Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[LordBaal]

Fucking amazing

[Loud Whispers]

Oh, Eldar were fucking scary back in the day. Don't forget that they used to be a real Empire, with Craftworlds as their goddamned merchant ships, that only died because of the unforeseen consequences of being so successful they were able to descend into the depths of hedonism.

Worst thing ever is that one novel depicting what the fall was, I think it was one of the HH novels where a word bearer gets a triptastic journey through time and sees living buildings being constructed out of living Eldar... Constructed by the buildings
Nightmare fuel
Fuel which promptly comes to life and beats you to death

When there were actual wars to fight? Consider how skilled a single Craftworld Eldar is, except a career soldier from a long and glorious tradition of soldiering, rather than a member of a dying race trapped upon their ships who struggle to emulate their gods and history in mourning for their dead fellows. Imagine them equipped with true military-level technology, and that the Craftworld Eldar stuff is, as far as it seems likely, the civilian/merchant defense gear. Consider how many more Eldar there were, all with equipment on that high of a level. Their equipment is all small and energy efficient because that's cheaper to have on board merchant vessels. The actually somewhat bulky shit that was given to the real warriors is probably as lost to them as the solid-light ships are to humans.
Yeah, they're still not uberperfect, but there's a reason they're pricks about being superior, just like there's a reason Humans do much the same, and are likewise watching their Empire collapse, albeit slowly and with great reluctance this time around.
Thing is, Empires only last until they don't. Probability means that as time goes on, the likelihood of it collapsing approaches 1.

Inb5 Eldar Heresy
Like the Imperium but everything is ELVES

Also seriously that ruststalker is fantastic

[90908]

*Snip*

That is...interesting. I mean, I hate the pointy eared pansies as much as the next Emprah fearing imperial, but that is going a little far.

How do you even do that? I am legitimately curious.

[Tack]

Ah, I've gotta start posting progress too.
Awesome work on the ruststalker by the way.

[TempAcc]

*Snip*

That is...interesting. I mean, I hate the pointy eared pansies as much as the next Emprah fearing imperial, but that is going a little far.

How do you even do that? I am legitimately curious.

Wraithbone. Once wraithbone became a thing, during the period that signalled the fall of the eldar they pretty much abused everything they had available to them, and since you can pretty much make anything with wraithbone, having living buildings that can come to life and maul things isn't farfetched.

Its safe to assume that wraithboning was prob a thing for a good while too (hue).

[Tack]

Yeah, I guess with greater emotional depth comes more exquisite tortures.

[Loud Whispers]

Goodness, it'd be like if all our concrete and steel decided we made good mortar

[Andres]

~20,000 year old civilization compared to ~1,000,000 year old civilization. (Those numbers are a massive stab in the can't-be-bothered-researching dark)
Yeah, they were good, but not that good.

Although all Eldar tech has afaik been developed around their passive psychic abilities, 'cos Eldar are basically orks.

Something to consider is that humans are superior. It's not just propaganda or belief, it's objective fact. The Eldar might be smarter, faster, more long-lived, and more psychic so they're better on the surface, but their non-obvious failings are far greater than these obvious advantages.

The Eldar are massively arrogant and hubristic and while these seem to be mere annoyances, they're actually crippling deficiencies. The Eldar got most of their technology from the Old Ones and otherwise would've barely grown at all or - more likely - never have grown at all due to their perpetual state of "I'm superior and don't need to change". Humanity wouldn't have gotten nearly as far as they did if they had these attributes hard-wired into their brains, they would've never even left orbit let alone colonised the galaxy! Humanity can grow, the Eldar are forever stagnant. Having a millions-year old civilisation means nothing if you don't use that time to advance.

Even where the Eldar are advantaged over humanity they are still deficient. Really, they're pretty much just grots in comparison to humans. They seem greater in the same way an adult grot is smarter, more dangerous, and more technically advanced than a newborn human baby. Like an actual grot, you would not call it a greater form of life than humanity just because it has a head-start in life. Eldar are stagnant and will forever be where they are. Humans are young and thus weak, but given time they will grow and they will be strong, better in every way compared to the Eldar. If you need proof, just look at the Emperor who is the physical manifestation of this destiny. He is better than any single Eldar by an extremely wide margin and something that humanity WILL eventually reach but that the Eldar never can.

tl;dr: Eldar can't advance so having a millions-year old empire means as much as having a three days old empire in terms of advancement. Eldar's obvious advantages (psychic, speed, intelligence) will eventually be surpassed by humanity if given time to evolve and become like the Emperor, something the Eldar can't do because they can't evolve.


On an entirely different topic, what's the title given to a female member of the Senatorum Imperialis?

[Rolepgeek]

Wait...so the humans aren't massively arrogant and self-centric? Human technology is currently advancing?

The assumption that all of humanity will eventually become the Emperor is...astounding, to say the least. So's the assumption that the Eldar can't evolve/change, or that humanity would allow mutants enough to 'evolve' in the manner you're talking about before being ripped apart by it's own inclinations towards Chaos. Eldar are just as strong as humans, while being faster in both mind and body. They live longer and are able to become that much more skilled. They aren't flat-out better than humans, unless you mean one to one comparison of a single Eldar to a single Human. But you're gonna have to do better than that if you want to make a living as a Imperial propaganda writer.

I mean, hell, using your logic, and mankind's susceptibility to Chaos, Tau are actually apparently the best race. Because they will grow and evolve and have grown and evolved far faster than humanity, forging an empire in four thousand years rather than forty thousand. I like Tau and it's still bullshit logic.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

The Eldar definitely do not evolve. They're an artificial race, like the Orks and Necrons before them, incapable of changing even over a million years by the Old One's design.

And humanity is definitely evolving to become more Emperor-like. Not only was a test acceleration of this process the stated goal of the Primarch Project, but even with all of the prejudice against psykers they've only managed to become more common. MIND BULLETS is just too good of a trait to be bred out, even when balanced against daemonic attention. Back in the Emperor's day there were only a few psykers around, and their collective suicide deprived humanity of the trait for thousands of years. Now, pretty much every world in the Imperium has both sanctioned and wild psykers on it, with more in every other human settlement in the Galaxy.

Further more, the evolutionary advantage of witch genes starts to assert itself long before a single psyker discipline can be harnessed, through what is called luck but is actually subtle reality bending, but is luck because that's what luck is and has always been. Between that and latent witch genes, even if the Imperium culled every single psyker they could find it still wouldn't stop the rising tide of human transition to a fully psychic species.

Of course, without the Emperor or Magnus around to help guide the process, getting the kind of secondary conditions like the Eldar possess to have the power without going utterly mad may prove...difficult.

That said, it actually is a point against the Tau as well. There aren't lucky Tau because luck is a warp phenomenon, and in 40k, sometimes luck is all you can rely on.

[Rolepgeek]

Bad luck also exists in the form of Daemons runabouts, I'll remind you, MetalSlimeHunt.

Plus, there are most definitely lucky Tau. Don't know what you're on about there.

[Andres]

Wait...so the humans aren't massively arrogant and self-centric? Human technology is currently advancing?

Humans don't have massive arrogance and self-centricism as extremely hard-coded traits, nor do they have those traits in as great an abundance as the Eldar and so it's not crippling. Detrimental, but not crippling. Human technology "isn't advancing" because that's a choice being made, not because it's impossible. (Quotation marks used because it actually is advancing, just slowly.) The Eldar can't advance even if they wanted to.

I mean, hell, using your logic, and mankind's susceptibility to Chaos, Tau are actually apparently the best race. Because they will grow and evolve and have grown and evolved far faster than humanity, forging an empire in four thousand years rather than forty thousand. I like Tau and it's still bullshit logic.

Tau are on the other end of the inferiority spectrum. While they can grow and evolve like any non-created race, their full potential is ultimately limited due to having lesser souls. They're a definite step up from Necrons due to having souls at all, but their souls are too weak to allow them to psychically and spiritually evolve like humanity can.

All the other arguments I was going to present have been made by MetalSlimeHunt whose knowledge and understanding of the lore is commendable.

Of course, without the Emperor or Magnus around to help guide the process, getting the kind of secondary conditions like the Eldar possess to have the power without going utterly mad may prove...difficult.

Difficult, but not impossible. While the Emperor would certainly be helpful, humanity has potential and that potential will remain with or without the Emperor, just as it had before he was born.

Also, while the Emperor was certainly wounded rather grievously in his duel with Horus, he still remains an extremely active participant in the protection of humanity. From that, it can be assumed that he's active in the evolution of humanity as well.

Plus, there are most definitely lucky Tau. Don't know what you're on about there.

GW plot armour doesn't count.

[Tack]

Yeah, pretty sure Khornes champion was pretty luck- wait.

But the question was "did humanity progress tech past the Eldar", and I would say the answer is no. They made artificial intelligence and gigantic war machines- Hell, Imperial Knights are for cutting wood, Leman Russes are tractors and the Land Raiders and Baneblade were light and medium tanks, respectively, apparently.
Humanity was pretty up there.

However, the Eldar have pocket holography, organic structures, spirit stones and monofilament.
Regardless of whether they developed that technology on their own or was gifted it by the old ones, the point is they were at a tech level which is basically the culmination of the most farfetched advancements a human writer could dream up today.
Very very big tanks doesn't surpass that, IMO.

The only thing I can think might be the exception is Plasma. Eldar, Tau and Humans all have it, but I'm unsure on whether humans prefer the higher-risk, higher-reward plasma they currently use, or are unable to develop a safer way to use it because heresy.

[Dorsidwarf]

Yeah, pretty sure Khornes champion was pretty luck- wait.

But the question was "did humanity progress tech past the Eldar", and I would say the answer is no. They made artificial intelligence and gigantic war machines- Hell, Imperial Knights are for cutting wood, Leman Russes are tractors and the Land Raiders and Baneblade were light and medium tanks, respectively, apparently.
Humanity was pretty up there.

However, the Eldar have pocket holography, organic structures, spirit stones and monofilament.
Regardless of whether they developed that technology on their own or was gifted it by the old ones, the point is they were at a tech level which is basically the culmination of the most farfetched advancements a human writer could dream up today.
Very very big tanks doesn't surpass that, IMO.

The only thing I can think might be the exception is Plasma. Eldar, Tau and Humans all have it, but I'm unsure on whether humans prefer the higher-risk, higher-reward plasma they currently use, or are unable to develop a safer way to use it because heresy.

Ryza-pattern Titan plasma doesn't overheat, for what that's worth

[sprinkled chariot]

Yeah, pretty sure Khornes champion was pretty luck- wait.

But the question was "did humanity progress tech past the Eldar", and I would say the answer is no. They made artificial intelligence and gigantic war machines- Hell, Imperial Knights are for cutting wood, Leman Russes are tractors and the Land Raiders and Baneblade were light and medium tanks, respectively, apparently.
Humanity was pretty up there.

However, the Eldar have pocket holography, organic structures, spirit stones and monofilament.
Regardless of whether they developed that technology on their own or was gifted it by the old ones, the point is they were at a tech level which is basically the culmination of the most farfetched advancements a human writer could dream up today.
Very very big tanks doesn't surpass that, IMO.

The only thing I can think might be the exception is Plasma. Eldar, Tau and Humans all have it, but I'm unsure on whether humans prefer the higher-risk, higher-reward plasma they currently use, or are unable to develop a safer way to use it because heresy.

- completely invisible ships inquisition has
-  Sentient factory battleship with blackhole shooting gun and device to teleport dodging eldars back in time.
- Vortex weapons
- graviton weapons
- Cryo weapons
-Panacea
- if we take emperors job into account, advanced enough genetic engineering to create demigods. And space marines are basicly pinnacle of creation, who are capable of being better then eldar.
- murderous sentient nanorobot swarms
- AI = technological singularity( unless it decides to rebel, huh)
- portable holo projector