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Sudden thought crossed my mind just now. What would have happened if the Tyranid Invasion occurred at a time when the Eldar Empire was at it's peak? Assuming corruption of the Eldar had not yet taken place and they weere still the "Masters of the Galaxy" how do you think they would have faired had the nids arrived?

Master of space and the webway... super technology, the ability to extinguish stars on a whim.... Tyranids seem pretty screwed

Von Chogg

They'd have supernovaed a couple of carefully-placed stars in the path of the 'Nid invasion fleet, perhaps exploded a few non-Eldar-inhabited life-rich planets to starve the swarm, and the entire thing would have been no more than a blip in the history of the Eldar. What did you think? That the 'Nids would have had any chance against a civilization that it took a Chaos God to wreck?

 AnomanderRake wrote:
What did you think? That the 'Nids would have had any chance against a civilization that it took a Chaos God to wreck?

Probably not. One can expect a whole lot of complaining on the Tyranid's part during the fight while the Eldar lol'ed through the whole encounter. For all we know, the Tyranid could have been waiting outside the galaxy until Slaanesh came along. The hive mind may be able to perceive the warp after all.

Hive Mind: "♫Gonna eat me some bipeds.♫" <Sees Slaanesh-warp-fetus> "Nope. Gonna wait for that little bit o' hell to blow over first."

There is very little proper information available on the capabilities of the Eldar from before the fall, aside from lines like "the stars once lived and died at our command".

They failed to wipe out the Necrons, and indeed were petrified of waking up said Necrons. They clearly weren't all that you guys are cracking them up to be.

The Necrons also weren't actively attacking the Eldar Empire nor drawing attention to themselves. The Eldar destroyed them wherever they could find them, though.

So clearly not.

- - - - - -

If the Tyranids attacked the Eldar at the height of their empire, the Tyranid would become extinct.

I don't know, even at their Peak the Eldar tried and failed to wipe out the Orks.

I agree with Kain. They'd probably put up a better fight than humanity in the 41st millennium though.

BlaxicanX wrote:
The Necrons also weren't actively attacking the Eldar Empire nor drawing attention to themselves. The Eldar destroyed them wherever they could find them, though.

So clearly not.

- - - - - -

If the Tyranids attacked the Eldar at the height of their empire, the Tyranid would become extinct.

I suppose that I am referencing the Eldar Empire from the time of the Old Ones vs Necrons/C'tan war. That might not be a true reflection of the Eldar Empire though, so I accept that this is a moot point.

Kain's point about the Eldar failing to wipe out the Orks is just as solid though, and the Tyranids are more or less on par with the Orks for surviving and bouncing back.

The orks are in the same position as the Necrons. Unless the Eldar were actively traveling across the Galaxy rooting out Ork infestations trying to make the race instinct, it's a non-issue. Besides, the Ork codex notes that there are Ork empires beyond our galaxy, so it's more than feasible that the Eldar pushed the Orks out of the galaxy and didn't have any trouble with them until after the Fall.

Dunno where the idea that Tyranids are as durable as Orks comes from. Unlike Orks, Tyranids have to constantly be on the offensive to gain biomass, otherwise they'll simply starve to death. Thus there is no "bouncing back" after a defeat. If Tyranids lose enough manpower that they can no longer win a battle, then they've lost the war.

BlaxicanX wrote:
Dunno where the idea that Tyranids are as durable as Orks comes from. Unlike Orks, Tyranids have to constantly be on the offensive to gain biomass, otherwise they'll simply starve to death. Thus there is no "bouncing back" after a defeat. If Tyranids lose enough manpower that they can no longer win a battle, then they've lost the war.

Ghorala says otherwise. A large tendril of Leviathan that pushed into the Octavius Ork empire was wiped out, bar a single mortally wounded Hive Ship. That Hive Ship threw a few Mycetic pods at Ghorala, and within a few months not only had those few spores created an infestation large enough to cleanse Ghorala (a well populated Ork world no less) or life, but the swarm had re-grown to the point where that tendril of the fleet was completely reborn in force and was able to push on further into the Ork system.

KingGhidorah wrote:

BlaxicanX wrote:
Dunno where the idea that Tyranids are as durable as Orks comes from. Unlike Orks, Tyranids have to constantly be on the offensive to gain biomass, otherwise they'll simply starve to death. Thus there is no "bouncing back" after a defeat. If Tyranids lose enough manpower that they can no longer win a battle, then they've lost the war.

Ghorala says otherwise. A large tendril of Leviathan that pushed into the Octavius Ork empire was wiped out, bar a single mortally wounded Hive Ship. That Hive Ship threw a few Mycetic pods at Ghorala, and within a few months not only had those few spores created an infestation large enough to cleanse Ghorala (a well populated Ork world no less) or life, but the swarm had re-grown to the point where that tendril of the fleet was completely reborn in force and was able to push on further into the Ork system.

So I started to post about how much sense this made intuitively, but then I did some math. Here goes:

Earth contains about 560 billion metric tons of bio-mass, according to wikipedia. Let's assume that a good-sized Tyranid hive ship is 12 kilometers long and 2 kilometers across, and has the same average density as a human body (1.4 g/cm^3). That works out to around 53 billion metric tons, in total, per hive ship.

Now, we'll go with 70% of that being water, which isn't counted in the wikipedia biomass cited above. Let's also be generous and say that half of the remainder is made up of minerals that can be obtained directly from soil or bedrock and also isn't included in the biomass number. Based on all this, an Earth-like planet could produce around 70 hive ships. That might be enough to make up losses from a battle and get you to the next planet, but it wouldn't be much of a fleet in total if you were starting from scratch.

But maybe Ghorala was a super-earth type planet, with twice the diameter and (scaling by the diameter cubed) 8 times the biomass. Now you're talking almost 600 hive ships.

So I guess in the end it is feasible for a hive fleet to regenerate itself from a single planet, if it's the right planet.

KingGhidorah wrote:

Ghorala says otherwise

No it doesn't. A single hive ship has "millions" of Tyranids on it. More than enough to still compete with Orks, who are morons by nature. The Tyranid codex points out that the Tyranids would have been wiped out by the Orks had they not resulted to assassination and guerrilla tactics for the majority of the fight. That isn't going to work against even modern day Eldar, who are pretty much the undisputed kings of guerrilla warfare and assassination, much less Eldar at the height of their power.

BlaxicanX wrote:

KingGhidorah wrote:

Ghorala says otherwise

No it doesn't. A single hive ship has "millions" of Tyranids on it. More than enough to still compete with Orks, who are morons by nature. The Tyranid codex points out that the Tyranids would have been wiped out by the Orks had they not resulted to assassination and guerrilla tactics for the majority of the fight. That isn't going to work against even modern day Eldar, who are pretty much the undisputed kings of guerrilla warfare and assassination, much less Eldar at the height of their power.

WOOT IZ YOU STOOPID OOMIE YAMMERING?!?

Me just get me choppa an ammer some smarts to dat tiny skull.

Gharkull Blackfang was a mastermind taking down 3 space marine legions and almost their primarchs with them (Horus, Mortarion and Dorn).

Warlord Grog's combat tactics are so terrifying that Tau leadership was paralyzed from fear.

Arch Arsonist devastated Rynn's World (Crimsonfist homeworld) before even the Crimson fists were awere of the ork presence.

Can't do assasination and guerilla warfare? Ever seen Red Skull Kommadoes? No you haven't because if you did you would be dead.

The greatest tactician in the galaxy (currently) is that necron dude (stormlord something?) can't counter moves made by orks.

A little bit of history of pre-fall eldar:

1. Old ones create eldar
2. War in Heaven starts
3. Old ones make krork <--
4. War in Heaven ends
5. Necrons hide in their tombs

post-fall eldar:

some panzee said:

The Orks are the pinnacle of creation. For them, the great struggle is won. They have evolved a society which knows no stress or angst. Who are we to judge them? We Eldar who have failed, or the Humans, on the road to ruin in their turn? And why? Because we sought answers to questions that an Ork wouldn't even bother to ask! We see a culture that is strong and despise it as crude.

I honestly do not think it would be a huge issue for them. Where as Orks and Necrons are harder to root out, there are effective methods you can employee to wipe out Tyranids and starve them "total war style". Orks are harder to get rid of, and Necrons are really an enemy that Eldar are always fighting an uphill battle against as their Technology is not a huge advantage versus Necrons. The Imperium I think could take care of the Tyranids if it wasn't so slow an dogged down. As well, the Imperium never wants to lose a planet and really fights until the last for it. Eldar I think would be much more accepting about losing a planet if it served a major purpose in the end. Them being able to see the future would help a lot in the battles as well, so that they could take care of issues like a 1/2 killed hive fleet before it grew into an issue.