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Today I scrolled through my own post history. It was quite fun and I came across this, originally posted two years ago. Seeing as we're in a new edition of the game and stuff has been moving forward I figured I'd repost it and update it for the current fluff. Here's a list of all "god like" enteties in 40k. The C'tans are included.

Mankind:
The Emperor -Patron entity of humanity, Encased in the golden throne, shining in the warp. (-Star Child)

Chaos:
Tzeentch -Chaos god of change, Resides in his realm in chaos.
Slaanesh -Chaos god of pleasure, Resides in his realm in chaos.
Nurgle -Chaos god of pestilence, Resides in his realm in chaos.
Khorne -Chaos god of war, Resides in his realm in chaos.
Malal/Malice -Chaos god, opposes the other four, imprisoned in the warp.
Valoscht -Chaos god, Patron of the soul forge, Resides in his realm in chaos.

Eldar:
Isha -Goddess of life, Imprisoned by Nurgle.
Kaela mesha Khaine -God of war, splintered amongst the craftworlds.
Cegorach -Laughing god, Lord of the webway and keeper of the black library.
Ynnead -God of death, unborn, cradled in the webway.

Hrud:
Quah -He who lingers, Residing in his Umbra

Orks:
Gork -Brutal but cunnin', Warp entity.
Mork -Cunnin' but brutal, Warp entity.

Tyranids:
The Hive mind -Unkown.

C'tan:
The Nightbringer -The C'tan of death, actively waging wars.
The Deciever -The C'tan of trickery, last seen close to the Eye of terror.
The Void Dragon -The C'tan of the machine, beaten by the Emperor, sleeps in Mars.
The Outsider -The C'tan of insanity, Sleeps outside our galaxy, has been actively avoided by Tyranids.
The Burning one -The C'tan of fire, splintered, shards in control of the necrons.
The Worldmaker -The C'tan responsible for the World Engine. Presumably left the galaxy.
The Enldess swarm -Unkown. (-name implies a link with the tyranids).

So what's new? We got a new tyranid codex and the necron codex is on its way. Ynnead is born and has some friends with her/him. Any help with updating this list would be appreciated.

Did you want to include the now-dead Eldar gods? Seems like you intended to leave them out (a reasonable, possibly wise, decision).

I thought the newcrons shattered the C'tan and made them Pokemon with only the Outsider and Void Dragon still at large.

There's also a shard of one C'Tan (Deceiver, I think?) inside (the avatar of) Khaine.

And some fluff points to shards of the Mars C'Tan in the vehicles with POTMS.

 Nerak wrote:

Orks:
Gork -Brutal but cunnin', Warp entity.
Mork -Cunnin' but brutal, Warp entity.

You've got that backwards; Gork is Cunnin', but brutal, and Mork is the one that's Brutal, but Cunnin'.

M.

Bharring wrote:
There's also a shard of one C'Tan (Deceiver, I think?) inside (the avatar of) Khaine.

And some fluff points to shards of the Mars C'Tan in the vehicles with POTMS.

Neat! I hadn't thought of it that way before.

The C'Tan that corrupted Khaine somewhat is the Nightbringer, reaulting in his aspect of the Reaper.

 Ynneadwraith wrote:

Bharring wrote:
There's also a shard of one C'Tan (Deceiver, I think?) inside (the avatar of) Khaine.

And some fluff points to shards of the Mars C'Tan in the vehicles with POTMS.

Neat! I hadn't thought of it that way before.

The C'Tan that corrupted Khaine somewhat is the Nightbringer, reaulting in his aspect of the Reaper.

Is that still actual fluff? I thought it was retconned along with other Oldcron stuff for not making much sense (How does a purely physical entity "corrupt" a warp entity?)

 Esmer wrote:

 Ynneadwraith wrote:

Bharring wrote:
There's also a shard of one C'Tan (Deceiver, I think?) inside (the avatar of) Khaine.

And some fluff points to shards of the Mars C'Tan in the vehicles with POTMS.

Neat! I hadn't thought of it that way before.

The C'Tan that corrupted Khaine somewhat is the Nightbringer, reaulting in his aspect of the Reaper.

Is that still actual fluff? I thought it was retconned along with other Oldcron stuff for not making much sense (How does a purely physical entity "corrupt" a warp entity?)

Good question. Haven't got the latest Craftworld codex to have a look. Shall have a flick through my 7th ed. one for it.

My take on the whole 'Khaine corrupted by the Nightbringer' is that the myths tend to be symbolic remembrances of real-world events (with a few fabrications thrown in there to make the story better), just like real-world myths.

So, the whole 'Khaine was corrupted by the Nightbringer after beating him in a fist-fight' could represent the eldar's dim and distant memory of one of the Old Ones (or their forces) winning against the forces of the Nightbringer at terrible cost and either adopting some of the Nightbringer's strategies. Likewise it could represent some sort of technological warfare with the Nightbringer attempting to corrupt not-yet-Khaine's technology with a virus. It could also be that what the eldar now remember as Khaine became bitter and twisted after their conflict with the Nightbringer's forces, changing culturally from a warrior-culture to a focus on 'reaping' their enemies. It could also be something completely different, or a complete fabrication.

That's how the myths of the eldar should be interpreted. They're all oral histories of real-world events that took place before the galaxy became quite as fethed up as it is now. Before the Chaos Gods. Probably before the Eldar Gods if the Old Ones somehow transitioned into them*. Back when the warp was a calm sea, and the Old Ones/Eldar Gods were regular flesh and blood.

*My favourite theory is that after the flesh-and-blood Old Ones were genocided by the Necrons/C'Tan, the Eldar conjured their gods based on how they remembered the big players from their lowly involvement as footsoldiers in the War in Heaven. So the eldar gods are completely new entities to the Old Ones, but are echoes of them from the eldar perspective. As is the want with oral histories and myths, everything gets muddled up with symbolism and retelling, and what results isn't necessarily an accurate telling of how stuff happened exactly.

One of the interesting things with the above theory is that it's likely that Cegorach is how the eldar remembered 'The Deceiver'. It's stated that both C'Tan and Old Ones switched sides during the course of the conflict, and the Deceiver especially is shown to have played both sides.

 Nerak wrote:
Malal/Malice -Chaos god, opposes the other four, imprisoned in the warp.

Pretty sure he isn't canon anymore, but oddly enough the Sons of Malice are.

 Nerak wrote:
Valoscht -Chaos god, Patron of the soul forge, Resides in his realm in chaos.

I have never heard of this Chaos God nor can I find mention of him. You got any links or other information on him?

The 'Khaine corrupted by the Nightbringer' might also be a misstatement. It might be that 'Khaine' "grew", or changed, in the less virulent sense. It's possible Khaine now has an aspect of Reaping, but it's nothing nefarious on Nightbringer's part, and doesn't detract from Khaine's other aspects. Like how if you play someone in a game, you learn from them, get better, and perhaps grow new aspects in yourself.

I do like that a shard of the Nightbringer is now part of Khaine, but I hope it doesn't play out as corruption or some C'Tan plot. Khaine being the Bloody Handed God is great fluff. Some of his followers being devoted to passionless reaping is great. But I'm glad they did the Shard thing to explain how Khaine has a passionless aspect.

Never head of that Valoscht chaos god as well

 Nerak wrote:
The Worldmaker -The C'tan responsible for the World Engine. Presumably left the galaxy.

The only really smart creature in the entire 40k setting!

Valchocht the Maker, he controls the Soul Forge, and is basically the Machine-God with tentacles and horns. I can’t remember if he’s canon or from The Shape Of The Nightmare To Come.

The Irony of 40k is that there are no Gods, all are just very powerful beings from there respective realms.

Every single Warp "god" is just the most powerful Vortex of there respective aspect, they can be absorbed by greater Vortex's in the warp, this last part is pure conjecture, what happens to the older aspects that are absorbed by the greater ones (chaos gods for example), do they take on some of that aspect, are the "old Gods" still sentient within the greater whole? makes me wonder.

C'Tan are just mega powerful real world entities and not actual gods either, they just seem like it from the very limited understanding of the 40k races.

Gork and Mork are the same as the chaos gods, same with eldar gods.

Hive Mind isnt a god either

The Umbra are a race of Xenos, possibly fragments of a chaos god or C'Tan, but mega cool, not gods or god like.

Another one that could be considered a "warp God" was Ghul, the only Deamon KING in the fluff, it fought Tzeench and nearly won, or was it Khorne?

 Formosa wrote:
The Irony of 40k is that there are no Gods, all are just very powerful beings from there respective realms.

Every single Warp "god" is just the most powerful Vortex of there respective aspect, they can be absorbed by greater Vortex's in the warp, this last part is pure conjecture, what happens to the older aspects that are absorbed by the greater ones (chaos gods for example), do they take on some of that aspect, are the "old Gods" still sentient within the greater whole? makes me wonder.

C'Tan are just mega powerful real world entities and not actual gods either, they just seem like it from the very limited understanding of the 40k races.

Gork and Mork are the same as the chaos gods, same with eldar gods.

Hive Mind isnt a god either

The Umbra are a race of Xenos, possibly fragments of a chaos god or C'Tan, but mega cool, not gods or god like.

Another one that could be considered a "warp God" was Ghul, the only Deamon KING in the fluff, it fought Tzeench and nearly won, or was it Khorne?

Very true although you could argue precisely the same thing in relation and any 'god' in mythology, real or fictional

 Ynneadwraith wrote:

 Formosa wrote:
The Irony of 40k is that there are no Gods, all are just very powerful beings from there respective realms.

Every single Warp "god" is just the most powerful Vortex of there respective aspect, they can be absorbed by greater Vortex's in the warp, this last part is pure conjecture, what happens to the older aspects that are absorbed by the greater ones (chaos gods for example), do they take on some of that aspect, are the "old Gods" still sentient within the greater whole? makes me wonder.

C'Tan are just mega powerful real world entities and not actual gods either, they just seem like it from the very limited understanding of the 40k races.

Gork and Mork are the same as the chaos gods, same with eldar gods.

Hive Mind isnt a god either

The Umbra are a race of Xenos, possibly fragments of a chaos god or C'Tan, but mega cool, not gods or god like.

Another one that could be considered a "warp God" was Ghul, the only Deamon KING in the fluff, it fought Tzeench and nearly won, or was it Khorne?

Very true although you could argue precisely the same thing in relation and any 'god' in mythology, real or fictional

I can and I do lol

 Formosa wrote:
The Irony of 40k is that there are no Gods, all are just very powerful beings from there respective realms.

Every single Warp "god" is just the most powerful Vortex of there respective aspect, they can be absorbed by greater Vortex's in the warp, this last part is pure conjecture, what happens to the older aspects that are absorbed by the greater ones (chaos gods for example), do they take on some of that aspect, are the "old Gods" still sentient within the greater whole? makes me wonder.

C'Tan are just mega powerful real world entities and not actual gods either, they just seem like it from the very limited understanding of the 40k races.

Gork and Mork are the same as the chaos gods, same with eldar gods.

Hive Mind isnt a god either

The Umbra are a race of Xenos, possibly fragments of a chaos god or C'Tan, but mega cool, not gods or god like.

Another one that could be considered a "warp God" was Ghul, the only Deamon KING in the fluff, it fought Tzeench and nearly won, or was it Khorne?

What makes something a god? If you go by the definition of “supernatural, superior being” then any warp entity of sufficient magnitude qualifies, and all warp entities (daemons) are either pretty weak or fragments of the large chaos god they’re associated with, so ergo the 4 chaos gods fulfill at least one working definition of “god.”

 gnome_idea_what wrote:

 Formosa wrote:
The Irony of 40k is that there are no Gods, all are just very powerful beings from there respective realms.

Every single Warp "god" is just the most powerful Vortex of there respective aspect, they can be absorbed by greater Vortex's in the warp, this last part is pure conjecture, what happens to the older aspects that are absorbed by the greater ones (chaos gods for example), do they take on some of that aspect, are the "old Gods" still sentient within the greater whole? makes me wonder.

C'Tan are just mega powerful real world entities and not actual gods either, they just seem like it from the very limited understanding of the 40k races.

Gork and Mork are the same as the chaos gods, same with eldar gods.

Hive Mind isnt a god either

The Umbra are a race of Xenos, possibly fragments of a chaos god or C'Tan, but mega cool, not gods or god like.

Another one that could be considered a "warp God" was Ghul, the only Deamon KING in the fluff, it fought Tzeench and nearly won, or was it Khorne?

What makes something a god? If you go by the definition of “supernatural, superior being” then any warp entity of sufficient magnitude qualifies, and all warp entities (daemons) are either pretty weak or fragments of the large chaos god they’re associated with, so ergo the 4 chaos gods fulfill at least one working definition of “god.”

I go with the classical meaning myself, so the supreme being, all knowing and omnipresent, creator of everything, anything or anyone can be worshipped as a God, but that doesnt actually make them a god, godlike sure, but not a true deity.

 Verviedi wrote:
Valchocht the Maker, he controls the Soul Forge, and is basically the Machine-God with tentacles and horns. I can’t remember if he’s canon or from The Shape Of The Nightmare To Come.

My Google Searching says he's from The Shape To Come which is fanfiction, so no - Valchocht the Maker is not canon.

So two of the originally listed Chaos Gods are not canon.

 Formosa wrote:

 gnome_idea_what wrote:

 Formosa wrote:
The Irony of 40k is that there are no Gods, all are just very powerful beings from there respective realms.

Every single Warp "god" is just the most powerful Vortex of there respective aspect, they can be absorbed by greater Vortex's in the warp, this last part is pure conjecture, what happens to the older aspects that are absorbed by the greater ones (chaos gods for example), do they take on some of that aspect, are the "old Gods" still sentient within the greater whole? makes me wonder.

C'Tan are just mega powerful real world entities and not actual gods either, they just seem like it from the very limited understanding of the 40k races.

Gork and Mork are the same as the chaos gods, same with eldar gods.

Hive Mind isnt a god either

The Umbra are a race of Xenos, possibly fragments of a chaos god or C'Tan, but mega cool, not gods or god like.

Another one that could be considered a "warp God" was Ghul, the only Deamon KING in the fluff, it fought Tzeench and nearly won, or was it Khorne?

What makes something a god? If you go by the definition of “supernatural, superior being” then any warp entity of sufficient magnitude qualifies, and all warp entities (daemons) are either pretty weak or fragments of the large chaos god they’re associated with, so ergo the 4 chaos gods fulfill at least one working definition of “god.”

I go with the classical meaning myself, so the supreme being, all knowing and omnipresent, creator of everything, anything or anyone can be worshipped as a God, but that doesnt actually make them a god, godlike sure, but not a true deity.

That's a very restrictive definition your applying to the word "god" and not most common one historically. Monotheistic gods are a recent historical development with the vast majority in history residing in pantheons of gods. The gods in most mythologies aren't " a supreme being, or all knowing and omnipresent". In most they are not even the actual creators of existence either. Once you get past basic animistic beliefs like say Orks have for instance. You get the concept of power supernatural beings birthed from the void. Which actually fits the Warp gods well. Concepts like omnipresent and omniscience, are much later add-on to existing deities.

The Hive mind could be seen as a god its immaterial "super-natural", powerful and worshiped by the Tyranids in away. Even the Old One and C'tans should qualify. If sufficiently advanced science is indistinguishable from magic. Then there's no reason a sufficiently powerful alien being would be indistinguishable from a god. Remember, one definition of a god is a "supreme being"; so even the Emperor could qualify as he certainly is that.

 IllumiNini wrote:

 Verviedi wrote:
Valchocht the Maker, he controls the Soul Forge, and is basically the Machine-God with tentacles and horns. I can’t remember if he’s canon or from The Shape Of The Nightmare To Come.

My Google Searching says he's from The Shape To Come which is fanfiction, so no - Valchocht the Maker is not canon.

So two of the originally listed Chaos Gods are not canon.

Well Malal is still sorta canon. Sorta.

There is no real definition of a god that covers everything we call gods, but nothing else. There are plenty of supernatural beings in mythology that aren't considered to be gods, such as the Devil in Christian tradition, the giants of Norse myth, nymphs, ghosts and whatnot. In the end, if the believers in an entity consider(ed) it a god, it is.

The entities I would call "gods" in the 40k setting are the Eldar gods, the Ork gods and the four Chaos gods. Basically warp entities of sufficient power and with followers who consider them gods. Daemon Princes aren't gods because they're vastly inferior to the four gods of Chaos, the Emperor isn't a god because he's physical, same with the C'tan.

This is just my take on it, there are plenty of gods in different myths around the world who seem to be very physical, and many are clearly inferior to other beings. A standard Eldar farseer could easily pass for a god in our world, as could probably a guy in an airplane to Stone Age people. That doesn't make them gods, but how do you know?

 Sersi wrote:

 Formosa wrote:

 gnome_idea_what wrote:

 Formosa wrote:
The Irony of 40k is that there are no Gods, all are just very powerful beings from there respective realms.

Every single Warp "god" is just the most powerful Vortex of there respective aspect, they can be absorbed by greater Vortex's in the warp, this last part is pure conjecture, what happens to the older aspects that are absorbed by the greater ones (chaos gods for example), do they take on some of that aspect, are the "old Gods" still sentient within the greater whole? makes me wonder.

C'Tan are just mega powerful real world entities and not actual gods either, they just seem like it from the very limited understanding of the 40k races.

Gork and Mork are the same as the chaos gods, same with eldar gods.

Hive Mind isnt a god either

The Umbra are a race of Xenos, possibly fragments of a chaos god or C'Tan, but mega cool, not gods or god like.

Another one that could be considered a "warp God" was Ghul, the only Deamon KING in the fluff, it fought Tzeench and nearly won, or was it Khorne?

What makes something a god? If you go by the definition of “supernatural, superior being” then any warp entity of sufficient magnitude qualifies, and all warp entities (daemons) are either pretty weak or fragments of the large chaos god they’re associated with, so ergo the 4 chaos gods fulfill at least one working definition of “god.”

I go with the classical meaning myself, so the supreme being, all knowing and omnipresent, creator of everything, anything or anyone can be worshipped as a God, but that doesnt actually make them a god, godlike sure, but not a true deity.

That's a very restrictive definition your applying to the word "god" and not most common one historically. Monotheistic gods are a recent historical development with the vast majority in history residing in pantheons of gods. The gods in most mythologies aren't " a supreme being, or all knowing and omnipresent". In most they are not even the actual creators of existence either. Once you get past basic animistic beliefs like say Orks have for instance. You get the concept of power supernatural beings birthed from the void. Which actually fits the Warp gods well. Concepts like omnipresent and omniscience, are much later add-on to existing deities.

The Hive mind could be seen as a god its immaterial "super-natural", powerful and worshiped by the Tyranids in away. Even the Old One and C'tans should qualify. If sufficiently advanced science is indistinguishable from magic. Then there's no reason a sufficiently powerful alien being would be indistinguishable from a god. Remember, one definition of a god is a "supreme being"; so even the Emperor could qualify as he certainly is that.

Yeah I know its restrictive, but thats kind of the point, as you said "science as magic" but hey, its still science, then you have total supernatural with the warp, they stick up the middle finger to science, and finally you have the C'Tan who make science there bitch, other beings are somewhere in between these powers of destruction, but not a single one of those beings can create life, not a single one, none can create worlds, sure they can make things with tools, but actually create it, from nothing, the Primarchs for example are just a lesser copy of the Emperor, test tube babies, not true creation of life.

None are onipresent, none are omnipotent, just being powerful doesnt make you a god, just being worshipped doesnt make you a god, its one of my favourite things about the 40k law, billions kill and die in the name of false gods.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Cream Tea wrote:
There is no real definition of a god that covers everything we call gods, but nothing else. There are plenty of supernatural beings in mythology that aren't considered to be gods, such as the Devil in Christian tradition, the giants of Norse myth, nymphs, ghosts and whatnot. In the end, if the believers in an entity consider(ed) it a god, it is.

The entities I would call "gods" in the 40k setting are the Eldar gods, the Ork gods and the four Chaos gods. Basically warp entities of sufficient power and with followers who consider them gods. Daemon Princes aren't gods because they're vastly inferior to the four gods of Chaos, the Emperor isn't a god because he's physical, same with the C'tan.

This is just my take on it, there are plenty of gods in different myths around the world who seem to be very physical, and many are clearly inferior to other beings. A standard Eldar farseer could easily pass for a god in our world, as could probably a guy in an airplane to Stone Age people. That doesn't make them gods, but how do you know?

So do you see the Warp Gods (all of them) as kind of a Greek Pantheon?

Personally I just see them as an extra dimentional predator, not even truelly sentient.

 Ynneadwraith wrote:

 Esmer wrote:

 Ynneadwraith wrote:

Bharring wrote:
There's also a shard of one C'Tan (Deceiver, I think?) inside (the avatar of) Khaine.

And some fluff points to shards of the Mars C'Tan in the vehicles with POTMS.

Neat! I hadn't thought of it that way before.

The C'Tan that corrupted Khaine somewhat is the Nightbringer, reaulting in his aspect of the Reaper.

Is that still actual fluff? I thought it was retconned along with other Oldcron stuff for not making much sense (How does a purely physical entity "corrupt" a warp entity?)

Good question. Haven't got the latest Craftworld codex to have a look. Shall have a flick through my 7th ed. one for it.

My take on the whole 'Khaine corrupted by the Nightbringer' is that the myths tend to be symbolic remembrances of real-world events (with a few fabrications thrown in there to make the story better), just like real-world myths.

So, the whole 'Khaine was corrupted by the Nightbringer after beating him in a fist-fight' could represent the eldar's dim and distant memory of one of the Old Ones (or their forces) winning against the forces of the Nightbringer at terrible cost and either adopting some of the Nightbringer's strategies. Likewise it could represent some sort of technological warfare with the Nightbringer attempting to corrupt not-yet-Khaine's technology with a virus. It could also be that what the eldar now remember as Khaine became bitter and twisted after their conflict with the Nightbringer's forces, changing culturally from a warrior-culture to a focus on 'reaping' their enemies. It could also be something completely different, or a complete fabrication.

That's how the myths of the eldar should be interpreted. They're all oral histories of real-world events that took place before the galaxy became quite as fethed up as it is now. Before the Chaos Gods. Probably before the Eldar Gods if the Old Ones somehow transitioned into them*. Back when the warp was a calm sea, and the Old Ones/Eldar Gods were regular flesh and blood.

*My favourite theory is that after the flesh-and-blood Old Ones were genocided by the Necrons/C'Tan, the Eldar conjured their gods based on how they remembered the big players from their lowly involvement as footsoldiers in the War in Heaven. So the eldar gods are completely new entities to the Old Ones, but are echoes of them from the eldar perspective. As is the want with oral histories and myths, everything gets muddled up with symbolism and retelling, and what results isn't necessarily an accurate telling of how stuff happened exactly.

One of the interesting things with the above theory is that it's likely that Cegorach is how the eldar remembered 'The Deceiver'. It's stated that both C'Tan and Old Ones switched sides during the course of the conflict, and the Deceiver especially is shown to have played both sides.

A couple of Eldar gods still exist though. Isha has been stated to be Nurgle's captive, Khaine's shattered pieces are the Avatars and Cegorach has been explicitedly stated to have been the one Eldar deity that completely evaded Slaneesh's grasp. So maybe the Eldar gods were originally mortal Old Ones who trascended to godhood, but they definitely did/do exist as independent immortal warp entities.

 Esmer wrote:

 Ynneadwraith wrote:

 Esmer wrote:

 Ynneadwraith wrote:

Bharring wrote:
There's also a shard of one C'Tan (Deceiver, I think?) inside (the avatar of) Khaine.

And some fluff points to shards of the Mars C'Tan in the vehicles with POTMS.

Neat! I hadn't thought of it that way before.

The C'Tan that corrupted Khaine somewhat is the Nightbringer, reaulting in his aspect of the Reaper.

Is that still actual fluff? I thought it was retconned along with other Oldcron stuff for not making much sense (How does a purely physical entity "corrupt" a warp entity?)

Good question. Haven't got the latest Craftworld codex to have a look. Shall have a flick through my 7th ed. one for it.

My take on the whole 'Khaine corrupted by the Nightbringer' is that the myths tend to be symbolic remembrances of real-world events (with a few fabrications thrown in there to make the story better), just like real-world myths.

So, the whole 'Khaine was corrupted by the Nightbringer after beating him in a fist-fight' could represent the eldar's dim and distant memory of one of the Old Ones (or their forces) winning against the forces of the Nightbringer at terrible cost and either adopting some of the Nightbringer's strategies. Likewise it could represent some sort of technological warfare with the Nightbringer attempting to corrupt not-yet-Khaine's technology with a virus. It could also be that what the eldar now remember as Khaine became bitter and twisted after their conflict with the Nightbringer's forces, changing culturally from a warrior-culture to a focus on 'reaping' their enemies. It could also be something completely different, or a complete fabrication.

That's how the myths of the eldar should be interpreted. They're all oral histories of real-world events that took place before the galaxy became quite as fethed up as it is now. Before the Chaos Gods. Probably before the Eldar Gods if the Old Ones somehow transitioned into them*. Back when the warp was a calm sea, and the Old Ones/Eldar Gods were regular flesh and blood.

*My favourite theory is that after the flesh-and-blood Old Ones were genocided by the Necrons/C'Tan, the Eldar conjured their gods based on how they remembered the big players from their lowly involvement as footsoldiers in the War in Heaven. So the eldar gods are completely new entities to the Old Ones, but are echoes of them from the eldar perspective. As is the want with oral histories and myths, everything gets muddled up with symbolism and retelling, and what results isn't necessarily an accurate telling of how stuff happened exactly.

One of the interesting things with the above theory is that it's likely that Cegorach is how the eldar remembered 'The Deceiver'. It's stated that both C'Tan and Old Ones switched sides during the course of the conflict, and the Deceiver especially is shown to have played both sides.

A couple of Eldar gods still exist though. Isha has been stated to be Nurgle's captive, Khaine's shattered pieces are the Avatars and Cegorach has been explicitedly stated to have been the one Eldar deity that completely evaded Slaneesh's grasp. So maybe the Eldar gods were originally mortal Old Ones who trascended to godhood, but they definitely did/do exist as independent immortal warp entities.

That's a definite possibility.

The main reason I prefer the 'Eldar gods are echoes of the Old Ones' is because it makes the Necrons more badass. It means that they have genocided not one, but two of the most powerful species ever to have existed in the 40k galaxy (Old Ones and effectively the C'Tan). Rule of Cool dictates my preference there. Both are equally viable possibilities.

The fluff states that the Old Ones died out when their fighting against the C'Tan and Necrons got out of hand, and they lost control. So it's kinda canon that Necrons genocided the Old Ones, for certain meanings of genocided. It could also be claimed that it was the Old Ones, not the Necrons, that killed them (accidentally).

Bharring wrote:
The fluff states that the Old Ones died out when their fighting against the C'Tan and Necrons got out of hand, and they lost control. So it's kinda canon that Necrons genocided the Old Ones, for certain meanings of genocided. It could also be claimed that it was the Old Ones, not the Necrons, that killed them (accidentally).

The trouble with 40k canon (especially on distant events) is that none of it should be taken at face value. While I do think that the Necrons wiped out the Old Ones, it's also equally possible that the Necrons only thought they wiped out the Old Ones because they couldn't follow them into the warp when/if they transcended. It's also equally possible that the Necrons didn't wipe out the Old Ones at all and just claimed they did. It could also be a complete fiction made up in the myths of the eldar bearing only the faintest resemblance to real-world events.

It's like real-world history piecing it together from differing biased accounts to try and come up with a plausible picture

In the fluff, do the Necrons even know/care if the Old Ones were eliminated?

I know they care about if they won the War, but wasn't their goal more not-get-wiped-out than kill-those-guys?

Bharring wrote:
In the fluff, do the Necrons even know/care if the Old Ones were eliminated?

I know they care about if they won the War, but wasn't their goal more not-get-wiped-out than kill-those-guys?

Newcron fluff probably not, but considering it's 80% awful I tend to cherry-pick the good bits and revert to the Oldcron fluff whenever it's better (read-most of the time)

Personal reading of course

Bharring wrote:
The fluff states that the Old Ones died out when their fighting against the C'Tan and Necrons got out of hand, and they lost control. So it's kinda canon that Necrons genocided the Old Ones, for certain meanings of genocided. It could also be claimed that it was the Old Ones, not the Necrons, that killed them (accidentally).

The old Necron Codex said there were degenerate descendants of the Old Ones around (and to represent them with WHFB Lizardmen), and that the Necrons still bore a special interest/hatred in them, allowing Eldar could use these degenerate OLd Ones as bait to lure Necrons into traps.

 IllumiNini wrote:

My Google Searching says he's from The Shape To Come which is fanfiction, so no - Valchocht the Maker is not canon.

So two of the originally listed Chaos Gods are not canon.

I'll have to look into Valchocht. If he's indeed only from fanfiction then he should be removed. From a lore perspective it would make sense for there to be a chaos god of machines. With the Admech having been active for so long, the previous men of Iron rebellion back during the DAoT and the presence of the necrons a machine chaos god should have come to exsist.

Malal is a bit more of an complex issue. Originally there was supposed to be 3 chaos gods and malal was a part of them. Gw lost the right to him when a certain employe quit the company. Since then malal has been hanging around edges of the canon as a form of anti chaos god. He doesn't have a legion associated with him nor has he been featured in the codexes. This is true for quah too though. So I figured let's keep him in there.

As for the definition of the gods I figure that the list speaks for itself. All the gods have a certain power level in common. I preffered the oldcrons but I figure the C'tans should still pass to make it on the list. Even though they're all splintered. If I include Khaine however then the C'tans shouldn't be left out.