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I'm curious of people's opinion here. I've found that recently, with all the "X vs Y" supplements that have come out and box sets, you can preeeeetty much predict the outcome of the various battles just based on the armies on the tin.

There seems to be a hidden (or not so hidden) hierarchy of designated winners and losers in the 40k fluff.
This is my proposed listing, I'm curious what people think:


In the pages of 40k fluff, when two armies clash, who is most often depicted as the winner? Who almost always seems to get chopped to bits with zero effort? And to be clear, I'm talking about a depiction of direct combat conflict, not "who won the war even if they lost the battle" because there are in-universe restrictions on some factions winning or losing. If the Tau or Eldar lose more than a couple cursory engagements, they're wiped out, and if the Daemons or Chaos Marines won more than a couple the universe might explode.


Tier 1 (Designated Winners): Tau, Necrons, Loyalist Space Marines


This may be controversial, but I think the absolute tip-top of the top tier here is the Necrons, both new and old fluff. While there are plenty of stories of tomb worlds getting blown up, small teams doing daring stuff and winning while the world is still waking up, etc, when it comes to a direct conflict between awakened necrons and any other enemy, you very, very rarely see them lose, or even die without reconstructing or phasing out. The only example I come up with is the fluff piece from Codex: Eldar Craftworlds with the ranger sniper.

Tied for second I would say Tau and Space Marines. The only reason I consider it a tie is that there is a lot of artwork depicting Tau getting blown up, stabbed, whatever even by lowly imperial guardsmen, but they almost never lose in the fluff in direct conflicts. Space Marines always win in direct conflicts UNLESS there is a particular need to demonstrate how awesome some particular thing is specifically in a codex or fluff piece that is not Space Marine centric.


Tier 2 (Worf Effect Tier): Eldar (Dark, Clown and Craftworld), Chaos Daemons, Titans

This tier consists of factions described as super-awesome and badass, but who highly frequently fall victim to the "Worf Effect", ie being defeated with seemingly no effort just to demonstrate how super-duper-extra-awesome some hero or tier 1 army is. Otherwise, they will generally defeat any mook or submook faction in the fluff. Honorable mention goes to the Avatar of Khaine or any nameless greater daemon for being most commonly affected by this phenomena.


Tier 3 (Mook tier): Tyranids, Chaos Marines, Orks

This tier consists of the forces who nearly always lose to the more heroic factions. Any description of how threatening or powerful they are in the fluff you know immediately on reading is just a setup to make the hero's victory more impressive.

Tier 4 (Submook): Guard, Sisters, Skitarii, >>>>>> Traitor guardsmen/cultists/rebels

There's got to be some kind of tier for the poor, poor submooks that get used to make the mooks look threatening before the heroes dispatch them. Frequently do not appear in the actual story save for a distress call and bodies lying around when the heroes arrive. And then there's "Generic Human Rebel Baddies", who are almost a tier of their own. They've never, in the 20+ year history of 40k, ever won anything to my knowledge. The best they've done is maybe get their planet blown up with an exterminatus.

I can think of at least one battle the 'crons lost. the second Battle of Demos.

@the_scotsman: Did you do any study for your tier? I've combed through the lore and created a list of win-loss ratios for most factions so I usually find that the most effective way to determine who the designated winner or losers are.

As for the list you're spelling out, well, it seems you've divided the Imperium into separate factions, something I don't usually do since their one polity, same with the Daemons and Chaos Space Marines. Still its your chart so that's fine, those are the ground rules you're laying.

I'd add this to what you've put down;

Tier 1: Necron are a bit of an odd choice. By victory-defeat ratio their at 10 defeats to 13 victories in the Imperium's favour (which is fantastic for any Xenos I must add) but they have very few major victories to their name. Additionally with the World Engine destroyed, the defeat at Damnos, Helbrecht's revenge on Imotekh, Imotekh further losing to Logan Grimnar's Space Wolves quite anti-climatically I wouldn't really call them 'Designated Winners'. They do very well for Xenos, amongst the best, but definitely below Loylaist Space Marines.

Which brings me to the next point; really everyone should be below Loyalist Space Marines, just crunching numbers the sheer weight of victories possessed by them overwhelms all other factions in the games. I'd have altered your chart by having a 'Space Marine' Tier and then just below it a tier with the Tau.

Then Tau; again I wish you'd quote what facts your using to state the Tau 'almost never lose direct conflicts' since what does Styx, Pallia, Kvariam Alpha or the colony wiped out by the Skitarii count as? Those are all direct defeats and engagements for the Tau, as is Voltoris.

Tier 2:

No way Craftworld Eldar should be here. They have the worst record of any major faction by far, far worse than the Tyranids or Mechanicus which you listed below them.

Other than that I broadly agree with this Tier, I'd simply state that I think you're underestimating the Dark Eldar; they actually have the best record of any Xenos faction against the Imperium at 11 wins to 12 losses. I'd have moved Dark Eldar up one since they have no crippling defeats to their history like the Craftworld Eldar and Orks do.

Tier 3:

Only one comment; Tyranids. In fluff they actually really do well, consuming important worlds like Gryphone and having even defeated the Space Wolves in battle before (a very rare feat for any Xenos). So I'd reckon that, by fluff alone, the Tyranid are being placed to low here.

Other than that this Tier is fine, just put the Craftworld Eldar in here.

Tier 4:

Why are Skitarii here? Seriously? What major defeats do they have? To my knowledge they, and the Mechanicus (who you haven't listed so I presume you mean them all together) have been very powerful in fluff of late, baring into Craftworlds and stealing their stuff, destroying Tau Colonies, fighting their way into the Webway despite the efforts of the Craftworld Eldar and reaching Comorragh, I think they definitely need to be higher than this.

Other than that this Tier is good. Also agreed human 'rebels' literally only exist so there can be a story about how effortlessly they are crushed. Sadly.

That would be my version going by your ground rules.

Imperial Guard frequently wins battles and campaigns though. In most of the BL Guard novels, they'll win, or at least wear out their opponents. Sometimes they'll win with the aid of random Space Marines. And they won on Armageddon, a couple of times.

Guard is epic even when defeated though.

I think the major difference here is I was only considering "direct conflict", i.e. fluff depictions of battles, rather than who wins the overall conflict.

For instance, a battle that describes how effortlessly the superior super-advanced technology of the tau blew away the blundering, ponderous machines of the Guard...but then goes on to say that the IG just blew up the whole world with an exterminatus and the Tau didn't gain anything. I'd be counting that as a victory for the Tau.


For instance, let's examine the Damnos Incident you cited:

1) Imperial Guard and Adeptus Mechanicus do some thing to awaken the necrons, get slaughtered by the awakened legions. Necron victory over Guard and Admech.

2) Ultramarines beat up necrons, lose the overall conflict but beat the necrons. So here, Space Marines > Necrons.

So yes, Damnos would definitely be Space Marines > Necrons > Admech and Guard.

The Harlequins' win ratio is actually pretty fantastic in the fluff.



They don't appear that often, but when they do, it's normally to hand out a beat-down. Death Masque was a real outlier in that regard.

 Robin5t wrote:
They don't appear that often, but when they do, it's normally to hand out a beat-down. Death Masque was a real outlier in that regard.

I haven't gotten to read through Death Masque, but isn't their defeat there largely due to trying to negotiate with the Emperor's unthinking killers? Like, at some point the Death Jester has Artemis at his mercy, and instead attempts to parlay to explain they're not enemies, and are working toward a common cause. To which Artmeis says something pithy like "Battle Brothers? Come the Apocalypse!" and shoots said merciful Harlequin in the face.

For my part, I feel like Orks are the mook of the setting by a pretty good margin. In video games, they're always the opponent before the "real" enemy reveal themselves. I know there's the "beast" book series right now attempting to push Orks up in threat level, but I don't get the impression anyone really thinks of them as a galactic threat, as much as a nuisance to train the recruits on.

Still, they don't have it as bad as the Beastmen in fantasy/AOS. They appear in storylines as afterthoughts, like "The warriors of Sigmar's divine wrath walked a few more city blocks, killing zillions of civilizations of Beastmen, when suddenly they encountered a threat!" Poor lads...

Oggthrok wrote:

 Robin5t wrote:
They don't appear that often, but when they do, it's normally to hand out a beat-down. Death Masque was a real outlier in that regard.

I haven't gotten to read through Death Masque, but isn't their defeat there largely due to trying to negotiate with the Emperor's unthinking killers? Like, at some point the Death Jester has Artemis at his mercy, and instead attempts to parlay to explain they're not enemies, and are working toward a common cause. To which Artmeis says something pithy like "Battle Brothers? Come the Apocalypse!" and shoots said merciful Harlequin in the face.

For my part, I feel like Orks are the mook of the setting by a pretty good margin. In video games, they're always the opponent before the "real" enemy reveal themselves. I know there's the "beast" book series right now attempting to push Orks up in threat level, but I don't get the impression anyone really thinks of them as a galactic threat, as much as a nuisance to train the recruits on.

Still, they don't have it as bad as the Beastmen in fantasy/AOS. They appear in storylines as afterthoughts, like "The warriors of Sigmar's divine wrath walked a few more city blocks, killing zillions of civilizations of Beastmen, when suddenly they encountered a threat!" Poor lads...

Death Masque's fiction, bar the part where the Death Jester shows up and kills a couple of the Deathwatch, is basically bolterporn. All the Harlequin troupers are taken out with almost no effort, and the Jester shows up when they're pretty much all dead. Despite the whole "it's the harlequins, allied with Eldrad!!!" thing, Eldrad doesn't do anything but stand there and wait for the dreadnought to stomp in, say a cool line, and shoot him with a plasma cannon.

Just like you would expect from a standard Call of Duty video game, the only reason for some of the heroes to die is to make the end boss seem threatening before the good guy dispatches them.

the_scotsman wrote:
Death Masque's fiction, bar the part where the Death Jester shows up and kills a couple of the Deathwatch, is basically bolterporn. All the Harlequin troupers are taken out with almost no effort, and the Jester shows up when they're pretty much all dead. Despite the whole "it's the harlequins, allied with Eldrad!!!" thing, Eldrad doesn't do anything but stand there and wait for the dreadnought to stomp in, say a cool line, and shoot him with a plasma cannon.

Just like you would expect from a standard Call of Duty video game, the only reason for some of the heroes to die is to make the end boss seem threatening before the good guy dispatches them.

That's really disappointing. I'm not an Eldar player historically, but I've understood the story of Ynead to be that the billions of souls collected in Eldar soulstones since the fall, could essentially be cashed in at once. This would birth a new god of the Craftworld Eldar; a light mirror to Slannesh's depravity. Thus, one god would kill the other, and the few surviving Eldar left to rebuild their civilization without the predations of Chaos.

But, it's one of those things like Abaddon surmounting the Golden Throne and slaying the emperor, that you never expect will ever happen. When it does, you imagine it will be the big dramatic ending that draws the story to a close.

Instead, Death Masque seems a bit like writing a story about how Leman Russ returns from the Eye of Terror, and is immediately killed by a new box set of Tau that's going on sale that month. Talk about your anti-climax...

(I love the models though, cheers on that part!)

Oggthrok wrote:

 Robin5t wrote:
They don't appear that often, but when they do, it's normally to hand out a beat-down. Death Masque was a real outlier in that regard.

I haven't gotten to read through Death Masque, but isn't their defeat there largely due to trying to negotiate with the Emperor's unthinking killers? Like, at some point the Death Jester has Artemis at his mercy, and instead attempts to parlay to explain they're not enemies, and are working toward a common cause. To which Artmeis says something pithy like "Battle Brothers? Come the Apocalypse!" and shoots said merciful Harlequin in the face.

For my part, I feel like Orks are the mook of the setting by a pretty good margin. In video games, they're always the opponent before the "real" enemy reveal themselves. I know there's the "beast" book series right now attempting to push Orks up in threat level, but I don't get the impression anyone really thinks of them as a galactic threat, as much as a nuisance to train the recruits on.

Still, they don't have it as bad as the Beastmen in fantasy/AOS. They appear in storylines as afterthoughts, like "The warriors of Sigmar's divine wrath walked a few more city blocks, killing zillions of civilizations of Beastmen, when suddenly they encountered a threat!" Poor lads...

Thinking of the Orks like that is how galaxies get curbstomped - the Beast Arises is a perfect example of just why the Orks are such a massive galactic threat. The Beast and his Waaagh would steamroll any of the factions in current 40k with just as much ease as he did the 32k Imperium.

the_scotsman wrote:
Death Masque's fiction, bar the part where the Death Jester shows up and kills a couple of the Deathwatch, is basically bolterporn.

The books Robin mentioned are shurikenporn so it all evens out then. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 Ashiraya wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:
Death Masque's fiction, bar the part where the Death Jester shows up and kills a couple of the Deathwatch, is basically bolterporn.

The books Robin mentioned are shurikenporn so it all evens out then. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Actually, Shuriken only make up a relatively small part of the action. I'd say it's more like 'slashy-backflippy-exotic-deadly-weaponporn'.

 Ashiraya wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:
Death Masque's fiction, bar the part where the Death Jester shows up and kills a couple of the Deathwatch, is basically bolterporn.

The books Robin mentioned are shurikenporn so it all evens out then. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Right, like that time where a super-l33t strike force of cool awesome eldar aspect warriors bust into the golden throne room, say a cool line, and blow up the emperor.

Oh wait, that didn't happen, because when you have a fluff element with a 20+ year buildup and it's something imperial, GW treats it with a tiny bit of respect

Space Marines trump most factions in the fluff 9 times out of 10. Looking into the necrons more, I'm definitely reconsidering my putting them at the top, they're probably sharing the same tier as the eldar: Above the mooks, but below the space marines.

Tau, though...oddly almost all the fluff I'm finding for Tau has them winning actual fights. Their losses tend to be either attritional stuff or based on naivete. All the fights seem to revolve around their cool amazing super-advanced shiny technology countering whatever they fight (on sale now, buy seven!)

the_scotsman wrote:
I think the major difference here is I was only considering "direct conflict", i.e. fluff depictions of battles, rather than who wins the overall conflict.

For instance, a battle that describes how effortlessly the superior super-advanced technology of the tau blew away the blundering, ponderous machines of the Guard...but then goes on to say that the IG just blew up the whole world with an exterminatus and the Tau didn't gain anything. I'd be counting that as a victory for the Tau.


For instance, let's examine the Damnos Incident you cited:

1) Imperial Guard and Adeptus Mechanicus do some thing to awaken the necrons, get slaughtered by the awakened legions. Necron victory over Guard and Admech.

2) Ultramarines beat up necrons, lose the overall conflict but beat the necrons. So here, Space Marines > Necrons.

So yes, Damnos would definitely be Space Marines > Necrons > Admech and Guard.

except that's not the case at all. Dedmos was two battles. the first one saw the Ultramarines fighting alongside the IG getting pushed off planet by the 'crons. (a definate loss for the space marines, and easily the highest profile lost battle of the Ultras) the second battle saw the Ultramarines return some 20 odd years later and pull out a win,

the_scotsman wrote:

 Ashiraya wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:
Death Masque's fiction, bar the part where the Death Jester shows up and kills a couple of the Deathwatch, is basically bolterporn.

The books Robin mentioned are shurikenporn so it all evens out then. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Right, like that time where a super-l33t strike force of cool awesome eldar aspect warriors bust into the golden throne room, say a cool line, and blow up the emperor.

To be fair, the Harlequins made a really, really good attempt at this in Throneworld...

the_scotsman wrote:
...but then goes on to say that the IG just blew up the whole world with an exterminatus and the Tau didn't gain anything. I'd be counting that as a victory for the Tau.

That would be the Imperial Navy though, Guard doesn't have weapon systems like that. It's an entirely different branch. And Exterminatus is very rarely used, so that wouldn't happen all that often. The Imperium might pull out, only to return a couple of years later to lay siege to the planet.

Obviously a single non-augmented human trooper would always lose against everyone else, because everyone else is basically an abnormal monster. But we're not talking unarmed combat, and the Guard makes up for their frailty with impressive projectile weapons and solid armoured vehicles. Guard should at least qualify for tier 3 on your list, possibly tier 2.

I suppose it all comes down to which fluff you seek out and have access to; and with humans being so numerous, and because they contrasts nicely with whatever every other faction is about, I can see why they would show up all the time in the background stories in Codexes, or in novels focusing on one of the many alien factions. Having said that, the novels I've sought out, shows Guard generally winning engagements, and wars on the whole.

@Zingraff: I'd agree actually, the Guard do fairly well for themselves, not Marine level, but definitely above Ork or Craftworld level. Particularly with the amount of novels they have.

@the_scotsman: I'm not really sure I get what you mean; all the battles I listed were Tau straight defeats, as in they engaged the enemy and all died, there was no exterminated or anything in any of them, Mont'ka's practically the only time that specific template is followed. Kvariam Alpha, Styx, Voltoris, Pallia and others simply have the Tau beat in direct combat, usually by Space Marines. Not to mention the Deatwatch recently crippling the military command structure of the entire Farsight Enclaves on their own recently, the Sktarii wiping out a colony for its tech, the Orks looting and making Tau Killa, the Dark Eldar's abduction of an entire planet.

@Oggthrok: I always felt Beastmen in Fantasy looked very cool. I do feel for them and generic rebels though, it loses any meaning to read about people defeating the, cause the fluff makes it seem like a strong breeze could kill them all.

@Robin5t: Harlequins...I never looked into the, because how minor they are. They might beat the Dark Eldar out actually.

 Anemone wrote:
@the_scotsman: Did you do any study for your tier? I've combed through the lore and created a list of win-loss ratios for most factions so I usually find that the most effective way to determine who the designated winner or losers are.

As for the list you're spelling out, well, it seems you've divided the Imperium into separate factions, something I don't usually do since their one polity, same with the Daemons and Chaos Space Marines. Still its your chart so that's fine, those are the ground rules you're laying.

I'd add this to what you've put down;

Tier 1: Necron are a bit of an odd choice. By victory-defeat ratio their at 10 defeats to 13 victories in the Imperium's favour (which is fantastic for any Xenos I must add) but they have very few major victories to their name. Additionally with the World Engine destroyed, the defeat at Damnos, Helbrecht's revenge on Imotekh, Imotekh further losing to Logan Grimnar's Space Wolves quite anti-climatically I wouldn't really call them 'Designated Winners'. They do very well for Xenos, amongst the best, but definitely below Loylaist Space Marines.

Which brings me to the next point; really everyone should be below Loyalist Space Marines, just crunching numbers the sheer weight of victories possessed by them overwhelms all other factions in the games. I'd have altered your chart by having a 'Space Marine' Tier and then just below it a tier with the Tau.

Then Tau; again I wish you'd quote what facts your using to state the Tau 'almost never lose direct conflicts' since what does Styx, Pallia, Kvariam Alpha or the colony wiped out by the Skitarii count as? Those are all direct defeats and engagements for the Tau, as is Voltoris.

Tier 2:

No way Craftworld Eldar should be here. They have the worst record of any major faction by far, far worse than the Tyranids or Mechanicus which you listed below them.

Other than that I broadly agree with this Tier, I'd simply state that I think you're underestimating the Dark Eldar; they actually have the best record of any Xenos faction against the Imperium at 11 wins to 12 losses. I'd have moved Dark Eldar up one since they have no crippling defeats to their history like the Craftworld Eldar and Orks do.

Tier 3:

Only one comment; Tyranids. In fluff they actually really do well, consuming important worlds like Gryphone and having even defeated the Space Wolves in battle before (a very rare feat for any Xenos). So I'd reckon that, by fluff alone, the Tyranid are being placed to low here.

Other than that this Tier is fine, just put the Craftworld Eldar in here.

Tier 4:

Why are Skitarii here? Seriously? What major defeats do they have? To my knowledge they, and the Mechanicus (who you haven't listed so I presume you mean them all together) have been very powerful in fluff of late, baring into Craftworlds and stealing their stuff, destroying Tau Colonies, fighting their way into the Webway despite the efforts of the Craftworld Eldar and reaching Comorragh, I think they definitely need to be higher than this.

Other than that this Tier is good. Also agreed human 'rebels' literally only exist so there can be a story about how effortlessly they are crushed. Sadly.

That would be my version going by your ground rules.

Didn't the Space Mutts get curb-stomped by the Orcs in Stormclaw?

honestly he TGau losing battles isn't that b ig a suprise. the real suprise is they win as often as they do given the sheer scale differances.

 Robin5t wrote:

 Ashiraya wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:
Death Masque's fiction, bar the part where the Death Jester shows up and kills a couple of the Deathwatch, is basically bolterporn.

The books Robin mentioned are shurikenporn so it all evens out then. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Actually, Shuriken only make up a relatively small part of the action. I'd say it's more like 'slashy-backflippy-exotic-deadly-weaponporn'.

Yeah, but that does not roll off the tongue as nicely.

I have always put Aspect Warriors on par with Space Marines, with Harlequins presumably being a bit above both.

Imperial Guard should not be bottom tier. They hold the line, and that means they win at least almost as many as they lose. Space Marines participate in at most a single digit percentage of the total number of battles involving the Imperium-- more than likely, less than one percent. The Imperial Guard participates in far more, and in spite of the memes, they do not constantly get wiped out and lose every battle they participate in.

Orks also control more of the galaxy than any other race, so don't count them as total losers, either.

@Dakka Wolf: I mean...you know Orks lose Sanctus Reach (which Storm Claw is part of) right? They even get upstaged as the final villains with Khorne Daemons coming in when the 'Now the real fight begins' moment comes.

Sanctus Reach is actually a good example of the phenomenon of 'Orks are a warm up for before the real villain shows up'.

@BrianDavion: Wish more people had that view.

@Melissia: The problem is though that even if you say that Space Marines only partake in 1% of the battles, which is a fair estimate taking into account the scale of things, that 1% is by far the 1% we've been exposed to and thus know enough to talk about.

It's hard to discuss stuff which might be true but, because we never see it, we don't know anything about it. It leaves it nebulous and impossible to talk about.

Also I thought it was always stated that the Imperium controlled more space than any other 1 faction? But I'd understand the logic of it being the Orks so that doesn't surprise me. They are still total losers in the fluff though because they've never won a major campaign; their greatest 'achivement' is losing the Beast War not to badly. Unlike the Imperium they can't claim to have won any major Wars.

EDIT: My own list would probably look more like this;

1) Dark Angels/Space Wolves/Ultramarines/Most Generic Loyalist Marines/Deathwatch/Grey Knights
2) Tau Empire/Adeptus Mechanicus/Harlequins
3) Imperial Guard/Blood Angels/Tyranid
4) Dark Eldar/Necron
5) Orks/Sisters of Battle/Imperial Knights
6) Chaos Space Marines/Chaos Daemons
7) Craftworld Eldar

Mind you I fully concede that my research is not absolute, particularly regarding Chaos since I normally have examined the Xenos side more closely, I might be placing them unfairly low, I just have always, from what I have gathered, been possessed of the impression that they fare very poorly.

I'd probably adjust the list as I read more about Chaos. Also I might be placing Blood Angels too low, I'm not an expert there, but again from what I have gathered they have usually seemed to fare a lot worse than any of the other 'big' chapters; Space Wolves/Dark Angels/Ultramarines. But I'm open to ammendments based on argumentation.

It's kind of ironic how the strongest army on the tabletop is the one who always get massacred in the fluff.

I feel compelled to point out that technically Orks should be have their own special tier at the very top of the list, because Orks never lose as long as they got a chance to fight (and it wasn't boring).

I feel like there's something to be said for embracing the mook-ness of a particular faction. One of the things I love about Orks is that they are sort of elemental form of mook, always there to die in droves while never being faceless. And it makes the victories especially sweet, as they often come as a result of their opponent underestimating them.

That would depend heavily on how one defines 'win' then, I suppose, and will force quite a semantic conversation. Personally I'd prefer to stick with an objective measure of who killed who/achieved primary objectives of military venture since it makes things easier.

I'm also not quite sure what you mean when you say 'embrace your mook-ness' do you mean, like, embrace how easy to kill and negligible your faction is to the setting? I know more than a few Ork players who would definitively prefer not to feel like, in fluff, their faction is largely a joke (joke in terms of importance, not in terms of strangeness inherent to Orkish charm).

Even in the Beast Series, much as I dislike the series for many reasons, when Orks are supposed to be at their most dangerous ever, the books waste no time making clear how negligible the Orks are in the great scheme of things.

 Anemone wrote:
That would depend heavily on how one defines 'win' then, I suppose, and will force quite a semantic conversation. Personally I'd prefer to stick with an objective measure of who killed who/achieved primary objectives of military venture since it makes things easier.

I'm also not quite sure what you mean when you say 'embrace your mook-ness' do you mean, like, embrace how easy to kill and negligible your faction is to the setting? I know more than a few Ork players who would definitively prefer not to feel like, in fluff, their faction is largely a joke (joke in terms of importance, not in terms of strangeness inherent to Orkish charm).

Even in the Beast Series, much as I dislike the series for many reasons, when Orks are supposed to be at their most dangerous ever, the books waste no time making clear how negligible the Orks are in the great scheme of things.

Honestly, all of those characters in Beast Arises intent on claiming that the Orks aren't the real threat just looked stupid to me, given that the Orks were literally capable of ending the Imperium at any point in the series from the point where they parked their attack moon over Terra. I mean, sure, Veritus and Harlequins, nobody's saying to ignore Chaos, but the Ork Warlord currently curbstomping the entire galaxy at once is probably the more pressing concern for everyone involved, here.

@Anemone... "mic drop". I bow yo your knowledge. Wheres daemons in the schema then. Ive only read 2 books. Scar and another and chaos was kicking EVERYONES butt.

 Anemone wrote:
@Melissia: The problem is though that even if you say that Space Marines only partake in 1% of the battles, which is a fair estimate taking into account the scale of things, that 1% is by far the 1% we've been exposed to and thus know enough to talk about.

It's hard to discuss stuff which might be true but, because we never see it, we don't know anything about it. It leaves it nebulous and impossible to talk about.

It's not "might be true" it IS true. What I stated was an established fact of the lore, which you can ignore if you choose to, but that's your choice. Not mine.

 Melissia wrote:

Wow... You are quite the instigator, aren't you? Anemone is genuinely trying to discuss something with you and you're just trying to turn it into a slug fest. True or not, if you dropped links and elaborated further instead of just claiming and attacking you might actually get somewhere.

Edit: If you're going to attempt any argument or anything of that nature, not saying you are, PM me. If you drop oodles of delicious links and examples I'd be happy to shut my trap and spend my quiet afternoon reading them.

 Benny Badmen wrote:

 Melissia wrote:

Wow... You are quite the instigator, aren't you?

If you have a real objection to what I said, feel free to say so. I'm not interested in discussing my "tone". The facts are:

1: The common citizen-- and that includes the Imperial Guard-- stands almost no chance of actually SEEING a Space Marine in their life times, and seeing a Space Marine in their lives is considered to be like meeting a figure of myth and legend brought to life.

2: The Imperial Guard is the primary force in the Imperium, and is mentioned as being involved in almost all of the Imperium's wars. This is supported by Black Library's lores, where almost all crusades use the Imperial Guard as the overwhelming bulk of their forces.

3: The Imperium is not a quickly collapsing mess. It is very slowly being eaten away by the countless horrors from within, from without, and from beyond-- but its military forces are enough, if only barely and only most of the time, to hold the tide.

Thus, it's quite reasonable to suggest that the internet memes about the Imperial Guard being nothing but wimps in paper shirts holding flashlights are not actually true within the 40k lore, and they do actually win if not a majority of their battles, at least close to it-- and without the help of Space Marines. That the Black Library lore focuses on jerking off the egos of Space Marines is well established, and any interpretation of the lore has to keep in mind that just because several BL writers are obsessed with Space Marines, it does not mean that non-Space Marine lore, even if lacking, is non-canon.

Also, I'm ignoring your edit. Talk about my argument, not me. I'm uninterested in your opinion about me.