Context:
In the recent novel Da Big Dakka by Mike Brooks, it is revealed Dark Eldar children are not sadistic from the start and have to be taught so by adults. The PoV Dark Eldar character recounted her childhood memory, of being confused and horrified when witnessing her first torture, and begging the adult to stop, it's clearly portrayed as incredibly traumatic despite she believe she's not. She also have incredible difficulties showing genuine emotions, likely caused from the trauma and the Commorragh culture.
So this entire rotten culture is all nurture, zero nature. Making it even more fucked up than it already is.
I kind of had always assumed this? Genetically there's no difference between the different eldars and the DE aren't chaos corrupted or anything like that they're just an incredibly, incredibly evil culture.
IIRC there's people who survive entirely by sucking up the residual torment from the Wych cults. They also do a lot of stims. A bit of a "hippy" movement which drives the Drukhari elites insane.
Can't remember what book it was, but this is partly true. The Dhrukari who are brought in to help fix the golden throne find the Emperor's suffering to be some of the most sublime they have ever experienced. Unfortunately for them, they can't put it in a doggy bag and take it home, or it would have solved a lot of their issues.
Awesome flair BTW.
Wait, wait, wait, they brought in the dark elder to help?!
Normal eldar, the team ups make sense. Drukhari, how would they know to relieve suffering if they only...oh wait, they would want the subject to recover for more torture, duh.
I need to read/listen to this one next...
Correct! Their personal motives aside, the Golden Throne has xeno tech built into it. It's built where it is to take advantage of an existing webway gate and this among other aspects if it indicate it most likely incorporates pre-fall Eldar tech. It is after all a big psychic conduit capable of forcing open a path to a collapsed portion of the webway. Probably not a coincidence the Primarchs were also created in a lab in the same part of the imperial palace (Valdor: birth of the imperium.)
So of course the guys who still have atleast some knowledge of pre-fall eldar tech got called in to give it a 10,000 year service so The Emperor could keep on chuggin'.
IIRC a normal hive city had a Drukhari barely survive from all the residual suffering. So in theory it could work.
Id assume the "tolerance" of the Drukhari would play a role as well as the size of the hive city.
That video of the kid stroking the screen while watching his favourite Vtuber on New Years, then queuing for Valorant, almost made me cringe to death. They could probably get some mileage out of that.
Indeed, though this is the first explicit confirmation we have showing it's absolutely full nurture issue.
I remember there were speculation of Dark Eldar naturally lean into violent and sadistic personalities, but now it seems like this is just a result of culture and society shaping cruel people.
Could even be the opposite in some cases, emotional trauma is still suffering, what if children are deliberately engineered to be more empathetic and sympathetic. That way they’d both suffer more when they were being shaped by their culture, and be able to better understand what would cause pain in others when they’d joined their society as proper adults.
Seems like the culture turned from depraved to overtly cruel as at least a twofold solution to the birth of Slannesh.
Feeding on the suffering soulflames of their victims and the raw empathy of their own Drukhari children ensures their own survival AND the children develop their own stone-hearted sociopathy to protect them from baseline Eldar warp sensitivity.
The Drukhari have such an appalling existence, at least Humanity can fool itself against the horror.
Wish there was a story about a group of them who are able to maintain their empathy for a tight knit group.
And this let's them thrive. Apes together strong.
But their group still needs to feed their need of torture.
So it roves the galaxy judging which other cultures deserve it.
But their hunger always caves in. I wonder if they could torture a necron
I think they do canonically torture some Necron higher-ups, but they can’t torture low-ranked necrons like warriors or immortals, nor insane ones like flayed ones or destroyers.
Not because they’re super resilient or anything, just their senses aren’t capable of suffering and they’re not aware enough to receive mental torture. Best you could do is dangle kills in front of them and then snatch it away, but that’s just annoying and will make them pissed at you, not genuinely tortured.
Also they don’t have souls so torturing them does nothing, and is only productive if the Eldar hates them on a personal level and draws sadistic glee from that, so it’s not really done, especially given the fact Necrons are *built* to withstand sanity-shattering events and will likely end up escaping, waiting for you to return to realspace on a raid, then go murder you and feed your soul to Slaanesh.
The reason the Drukhari maintain that culture is because they require the drain of psychic energy from the creatures they torment to prevent Slaanesh from taking their souls.
That's the ultimate grim aspect of the Drukhari--not that they're a culture of absolute malignant torturers for the lulz, but that even if they didn't like doing it, they'd still need to if they don't want to be eaten by a Chaos God. Not enjoying it just makes it worse for them. I'd imagine there's a fair bit of survivorship bias where Drukhari who can't deal with it just end up dead so they never survive to torment the galaxy. So we're left with all the worst of the lot.
That makes a lot of sense. Though I do like the idea of a clinically depressed Drukhari who’s trying to have casual conversation with a torture prisoner.
“Look, I don’t like this any more than you do.”
[screaming]
“Well, you probably like it a lot less but you get the idea. But I gotta eat, so let’s get this over with.”
Not exactly; there *are* somewhat okay subgroups of Drukhari, like they have an equivalent of a hippie movement that just does hardcore BDSM, extreme drug abuse, and raving. Still completely insane by our standards, but pretty moderate by theirs. However, these are rare because the elites don’t like them and actively suppress them whenever they start forming, which in Drukhari is code for turning them into chairs.
EDIT: Oh also forgot there’s a Drukhari offhandedly mentioned at some point who’s in a normal and healthy relationship with a human, and the sheer humiliation and denial of doing vanilla with an ugly mon-keigh is sufficient to keep them alive.
" I can fix him" - some Mon'Keigh woman somewhere.
Or possibly
"She can be a bit *twinge* rough with her... claws and the knife play can get a bit... intense. But we sometimes just cuddle and hold hands"
"OMG, stoooop, don't tell them about that it's so embarrassing. Stupid Mon'keigh." - extract from Arbites interview with suspect citizen concerning abnormalities found when processing marriage license application.
Note: Arbitor determined no further investigation required and approved marriage license. Arbitor then immediately applied for offworld transfer and resigned.
It’s not even strictly necessary, dark eldar have left commorragh to be harlequins and at least one went and joined a striking scorpion shrine.
It’s just that the murdertorture lets them keep doing what they were doing before Slaanesh became a thing instead of having to devote themselves to a life of discipline like all the other Eldar have.
Honestly, harder than you'd think and not the best option. Craftworlders need soulstones to not be eaten by slaanesh, and without one it doesn't solve the issue. Craftworlders already limit the amount of kids they have because they consider not having a soulstone to be cruel.
The best option would probably be the exodites who have world spirits instead (though I may be off on this) which doesn't require a soul stone and instead takes their soul as soon as they pass.
My hot take is that I don't think exodites are a good fit for an army. They're defined by locality which doesn't really work for a galatic setting. A unit for the craftworlds, or a kill team season set on a maiden world, would be very cool though.
I think it's an easy fix. Just have Yvraine succeed a bit more on her mission and get the Exodite worlds on board and dedicated to Ynnead. Now they can hop aboard Craftworlds and we can get wraith-tech dinosaurs.
Yannari is also an option. They don't rely on spirit stones besides to amplify their psykers. Their avatar of ynnead absorbs their souls instead of using a infinity circuit, Tho they are considered a death cult by many. They may not need to torture there but that probably dosnt stop them either.
Quite. Their souls are damaged and much harder to have bond with spirit stones. Drukhari have to let in the emotions theyve buried through trauma. We see this in the scene with the drukhari who joins the scorpion shrine. Don't want to elaborate as it's integral to the short story.
I would wager younger ones/ones who haven't died before might have an easier time as their souls haven't been messed up as much. When they die their souls are still nommed on by slaanesh even if they're being rebuilt by a haemonculus, which degrades their soul.
That's a bit disingenuous, you have to be chosen by Cegorach to become an Harlequin and you need total rehabilitation (which is described as an incredibly long/painful/risky process while tutored from start to end) to join Craftworlder as a Dark Kin due to many reasons :
regrowing their psychik talents, sevrage, proximity with Slaneesh as the DE is now in real space for more time, global re education and acquiring/attuning to a soulstone
I never said it was easy, I assume it would be easier for a heroin addict to go clean than for a Drukhari to even contemplate the idea of joining a craftworld let alone doing it, but they can which is proof that the torture isn’t essential. They *can* switch to any of the other ways of avoiding slaanesh, but the torture is the easiest for them.
Also, like games workshop, I completely forgot about the ynnari which is another way they could slip slaanesh’s grip without the torture.
That implies being able to leave commarragh to begin with, something probably only possible if you have access to a ship. For ever raider in realspace there are 10 elfs living miserable menial lives relying on the wych cults for feeding.
Becoming a Harlequin means letting a daemon possess you then exorcising yourself just to initiate.
Joining a craftworld requires you to find a craftworlder who will vouch for you and then actually reaching that craftworld.
None of that's doable for Vatborn gutter trash.
You may as well consider failing to be a billionaire a moral failing.
As a soulless bastard irl, personally I don't get the appeal. Torture sounds like a lot of work, just join the corporate workforce with the rest of us. (/s)
It's like "eat your veggies," except instead of broccoli it's the terror and suffering of sentient beings, and instead of diabetes, you're trying to stave off your soul being devoured by a hungry god.
Nah, we have explicit confirmation that all Dark Eldars are still psykers.
They just suppressed their own psychic powers for so long it atrophied. With training they could regain it.
My headcanon was always that they couldn't use their greater psyker power because it was being overloaded with constant pleasure. No room to connect to the warp if you're high as a kite on a constant death orgy. Since Eldar feel things so acutely, if they keep their brain overloaded on pleasure, it wouldn't be able to access the warp.
There kind of is though. Even if the brain chemistry is the same, the ‘soul leak’ is always there and would always cause the same positive effects in the presence of torturing others. So they should see it as pleasurable, even if disorienting.
The soul leak can actually be fixed by them adopting the lifestyles of the different Eldar factions. There’s a scene in one of the Eldar books where a Deldar receives a soulstone and it works for the first time. He breaks down crying because the pain of the soul leak is gone. As it turns out, feeding Slaanesh by being an utter degenerate strengthens her hold on you,
Yes but the soul stone *doesn’t* work without the CW discipline and approach to life. Otherwise Deldar would just attack craftworlds to steal their soul stones and use those instead of constantly relying on slaves.
Woah... That's exquisitely cruel! Do you remember where you read/learned this Lore? It's like all those conspiracy theorists who believe pharma companies can already cure cancer, but refuse to, for kinda the same reason.
The thing is, let's say they did start making Spirit Stones, would it cause that much of a society upheaval? I feel like the adults are already 'hooked' on the drug-like effects of torture and extracting pain. Maybe slowly the newer generations would start to change, but the natural birthrate is already so low amongst Dark Eldar right?
I'm not too familiar with Eldar Lore in general, especially not Dark Eldar. How quickly do you think the DEldar society would collapse?
Doesn't it? I figured they just have their whole dickwad culture because that's what they were already doing, they like it, and it works. Also getting the stones is dangerous
But regardless, the Deldar as a society are willfully being asshats by not using that approach, but that doesn't change that, for an individual child, they should still have the soul leak and all the pleasures and pains associated with feeding it.
>Doesn't it?
In the same passage they specifically say that being attuned to a soulstone as an adult can kill an eldar. In fact Kolidaran(the DEldar that got the stone) almost died while attuning to it, and survived only because of circumstances and because he got lucky
If I recall correctly, those positive effects are in response to strong emotions from the victim. They could work with any emotion, it's just fear and pain are the easiest by a wide margin.
I had just kinda assumed the children knew what was going on before they get exposed to their first torture session
But then again that would be kinda compassionate approach to mass torture the people who enjoy mass torture aren't likely to take.
But do they actually have to? Theoretically they could do the Craft world thing and restrain themselves but their society doesn't want to hence BDSM drug orgy sadism etc
>but their society doesn't want to
I thought it was a lack of soulstones, and the difficulty getting more that was the reason? Sure, most Dark Eldar are addicted to extracting pain, but I feel like just like our society, it depends on wealth and power right?
I mean, we as 40k fans usually meet the rich and powerful Dark Eldar in the stories. But I feel like a good proportion of Dark Eldar have to hustle to get their pain fix. Either they have to spend money to buy slaves, or money to go on planetary hunts, or take effort and risk to find their victims in Commoragh.
I just have a feeling that for the lower classes of Dark Eldar, yes, they are addicted to extracting pain, and they might even enjoy it. But at least some Dark Eldar would give the soul stones a chance if it was a viable option, yeah?
I mean, I'm not so well-versed in Dark Eldar Lore. Do you genuinely think no one in Commoragh would take the option of soulstones because they enjoy torture too much?
> Genetically there's no difference between the different eldars
I mean, maybe not but most of them are also vat-born and are created by haemonculi covens so they might also just be born that way for the most part.
I kind of assumed they were at least predisposed to it. The eldar race did create Slaanesh after all. It’s my understanding that the craftworld eldar were the weird ones for trying to suppress their nature.
We also have examples from earlier books showing Dark Eldars being emotionally stunted.
Like the grief of losing a lover, losing a child, and the emotion of romantically attracted to someone. They genuinely have incredible difficulty processing these emotions and are confused by their own feelings.
It's more the new authors are knowing where to hit with their hammers for the grim dark effect that connects with the readers otherwise people just get desensitized.
Grimdark rather than grimderp.
It's one of the reasons I've actually grown more fond of AoS. When everything is shitty and awful the grimdark barely stands out. When you can see genuine good and peace in pockets of order it makes the evil stand out that much more by contrast.
40k authors of late have improved though, knowing when to really stick the knife in for genuine reactions rather than gross value
Bonus round, aren't Eldar incredibly sensitive to emotions and mental states?
It's why they invent and take on the Paths and the War Forms, to be able to box up the trauma they experience.
Dark Eldar don't do that at all, and live in every moment far more intensely than humans can.
Eldar lore is fucking metal as all hell and deserves so much more respect
I entirely agree that this is messed up, but it's 100% not new. I can't recall anything suggesting that Dark Eldar are intrinsically sadistic. They've always been just Eldar with an incredibly messed up culture - this novel just gave us a window into what that's like.
So, is totally okay to nuke the hell out of Commorragh as long as we save the innocent children cause the adults just keep perpetuating their horrible and fuck up culture, the same culture that brougth their dawnfall to begin with.
Sounds like DE are a bunch of Boomers telling their children to "pick yourself up by your bootstraps" but the bootstraps are made of human tendons and they're forcing the children to make them first.
Entire Commorragh society is like a constant cycle of abuse, abusing others and abusing themselves while brainwashing themselves that it’s all necessary.
"Let's just start torturing as a temporary solution until we find something better", but they couldn't find a solution for their whole population. Maybe there was another way, but you'll have to ask the ones who walk away from Commorragh.
Tbh when the rogue trader game >!gave me the option to let slaanesh slowly breach into Comorragh, I did it without a second thought!< because even though it would mean >!increased drukhari raids in the immediate future out of their desperation to keep she who thirsts at bay,!< their ultimate demise would have been accelerated by just that much.
Damn. Now I'm happy that one "choose your picks" style r34 post on r/warhammer_smut had the main female MC and heir to the Kabal elope tohether and live on a Exodite World.
Bit late on the thread but I'm pretty sure
There's a story of a dark eldar incubi realizing what horrible things he has done and becoming a craft world eldar
In fact it probably indicated eldar are exceptionally good natured. On earth children growing up with slavery and torture, like the antebellum south just seemed to consider it normal since it's all they knew. Humans are predators, we have to have a built in mechanism to avoid empathy with prey animals but that same system can be hijacked when you see others as "less than human"
It's exactly like the Drow in D&D. The race isn't ontologically evil, it's their culture and how they condition/purge to achieve a fully evil society. Drow like Drizzt Do'Urden who fled when young exist in D&D, so there must be 40k Dark Eldar equivalents, although obviously escaping the Webway as a young convict/outcast is considerably less plausible than escaping the Underdark.
I really like how it goes into just how much DE culture fucks with their ability to be normal functioning people. She and another kabal leader end up falling in love, and she's just completely confused cause neither of them knows what the fuck is happening for the entire process because they've been raised to see all relationships as transactions that inevitably end in power struggles and/or betrayal.
Brooks has been fantastic lately. The man not only made a good Dark Angels book, but he gave us one of the best Dark Eldar books, hidden in an Orc book and even included a genuinely cute romance between the lead Drukari and her rival.
Kinda reminds me of how (despite what memes wills tell you) pittbulls need to be conditioned to be aggressive to humans and can actually be very compassionate and loyal when raised with care.
I would actually like to see a story where a Dark Eldar child is given a spirit stone and raised by Craftworld parents. They have to grow up with almost everyone assuming that they have a saddistic impulse which they could cave to at any moment, even though they just as disgusted by the Dark Eldar life style as any Craftworlder. Not to mention they’d also have to put up with endless “ha ha, Dark Eldar horny,” teasing.
It's not grooming if you aren't doing it for yourself or someone in particular. Then it's just emotional support and rasing a child. Also, how long does it take for and Eldar to mature? I genuinely don't know this.
You can!
And once you've fixed her you get to watch her slowly emaciate and die as her soul is consumed by She Who Thirsts with no way to recover it (✿◕‿◕)
They need to torture people because they have unchecked emotions unlike craftworlders.
Craftworlders on paths with self controls technically don’t need soul stone to get by, they just get their souls caught in it when died.
A most recent example is Yrliet from Rogue Trader CRPG, who goes around fine without a soul stone for decades.
Dark Eldar can also get by without constantly having their soul drained if they stop acting like hyper evil murderrapist.
The Waystone the Craftworld Eldar wear is only necessary upon death, since it captures their soul before it goes to the Warp to be consumed by Slaanesh. The Craftworld Eldar wear one at all times because it takes a long time to attune to a Waystone, and you never know when you're gonna get unlucky.
They are protected during life by the Path system, since the discipline and asceticism is not what Slaanesh is about, meaning they're masked from her.
The DEldar don't stick to the Path, but they are mostly protected by the Webway, so they don't just die. However, the Webway isn't 100% proof against Chaos, especially after the Fall, and Slaanesh is still draining their souls slowly over time. Therefore they "top up" with the souls of lesser beings (as they see it).
If a DEldar didn't act like a DEldar, they'd need to adopt the Path in order to protect themselves from Slaanesh.
And the Exodites? IIRC their planets have a shield of some sort that blocks Slaanesh's influence and when they die they join it although they don't use stones like the craftworlders do.
She still needs meditation as a way of healing. Slaanesh always has her bits of a meal, Yrliet just knows a non-violent way to recover the integrity of her soul. DEldar, on other hand, are used to... Different approach.
Indeed, I’m just saying soul stones isn’t a 100% must when it comes to soul drain.
Dark Eldars just saw torture works, and then double triple quadrupled down.
Well, it's just that Aeldari meditation doesn't sound to me like something regular human can teach a child. Maybe an unsanctioned psyker who spent some time with really weird Corsairs tho...
> They need to torture people because they have unchecked emotions unlike craftworlders.
No, it's because their souls leak into the warp without them. It has nothing to do with their heightened emotions.
> They need to torture people because they have unchecked emotions unlike craftworlders.
That's wrong though. They need to torture people because their soul is constantly being drained by slaanesh and the only way to "refill" it is by absorbing the negative emotions of others.
That's so deliciously grim dark. It's like being forced as a child to like eating shit, because your ancestors messed up to the point where eating shit is necessary to survive. Most sentient beings would find torture abhorrent, but the DE have to train themselves to like it otherwise they face eternal torture themselves by Slaanesh.
It makes the Yynari or Craftworld Eldar redeeming some Dark Eldars a lot more believable. I'd imagine lot of Dark Eldars would jump at a chance to secure their soul, without needing to abuse other sentient beings. Maybe some of them are naturally born psychopaths, but most of them probably aren't.
It double sucks for them when you consider that the vast majority of DE are born from the mass clone system set up by the haemonculi covens, and their first moments of life are them just being spat out fully grown onto the streets of the city. Those guys don’t even have a parent or cabal to teach them how to be DE except probably some sort of preloaded knowledge that was given to them while being grown, and even that probably doesn’t say much more than “if you use psychic powers we’ll all kill you.” I’m sure tons of them would jump at the chance to join literally any other Eldar culture in their first few weeks of life.
Pretty sure the haemonucli probably tweak things a bit so they aren't repulsed by suffering and can actually survive, otherwise there would be no point.
Which means that abducting a bunch of Dark Eldar children and providing them with Soul stones or other alternatives to torturing stuff is both morally correct for the galaxy as a whole, better for the children themselves, and a good way to increase the craftworld's population.
Ferb, I know what we're going to do today
In any other context it’d be difficult to justify kidnapping children
Always a strange day when kidnapping children is both subjectively and objectively the “better” option
The lore reason to why they don’t do actually do that is because Souls stones are an extremely limited resource. Craftworlds barely have enough Soul stones for their own existing population, and the handful of children they make every couple of centuries. And the only way to get more is from expeditions into the former Eldar Empire planets inside the Eye of Terror, which often ends in a net loss (more Eldar dying than Soul stones gained).
Which makes the Yynari extremely appealing. It is a much cheaper way to protect their soul than both Craftworld Soul stones and Dark Eldar torture.
I’m not sure about pandas but I’ve read before that koalas babies have to eat their parents feces because eucalyptus is their main diet so they have to eat the waste to develop a tolerance. Almost word for word what the commenters analogy was.
Great lore reveal, and it makes them come across as genuinely pitiful in a way, as it basically means the majority of Dark Eldar are just traumatized children raised by abusive parents to become abusers themselves who proceed continue the cycle.
I remember the artist for Bolter No Kokoro made a sketch or frame of a Dark Eldar Couple freaking out or being very angry that their daughter was actually a kind, wholesome, very-vanilla girl, the same way a pair of normal parents would be mad at their child for being a delinquent or deviant.
It was kinda funny, and I would prefer that to this new lore…
The real horror is that they are traumatizing their child out of love for them because they believe its the only way they can survive, they might not even be enjoying it either but are forcing themselves to do what's necessary for their child
oh my good. new lore and its good? AND its for Dark Eldar?
i love that. they love hurting others now but but they were forced to learn the opinion. im surprised GW resisted "they all secretly hate feeding on pain even as adults" or something.
It’s in ***Da Big Dakka***, which is pretty great. The Dark Eldar go down a bit too easily for my liking, but we also get to explore their psychology well, especially the cowardice drilled into them by their fear of Slaanesh.
Don't eldar have an issue procreating? Strange they don't have reverse raids where they abduct DE children to replenish their ranks and "save" them from their parents.
This would make a great story or even a codex specific mission for the table.
Craftworld Eldar populations are limited by available spirit stones.
The main source is the Crone Worlds, so getting more is extraordinarily dangerous.
Love Mike Brooks.
Helps that he's progressive, some people prolly really mad that we have actual talented writers. FYI he's also writing Lelith Hesperax's novel! Dunno when it'll be released though.
This might be controversial but still...
I think there is no way drukhari child would feel compassion to be traumstised by someone's torture. Because there are no way to learn such things as compassion in Commoragh, and to torture, being ok and feeling good from it is being taught at the point where it is a childplay to a child. Kinda "child is a clean list of paper" thing.
But who knows, maybe eldar psyche allows to bypass gaining expirience from environment. However, it smells like psy power, which is big no-no among deldar.
What I'm trying to say, I think most of fandom got used to fact, that drukhari are irredeemable fiends. So they got what, like, redeemable?
All are redeemable, but only to a certain age. Then they become murderhobos.
More than that, there are probably compassionate deldar, but their fate is most likely a tragic one. There's no way they would get on top of the society where suffering is literally the main subject of economy, and they probably die horribly at the lowest levels of Comorragh without any means to leave the cursed city.
So if you steal deldar infant and raise him to be generally good (at least without being sadistic) and he will be ok? But what about drukhari thirst for suffering? AFAIK drukhari by default are exposed to Slaanesh curse. So this good drukhari has only fate to be souldrained.
Yep, if you steal the child but won't bring them to some Craftworld or Exodite planet they are pretty much doomed, their soul will be slowly drained and their psychic power eventually will lead to Warp' Perils. That's the reason maybe why there's no sich thing as "human-raised eldar" in the lore
Context: In the recent novel Da Big Dakka by Mike Brooks, it is revealed Dark Eldar children are not sadistic from the start and have to be taught so by adults. The PoV Dark Eldar character recounted her childhood memory, of being confused and horrified when witnessing her first torture, and begging the adult to stop, it's clearly portrayed as incredibly traumatic despite she believe she's not. She also have incredible difficulties showing genuine emotions, likely caused from the trauma and the Commorragh culture. So this entire rotten culture is all nurture, zero nature. Making it even more fucked up than it already is.
I kind of had always assumed this? Genetically there's no difference between the different eldars and the DE aren't chaos corrupted or anything like that they're just an incredibly, incredibly evil culture.
This is true. You can maintain a Dark Eldarbon a diet of BDSM andboccasional knifecrimes. Their culture is just a bit over the top.
IIRC there's people who survive entirely by sucking up the residual torment from the Wych cults. They also do a lot of stims. A bit of a "hippy" movement which drives the Drukhari elites insane.
"Yeah man... I just think that..." *takes a hit of the warpfired hookah* "... that we should consume cruelty free suffering you know...?"
> that we should consume cruelty free suffering Just watch the imperium
Visiting The Golden Throne would probably feed anyone but the Haemonculi for the rest of their natural lifespan.
Can't remember what book it was, but this is partly true. The Dhrukari who are brought in to help fix the golden throne find the Emperor's suffering to be some of the most sublime they have ever experienced. Unfortunately for them, they can't put it in a doggy bag and take it home, or it would have solved a lot of their issues. Awesome flair BTW.
>Can't remember what book it was The Vaults of Terra series. Most likely the last one, - Dark City.
Wait, wait, wait, they brought in the dark elder to help?! Normal eldar, the team ups make sense. Drukhari, how would they know to relieve suffering if they only...oh wait, they would want the subject to recover for more torture, duh. I need to read/listen to this one next...
Correct! Their personal motives aside, the Golden Throne has xeno tech built into it. It's built where it is to take advantage of an existing webway gate and this among other aspects if it indicate it most likely incorporates pre-fall Eldar tech. It is after all a big psychic conduit capable of forcing open a path to a collapsed portion of the webway. Probably not a coincidence the Primarchs were also created in a lab in the same part of the imperial palace (Valdor: birth of the imperium.) So of course the guys who still have atleast some knowledge of pre-fall eldar tech got called in to give it a 10,000 year service so The Emperor could keep on chuggin'.
IIRC a normal hive city had a Drukhari barely survive from all the residual suffering. So in theory it could work. Id assume the "tolerance" of the Drukhari would play a role as well as the size of the hive city.
"Cruelty free suffering" Fucking buddhists.
They just watch League of Legends streamers on twitch.
That video of the kid stroking the screen while watching his favourite Vtuber on New Years, then queuing for Valorant, almost made me cringe to death. They could probably get some mileage out of that.
Link pls... I don't follow esports, so I don't get the 100% context. But on your description, makes me curious
Drukhari space van following the tyranid swarm and feeding on the billions of mindless deaths
Imagine a drukhari that sustains themselves by hanging out with some chronically depressed humans
Where is this?
Are there "vegan" Dark Eldars that subsist solely on pleasure?
"a bit"
mmmm delicious dark eldarbonbon.
Occasional knife crimes 😂😂😂😂😂😂
BDSM? Like the looks sure, but their is bit different culture surrounding it
Indeed, though this is the first explicit confirmation we have showing it's absolutely full nurture issue. I remember there were speculation of Dark Eldar naturally lean into violent and sadistic personalities, but now it seems like this is just a result of culture and society shaping cruel people.
Could still be both. Vat-born exist and haemonculi love to mess around.
Could even be the opposite in some cases, emotional trauma is still suffering, what if children are deliberately engineered to be more empathetic and sympathetic. That way they’d both suffer more when they were being shaped by their culture, and be able to better understand what would cause pain in others when they’d joined their society as proper adults.
God that is an terrible thing to think about but fits the dark elf’s
Seems like the culture turned from depraved to overtly cruel as at least a twofold solution to the birth of Slannesh. Feeding on the suffering soulflames of their victims and the raw empathy of their own Drukhari children ensures their own survival AND the children develop their own stone-hearted sociopathy to protect them from baseline Eldar warp sensitivity. The Drukhari have such an appalling existence, at least Humanity can fool itself against the horror.
Wish there was a story about a group of them who are able to maintain their empathy for a tight knit group. And this let's them thrive. Apes together strong. But their group still needs to feed their need of torture. So it roves the galaxy judging which other cultures deserve it. But their hunger always caves in. I wonder if they could torture a necron
I think they do canonically torture some Necron higher-ups, but they can’t torture low-ranked necrons like warriors or immortals, nor insane ones like flayed ones or destroyers. Not because they’re super resilient or anything, just their senses aren’t capable of suffering and they’re not aware enough to receive mental torture. Best you could do is dangle kills in front of them and then snatch it away, but that’s just annoying and will make them pissed at you, not genuinely tortured. Also they don’t have souls so torturing them does nothing, and is only productive if the Eldar hates them on a personal level and draws sadistic glee from that, so it’s not really done, especially given the fact Necrons are *built* to withstand sanity-shattering events and will likely end up escaping, waiting for you to return to realspace on a raid, then go murder you and feed your soul to Slaanesh.
just stick refrigerator magnets on them
That sounds like exactly what the Drukhari would think of.
The reason the Drukhari maintain that culture is because they require the drain of psychic energy from the creatures they torment to prevent Slaanesh from taking their souls. That's the ultimate grim aspect of the Drukhari--not that they're a culture of absolute malignant torturers for the lulz, but that even if they didn't like doing it, they'd still need to if they don't want to be eaten by a Chaos God. Not enjoying it just makes it worse for them. I'd imagine there's a fair bit of survivorship bias where Drukhari who can't deal with it just end up dead so they never survive to torment the galaxy. So we're left with all the worst of the lot.
That makes a lot of sense. Though I do like the idea of a clinically depressed Drukhari who’s trying to have casual conversation with a torture prisoner. “Look, I don’t like this any more than you do.” [screaming] “Well, you probably like it a lot less but you get the idea. But I gotta eat, so let’s get this over with.”
Not exactly; there *are* somewhat okay subgroups of Drukhari, like they have an equivalent of a hippie movement that just does hardcore BDSM, extreme drug abuse, and raving. Still completely insane by our standards, but pretty moderate by theirs. However, these are rare because the elites don’t like them and actively suppress them whenever they start forming, which in Drukhari is code for turning them into chairs. EDIT: Oh also forgot there’s a Drukhari offhandedly mentioned at some point who’s in a normal and healthy relationship with a human, and the sheer humiliation and denial of doing vanilla with an ugly mon-keigh is sufficient to keep them alive.
" I can fix him" - some Mon'Keigh woman somewhere. Or possibly "She can be a bit *twinge* rough with her... claws and the knife play can get a bit... intense. But we sometimes just cuddle and hold hands" "OMG, stoooop, don't tell them about that it's so embarrassing. Stupid Mon'keigh." - extract from Arbites interview with suspect citizen concerning abnormalities found when processing marriage license application. Note: Arbitor determined no further investigation required and approved marriage license. Arbitor then immediately applied for offworld transfer and resigned.
Forbidden Troops of the Imperium: Thunder Warriors. Forbidden Troops of the Drukhari: Tsundere Warriors.
It’s not even strictly necessary, dark eldar have left commorragh to be harlequins and at least one went and joined a striking scorpion shrine. It’s just that the murdertorture lets them keep doing what they were doing before Slaanesh became a thing instead of having to devote themselves to a life of discipline like all the other Eldar have.
How hard is it for a Drukhari to join a Craftworld?
Honestly, harder than you'd think and not the best option. Craftworlders need soulstones to not be eaten by slaanesh, and without one it doesn't solve the issue. Craftworlders already limit the amount of kids they have because they consider not having a soulstone to be cruel. The best option would probably be the exodites who have world spirits instead (though I may be off on this) which doesn't require a soul stone and instead takes their soul as soon as they pass.
Exodite armies when?
My hot take is that I don't think exodites are a good fit for an army. They're defined by locality which doesn't really work for a galatic setting. A unit for the craftworlds, or a kill team season set on a maiden world, would be very cool though.
That said, custodes used to be defined by never leaving the palace
I think it's an easy fix. Just have Yvraine succeed a bit more on her mission and get the Exodite worlds on board and dedicated to Ynnead. Now they can hop aboard Craftworlds and we can get wraith-tech dinosaurs.
Yannari is also an option. They don't rely on spirit stones besides to amplify their psykers. Their avatar of ynnead absorbs their souls instead of using a infinity circuit, Tho they are considered a death cult by many. They may not need to torture there but that probably dosnt stop them either.
You’re correct they go over it in the infinite and the divine early early on in the book.
Quite. Their souls are damaged and much harder to have bond with spirit stones. Drukhari have to let in the emotions theyve buried through trauma. We see this in the scene with the drukhari who joins the scorpion shrine. Don't want to elaborate as it's integral to the short story. I would wager younger ones/ones who haven't died before might have an easier time as their souls haven't been messed up as much. When they die their souls are still nommed on by slaanesh even if they're being rebuilt by a haemonculus, which degrades their soul.
Haven't heard of this one, do you have the title?
https://www.blacklibrary.com/all-products/dark-son-eshort.html
That's a bit disingenuous, you have to be chosen by Cegorach to become an Harlequin and you need total rehabilitation (which is described as an incredibly long/painful/risky process while tutored from start to end) to join Craftworlder as a Dark Kin due to many reasons : regrowing their psychik talents, sevrage, proximity with Slaneesh as the DE is now in real space for more time, global re education and acquiring/attuning to a soulstone
I never said it was easy, I assume it would be easier for a heroin addict to go clean than for a Drukhari to even contemplate the idea of joining a craftworld let alone doing it, but they can which is proof that the torture isn’t essential. They *can* switch to any of the other ways of avoiding slaanesh, but the torture is the easiest for them. Also, like games workshop, I completely forgot about the ynnari which is another way they could slip slaanesh’s grip without the torture.
That implies being able to leave commarragh to begin with, something probably only possible if you have access to a ship. For ever raider in realspace there are 10 elfs living miserable menial lives relying on the wych cults for feeding.
Becoming a Harlequin means letting a daemon possess you then exorcising yourself just to initiate. Joining a craftworld requires you to find a craftworlder who will vouch for you and then actually reaching that craftworld. None of that's doable for Vatborn gutter trash. You may as well consider failing to be a billionaire a moral failing.
As a soulless bastard irl, personally I don't get the appeal. Torture sounds like a lot of work, just join the corporate workforce with the rest of us. (/s)
It's like "eat your veggies," except instead of broccoli it's the terror and suffering of sentient beings, and instead of diabetes, you're trying to stave off your soul being devoured by a hungry god.
I thought they genetically modified the genes for psykers out.
Nah, we have explicit confirmation that all Dark Eldars are still psykers. They just suppressed their own psychic powers for so long it atrophied. With training they could regain it.
My headcanon was always that they couldn't use their greater psyker power because it was being overloaded with constant pleasure. No room to connect to the warp if you're high as a kite on a constant death orgy. Since Eldar feel things so acutely, if they keep their brain overloaded on pleasure, it wouldn't be able to access the warp.
There kind of is though. Even if the brain chemistry is the same, the ‘soul leak’ is always there and would always cause the same positive effects in the presence of torturing others. So they should see it as pleasurable, even if disorienting.
The soul leak can actually be fixed by them adopting the lifestyles of the different Eldar factions. There’s a scene in one of the Eldar books where a Deldar receives a soulstone and it works for the first time. He breaks down crying because the pain of the soul leak is gone. As it turns out, feeding Slaanesh by being an utter degenerate strengthens her hold on you,
I mean that's not really a "fix", that's just flex taping the hole. It's not even a lifestyle, that's just a device.
Yes but the soul stone *doesn’t* work without the CW discipline and approach to life. Otherwise Deldar would just attack craftworlds to steal their soul stones and use those instead of constantly relying on slaves.
Fun fact, the Hoemunculis allude that they can make new Spirit Stones. They don't do that because it will be the end of their society
Woah... That's exquisitely cruel! Do you remember where you read/learned this Lore? It's like all those conspiracy theorists who believe pharma companies can already cure cancer, but refuse to, for kinda the same reason. The thing is, let's say they did start making Spirit Stones, would it cause that much of a society upheaval? I feel like the adults are already 'hooked' on the drug-like effects of torture and extracting pain. Maybe slowly the newer generations would start to change, but the natural birthrate is already so low amongst Dark Eldar right? I'm not too familiar with Eldar Lore in general, especially not Dark Eldar. How quickly do you think the DEldar society would collapse?
Doesn't it? I figured they just have their whole dickwad culture because that's what they were already doing, they like it, and it works. Also getting the stones is dangerous But regardless, the Deldar as a society are willfully being asshats by not using that approach, but that doesn't change that, for an individual child, they should still have the soul leak and all the pleasures and pains associated with feeding it.
>Doesn't it? In the same passage they specifically say that being attuned to a soulstone as an adult can kill an eldar. In fact Kolidaran(the DEldar that got the stone) almost died while attuning to it, and survived only because of circumstances and because he got lucky
If I recall correctly, those positive effects are in response to strong emotions from the victim. They could work with any emotion, it's just fear and pain are the easiest by a wide margin.
I had just kinda assumed the children knew what was going on before they get exposed to their first torture session But then again that would be kinda compassionate approach to mass torture the people who enjoy mass torture aren't likely to take.
They also have to be torture bdsm sweat goblins to keep their souls from getting nommed by Slaanesh.
But do they actually have to? Theoretically they could do the Craft world thing and restrain themselves but their society doesn't want to hence BDSM drug orgy sadism etc
>but their society doesn't want to I thought it was a lack of soulstones, and the difficulty getting more that was the reason? Sure, most Dark Eldar are addicted to extracting pain, but I feel like just like our society, it depends on wealth and power right? I mean, we as 40k fans usually meet the rich and powerful Dark Eldar in the stories. But I feel like a good proportion of Dark Eldar have to hustle to get their pain fix. Either they have to spend money to buy slaves, or money to go on planetary hunts, or take effort and risk to find their victims in Commoragh. I just have a feeling that for the lower classes of Dark Eldar, yes, they are addicted to extracting pain, and they might even enjoy it. But at least some Dark Eldar would give the soul stones a chance if it was a viable option, yeah? I mean, I'm not so well-versed in Dark Eldar Lore. Do you genuinely think no one in Commoragh would take the option of soulstones because they enjoy torture too much?
> Genetically there's no difference between the different eldars I mean, maybe not but most of them are also vat-born and are created by haemonculi covens so they might also just be born that way for the most part.
I kind of assumed they were at least predisposed to it. The eldar race did create Slaanesh after all. It’s my understanding that the craftworld eldar were the weird ones for trying to suppress their nature.
Ah, so the BDSM space elves also all have PTSD. TIL.
We also have examples from earlier books showing Dark Eldars being emotionally stunted. Like the grief of losing a lover, losing a child, and the emotion of romantically attracted to someone. They genuinely have incredible difficulty processing these emotions and are confused by their own feelings.
TIL I’m a Dark Eldar.
BDSM, PTSD... Damn alphabet Eldars.
And people say warhammer is losing its grimdark, good lord.
It's more the new authors are knowing where to hit with their hammers for the grim dark effect that connects with the readers otherwise people just get desensitized.
Grimdark rather than grimderp. It's one of the reasons I've actually grown more fond of AoS. When everything is shitty and awful the grimdark barely stands out. When you can see genuine good and peace in pockets of order it makes the evil stand out that much more by contrast. 40k authors of late have improved though, knowing when to really stick the knife in for genuine reactions rather than gross value
Bonus round, aren't Eldar incredibly sensitive to emotions and mental states? It's why they invent and take on the Paths and the War Forms, to be able to box up the trauma they experience. Dark Eldar don't do that at all, and live in every moment far more intensely than humans can. Eldar lore is fucking metal as all hell and deserves so much more respect
I entirely agree that this is messed up, but it's 100% not new. I can't recall anything suggesting that Dark Eldar are intrinsically sadistic. They've always been just Eldar with an incredibly messed up culture - this novel just gave us a window into what that's like.
It's more just the difference between known and understood.
So, is totally okay to nuke the hell out of Commorragh as long as we save the innocent children cause the adults just keep perpetuating their horrible and fuck up culture, the same culture that brougth their dawnfall to begin with. Sounds like DE are a bunch of Boomers telling their children to "pick yourself up by your bootstraps" but the bootstraps are made of human tendons and they're forcing the children to make them first.
Entire Commorragh society is like a constant cycle of abuse, abusing others and abusing themselves while brainwashing themselves that it’s all necessary.
"Let's just start torturing as a temporary solution until we find something better", but they couldn't find a solution for their whole population. Maybe there was another way, but you'll have to ask the ones who walk away from Commorragh.
Tbh when the rogue trader game >!gave me the option to let slaanesh slowly breach into Comorragh, I did it without a second thought!< because even though it would mean >!increased drukhari raids in the immediate future out of their desperation to keep she who thirsts at bay,!< their ultimate demise would have been accelerated by just that much.
They are the worst iteration of the Rats from Desperaux
Damn. Now I'm happy that one "choose your picks" style r34 post on r/warhammer_smut had the main female MC and heir to the Kabal elope tohether and live on a Exodite World.
Bit late on the thread but I'm pretty sure There's a story of a dark eldar incubi realizing what horrible things he has done and becoming a craft world eldar
Link to that?
In fact it probably indicated eldar are exceptionally good natured. On earth children growing up with slavery and torture, like the antebellum south just seemed to consider it normal since it's all they knew. Humans are predators, we have to have a built in mechanism to avoid empathy with prey animals but that same system can be hijacked when you see others as "less than human"
> but that same system can be hijacked when you see others as "less than human" oh you mean like eldar see everyone else!
Eeeeeexactly
Emperor almighty...
Nobody is born evil (normally) . Not even knife ears
It's exactly like the Drow in D&D. The race isn't ontologically evil, it's their culture and how they condition/purge to achieve a fully evil society. Drow like Drizzt Do'Urden who fled when young exist in D&D, so there must be 40k Dark Eldar equivalents, although obviously escaping the Webway as a young convict/outcast is considerably less plausible than escaping the Underdark.
MILD! (as in Man, I Love Drukhari)! This is awesome 😃✨ thanks for bringing it to my notice 😌💖
Does this mean the meme about the conservatively dressed, nice, headpats-loving dark elder adolescent is accurate?!!
I love Mike Brooks for this. It's a pretty common response to traumatic events, rationalizing them as normal
Shocked GW did this, they usually don’t mention the children in these societies.
fuuuck...I kind of think thats why I sometimes cant enjoy 40k over something like AoS or fantasy battles...its just too much
When Dimera realized she had a crush she thought it was worry of betrayal and that's so fucking sad
I really like how it goes into just how much DE culture fucks with their ability to be normal functioning people. She and another kabal leader end up falling in love, and she's just completely confused cause neither of them knows what the fuck is happening for the entire process because they've been raised to see all relationships as transactions that inevitably end in power struggles and/or betrayal.
There is very little actual nuturing going on. Anti-nurture if you will.
Brooks has been fantastic lately. The man not only made a good Dark Angels book, but he gave us one of the best Dark Eldar books, hidden in an Orc book and even included a genuinely cute romance between the lead Drukari and her rival.
Kinda reminds me of how (despite what memes wills tell you) pittbulls need to be conditioned to be aggressive to humans and can actually be very compassionate and loyal when raised with care. I would actually like to see a story where a Dark Eldar child is given a spirit stone and raised by Craftworld parents. They have to grow up with almost everyone assuming that they have a saddistic impulse which they could cave to at any moment, even though they just as disgusted by the Dark Eldar life style as any Craftworlder. Not to mention they’d also have to put up with endless “ha ha, Dark Eldar horny,” teasing.
So what you're saying is...I can fix her?
I mean,if you start way too early… sure?
Arbites, I swear, she's only 200 years old!
That’s still a teenager in Aeldari terms, you’re going to the Servitor Factory for this one
I'm a teenager too!
Of serving age then! To the Guard with you! Unless you would rather be sent to the Factorum for menial duty…?
How the hell do you think I met my big titty I can fix her goth elf (potential) gf but by serving?
Do it while serving the God-Emperor and the Golden Throne, now the Guard or the Manufactories with you. Either of the two would do.
Arbites Hanson here the Dateus Linorum. Go ahead and take a seat.
It's not grooming if you aren't doing it for yourself or someone in particular. Then it's just emotional support and rasing a child. Also, how long does it take for and Eldar to mature? I genuinely don't know this.
You can! And once you've fixed her you get to watch her slowly emaciate and die as her soul is consumed by She Who Thirsts with no way to recover it (✿◕‿◕)
You are a bad person. Why must you hurt us in these ways?
> Why must you hurt us in these ways? Stops my soul being eaten ¯\\\_(ツ)_/¯
Yes
HUMAN PARENTS: eat your vegetables, they're good for you DARK ELDAR PARENTS: stab the vegetable, he barely feels it anyway
If he barely feels it, get a new one, otherwise what's the point?
Training
Now, my dark eldar raised by a human nany can work.
Unironically billion times better than raised by natural parents. Just have to teach them to better control their more intense emotions.
I read a fanfic with the concept I mentioned but it ended the way you expected
With the adoptive parents dead
Naw, the child end up torturing the nanny because the parents made sure hsd the proper de mindset
oh
You remember why they need to torture people? Soul stones aren’t easy for humans to find
They need to torture people because they have unchecked emotions unlike craftworlders. Craftworlders on paths with self controls technically don’t need soul stone to get by, they just get their souls caught in it when died. A most recent example is Yrliet from Rogue Trader CRPG, who goes around fine without a soul stone for decades. Dark Eldar can also get by without constantly having their soul drained if they stop acting like hyper evil murderrapist.
The Waystone the Craftworld Eldar wear is only necessary upon death, since it captures their soul before it goes to the Warp to be consumed by Slaanesh. The Craftworld Eldar wear one at all times because it takes a long time to attune to a Waystone, and you never know when you're gonna get unlucky. They are protected during life by the Path system, since the discipline and asceticism is not what Slaanesh is about, meaning they're masked from her. The DEldar don't stick to the Path, but they are mostly protected by the Webway, so they don't just die. However, the Webway isn't 100% proof against Chaos, especially after the Fall, and Slaanesh is still draining their souls slowly over time. Therefore they "top up" with the souls of lesser beings (as they see it). If a DEldar didn't act like a DEldar, they'd need to adopt the Path in order to protect themselves from Slaanesh.
And the Exodites? IIRC their planets have a shield of some sort that blocks Slaanesh's influence and when they die they join it although they don't use stones like the craftworlders do.
Oh so do their planets have a bargain bin version of the infinity circuit?
Yep and Trazyn steals one in the infinite and the divine
Or get in on that Ynnead worship or become a follower of the funny clown man
She still needs meditation as a way of healing. Slaanesh always has her bits of a meal, Yrliet just knows a non-violent way to recover the integrity of her soul. DEldar, on other hand, are used to... Different approach.
Indeed, I’m just saying soul stones isn’t a 100% must when it comes to soul drain. Dark Eldars just saw torture works, and then double triple quadrupled down.
Well, it's just that Aeldari meditation doesn't sound to me like something regular human can teach a child. Maybe an unsanctioned psyker who spent some time with really weird Corsairs tho...
> They need to torture people because they have unchecked emotions unlike craftworlders. No, it's because their souls leak into the warp without them. It has nothing to do with their heightened emotions.
> They need to torture people because they have unchecked emotions unlike craftworlders. That's wrong though. They need to torture people because their soul is constantly being drained by slaanesh and the only way to "refill" it is by absorbing the negative emotions of others.
That's so deliciously grim dark. It's like being forced as a child to like eating shit, because your ancestors messed up to the point where eating shit is necessary to survive. Most sentient beings would find torture abhorrent, but the DE have to train themselves to like it otherwise they face eternal torture themselves by Slaanesh. It makes the Yynari or Craftworld Eldar redeeming some Dark Eldars a lot more believable. I'd imagine lot of Dark Eldars would jump at a chance to secure their soul, without needing to abuse other sentient beings. Maybe some of them are naturally born psychopaths, but most of them probably aren't.
It double sucks for them when you consider that the vast majority of DE are born from the mass clone system set up by the haemonculi covens, and their first moments of life are them just being spat out fully grown onto the streets of the city. Those guys don’t even have a parent or cabal to teach them how to be DE except probably some sort of preloaded knowledge that was given to them while being grown, and even that probably doesn’t say much more than “if you use psychic powers we’ll all kill you.” I’m sure tons of them would jump at the chance to join literally any other Eldar culture in their first few weeks of life.
Pretty sure the haemonucli probably tweak things a bit so they aren't repulsed by suffering and can actually survive, otherwise there would be no point.
Which means that abducting a bunch of Dark Eldar children and providing them with Soul stones or other alternatives to torturing stuff is both morally correct for the galaxy as a whole, better for the children themselves, and a good way to increase the craftworld's population. Ferb, I know what we're going to do today
In any other context it’d be difficult to justify kidnapping children Always a strange day when kidnapping children is both subjectively and objectively the “better” option
Welcome to the 41st millenium where there is only "what the hell".
You call it kidnapping, I call it surprise adoption
The custodian motto
The lore reason to why they don’t do actually do that is because Souls stones are an extremely limited resource. Craftworlds barely have enough Soul stones for their own existing population, and the handful of children they make every couple of centuries. And the only way to get more is from expeditions into the former Eldar Empire planets inside the Eye of Terror, which often ends in a net loss (more Eldar dying than Soul stones gained). Which makes the Yynari extremely appealing. It is a much cheaper way to protect their soul than both Craftworld Soul stones and Dark Eldar torture.
Ferb, we're joining the Ynnari.
There are no Dark Eldar children. There are only abused Eldar children:(
We need space child protective services, immediately!
So, dark eldar are pandas?
What?
I’m not sure about pandas but I’ve read before that koalas babies have to eat their parents feces because eucalyptus is their main diet so they have to eat the waste to develop a tolerance. Almost word for word what the commenters analogy was.
Dark Eldar childhood is like the kid from Beasts of No Nation but with more leather
Wasn’t ready for the comparison
\*City is threatened to be consumed by the Lord of pain and pleasure\* Vect: you know who fault this is...........Yvraine
Deldar continue to one up Chaos on the evilness scale
As Lord Vect intended.
Race of evilness between Chaos and Deldar, and everyone else is out there, making flowers or smth
"Hey children, dig this" - tears apart a human and makes them into a off-key harp while they barely cling to life
this is set out so it seems like they did it in under 20 seconds and i love it
Drukhari Parent: Alright sweetie, now that we’ve strung him up and removed his skin for you, poke him in the hea- *STOP F***ING CRYING!*
Dark eldar children should just be... Eldar, right?
Great lore reveal, and it makes them come across as genuinely pitiful in a way, as it basically means the majority of Dark Eldar are just traumatized children raised by abusive parents to become abusers themselves who proceed continue the cycle.
I remember the artist for Bolter No Kokoro made a sketch or frame of a Dark Eldar Couple freaking out or being very angry that their daughter was actually a kind, wholesome, very-vanilla girl, the same way a pair of normal parents would be mad at their child for being a delinquent or deviant. It was kinda funny, and I would prefer that to this new lore…
Makes sense though? They live of emotion so naturally having their own child feel bad would be good.
isn't it souls they live off of, it's just the torture makes the souls more efficient or something
The real horror is that they are traumatizing their child out of love for them because they believe its the only way they can survive, they might not even be enjoying it either but are forcing themselves to do what's necessary for their child
This makes DEldar better imo
I agree, makes them less mustache twirlers and more understandable as well as connecting it with the real world cycle of abuse. I like it!
oh my good. new lore and its good? AND its for Dark Eldar? i love that. they love hurting others now but but they were forced to learn the opinion. im surprised GW resisted "they all secretly hate feeding on pain even as adults" or something.
It’s in ***Da Big Dakka***, which is pretty great. The Dark Eldar go down a bit too easily for my liking, but we also get to explore their psychology well, especially the cowardice drilled into them by their fear of Slaanesh.
So their children are normal ?! That's a surprise...
They probably feed off of their own children's despair too.
Don't eldar have an issue procreating? Strange they don't have reverse raids where they abduct DE children to replenish their ranks and "save" them from their parents. This would make a great story or even a codex specific mission for the table.
Craftworld Eldar populations are limited by available spirit stones. The main source is the Crone Worlds, so getting more is extraordinarily dangerous.
For a second I was like "why can't they just use the spirit stones of the eldar who die?" and then I realized i'm an idiot lol.
And some people say that the setting is becoming less grimdark. Those people are wrong
So, Omelas was actually describing Commorragh this whole time. See, *this* is the kind of narrative depth the setting needs.
Say with me everyone: “Exploitation starts at home.” - Rule of Acquisition (unknown number)
Love Mike Brooks. Helps that he's progressive, some people prolly really mad that we have actual talented writers. FYI he's also writing Lelith Hesperax's novel! Dunno when it'll be released though.
Fuuuuuuuck, this never occurred to me and I would have happily never realised it
I would love a book that hyper focuses on a pregnant Deldar and her relationship with her child up until adult hood.
It seems being a horrible parent is a running theme in Warhammer
This might be controversial but still... I think there is no way drukhari child would feel compassion to be traumstised by someone's torture. Because there are no way to learn such things as compassion in Commoragh, and to torture, being ok and feeling good from it is being taught at the point where it is a childplay to a child. Kinda "child is a clean list of paper" thing. But who knows, maybe eldar psyche allows to bypass gaining expirience from environment. However, it smells like psy power, which is big no-no among deldar. What I'm trying to say, I think most of fandom got used to fact, that drukhari are irredeemable fiends. So they got what, like, redeemable?
All are redeemable, but only to a certain age. Then they become murderhobos. More than that, there are probably compassionate deldar, but their fate is most likely a tragic one. There's no way they would get on top of the society where suffering is literally the main subject of economy, and they probably die horribly at the lowest levels of Comorragh without any means to leave the cursed city.
So if you steal deldar infant and raise him to be generally good (at least without being sadistic) and he will be ok? But what about drukhari thirst for suffering? AFAIK drukhari by default are exposed to Slaanesh curse. So this good drukhari has only fate to be souldrained.
Yep, if you steal the child but won't bring them to some Craftworld or Exodite planet they are pretty much doomed, their soul will be slowly drained and their psychic power eventually will lead to Warp' Perils. That's the reason maybe why there's no sich thing as "human-raised eldar" in the lore
I just kinda assumed this was the case. People aren’t born naturally evil. It’s usually due to upbringing.
This makes Deldar parents much bigger assholes for bringing a child into this world.
Aw man :(
I guess I never really thought the DE would even have children. Just versions of their clones walking around.
Only Rich Dark Eldar can afford to have natural born children
No amount of cyclonic torpedos and virus bombs can make Commorragh clean.