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 Da Boss wrote:
So you guys all agree that the Eldar and presumably the Golden Age humans could easily have wiped out the Orks?

And the Eldar didn't because they were amusing, and the Golden Age humans didn't for some other reason?

Hard to say about Golden Age humans because they have very little lore (though it seems plausible considering some of the nonsense DAoT tech we've seen), but the Eldar? Absolutely. They were not only post-scarcity, they were basically post-everything. They created and destroyed stars on a whim. The reason they didn't affect the galaxy more than they did is because they were inwards-turned. The Orks were not amusing, they were uninteresting. Who cares about war and politics when you are so close to omnipotence that you don't notice a difference? This is also why DAoT humanity and the ancient Eldar empire seemed to not interact much beyond what Cawl speculates to have once been a diplomatic site. They just did not care.

That does not mean Orks are not dangerous in present day 40k. They are. But they are predictable. There is a reason why they are the default antagonist in so many 40k games, often before more striking enemies appear - see Space Marine 1, Dawn of War 1 & 2, and so on. They are "normal". The Imperium is used to fighting them. Everyone is used to fighting them. They can be a serious problem when massed, but they are also a problem that even the regular Imperial Guard alone can competently deal with on even ground, because very, very very often they have to, and the Imperium wouldn't last long if they couldn't.

Man, I really hate modern 40K background.

That last bit isn't that modern. Orks have been the regular brawling partner of the Imperium for the last 10k years. That the Imperium has endured and at times even rebounded a bit during that time tells us they can't be too unmanageable.

Not every threat has to be cataclysmic on a galactic scale. With Orks you can tell stories that aren't just about the end of everything. They can be a local threat for local narratives. I would actually like it if GW used Orks more often as the antagonists. Remember that the very first 40k scenario ever published, in the back of the Rogue Trader rulebook, was about some Space Marines hiding out in a farm that unfortunately also happened to be where some marauding Orks had buried some treasure. I also liked that Orks weren't as flanderized back then, and did (marginally) have interests beyond immediately fighting.

(I guess this thread is now about Orks.)

If you think Orks have been flanderised? Give the Ufthak Blackhawk stories a whirl. Loads of Orky action, and insight into their cultural world view.

 Da Boss wrote:
Man, I really hate modern 40K background.

Which bit?

The eldar having galactic dominon until the fall is almost as old as 40k itself. And while there is no text that specifically walks you through that they culled the Orks, it is a logical inference based on how Orks work and the technology we know the Eldar possessed. If they weren't suppressed in some form, the galaxy would have been overrun by them and no other species would exist. Certainly the Eldar empire couldn't have reached its apex and kept its whole population in indolent boredom for tens of millennia if they were perpetually fighting Ork wars. Maiden worlds that were Terra formed are as old as that background, while the void weaver technology comes from epic armageddon in the early 2000s it combines two existing Eldar technologies from the early 90s - monofilament weapons and wraithbone immune parasites (where warp spiders get their name).

Terra forming a planet and releasing a nanobot swarm that eats ork spores is hardly a complicated thing. The idea that you cant get rid of Orks once they infest is more problematic than technologies that remove them.


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 sigkill wrote:
.
(I guess this thread is now about Orks.)

It something I've noticed about 40k in general is that discussion revolves around the imperium but it's been done to absolute death so many times that all the answers are wheeled out pretty fast and it often launches conversations into areas not discussed as much.

I wish more people put up threads about non imperial factions to discuss this instead, but it looks like it only happens in other threads.

I always assumed that the Eldar's galactic dominion was in reality pretty spread out. Like, they were everywhere, but only on selected worlds they thought were good enough - the beautiful maiden worlds.

I never saw them having a massive, teeming population, because it goes against the Elf trope they're inspired by. So I always thought there was PLENTY of space for Orks to be off in the barren reaches of the galaxy, warring with each other and whoever else. I figured the Eldar would likely just hide themselves form the Orks with all kinds of trickery, rarely ever fighting them face to face, because that's just not how they work.

I felt it was implied by the fact that the Squats, who also existed in the barren and hostile galactic core, specifically had fought countless wars against the Orks, enough to justify them having the Hatred special rule.

If it turns out I was wrong about all that, well that's all fine. I just think the setting is much poorer for it.

Edit: And I'm sorry for derailing the thread, I wasn't going to reply again only Hellebore asked me directly and it seemed rude not to. I sort of want to make a thread about these sorts of things, but I feel I can predict how it will go and the prospect is too disheartening for me to go through with it.

During the golden age/pre birth of slaneesh The eldar where everywhere, regardless of off their numbers due to their access to their webway. That was their ace in the hole.

We know quite a bit about eldar from that time becuase they hid and survived in the webway on their craft worlds that haven’t changed (as far as I am aware) since that time.

We don’t know much about humanity from that time and even less about ork. We know the Krorks were a thing an that orks evolve as they become more numerous. So there could have been a golden age ork population during that time which was much more civil, as humans and eldar seemed to be.

For all we know the birth of slaneesh obliterated orks aswell resetting their civilisation to the war machine it is in 40K.

I’d also be interested to know if the orks ever had access to the webway when they were troops for the old ones and if they did why did they loose access.

I absolutely hate the modern Krork background. Awful!

Reminds me. I got a copy of the original Necron Codex to read up on that…

The 3e codex just refers to an ancient race known and the Krork. I think the inference back then was supposed to be that that was what the Orks used to be called at some point.

In the (awful) War of the Beast series they invent the idea that Orks gradually evolve into bigger and smarter forms until they become building sized "beasts" which some fans have taken to be them "evolving" into Krork, the idea that Orks eventually evolve into "Primork" level Krork.

I know the idea of Orks getting bigger from fighting has been around for ages and I broadly have no issue with that. But it's taken to such a ludicrous extreme here, and also linked to Ork intelligence in a way I really dislike.

It's also the story where they retcon it so that Armageddon is Ullanor which...I mean when people talk about them making the setting smaller with the Heresy stuff this is THE prime example of that. Awful stuff on par with the Heresy causing the Tyranids.

I absolutely hate this idea and I think it's some of the worst background ever written. It leads to lots of fans speculating if Ghaz is going to "become a Krork" or whatever and I just find it awful.

I always thought they introduced it so they could give orks a Guilliman equivalent on the table top.

For what ever it’s worth I’m glad ghaz is a big bugger now. I always thought the 2nd ed model was underwhelming for a ork of his reputation.

Actually, that concept predates War of the Beast. It’s mentioned as a hypothesis no later than Xenology.

Essentially, there’s speculation that Ghaz may be a hitherto unknown Oddboy, specifically a Leader Caste.

We also see from the Ufthak novels that once a Boy becomes a Nob? He becomes more intelligent, the better to form more kunnin’ battle plans. Not “sudden genius”. Just a greater capacity to think beyond clobbering whomever is nearest.

The implication of course is that greater size and greater leadership abilities go hand in hand.

I don’t buy that the Krork = Orks. Which is why I’ve bought the Codex so I can read the primary source.

But the other stuff, of bigger = smarter remains canonical.


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Though I hasten to point out greater intelligence is still relative. It doesn’t mean a Warboss is going to be a strategic genius on par with a Space Marine or Autarch.

Just that, for Orks, they’re more capable of abstract thought and seeing bigger pictures in a given theatre of war.

That, with the natural Orky drive to follow the biggest and ‘ardest does support what makes them so successful as a species. All their knowledge is in their genome. And the more the fight, the tougher they get, with their growth only being arrested once someone or something slaps them down.

So whilst still somewhat basic of outlook? Having the biggest and strong also be the most mentally capable makes sense. They’re the one with the vision and the muscle to see it through. And the rest of society instinctually follows Da Plan, whatever it is. There’s less second guessing, less rebellion. Until at least Da Plan stops getting results, which will lead to a leadership challenge.

God I love Orky society!

Why wouldn't a warboss be as smart as a Space Marine? I maintain that Orks are not stupid at all, they are excellent problem solvers. It's just that their drives and desires make no sense to us, and their appearance and behaviour leads to them being stereotyped as stupid.

Anyway, canon-schmanon. I've always taken the in universe mechanicus or inquisitorial view on Orks with a grain of salt - we're looking at an alien species through the lens of absolute xenophobes, of course they're going to get stuff wrong (notably, not being able to believe that Ork tech could work at all).

I do recognise that the ambiguity has been stripped out of all of that now and the meme lore version is basically how it works in 40K these days.


And the Imperium now works just like Ork society too. Space Marines are bigger and smarter than normal humans, Custodes are bigger and smarter than Space Marines and Primarchs are the biggest and smartest of all. And everyone wants to follow the biggest and smartest guy naturally.

Edit to add: I'm sorry for derailing, I'll stop replying now!

Orks have a societal drawback. The aforementioned in this thread need to seek out the best fight.

The Boyz expect it of the Warboss. And a Warboss that can’t find a big enough fight likely isn’t going to be Warboss for very long.

So, despite obvious if entirely alien intelligence? They’re relatively easy to bait. You make a show of strength and put up a real fight.

For the Warboss to keep his hand in and maintain his position? He kind of has to duff up the enemy’s biggest and best champion. Stomping their warriors into the dirt just isn’t enough.

That seems to lead to a fairly blinkered view of a battle. The Warboss wants to, and kind of has to, go where the fighting is thickest. And so, prone to ambush.

All much easier said than done, but it does introduce a level of predictability Astartes don’t really demonstrate.

A given Chapter will have its preferences. But they’re by no means limited by said preferences.

A Warboss is heavily informed by his Clan’s predilections. If you’ve no Blood Axes in your cadre of under Bosses? You’re probably not going to think of something typically Blood Axes in terms of tactics. And if it does occur, it may be dismissed as Not Orky.

A Warboss may not have the knowledge of structural weaknesses, so when assault fortifications or looking to bring down an edifice? It may lack the insight a Chapter Master might as to how to effect that as efficiently as possible.

We also see Orks get too caught up in the current fight, where they’ve having so much fun battering everything in sight, they can easily lose sight of the wider battle or theatre.

But, as ever? That’s all true until, Orks being Orks, it isn’t true. Which may imply any Warboss will be able to see any given Clan’s approach - they’re just mentally ranked differently.

 Da Boss wrote:
Why wouldn't a warboss be as smart as a Space Marine? I maintain that Orks are not stupid at all, they are excellent problem solvers. It's just that their drives and desires make no sense to us, and their appearance and behaviour leads to them being stereotyped as stupid.

I think "their drives and desires are different" feels like a bit of a stretch to explain why Orks are not pretty dumb, when we see them comically self-sabotage in every conceivable way leading all the way back to the oldest lore.

The 4th edition Orks codex (my favourite one) very much shows how weird they are, and yes, scary, but also funny. You could argue all that self-sabotage is largely rooted in all the stuff they just don't care about, but at that point you could just as well use it to excuse the Skaven too...

(Edit: And yes, I think the Beast series is profoundly silly too)

Even their sabotage makes sense in their society.

It’s entirely permissive. You can get away with whatever you can get away with. Which usually boils down to “can I beat up the other Ork”.

This ensures regular fights, which act as a social steam valve, ensuring as many Orks as possible are as ‘ard as possible. And because they can survive even the most horrific injuries? It’s quite often both sides getting the benefit.

It also keeps their economy ticking over. Docs get paid, so the more you get injured, the more you spend. This helps prevent the hoarding of wealth, just as paying Meks for ever bigger and grander toys. This is further reinforced by Teef being biodegrable. Yes you could amass a huge amount of Teef by means fair and foul. But sooner or later? They will rot away to nothing, so you’re better off spending them.

Poverty is all but unheard of. Because again, permissive. Your Teef regrow, and you can always nick whatever you think you can get away with.

And importantly? Everyone has a great time living in that society.

I really think all this is trying to get around what is presented at face value, when there is nothing wrong with what is presented at face value.

When the Gargant that tried to slam its giant saw down on Trazyn the Infinite found itself catastrophically overbalancing when doing so (it was built with very poor balancing), resulting in the whole Gargant tipping over and falling into the sea where it was destroyed, that wasn't actually a win in a way we can't understand. It was incompetence. And it's okay, because it was funny.

What little we know of Golden Age humanity paints a species still prone to division and infighting and self-destruction, not fundamentally different from any other stage of humanity, just with bigger golden toys.

Golden Age humanity never could have wiped out the Orks, it would have inevitably been destroyed long before that, either by itself or by Chaos (so you know, kinda same thing that happened to the Eldar).

As long as the universe exist, there will likely be Orks in it. I don't believe you can say that about Eldar or Humans (or Tau even though their journey to galactic hegemony is just starting).

Tyranids could wipe out orks, however Tyranids are perhaps the only faction who, in theory would just consume everything there was in the Galaxy. You can't respawn orks if there's nothing left.

Though in practice there'd probably be some floating rock in the middle of nowhere with a handful of orkspore. Perhaps even durable enough to survive the pure black of nothing for countless eons until it drifts into a new Galaxy.




Necrons might also have done it as well if given enough time and if pressed to actually bothering them enough to do it since their weapons focus on disintegration. They've also the potential tenacity to keep at it.

Eldar, humans and many others would get so far and the consider it "job done move onto the next political issue"

Necrons technically have the capability, but would sooner descend into civil war and insanity.

There's a difference between extinction and suppression.

The Orks were not a galactic threat during Eldar dominon. It doesn't mean they wiped them out, it just means they never had a concentration high enough to trigger galaxy wide waaaghs that would exterminate everyone they ran over.

For some fun maths we can do the following. If an Ork colony doubles exponentially without challenge, how long will it take before there as many Ork colonies as stars in the galaxy?

The highest estimate of stars is 400 billion.

The number of doublings it takes to get from 1 to 400 billion is roughly 39.

60 million years divided by 39 is 1,538,461 years.

So, if Orks had no threats and just kept expanding as their spores are want to do, you could take 1.5 million years between doublings and we'd still get as many Ork colonies as stars in the galaxy in the 60 million years since their creation....

Given that orks breed much faster than that, you could take the time humans got from existing to the imperium (anywhere from 350,000 to 400,000 years) and use those as single colony generations, and it would take 15.6 million years for Orks to have as many colonies as stars.

So assuming an Ork population went from 1 planet to 2 planets in 400,000 years, without threats they would have 400 billion planets in 15 millon years.


As Orks grow as much as the environment will allow, they would absolutely have needed something to keep them in check for the 60 million years between their creation and the age of strife.

I'd be cautious about attributing too much resilience and mobility to Ork spores. I don't think that is substantiated by the material. It also takes a while for spores to grow, and they're hardly invisible while they do - we are not talking genestealer cults here. The spores are a problem, but they're not particularly viral.

In particular, spores have never been shown to be able to cross interplanetary space, which means Orks only spread between planets when Orks intentionally decide to go somewhere else. Orks can certainly build spaceships after reaching a certain technological level, but why would Orks ever go to an empty planet? There is no fight to be had there. Orks have no inherent drive to multiply, except as necessary to form a Waa-Ork, and in that case it is done through recruitment. I am not aware of any case where Orks intentionally colonize an otherwise empty planet. I think that is actually the real reason Orks don't spread to cover the entire galaxy whenever there is a power vacuum - the Orks have no motivation to go anywhere when the best available scrap is with other nearby Orks. Only when non-Ork civilizations appear do the Orks start moving outside of Ork space. The main complication to this analysis is that Ork travel technology is hardly reliable, and there are plenty of stories of Orks ending up somewhere they didn't intend to (Gorkamorka being perhaps the most famous case).

Orks don't know whats out there until they go. They don't have astronomorks checking if they can see someone to Crump in another star system.

Their waaaghs are described as part holy war and part migration. They build ships to go find someone to scrap with. They also do run away and get run out of areas where one Ork tribe got bigger and they didn't join.

Orks are always moving around and until they get to an empty planet they don't know it's empty.

Indeed, that’s their greatest limitation. And their greatest boon.

If even the Orks don’t really know where their ship or Spacehulk is taking them? How can you properly prepare?

 Hellebore wrote:
Orks don't know whats out there until they go. They don't have astronomorks checking if they can see someone to Crump in another star system.

Their waaaghs are described as part holy war and part migration. They build ships to go find someone to scrap with. They also do run away and get run out of areas where one Ork tribe got bigger and they didn't join.

Orks are always moving around and until they get to an empty planet they don't know it's empty.

That’s not 100% true though is it? I’m sure Ghazkull has visions to let him know which direction to send is waaaaaaagh. God knows what orky tech lets them direct their space hulks, probably a witted boy with a rod up his backside

 Ashiraya wrote:


Hard to say about Golden Age humans because they have very little lore (though it seems plausible considering some of the nonsense DAoT tech we've seen),

If GW writers have done any reading for their copy paste I sincerely hope they read the culture stuff, but with a 40k dystopia mindset. I would have thought humans in the 'Dark Age' had culture level tech and all of the pettiness and power hunger still. So when humans can have the power of gods, we start to squabble like our pantheons of old, with tens of thousands of human empires and alliances competing with each other. Those able to escape the society get a copy of colonisation for dummies (an STC is probably an equivalent of a scouting for boys camping guide), a basic spaceship (decommissioned warship, rusting hulk etc.), and go found a new world.


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 Da Boss wrote:
In the (awful) War of the Beast series they invent the idea that Orks gradually evolve into bigger and smarter forms until they become building sized "beasts" which some fans have taken to be them "evolving" into Krork, the idea that Orks eventually evolve into "Primork" level Krork.

It was pretty awful. The idea of bigger is better is also hilarious and straight out of invader Zim. Often thought its GW seeing how far they can push things to see what people swallow.

mrFickle wrote:

 Hellebore wrote:
Orks don't know whats out there until they go. They don't have astronomorks checking if they can see someone to Crump in another star system.

Their waaaghs are described as part holy war and part migration. They build ships to go find someone to scrap with. They also do run away and get run out of areas where one Ork tribe got bigger and they didn't join.

Orks are always moving around and until they get to an empty planet they don't know it's empty.

That’s not 100% true though is it? I’m sure Ghazkull has visions to let him know which direction to send is waaaaaaagh. God knows what orky tech lets them direct their space hulks, probably a witted boy with a rod up his backside

It isn't 100% true but it is true enough for the argument that Orks move around a lot and are basically everywhere in the galaxy.

I hate the fact they are green and fart spores to reproduce.

 Adeptekon wrote:
I hate the fact they are green and fart spores to reproduce.

The spore thing is a retcon. In 1990's Waaargh The Orks! it is made clear that new orks are grow in marsupial-like pouches on older orks that have gone feral (like kangaroos). They were always green, though - that's a an original Warhammer staple.