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Ok this may seem like a dumb question but do the orks really want to conquer the whole galaxy?

It seems to me if they did they would have during the 60 million years after the war in heaven while the necrons were napping, the eldar were degenerating and humans were evolving. Given the rate they can reproduce it seems like they could have overran every habitable planet in the milky way long ago even with just sublight ships.

Is it possible orks don't really want to conquer the galaxy because there's be nothing left for them to do afterwards? Thrakka could have killed yarrick once but didn't because orks need good enemies to fight.

So do orks subconsciously sabotage their own efforts to conquer everything because there'd be nothing else to fight? Is it almost like humans limiting hunting to keep species from going extinct? After the war in heaven did the krorks just sit on their big green butts and degenerate into orks for 60 million years to let new lifeforms evolve so they'd have enemies to fight, occasionally beating down the eldar to stop them taking up all the planets in the galaxy? Do orks start to fight among themselves when near total victory to give other races a chance to survive, regrow and come back at them?

Conquering the galaxy might seem like what most orks would want, but i remember that old twilight zone ep where a crook died and went to the afterlife where he got everything he wanted, only to find out it was hell, not heaven, because it was boring after a while.,

Nothing in the 40k timeline makes any sense. Trying to make sense of it is silly. The idea that the Eldar sat around for 60 million years without appreciable technological advancement is farcical.

The much-maligned comment about how "there are as many elves as the story requires at the given moment" thing was a rare instance of total honesty. Nothing in 40k is designed to make sense; it's just designed to tell fun stories.

There are as many orks as the story needs, and they never actually succeed all that much because that wouldn't make for good storytelling.

Well, that is an honest answer, I give you that.

Conquest isn't really the goal of orks at any point. They don't show up to planets to take ownership or titles or land rights, but to have a good fight. And then get supplies for the next fight.

After they leave they don't care what happens. If the humies or whoever take it back, that's fine. If a new mob of yoofs grow up there and go out and find something to fight, that's fine too.

One could argue that the Orks actually DID Conquer the galaxy aside from the ridiculously small amount of planets that's inhabited by the Imperium. The amount of planets that are controlled by Orks outnumbers the Imperium and every other faction. Source? That cool map showing the Ork Population in the galaxy.
Closer to the point might be the Ork empires of Ullanor and the Beast where they came close to actually Conquer the Imperium, but were fought back.

The Orks won't conquerer the galaxy, because they have not interest in holding ground. They locate a target worthy of fighting. Fight it until the win or lose. And then move on to the next challenge.

So they may take a destroy a civilization, but they don't conquer it. They move on and come back a few centuries later to fight what grew up in their wake.

Answer is whatever mood the storyteller is feeling at the moment. The Tl;Dr is that only marines have narrative power right now, everyone else is doing nothing.

All they want to do is krump. if they krump enuff that there is nothing left to krump, they'll krump between each other. (un)fortunately for them, they really never get that far so....lather, rinse, repeat.

My take on this is that the Orks do want to conquer, but they want to keep fighting more. It's just that the vast, vast majority of them are a bit dim to realise that if they conquer everything, they won't have anything left to fight but themselves.

It's like putting a box of chocolates in front of a 5-year-old, and expecting them to have the self-awareness to save some for later. Of course not! That kid's gonna wolf down the whole box in one go, and probably be sick later.

If you directly asked an Ork, he probably would say yes. But in a philosophical sense he would not actually want that because it would mean no more fighting, though he wouldn't really understand it.

Because thats the real goal of orks. They just want to fight. Their fractious nature also prevents them from getting organized enough to actually conquer the galaxy. Every unstoppable Waaagh eventually, without fail, will fall apart due to infighting. The warboss will get challenged by one or more of his underlings, and this in turn will lead to them fighting each other, until eventually the Waaagh is no more.

Orks don't deliberately sabotage their efforts at galactic conquest, their inherent nature does. Ork's aren't a coherent galactic political entity, they just a species splintered into countless warring factions that fight everybody who isn't directly a part of their current group.

If the theory that Orks are a rogue bio-weapon is true, its possible that the designers of the orks had this situation in mind. They deliberately designed their bio-weapon to have a self-defeating failsafe that prevents it from totally taking over. IE: The orks will always fall to infighting if an individual group becomes too powerful.

In general Orks want a fight and from what we can generally see they will organise and mobilise to fight the biggest thing within their sphere of influence. If their sphere is a single world then they'll rise in numbers to challenge that world; if its a few worlds or a system or even a chapterhouse of Marines then they'll rise up in numbers to achieve that. This can somewhat explain why, when their sphere of influence contains no more power-body for them to fight; they start to crumble and infight. It is indeed an interesting selfbalancing system that allows orks to keep fighting continually.

It's a disaster for taking and holding worlds because they are unlikely to hold them for a great length before they destroy their own power to infighting. However as a means to ensure that the Orks keep getting fights and also that they keep having a real chance to win, its an interestingly effective system.

 Matt Swain wrote:
Is it almost like humans limiting hunting to keep species from going extinct?

Sad fact is humans are actually, as a species, pretty bad at doing this. In fact disastrous would be a good way to describe our hunting practice in terms of prey preservation.

 Overread wrote:

 Matt Swain wrote:
Is it almost like humans limiting hunting to keep species from going extinct?

Sad fact is humans are actually, as a species, pretty bad at doing this. In fact disastrous would be a good way to describe our hunting practice in terms of prey preservation.

The opposite actually. The current North American model is actually the best method for preserving wild prey species anywhere. Elk, Pronghorn, and many other species have bounced back and are thriving thanks to the system in place.

The issue with hunting comes from illegal poachers feeding the Asian crackpot medical market. Legal hunting is extremely beneficial as a management tool, plus it brings in lots of money to pay for conservation. Far more than donations from non-hunters.

 Grey Templar wrote:

 Overread wrote:

 Matt Swain wrote:
Is it almost like humans limiting hunting to keep species from going extinct?

Sad fact is humans are actually, as a species, pretty bad at doing this. In fact disastrous would be a good way to describe our hunting practice in terms of prey preservation.

The opposite actually. The current North American model is actually the best method for preserving wild prey species anywhere. Elk, Pronghorn, and many other species have bounced back and are thriving thanks to the system in place.

The issue with hunting comes from illegal poachers feeding the Asian crackpot medical market. Legal hunting is extremely beneficial as a management tool, plus it brings in lots of money to pay for conservation. Far more than donations from non-hunters.

Oh I agree legal hunting correctly controlled and monitored can be of benefit - especially in terms of bringing human value to land outside of its conversion to urban or farming practice. That said poachers aren't the only issue, sometimes hunting that's too profitable also brings its own issues (perhaps not to the direct prey species,but everything else)

However historically speaking humans are pretty bad at prey preservation. In fact its argued that as this is the only interstadial period without megafauna and this is the only one with humans that the two have a relationship. Which when you consider how good we are at hunting in general, does support it. Historically speaking we are very very bad at prey preservation. But taking this further would be a whole discussion in its own right.

did nobody read the war of the beast? As ork warbands grow in power they get more and more civilized. hell an ork emmesary came down to accept the surrender of the imperium and discuss terms. when orks are small warbands they just have feral boyz but as they grow the get nobz, warbosses, meks, docs, even bankers (teef counters) and brewers making squigg ale. In war of the beast we had an ork primarch (or better) equivilant and the society was quite good and complex.I might even argue a galaxy under ork rule might be better off than the rest of the grimdark 40k world.

In fact its argued that as this is the only interstadial period without megafauna and this is the only one with humans that the two have a relationship.

That's... a very bad argument
Its literally a single datapoint

 G00fySmiley wrote:
I might even argue a galaxy under ork rule might be better off than the rest of the grimdark 40k world.

Definitely better off than under the fascist, speciest, ableist Imperium - though their recent fluff seems to be moving the Imperium more towards the good guys (boo!).

Orks are actually the closest thing to utopians in 40k. They have none of the angst that every other race is burdened with. The only thing in their lore that is really problematic is the way they abuse the grots, but for all we know that's also just another side-effect that would also disappear with greater size and organization.

Of course, by the same token, it's possible that the utopianism of Ork society is because it is so simple, and that as their society becomes more complex, it may also become more grimdark.

Orks rise to the level of their opponent and devolve when its just them. Hence, in the Saga of the Beast, when the imperium was mostly unified and chaos marines had been expelled to the Eye of Terror, the Orks were likewise at their pinnacle. In the absence of an external foe, Orks will just keep fighting among themselves.

 Grumblewartz wrote:
Orks rise to the level of their opponent and devolve when its just them. Hence, in the Saga of the Beast, when the imperium was mostly unified and chaos marines had been expelled to the Eye of Terror, the Orks were likewise at their pinnacle. In the absence of an external foe, Orks will just keep fighting among themselves.

I think you're right, but it is contingent on the Orks not being continuously weeded out to prevent critical mass for WAAAAGH!'s. The Orks never managed to challenge Eldar Empire's supremacy in their apex before the Fall, partly because the Eldar's autonomous constructs went on periodical purges to keep them in check. Part of the reason the Beast was formed was because the Imperium became complacent and didn't finish what they started, so the Orks were basically able to rebound from their loss in the GC.

As said, Orks live to fight and tend to rise to the occasion when it comes to threats. The Orks will go to war with anyone for the sake of going to war. And when/if there's only Orks left, they'll just kick the granny out of each other until someone else comes along.

yukishiro1 wrote:
Nothing in the 40k timeline makes any sense. Trying to make sense of it is silly. The idea that the Eldar sat around for 60 million years without appreciable technological advancement is farcical.

The much-maligned comment about how "there are as many elves as the story requires at the given moment" thing was a rare instance of total honesty. Nothing in 40k is designed to make sense; it's just designed to tell fun stories.

There are as many orks as the story needs, and they never actually succeed all that much because that wouldn't make for good storytelling.

I disagree, if the Orks won sometimes and gained ground on the imperium it’s would be a great part of the story. Part of my problem with the whole 40K story is that GW try and present each non imperium army as the big bad and then they never achieve anything. There no real peril in the cannon. Even with abandon opening the great rift the imperium smashes back all enemies in 200 years which is very quick considering the size of the galaxy and those in the dark imperium don’t seem to suffer too much do they?

Fickle the Imperium has had huge losses. Tyranids have nearly eaten two whole Space Marine Chapters, including the most holey Ultramarines. But yeah GW isn't going to use lore to write off their most profitable and heavily marketed army.

The status quo will always remain more or less. Tau will steadily gain ground though; growing their empire; the Tyranids will nom more worlds; Orks will flex their muscle.


I suspect this "Imperium always tends to come out the winner" aspect will diminish if GW starts to write more and more Xenos focused books from Xenos points of view and giving them their own victories and heroes.

I agree that the imperium continuously loses resources but there are infinite resources, Not just the imperium as someone said there are as many elves as there needs to be. As you said the status quo will remain. With the exception of the fall of Cadiz what has really changed in the land scape of the galaxy. Humanity is still dominant and everyone else attacks but it ultimately beaten back. If the GW want to portray a galaxy where war is perpetually going on then they need to show how the galaxy changes with the war. Territory is gained and lost.

The blood angles were nearly wiped out but fortunately someone just made a batch or super space marines to fill their ranks.

How long have the necrons been waking up to take back the galaxy? Yet any map you look at, even in 9th, will only show necron territory As some known tomb worlds.

Thrakka has been around since second Ed and attacked Armageddon how many times? And never achieved anything as far as I’m aware

Yes but how will GW show that loss or gain? It won't have any effect on the models you buy; the armies you deploy or the games you play.

It's purely the lore in the background to the setting. Plus by keeping the status quo its much easier to write stories because many can be slotted in "anywhere" without need of a super strict timeline of events and such. This can work against GW, but it works in their favour with having such a huge lore written by a huge team of writers.


In contrast things like Marvel and DC do the same, but instead simply "rebirth" their franchise every few years so that they change things up.


GW just has a very powerful status quo and a fuzzy timeline.




Plus part of the whole setting is this huge Imperium of Man standing against a vast alien threat. Also don't forget even if they did change it it would take more than 1000 years to change the landscape of millions of worlds. Unless it was a case of "Tyranids swarm eveyrone dies" or "Chaos rises everyone dies" in a few hundred years; it would take thousands of years to change. Don't forget most of the setting is in the 41st mellenium - only a 1000 year time span.

The lore is a huge part of the 40K games. Changes in current state of the galaxy could easily be shown as the story and game develop. They did this with the great rift but have chosen to show this a chaos territory, just a barrier between 2 parts of the imperium. I don’t feel that the great rift has elevated chaos as a faction at all.

Stars wars is a simple story example. Some time the goodies are on top, some times the baddies.

And I think it would have an impact on models that people buy. The lore of an army is very important to people playing that army and I think it directly contributes to the fact that so many people play SM chapters.

The some of the xenos armies are like the baddies in teenage mutant ninja turtles, it doesn’t matter what scheme they come up with ultimately they get their butt kicked and the boss is screaming why am I surrounded by morons!

But somehow humanity is in the path to being consumed by chaos

To me, in Warhammer lore, Orks have always been essentially a natural disaster with dakka and teef. They are supposed to be random and uncontrollable, the Imperium likes to pretend they can monitor the situation and put up defences, but the tornado is still going to sweep through and wreck up the place. Orks turn up to fight and it just so happens as a side effect that if you krump everyone you conquer a planet or a sector. Orks don't set out to conquer the universe, they set out to fight. If they can't find enemies to fight they fight themselves. The eternal Waaaargh!

 G00fySmiley wrote:
did nobody read the war of the beast? As ork warbands grow in power they get more and more civilized. hell an ork emmesary came down to accept the surrender of the imperium and discuss terms. when orks are small warbands they just have feral boyz but as they grow the get nobz, warbosses, meks, docs, even bankers (teef counters) and brewers making squigg ale. In war of the beast we had an ork primarch (or better) equivilant and the society was quite good and complex.I might even argue a galaxy under ork rule might be better off than the rest of the grimdark 40k world.

If we overlook the Auschwitz-like planets they were herding the subjugated humans on - even the Iron Warriors were disturbed.

But then again, it's not as if the Imperium is much better in that regard.

 Esmer wrote:

 G00fySmiley wrote:
did nobody read the war of the beast? As ork warbands grow in power they get more and more civilized. hell an ork emmesary came down to accept the surrender of the imperium and discuss terms. when orks are small warbands they just have feral boyz but as they grow the get nobz, warbosses, meks, docs, even bankers (teef counters) and brewers making squigg ale. In war of the beast we had an ork primarch (or better) equivilant and the society was quite good and complex.I might even argue a galaxy under ork rule might be better off than the rest of the grimdark 40k world.

If we overlook the Auschwitz-like planets they were herding the subjugated humans on - even the Iron Warriors were disturbed.

But then again, it's not as if the Imperium is much better in that regard.

WHOAAAAHH! Given the iron warriors treatment of prisoners in storm of iron, i really need to see what kind of treatment of people made them feel disturbed.

I'm not doubting you, just politely asking for a source on this.

 Matt Swain wrote:

 Esmer wrote:

 G00fySmiley wrote:
did nobody read the war of the beast? As ork warbands grow in power they get more and more civilized. hell an ork emmesary came down to accept the surrender of the imperium and discuss terms. when orks are small warbands they just have feral boyz but as they grow the get nobz, warbosses, meks, docs, even bankers (teef counters) and brewers making squigg ale. In war of the beast we had an ork primarch (or better) equivilant and the society was quite good and complex.I might even argue a galaxy under ork rule might be better off than the rest of the grimdark 40k world.

If we overlook the Auschwitz-like planets they were herding the subjugated humans on - even the Iron Warriors were disturbed.

But then again, it's not as if the Imperium is much better in that regard.

WHOAAAAHH! Given the iron warriors treatment of prisoners in storm of iron, i really need to see what kind of treatment of people made them feel disturbed.

I'm not doubting you, just politely asking for a source on this.

It's in the The Beast Arises series, I believe in the "Echoes of the Long War" book.

 Matt Swain wrote:

 Esmer wrote:

 G00fySmiley wrote:
did nobody read the war of the beast? As ork warbands grow in power they get more and more civilized. hell an ork emmesary came down to accept the surrender of the imperium and discuss terms. when orks are small warbands they just have feral boyz but as they grow the get nobz, warbosses, meks, docs, even bankers (teef counters) and brewers making squigg ale. In war of the beast we had an ork primarch (or better) equivilant and the society was quite good and complex.I might even argue a galaxy under ork rule might be better off than the rest of the grimdark 40k world.

If we overlook the Auschwitz-like planets they were herding the subjugated humans on - even the Iron Warriors were disturbed.

But then again, it's not as if the Imperium is much better in that regard.

WHOAAAAHH! Given the iron warriors treatment of prisoners in storm of iron, i really need to see what kind of treatment of people made them feel disturbed.

I'm not doubting you, just politely asking for a source on this.

The Beast Arises, Volume 6 or 7 (not quite sure).

 Esmer wrote:

 Matt Swain wrote:

 Esmer wrote:

 G00fySmiley wrote:
did nobody read the war of the beast? As ork warbands grow in power they get more and more civilized. hell an ork emmesary came down to accept the surrender of the imperium and discuss terms. when orks are small warbands they just have feral boyz but as they grow the get nobz, warbosses, meks, docs, even bankers (teef counters) and brewers making squigg ale. In war of the beast we had an ork primarch (or better) equivilant and the society was quite good and complex.I might even argue a galaxy under ork rule might be better off than the rest of the grimdark 40k world.

If we overlook the Auschwitz-like planets they were herding the subjugated humans on - even the Iron Warriors were disturbed.

But then again, it's not as if the Imperium is much better in that regard.

WHOAAAAHH! Given the iron warriors treatment of prisoners in storm of iron, i really need to see what kind of treatment of people made them feel disturbed.

I'm not doubting you, just politely asking for a source on this.

The Beast Arises, Volume 6 or 7 (not quite sure).

Spoiler:

The Fists Exemplar and Iron Warriors have struck a desperate truce against the Orks and come across an Ork-run planet that seemed rather heavy-handedly based on Nazi extermination camps, complete with an ash-heavy sky from massive incineration furnaces. The humans there had been mentally and physically broken to a point that they could only respond to primal commands like "Light goes on - open mouth - food" - except for some of them that were assisting the Orks as Kapos. In the end the Iron Warriors warlord proposed nuking the entire blasted planet from orbit, as they would be doing the poor inmates a favor.

Wow, that does seem kinda heavy handed.