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i was reading through the dark eldar codex, and it keeps saying that they're the most evil and decadent race in warhammer. now, being a chaos player, i felt this a grave injustice against me, for truly chaos is the most evil? i mean, it seems dark eldar try really hard to be as evil as chaos, but just dont quite make it, haha.

This depends entirely on wether or not you believe that when a chaos marine kills you, your soul becomes his gods play thing or not. Dark Eldar are really good at complete torture while you are alive.... where as a chaos marine simply kill your to appease his god.... however if that god were to torture you for the rest of time.... I'd go with chaos

well its hard to choose between the greater of two evils.
on one hand,there is torture for ages.
on the other,you get brutalized by an 8 foot tall iron-clad death machine,then torture for eternity.

Chaos.

Chaos believes that what they do is for the "good" of the galaxy. Atleast some of the marine traitors do.

There is nothing inherently evil about chaos. Chaos is a differant entity from good and evil. Whose read Dragonlance books? Remember you've got the 3 differant aspects of Good, Evil, and Neutrality. And then Chaos was something entirely differant.

Now for the Dark Eldar, they are evil to the core. They derive physical pleasure from causing harm to themselves and to others. They know that they are evil, and love the fact of it.

Are they the most evil entity in the galaxy? *shrugs* Big galaxy, but their surely more "evil" then the Chaos powers.

Necron star gods are as evil as you can get. They just want to consume entire populations (worlds)  and a star or two. The fluff has them trying to extingish all life including chaos. The Eldar pantheon of gods are based on them including DE.

Since skulls and severed heads is the measure of evil in WH40k;  I think the Night Lords Hero is probably the most evil model ever.  It has over 20 skulls and severed heads modeled on to it.  And it goes on a 25mm base.  No other model has that kind of "evil density".

now if you go by that, then most evil thing in the 40k 'verse are the new cityfight buildings...

I don't think there's anything really 'evil' in 40k. As has been pointed out, most chaos marines believe what they are doing is good, they see the Imperium as evil. There are some who are evil and are just out to kill stuff (ie night lords). Dark Eldar aren't really evil either... they don't torture people to get pleasure just for the hell of it. They don't have spirit stones like Craftworld eldar, so by killing and torturing others, their victims souls get eaten up by slaanesh instead of their own. It's just self preservation. Necrons are mindless and just do what they're told by the C'Tan, who are just hungry. The same goes for 'nids. Orks were genetically bred to fight and do nothing else, so blame the old ones for them. And again, though the Imperium sees them as evil, the Tau believe they're doing the right thing. It's all relative.

The Imperium is evil, since it crushes all free thought and free will, forcing all under its aegis to slave all their lives to serve the privileged few...

Really, there's no good or evil; it's all a matter of survival, each faction doing what it believes is needed to survive and/or dominate. Whichever one "wins" will define who is the "good guy", and the losers become the "evil".

@ Born Again:  You're right, the Dark Eldar do what they do to survive.  They also enjoy the hell out of it.  It specifically says in their codex that they get pleasure from inflicting pain and terror on others, which is pretty damn evil in my book.  DE definitely gets my vote for most evil.

Everyone in 40K is evil. The Imperium is a soul crushing organization that exists on blind hatred and zealous faith, Chaos has its insanity and cruelty, Eldar are capricious, viscious and obscenely selfish, Dark eldar are evil for the reasons stated, Tau are Hegomonizing racists, Orks are, well the Orks are the party animals of the universe. And you then have the most evil, the C'tan and their necron helpers. The C'tan, amongst all the factions, actively chose to be evil, because they find petty cruelty to be more entertaining, and gives the souls of the innocents they wish to consume a more pleasing taste. They actively attempt to engineer tortures that would damn near the make Dark Eldar faint, and would give the most dedicated Slaanesh cultists nightmares. The don't want simple dominance, or even to just consume the souls of those they enslave, they want an endless dark paradise of hidden tortures and endless woe. Of all the factions, they are the most evil, because they have the power, ability, and knowledge to chose not to be, but are so petty that they would rather choose pure unaldulterated evil than to actually have to suffer some minor deprivation of thier pleasures. They are what the Dark Eldar want to grow up to be, infinitely cruel, even to the point of helping those they wish to hurt along, simply to make the fall worse.

I'm gonna have to say DarkHellion speaks the truth, the C'tan do indeed seem to be the most "evil" outta them all

Evil is all based on perspective. All the races in 40k do what they believe is right. I don't believe the C'tan grasp the concept of evil, they just automatically assume that everything they do is their given right Nobody thinks they are evil, except the Dark Eldar. They are the only race that conciously recognises the fact that what they do is wrong, and they thrive on it.
Based on that, i would say that the Dark Eldar are the most evil race in the galaxy.

I'd say the Dark Eldar are the worst.

As has been said, CSM's follow Chaos as an alternative. Consider, if you will, the difference between Chaos (Gods, Daemons) and CSM's. What are the non-Mortal's objectives? The Chaos Gods surely exist in all galaxies, and to be concentrating power in one, to crush one psyker is a tall tale. Of course, they could be only based in our galaxy, and out there, there are many other warp creatures plaguing different places. Who knows, beyond the 'Nids, ours could be the only galaxy to have developed psychic powers.

In a roundabout, and not very specific way, I'm saying CSM's aren't evil, they are an alternative (particularly Slaneesh followers; insert 'lifestyle choice' to that sentence in their case). It could be argued that what the Gods stand for is good; mortals achieving perfection, but being denied it by fighting them.

The Dark Eldar are plain nasty. If you think about it, they live lives nothing like the Craftworld Eldar, and are sadistic to an extreme. You can join Chaos, DE will not give you a half a chance. If the Dark Eldar are the remnants of the Eldar's civilisation as it stood, thank goodness the Eldar empire fell.

As for C'tan, I don't even imagine them thinking. I've always seen them as creatures which see the need to survive, and do it in anyway they can.

I believe the nightbringer is the most evil. That fluff about him implanting the fear of death in every newborn race save the orks. Thats pure evil at its best. He wanted to be the embodyment of terror for the entire galaxy when he awoke.

I decide whose evil based on their 'shoot on sight' belief. If I were to run up to a certain race in the galaxy waving a big Irish flag but holding no weapons how would they react?

Imperium?
Army?Yes [Usually, unless I run up to the Chapter of SM I made - that's there banner]
Random guy on street? Probably yes still. They're an angry people.
Eldar? No. [Probably, unless they're Saim Hine - forgive my spelling]
D Eldar? Yes - in practice. They may not kill me right away but they'd intend to do when they saw me.
Necons? Yes - again in practice. Unless they needed slaves. I saw that picture in the codex.
Nids? Yes. No question.
Orks? Ironically No - there's plenty of accounts of Orks and Humans NOT killing each other right away. Some even talk and trade with each other - I wouldn't mind having a drink with one.
Tau? No. [Greater good and all that dictates that all become one]
Choas? Yes - in practice. [Depends but in the end they're there to kill me.]

Granted, some might not shoot me ON sight but when they saw me they'd want to kill me. I'm ugly and Obnoxious and I have a funny accent. Lol

This may not answer a question but I really wanted to make a list. Who I think is most evil? The Imperium - any empire that functions on the Mormon ideal of eyes and ears closed is just evil.

I have too say the Imperium is the most evil of the bunch( Big brother is watching you)
Come on if you have too kill 1000 pyskers a day too keep the golden portapotty going some thing is wrong there....
Plus Marines/ Inquistions have Coaliation all over them( From Rifts faction there says Xenos are bad and all must die except the dog race they made)
Imperial gaurds reminds me of Stalins Red army ( Ever see emeny at the gates??) big scene in the movie were they give one soldier a rifle and two bullets and the next soldier five bullets and no rifle and say if he dies you pick up the rifle.... then later on in the movie you see them retreating and they get mowed down by there own troops ( Imperal Gaurd all over it in my opinion)

Sister of battle well all i have too say is WAVES.... enough im done ranting now ...lol

Posted By DarkHellion on 05/26/2006 2:57 AM
Everyone in 40K is evil. The Imperium is a soul crushing organization that exists on blind hatred and zealous faith, Chaos has its insanity and cruelty, Eldar are capricious, viscious and obscenely selfish, Dark eldar are evil for the reasons stated, Tau are Hegomonizing racists, Orks are, well the Orks are the party animals of the universe. And you then have the most evil, the C'tan and their necron helpers. The C'tan, amongst all the factions, actively chose to be evil, because they find petty cruelty to be more entertaining, and gives the souls of the innocents they wish to consume a more pleasing taste. They actively attempt to engineer tortures that would damn near the make Dark Eldar faint, and would give the most dedicated Slaanesh cultists nightmares. The don't want simple dominance, or even to just consume the souls of those they enslave, they want an endless dark paradise of hidden tortures and endless woe. Of all the factions, they are the most evil, because they have the power, ability, and knowledge to chose not to be, but are so petty that they would rather choose pure unaldulterated evil than to actually have to suffer some minor deprivation of thier pleasures. They are what the Dark Eldar want to grow up to be, infinitely cruel, even to the point of helping those they wish to hurt along, simply to make the fall worse.

I disagree. The C'tan just kill. If you are killed by DE, then your very soul is eaten. Since C'Tan have no jurisdiction over the warp (where the soul exists), then they can't do anything to your soul. Furthermore, they do what they do because they believe that it is best for the galaxy, and because their nature drives them to do so (at least in terms of their diet). DE Make a choice to be knowingly evil, they know what they do is wrong, but they do it anyway.

But a C'tan 's are Star Gods they dont have too play by the rules you know. They make up there own rules as they go along. My Vote is still for the imperium as being the most evil of all of 40k
Big Brother is watching you

I used to say chaos. But after reading the dark angel book where they catch one of the fallen and he explains what happened in the heresy also the heresy books themselves show the emporer to be no better than any chaos scum. He even made deals with chaos to make his genetically enhanced primarchs more powerful...So all marines have a mild taint in there genes.
See; Horuses dream it explains it if your wondering what im talking about.

Dark Eldar are the worst followed closely by cron.

I guess since we're talking about evil this is essentially a morality question, so if you'll excuse some philosophizing on my part, I'm just gonna dive right in.

I don't think that you can claim that the Imperium is the most evil organization. After all, it exists in a universe of unimaginable horror, wherein it is beset on all sides by terrible abominations that threaten it from the inside and out. The Orks and the Tyranids represent galaxy-spanning killing machines that basically exist to fight, devour, and destroy every world they come across. The Craftworld Eldar count humans as tools for their use under the best of circumstances, and as little more than bacteria under the worst. The Dark Eldar live only to torture us, for no good reason mind you, and then consume our souls for their own benefit. The Necrons want to enslave and eat us. And let's not forget the fact that we're constantly battling against a force so powerful, corrupting, and seductive that it turned almost half of the imperium, including it's greatest champion Horus, against itself.

Under these circumstances, it's almost a necessity to have a fundamentalist totalitarian regime to keep things in line. Without order, the Imperium wouldn't be able to muster the military forces to repel all of these outside threats at bay. Without the extreme fundamentalism, the ever present threat of Chaos would consume it from within. Of course, that doesn't really account for what seems to be the complete degeneration of reason in the Imperium - including the sometimes extreme and non sensical xenophobia that they exhibit, as well as rigid thinking to the point of self harm when it comes to technology and military tactics. Then again, several millenia of nothing but strife will make any organization unreasonable and paranoid to the extreme.

I like to think of it this way - the Imperium is like a man who has been betrayed by every constant that he trusted in his life. Similar to a person who was abandoned by his family by no fault of his own, falsely accused of murder and thrown in jail, having all of his friends murdered in a plane crash that he inadvertently caused somehow, and was cheated on by every woman that he ever knew by bad luck of the draw. This person is likely to be bitter, cynical, hostile, and paranoid. And who could blame him? Of course it's still possible that he could rise above everything that happened to him, but he would be a product of his environment if he did not. What I am saying is that the Imperium certainly could be more reasonable and flexible, and less paranoid and xenophobic, but it's not entirely their fault. They are a product of their environment. Therefore they are less immoral than some other races.

We can also discount the Orks, since they are a force of nature more than anything else. They lack the reason to change their ways and are genetically programmed to be hyper aggressive. They're amoral rather than immoral.

I guess the tyranids could probably be dismissed as the most evil race as well, depending on the nature of the hive mind. But since we don't really know if the hive mind is self aware (or do we? anybody know?), we can't consider it's actions evil.

The Tau are clearly trying to unify or coexist with other races, which means they can't be the most evil race - despite the ethereal's dubious mind affecting abilities over other Tau.

The Craftworld Eldar would certainly want to see humanity wiped out, but that's because they believe that the imperium is a destructive force and that humans are unworthy and ignorant. They seem to have taken to the Tau, they don't hate them at the very least. They are trying to make the galaxy a better place, even if they are self-centered and arrogant. They may be misguided (they claim that they just operate on a higher level of consciousness than humans which, honestly, is probably true), but there is at least some morality there.

This, of course, leaves the big three - Chaos, Dark Eldar, and the C'Tan. The Chaos powers are supposedly reflections of all of the negative emotions and tragedy in the universe, manifest in the warp. They are composed of evil on a fundamental level. The real damage done by chaos however, is done by it's followers. All of those followers made a choice to follow Chaos, but not for the sake of being evil. Some were promised power, some believed that the emperor was false and the true gods were chaos, and some thought that chaos' strength made it the rightful ruler of the galaxy. Basically, they all made the choice to increase their personal power at the (very large) expense of others. This is surely an evil act, but two factors mitigate this. Firstly, chaos followers can claim that they worship chaos for the good of humanity, even if this is a misguided belief. Secondly, Chaos seems to have the power to influence the minds of people to do insane things. It spreads like a disease. Just as you can't blame somebody for catching a cold, many chaos followers can not be held accountable for their actions.

Then we have the the dark eldar, a race who's flagrant disregard for any sort of morality whatsoever, through their own choice and by their own admission, makes them the most evil race in 40k. They don't follow the chaos gods so they are under no curse or compulsion, and they had a chance to turn away from their wicked ways with the craftworld eldar. They have no regard for any other living creature (even their own kind) and routinely consume the souls of thousands of beings to extend their own lives. Not to mention the sadistic torture of prisoners for no good reason. Their civilization was so decadent that it spawned a chaos god.

But what about the C'tan? They don't need souls to live, but they eat them anyway, and have similarly no regard for any other race, even each other. They don't seem to be hyper intelligent, though they are clearly extremely powerful, so they can't really claim to be working on another level than other races. This is pretty much the same situation as the Dark Eldar, especially because the war that the C'tan started spawned all of the other chaos gods.

Whelp, that was extremely long winded. I didn't really expect to write a giant essay about this, but insane boredom at work will do that to you. That, and it was too late to turn back by the time I had started. Oh well.

The final conclusion? Tie between DE and C'tan! Hurray!

Many of the [More powerful] followers didn't have a choice but to follow chaos tho. The Dark Gods forced them into doing it. It was just a sickness - it was an attack.

Lorgar of the Word Barers was forced to Chaos when the Emperor turned against him for "being priests not soldiers"

Mortarion of the Death Guard was tortured into aligning his chapter to Chaos. He was on his way toe the Drop site Massacare when the Choas God Nurgle trapped his fleet in the warp and bombarded him and his men with so many crippling and sickening deseases that he had to swear fealty to the Dark Gods in order to save their lives.

And don't even get me started on how Magnus the Red was forced into the Choasness. Taken over by a Daemon/ betrayed, humiliated and branded as a tratior by his father for trying to save him/ attacked by his brother so many bad things happened to him and his Chapter. Soooooooo.... forced into it. I actually feel bad for him - and Conrad Cruz "Mostly cos he had the coolest name tho"

Posted By Bozman on 02/20/2007 3:23 PM
Not to mention the sadistic torture of prisoners for no good reason.

What about fun?  That seems like a good reason.

I don't think it's fair to apply all these standards of morality to alien races.  Yes, the C'tan want to eat you, but that's only because you're so tasty!  Hell, little fluffy lambs are cute as a button, but that doesn't mean they're not yummy to my tummy.  If I'm not supposed to eat them then why are they made out of tender succulent meat?

Chaos and Dark Eldar just want to savor the flavor of your delicious soul.  Yes, they have been known to play with their food, but having bad table manners isn't exactly evil per se.  And Tyranids just want to taste your sweet, sweet biomass.  The Emperor devours the souls of a thousand psykers every day - so what?  Fat kids gotta eat!  I think most of the factions in 40K aren't really evil so much as just really hungry.

Dark Eldar are the most evil race. Nobody can touch them on their Spiky Bits rate - it's got to be at least 10-15 SBPSI for an average Dark Eldar model.

Yah! First post. Anyhoo.

Chaos is definently the most evil. Look at it this way the DE does alot of torturing but they are a small faction, where as Chaos is huge. And in case anyone remembers Slaneshi followers do the torture thing too, but just for fun. Also She Who Thirsts is a DE god and that is Slaneesh so DE are chaos.

C'tan are pretty evil, but I think more like children. The old saying is children can be so cruel. Well to the C'tan the physical universe is just a play ground to them so I would question if they acutally if they really understand what they are doing. Like killing ants with a magnifying glass when your 8yrs old.

 

that was flipping hillarious!

Posted By Celtic Strike on 02/10/2007 1:58 AM

Nids? Yes. No question.

I would actually disagree with saying that nids are evil. Yes, they devour everything in their path and kill mercelessly, but its out of instinct. They do it for the survival of their species. There is no thought processes behind it, unlike Chaos and DE. Those two think about what they are doing. A gaunt does not.

Take sharks for example. They are vicious predators that have killed humans in the past. Does it make them evil? Not really. They are just doing what instinct and millions of years worth of evolution have tought them to do and made them to do well.

The only real trully evil race is Humanity

Chaos Belives that the emperor was the wrong man for the job. But they backed the wrong horse in Horus .

Tau fight for the survival of their race but are kind enough to allow other races to join their fight.

Nids are not evil because they are following the darwinan concept of survival of the fittest.

Orks are not evil because they just want a good fight and nothing more are are born into it and have no real choice.

Necrons are basically a pawn race for the C'Tan but are willing to use others for the perfect form.

Eldar are selfish but do so at the protection of their race and try to keep the necrons/C'tan in check.

Dark Eldar are just twisted Sadists who just want pleasure and only collect slaves to show their power. Devious yes but not trully evil.

C'Tan want to destroy life at its very core and are just plain evil.

Kroot are hungry and are all about evolving their species not evil and they serve other races.

Humanity is trully evil as they will usually kill aliens and anyone who disagrees with their policies. They use their own race as pawns and toss out mutants or use abhumans as their own slaves. They also are twisted in their ideology and send thousands of their own to die for a gimp in a huge toilet so he can crap over them and they use it for psycannon ammo.


Humanity and C'Tan are most evil

NIds remind me more of an ant colony than being truly evil. They go around consuming everything for the colony and to grow. It's just an organism that eats to survive.