke it, over and over again. Humanity is fairly unwilling to be destroyed, and I fairly sure if it were to be real, pretty much every human would attempt to hurt as much as they could as natural instinct. Well, I know I would go down attempting hack open some nids face with a Broadsword kept on my wall, failing that I would try and tear its throat out with my fething teeth. But yeah, the point stands, humanity is pretty damn hardy, and angry, when it comes to things like that.

1 day.

Guys guys guys, your forgetting one big weapon we have that can single handedly destroy an entire tyranid fleet, that the imperium has no access to.


Chuck Norris, he still lives...

yournamehere wrote:Guys guys guys, your forgetting one big weapon we have that can single handedly destroy an entire tyranid fleet, that the imperium has no access to.


Chuck Norris, he still lives...

Chuck, Bruce Lee, Arnie, Sulvester stalone, Jet Li, Harrison Ford.

All Primarchs, created from the genetic material of the emporer himself.

this guy?
lol

Devastator wrote:


this guy?
lol

Its because chuck norris is God. He wants man to worship him as it right and true

THere is only one thing in the whole of the 'verse that can stop Chuck Noris and Bruce Lee is dead.

People would like to think "Oh humanity can persevere through anything" No we can't. They would have ships filled with billions upon billions of tyranids. Would we fight? of course. Would we win? No way in hell. We have a finite number of resources. Chief amongst them, oil.

Imagine trying to get oil moved around the planet when the entire planet is a warzone. The hive mind isn't stupid, the second it realizes our warmachine needs oil like we need blood it's going to shut it off. and without oil, we can't move our forces & if we can't be mobile we can't fight. Not to mention all the manufacturing that requires oil.

tl;dr we. are. boned. I give us 4-6 months max of solid resistance with small pockets lasting until the very end (absorption into the hive ships)

Against a small break of a main tyranid fleet invading. Yes I think we have a small chance.

Remember a lasgun is really no better then there auto-guns they are just more reliable.

Not only that we could easily create a bio-weapon against them.

1 day for all major powers to be eliminated as functional entities. All nukes, nerve gas, etc expended within 3 days. Oceangoing forces would last longer, simply because the Nids seem to stick to land when they can, until the final consuming stages.

There is simply no way for any nation on earth to form a coherent response in the face of a global, simultaneous orbital assault. How can you decide where to launch the nukes, when every corner of your nation is heavily infested? The army cant move to defend civilians when their bases are under attack.

Yes, we would go down fighting, but it would be brief.

If it was a large Nid attack we would go down, but...we would make them glow in the dark before we did.

If it was a on a small scale, say a few thosand drop pods or landing craft, we would own the Nids, or any other army/force from 40k, they just could not stand against all the fire power we could bring to the fight.
Yes the we would lose a butt load of civs at the start.
But even they with all there house hold fire arms would take a huge toll on any force.
And after the "O CRAP" moment passed...and the armys of the world got there stuff together...the Nids would be no more in sort order

It would take a lot of political to-ing and fro-ing to co-ordinate the governements of the world, ones that have a hard enough time doing anything as a cohesive unit. The time this would take would be spent getting eaten.

Gravity distortions caused by the nids method of space travel (narwhals?) would cause earthquakes, eruptions, etc, destabilising large populations, well in advance of their presence.

The preceeding biological attack (spores, viruses etc) from the nids themselves would leave us severely depleted, morally and physically.

The mental/psychic horror of the hive mind would begin to drive the entire population insane, so that only the hardiest few were capable of mounting resistance. Assuming they were able to get to any nuclear weapons, they would need to be lucky to know where to aim them without killing the other pockets of resistance. More people would begin to die from radiation poisoning. Nids, by all accounts don't seem to mind such things (although obviously not the direct force of the blasts).

The swift destruction of our satelllites in orbit by their ships would asolutely cripple the militaries of the world, so organised resistance would crumble.

This leaves a few people with their own weapons, and some scant remnants of the military. These would be taken down piecemeal by a co-ordinated, efficient force governed by a single will, not thousands of individuals with precious few ways of communicating over distances.

The effects of such basic weaponry (compared to 40k standards) is debateable. Battle tanks and fighter/bombers would do some damage, and sure a few hypothetical weapons might do something, but it assumes that the people who might be able to use them were alive or mentally aware enough to do so.

Not very long. I second the 'we're boned' statement.

L. Wrex

Not very long... Though we would speed it up by nuking everything in sight...

Reanimator wrote:It would take a lot of political to-ing and fro-ing to co-ordinate the governements of the world, ones that have a hard enough time doing anything as a cohesive unit. The time this would take would be spent getting eaten.

Gravity distortions caused by the nids method of space travel (narwhals?) would cause earthquakes, eruptions, etc, destabilising large populations, well in advance of their presence.

The preceeding biological attack (spores, viruses etc) from the nids themselves would leave us severely depleted, morally and physically.

The mental/psychic horror of the hive mind would begin to drive the entire population insane, so that only the hardiest few were capable of mounting resistance. Assuming they were able to get to any nuclear weapons, they would need to be lucky to know where to aim them without killing the other pockets of resistance. More people would begin to die from radiation poisoning. Nids, by all accounts don't seem to mind such things (although obviously not the direct force of the blasts).

The swift destruction of our satelllites in orbit by their ships would asolutely cripple the militaries of the world, so organised resistance would crumble.

This leaves a few people with their own weapons, and some scant remnants of the military. These would be taken down piecemeal by a co-ordinated, efficient force governed by a single will, not thousands of individuals with precious few ways of communicating over distances.

The effects of such basic weaponry (compared to 40k standards) is debateable. Battle tanks and fighter/bombers would do some damage, and sure a few hypothetical weapons might do something, but it assumes that the people who might be able to use them were alive or mentally aware enough to do so.

Good analysis.

A lot of people who are talking about 'civilian being armed and doing some damage' seem to forget that a good amount of combatants (both civilian and professional... but really, mostly civilians who don't really have any discipline for those sort of things) would most likely be insane or dead before the war actually started.

It's one thing to be trained to fire a gun... but how do you deal with monsters (which is what the tyrannids are really)? Of the few rednecks with shotguns left when the Tyrannids would touch down... how many would just gak their pants and run when faced with a Warrior or worse? Heck, even the gaunts are nightmares made flesh...

This isn't just about some bugs running all over Kansas either... it's a global invasion. Communication and organization on such a scale is unheard of in today's military. If the most powerful military body in the world is making a mess of 1 war in 1 country, I can't even imagine what things would look like on a global scale with no easy to define battle front (where do you send the airstrike/nukes when the nids are fighting in your cities and military infrastructure?)... and that's before we even factor in the Tyranide striking us blind by taking down satellites and other communication arrays...

the tyranids also launch a psychic attack on the defenders so well see how billy bob does when he poops his pants from total fear, plus they devour all bio-mass from the planet so im sure they got ways of consuming oceans and what not so ships would probably be screwed eventually and apparently the whole process takes a month and the defenders are dead by around day 22 so i'd say were pwned lol

It would only last for days at most. I mean, in the background the tyranids are presented as being invincible. This is a sort of dissonance with the rest of the background. When the background wants to describe the IG or even Orks attacking a planet, they often talk of forces that wouldn't be large enough to fight, say, one of the powers involved in WW2. When tyranids are desribed as attacking a planet, horrible death-monsters rain from the sky for days on end. So yeah, we'd be boned, and it would probably go to nuclear weapons ASAP.

An hour, at most, only because Earth is one, small, lonely, orbitally defenseless planet. Our ammunition would be burnt within hours, the second wave of nids would be immune to nukes more or less. Unless we fired like...anthrax missiles or something at their massive motherships or gave them the common cold (HARDY HAR) we would be killed instantly. Every meter of earth would be under attack in 20 minutes.

I think we would simply nuke the nids out of orbit.

First of all, we would detect something as big as a hive fleet months before it would reach us, with all those astrophysicians staring at the stars 24 hours a a day.

From there, I guess it would not take us that long to figure out that the stuff heading towards Earth are actually quite dangerous.

20 000 nukes would probably be enough to slaughter the incoming hive fleet. I guess a few ships would make it to low orbit and release their spores, but it would remain manageable.

Of course, if the entire fleet would make it to the surface, we would not stand a chance (and get nommed in an hour), but I'm pretty confident that we would prevent most of the nids from reaching the surface.

incarna wrote:I’m not saying that modern-day earth is completely amazing or anything but we’re pretty adaptable and the, for the most part, our Industrialized/militarized nations are educated. Where the Tyranids can adapt biologically, we can adapt technologically – very quickly.

When most people think of the 40k universe, they tend to think of bombs and nukes and the sort of bloody conflict reminiscent of World War 2 and World War 1 set in a Dark Ages analogy. That’s not how we fight any more – and it certainly wouldn’t be how we would fight against an invading alien species.

First you have to consider that in 40k, the PDF is a single organization that’s lead by a single (often incompetent) leader. On earth there are over one hundred nations, each with their own fighting doctrine and command structure. There are between five and ten nations who wield nuclear weapons and would certainly be ready to use them in the name of self preservation. While the Nuclear Non-proliferation treaty has certainly depleted the worlds arsenal of nuclear weapons, there are still estimated to be over 20,000 nuclear weapons worldwide locked, cocked, and ready to rock at the drop of a hat – and between Russia and the US alone there are an estimated additional 60,000 cold-war era weapons that can be mobilized in a situation as dire as a Tyranid invasion.

They Tyranid lore paints them as quite a nasty and horrifying threat but if you REALLY think about the nuclear weapons available to the nations of the world, we have quite a bite of our own.

The use of Nukes would be very hard to co-ordinate. Assuming that the leaders of such countries aren't all dispatched by infiltrators or overrun in the first few hours of the invasion, where would they target these weapons? How are they to know that New York is managing to keep the larger protion of a Tyranid Horde at bay, when Washington itself is already flooded by a horde of chitin? There would be no means to direct these weapons at the bulk of Tyranid forces (which inevitably drop down at the major population centres). In the final few seconds before whatever headquarters the military leaders of the world are tucked away in (assuming infiltrators don't get there as well) there might be enough desperation to simply launch as many nukes as possible, but unless every single city in the world was targetted then the damage to the Tyranid forces would even be noticeable, and if they are launched at these cities the nukes might also wipe out the last pockets of real resistance in the process of trying to deny the Tyranids a complete victory.

Now, we should also consider that the Biological Weapons convention prohibits the development and use of such weapons. I’d imagine it wouldn’t take long for those weapons that lay dormant in secret vaults all over the world to make an appearance. Likewise, I’d imagine it wouldn’t take long to develop a virus/toxin that attacks Tyranid-specific biology. I think it’d be about ten days after the capture of the first Tyranid body for Dicks Sporting Goods shelves to be stocked with instant-acting Tyranid Ebola/AIDS/Plague mace right next to their gaunt-shaped target dummies.

Firstly, 10 days would see the end of most organized resistance and certainly would have the weapon mass-produced by any means. Secondly, the Imperium has tried such methods, sometimes with sucess, but it has never been a final solution, and they had the means to deliver these weapons precisely where it would hurt.

Which brings up another important point… The universe of 40k commonly depicts the rank-and-file civilian as an ignorant and helpless fool standing feebly behind marginally better equipped PDF. Many (not all) nations (particularly the U.S., many Middle Eastern countries, and some Asian countries) have an armed population ready and willing to fight off would-be invaders. I myself have numerous (that’s NUMEROUS, not one, or a few) friends and relatives who are unintentionally equipped to look a zombie apocalypse straight and the eye, spit in its face, sleep with its girlfriend, and eat its lunch before putting a bullet straight through its brain. The U.S. LITERALLY had truckloads of armed civilians driving around looking for trouble because of a FAKE War of the Worlds radio broadcast. It wouldn’t take long for history to repeat itself in the event of a REAL invasion.

Spores and other Tyranid biological weapons utilised in the atmosphere prior to the invasion would render most civilian forces, as well as a large portion of infantry forces, all but useless. The civilian gun-happy force that would supposedly make such a huge impact would most likely be huddling in their houses and bunkers, hunted down by swarms of gaunts, rippers and genestealers. Ironically just like most 40k civilians.

Lastly, I’ll mention the X-factor of technological development that the general populace is unaware of. Remember, that Hiroshima and Nagasaki happened in an era where the most powerful computer on earth was about half as powerful and one tenth as fast as the cellular phone I carry in my pocket. I have been in college math classes where the conversation shifted to modern mathematics application to weapons – the professor said that he really couldn’t discuss it but nuclear weapons may as well be bow and arrow in today’s modern technological world, that he had personally seen and worked on mathematics that could obliterate a mountain range and that math was being used to develop the weapons of the future. This was about 12 years ago, before 9-11, and war has a tendency to speed weapons development exponentially. I’m not sure this is really “optimism” per-se, but I’m willing to bet that there are some mind-boggling weapons the governments of the world have at their disposal that we’ve never seen that would come in handy during an alien invasion.

How's that tinfoil hat going for him?

Even so, the destructive power of these weapons is meaningless, unless there is somehow a way to direct them where it would actually hurt the Tyranids.

They Tyranids, as they’re depicted in the lore, wouldn’t have as easy a go at modern-day earth as one might expect.

I think you're first mistake is to assume that the Tyranid forces always attack in an onrushing horde. The only reason that most 40k defences/population centres are not overrun in the first couple of hours is becuase of the orbital defences, anti-air batteries and Void Shields that prevent the cities themselves from being the Tyranid landing forces. With no such countermeasures available in modern-day cities they would be overrun in a matter of hours, barring perhaps a few well defended military bases, or even Airfields.

To cut to the chase, they would have an easy time of modern-day Earth. They really would.

xlightscreen wrote:Against a small break of a main tyranid fleet invading. Yes I think we have a small chance.

Remember a lasgun is really no better then there auto-guns they are just more reliable.

Not only that we could easily create a bio-weapon against them.

This thread has been full of silly statements, but this one is just about the worst. I wish effective bioengineering projects could start from scratch and reach effective fruition in a matter of hours. It'd certainly make my life easier.

Anyway, the definitive answer is, 'not long.' The tyranid's complete dominance of space would mean we're toast.

Hours... Nothing more. Added nukes, tanks, and what anyone is able to think of, or imagine the world hasn't yet seen or can be invented.

The Tyranids invade planets by the billions. Alone their mycetic spores, gargoyles etc. is so vastly numerous, that is blocks out the sun.

i think the current us would survive quite well actually, given that in 40k, the standard everybody, up to officers in the emperors imperial forces are...well. backwater, superstitious fear mongering, frightend of their shadow, brainless imbeciles. they learn very little of their enemys other then "if we shoot the big ones with missles or tank fire they die! well, they die withlasguns too"

We on the otherhand learn and adapt and study and produce. i mean, Mankind built a car that goes from 0-100 in like 3 seconds for sng's when are back is to the wall, we will build. plus who knows what kind of bio tech we can build using Tyranid bio!


I also think, that if tyranids are real, then Eldar must be real! and other races...and im sure they would probably give us a heads up