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I'm curious, does 6th Edition stick with the approximately 23 Second Founding Ultramarines successors, or has it been altered to account for the Legion sizes in the Black Library books that would suggest the Ultramarines would have closer to 200 Second Founding successors (with most of the other Legions adjusted upward accordingly)?

Pacific wrote:Well, I believe the correct way of putting it would be that there has been one incident of them 'infighting' in the 3rd edition book - except, its not even that - infighting implies some kind of mixed objective or leadership (the horus heresy, or any other form of civil war could be described as 'infighting').

We still generally have the impression that the entire Tyranid species is controlled by one, malign intelligence in the form of the Hive Mind.

You should read the 3rd ed nid codex or maybe even just my reply toyou earlier in this thread. There is an objective to the tyranids fighting each other. They strengthen themselves by dispensing of weaker forces, recoup the biomass and move on.

I was agreeing with that.. !

There is a difference between being directed by the hive-mind, the purpose being to make the brood stronger, and two or more different factions with different objectives fighting for supremacy over each other.

Pacific wrote:I was agreeing with that.. !

There is a difference between being directed by the hive-mind, the purpose being to make the brood stronger, and two or more different factions with different objectives fighting for supremacy over each other.

Oh I see. To be fair I had no way of knowing you had started differentiating between what kind of 'fighting' you meant when you said...

Pacific wrote:IAlso, I remember no mention of Tyranids fighting each other - ever. The only time this might happen is if the Tyranid hive-mind control has been somehow blocked, and they revert to their basic instincts. Is there the possibility that they may be trying to introduce more 'character' (as with the Necrons), or it is just a fluff justification for players having Tyranid on Tyranid battles?

...since I took it at face value.

Also it's much more than "one incident" and it's more than fair to call it in-fighting, as that gives no implied connotations of "fighting for supremacy over each other"....even if that is kind of what they are doing anyway.

Sorry for the miscommunication, I thought I'd already acknowledged that part of the 3rd edition codex that I hadn't been previously aware of, following both the reply from yourself and someone else Glorioski?

Regarding 'in-fighting', while I've got no real desire to start quibbling over semantics, to me the expression implies dissent in the ranks in some form. Even if the Nids have been killing each other, for whatever reason, presumably both sides are doing so at the behest of the hive mind and for a single, unified purpose.

Veteran Sergeant wrote:I'm curious, does 6th Edition stick with the approximately 23 Second Founding Ultramarines successors, or has it been altered to account for the Legion sizes in the Black Library books that would suggest the Ultramarines would have closer to 200 Second Founding successors (with most of the other Legions adjusted upward accordingly)?

That's an interesting point. The Horus Heresy book series have upped the anti considerably regarding legion numbers, has there been any change in the 6th edition book to reflect that?

From the answer I got on another forum, apparently not. The Grey Knights codex book says there were just over 400 Second Founding chapters. The 6th Ed book still talks about the "at least 23" Second Founding Ultramarines successors.

Sounds like more lazy Copy/Paste editing sadly.

Pacific wrote:Sorry for the miscommunication, I thought I'd already acknowledged that part of the 3rd edition codex that I hadn't been previously aware of, following both the reply from yourself and someone else Glorioski?

Regarding 'in-fighting', while I've got no real desire to start quibbling over semantics, to me the expression implies dissent in the ranks in some form. Even if the Nids have been killing each other, for whatever reason, presumably both sides are doing so at the behest of the hive mind and for a single, unified purpose.

The problem with it stems from the fluff of the Hive Mind mostly. While there's minimal fluff about infighting, it mostly feels like it's there to make mirror matches feel less wrong in game. The fluff for the Hive Mind is always, unequivocally 'there is one Hive Mind, it is made up of the sentience of every Tyranid'. So that's how I see it. The infighting fluff is just there so fluff nutters who end up in a campaign with two Tyranid forces don't have one of those awkward moments.

Veteran Sergeant wrote:I'm curious, does 6th Edition stick with the approximately 23 Second Founding Ultramarines successors, or has it been altered to account for the Legion sizes in the Black Library books that would suggest the Ultramarines would have closer to 200 Second Founding successors (with most of the other Legions adjusted upward accordingly)?

I don't recall any specific numbers but remember that the UM took a MASSIVE beating from the WordBearers. The UM would not have been 200k strong at the end of the heresy. And some legions were hardly much bigger than a single chapter by the end (Raven Guard, Salamanders). So ~23 Second founding chapters sounds perfectly reasonable.


And then there is the whole debate over how many chapters are strictly 1000 marines in the first place.

-Loki- wrote:

DOOMBREAD wrote:I agree with you that Tyranid infighting makes no sense. The Tyranids were a lot cooler when they were an animalistic yet strangely intelligent alien species launching a massive invasion upon our galaxy bent on devouring all the galaxy's biomass. Now, hive fleets are little better than overgrown, space-faring beehives.

Read more fluff, listen to less internet. This simply isn't true. They're still the same intelligent alien intelligence, and Tyranid infighting has been around since 3rd edition.

I actually read a lot of fluff (though not much Tyranid fluff) and nowhere have I seen reference to hive fleet infighting. Can you name an example of a pre-6th edition reference to Tyranid infighting?

Also the idea that Tyranid infighting makes them seem less "sinister alien intelligence" was more my opinion than fact. I acknowledge that many will disagree.

So you get to the table with a swarm of tyranids and you think to yourself, I am the devourer, I will consume all in my path and when there is nothing but burnt out starts I will move on...There is a problem though. Across the table your opponent chose to bring Tryanids. WTFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF. If you really care about fluff you can't stand this tyranids don't fight tyranids...oh wait maybe they do.

You see there would be no point in coloring tyranids diffrently if the diffrent hive fleets weren't diffrent. They have diffrent tactics, have unique numbers of diffrent spiecies and even more important diffrent mutations of new tyranids. So when you end up facing a tyranid player there can be a fluffy reason for you facing that guy accross form you.


To the tyranids keeping 100% of biomass I don't think you guys quite understand the definition of biomass. You see biomass is mass and if 12th grade physics taught me anything it's that mass can't really be destroyed. So yes when tyranids kill eachother and send the rippers through for clean up they keep 100% biomass.

But protonhunter I think I caught a hicup in your explination. What about all the tasty tyranid meat they digested and made into energy to perform those epic acts of distructions, or more simply don't tyranids need to eat to sustain life? don't they need to pocess water and other materials to sustain themselve thus use materials to continue living (hence loose energy by creating waste)?

No why would they. Have you ever heard of tyranid poop? No? well it's probably because they don't. You guys are actually talking about energy not biomass. Yes tyranids keep 100% biomass so the size of a hive fleet isn't damaged. You are probably are confused as to how a organizm continues to function without the replenishment of consumed energy. Who knows to that, maybe they farm flora on their bioships or their consumption of tyranid flora gives them stores of consumable and useable biomass (this would be exausted eventually). More probable though would be that if given nurishment indefinitly lesser species of tyranid would probably die. They are the ones that go into the reclaimer pools and thus that energy is saved. I want to stress the fact that when a gaunt kills a guardsmand it doesn't digest him for nurishment instead it simply takes the mass of his body back to the pools to be made into a new tyranid.

protonhunter wrote:So you get to the table with a swarm of tyranids and you think to yourself, I am the devourer, I will consume all in my path and when there is nothing but burnt out starts I will move on...There is a problem though. Across the table your opponent chose to bring Tryanids. WTFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF. If you really care about fluff you can't stand this tyranids don't fight tyranids...oh wait maybe they do.

You see there would be no point in coloring tyranids diffrently if the diffrent hive fleets weren't diffrent. They have diffrent tactics, have unique numbers of diffrent spiecies and even more important diffrent mutations of new tyranids. So when you end up facing a tyranid player there can be a fluffy reason for you facing that guy accross form you.


To the tyranids keeping 100% of biomass I don't think you guys quite understand the definition of biomass. You see biomass is mass and if 12th grade physics taught me anything it's that mass can't really be destroyed. So yes when tyranids kill eachother and send the rippers through for clean up they keep 100% biomass.

But protonhunter I think I caught a hicup in your explination. What about all the tasty tyranid meat they digested and made into energy to perform those epic acts of distructions, or more simply don't tyranids need to eat to sustain life? don't they need to pocess water and other materials to sustain themselve thus use materials to continue living (hence loose energy by creating waste)?

No why would they. Have you ever heard of tyranid poop? No? well it's probably because they don't. You guys are actually talking about energy not biomass. Yes tyranids keep 100% biomass so the size of a hive fleet isn't damaged. You are probably are confused as to how a organizm continues to function without the replenishment of consumed energy. Who knows to that, maybe they farm flora on their bioships or their consumption of tyranid flora gives them stores of consumable and useable biomass (this would be exausted eventually). More probable though would be that if given nurishment indefinitly lesser species of tyranid would probably die. They are the ones that go into the reclaimer pools and thus that energy is saved. I want to stress the fact that when a gaunt kills a guardsmand it doesn't digest him for nurishment instead it simply takes the mass of his body back to the pools to be made into a new tyranid.

The thing is it doesn't matter if you are a Tyranid or whatever you need energy. Energy can not be recovered 100%. Thus they will eventually run out of energy, although it's more likely that when the time comes they are either out of this galaxy or exterminated. In short terms, it has to do with Entropy.

Pointless squabbling over tyranid...

Veteran Sergeant wrote:The Tyranids have conquered more of the galaxy in less time than any other faction in 40K....

... including wildly inaccurate statements aside, thanks for the list. I haven't been paying quite as fine-toothed of attention to the fluff part as the OP has.

The two things that struck me most were firstly the change to the ecclesiarchy. The age of apostasy is basically glossed over with hardly a mention (compared to 5th ed), and everything got rearranged in such a way that hints at what's going to happen to SoB (being re-released in a manner similar to grey knights).

The second, more interesting thing was the many, many references to the emperor being actually alive and actually continuing to do a bunch of very important stuff. 5th ed left it much more open to interpretation whether the emperor is, in fact, alive at all, or whether he is more of a convenient fiction that allows the high lords to more easily control the imperium.

Ailaros wrote:everything got rearranged in such a way that hints at what's going to happen to SoB (being re-released in a manner similar to grey knights).

Can you be more specific about this "everything"?

The biggest thing is that the ecclesiarchy just became much more important to the fluff than it was before. Furthermore, sisters of battle are always talked about in the lens of this new, larger ecclesiarchy.

Rather than the SoB being attached to the witch-hunter inquisitors, it looks like they're getting set to have a codex:ecclesiarchy, and leave the inquisitors to grey knights. Just like how the new GK codex was made by wrapping all of the old inquisition around grey knights, so will the new ecclesiarchy codex be a new army that wraps around sisters of battle as their main infantry choices.

At least, that's what it felt like to me.

Well, that is what I have said for the past few years now so I wouldn't be surprised.

Um, that is not exactly a new thing - it's a change in focus, but none of the information given is different from what we have heard before. The 6E rulebook still has a blurb about the alliance between the Sisters and the Ordo Hereticus, it's just that this has taken the backseat and the portrayal stresses the Sororitas' role as the Ecclesiarchy's standing army. Basically, it's a return to what we heard in 2nd Edition. And just like in 2E, we already have a "Codex: Sisters of Battle" that contains optional elements of the Ecclesiarchy organized around a core of Battle Sisters.
The question left open is whether GW will follow up on their supposed "promise" and present us with a proper Codex book replacing the pitiful WD scrapings, or whether we will be left hanging in the dark for years again. Along with the usual Marine hype, the new rulebook has committed at least two pages to the Sisters, which is way more than we got in the past couple editions, so that is a good sign. Just nothing that will have me rejoice in happy anticipation just yet.

Actually, there are two minor differences in this rulebook's portrayal to the past:
#1 This book has spread out the Battle Sisters in a much less concentrated manner than before. Where until now we had the various Orders focusing their power projection on a few important places, there is now an additional layer of representation by having individual Sisters hold a lone vigil over the countless smaller shrines throughout the Imperium.
and also
#2 The Sisters have been relieved from Black Ship guard duty - this is now the sole responsibility of Inquisition Storm Troopers.

It's just a matter of waiting. We even know there are at least a couple of new Sisters sculpts already (posters reported that Jes Goodwin mentioned this at GamesDay 2010). Personally, I'd be happiest with a new Sisters book towards the middle of Sixth rather than at the very beginning or end. The fact that Sisters got a rundown at all in the core book, whereas they were absent as a faction from Fifth, is a great sign.

Manchu wrote:posters reported that Jes Goodwin mentioned this at GamesDay 2010

Didn't other posters report that James Goodwin said he wasn't working on any such thing?
I remain cautious as to those initial rumours, especially given how detailed they already were, and how much time has passed since them - and still we didn't see any results. I think it was just a load of hot air.

Manchu wrote:Personally, I'd be happiest with a new Sisters book towards the middle of Sixth rather than at the very beginning or end. The fact that Sisters got a rundown at all in the core book, whereas they were absent as a faction from Fifth, is a great sign.

True enough.

IIRC, he commented that the Sisters sculpts are difficult because they wanted multipose models but they are wearing loose cloth sleeves, which makes it difficult because the cloth would obviously drape a certain way based on the pose. Sounded and sounds plausible enough to me. And now that I look it up, it wasn't GamesDay but an event at Warhammer World on the release of DE.

Lynata wrote:Um, that is not exactly a new thing - it's a change in focus, but none of the information given is different from what we have heard before. The 6E rulebook still has a blurb about the alliance between the Sisters and the Ordo Hereticus, it's just that this has taken the backseat and the portrayal stresses the Sororitas' role as the Ecclesiarchy's standing army. Basically, it's a return to what we heard in 2nd Edition. And just like in 2E, we already have a "Codex: Sisters of Battle" that contains optional elements of the Ecclesiarchy organized around a core of Battle Sisters.
The question left open is whether GW will follow up on their supposed "promise" and present us with a proper Codex book replacing the pitiful WD scrapings, or whether we will be left hanging in the dark for years again. Along with the usual Marine hype, the new rulebook has committed at least two pages to the Sisters, which is way more than we got in the past couple editions, so that is a good sign. Just nothing that will have me rejoice in happy anticipation just yet.

Actually, there are two minor differences in this rulebook's portrayal to the past:
#1 This book has spread out the Battle Sisters in a much less concentrated manner than before. Where until now we had the various Orders focusing their power projection on a few important places, there is now an additional layer of representation by having individual Sisters hold a lone vigil over the countless smaller shrines throughout the Imperium.
and also
#2 The Sisters have been relieved from Black Ship guard duty - this is now the sole responsibility of Inquisition Storm Troopers.

It also noticable that they now state "a Force of Battel Sisters will be present to guard every shrine and Fortress Cathedral in the Imperium" as well as their other duties - no wonder they can't guard the Black ships as well!!

Really hope they do get a proper Codex and some new minis

Mr Morden wrote:It also noticable that they now state "a Force of Battel Sisters will be present to guard every shrine and Fortress Cathedral in the Imperium" as well as their other duties

That's what I meant with #1 - I was worried at first in that it would change their comparatively small number, but then I read that the shrine part is covered by lone Sisters rather than an entire Order.

It's a bit disappointing though that the battle pages then presented us with an utter lack of any SoB presence whatsoever, even though the scenery was clearly holy ground. Hell, that one mission even had the name "Sacrifice of Martyrs" ... and who were the martyrs? Cadian Shock Troops again, duh.
Same for the fluff bits. There would have been potential for so much more.

But I shouldn't complain. It's already much more than we got in the last book.

I'm actually glad to hear the Sisters weren't martyrs for once.

Manchu wrote:I'm actually glad to hear the Sisters weren't martyrs for once.

Maybe I've just become too paranoid and fear that another unique Sisters perk is being stolen now.

"Hey -- we're the ones who are supposed to fail triumphantly!"

-Dark Eldar don't just seem to not use Farseers and Warlocks and what have you, they are stated to not be psychic altogether. No explanation as to how this difference from Craftworld Eldar took place.

Their fluff has stated that if there are any children born or anyone showing a forming psychic ability, they are killed immediately. To keep Slaneesh away as long as possible.

Thanks for this thread, here';s my two cents on a few sections:

Harriticus wrote:-The Inquisition still retains the 3 classic Ordo Militants it seems. It is flatly said that the Grey Knights are the Ordo Militant of the Ordo Malleus, the Deathwatch Ordo Xenos, while the SoB maintain "close ties" with the Ordo Hereticus. The SoB don't seem to be formally an Ordo Militant but a de facto one.

The sisters were only brought into the Hereticus militants order during their short lived witchhunters 'dex iirc. Before and after they have been keepers of the imperial faith, devout beyond belief.

-The Tau-Ultramarines alliance or Tau ties to the Emperor is never alluded to. Beyond the Allied chart there's no explanation why the Astartes and Tau are brothers in arms.

Que? that just makes no fething sense... Battle Brothers? no... at best I'd have thought Desperate Allies...

-The excerpt about the Golden Throne malfunctioning is in there, but it's the exact same one from 5th Edition. No progress. The only new bit of info really is that the Golden Throne requires far more psyker sacrifices than it used to, about four times the original level.

New info on it is highly unlikely tbh... The Tyranid invasion has come on leaps and bounds, but certain parts of the 40K timeline will stay in limbo to add to the air of illusion Gw attempt to create. the golden throne is one of them, as well as the primarchs return.

-A major war against the Hrud occurred in M35, the "Hrud Rising". If GW is ever going to add another Xenos race (unlikely), but guess is it'll be Hrud by this point.

Unlikely to be the Hrud, as they were largely purged until they became a nomadic race... now they avoid imperial space and hate the sight of humans for what they have done. if they turn up as a dex I'd be surprised as they'd have to be few but powerful. It would be nice to see alien races with dex's though... its something I feel is silly... theres more imperial dex's than aliens... makes NO SENSE.

-The Adeptus Mechanicus is no longer part of the Adeptus Terra. It is separate and reports directly to the High Lords of Terra, like the Ecclesiarchy.

I may have missed something, but I thought that had always been the case, with them reporting whatever the hell they wanted to lols.

-During the Dark Age of Technology, mankind went on an alien-extermination campaign. Many xenos species were wiped out and their worlds colonized by humanity. Humanity had some sort of relations with the Eldar during this time, and also mentioned Orks (undoubtedly meaning wars with them). Today, often invasions by lesser alien races on "Imperial" worlds are just attempts to reclaim their lost homelands

Yeah this ties in with what I said about the Hrud above.

-A few new Xenos seem to be mentioned. The Zygo live on Camgia have successfully fought off Imperial invasions for the last 500 years, The Dracolith, an emerging alien empire mentioned in 5th edition, are described as being chrystalline beings. There's a big picture with an illustrtion of lots of interesting-looking minor Xenos races. However none are identified by name. Frustrating.

Might be worth picking up the Fantasy Flight series of RP books for 40k, theres a wealth of source material in there which contains a lot of races never mentioned anywhere else.

-Dark Eldar don't just seem to not use Farseers and Warlocks and what have you, they are stated to not be psychic altogether. No explanation as to how this difference from Craftworld Eldar took place.

It's been touched upon in other fluff lost in the annals of GW history, iirc the reason for it was to not draw unwanted attention from Slaanesh the being they helped create during "the Fall"

-Tyranid Hive Fleets encountered are described as consisting of millions of Bio-ships each with millions of Tyranids on board. So it seems that Hive Fleets can easily approach the trillions figure in size.

Something I kinda had an idea about, but now its nice to see its actually canonical fluff.

-Tyranids fight with each other now. Hive Fleets compete with each other and clash over food on planets. The Hive Mind is still stated to be directing the overall Tyranid race regardless of this, this is probably the stupidest thing in the Codex.

This makes no sense what so ever... why in the name of holy trent reznor would they fight between fleets when controlled by the same mind... thats like eating your own hand but forgetting its part of you... i mean seriously GW... SERIOUSLY?

-The Tyranid Hive Fleets seen so far are just a splinter of the 1 furthest tendril of the main Tyranid invasion force in the galactic void.

Again, something a lot of players already assumed, so nice for the confirmation at least.

-The section on Chaos is entitled "The Greatest Threat". They get a lot of fluff dedicated to them, Chaos as a whole has a level of fluff coverage (almost 20 pages) only the Imperium surpasses in page amount. Hyperbole, or is GW making Chaos out to be the big baddie again? With downgrading the Tyranids to fighting one another, who knows.

Yes, because chaos are the obvious threat to the galaxy... not some extra galactic race thats consumed billions of worlds already, and is most likely still doing the same in other galaxies... again GW, bravo on something altogether nonsensical...

-Chaos is definetly displayed in a more united fashion of CSM, Daemons, and heretics working towards a common goal. CSM/Daemon/Cultist fluff is all intermingled together and their models showcase are intertwined together under the title "The Great Enemy"

About time...

-Abaddon's Black Crusades are described more as repeated blows to the Imperium to gradually weaken it and as part of a greater plan, rather then 13 separate attempts to march on Terra. None of the Black Crusades are described even as failures. GW trying to end the stereotype of Faildabbon I take it.

Well it'd be nice to hear that rather than the "whats that abbadon, you failed again, oh ok, we might be the chaos gods, but will let you of again..." yes, because Chaos is gratious liek that... :faceplam: again Gw

-The Ulumeathic League has been destroyed

Hmmm interesting, I have no idea who the Ulumiathi are, but it certainly explains Ordos Xenos having use of the Ulumiathi Plasma Syphon (which is a godsend btw against a lot of nurgle players )

-The Space Marines are only connected to the Imperial hierarchy by a dotted arrow (everyone else has a straight solid line), perhaps indicating their further dependence

Hopefully they are putting paid to the dependancies on SM's now then... because they have made them out to be the Imperiums last great hope for at least a decade... silly GW...

-Not only are Tau and Smurfs not allies, there's accounts of them fighting in 999.[[M41]]. The allied chart is making less sense.

this just made me lol :thumsbup:

On a separate note, the Dark Angels seem to take center stage here. They have cover art, back art, and the intro art for the Space Marine section.

Nice to see them take the spotlight back again after all this time... anything is better than ultrasmurphs....

AnUnearthlyChilde wrote:

The Inquisition still retains the 3 classic Ordo Militants it seems. It is flatly said that the Grey Knights are the Ordo Militant of the Ordo Malleus, the Deathwatch Ordo Xenos, while the SoB maintain "close ties" with the Ordo Hereticus. The SoB don't seem to be formally an Ordo Militant but a de facto one.

The sisters were only brought into the Hereticus militants order during their short lived witchhunters 'dex iirc. Before and after they have been keepers of the imperial faith, devout beyond belief.

The Sisters have always been the Ecclesiarchy's standing army, primarily, just that with 3E an alliance with the Ordo Hereticus was thrown in on top of that. 6E seems to only mention this pact in passing, though, so one could say that whilst not being an actual retcon it is a change in "focus of presentation" - if that description makes any sense?

AnUnearthlyChilde wrote:

-The Adeptus Mechanicus is no longer part of the Adeptus Terra. It is separate and reports directly to the High Lords of Terra, like the Ecclesiarchy.

I may have missed something, but I thought that had always been the case, with them reporting whatever the hell they wanted to lols.

I thought this was always so, but upon looking at the older chart in the Codex Imperialis I did notice that this was changed indeed. Makes more sense this way, too, alluding to the relative sovereignty of the Mechanicus "satellite state(s)".

AnUnearthlyChilde wrote:

There's a big picture with an illustrtion of lots of interesting-looking minor Xenos races. However none are identified by name. Frustrating.

Might be worth picking up the Fantasy Flight series of RP books for 40k, theres a wealth of source material in there which contains a lot of races never mentioned anywhere else.

You could just as well make them up yourself, though. Sadly, there is little overarching consistency between the various sources, owing to how the franchise is run. So book B cares little for what was said in book A, especially when it was produced by an entirely different team of writers. :I

But if you're interested, here's something from the old 4E rulebook - I'm too lazy to check if these are the same xenos right now.
http://img841.imageshack.us/img841/4673/xenos.jpg

AnUnearthlyChilde wrote:

Tyranids fight with each other now. Hive Fleets compete with each other and clash over food on planets. The Hive Mind is still stated to be directing the overall Tyranid race regardless of this, this is probably the stupidest thing in the Codex.

This makes no sense what so ever... why in the name of holy trent reznor would they fight between fleets when controlled by the same mind... thats like eating your own hand but forgetting its part of you... i mean seriously GW... SERIOUSLY?

This was discussed in another thread (I forgot which), but it does make some sense when you consider that this infighting would serve to improve the victor. The biomass of the loser is absorbed and transformed into the superior strain, making the Hive even stronger than before. It's like some sort of military maneuver as a means to try out new tactics and equipment ... just with live ammunition.

Lynata wrote:

AnUnearthlyChilde wrote:

The Inquisition still retains the 3 classic Ordo Militants it seems. It is flatly said that the Grey Knights are the Ordo Militant of the Ordo Malleus, the Deathwatch Ordo Xenos, while the SoB maintain "close ties" with the Ordo Hereticus. The SoB don't seem to be formally an Ordo Militant but a de facto one.

The sisters were only brought into the Hereticus militants order during their short lived witchhunters 'dex iirc. Before and after they have been keepers of the imperial faith, devout beyond belief.

The Sisters have always been the Ecclesiarchy's standing army, primarily, just that with 3E an alliance with the Ordo Hereticus was thrown in on top of that. 6E seems to only mention this pact in passing, though, so one could say that whilst not being an actual retcon it is a change in "focus of presentation" - if that description makes any sense?

Yeah makes sense I guess, when I said keepers of the faith I meant Ecclesiarchy It never made much sense that they were the Hereticus Ordos Militant imo, especially how Sisters came to be (orphaned girls who were brought up in devout belief of imperial truth making them the ultimate and unswerving warrior)

Lynata wrote:

AnUnearthlyChilde wrote:

There's a big picture with an illustrtion of lots of interesting-looking minor Xenos races. However none are identified by name. Frustrating.

Might be worth picking up the Fantasy Flight series of RP books for 40k, theres a wealth of source material in there which contains a lot of races never mentioned anywhere else.

You could just as well make them up yourself, though. Sadly, there is little overarching consistency between the various sources, owing to how the franchise is run. So book B cares little for what was said in book A, especially when it was produced by an entirely different team of writers. :I

But if you're interested, here's something from the old 4E rulebook - I'm too lazy to check if these are the same xenos right now.
http://img841.imageshack.us/img841/4673/xenos.jpg

cheers for that, all of those either existed in Rogue Trader of have since been brought into the game. Yeah someone told me there were inconsistencies in the books, but, as GW sanction them they are still canon, not sure if thats a good thing or not.

Lynata wrote:

AnUnearthlyChilde wrote:

Tyranids fight with each other now. Hive Fleets compete with each other and clash over food on planets. The Hive Mind is still stated to be directing the overall Tyranid race regardless of this, this is probably the stupidest thing in the Codex.

This makes no sense what so ever... why in the name of holy trent reznor would they fight between fleets when controlled by the same mind... thats like eating your own hand but forgetting its part of you... i mean seriously GW... SERIOUSLY?

This was discussed in another thread (I forgot which), but it does make some sense when you consider that this infighting would serve to improve the victor. The biomass of the loser is absorbed and transformed into the superior strain, making the Hive even stronger than before. It's like some sort of military maneuver as a means to try out new tactics and equipment ... just with live ammunition.

I've always seen it from another point of view tbh... the way I see it is that each tendril will evolve differently due to biomass ingestion, but when fleets combine, they simply merge their genetic data in some form of weird tendrilled mating thing, and from then on they act as one fleet. Fighting costs energy, energy means biomass lost, which seems pointless imo. but thats just the way I interpret Tyranid fluff, as a lot of it is illogical from a biology and nature point of view (I like things to at least have some form of sense/logic, even if it is a sci-fi game).

AnUnearthlyChilde wrote:

Lynata wrote:

AnUnearthlyChilde wrote:

Tyranids fight with each other now. Hive Fleets compete with each other and clash over food on planets. The Hive Mind is still stated to be directing the overall Tyranid race regardless of this, this is probably the stupidest thing in the Codex.

This makes no sense what so ever... why in the name of holy trent reznor would they fight between fleets when controlled by the same mind... thats like eating your own hand but forgetting its part of you... i mean seriously GW... SERIOUSLY?

This was discussed in another thread (I forgot which), but it does make some sense when you consider that this infighting would serve to improve the victor. The biomass of the loser is absorbed and transformed into the superior strain, making the Hive even stronger than before. It's like some sort of military maneuver as a means to try out new tactics and equipment ... just with live ammunition.

I've always seen it from another point of view tbh... the way I see it is that each tendril will evolve differently due to biomass ingestion, but when fleets combine, they simply merge their genetic data in some form of weird tendrilled mating thing, and from then on they act as one fleet. Fighting costs energy, energy means biomass lost, which seems pointless imo. but thats just the way I interpret Tyranid fluff, as a lot of it is illogical from a biology and nature point of view (I like things to at least have some form of sense/logic, even if it is a sci-fi game).

This is not new, this has been in the background since the 3rd ed Nid codex. It says that they recover the biomass at a rate of 100% efficiency. Obviously this ignores the laws of thermodynamics, but hey, it''s 40k.

Glorioski wrote:

AnUnearthlyChilde wrote:

Lynata wrote:

AnUnearthlyChilde wrote:

Tyranids fight with each other now. Hive Fleets compete with each other and clash over food on planets. The Hive Mind is still stated to be directing the overall Tyranid race regardless of this, this is probably the stupidest thing in the Codex.

This makes no sense what so ever... why in the name of holy trent reznor would they fight between fleets when controlled by the same mind... thats like eating your own hand but forgetting its part of you... i mean seriously GW... SERIOUSLY?

This was discussed in another thread (I forgot which), but it does make some sense when you consider that this infighting would serve to improve the victor. The biomass of the loser is absorbed and transformed into the superior strain, making the Hive even stronger than before. It's like some sort of military maneuver as a means to try out new tactics and equipment ... just with live ammunition.

I've always seen it from another point of view tbh... the way I see it is that each tendril will evolve differently due to biomass ingestion, but when fleets combine, they simply merge their genetic data in some form of weird tendrilled mating thing, and from then on they act as one fleet. Fighting costs energy, energy means biomass lost, which seems pointless imo. but thats just the way I interpret Tyranid fluff, as a lot of it is illogical from a biology and nature point of view (I like things to at least have some form of sense/logic, even if it is a sci-fi game).

This is not new, this has been in the background since the 3rd ed Nid codex. It says that they recover the biomass at a rate of 100% efficiency. Obviously this ignores the laws of thermodynamics, but hey, it''s 40k.

What I'm also talking about is the sure they regain 100% biomass, but, it takes time to "regrow" ships and minions, but biomass is also expended as "fuel" to fight and "birth" the troops. Its a totally inefficient way of waging war as the supposedly highest predator on the food chain... wholesale accepted assimilation is much more efficient and logical as a superior predator, which is what the Tyranid race is supposed to be.

Yeah I know its been in the background since 3rd ed. But Tyranids also used to take "slave races" like Zoats, just because GW writes it, doesnt mean it makes sense As I said before, I prefer it to make sense, and therefore be logical. expending biomass just to assimilate another hive fleet is inefficient, and provides a huge flaw in the race... and considering GW has led us to believe that the tyranid species lacks any flaws other than the speed in which it can adapt, its just plain silly.

Sorry don't mean to sound argumentative, I'm just a little perturbed that GW leave large rediculous loopholes like this...