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And so, there has long been a theory that tyranids are the creation of the Old Ones as an attempt to stop Necrons. Recently, a book about Cawl was published, in which it turns out that Pharos (the thing that attracted the tyranids) is not a psichic device(https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/d7779m/belisarius_cawl_the_great_work_lore_dump_spoilers/f3kkx6e/). This is a device of necrons and it works due to the power of C'tan. And so, it turns out that the power of C'tan attracted tyranids to our galaxy? Can this be considered evidence that the tyranids are the creation of the Old Ones, created to combat the necrons?

It's not strictly a Necron device, but one re-purposed by the Necrons.

Personally I'd be against it on the basis of the universe not needing to be narrowed anymore than it already is, and it would be nice to have actors beyond the Old Ones and C'tan.

Not really. It's like saying if I set off a big fire in medieval England and that fire attracts French raiders to my village then fire is a French weapon.

pm713 wrote:
Not really. It's like saying if I set off a big fire in medieval England and that fire attracts French raiders to my village then fire is a French weapon.

Doesn’t it seem strange to you that it was C'tan’s power that attracted them? Tyranids are psychic creatures, but they noticed it anyway. And didn’t it in the novel mention that the Tyranids were waiting for some signal and received it when Pharos was activated?

No, I don't think they are. As far as we are aware, the Tyranids are much older then the Old Ones and the Necron, possibly even older then the C'Tan. They are also comming from a distant galaxy in which there are no Old Ones and no Necrons nor C'Tan. Tyranids are attracted to the Milky Way because there is life in it. The Pharos is a proof that there is a lot of living things that can be consumed.

darkoms wrote:

pm713 wrote:
Not really. It's like saying if I set off a big fire in medieval England and that fire attracts French raiders to my village then fire is a French weapon.

Doesn’t it seem strange to you that it was C'tan’s power that attracted them? Tyranids are psychic creatures, but they noticed it anyway. And didn’t it in the novel mention that the Tyranids were waiting for some signal and received it when Pharos was activated?

Not really. I think it's dumb that they're doubling down on C'Tan Shards but that's it. They saw the psychic version of an explosion and went towards it and it's not exactly unique that they have science interacting with the Warp.

It is unlikely that tyranids are a creation of the old ones that was meant to fight the necrons.

For one, the Tyranids are confirmed to be extragalactic in origin, and there isn't any evidence to confirm that the old ones operated outside of our galaxy. Secondly, there is also the fact that it is explicitly said in the lore that Tyranid hive fleets actively AVOID necron tomb worlds like the plague. Why would the Tyranids avoid tomb worlds if it was their purpose to fight necrons/C'Tan? Lastly, the Tyranid processes of reproduction depend on harvesting biomass, and the necrons and their worlds have little if any of that. Why would the old ones make a weapon that was depleted by doing its "task" like that, but gets stronger when it kills biological organisms and harvests non-necron worlds? It doesn't make any sense...

It is far more likely that the Tyranids are just intergalactic space locusts that happened to be attracted to our galaxy for whatever reason.

The threat and horror of the Tyranids is their sweeping aside of humanity's petty squabbles and ideology and concerns as irrelevant and of no concern to the rest of the universe.

Of all the threats, the vast majority are threatening humanity with some form of enslavement or foreign domination. Whether it be to Orks, to Dark Eldar, to the Necrons/C'tan, to the Chaos gods, or Tau, humanity would still survive albeit in some oppressed or degraded fashion. The manner of survival may be repugnant to the reader but the species as a whole would still survive even if the life of any one individual is short or brutal.

However Tyranids present a different sort of threat: that of total and utter extinction for the individual and the species. That is where their horror lies: they don't care about you. You are not even a plaything or slave to them. Other races and factions care enough to hate and oppose your ideals, or look down on you as primitive and barbaric or effete and wimpy. The Tyranids are like an implacable and uncaring force of nature, and puts individuals of all races in their place as insignificant specks in a hostile but most of all uncaring universe, to be swept away in an avalanche of claws and teeth.

Almost all Tyranid Lore is written from the perspective of other races, even within their own codex. As a result whilst much is known most is unknown about them.

Origins, purpose, thoughts, ideals, whatever you want to call it we basically don't know when it comes to Tyranids. One can only observe their behaviour and draw hypothesis.

Wouldn't surprise me with the similarities between the orks and the Tyranids since the beast series was written.

 Formosa wrote:
Wouldn't surprise me with the similarities between the orks and the Tyranids since the beast series was written.

Come on. That is a massive stretch at best, and you know it.