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Lots of people ask, "If the Imperium is so doomed by all of the other races, how is it still alive? Obviously those other guys are being exaggerated and in reality the Imperium is super ultra powerful and invincible." Here's my explanation for that question.

THE BIG FOUR (Tyranids, Traitor Legions, Necrons and Orks) BALANCE EACH OTHER OUT!

Here's how it works. Necrons have no biomatter, so they defeat Tyranids. Traitor Legions have Chaos, so they defeat Necrons. Tyranids eat biomatter, so they defeat Traitor Legions. Orks defeat everything, so they also defeat themselves. The big four keep eachother balanced and thus prevent any one of them from just wiping out the Imperium with a derisive assault. That's how the Imperium (and the Tau and Eldar) have managed to survive for so long.

So, what do you guys think? Do you agree with this theory? Do you disagree? Will this turn into another Tau Hater/Fanboy war?

I do agree. It makes sense on how the Imperium stays alive. If everything attacked the Imperium at once they'd be screwed.

I have a theory on how the Imperium hangs around as well...
I call it the tidal theory.
During certain times the Imperium becomes over zealous and takes massive sectors of space. [High tide]
In doing this they stretch out and deplete their forces.
They then begin to lose ground to various alien factions or rebellions and are pushed back.
They consolidate and hold their territory.[Low tide]
Years later they begin to retake massive sectors of space.

Rock Papper Sissors!

Edit: V Yeah me neither

The IOM has galaxy-thick plot armour.

Neither paper cuts, rocks or scissors can get through it...


**edit* can't spell tonight.

Makes sense to me. Often fringe groups that just like to fight tend to balance out...

I can agree with both the tidal theory and the big four theory. Both of them work at different parts of the galaxy maybe?

The problem for the Imperium is that new threats are emerging, The Imperium has been fighting Chaos, Orks, and rebellions for 10,000 years but the Tyrannic Wars, probably the largest mobilization of Imperial forces since the Heresy, has only happened quite recently. Until their retcon the Necrons were also a major threat that would destabilize everything, while now they're more of a localized problem on the Eastern Fringe.

So on top of these new threads are also upstarts causing trouble and draining Imperial resources. The Tau Empire, Ulumeathic League, Reek Worldweave, Draxian Hegemony, and Church of Dracolith were described as 5 new alien empires encoraching on the Imperium borders. In addition to its eternal foes of Chaos and Orks as well as the constant problem of rebellion, the Imperium must also deal with new very major threats like the Tyranids and weaker, smaller, but collectively troublesome and increasingly stronger minor xenos empires. Then there's also annoying issues like pirates, Eldar machinations, Eldar Corsairs, Dark Eldar, and so on.

Thus the Imperium has found itself as of M41 overstretched to the limit. Stuff like Armageddon/13th Black Crusade in combination with the above has basically put them at the breaking point. It's part of the Grimdark. The Imperium has relied on this balance of power and delicate system of constant war for 10,000 years, but towards of the end of M41 there were too many new variables.

The biggest problem is the Tyranids though, the Imperium has held back (but not destroyed) its classical enemies for so many thousands of years, then this gigantic new threat emerged and unleashed a series of wars engulfing entire Sectors. It's the equivalent of adding the Eastern Front to the German War Effort in WWII.

I for one would like to start the tau hating, its the best part of 40k.... Jk.

I agree with the tidal theory. The IoM has recently exhausted their military power in their countless crusades. Which while expanding the Imperium has left them relitively weak.

This again....
Simple reason is: everybody is fighting eachoter, with only Imperium, Tyranids and Tau being unified and all other wage war between themselves.

-Orks are very numerious but disorganized.
-Chaos is fighting more between themselves then other factions.
-Necrons also fight between themselves and they still don't have numbers.
-Tau are to small fry to actually be a threat.
-Eldar are to few
-Dark Eldar wage battles for fun not conquest or extermination of others.

Why people can't realize that Imperium represent united Mankind. Race so numerous that only Orks and Tyranids outnumber. Take that numbers, add endless tides of starships, vehicles and heroes that can defeat entire army's by themselves and you get one big and bad faction.
Why are they declaying as an empire instead of spreading? See purplefood tidal theory and also use in account that they have to occasionally fight rebellions within their own empire.

Yes, the enemy forces are too disorganised (or enemies) to destroy the IOM or each other.

LoneLictor wrote:Lots of people ask, "If the Imperium is so doomed by all of the other races, how is it still alive? Obviously those other guys are being exaggerated and in reality the Imperium is super ultra powerful and invincible." Here's my explanation for that question.

THE BIG FOUR (Tyranids, Traitor Legions, Necrons and Orks) BALANCE EACH OTHER OUT!

Here's how it works. Necrons have no biomatter, so they defeat Tyranids. Traitor Legions have Chaos, so they defeat Necrons. Tyranids eat biomatter, so they defeat Traitor Legions. Orks defeat everything, so they also defeat themselves. The big four keep eachother balanced and thus prevent any one of them from just wiping out the Imperium with a derisive assault. That's how the Imperium (and the Tau and Eldar) have managed to survive for so long.

So, what do you guys think? Do you agree with this theory? Do you disagree? Will this turn into another Tau Hater/Fanboy war?

Well, I would've gone with Orks are immune to Chaos so they beat Traitors, Tyranids eat biomass so the eat Orks, but apart from that it seems pretty good.

...Though now I'm imagining a derisive assault.
"Nice defences, loser. NOT!"

Not immune, but very very resistant.

There have been nurgle ork cults in the fluff.

I like the old Warphead fluff better though. A warphead was what happens when a daemon attempts to possess/turn into a gate an ork psyker, and instead ends up trapped inside the ork's head until the Weirdboy dies, screaming...

Doubly so if its a KOS or LOC

Ascalam wrote:Not immune, but very very resistant.

There have been nurgle ork cults in the fluff.

I am SO going to make some.

I used to have a painboss led ork chaos cult back in the day.

Ork plaguebearers and nurgle mutated boyz, plus a nurgle Dread

No idea what happened to them, but they were awesome to me

Ascalam wrote:I used to have a painboss led ork chaos cult back in the day.

Ork plaguebearers and nurgle mutated boyz, plus a nurgle Dread

No idea what happened to them, but they were awesome to me

Whoa, thats epic.

I may have to recreate them

Chaos Daemons is my convert/paint army. I rarely play them, but they make great conversion fodder.

LoneLictor wrote:THE BIG FOUR (Tyranids, Traitor Legions, Necrons and Orks) BALANCE EACH OTHER OUT!
Here's how it works. Necrons have no biomatter, so they defeat Tyranids. Traitor Legions have Chaos, so they defeat Necrons. Tyranids eat biomatter, so they defeat Traitor Legions. Orks defeat everything, so they also defeat themselves. The big four keep eachother balanced and thus prevent any one of them from just wiping out the Imperium with a derisive assault. That's how the Imperium (and the Tau and Eldar) have managed to survive for so long.

Well, it's no secret that the enemies of the Imperium also fight among themselves. If that were not he case, the Imperium would be screwed

However, I don't think its rock-paper-scissors as you're kinda suggesting. For instance, CSM have some advantages over Necrons, but Necrons have plenty of advantages over CSM too.

Ascalam wrote:The IOM has galaxy-thick plot armour. Neither paper cuts, rocks or scissors can get through it... **edit* can't spell tonight.

True

SwiftLord14 wrote:I can agree with both the tidal theory and the big four theory. Both of them work at different parts of the galaxy maybe?

Well, the fact that the IoM's enemies fight each other probably allows the Imperium to expand and contract. More enemy "infighting" means Imperial expansion, less enemy "infighting" means less Imperial expansion
...or if the intensity of enemy infighting is relatively constant, infighting keeps the Imperium's enemies sufficiently weak so that the Imperium is able to expand occasionally and it doesn't implode when it contracts

I dub this the "Unified Tidal Balance Theory"