one big necron quedtion.

By Professor Tanhauser, in Deathwatch

OK, the necrontyr fought a huge war, 65 million years ago, met the c'tan, got suckered into losing their souls and being stuck in.machine bodies. Finally avenged themselves on the c'tan by shattering them, took a 65 million year snooze to let the eldar decay and now they're asking up with plans to reconquer the galaxy. Some want to conquer and enslave other races, others want to do a total dakek bit.

Uh I do have one minor question here: Since the necrons can't breed and they must.occasionally lose some of their population beyond repair, like what the tyranids we're apparently doing to the enemy dynasty of the subekhar dynasty, how are they planning to conquer the galaxy and what do they plan to do afterwards? Basically they can't breed, they can't increase their numbers, most of them have the IQ of a roomba and they can apparently no longer assimilate 'nulls' o make new nectobs like the original ones did.

I know some of them want to go back to flesh by making clones of space marines but still how do they plan on dealing with their limited numbers and such? Create a new living necron species? Make new living necrons and upgrade them to machines as they age? Any ideas? The stuff in outer reaches was great, is there.more on the necrons?

Individually, Necrons are very hard to permanently destroy. Normally when they are too damaged for their own self-repair they are teleported away.

However, you do have a good point, they have a negative population growth. To my knowledge there is no way to create new Necrons.

How do they expect to conquer the Galaxy? Well, for starters, remember they once controlled most of the galaxy, and if even a fraction of them survived the long sleep, we are still talking about tens or hundreds of millions of sleeping metal men. However, the most important thing is the fact they are arrogant and crazy. They know they are superior to everyone else therefore it is only logical they would conquer all their old dominions. They probably haven't given what happens after the conquest much thought, but it probably goes back to the dynasties scheming against each other. The Necrons hate each other, its just they hate everyone else more.

There may be a few unconventional thinkers among the Necrons who realize that a dwindling population is a Bad Thing and have turned their super science towards finding a solution, but that involves reversing the Biotransferrence to put them back in biological bodies, and that is a hard thing.

The best way to think of it is that necrons number in countless untold millions. There are tomb worlds littered across the galaxy, some of them as of yet undiscovered to the Imperium. Entire worlds, Imperial fortresses can be built upon sleeping tombs which could one day awaken and add their numbers to the hoard, each necron is fully capable of being a threat on its own. Think of the discussion as akin to daleks versus cybermen:

Doctor Who - Doomsday
Cyber Leader: We have five million Cybermen. How many are you?
Dalek Sec: Four.
Cyber Leader: You would destroy the Cybermen with four Daleks?
Dalek Sec: We would destroy the Cybermen with one Dalek! You are superior in only one respect.
Cyber Leader: What is that?

Dalek Sec: You are better at dying.
Necrons don't quite have a negative population growth though despite the suggestion or at least not that high as you might think. Admittedly much of this was retconned in the scum move to Newcrons which OP did indeed twig however some of it still remains. To expand on that with detail however the now removed Necron Pariah was proof that necrons did have the capacity to create more of themselves, using human untouchables resistant to the warp and combining it with necron machinery to create a cybernetic warrior. Necrons cannot develop this normally since psychic nulls were not present in their society and is a human trait only, thus they would have harvested null humans to make these hybrid warriors. Whether this still remains part of canon somewhere in the newer iterations or never mentioned...
Additionally it is exceptionally difficult to destroy a necron as most parts of them simply phase out and return to the nearest safe point. Unless one were to somehow trap it in a stasis field, it's unlikely that they can stop the body disappearing. It's why the Adeptus Mechanicus have little to go on since the bits always vanish. In fact the body is not a problem at all, since they are all made of the same living metal, all necrons can repair itself as well as regenerate with ease. In fact Tomb Spyders are intended to maintain and repair tomb worlds while the rest of the hoard remain in perpetual slumber. As they have no need to consume materials and only seem to require power this suggests that Necron tech is capable of utilising energy to matter conversion and meaning with enough power at their disposal, a tomb can be rebuilt no matter how badly damaged as long as there are scarabs and spyders to rebuild it. In essence the limiting factor then is the necron "consciousness" (if it can indeed be called such a thing). It used to be mentioned in one of the books that when a necron is destroyed and teleported back to the tomb world for rebuilding, it's consciousness used to remain part of its body but would become ever so slightly damaged or disrupted. Over time, warriors who continued to suffer this fate of phasing out would become more unstable and some sources have suggested these warriors become the Flayed Ones or Wraiths. Few meanwhile managed to hold onto their personality after the change and over time that would decay. This suggests that there is some way of storing centrally a single necron warrior conscious, similar to the Eldar Infinity circuit and that this consciousness can be reuploaded into a new body or this may be part of the curse of the C'tan to be forever bound into bodies of metal, to be reborn anew eventually.
Necron Cryptek of the new era meanwhile have been studying ancient technology and are masters of science and logic with some having powers of transmogrification, teleportation or chronomancy. It is possible that some such beings may have established the process to create new vessels and an AI to populate them as other sources have mentioned that AI can inhabit necron bodies.
Edited by Calgor Grim

I know it can be hard to permakill a necron, but what hspens when a necron tomb world and the tomb complex is destroyed, as was apparently happening to the charnokov dynasty according to the info in outer reach? Also it was said a lot if tomb complexes had failed or been destroyed during the long sleep. So again the necrons are starting at a lot less numbers than they expected to.

I know it can be hard to permakill a necron, but what hspens when a necron tomb world and the tomb complex is destroyed, as was apparently happening to the charnokov dynasty according to the info in outer reach? Also it was said a lot if tomb complexes had failed or been destroyed during the long sleep. So again the necrons are starting at a lot less numbers than they expected to.

I think that Dynasty wasn't fully wrecked actually and that there are still worlds in place of that Dynasty for them to rebuild with. It is an interesting idea though whether there is a collective data bank of all fallen Necron consciousness stored somewhere waiting to be rebuilt as that dynasty gets around to it...

I don't know really. I mean look at what's happening with our very own subekhar dynasty. The phaeron is royally (no pun intended) #$%&ed and pretty much the whole dynasty is pretty well fubared. I know they did it for game balance of course, to explain why the subekhar dynasty didn't just wake up as planned and simply eat the Jericho sector for breakfast. Still it shows a real weakness and lack of foresight on the necrons part that there's no way to fix that catastrophe.

BTW, loved your Dr. Who reff.

Since you're an expert on forbidden lore (nerons), my little green xenos filth friend, I want to ask you if that old reff to the adeptus mechanics machine God being a C'tan is still valid or was it retconned away?

I don't know really. I mean look at what's happening with our very own subekhar dynasty. The phaeron is royally (no pun intended) #$%&ed and pretty much the whole dynasty is pretty well fubared. I know they did it for game balance of course, to explain why the subekhar dynasty didn't just wake up as planned and simply eat the Jericho sector for breakfast. Still it shows a real weakness and lack of foresight on the necrons part that there's no way to fix that catastrophe.

BTW, loved your Dr. Who reff.

Since you're an expert on forbidden lore (nerons), my little green xenos filth friend, I want to ask you if that old reff to the adeptus mechanics machine God being a C'tan is still valid or was it retconned away?

GW have never explicitly stated it's a necron of course but there was the old story that once a small necron scout force made a single minded approach and bypassed all Mars defences just to land on the Mars surface. Nobody knows how or what the goal was but they landed...before being promptly targeted with so much firepower.

As of current versions this has never been adapted further then the original theories which were raised from third edition and hints of the Dragon of Mars being some powerful Xenos and suggested to be a C'tan.

Wasn't the necron lore updated to include a desire to become alive again? If they did that, they'd be back to growing population again.

Wasn't the necron lore updated to include a desire to become alive again? If they did that, they'd be back to growing population again.

So far he has concluded only a space marine body can sustain a necron essence, which I find a bit odd as most necrobs have been described as having a mind roughly on par with a roomba's.

If you want more info if 40k necron lore ask our cheerfully helpful little green xenos filth friend, he seems well informed on the subject.

Edited by Professor Tanhauser

The average Necron warrior has all the initiative and personality of a toaster. The Necron Lords, Overlords, and Crypteks on the other hand retained their full personality and ambitions. While they are undoubtedly brilliant, and have immense amounts of personal experience that would overwhelm a lesser mortal mind, I can't help but wonder if the Cryptek you mentioned chose space marines because they were also physically imposing. They are used to being pretty much immortal. I can't imagine they would be willing to transfer into anything fragile.

Wasn't the necron lore updated to include a desire to become alive again? If they did that, they'd be back to growing population again.

A desire to be alive again doesn't equate to being able to do it. AFAIK the biotransference process was one-way in background.

Wasn't the necron lore updated to include a desire to become alive again? If they did that, they'd be back to growing population again.

A desire to be alive again doesn't equate to being able to do it. AFAIK the biotransference process was one-way in background.

Yes, in the GW fluff they mention that a longing to return to the flesh is shared by a number of Necrons. The problem is the process of Biotransferrence was developed by the C'tan and the Necrons have not been able to figure out how it exactly worked, much less how to reverse it. It may indeed be impossible, since it is stated that the process transferred their minds but destroyed their organic bodies and souls (which the C'tan fed upon). In a very real way, the Necrons are just artificial copies of an extinct race.

No wonder they are crazy.

the necrons are cleverer than the c'tan thought. Even after being reduced to shadows of themselves they managed to in the current dw background royally hose the c'tan and get some measure of revenge on them. It's possible they could figure out the biotrabsferenfe process and referee it or recreate it. They did outwite the c'tan at least once after all.

Given that necron have limited manipulation of time (through things like a chronometron), living metal regenerative hull and flesh, weapons capable of physically disintegrating a target, inertia-less drives for faster than light travel (I don't buy that dolman gate nerf bat retcon sh**), I don't see why in time they couldn't transfer back to flesh but why bother? Machine is better. I haven't found many sources which say they even want to, most still say that their goals remain to subjugate or wipe out the living, perhaps they may have given up on organic so this becomes second favourite. Any goals of returning to organic are purely individual dynasty and not representative of the entire necron race.

Wasn't the necron lore updated to include a desire to become alive again? If they did that, they'd be back to growing population again.

A desire to be alive again doesn't equate to being able to do it. AFAIK the biotransference process was one-way in background.

Yes, in the GW fluff they mention that a longing to return to the flesh is shared by a number of Necrons. The problem is the process of Biotransferrence was developed by the C'tan and the Necrons have not been able to figure out how it exactly worked, much less how to reverse it. It may indeed be impossible, since it is stated that the process transferred their minds but destroyed their organic bodies and souls (which the C'tan fed upon). In a very real way, the Necrons are just artificial copies of an extinct race.

No wonder they are crazy.

Pretty much. The process is described as removing souls. The necrontyr are also a shadow of what they were. Something is certainly lost, and that may not be replaceable even if they could return to flesh.

the necrons are cleverer than the c'tan thought. Even after being reduced to shadows of themselves they managed to in the current dw background royally hose the c'tan and get some measure of revenge on them. It's possible they could figure out the biotrabsferenfe process and referee it or recreate it. They did outwite the c'tan at least once after all.

Just because the Necrontyr can backstab the C'Tan, doesn't mean they can do everything the C'Tan could. You don't need to be able to understand how to build a gauss flayer to wield it, as a simple example.

Given that necron have limited manipulation of time (through things like a chronometron), living metal regenerative hull and flesh, weapons capable of physically disintegrating a target, inertia-less drives for faster than light travel (I don't buy that dolman gate nerf bat retcon sh**), I don't see why in time they couldn't transfer back to flesh but why bother? Machine is better. I haven't found many sources which say they even want to, most still say that their goals remain to subjugate or wipe out the living, perhaps they may have given up on organic so this becomes second favourite. Any goals of returning to organic are purely individual dynasty and not representative of the entire necron race.

It is possible they could find a method, but it won't bring back the Necron race as such. And agreed that anyone trying isn't the majority.

BTW, I'm kind if surprised an eldar body can't sustain a necron. Ekdsrbhave vast psychic power and apparently live incredibly long lives so I'm surprised they can't be veseks for necrons. Plus it would be a huge joke onntge ekdsr if the necrons we're stealing asbdbusibg their bodies given their history.

Calgor Grimm, as to why the necrons might want to go back to the time of flesh, 6 reasons come to mind.

1. Sex.

2. Sex.

3. Sex.

4. Sex.

5. Increasing necron numbers to.make up for the ones lost in the sleep of aeons.

6. More sex.

Edited by Professor Tanhauser

You know I just had a thought here. I hope it doesn't get me in trouble but it's too funny not to share and I think we're all.mature enough to handle it.

I think the ultimate way to defeat the necrons would be to help them go back to the time of flesh. Seriously, after existing for aeons as machines they necrons would be doomed if they went back to living bodies. I mean can you imagine what would happen to these things after being machines for so long and suddenly being g in living bodies again?

I could see the 'post return to time of flesh necron survival rules.'

Once a necron successfully returns to a living body, roll 1d10 to determine how many months he survives before dying.

Optional: Roll1d5 to determine the cause of the necron's death.

1. Heart failure from constant wanking.

2. Heart disease and diabetes brought about by Bacon double cheeseburgers, cheetos and mountain dew.

3.Alcohol poisoning from drinking multiple bottles of Jack Daniels every day.

4. Drug overdose.

5. Accidental electrocution from mistaking a power socket for a urinal.

6. Total cessation of higher brain functions caused by watching reality TV.

Seriously, all the Inquisition has to do is help the necrons go back to the time of flesh, introduce them to some basic human vices and let the problem solve itself.

I do hope this isn't offensive. I mean deathwatch deals with deaths on a massive scale, people being routinely tortured and murdered by 'the good guys". planetary populations being exterminated, etc. I hope no one thinks making a joke about a necron wanking himself to death is too offensive.

Edited by Professor Tanhauser

You know I just had a thought here. I hope it doesn't get me in trouble but it's too funny not to share and I think we're all.mature enough to handle it.

I think the ultimate way to defeat the necrons would be to help them go back to the time of flesh. Seriously, after existing for aeons as machines they necrons would be doomed if they went back to living bodies. I mean can you imagine what would happen to these things after being machines for so long and suddenly being g in living bodies again?

I could see the 'post return to time of flesh necron survival rules.'

Once a necron successfully returns to a living body, roll 1d10 to determine how many months he survives before dying.

Optional: Roll1d5 to determine the cause of the necron's death.

1. Heart failure from constant wanking.

2. Heart disease and diabetes brought about by Bacon double cheeseburgers, cheetos and mountain dew.

3.Alcohol poisoning from drinking multiple bottles of Jack Daniels every day.

4. Drug overdose.

5. Accidental electrocution from mistaking a power socket for a urinal.

6. Total cessation of higher brain functions caused by watching reality TV.

Seriously, all the Inquisition has to do is help the necrons go back to the time of flesh, introduce them to some basic human vices and let the problem solve itself.

I do hope this isn't offensive. I mean deathwatch deals with deaths on a massive scale, people being routinely tortured and murdered by 'the good guys". planetary populations being exterminated, etc. I hope no one thinks making a joke about a necron wanking himself to death is too offensive.

Ah you see you just make all the Necrons behave like Bender of Futurama; drinking, chain smoking, stealing, disliking and killing humans, interest in folk singing.

Yeah, see bender can drink and smoke and all that because he's a machine. He can't get cancer, obesity, heart disease, etc. Once the necrons are living again they can.

And then they all feed themselves to slan and summon keeper of secrets by the hundreds. Inquisitor, you're fired!

lol

BTW, I'm kind if surprised an eldar body can't sustain a necron. Ekdsrbhave vast psychic power and apparently live incredibly long lives so I'm surprised they can't be veseks for necrons. Plus it would be a huge joke onntge ekdsr if the necrons we're stealing asbdbusibg their bodies given their history.

Calgor Grimm, as to why the necrons might want to go back to the time of flesh, 6 reasons come to mind.

1. Sex.

2. Sex.

3. Sex.

4. Sex.

5. Increasing necron numbers to.make up for the ones lost in the sleep of aeons.

6. More sex.

Aaaand this is how you might end up with Slaanesh necrons ;)

Aaaand this is how you might end up with Slaanesh necrons ;)

"Is that a twin linked gauss blaster in your necrodermis or are you just happy to see me?"

necronheavydestroyer.JPG

No, we are not overcompensating for something! Why do you ask?

Wow, either those gun barrels weight next to nothing (Possible, actually, since the green bits are supposed to represent energy) or those hover platforms are compensating for something, all right, compensating for a hell of an off center load imbalance...

As someone who had access to those models, right as they were becoming too expensive to buy in quantity, yes, the load is a problem! ;) A buddy of mine wanted enough Destroyers to field, and the option of Heavy Destroyers, but didn't want to spend all the moneys; his girlfriend was getting fed up, he was a college student, and he was maintaining 6+ entirely functional armies, at the time, so, since the Destroyer body is mostly the same, and only the cannon arm is different, he magnetized the shoulder, and could swap out the gun, between the Destroyer, and his Heavy counterpart. Problem: the heavy gauss cannon is pewter, in 2004, so the little magnets weren't always strong enough to "keep the weapon erected forward" if you will, while the three-barreled gauss cannon, while almost as much material, was plastic, and shorter; worked much better.

As I see it, depending on what "makes Necrons go" these days, I don't see why they couldn't make more of themselves, at least the lesser drone types. They might imprint on human Servitors, and capture people, using necron components to do what the AdMech already does, and get more durable, resilient Servitor Warriors, if not better than the AdMech-variants. They might, or at least one Tomb World might, discover either the ruined shell of a Man of Iron, or even a functional one, and perhaps figure out how to make more of them.

As to becoming flesh, I think that it is a thing some want, and the Silent King is certainly looking into it (weird how no mention in two pages; maybe still more fans of the Oldcrons, here? ;) ), but while I can see why some might want to, and he sees it as his task, others would see it as a downgrade, and even the Silent King knows that the Tyranids are coming; encountering them might be what brought him back, to a group of Necrons not so much interested in what he has to say, and having his people finally become flesh, again, just to get nommed by the Nids, seems a waste of a species milestone.

Way back, yeah, the theory is that during the War in Heaven, several of the Talismans of Vaul (Blackstone Fortresses, to those who maybe once played Battlefleet Gothic), used their warp cannons to down the Void Dragon C'Tan, some say the singly most potent C'Tan, on Mars, before having to leave, and not finish the Star God off, and then later the Emperor came along, and fought the still regenerating monster, before enslaving its power, granting the AdMech control of machines, and cementing his place as the Omnissiah, or, since that sounds silly, SOMETHING happened to confine its power there, and there are those who believe that, if the AdMech worships the Omnissiah, "the Dragon of Mars", AND there happens to be a huge, powerful, mechanized dragon, with near-godlike power, regarding machines, what are the chances that there are two? I like to imagine that, in the deepest catacombs of Mars, if you were to find the most aged, changed Magos, they'd basically be Necrons, with just a few brain cells left, in a jar. B'Omaar Monks, from Star Wars, and characters like the Major Kisaragi, from Ghost in the Shell, are still more organic, in my mind, than some of these AdMech; I just wish that some of them favored the human form more, and did like GitS, or Guri, from Star Wars, making powerful, high-end machinery for a body, but still looking like a human they used to be, even if numerous other devices were incorporated; certainly, the human form can be flawed, and can use some help, but that wouldn't be hard for their level of tech.

Lastly, I hope that the Pariahs do, eventually, come back, in SOME fashion. Maybe still Blanks made Necron, maybe a Lychguard with just a sliver of the smallest bit of a C'Tan shard, I don't know, I miss them, and am only slightly glad that, at least, they have their gloom prisms, or whatever, to fight off psykers with. When they first introduced the Psychic Phase to TT, I wondered what the Crons, the DE, and the Tau were going to bring to the table, either to have something to do, or just to defend against it, since they weren't likely to have much Deny the Witich, Adamantine Will, or Psyker, to counter psychic shenanigans, and then the Assassinorum pdf came out, and we saw what they did with the Culexus (HE IS CHEESE! by the way); I hoped that they would give Necrons a whole squad of at least the part where he crashes the psychic phase, but nope, nor did the Dark Kin get their Crucibles of Malediction to ward off other psychic stuff. Oh well, things DID get a bit better, and these races can safely suck at this phase. For me, I still pretend, in RPG, that Pariahs can be a thing, and have fluff ready for one Tomb World that has it as their "hobby", sort of like how different Craftworlds focus on different aspects of how Eldar fight, or how different Chapters/Guard Regiments focus on a different type of weapon/battle strategy. This one Tomb World was working on "Pariahs" before they went to sleep, and some of their neighbors either didn't support it, or wanted the project for themselves, so it was hampered, before the Sleep of Aeons, but, as they slowly wake back up, they'll slowly get back to work. They also have a prototype of a Necron who can peer into the Warp, while safely ensconced in this reality, sort of like a Navigator, that they would use as a spy, and, more importantly, an early-warning system, to see warp-traveling threats, before they exited the Sea of Souls. How? Completely unimportant, thankfully. ;)