Dark Eldar qualifying as a faction.

[Stonerhino]

DE are linear descendants of the Eldar Empire, from a values/morality/cause and effect type perspective. It was they who blew away the warp storms by birthing slaanesh. Thats the only contribution they need to 'matter'.

What makes the DE more intersting in the fact they are not the same Eldar that they were during the Empire. The DE exist as we know them because of Vect. He coined the phrase and tought them how to extend their lives and not have their soul sucked up by Slaanesh.

To that Vect would not be who he is today without the fall. He gathered up refuges and fled to Commorragh. Their he took out the last remnants of the old Empire by ending the rule of the Noble Houses. Physically they are different in that they are no a psychic race and instead get their power from pain. Socially they are different because they don't follow "Rules" of the old Empire.

Its the same as the United States being different then the old British Empire. Or any country that changed after it revolted from the previous regime. The new one is not the old one.

Actually, Necrons have been around longer than DE. They were initially introduced in 2nd Ed, while DE didn't arrive until the start of 3rd.

Also, with regards to the pylons on Cadia, they have been around for ages before being attributed to the Necrons - there's always been a Cadian Gate, but the Necrons weren't given ownership of the pylons until their book was released towards the end of 3rd when the C'tan were shoehorned into everything imaginable.

So. The Necrons were given credit for an important part of the setting and the DE were not. That's the whole point. Shoehorned in or not the Necron fluff is tired to important parts the setting. The same could have been done for the DE but was not.

When the DE were fleshed out. They made them a minor faction with huge potential. But until they actually do something significant to the setting, they will remain a minor faction.

To touch on the Necrons being "Older". I played against more then a few "Dark Eldar" armies long before the Necron became a race. The difference was that back then the current idea of the Dark Eldar had not been locked down. So they generally were just dark painted Eldar Armies with a Slaaneshyness to them. Keeper of Secrets, used as an Avatar for example. So the ideas for DE existed long before the release of their first codex. Their current fluff was just one direction they could have taken.

[Drasanil]

Space marines = Try to seperate the current Horus Heresy fluff from the setting. Without Space Marines 40k as we currently know it does not exist.

Rogue Trader, no need for Marines as are or the Heresy as is, worked just fine before it and the Imperium was still fundamentally the same actor. Try again.

Orks/Tyranids = Are threats that suck up huge amounts of resouces that the IoM needs to keep expanding and deal with it's own internal struggles. Their removal allows the IoM to commit larger forces to both. Including the fight against Chaos.

So why is it fundamental that these races do these things but not the dark eldar? Leaving aside that you're changing the criteria of relevance on a whim to suit your needs, those threats ultimately do nothing to change the overall Imperium/Chaos situation on a fundamental level. Either the Emperor dies and the Imperium is screwed or he ascends to godhood or gets up out of the Throne and the Imperium gets a reprieve.

Necrons = As said before no Necrons = no pylons on Cadia. Without them we might not even have a galaxy now. Not to mention the fluff behind the Admech may be dependant on their close proximity to a C'Tan.

Pylons and the Admech existed before the Necrons, you can delete them and the setting would get along just fine, try again.

The simple fact is that each of these factions since being created. Was writen into the fluff in a way that forever changed the 40k setting. The writers had the same chance with the DE and chose not to give them any fluff that redefined the setting. The non-existant Eldar Empire changed the setting more then the current Dark Eldar.

They didn't fundamentally change the setting because none of these races actually brought something that fundamentally altered the Chaos/Imperium struggle, which is the core of the setting.

Except that this has been addressed before. With the same result. Other factions make a difference to the setting and the DE simple are in it.

Except it hasn't and they don't, you haven't proven how a single one of those factions has actually substantially changed the nature of the Imperium/Chaos dichotomy.

[Stonerhino]

They didn't fundamentally change the setting because none of these races actually brought something that fundamentally altered the Chaos/Imperium struggle, which is the core of the setting.

Do you even understand that when they invent fluff that explains older fluff. The old fluff is in itself changed. So it doesn't matter that the Heresy, pylons, admech exist before the fluff explaining them. The fluff explaining them becomes a fundamental part of of those events. So once an event has been explained the removal of the forces involved in the explination also removes that event.

For example you cannot remove the Primarchs from the current setting without the removal of the Horus Heresy. Since if by the current fluff, if Horus never existed then he could not have been part of the Horus Heresy. So yes once the Primarchs became part of the fluff they changed the setting.

Except it hasn't and they don't, you haven't proven how a single one of those factions has actually substantially changed the nature of the Imperium/Chaos dichotomy.

Sure noone has thought up your mind bogling idea anywhere in this thread before you.

All that now lets pretend that the DE don't exist at all. Did anything change??? The setting has not changed at all by removing the DE's "Epic, setting changing victories".

"Name something fundemental that, for example, Blood Angels have done?" The defence of Terra during the siege. Same idea "Remove the Blood Angels from the setting". We don't have Sanguinius defending the Eternity gate solo. Leaving the possibility that we would now have "The Imperium of Choas" instead. That's rather huge when looking at the setting as a whole. And I did not include them on my list of races because they are not one.

But we can run down the list and apply the same logic:
Orks = The size of the wars they fight against other races require so much resorces that by removing them from the setting. You are adding a huge amount of military forces to some factions to the point where it unbalances the setting. Also their is the story of the Ork who was chocking out the Big E and Horus had to save him. Not huge but implants the idea that Horus might be able to defeat the Big E.
IOM = no questions.
Chaos = The Horus Heresy...
Necrons = War in Heaven + Trying to restore their Old galactic Empire
Tyranids = To cool to be removed. As in their removal is posible but they are so intrenched through their own actions that the setting is not the same without them. (Battle for Maccrage, ect)
Eldar Empire = War in Heaven + Slaanesh.
*Craft World Eldar = fighting Slaanesh by creating a new god.
*Dark Eldar = Can be removed.
Tau = Can be removed.

The Dark Eldar have the potential to step up and be a galactic player. They just have not done it yet.

Rogue Trader, no need for Marines as are or the Heresy as is, worked just fine before

Lol. Yes because the setting has not changed at all since the Rogue Trader days...

[ftayl5]

Tyranids = too cool to be removed.

Hello? Evil pirate space elves.

[MvS]

Well, as Inquisitor Bastalek Grimm is reported as saying in the Dark Eldar Codex, there's a "very good" reason why "so many" of the galaxy's cultures and societies are afraid of the dark. The Dark Eldar.

If the Dark Eldar are the descendents of the Eldar who created Slaanesh and opened the Eye of Terror; if they are described as having technology as advanced as Craftworld Eldar; if they can capture entire stars and drag them into the Webway; if they are vastly more populous than the Craftworld Eldar; if their leaders and wealthiest luminaries are effectively immortal, and can even be returned from death, thanks to the technology of the Haemonculi; if they are described as "regularly" stealing away millions and even billions of captives from Realspace; more, if they can carry away whole planetary populations, including the tens of billions of humans who live on Imperial Hiveworlds, all without the Imperium even knowing until after it has happened; if they can steal aspirants from Fenris and then experiment on them right under the Space Wolves sensitive noses on Fenris itself and then get away scot free; if they can cripple Astartes strike cruisers and drag them into the Webway without killing a single Marine in the process, just to use said Marines to further their own ends; if they can "tear apart" all the Imperial Guard regiments guarding the planets in the Desaderian sector; if they can cause Ork waaghs to descend on Mechanicus planets and steal STC templates that would create a panacea that would change the face of the Imperium forever by eradicating disease; if they can save an entire Craftworld, Iyanden, from an Ork invasion on a simple whim; if Inquisitor Czevak has written a running commentary on them and the threat they pose, showing that the Imperium's highest echelons are very aware of the Dark Eldar threat; if they can mutate whole planets of humans into huge ravening beasts just to attract a Tyranid Hivefleet so that they can capture Tyranid creatures to take home for inspection, experimentation and sport; if they can manipulate Imperial fleets to eradicate their enemies and then claim all the spoils and Realspace territory for themselves, such as at the Thaxar Rift; if they can wipe out an entire Ork fleet and planetary base with one virus infected corpse; if they can 'disappear' the entire 121st Cadian Elite "Eldar Killers" regiment without so much as a single distress signal, and then turn them into thousands of headless and armless bodies that still walk and bump around the dark streets of Commorragh; if they can make the entire population of the Imperial planet Desperation into beasts and/or slaves who worship the Dark Eldar instead of the Emperor as gods; if they can cripple the Imperium's naval capabilities at Bakka and leave multiple star systems effectively defenceless; and if, as is stated at the bottom of page 177 in the new 40K rulebook, that almost any even insignificant event could tip the balance and bring down the Imperium because of its interlinked ramifications, then it goes without saying or reasonable argument that the Dark Eldar "qualify" as a faction in the 40K imagery and are indeed both "threats" and "players" in the senses meant in this thread and in any sensible discussion.

We can interpret the imagery as we please to suit our preferred vision, it's our hobby after all, but there's a limit to how much we can make our image "THE OBJECTIVE TRUTH ABOUT EVERYTHING" (tm) when the rationale and details of the imagery / setting are unpacked.

[Drasanil]

Do you even understand that when they invent fluff that explains older fluff. The old fluff is in itself changed. So it doesn't matter that the Heresy, pylons, admech exist before the fluff explaining them. The fluff explaining them becomes a fundamental part of of those events. So once an event has been explained the removal of the forces involved in the explination also removes that event.

Do you even understand that fluff which functioned perfectly with out the need for those events 'explaining it', by definition makes those events 'explaining it' unnecessary as they were not required to have the original piece in the first place?

For example you cannot remove the Primarchs from the current setting without the removal of the Horus Heresy. Since if by the current fluff, if Horus never existed then he could not have been part of the Horus Heresy. So yes once the Primarchs became part of the fluff they changed the setting.

Yes you can remove the primarchs, Heresy will just return to it's pre-Primarch state, which results in the same out come making the primarchs unnecessary. Horus will be a upstart warmaster, Leman Russ a tank commander and the Ultramarines a third founding chapter with a half-eldar chief librarian

Sure noone has thought up your mind bogling idea anywhere in this thread before you.

And yet you don't have an answer to it? I guess that means you've now been stumped twice by the same 'mind boggling' idea.

Lol. Yes because the setting has not changed at all since the Rogue Trader days...

You're point being? It could change back and still be recognizably '40k'.

PS: I noticed you have yet to be able to justify orks or tyranids, I guess you'll just be sticking to the "orks/tyranids are the l33test" then?

[thenurgler]

Just to add to this, there are a lot of Dark Eldar which live outside the city as well (they are called Eldar Pirates by the Imperium).

In addition, GW doesn't particularly take faction size into account in terms of army availability, otherwise we would probably have Adeptus Arbites and Adeptus Mechanicus armys as well (just in terms of sheer size).

[Stonerhino]

Yes you can remove the primarchs, Heresy will just return to it's pre-Primarch state, which results in the same out come making the primarchs unnecessary. Horus will be a upstart warmaster, Leman Russ a tank commander and the Ultramarines a third founding chapter with a half-eldar chief librarian

So your idea is that they didn't change the setting because the setting can be changed back to what it was before they changed it???

It might just be me but that sounds like a lot of "Changing" for something you say didn't change anything.

PS: I noticed you have yet to be able to justify orks or tyranids, I guess you'll just be sticking to the "orks/tyranids are the l33test" then?

PS: I noticed you have yet to go back and read the parts of this thread where this has already been discussed.

Hello? Evil pirate space elves.

Which is why they deserve to be a faction. I have said as much. This has not been about the DE being a faction for a while now.

@MVS: While that list looks impressive. Compare it to events that the IoM does to itself. For a small example the aftermath of the first war on Armageddon. The =][= inficted more damage then most of your list combined. Just to keep a secret. Even the STC theft didn't really impact anything because at best all it did was keep things the same.

Listing the DE achievements shows a race that is highly capable of making a difference in the galaxy but chooses not to.

[Drasanil]

So your idea is that they didn't change the setting because the setting can be changed back to what it was before they changed it???

It might just be me but that sounds like a lot of "Changing" for something you say didn't change anything.

Sure they changed some details, but those events didn't change the over all outcome of what happened, hence why they are unimportant and easily revertible/removable.

PS: I noticed you have yet to go back and read the parts of this thread where this has already been discussed.

I have, you failed to justify it previously and you're making no effort to do so now, side stepping or ignoring the issue at every turn, which leaves me to believe you simple can't.

[LordLucan]

Hello? Evil pirate space elves.

Correction; evil ninja, pirate, vampire space elves. And that's just the Kabalites!

[Depulsor]

Well... the Fall of the eldar and the birth of slannesh are so important, that ANY ex-eldar-empire-faction is an important part of the background.


They just dont NEED another plot-hook.



"But what things of importance do they do now?": Nothing exept fighting. But why should they have to do anything else? Every other faction does the same... there is only war... there is no victory for anyone. No hope. No peace. Only mad dreams, which at the end will never come true anyway.

[Stonerhino]

Sure they changed some details, but those events didn't change the over all outcome of what happened, hence why they are unimportant and easily revertible/removable.

Old fluff = there is the Cadian Gate. It then gets explained that the Cadian Gate exists because the Necrons built anti warp-ish pylons in that area. So if you then remove the Necrons from existance. Then they where not around to build those pylons. No pylons, no Cadian Gate and potentially nothing containing the Eye of Terror.

Sure you can change the Necron's fluff and remove them. But then you have to retcon the existing fluff for the Cadian Gate among other things. You cannot simply delete them.

Which is vastly different then "DE do something to a nameless hive world". Which you can just delete with no further effort. You can even just delete the attack on Bakka since nothing has happened because of it.

I have, you failed to justify it previously and you're making no effort to do so now, side stepping or ignoring the issue at every turn, which leaves me to believe you simple can't.

If you can't understand the ramifications of vastly increasing the available military might for some factions like the IoM and the affect that that would have on the setting. Then there is really nothing to explain. But does however explain why you think changing fluff that was changed, back to what it was before it was changed means that the fluff wasn't changed.

[Drasanil]

Old fluff = there is the Cadian Gate. It then gets explained that the Cadian Gate exists because the Necrons built anti warp-ish pylons in that area. So if you then remove the Necrons from existance. Then they where not around to build those pylons. No pylons, no Cadian Gate and potentially nothing containing the Eye of Terror.

Sure you can change the Necron's fluff and remove them. But then you have to retcon the existing fluff for the Cadian Gate among other things. You cannot simply delete them.

Which is vastly different then "DE do something to a nameless hive world". Which you can just delete with no further effort. You can even just delete the attack on Bakka since nothing has happened because of it.

There's no substantive difference at all, remove the Necrons and the pylons simply go back to being unexplained, the very fact the pylons existed before the necrons, proves the necrons are not crucial to their existence.

If you can't understand the ramifications of vastly increasing the available military might for some factions like the IoM and the affect that that would have on the setting. Then there is really nothing to explain.

If you think the extra lasguns from those forces is what will decide the fate of the Imperium it proves you simply don't understand the setting itself and there is nothing more to discuss.

But does however explain why you think changing fluff that was changed, back to what it was before it was changed means that the fluff wasn't changed.

Uhm... actually that's exactly what it does, it simply returns the fluff to it's original inviolate state. Delete/revert a change and that change never happened... it's quite a simple concept really.

[insectum7]

Actually, Necrons have been around longer than DE. They were initially introduced in 2nd Ed, while DE didn't arrive until the start of 3rd.

Heh, that's true. While they didn't have much, they totally did exist. My bad.

[Stonerhino]

If you think the extra lasguns from those forces is what will decide the fate of the Imperium it proves you simply don't understand the setting itself and there is nothing more to discuss.

Yup and Armageddon proves that the IoM only ever deploys rifle infantry against the Orks.....

[Drasanil]

Yup and Armageddon proves that the IoM only ever deploys rifle infantry against the Orks.....

What stunning insight... thank you for proving my point.