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I feel clinging to the lore as a reason for anything is kind of... idk, naïve? Especially for something like the Hrud, where the details are flimsy to say the least. GW doesn't consider itself beholden to fairly major aspects of the lore - its certainly not going to care about some small asides which the vast majority of the playerbase have likely never read.

I can't see it any time soon, but in 5 years time when GW are once again looking for a new faction to launch? Its not impossible to imagine.

Hrud do seem to be the largest alien faction in current lore that doesn't have any representation in the games. The other main contender would be Khrave IMO.

I think a decent argument could also be made for Slaugth/Rangdan, they do have the street cred of nearly destroying the Imperium during the Great Crusade and knocking the Dark Angels off the largest legion pedestal. However, they are currently fairly confined to infiltration tactics on the fringes of Imperial space.

Plus the tabletop battle is not supposed to represent a lengthy battle as far as I remember and more of a few crucial minutes so to say. Unless we have been provided with a chart to actually make the calculation of how older you would get hanging around the Hrud, it is perfectly valid to have them damage stars in an area and not insta kill people. Maybe add that the more turn you spend, the worse the debuff gets. No reason this wouldn't work considered on its own.

What I'm unsure about is what units could be created for the Hrud but I'm still a partisan of the idea that a fluff army list for campaign players doesn't need to be huge.

Btw, would like to see the Qrol too.

Hrud are stated to basically be all over the place, living underground or out of sight of other races beneath their cities, not unlike the Skaven (or in this case some sort of lovecraftian extra-dimensional intelligence made from the wet dreams of modern day UFOlogists). If you can have an entire cities worth of Hrud living under your feet without experiencing rapid aging or whatever, then the fluff-effects are either overstated or its something that really doesn't trigger until you hit an absolute critical mass and density that need not be the "default" for potential conflicts represented on the tabletop.

I might also point out that scientific research on the Hrud is, at best, incomplete. At worst, it's purely speculative. Seeing as how one has never, and cannot apparently be taken alive, and once it's killed, cannot be studied quickly as it just sort of, melts, means that even the most accomplished researchers on them know shockingly little.

All I'm point to is that fact. That maybe the sentient frog creatures controlling this universe know all the answers, but humanity doesn't. There could be entire sub species of Hrud that Don't do these things. That are just really good at shooting stuff. Or stabbing stuff. Heck, we Literally JUST Learned about a complete civilization of super Tau Level Technologically advanced super space dwarves, that we seemingly missed the first time around. oopsies. Oh, and the are about a trillion super Astartes we call Primaris, that again, no one knew about until relatively yesterday. It's not hard to "concieve" of an evolved or altered race of Hrud.

If you take the skaven way for the hruds and make them mostly live hidden under other races planets, really, they're would be ample room for them on this sandbox of a galaxy.

 Maréchal des Logis Walter wrote:
If you take the skaven way for the hruds and make them mostly live hidden under other races planets, really, they're would be ample room for them on this sandbox of a galaxy.

Especially if they are not LITERALLY hidden, but in the extradimensional cracks between realities. They can be like some of the UFO lore/fairy lore, kidnapping people for bizarre reasons known only to them.

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:

 Maréchal des Logis Walter wrote:
If you take the skaven way for the hruds and make them mostly live hidden under other races planets, really, they're would be ample room for them on this sandbox of a galaxy.

Especially if they are not LITERALLY hidden, but in the extradimensional cracks between realities.

Schrodinger's new Xenos faction?

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:

 Maréchal des Logis Walter wrote:
If you take the skaven way for the hruds and make them mostly live hidden under other races planets, really, they're would be ample room for them on this sandbox of a galaxy.

Especially if they are not LITERALLY hidden, but in the extradimensional cracks between realities. They can be like some of the UFO lore/fairy lore, kidnapping people for bizarre reasons known only to them.

Yeah. Yeah pretty much, creatures of dread tales on countless worlds sometimes materialising in agony as a migration strikes. Doesn't that sound mental?

Tyel wrote:
I feel clinging to the lore as a reason for anything is kind of... idk, naïve? Especially for something like the Hrud, where the details are flimsy to say the least. GW doesn't consider itself beholden to fairly major aspects of the lore - its certainly not going to care about some small asides which the vast majority of the playerbase have likely never read.

I can't see it any time soon, but in 5 years time when GW are once again looking for a new faction to launch? Its not impossible to imagine.

the way of warhammer has always been for the models to dictate the lore. "we're making a new box set, but we can't afford two different sets of sprues, so let's just reuse the same sprue twice. and that's fine because... there was a time when space marines fought each other" or "all the squats got eaten by tyranids, which is why they don't have models anymore. except a few survived and now they're back"

if they wanted to make hrud a proper faction, they could explain that what was known about them before was incomplete, or that it was only one type of hrud, and these are different, or that they only do that sometimes, and they fight normally at other times. they brought back squats, after all. if they want to make the models, they will, and they can justify it later

What kind of artwork do we have of the Hrud? I don’t actually know what they look like, and a Google Search is liable to get a lot of fan art.

As far as I know there's 2 bits of official art.

One has just a robed hidden figure with a rat tail. Another has something that looks like a burnt corpse.

As far as I've the aspect of the Hrud in 3rd edition rulebook had them rumoured to be the potential space skaven for a while. At least according to the internet. I mean I've got and read the rulebook a few times because it is just that gorgeous but I wasn't into 40k at the time.

Then you've got that "burnt corpse" illustration from Xenology I think, where proper explanations about the Hrud started to be given.
The one of dissected hrud. But if anyone has got RPG books, maybe a Hrud might be depicted in one corner or the other as well?

Our first glimpse



OK the image from Xenology is more Creature from the Black Lagoon than burnt corpse.

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:
Our first glimpse

they probably wouldn't use this design for a line of models in 40k, but i really love the crouching hidden interpretation here. it's like a mix of skaven and night goblins

The Xenology design is also an "artist's impression" because no Imperial has actually seen anything other than goo beneath their shroud. It is likely completely wrong.

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:
Our first glimpse



OK the image from Xenology is more Creature from the Black Lagoon than burnt corpse.

There’s two pictures in Xenology.

There’s that artist’s impression one plus there is a picture of the partially dissected corpse which apparently started rapidly rotting as soon as it died which is the ‘burnt corpse’ people are referring to.

Lord Zarkov wrote:

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:
Our first glimpse



OK the image from Xenology is more Creature from the Black Lagoon than burnt corpse.

There’s two pictures in Xenology.

There’s that artist’s impression one plus there is a picture of the partially dissected corpse which apparently started rapidly rotting as soon as it died which is the ‘burnt corpse’ people are referring to.

This is the rapidly-liquefying dissection corpse:

Thanks man!

Yeah, that last ones was the dissection I was talking about

Incidentally, the lore around that image talks about this specimen wearing a shabby cloak, along with others wearing cloaks. They are described as having tails too, although not visible above. I think even with a more alien countenance beneath the clothing, visually they still look like Space-Skaven from the outside.

The right arm on that specimen is a scavenged Imperial augmetic and it was captured from an Imperial warship. I don't think the entropy effects are going to be an issue for 40k outside of massive end-of-the-world migration events.

Again, grain of salt on the "dissection" image, because the whole "between two worlds" bit. No one is really 100% sure what they look like, and they dissolve into goo within minutes of death.

Might also by several accounts it takes a lot to bring a single one down, so that much firepower isn't likely to bring a lot back to the meat wagon for analysis.

I mean, keep in mind also that the leading technological/xeno-biological minds in the entire imperium, are little more than psychotic religious fanatics that believe toasters have souls. That is who is giving us "facts" on the racial makeup and abilities of the Hrud.

Skaven are fairly 40kified as a faction these days anyway

A space skaven army could almost be made with fantasy models.

I think there is a discrepancy between sources. In particular, the Hrud faced by the Iron Warriors during the Great Crusade seem to be much stronger than Hrud encountered elsewhere except during full-scale migrations.

To contrast, the Hrud specimen in Xenology was captured after being hit by a shovel by a crewman...

I suspect that the Hrud encountered in the Great Crusade represented an elite, technologically advanced, and exceptionally powerful tribe. Akin to the Orks fought at Ullanor, this tribe was probably approaching the pinnacle of Hrud power. In addition, Hrud seem to be able to manipulate their entropy fields, so probably there is a difference between great Hrud warriors and civilian Hrud scavengers.

In general though Hrud seem to be a horde of individually-fairly weak combatants that have deleterious effects on their surroundings in large numbers.