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My current headcanon is that the universe's status quo is maintained by psychic forces. Things aren't going to change because the orks/eldar/hivemind/astronomican/tzeentch is keeping it there, either for their own reasons, or as a subconscious side affect.

My best bot if head canon?

Longstrider wrote:
Ooh, this is a nice idea, and I think some of you had some great ideas. That one about the Eldar thinking about wraithbone as related to what the Necrontyr were doing in particular... delicious!

Thanks I think it adds a bit more depth to their dislike of using wraith constructs. Just 'it being akin to necromancy' and them being angsty about that doesn't quite gel with me, but it being exactly the tool used by the ancient enemy they were literally created to fight against, that they are genetically and culturally pre-determined to hate seems to have a bit more weight behind it.

I like your idea about new aspects and the first exarchs seeking out Asurmen. Gives a little background as to how newer aspects like the Warp Spiders came about.

Also, I absolutely love the idea that the DA Watchers are Squats. Perfect!

The Tau are left alive by all the "decently" smart armies o in the galaxy(not orks or nids) only because they believe they will destroy chaos

 TheLumberJack wrote:
The Tau are left alive by all the "decently" smart armies o in the galaxy(not orks or nids) only because they believe they will destroy chaos

To destroy chaos, wouldn't they have to kill all humanity/eldar/orks? Big part of the Alpharious story

After the new Necron codex came out, I was so miffed at how they changed the C'Tan. Played a 4 way battle using the old Carnage mission with some friends (cuz that's how we do), me playing Deathwing, one buddy playing Necrons, One guard and one space wolf. About half way through, another friend came in to the shop, though we thought he wouldn't be there that day. (Change of plans.) Rather than leave him out, we let him jump in with 1000 pts of his Necrons. They DS down on the objective, next to Alex's Necrons and just lit into them before moving on the objective.

At the end of the match, his Overlord was the only model he had left and he and my Belial and Deathwing Knights were dueling over the objective. He got a couple lucky hits and killed Belial at the end of his turn and the game. So fluff wise we just stated that his Overlord took whatever the objective was and warped/phased out. Well that got me thinking. In a fluff sense, why would these Necrons attack other Necrons? (He went after Alex's Necrons more than the rest of us. Not by design, just how the game unfolded.) So I wrote up some fluff and it got me started on my own small Necron army. And they are a Dynasty that is hell-bent on bringing the C'tan back from the "dead". More specifically, they are seeking all the shards of the Nightbringer to bring back their "God of Death". Never really got to finish the army, but always wanted to go back to it. Even use them as a nemesis to my long standing Space Marine chapter.

Anyway. Sorry for the long winded nature of that, and not sure if that belongs here. But that was the most fun I had with my own fluff.

Necrons loyal to the C'tan [still] exist - they're featured in The World Engine, for example.

 Lusall wrote:
After the new Necron codex came out, I was so miffed at how they changed the C'Tan.

Oh god I hate what they did to the Necrons and C'Tan as well. The whole thing is just pitiful.

So the Oldcrons were an ancient and unfathomable evil from the pre-history of the galaxy, that only went into slumber because all the life had died out in the galaxy and they had to wait until it re-grew before they started harvesting them to feed their star-vampire overlords again. Bat-gak scary, worthy of the fear with which the Eldar hold them in (who only just remember who they were from their myths and legends), and perfectly fitting with the 40k setting.

Then, Newcrons came about and this legion of pre-historic Terminators is suddenly a squabbling rabble of petty warlords whose leader (The Silent King) seems to be the most saintly soul in all of 40k-dom and they're perfectly fine teaming up twice with their best-buds the Blood Angels. But wait, they've got stupid-level technology to make them still seem like a threat and they're eeeevil (honest) so they're still scary (double-honest this time).

Wat.

I just have such difficulty grasping the fact that these ancient soul-less aliens seem so human.

I had a bit of headcannon about the Oldcrons that they couldn't even speak to the younger races of the galaxy. Their language was so old and ancient that no-one from the modern world even knew how to communicate with them.

I guess my current piece of headcanon for Necrons is that some servitor tasked with writing up the Imperium's current intelligence on the Necrons wasn't properly mind-wiped and in its madness started mixing the fluff of an ancient evil threat to rival the Tyranids with the soap opera the Ad Mech Magos was watching that morning.

 Lord Damocles wrote:
Necrons loyal to the C'tan [still] exist - they're featured in The World Engine, for example.

At the time that the 5th edition codex came out though, it seemed to imply that, that wasn't the case. While the events of the World Engine have been canon for a while, the book didn't come out till later. (Not long after that Necron codex I went into a prolonged break from 40K) I just think the idea is nifty. Fighting over a lost shard of the nightbringer. And scouring the Galaxy for them to rebirth the god of death. Had a couple conversions of Immortals with tattered cloaks. Not sure I'm still that good with the greenstuff anymore though.

Ynneadwraith wrote:

Oh god I hate what they did to the Necrons and C'Tan as well. The whole thing is just pitiful.

So the Oldcrons were an ancient and unfathomable evil from the pre-history of the galaxy, that only went into slumber because all the life had died out in the galaxy and they had to wait until it re-grew before they started harvesting them to feed their star-vampire overlords again. Bat-gak scary, worthy of the fear with which the Eldar hold them in (who only just remember who they were from their myths and legends), and perfectly fitting with the 40k setting.

Dude...this. I remember buying that codex, going home to my room, putting on background music and reading that in bed and just getting this feeling of absolute dread from the book. Like..."Oh my god. These C'tan. They're like the Chaos gods of reality. They have complete mastery of real space and they've been effing with us this whole time". The idea that the Nightbringer was so powerful and so destructive that his visage was seared on the psyche of every sentient race in the galaxy as essentially the grim reaper just...damn, dude. And the codex had so many references to Black Library books and other events and places you had read about. That poem in there, talking about the eye of Isha closing...Just a good codex. Really loved that fluff. And the getting rid of the Pariahs and the genes that may have been implanted by the Deceiver bugged me big time.

Ynneadwraith wrote:
Then, Newcrons came about and this legion of pre-historic Terminators is suddenly a squabbling rabble of petty warlords whose leader (The Silent King) seems to be the most saintly soul in all of 40k-dom and they're perfectly fine teaming up twice with their best-buds the Blood Angels. But wait, they've got stupid-level technology to make them still seem like a threat and they're eeeevil (honest) so they're still scary (double-honest this time).

Wat.

Yeah, I was just taken aback by it. I mean I got what they were trying to do, but it just came off as "So instead of a slight rip off of Vampire Counts in space let's just go with a total rip off of Tomb Kings in space. Tada!" The Silent King thing is just...doesn't seem to make sense to me. Seems ham fisted. Like "Well we need to give them a new leader/figurehead so boom there we go". And the idea that he's supposed to be super good is just...against the 40K feel. And the thing about Tomb Worlds just randomly waking up and executing programing errors just had me rolling my eyes. I don't mean to sound like I totally hate it, but it just wasn't the same. And the getting rid of the Pariahs and the genes

Ynneadwraith wrote:
I just have such difficulty grasping the fact that these ancient soul-less aliens seem so human.

I had a bit of headcannon about the Oldcrons that they couldn't even speak to the younger races of the galaxy. Their language was so old and ancient that no-one from the modern world even knew how to communicate with them.

100% agree. I mean, the Eldar and humans have at least some commonality. The Necrons are like "Physics? Spacetime? Roflwat?" I like the idea that communicating with the Necrons would just be the hardest thing to do. Not only are they more ancient, they're not even "living" anymore.

The Silent King waged a genocidal war because he was worried his empire would splinter. That's not good or nice.

I never understood why people liked the 3rd Edition Necrons so much. Oh look at this new race. They're older than the Eldar, more advanced than them too, in fact the Eldar and the Orks were both created to fight them. Their gods are so awesome one implanted the fear of death in everybody, and another one thinks so little of Chaos he'd rather let them have activated Blackstone Fortresses than leave them deactivated. Also their gods are actually walking around with full power in the Materium unlike every other god in the setting. It struck me as over the top compared to the other 40K factions.

Admittedly most of that background still applies even with the new Codexes.

- Event Horizon is set in Warhammer 40k universe, and the movie is what happens when you do a warp jump without the Gellar Fields activated.

- There are planets/systems with DAoT -level tech within the Imperium.

- Emperor knew about the impending heresy, he just didn't expect Horus to lead it.

Yeah, I really do prefer the new Necron lore, at least, at it's core.

The whole allying with Blood Angels only makes sense when people actually put it into context that both factions were planning on betraying the other after.

The whole unstoppable legions thing can still exist - just say the Tomb World was faulty, and now the lord has lost all actual tactics and just walks their Necrons into battle. Done.

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:
The Silent King waged a genocidal war because he was worried his empire would splinter. That's not good or nice.

I never understood why people liked the 3rd Edition Necrons so much. Oh look at this new race. They're older than the Eldar, more advanced than them too, in fact the Eldar and the Orks were both created to fight them. Their gods are so awesome one implanted the fear of death in everybody, and another one thinks so little of Chaos he'd rather let them have activated Blackstone Fortresses than leave them deactivated. Also their gods are actually walking around with full power in the Materium unlike every other god in the setting. It struck me as over the top compared to the other 40K factions.

Admittedly most of that background still applies even with the new Codexes.

Their gods weren't as all powerful the way the Chaos gods were though. However, I do agree...that's one of the parts of this newcron fluff that I'm actually okay with. To each their own, though.

 Finlandiaperkele wrote:
- Event Horizon is set in Warhammer 40k universe, and is the movie is what happens when you do a warp jump without the Gellar Fields activated.

So much this.

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:
The Silent King waged a genocidal war because he was worried his empire would splinter. That's not good or nice.

True, but that's pretty much the only evil thing he's done. since then he's been a halfway decent guy which is just out of place in 40k. The 'good guys' in 40k shouldn't be in charge or you start to erode the grimdark too much (Salamanders as good guys is about as far as I'd go, and you can explain that away as propaganda if you want)...

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:
Admittedly most of that background still applies even with the new Codexes.

Yeah that's my issue mainly. They kept what wasn't really good in the old codex (overpowered C'Tan), threw away all the cool stuff and replaced it with a soap opera (while making them even more overpowered).

I definitely like the sharding of the C'Tan (overpowered god-like entities belong in the past in 40k, not the present), and the addition of different dynasties (it's a cool little insight into their pre-transference society), and more autonomy of thought for Necron lords. Those are real positives from the change in fluff. My issue is that they've stripped them of all the fear that they had as a legion of terminators. They just seem too comedic with their petty squabbling and stupid-tier technology.

By all means, keep them as having different dynasties with slightly different motivations , keep their Lords having distinct personalities, keep the C'Tan being sharded. Just make it so that their main purpose is the harvest of living beings, and make their motivations/thought processes more alien and less petty.

Easier said than done I'm sure...

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
Yeah, I really do prefer the new Necron lore, at least, at it's core.

Yeah there are good bits about the new fluff, but it's just the whole fear aspect has been replaced with petty goals and then they've tried to jam stupid-level technology in there to make them feel like a threat again.

It's not their level of tech that made them scary, it was their motivations. 'Rebuild the empire' is the motivation of tons of existing younger races. 'Harvest the life-force of the galaxy' sounds like a better motivation for soul-less ancient alien robots.

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
The whole allying with Blood Angels only makes sense when people actually put it into context that both factions were planning on betraying the other after.

The thing about allying with the Blood Angels that gets me is why did the Necrons give a toss? Tyranid hive fleets have been shown to skirt around Necron tomb worlds. They'd literally have zero motivation for helping out the pitiful fleshy ones. Why not let them get rolled over by the Tyranids, and then annex the dead world for their dynasty if we're going by the new fluff?

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
The whole unstoppable legions thing can still exist - just say the Tomb World was faulty, and now the lord has lost all actual tactics and just walks their Necrons into battle. Done.

Yeah I get that they've tried to pacify the people who liked Oldcrons with that, but just a handful of Tomb Worlds who have gone wrong doesn't bring back the ancient fear aspect that the Necrons had. It seems small-fry if it's not the majority of the faction.

And just because they're soul-less terminators, doesn't mean that their lords don't have a terrifying alien intelligence that is more than capable of tactics. Terminators in the movies were pretty smart, which was part of what made them scary.

 Lusall wrote:
scouring the Galaxy for them to rebirth the god of death

That's better! I guess it's the motivation of the Newcrons I struggle most with. So, they wake up after their millenia-long slumber, kleptomaniac Trazyn looks over his shoulder at senile old Zandrehk and says 'Gee Zandy, what do we do tonight?'. The old Nemesor looks back and says 'same thing we do every night Trazy...try to take over the world! Mwuahahahaha'.

Yeah. No thanks.

At least if their trying to rebirth the god of death they venerate seems like a believable motivation for an ancient soul-less alien.

 Lusall wrote:
getting rid of the Pariahs and the genes that may have been implanted by the Deceiver bugged me big time.

Again it's back to motivation. With the Pariah gene, it gave us a terrifying window into what a Necron-dominated universe would be like, and what their plans for humanity might be. At the moment, I can't help but feel that a Necron-dominated universe would be like an episode of Itchy and Scratchy with Necron dynasties...

 Lusall wrote:
The Necrons are like "Physics? Spacetime? Roflwat?"

This should be the tagline for their technology section in the wiki. It's just so outlandish it comes across as comedic. By all means, have their technology be terrifyingly advanced, but treat physics-breaking things with respect.

You can make them scary without resorting to physics-breaking stuff.

A tomb full of soul-less robots waking up from beneath your feet and then flaying you atom-by-atom to harvest your soul is a lot scarier than 'squabbling warlord B has a room somewhere where they can blow up any star anywhere in the galaxy whenever they want, but doesn't do it because they're gardeners'.

 Lusall wrote:
I like the idea that communicating with the Necrons would just be the hardest thing to do. Not only are they more ancient, they're not even "living" anymore.

Exactly! Do you think that they would be anything like us in any way whatsoever? Hell, technically they're even further removed from us than the Tyranids are. At least they've got the same biological survival instincts as us. In their current format they seem more relatable than the majority of the Imperium...

Apologies for the monumental thread drift!

I too love the idea that Event Horizon is a documentary on the first unprotected warp jump...

To me what kills their scariness was that before they were united and when they all awake they be unstoppable scouring the galaxy of life. It was enough that it looked like it'll take millenia to all wake up having made the decision to slumber for so long without making sure their tech can also withstand the degradation of time.
Now not only does the galaxy have to wait for them to wake up before being a threat but also have to wait for them to solve their differences and unite too. Orks except lazy and sleeping.

 ProwlerPC wrote:
To me what kills their scariness was that before they were united and when all awake they be unstoppable scouring the galaxy of life. It was enough that it looked like it'll take millenia to all wake up having made the decision to slumber for so long without making sure their tech can also withstand the segregation of time.
Now not only does the galaxy have to wait for them to wake up before being a threat but also have to wait for them to solve their differences and unite too. Orks except lazy and sleeping.

Yeah that's definitely another aspect to it. They definitely seem weaker not being unified. I keep coming back to the word 'squabbling' which does not engender any sort of terror.

If they want to make a fluff reason for necron vs necron battles then keep the idea of some tomb worlds waking up with malfunctioning central intelligence programmes that are trying to borg-like assimilate other necron forces into their collective.

Oh, also, i miss the fluff for flayed ones being driven insane by being awake for their 65 million year slumber. Especially considering that prior to that they were probably some necron citizen somewhere dossing around spending time with their family on a backwater planet.

Actually, that's another of my favourite bits of headcannon:

Bio-transference
Note that they say that all Necron citizens were turned into warriors, not just Necron soldiers.

So the warriors you see marching up the battlefield were once men...women...children.

In my headcannon, their sould remain in their robotic bodies as a power source. The last moment they remember is blacking out from their normal day-to-day Necrontyr citizen life and waking up in an unfeeling, cold metal casket before fading away from consciousness.

The noise Necron warriors make when they're 'killed' is a sort of metallic rasping scream.

This is the soul that powers them flashing briefly into consciousness, continuing a 65 million year old scream of utter terror and confusion.

The idea that the implacable Necron warrior you've just triumphed over contains the soul of a long-dead innocent little Necrontyr child really brings home the heart-breaking tragedy of what happened to the Necrontyr.

Actually, in light of that, the concept of a Necron Lord trying to find new bodies for them makes more sense. It seems sort of pointless when it's just the lords that retained their souls, but makes more sense if the souls of their entire people, everyone they knew in life, are trapped in tortuous metal cages.

If there's one thing that 40k is about other than grimdark, it's ambiguity over good and evil.

 Finlandiaperkele wrote:
- Event Horizon is set in Warhammer 40k universe, and is the movie is what happens when you do a warp jump without the Gellar Fields activated.

This makes too much sense.

All numbers given for space marine chapter strength are off by four orders of magnitude.

Martel732 wrote:
All numbers given for space marine chapter strength are off by four orders of magnitude.

I would say some it's accurate like the UM, but for others like the Wolves, BT, DA, etc. it's off by a lot

No. You'd need a million marines per chapter minimum to have any kind of impact in a galactic conflict. Even then, they'd be outnumbered by Guard by nine orders of magnitude.

Well yeah they'd be outnumbered, but from a fluff standpoint one marine is worth thousands of guardsmen

 TheLumberJack wrote:
Well yeah they'd be outnumbered, but from a fluff standpoint one marine is worth thousands of guardsmen

But they're not, no matter what the fluff says. If they actually WERE that good, they'd pass the ogre limit and they'd all be dead due to prioritization from enemies of IoM.

Martel732 wrote:

 TheLumberJack wrote:
Well yeah they'd be outnumbered, but from a fluff standpoint one marine is worth thousands of guardsmen

But they're not, no matter what the fluff says. If they actually WERE that good, they'd pass the ogre limit and they'd all be dead due to prioritization from enemies of IoM.

What is the ogre limit?

The ogre limit is a concept that limits how effective a tactical unit or vehicle can be before it becomes worthwhile to use strategic weapons on said target.

 Finlandiaperkele wrote:
- Event Horizon is set in Warhammer 40k universe, and the movie is what happens when you do a warp jump without the Gellar Fields activated.

Naw, The Event Horizon didn't jump into warp space without a Geller field.

It jumped through the CENTRE of the universe, where dwells Azathoth, the demon-sultan and took a chunk of it with itself when it left.
That's why they went mad and dead (and not necessarily in that order).

Not because of some stoner-induced psychedelia from one-too-many 'shrooms.

But because a star god from beyond space-time now inhabited it. Ia Ia ftagn

Have some soul when you venerate the Outer Gods!

Ïa! Ïa! Azathoth, the nuclear chaos at the center of all things! Ïa! Ïa! Azathoth fhtagn!

Martel732 wrote:
The ogre limit is a concept that limits how effective a tactical unit or vehicle can be before it becomes worthwhile to use strategic weapons on said target.

When the ogre limit is reached, a loud audible alarm of 'NERDS?!?!?!' is played from a loud speaker.

Ooh, another one that ups the general grimdarkness of psykers, the black ships and the golden throne (if you thought that possible).

Feeding psykers to the Golden Throne does absolutely nothing. Zip. Nada.

Psykers in proximity to mechanisms in the Golden Throne burn out, but that's all that happens.

The Imperium keeps sacrificing thousands upon thousands of people every day for no material gain, simply because they don't understand how the technology works.

Martel732 wrote:
All numbers given for space marine chapter strength are off by four orders of magnitude.

I'm behind this one. I'd also say it goes for most GW numbers.

Personal favourite is that the Imperium isn't that horrible a place to live in unless you're drafted into the military or grow up on a feral/feudal world. The Imperiums middle class enjoying very few citizen rights but being able to do interplanitary travel for vacations, purchase food/entertainment/artwork on an interplanitary market and have access to health treatments that renders diseases completly non-leathal.
Fun fact: every 40k player knows more about the god like Space marines then they do the average citizen.

The Emperor is the Carter of H.P. Lovecraft's Dream-Cycle Mythos. While his body rots on the Golden Throne, he spins out Incarnates (from the Quartz Throne of Celephais of the Dreamlands, which he also rules) into the Waking World, which are various heroic figures (often, but not always, also potent Psykers) currently and previously in existence.

As the Emperor is many thousands of souls compressed into one, he can "loan out" a soul to inhabit a new body in order to do something to further his plans. His souls are immortal, his Incarnate bodies are not. The death of one of his Incarnates is not always counter to his plans... sometimes, it takes a martyr-figure to inspire others to action.

He may also have been the legendary King in Yellow, though that may alternately have been Hastur.

The Ruinous Powers are avatars and/or pawns of Nyarlathotep, the Crawling Chaos and other Outer Gods, such as Azathoth and Yig.