# Pre-Fall Eldar vs Pre-Heresy Imperium



## SoL Berzerker (May 5, 2009)

So, both empires are at the height of their strength, for arguments sake Lorgar is still loyal and is in no way seeking out the forces of Chaos. This is also pre-Nikea. 

The Eldar are also just now getting to their height, so they are far from the indulgences that brought about Slaneesh. 

Would they be forced into war or would they be able to make peace? If they go into war, who would be victorious?


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## Chompy Bits (Jun 13, 2010)

There would not be peace. Imperial mandate pretty much says kill the zenos, and that the galaxy is humanity's birth right. The Eldar are supremely arrogant and view humans as little better than Orks.

While both empires pretty much dominated the galaxy at the height of their respective powers, I'm inclined to say Eldar. I admit I am not that big on Eldar fluff, so I am not too clued in on all the fancy gadgets and shit they had back in the day, but I'm betting their tech was still WAY more advanced than anything the GC Imperium could come close to producing. In terms of the human/Eldar element, hard to call. I'm assuming peak Eldar empire means their gods are all still alive and kicking as well, but then the Imperium has 18 Primarchs and the Big E still fully combat capable, and space marines can generally match or better their Eldar force equivalent. In fact, in the HH series, encounters between Space Marine legions and Eldar generally end very very poorly for the Eldar when they try to fight them. But seeing as I don't have a clear idea on pre-Fall Eldar numbers, can't really call this one.

For me what tips it in the Eldar's favor is the use of the Webway. Even at it's height the GC Imperium had only begun to make any in roads into exploring it. The Eldar had it totally under control at their peak. The ability to strike almost instantly anywhere, compared to the relatively sluggish and far more dangerous method of warp travel the Imperium uses, would be pivotal in a galactic scale conflict. It would be bloody and Eldar would take a serious mauling, but ultimately I think they'd come out on top.


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## Old Man78 (Nov 3, 2011)

The pre fall Eldar could shape planets on a whim according to some of the fluff, their tech mind boggling, I reckon they would completely pan the Imperium, Eldar tech now is way better than the Imperiums and post fall Eldar are like cave men compared to their ancestors!


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## lokyar (Apr 24, 2011)

they would fight, they would tear apart the galaxy. the legions would destroy many eldar but i think the eldar would win in the end just by merrit of numbers and advanced technology.


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## JAMOB (Dec 30, 2010)

See, Eldar pose a huge threat to SMs now, when they're on the brink of extinction - at the height of their power their tech was even more impossibly awesome, and they had hundreds if not thousands of times more people. Possibly more. They have maybe a couple billion to the empire's untold trillions? Imagine the Eldar with more people than the imperium. Think back to that anti-planet stuff. That's what we're looking at.


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## Lost&Damned (Mar 25, 2012)

hmmmm, i dont know, i mean what could ever come close to all 18 primarchs united in hate against a common foe?
The khan, the lion, guilliman, Horus,sanguinius?
True, the eldar would harvest a fearsome tally, but so long as the primacrhs stayed in groups they coukd cleave out any empire,even Angrons bezerkers and Lorgar zealots have been known to kill eldar craft worlds in days.
Imagine Magnus using his powers to divine where the enemy is, the emchnicum working tirelessly to improve their weaponry, Fulgrim and Ferrus together.

Nothing has ever held against the Astartes, nothing came close to stopping a whole legion, let alone 18, even the enemies of the Imperium recognize the astartes as the galaxies greatest killing force.
entire empires have fallen to chapters, entire systems to a single legion, imagine 18 legions spearheaded by their primarchs.


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## MidnightSun (Feb 10, 2009)

Pre-fall Eldar, in my view. See how hard the Dark Eldar beat up the Salamanders in Commorragh (yeah, I know, the Dark Eldar took a bit of a beating, lost the High Archons, but in the grand scheme of things it was what the Munitorum describe as 'acceptable losses' and most of that was engineered by Vect anyhow)? I imagine it'd be a similar scene.


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

I believe the Eldar would utterly dominate the Pre-Heresy Imperium. The technology difference would be considerable.

I think a closer match would be a united humanity from the Dark Age of Technology.


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## acaoshes (Nov 20, 2013)

The Dark Eldar stole a sun to power Commerragh. The Imperium couldn't even dream of this - the best I've read is the stimulation of flare activity to mask sensor readings. Eldar, with their pre-collapse population, all the way.


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## Jacobite (Jan 26, 2007)

The Imperium did mange to ensnare a chunk of star and use it as a weapon against Badab in the closing stages of the Badab War, however I agree. Pre Fall Eldar would hand the Pre Heresy Imperium their ass on a plate.


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## Sethis (Jun 4, 2009)

Ignore all the fucking retarded fluff that is written about Eldar in Space Marine novels. Whenever a Black Library author thinks "Who shall the Spess Mahreens give a good kicking to today in order to prove how supa-awsums they are?" then they settle on Eldar like 60% of the time.

In reality Eldar would completely decimate the Imperium if they wanted to, pre-fall. Hands down, no questions. You're talking about an Empire that took on the entire Necron empire plus C'tan and beat them into the ground with the help of their gods (actual gods, not just Primarchs who can just about fight equally with an Avatar).


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## Child-of-the-Emperor (Feb 22, 2009)

The Eldar. I imagine the webway (at it's pre-Fall zenith) would be one of the main deciding factors.



Sethis said:


> In reality Eldar would completely decimate the Imperium if they wanted to, pre-fall. Hands down, no questions. You're talking about an Empire that took on the entire Necron empire plus C'tan and beat them into the ground with the help of their gods (actual gods, not just Primarchs who can just about fight equally with an Avatar).


Slight exaggeration? The Eldar were only one, tiny, component of the War in Heaven. They fought alongside the Old Ones, Kork, and countless other species against the Necrons and C'tan.


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## Lux (Apr 17, 2010)

The Eldar did not beat down the Necrons and the C'Tan, in fact the Necrons with the C'Tan defeated the Old Ones and their allies. It was only post of the war that once the Necrons had obliterated the Old Ones (the primary threat), that they then turned upon the C'Tan and began a very long civil war. After the civil war, the Necrons were in no shape to fight yet another war and thus went into hiding. It was during this time they were in hiding that the Eldar with an uncontested galaxy were able to grow, yet make no mistake they did not defeat the necrons in war.

Post of the Necrons defeating the Old Ones, the Eldar would have been utterly obliterated by the combined might of the necrons and the C'Tan. It was only thanks to a long, and very bloody civil war that the Necrons were weakened.


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## Deadeye776 (May 26, 2011)

Sethis said:


> Ignore all the fucking retarded fluff that is written about Eldar in Space Marine novels. Whenever a Black Library author thinks "Who shall the Spess Mahreens give a good kicking to today in order to prove how supa-awsums they are?" then they settle on Eldar like 60% of the time.
> 
> In reality Eldar would completely decimate the Imperium if they wanted to, pre-fall. Hands down, no questions. You're talking about an Empire that took on the entire Necron empire plus C'tan and beat them into the ground with the help of their gods (actual gods, not just Primarchs who can just about fight equally with an Avatar).




The eldar were created by the Old Ones to fight the Necrons. One of many races. On their own against the new fluff of the Necrons/C'tan (pre-shard) empire the Eldar would be LITERALLY devoured. Ironically that's still there fate post-Fall. If you remember the war, they also lost against the Necrons but the internal conflict crippled both the C'tan and Necrons leaving them to weak to take on anyone. If that's how you classify "beating them into the ground" than okay. 

To the original point, pre-fall eldar vs pre-heresy Imperium would be the Eldar Empire destroying the humans wholesale. The Emperor at his peak was trying to replicate technology the Eldar used not even he could duplicate. The Eldar's knowledge of the warp's powers, webway, and the fact they were created to fight PRIMORDIAL star-gods and the Necron empire make them out of humanities league. I know they've got the Big E right? Well the Eldar created the Blackstone Fortresses that were built to destroy the Void Dragon. The Emp beat it at it's weakest but I don't he'd be able to withstand the fury that thing could unleash. The primarch's are emotionally weak and could be manipulated by superior intellects (as seen by the Emperor, Horus, The Cabal, and the Warp Gods). To be honest, the Imperium today with the tech of pre-heresy would have the best chance of taking on the pre-fall Eldar. I would like to say with no primarchs.


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## Stormxlr (Sep 11, 2013)

Deadeye776 said:


> The eldar were created by the Old Ones to fight the Necrons. One of many races. On their own against the new fluff of the Necrons/C'tan (pre-shard) empire the Eldar would be LITERALLY devoured. Ironically that's still there fate post-Fall. If you remember the war, they also lost against the Necrons but the internal conflict crippled both the C'tan and Necrons leaving them to weak to take on anyone. If that's how you classify "beating them into the ground" than okay.
> 
> To the original point, pre-fall eldar vs pre-heresy Imperium would be the Eldar Empire destroying the humans wholesale. The Emperor at his peak was trying to replicate technology the Eldar used not even he could duplicate. The Eldar's knowledge of the warp's powers, webway, and the fact they were created to fight PRIMORDIAL star-gods and the Necron empire make them out of humanities league. I know they've got the Big E right? Well the Eldar created the Blackstone Fortresses that were built to destroy the Void Dragon. The Emp beat it at it's weakest but I don't he'd be able to withstand the fury that thing could unleash. The primarch's are emotionally weak and could be manipulated by superior intellects (as seen by the Emperor, Horus, The Cabal, and the Warp Gods). To be honest, the Imperium today with the tech of pre-heresy would have the best chance of taking on the pre-fall Eldar. I would like to say with no primarchs.


 The Imperium of today? Why is that? Current Imperium is weak and corrupted they don't have a strong leader and all factions are just fighting for power. Pre-heresy Imperium was the strongest after united human race of the Age of technology.


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## Phoebus (Apr 17, 2010)

Sethis said:


> "Who shall the Spess Mahreens give a good kicking to today in order to prove how supa-awsums they are?" then they settle on Eldar like 60% of the time.


Maybe the Dark Eldar. Perhaps I'm wrong, but I honestly haven't noticed that many Eldar vs. Space Marine books. I suppose that's because the Eldar are also "good guys" insofar as "good guys" exist in 40k.



> In reality Eldar would completely decimate the Imperium if they wanted to, pre-fall. Hands down, no questions. You're talking about an Empire that took on the entire Necron empire plus C'tan and beat them into the ground with the help of their gods (actual gods, not just Primarchs who can just about fight equally with an Avatar).


Sounds like they would be capable of more than just destroying ten percent of the Imperium, then. :wink:


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

Phoebus said:


> Maybe the Dark Eldar. Perhaps I'm wrong, but I honestly haven't noticed that many Eldar vs. Space Marine books.


Though I'm not exactly a huge fan of the Eldar. I steer clear of books that have them as the protagonists, so that may be coloring my view of them. The few that I have read that reference the Eldar show them taking it more than they give it. 

The only few I can think of is _Fulgrim_--where the Space Marines come out ahead. Granted they had a Primarch, but even so...

_Know no Fear_ where there's a mention of a Space Marine Captain fighting 12 (or 13, depending on who's telling the story) Eldar warriors by himself and winning.

Then there's _Void Stalker_ where the Eldar guardians are slaughtered wholesale while the Banshees fare better but are eventually overcome without too much loss of life.




Phoebus said:


> Sounds like they would be capable of more than just destroying ten percent of the Imperium, then.


Perhaps monomate, then :laugh:.


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## Stormxlr (Sep 11, 2013)

I haven't read any eldar novels, any worthwhile ones?


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## Phoebus (Apr 17, 2010)

It's been a while since I read _Void Stalker,_ but I thought its final battle ended on a pretty even note. The Night Lords were almost completely wiped out, were they not?

Besides the ones you mentioned, I recall them having secondary parts in _Lord of the Night_ and the old Inquisition War trilogy by Ian Watson... though neither focus on Eldar versus Space Marines plot lines. Besides those, I can recall one or two short stories that they feature in.


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## Chompy Bits (Jun 13, 2010)

In the joint Iron Hands, Salamanders and Death Guard campaign during the Great Crusade on that one planet, the Eldar also got torn a new asshole pretty badly... though that whole particular HH plot/storyline was borderline retarded to me. The story was bleh and that one particular depiction of Eldar as dinosaur riding forest elves was just bizarre IMO.


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## SoL Berzerker (May 5, 2009)

I want to agree with Lost&Damned, I mean, each space marine legion was powerful enough to go out on their own and conquer entire civilizations. If all 18 Legions were to get together against a single foe I don't think anything could stand a chance, and surely the Emperor would deem this important enough to lead himself. 

It is also reasonable to assume that the Primarchs will realize that they cannot win an outright war and will resort to different tactics, we really have no way of knowing how the Imperium will react to a great threat while still having all 18 Primarchs and their Legions to fight the threat. 

If the Emperor were to not lead the fight, how long would it take him to finish the Imperiums access to the webway considering Magnus will not ruin the project? Is there any known form of a timeline?


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## Child-of-the-Emperor (Feb 22, 2009)

SoL Berzerker said:


> If the Emperor were to not lead the fight, how long would it take him to finish the Imperiums access to the webway considering Magnus will not ruin the project? Is there any known form of a timeline?


Imperial agents had crossed the artificial bridge created and sustained by the Emperor's powers via the Golden Throne and entered the webway network. They had effectively already gained limited access. 

But this has to be put into context: The webway was shattered by the psychic backlash of the Fall. Hypothetically, if the Fall hadn't occurred then the Eldar would have been much better placed to defend the webway than they were when the Emperor actually attempted to access it. For example, we know that the Necrons, when they access the webway, have to travel quickly because of the Eldar's ability to defend it and the webway's ability to defend itself (and that is post-Fall). Obviously pre-Fall they would be even better placed to defend the webway against intruders.

The Eldar are also known to have the ability to seal off particular sections of the webway with powerful runes. I think it's unlikely the Imperium would have been able to gain proper access to the network if the Eldar were at their peak.


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## Deadeye776 (May 26, 2011)

Stormxlr said:


> The Imperium of today? Why is that? Current Imperium is weak and corrupted they don't have a strong leader and all factions are just fighting for power. Pre-heresy Imperium was the strongest after united human race of the Age of technology.


You must be joking? The Imperium before the Heresy did not have the capability to repel daemonic incursion from Chaos. They had no real knowledge of Chaos. The Imperium today is a fascist state ruled by a council of lords who don't give a shit about the people, only planets and territory. Pre-heresy was an idealistic fantasy based on lies and bullshit. Post-heresy is a religious zealot led cult demanding loyalty and worship on the pain of death or worse. I myself would rather live in the pre-heresy. Nicer place. However, that Imperium wouldn't make it in today. The Imperium is far stronger and ruthless than it was. Ask the first inhabitants of Armageddon.


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## Bearer.of.the.Word (Aug 11, 2013)

hailene said:


> I believe the Eldar would utterly dominate the Pre-Heresy Imperium. The technology difference would be considerable.
> 
> I think a closer match would be a united humanity from the Dark Age of Technology.




I'm not sure but according to a whole lot of fluff (codecies in particular) the pre-dark age was when the Eldar where at their height, most of the books state that the birth of Slaanesh was what both crippled the Eldar and released the Imperium from the dark age.


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## Emperorguard500 (May 5, 2010)

i think the emperor and the 18 primarchs united are a threat to the eldar


their is not one eldar that is as powerful psyker as Big E


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## Lux (Apr 17, 2010)

The Eldar gods would crush the primarchs in combat, the height of the Eldar Empire is when their gods were still able to freely cross in and out of the immaterium/materium.


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## Emperorguard500 (May 5, 2010)

Lux said:


> The Eldar gods would crush the primarchs in combat, the height of the Eldar Empire is when their gods were still able to freely cross in and out of the immaterium/materium.


something always confused me about the eldar gods?

the old ones created the eldar? so did they create the eldar gods?


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## Lux (Apr 17, 2010)

Emperorguard500 said:


> something always confused me about the eldar gods?
> 
> the old ones created the eldar? so did they create the eldar gods?


Keep in mind everything we know of the ancient text is merely that, of ancient text that have long been warped by the passing of time. 

The Old Ones created the Eldar along with a myriad of other races in their war effort against the Necron/C'Tan empire, the Eldar's beliefs and racial gestalt psychic presence in the warp formed their racial gods. 

So the old ones did not directly create the eldar "gods", however the old ones did create the eldar which in turn created the eldar "gods".


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## Emperorguard500 (May 5, 2010)

Lux said:


> Keep in mind everything we know of the ancient text is merely that, of ancient text that have long been warped by the passing of time.
> 
> The Old Ones created the Eldar along with a myriad of other races in their war effort against the Necron/C'Tan empire, the Eldar's beliefs and racial gestalt psychic presence in the warp formed their racial gods.
> 
> So the old ones did not directly create the eldar "gods", however the old ones did create the eldar which in turn created the eldar "gods".


and if im not mistaken the chaos gods whiped the eldar gods out, or was it just slaneesh...how were the 4 chaos gods formed then?


were the eldar gods more powerful then the emperor when he was walking


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