How are the dark eldar still alive?

[Oslecamo]

This is a small question that has been bugging me for weeks, and I want to hear your opinions.

A quick review of the principles I know.

The dark eldar are, as the name implies, the uber evil version of the Wh40K eldar. They only care about experiencing the most excentric pains and pleasures, and theyraid the other races in order to get slaves to either torture or fight gladiator style for their own amusement.

Also, the Dark Eldars are always described as bastards among bastards, wich betray, poison and backstab each other at any sign of weakness, either for power, fun, profit or a combination of those.

Now, altough we don't have any oficial data on the Dark Eldar, we know that their good cousins have a very low birth rate, wich keeps the eldar numbers low.

However, the normal eldar respect their race's lifes above everything, and thus don't go around killing each other left and right. And still their numbers are always refered as very low.


So I ask of you, how have the Dark Eldar still didn't destroyed themselves, since they kill each other constantly and probably have a very low birthrate?

The Tyranids multiply like bugs, the forces of chaos feed on traitors and feelings, the necrons repair themselves, but how do the dark eldar replenish their numers with such bad habits?

Thank you for your opinion.

[Emperor Ing]

huh, I thought everybody knew little Dark Eldars grew off the sides of adult Dark Eldars :smalltongue:

[Selrahc]

Its possible they have higher birthrates than Eldar. The Eldar are all about dedicating themselves to a life of chaste self control, while the dark eldar are about hedonistic decadence.

Theres also the fact that there were probably loads of Dark Eldar, since the ones who left on craftworlds were a tiny minority of the population, and there are still billions of those around. That and their style of warfare has a very low rate of attrition.

I'm not sure how deadly commoragh actually is for the vast majority of the Dark Eldar, because all we ever get to know about is from the view point of the slaves, or about the top levels of politics. Street level Dark Eldar life seems to revolve around gangs, with relatively little infighting. I imagine most of the inter gang warfare is done with expendable slaves, and things probably settle into a cold war situation. Purely because if things were more deadly then yeah, society should collapse.

[Mr. Scaly]

Huh. Maybe they clone themselves and imprint their thought patterns via Awesome Mind Powers (TM) onto the bodies whenever they die, effectively becoming immortal? They wouldn't be the first ones to.

[Eldan]

Well, I only know Eldar fluff and little about Dark Eldar, but from what I know, Eldar were reincarnated when they died before the fall. Now, if the Dark Eldar manage to suck up to Slaanesh enough, maybe he lets them be reborn?

[Myshlaevsky]

Well, I only know Eldar fluff and little about Dark Eldar, but from what I know, Eldar were reincarnated when they died before the fall. Now, if the Dark Eldar manage to suck up to Slaanesh enough, maybe he lets them be reborn?

Dark Eldar don't suck up to Slaanesh. They eat souls to 'fill' up their own, as theirs are slowly, constantly eaten by the Prince of Pleasure. The rebirth rate of the Dark Eldar is a bit of a problem, but to be honest, they probably take far less casualties than any of the other 40K races - with the exception of the Necrons.

[snoopy13a]

There are two possiblities of a race like this sticking around:

1) A high birthrate

2) The violence and high mortality rates is restricted to males and the surviving males take multiple wives. If 75% of males die due to wars, in-fighting, etc and the 25% who survive take on average four wives apiece then every female ends up married and the population should remain stable.

[Lorn]

Eldar birth rates may be low, but Dark Eldar birthrates may not be - they're all about pain and pleasure, meaning chances are they simply reproduce a LOT faster.
Also, following on from what Snoopy said, maybe one male might reproduce with several females. Definitely goes with the pleasure thing :smallwink:

Plus, they love experiencing pain (or just causing, not 100% sure) meaning that, well, there's a huge chance that they don't actually kill each other. Just inflict senseless pain then dump the remains or something. Can't hurt something if it's dead. From this, they could be able to withstand considerably more pain than normal Eldar, yet still have (somewhat) fragile bodies compared to other races or something.

[Dorizzit]

Let me put it this way: Eldar birthrates aren't as much lower than humans as their numbers might indicate; Eldar have complex, lengthy bonding processes resulting in marriage, and even then they remain rigidly disciplined. The idea of a one-night stand or any form of fornication simply doesn't exist in Eldar society, perhaps excepting the Rangers or other outcasts.
The Dark Eldar rut about at just about every opportunity. Bonus points for every one past the initial two.

[puppyavenger]

Let me put it this way: Eldar birthrates aren't as much lower than humans as their numbers might indicate; Eldar have complex, lengthy bonding processes resulting in marriage, and even then they remain rigidly disciplined. The idea of a one-night stand or any form of fornication simply doesn't exist in Eldar society, perhaps excepting the Rangers or other outcasts. .

the reason being that there is a hedonistic god formed of pleasurable experiences who is trying to eat all there souls. and if they lose control there is a moderate chance of said God being attracted to the violent emotions and eating their souls. Plus apparently Eldar experience emotions like 20 times more acutely than humans. Which explains a lot about dark eldar..

[Revlid]

huh, I thought everybody knew little Dark Eldars grew off the sides of adult Dark Eldars :smalltongue:

Close, actually. Cloning is incredibly common among Dark Eldar - the more influential clone themselves and attempt to copy their mind into the copy with a combination of technology, brainwashing, and psykery, resulting in many of the more obvious cases of insanity (beyond the usual sociopathy) in the Dark Eldar, as well as their reputation for being (apparent) Karma Houdinis. Others just clone themselves and trust in genetics, and some mix-and-match their genes for fun and profit, resulting in deliberately mutated or just different 'offspring'.

Haemonculi are generally in charge of the process, the failed/experimental results of which often end up as Grotesques. This also explains some of the flaws/differences in the clones - the Haemonculi saw something shiny in the genetic code and decided to muck about with it for giggles.

Oh, also, DEldar go at it like bunnies.

[Selrahc]

2) The violence and high mortality rates is restricted to males and the surviving males take multiple wives. If 75% of males die due to wars, in-fighting, etc and the 25% who survive take on average four wives apiece then every female ends up married and the population should remain stable.

Nah. Females are every bit as crazy as the males. In fact some of the more violent cults(Wyches) are cheifly female.


Close, actually. Cloning is incredibly common among Dark Eldar - the more influential clone themselves and attempt to copy their mind into the copy with a combination of technology, brainwashing, and psykery, resulting in many of the more obvious cases of insanity (beyond the usual sociopathy) in the Dark Eldar, as well as their reputation for being (apparent) Karma Houdinis. Others just clone themselves and trust in genetics, and some mix-and-match their genes for fun and profit, resulting in deliberately mutated or just different 'offspring'.

Huh. What was your source? I haven't seen much dark eldar material out there thats beyond the superficial level.

[LordVader]

Yeah, I'm pretty sure that the DE population is expanding for two reasons:
1) They lack none of the inhibitions of their more noble cousins;
and
2) Their main population is relatively sheltered in the Webway; To paraphrase a Chuck Norris joke, you don't find the Dark Eldar, they find you.

On another note, I look forwards to the new Dark Eldar book coming out (eventually) that's bringing a whole new look and undoubtedly a ton of cool new fluff.

[Tengu_temp]

One new Dark Eldar appears from the void each time a WH40K fan headbangs or makes superhorns over his books/minis.

[Spiryt]

Dude, the 40k universe

Nothing to do with - logic
Nothing to do with - physic

And so on.

Just let the battle begin.

[Cubey]

They're still alive because, despite their rather low birth rate, their sense of survival is honed to the highest degree. Doesn't matter is it a raid on other races or an internal struggle, as soon as one Dark Eldar dies...

[outrageous French accent]"Ai! They killed Jacques! Run!"[/accent]

And off they go. Therefore, each conflict and, ahem, "accident" claims the life of one Dark Eldar at most.

[hanzo66]

I would assume that it's a mix of Commoragh being in the Webway (and safe from pretty much everyone else save for maybe Jagatai Khan or Ahriman), their Hit-And-Run warfare style (they are fast little buggers) and the fact that rape and sex is a big part of their lifestyle (I don't know what happens with a human woman, but I'd rather not think of that). Also they rarely get involved in stuff that would cause mass losses, such as fighting over planets or stuff.

[Inhuman Bot]

Well, I only know Eldar fluff and little about Dark Eldar, but from what I know, Eldar were reincarnated when they died before the fall. Now, if the Dark Eldar manage to suck up to Slaanesh enough, maybe he lets them be reborn?

I think that's what he I do.

[LordVader]

They're still alive because, despite their rather low birth rate, their sense of survival is honed to the highest degree. Doesn't matter is it a raid on other races or an internal struggle, as soon as one Dark Eldar dies...

[outrageous French accent]"Ai! They killed Jacques! Run!"[/accent]

And off they go. Therefore, each conflict and, ahem, "accident" claims the life of one Dark Eldar at most.

Are you sure about this? While they favor sneak attacks, Dark Eldar are not cowards.

@Spiryt- While some aspects of 40k are indeed ridiculous, the Imperium and Marines are a lot more realistic and physics-oriented than many science-fiction settings. They don't have much in the way of flashy techs and pew-pew lasers.

Necrons, on the other hand, are probably one of the most ridiculously teched-up physics-raping science fiction races ever invented.

[Bryn]

@Spiryt- While some aspects of 40k are indeed ridiculous, the Imperium and Marines are a lot more realistic and physics-oriented than many science-fiction settings. They don't have much in the way of flashy techs and pew-pew lasers

Apart from the lasguns of the Emperor's glorious Imperial Guard, that is? :smalltongue:

I love 40k. But I have no need to pretend that it is realistic. Gritty and dark, yes, but realistic, no way. The setting runs on the Rule of Cool (http://tvtropes.org/Main/RuleOfCool), which is just the way I like it. The titans, the cathedral-like spaceships, the hive cities on the larger side of things. The stories of the individual Guardsmen caught in a hopeless war, facing the horrors of the Tyranids, the Necrons, and the insiduous threat of Chaos. None of these things are realistic, but that just makes them all the better.

[LordVader]

Lasguns, yes, but again, I can think of far sillier science fiction weapons.
(Phasers, maybe? :smallbiggrin:) Plus, autoguns and shotguns are widely used as well.

I'm not saying 40k is realistic, just saying that many people often percieve it as being really out there because of its exaggerated weaponry and construction (and many of the races can be!) but there's also stuff in there that isn't too far off from what we have today, since there's the whole "degenerating technology" angle there too.

[Inhuman Bot]

They don't have much in the way of flashy techs and pew-pew lasers.


http://mryamamoto.50megs.com/errors/lazer-mog.jpg

[arguskos]

http://mryamamoto.50megs.com/errors/lazer-mog.jpg
Anyone else note the irony of Slaanesh posting in the Dark Eldar thread? :smallbiggrin:

-argus

[Oslecamo]

The titans, the cathedral-like spaceships, the hive cities on the larger side of things. The stories of the individual Guardsmen caught in a hopeless war, facing the horrors of the Tyranids, the Necrons, and the insiduous threat of Chaos. None of these things are realistic, but that just makes them all the better.

Since when there being forces out there that want to destroy/control/turn you into some kind of harvest is unrealistic?

Anyway, thanks everybody for the responses. Some interesting theories there.


On the matter of the Dark Eldar having a higher birth rate.

Well, altough surely the DE will have much more carnal relations than the eldar, it doesn't exactly translate into more individuals.

That's because in order to get more adults, someone would need to take care and develop those babies. And in a world where mommy and daddy may die at any minute and highly dangerous drugs and abominations run rampart I really don't see much babies surviving until adulthood. Or maybe they have some kind of machines to take care of those hard first years.

And then the other DE would need to show some kind of mercy and compassion to the young ones in order to teach them. This is, are DE capable of compassion and mercy and "gasp" inocent love?

But this way leads to a lose-lose situation. If you don't teach your offspring well, they'll die in the ruthless DE society, but if you teach them well, they'll probably kill their brothers and yourself to take the family's power, meaning each DE couple would at best generate one single replacement before dying horribly. Unless the DE daddies ake some kind of pact and the whole family becomes servants to the strongest member, or somethinglike that. Hmm, I could see that hapening.

Anyway, I'm more inclined to the cloning theory. No hassle taking care of weak babies, faster and you can mess up with their genetic code.

[LordVader]

I've never heard of Dark Eldar cloning on such a massive scale.
My theory as to why the Dark Eldar young won't kill their family is twofold. One, they will lack the skill to kill their parents.
And two, what would be in it for them? Killing the people who teach them the skills they need to survive is hardly a good idea, and individual families don't have any power that would warrant a Dark Eldar killing his/her siblings to inherit it. The power is in the hands of the Kabals. Although the Kabals do clash fairly often, every Dark Eldar is not necessarily a member, and I'm pretty sure that massive widespread gang warfare is not erupting through the streets of Comorrogh every day, the real big fights are probably only when one major Kabal decides to take another one head-on, and even then I'd expect an emphasis on prisoners.

[Dervag]

I love 40k. But I have no need to pretend that it is realistic. Gritty and dark, yes, but realistic, no way. The setting runs on the Rule of Cool (http://tvtropes.org/Main/RuleOfCool), which is just the way I like it. The titans, the cathedral-like spaceships, the hive cities on the larger side of things. The stories of the individual Guardsmen caught in a hopeless war, facing the horrors of the Tyranids, the Necrons, and the insiduous threat of Chaos. None of these things are realistic, but that just makes them all the better.It's not realistic, but the arms and equipment of the Imperium are stuff we can imagine having. They use things like machine guns; their equipment mostly seems to be made out of stuff with properties we can understand. Even if we could never build a titan, or if it would be stupid to build one, they're at least an imaginable extension of technology we know we have or can expect in the future.

Same goes for the Tau, mostly.

In short, the Imperium follows most of the laws of nature as we know them, except for psykers. The unobtanium that goes into their technology is stuff we can reasonably imagine having in the future. The technology itself is schizo, granted.

Whereas the Necrons are a species literally made of unobtanium. Really powerful unobtanium, too. The orks are an entire species whose equipment runs on the principle of "clap your hands if you believe."

They cheat.

[Oslecamo]

Although the Kabals do clash fairly often, every Dark Eldar is not necessarily a member, and I'm pretty sure that massive widespread gang warfare is not erupting through the streets of Comorrogh every day, the real big fights are probably only when one major Kabal decides to take another one head-on, and even then I'd expect an emphasis on prisoners.


Well, I do remember a fluff history from one Dark Eldar codex where the leader of a kabal faces a betrayal from a rising warlord, wich brings her entire retinue to the Kabal's boss chamber. However the chamber reveals to be filled with hidden Cabal warriors wich imediatily kill all the betrayers but the leader. Yes, killing, as in the betrayers are cut to little pieces, not just knocked down

At the end, the Kabal's boss claims he faces "betrayals" like that every other week or so, and he has crushed them all(sugesting is pretty common). He then offers the betrayer a job as his new anti-infiltration official, since the last one claerly didn't do much of a great job, and had just been executed.

The Kabal's lord then proceeds to consume the souls of the fallen, comenting on how he devours thousands of souls a day to saciate his hunger.

I just got the imprssion the DE, well, kill each other whitout much regrets.

[LordVader]

Well, I do remember a fluff history from one Dark Eldar codex where the leader of a kabal faces a betrayal from a rising warlord, wich brings her entire retinue to the Kabal's boss chamber. However the chamber reveals to be filled with hidden Cabal warriors wich imediatily kill all the betrayers but the leader. Yes, killing, as in the betrayers are cut to little pieces, not just knocked down

At the end, the Kabal's boss claims he faces "betrayals" like that every other week or so, and he has crushed them all(sugesting is pretty common). He then offers the betrayer a job as his new anti-infiltration official, since the last one claerly didn't do much of a great job, and had just been executed.

The Kabal's lord then proceeds to consume the souls of the fallen, comenting on how he devours thousands of souls a day to saciate his hunger.

I just got the imprssion the DE, well, kill each other whitout much regrets.

Oh, they do, but we're not seeing mass murders of civilians every day either, I think. As far as the betrayals though, I might expect him to make something like that up to intimidate his fellows and keep them in line. DE aren't exactly known for their truthful nature.

[hanzo66]

Then again, Asdrubael Vect (the aformentioned Kabal lord) is supposed to be the strongest of the Dark Eldar.

[LordVader]

That was Asdrubael?
In that case, I can understand the fights, because he is literally the leader of the Dark Eldar and people must make regular runs at him. However, I doubt we see that much regular bloodshed between lower-level Kabals, and even taking on Vect is something most people has second thoughts about.

[Talkkno]

It is detailed in Xenogly, the reason for the low Eldar population is the intricate rituals and arduous approval meathods before a couple can get pregenet, so they don't fall prey to the paws Slaanesh, as Eldar experience emotions in a far more massive scales then humans do.

[Sam]

Call me crazy, but I don't think breeding like bunnies is how they do it- after all, when they are pregnant, they are probably weaker, just like humans. Given the fear of betrayl, I'd think they all use birth control to avoid any unwanted kids coming to bump them off.

The most likely explanation is that they had a HUGE starting population. After all, there are billions of craftworld eldar and they are the minority (there are more Eldar than Tao, right?).

As such, the Dark Eldar would have a HUGE population. The reason the have so few troops considering their size is becuase most of the population probably does not indulge in raids, but in other forms of decadence. When they tire of that, they probably sign up for raiding.

If you think about it, this is a problem all "Always Choatic Evil" races have. The Drow are a worse example- I have no idea how they manage to out breed elves or how they haven't managed to kill all of themselves.

Alternately, alot of the Dark Eldar could be in stasis. After all, they needed to flee to escape Slaneesh, no questions asked... could explain why they don't have a population problem.

Basically, it boils down to "they aren't a civilization". The dark Eldar are simply a bunch of pirates... with insanely powerful weapons.

As for the "realism" of 40K... yes and no. It IS sciencce fiction fantasy, with many of its concepts ripped out of the orgional Dark Ages. However, it does one thing that few other science fiction series do- it is internally consistant AND actually feels its size. 40K feels like a galaxy spanning empire- heck, in 10 milenia it has only had 2 major crisises that affected the whole- the Age of Apostacy and the Horus Heresy. All the wars, all the fighting, all the bloodshed... all Sector problems, unless said sector is over run. The Exception is the Black Crusades, which aim at Terra itself, but that is due to the value of Mankinds homeworld and not because of the power of the blasphemous Choas forces martial strength.

Anyone who disagrees will be facing THIS:
http://bbs.stardestroyer.net/viewtopic.php?t=114797&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=25

[Durp]

I want everyone to know i am not a sick minded retard. But, mabye all the rape DE perform on eachother pays off...

[Sam]

Probably not. After all, this is the dark eldar we are talking about- they don't respect pregnant women any more than anyone else.

Not to mention I... come to think of it, I'm pretty sure the Eldar and humans are incompatible. Of course, sources vary- in rouge trader you have a half eldar/human high breed and the DE have human women on the Dias in Soulstorm, but I doubt it. They look down on human like... people to cows. Well, that would be the noraml Eldar, with the Dark Eldar more like... people to tapeworms. The examples of the and other species are probably exageration or mind screws- after all, they have a sick and twisted sense of humor.

As for them raping each other... something tells me that there is no unattached individuals in their cities because everyone joins a group for protection.. Any attempts to do that would lead to reprisals and gang violence.

Basically there are only three options for how they keep going
1) The normal way
2) The artifical way
3) No way

Given the Dark Eldar don't really care about anything, BUT the pursuit of pleasure, it is probably 3. Of course, given their lifespan and the fact they may be doing something like cold storage, it will be a while before it is a problem. Could be wrong though- are their any books from their perspective?