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Warhammer Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader Pre-Release Thread [GAME RELEASED, GO TO NEW THREAD]

Yosharian

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Jaedar

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I'm curious to see how they write the dark eldar romance because it should ended the same way as Morinith romance from ME2, except it will feature a longer and more painful death.
There is already datemine info that you can get him to switch to using a soulstone so most likely he does have a redemption arc of some kind.

A reminder that the definition between eldar and dark eldar is very weak and they cross over all the time.
Is it? It's news to me.Afaik, it comes down to something simple.

A dark eldars soul is fully claimed by slaanesh, in the sense of sitting in its palace and being tormented. This is what makes the dark eldar go around torturing things, it distracts slaanesh and reduces the torture they have to deal with.

A craftworlders soul belongs to slaanesh by default, because slaanesh ate most of the eldar pantheon. But it is not a strong claim, so if they carry a soulstone when they die it can suck up the soul and keep it from going to slaanesh.

If dark eldar could just equip a soulstone to escape eternal torment by slaanesh they would, anything else is retardo grimdark.
 

S.H.O.D.A.N.

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A dark eldars soul is fully claimed by slaanesh, in the sense of sitting in its palace and being tormented.

Technically, Dark Eldar possess souls as normal, but their soul energy is constantly drained by Slaanesh, and replenished by consuming the soul energies of others.

Their souls are only claimed by Slaanesh after they die.

They don't use soulstones because a) they don't have (easy) access to them, b) most of the things DE do would sever their connection to a soulstone even if they formed one, and c) they see them as a weak solution to the problem, when soul consumption grants them effective immortality.
 

Tyranicon

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A dark eldars soul is fully claimed by slaanesh, in the sense of sitting in its palace and being tormented.

Technically, Dark Eldar possess souls as normal, but their soul energy is constantly drained by Slaanesh, and replenished by consuming the soul energies of others.

Their souls are only claimed by Slaanesh after they die.

They don't use soulstones because a) they don't have (easy) access to them, b) most of the things DE do would sever their connection to a soulstone even if they formed one, and c) they see them as a weak solution to the problem, when soul consumption grants them effective immortality.

In addition to what SHODAN said, I wouldn't take deldar lore too seriously.

It has idiocy such as:

  • Be part of a race created to have incredible psychic powers.
  • Can't use them due to slutdemons homing in on your location
  • But regular eldar can use them because of spirit stones
  • Don't have spirit stone technology because of stupid reasons
  • Decide instead to just get your soul sucked slowly
This is all just to justify their S&M hedonist torture culture btw.
 

easychord

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I believe the Slaanesh event happened because a large majority of planet based Elves were already full-on sadists and Slaanesh was the manifestation of their tastes rather than something forced on them. It is only the craftworld Eldar who are willing and able to resist the corruption, along with the smaller group of Harlequins who are protected by the laughing god.
 

Jaedar

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  • But regular eldar can use them because of spirit stones
To be fair, most regular eldar don't use psychic powers either. It's kinda just the warlocks/farseers?
I think it could be argued that this is because the birth of slaanesh fucked up the warp hard (this is at least somewhat canon iirc, the birth of slaanesh coincided with major warp storms spawning in real space), so as a race they lost a lot of their powers.

I believe the Slaanesh event happened because a large majority of planet based Elves were already full-on sadists and Slaanesh was the manifestation of their tastes rather than something forced on them. It is only the craftworld Eldar who are willing and able to resist the corruption, along with the smaller group of Harlequins who are protected by the laughing god.
This is all just to justify their S&M hedonist torture culture btw.
See, this is dumb, because it's supposed to be more nuanced and reversed causality. The pre-fall eldar were horrendously decadent and perverse, and their centuries, species wide kink orgies is what created slaanesh. But slaanesh is not the god of torture porn, shem is the god of excess*. The dark eldar culture their all their perversity towards torture because it was the only way to gain reprieve from slaanesh. Craftworld and exodite eldar survived unscathed due to their distance to standard eldar culture, being essentially the hippies and amish of the eldar race.

Harlequins are a bit of a special case. Iirc in order to become a harlequin they have to let themselves be possessed by a slaaneshi daemon and cast it out through pure willpower. Doing so nullifies any claim slaanesh has on their soul, so they can roam free without soulstone or torture.

*Slaanesh I think is the most misunderstood chaos god, and tends to be simplified a lot. For a good description I recommend the opening lore blurb of the tome of excess black crusade supplement.
 

easychord

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  • But regular eldar can use them because of spirit stones
To be fair, most regular eldar don't use psychic powers either. It's kinda just the warlocks/farseers?
I think it could be argued that this is because the birth of slaanesh fucked up the warp hard (this is at least somewhat canon iirc, the birth of slaanesh coincided with major warp storms spawning in real space), so as a race they lost a lot of their powers.

I believe the Slaanesh event happened because a large majority of planet based Elves were already full-on sadists and Slaanesh was the manifestation of their tastes rather than something forced on them. It is only the craftworld Eldar who are willing and able to resist the corruption, along with the smaller group of Harlequins who are protected by the laughing god.
This is all just to justify their S&M hedonist torture culture btw.
See, this is dumb, because it's supposed to be more nuanced and reversed causality. The pre-fall eldar were horrendously decadent and perverse, and their centuries, species wide kink orgies is what created slaanesh. But slaanesh is not the god of torture porn, shem is the god of excess*. The dark eldar culture their all their perversity towards torture because it was the only way to gain reprieve from slaanesh. Craftworld and exodite eldar survived unscathed due to their distance to standard eldar culture, being essentially the hippies and amish of the eldar race.

Harlequins are a bit of a special case. Iirc in order to become a harlequin they have to let themselves be possessed by a slaaneshi daemon and cast it out through pure willpower. Doing so nullifies any claim slaanesh has on their soul, so they can roam free without soulstone or torture.

*Slaanesh I think is the most misunderstood chaos god, and tends to be simplified a lot. For a good description I recommend the opening lore blurb of the tome of excess black crusade supplement.
It's dumb, but you go on one little harmless century long torture rape bender and people stereotype you as a murderer rapist.
 

Fedora Master

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Dark Eldar are essentially the original pre-Fall late-stage Eldar who never stopped doing what they were doing. Exodites and Craftworld Eldar are the ones who saw the writing on the wall and decided to get the fuck out while they could.
 

Fedora Master

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But slaanesh is not the god of torture porn, shem is the god of excess
The problem with Eldar is that they very easily become obsessive-compulsive-autistic about things. All things. Hence why Craftworld Eldar use the path system to do one thing for a while and then switch to a different path before they overdo it. Excess is built into the race.
 

Trithne

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Harlequins are a bit of a special case. Iirc in order to become a harlequin they have to let themselves be possessed by a slaaneshi daemon and cast it out through pure willpower. Doing so nullifies any claim slaanesh has on their soul, so they can roam free without soulstone or torture.
What you're describing there is the Solitaire, which is the member of a Harlequin troupe that represents Slaanesh in their performances. Because Harlequin performances are some kind of weird reflection of history, the Solitaire, by being the one to represent Slaanesh, forever damns their soul to Slaanesh with no hope of safety once the Solitaire dies.

But slaanesh is not the god of torture porn, shem is the god of excess
The problem with Eldar is that they very easily become obsessive-compulsive-autistic about things. All things. Hence why Craftworld Eldar use the path system to do one thing for a while and then switch to a different path before they overdo it. Excess is built into the race.
This is the correct way of looking at both the Eldar and Slaanesh. The Eldar experience everything a thousand times more potently than a human does, from physical sensation to emotional response. Slaanesh is just the manifestation of that mindset - Do everything, do anything, to the point that it becomes an obsession, that it consumes you. This is what the Craftworlders seek to avoid with their rules.

The Dark Eldar approach is simply that as all Eldar are psychic, even without reaching into the warp to exercise their psychic power, they can strengthen their souls by draining those of the lesser races, and if they do so enough, stay just ahead of Slaanesh's pull.
 

Jaedar

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I acknowledge what you are all saying, but I have determined that having deldar be psychic vampires is retarded, so I will continue to use my headcanon.

(It is very important to headcanon in 40k. Otherwise you have to deal with newcrons, khaldor draigo and all sorts of other stupidity)
 

lightbane

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If dark eldar could just equip a soulstone to escape eternal torment by slaanesh they would, anything else is retardo grimdark.
They can, as explained, but they LIKE their grimderp. In newer editions, they physically need to cause pain or they wither to death, not sure if it's related to Slaa

  • Can't use them due to slutdemons homing in on your location
They don't use psykers cuz their culture loathes them, but they can use super-psychic artifacts just fine, like a portable small mirror that traps your reflection and, upon shattering the mirror, causes physical wounds to the target (shame the weapon was underwhelming in the pnp). Or that magical sword that absorbs moisture that can turn someone to dust upon critting, insta-killing the target.


This is the correct way of looking at both the Eldar and Slaanesh.
Remember they were supposed to be a weapon race that was forgotten about. No wonder they are insane.
 

Peachcurl

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Harlequins are a bit of a special case. Iirc in order to become a harlequin they have to let themselves be possessed by a slaaneshi daemon and cast it out through pure willpower. Doing so nullifies any claim slaanesh has on their soul, so they can roam free without soulstone or torture.
Hm... that'd be news to me at least. Laughing god influence was what I remembered.

This sounds more like a special case, with specific Harlequins maybe, I remember something going on there... but that also involved the laughing god in some way. I think.

edit: ah, Trithne already has it right
 

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