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Warhammer 40,000/Headscratchers: Difference between revisions
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** I've seen some articles on the old Games-Workshop page about daemon possessed Tau Battlesuits. Also, it's been stated that the Tau have a minimal Warp presence. Minimal, sure, but they still have one.
*** Their warp presence is small enough to keep them sentient beings, pretty much - they're vulnerable to Daemons and psykers, but they're not able to be psykers themselves (the Ethereal Mind Mojo is pheromonal, if it even exists) and Chaos isn't really interested in them because humans and Eldar are just so much brighter in the Warp. It was part of a trend in 3rd edition to de-emphasize psykers - none of the races introduced in 3rd Ed had psychic powers (Dark Eldar, Necrons, and Tau), and two of them hated them.
** Tau have "shallow" souls and [[Your Brain Won't Be Much of a Meal|daemons don't consider them nutritional enough]] to be worth an effort to hunt, let alone try and "ascend" as vassals. So the Tau are not enticed actively, and even can sort of travel Warp and live. But when readily available, they don't escape unscathed, daemons only treat them as low-priority food: leave alone as long as they can get a tastier Gue'Vesa instead, but then it's the Tau turn. Which happened when they gone without adequate protection and navigation as deep into Warp as Imperial drives push (Fourth Expansion) and thus served themselves all the way to the table.
* The Necrons hate all life. Hate is an emotion. All emotions are stored in the Warp. Necrons are anti-Warp. How is that possible?
** They have no souls. No souls means no warp presence.
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* Are the [[StarCraft|Zerg]] really [[Expy|expies]] of the Tyranids? I've heard somewhere that the 'nids only became a fully fledged [[Horde of Alien Locusts]] after ''[[StarCraft]]'' was released. I've also seen some photos of second edition models, and they looked nothing like the modern Tyranids or the Zerg.
** Genestealers first appeared as enemies in 1989's ''Space Hulk''. Here, they were plagiarized xenomorphs from ''Alien''. Though they appeared all the way back in 1987's ''Rogue Trader'', "Tyranids" as we know them today first appeared in ''Advanced Space Crusade'' in 1990, with biotech and the insectoid-dinosaur appearance instead of their original technological armaments. 1993 brought Warhammer 40K's Second Edition, featuring the first Tyranid codex and complete model range, with the Hive Tyrant, Carnifex, Zoanthropes, Lictors, Biovores, Genestealers, Gargoyles, Warriors, Termagants, and Hormagaunts. They were now an all devouring swarm. 1998 brought 3rd edition, in which Tyranids looked like [http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/mediawiki/images/thumb/f/f0/Codex_Tyranids.jpg/220px-Codex_Tyranids.jpg this]. Starcraft was also released in 1998.
** Both came from earlier sources, like ''[[Starship Troopers]]''.
* If the chaos gods are as powerful as generally assumed, why don't they destroy loyalist ships once they enter the warp? Or are we to expect that they cannot overcome some artificial "bubble of real space" in their very own dimension? "Ruinous powers" indeed...
** Mostly because the Chaos Gods don't ''care'' enough to bother with Imperium ships. For the most part, they ignore them because they don't much care whether Chaos wins against the Imperium. They just care that their particular agendas are being pursued. The guys who are generally hostile toward the Imperium and perate under the "Chaos" namesake are mostly mortals who've earned favor of a warp entity of one sort or another.
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* Did the Eldar Empire have any contact with humanity before their fall? Seeing how as they were at their height during humanity's Dark Age of Technology, it seems pretty feasible.
** Yes.
** Probably limited. The common Eldar were more like Dark Eldar, but without soul-sucking problem, thus mostly concerned with hedonism and status among their own before eventually all got sucked into Eye of Terror. The conflicts couldn't be widespread in that both sides were more than powerful enough to make it too damn expensive for the other guy, and neither had a compelling reasons to try — once the border was established and human expansion turned elsewhere, the rest was just a matter of occasional individual interest.
* How do you pronounce the names of the four Chaos gods? I've never played the game but I know about it through cultural osmosis (and tvtropes!).
** Nurgle- Seems straightforward. Rhymes with "burgle?"
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**** You seem to be drastically understating the consequences of allowing the Emperor to die. Say that the theory turns out to be false and the Emperor just stays dead. Now the Imperium has just lost its one and only method of FTL travel, effectively cutting all their sectors in space off from one another and leaving them in the dark to be picked off one by one by the Imperium's numerous enemies. Yes, they could try, but they simply have far too much to lose should the plan fail.
*** The bit about shutting down the FTL is especially important. FTL is the only thing keeping the Imperium together. Cut that, and there's no Imperium, just individual worlds that will die off one by one without Guard/Space marine support and interstellar trade. Hive worlds starve, agriworlds have no support to defend themselves, and the enemies of mankind have a field day. They won't risk it for possible zero return.
** It got breached when Magnus tried to warn Emprah about Horus, then he was busy sorting out the immediate consequences, and then he had a war on his hands. So it remains closed only via emergency means of Throne control simply because he didn't have time to repair, block or remove it properly.
* In related news, why is the Astronomican made as retarded as possible? 1. It's a beacon, but still needs the Emperor's will to direct its power. Is that so. He's obviously not contributing any power, because he's trapped between life and death and can't do shit. 2. If the Empire's FTL travel uses beacon-based navigation, they are also using coordinates. Now everything in the Milky Way shifts around constantly, but on a cosmic time scale where even 40,000 years is about as significant as a second's fart. And updating the Galactic map would provide a nice bread-winning avenue for that many extra Imperial citizens. 3. It is a [[Card-Carrying Villain|pointlessly evil]] solution. Why have just the one huge beacon that stretched even the height of the Empire's technological progress, and kills every one of its crew within months, instead of building smaller beacons on each world, creating a much more useful signal map in the Warp? 4. Why doesn't it use a lot more psykers, so they don't wear themselves out? If the Astronomican crew would live their full lives, that's two orders of magnitude AT LEAST shaved off the needed number in the long term. Moreover if these people live long enough they can reproduce. Way more Psykers = way more Tyranids etc. rendered extra crispy. The same % would fall to Chaos, so that's not an issue. I know common sense takes a back seat to horror in WH40K, but the Astronomican [[Full Metal Jacket|took a giant shit on]] my willing suspension of dispelief when I read about it.
** Yes the Emperor does do stuff, he essentially acts as the power source and light of the Astronomican he is such a strong psychic presence that people can use it to track where they are in relation to Tera at all times meaning they don't get lost. Warp travel is impossible to reliably track a course for that will work twice on too because it is constantly shifting thus necessitating a relatively constant beacon for people to be able to track their movements. On the "why have one huge beacon" question, they would if they could but they cant the Astronomican is a technology that they have no chance of ever recreating, it was built and designed by the Emperor himself who has no way of telling them how to make one and they arent gonna try and reverse engineer it for fear of breaking the one thing that keeps the Imperium alive. They also are using as many Psykers as is physically possibly, they need the navigators to actually pilot the ships in warp so there is no way they could do that, the Inquisition uses a few Psykers and would cause hell if someone started using Grey Knights as fuel for the Astronomicon, and the Space Marines need their Librarians for combat support and much needed psychic protection. Psykers are rare and they already use a lot, it doesnt help that the Imperium
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* If the Alpha Legion really are undercover Loyalists, how are they keeping their true intentions from the Chaos Gods, who are you know, '''GODS'''?
** They aren't omnipotent or all knowing. Being a god does not necessarily mean you know everything.
** Nor even particularly interested, until someone consistently attracts their attention with acts that "call to them". Or someone relatively important to the fates of Galaxy does something out of it, like… a Primarch with retinue disembarks on a Daemon world and tries to blast his way through everything.
* Maybe I'm being overly sentimental, especially since it's the game that coined the word "grimdark", but I can't help but feel a little sad about the Eldar's master plan. What's the point of destroying Slaanesh if there are no longer going to be any Eldar around to enjoy the new freedom? On the other hand, it would at least mean no more [[Complete Monster|Dark Eldar]].
** They won't be alive, but at least their souls would be free.
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* If the 41st millennium is the ultimate [[Crapsack World]], then why did the writers create the [[Hope Spot|Starchild theory]]?
** Either they were trying to decrapsackify it, or they were intentionally setting up hope so they could dash it against the rocks.
** To show why those who ''know'' how bad it is don't just give up?
* Who is the most badass human in the Warhammer universe?
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