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Has there ever been a Fluff example of a Failed Exterminatus?

As in, the Inquisition making the declaration, loading up the fleet to go burn a few worlds to ash, only for _________, to prevent the order from being carried out?

In Savage Scars an Inquisitor tried to Exterminatus a Tau Sept World only to fail.

The Tau home world when they were a primitive species was sentenced to Exterminatus prior to human colonization, however a warp storm prevented the fleet from getting there and it did not clear up for 1-2 thousand years. And then they appeared to have turned into Gundam Wing, so was deemed not worth the man power right now to carry out the order as there are other more pressing matters to worry about.... Despite Tau Kroot mercenaries always appearing in the books as a problem.

 Kalshandra wrote:
The Tau home world when they were a primitive species was sentenced to Exterminatus prior to human colonization, however a warp storm prevented the fleet from getting there and it did not clear up for 1-2 thousand years. And then they appeared to have turned into Gundam Wing, so was deemed not worth the man power right now to carry out the order as there are other more pressing matters to worry about.... Despite Tau Kroot mercenaries always appearing in the books as a problem.

Six Thousand years passed between the exploratory fleet and recontact. Making it not as impossible as people like to make out that they advanced so far.

 Kalshandra wrote:
The Tau home world when they were a primitive species was sentenced to Exterminatus prior to human colonization, however a warp storm prevented the fleet from getting there and it did not clear up for 1-2 thousand years. And then they appeared to have turned into Gundam Wing, so was deemed not worth the man power right now to carry out the order as there are other more pressing matters to worry about.... Despite Tau Kroot mercenaries always appearing in the books as a problem.

Aww, I was going to say that .

 Kalshandra wrote:
The Tau home world when they were a primitive species was sentenced to Exterminatus prior to human colonization, however a warp storm prevented the fleet from getting there and it did not clear up for 1-2 thousand years. And then they appeared to have turned into Gundam Wing, so was deemed not worth the man power right now to carry out the order as there are other more pressing matters to worry about.... Despite Tau Kroot mercenaries always appearing in the books as a problem.

No, the planet was NOT sentenced to Exterminatus. That would have the planet unsuitable for colonization.

The Tau species was filed for extermination so the planet could be colonized. Which means you just send a few IG regiments to exterminate them along with the Colonists.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Maniac_nmt wrote:

 Kalshandra wrote:
The Tau home world when they were a primitive species was sentenced to Exterminatus prior to human colonization, however a warp storm prevented the fleet from getting there and it did not clear up for 1-2 thousand years. And then they appeared to have turned into Gundam Wing, so was deemed not worth the man power right now to carry out the order as there are other more pressing matters to worry about.... Despite Tau Kroot mercenaries always appearing in the books as a problem.

Six Thousand years passed between the exploratory fleet and recontact. Making it not as impossible as people like to make out that they advanced so far.

Not really. They basically went from the Stone Age to having Warp Technology(or at least a primitive mockery of it) in 6 thousand years.

A process which took humanity nearly 20,000 years, and who knows how long it took the Eldar and Necrons to make it that far.

The Tau development was unnatural to say the least.

Wasn't there some mention in one of the chaos books of a daemon world that bamfed out of existence right before the cyclonic torpedoes hit?

 Grey Templar wrote:

 Kalshandra wrote:
The Tau home world when they were a primitive species was sentenced to Exterminatus prior to human colonization, however a warp storm prevented the fleet from getting there and it did not clear up for 1-2 thousand years. And then they appeared to have turned into Gundam Wing, so was deemed not worth the man power right now to carry out the order as there are other more pressing matters to worry about.... Despite Tau Kroot mercenaries always appearing in the books as a problem.

No, the planet was NOT sentenced to Exterminatus. That would have the planet unsuitable for colonization.

The Tau species was filed for extermination so the planet could be colonized. Which means you just send a few IG regiments to exterminate them along with the Colonists.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Maniac_nmt wrote:

 Kalshandra wrote:
The Tau home world when they were a primitive species was sentenced to Exterminatus prior to human colonization, however a warp storm prevented the fleet from getting there and it did not clear up for 1-2 thousand years. And then they appeared to have turned into Gundam Wing, so was deemed not worth the man power right now to carry out the order as there are other more pressing matters to worry about.... Despite Tau Kroot mercenaries always appearing in the books as a problem.

Six Thousand years passed between the exploratory fleet and recontact. Making it not as impossible as people like to make out that they advanced so far.

Not really. They basically went from the Stone Age to having Warp Technology(or at least a primitive mockery of it) in 6 thousand years.

A process which took humanity nearly 20,000 years, and who knows how long it took the Eldar and Necrons to make it that far.

The Tau development was unnatural to say the least.

It took humanity ~7000 years. Known/recorded history does not go back that far. Known/recorded history deals with about the last 6000-7000 years, at the start of which human society was not significantly advanced beyond the comparable Tau society. Not far fetched at all, given that the Tau never 'lost' major technological innovations like humanity did (we still conjecture over the construction of the pyramids, how the Chinese chrome plated metal over 2000 years ago, how the Romans provided sun shade for the coliseum, Mesopotamian batteries from 2000 years ago, how to construct torpedoes which were in use 800 years ago, eqyptians understanding the principles of flight well enough to construct 'toy' gliders, gun powder is ~1200 years old, etc).

Tau were using gun powder well before the ethereals (which are the earliest possible alien tampering suggested at any time in the Tau history). Advanced construction techniques were known, along with specialized irrigation, cultivation, metallurgy, and more. Hardly a 'huge' and unbelievable leap forward. It ignores or lightly brushes past some theories of constraints, but not so much so that it defies reality. Then again, I've always thought that was kind of the point. The Tau aren't unlike us or known societies on Earth, right down to the conspiracy theory that aliens built the pyramids (which lacks any substantial backing).

For goodness sake, we know how the pyramids were built. They used boats and log rollers to mover the stones. That and a lot of slaves.

We have a decent idea, but we still don't know a lot about how some ancient buildings were built. Or how the stones were carved and fit perfectly. Or how there was understanding of electricity or other principals lost to time.

Anyway, its not the Tau getting to the point the Ethereals showed up that is mind boggling. Its how they went from that point to where they are now that is unnatural.

Sure we do, aliens .

But yeah, it's that later progression that is impressive.

There is some fluff about exterminatus failing against Tyranids. One example was when a world was lost to the Tyranids and the exterminatus fleet was destroyed by the Hive fleet before it could attack.

Another more interesting example is on several occasions exterminatus has been used on worlds lost to the swarm only for it fail in killing all the Tyranids present. The examples in several older Tyranid codexes. It happens when Tyranids burrow deep and hybernate. This took placewith Rippers and a Carnifex on separate planets. The Inquisition has forbidden anyone from going to such worlds as they know many more creatures will go unseen.

This isn't the case of exterminatus being stopped but exterminatus simply not being up to the task of killing all the bugs.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
For goodness sake, we know how the pyramids were built. They used boats and log rollers to mover the stones. That and a lot of slaves.

It's only a recent discovery that seems to indicate how the stones were moved:

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/d-brief/2014/05/01/secret-building-pyramids-wet-sand/

Boats only take you so far....

Man power yes, but technical knowhow is also required. Brute forcing a 1000 mile aqueduct isn't going to yield lasting results

It sure does when your society views the ruler as a literal god of omnipotent power.

When God says "build me a pointy building", and you have a whole lotta guys who figured out the mathematics to make it perfectly pointy a few hundred years ago, and an even bigger number of a whole lotta guys who perfected stone-carving even longer ago, and millions of people who you are the undisputed divine ruler over...

... getting a pyramid built isn't really that hard.

Maybe not, but getting the pyramid to have some nearly perfect mathematical proportions is pretty hard. Simple brute force isn't going to build that. They had some great engineers and mathematicians.

And the Incas getting hand carved stones to be perfectly aligned so that you can't even fit a piece of paper between them is pretty amazing.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
For goodness sake, we know how the pyramids were built. They used boats and log rollers to mover the stones. That and a lot of slaves.

The pyramids were built with well paid and compensated workers. Not slaves. It was considered an honor in Ancient Egypt to build a pyramid as it was an incredibly rare event.

Yeah, slaves were used for other things.

Building a pyramid was far too important to trust it to them.

Anyways...

I can't say of an order being cancelled, but there are definitely exterminatuses that have failed for other reasons. Mostly because an exterminatus isn't always as strong as people like to think it is.

Kreig and Tallarn were both bathed in total, annihilating nuclear bombing and virus weapons that destroyed nearly all life on the the planet. But they're both still around, pumping out guardsmen and being general badasses.

It turns out human life can survive even apocalypses.

This thread got genuinely interesting very fast. Discuss more, friends.