call it morbid curiosity, but I found myself pondering what life must have been like for the Eldar prior to the Fall.

they had long life spans.

**** near perfect health.

didn't have to work for a living

they could do *anything*.

Imagine if everyone around you had the means, the technology and the money to act like the richest person on earth does right now. Imagine if anyone off the street could live in fabulous buildings, if they could reorder entire biospheres by thought alone or if they could pick up and move to any environment they wanted.

I wonder what it would have been like for the 'average' eldar to grow up in that society?

Before The Fall the Eldar were a technologically advanced race, generally considered one of the most powerful races in the entire Galaxy. Their technology had advanced so far that little or no work was required by individual Eldar, and as a result, at some point around the 24th or 25th millennia, groups of Eldar began forming cults dedicated to the pursuit of experiencing everything that life had to offer.

The Eldar mind is capable of a far deeper level of emotion and imagination than that of a human; therefore although they are capable of experiencing the greatest joys and creating the most beautiful pieces of art and music they are also capable of experiencing the deepest hate and ugliest depravities. These pursuits became more extreme and depraved as time went on. Torture and murder came to be seen as artforms every bit as worthy as music and drama. The Eldar were extremely long-lived, never suffered from senility or disease, and their superior intellect allowed them to perfect their skills to a degree far beyond that of even the most talented humans. The Eldar were able to devise cunning new ways of torturing and killing their fellows at rates never imagined.

Despite the prediction of the reclusive Eldar Seers that warned of impending doom if the Eldar did not change their ways, government within the Eldar Empire soon collapsed and the moral degeneration of their homeworlds and colonies continued unimpeded. As the pursuit of ever more extreme experiences reached its height, death reigned in the streets of Eldar cities, hunter and hunted each being part of a twisted ritual of destruction which consumed thousands. Some Eldar were able to see that their now-corrupt society was destroying itself, and fled in disgust; these refugees would settle in the distant colonies of their Empire, and would later be known as the Exodites.

Upon dying, the soul of the deceased traverse the bounds of the physical realm and go to rest within the warp. As more and more Eldar died, the souls began to somehow coalesce into a larger entity, a living representation of the corruption that had taken their lives. This collection of souls gained sentience sometime in the early 30th millennium, creating the being known as the Chaos god Slaanesh. When Slaanesh came to be, an ethereal explosion occurred, with the epicentre being the Eldar homeworld. All Eldar caught in the immense blast were instantly killed, their souls consumed by Slaanesh. Most of the remaining Eldar gods were destroyed by Slaanesh. Kaela Mensha Khaine attempted to combat the new being, but Khaine's form was shattered and exiled to the mortal realm in the form of great statues called "Avatars", which rest in the hearts of the various Craftworlds. The other Eldar gods to survive the Fall were the trickster god Cegorach (also called the Laughing God), who hid himself within the Webway, and Isha, whom was ripped from the jaws of Slaanesh by Nurgle, who now keeps her as a slave (though she does spread knowledge of cures for Nurgle's poxes to mortals). The Eldar are also believed to be using their Infinity Circuits to create a Death God, Ynnead, one that will only come into being after the last Eldar has died and been absorbed into it. This Death God's purpose is to destroy Slaanesh.

The Fall destroyed the Eldar Empire, leaving scattered bands of Eldar fighting for survival. Before the Fall, vast space-borne vessels called Craftworlds were constructed, enabling those wishing to escape the degeneration to flee. When the Fall occurred, the various Craftworlds rode out the ethereal shockwave, some being destroyed in the process. The Exodite worlds, far from the epicentre of the catastrophe, were largely untouched. In order to prevent the events of The Fall from ever recurring, the Eldar devised the Path system.

From HERE

yeah, I get that bit. but what was it like to get up every morning? did they party ever day? all day? did they study? if so, what did they study? what were their relationships like? did they have close knit families, or did they spawn indiscriminately?

The Eldar mind is capable of a far deeper level of emotion and imagination than that of a human; therefore although they are capable of experiencing the greatest joys and creating the most beautiful pieces of art and music they are also capable of experiencing the deepest hate and ugliest depravities. These pursuits became more extreme and depraved as time went on. Torture and murder came to be seen as artforms every bit as worthy as music and drama. The Eldar were extremely long-lived, never suffered from senility or disease, and their superior intellect allowed them to perfect their skills to a degree far beyond that of even the most talented humans. The Eldar were able to devise cunning new ways of torturing and killing their fellows at rates never imagined.

As the pursuit of ever more extreme experiences reached its height, death reigned in the streets of Eldar cities, hunter and hunted each being part of a twisted ritual of destruction which consumed thousands.

From what i recall of 1st ed days they formed life partnerships but having children was a very rare thing, a cause for huge celebrations by whole communities, so long is the life of an eldar that carrying a child is long, looking after the child is an ages long process, tohugh they would have had specialist teachers and the like to rely on and whole communities to look after those few that were born.

Best thing to do is look at the stuff in WHFRP and even LotR/Silmarillion and go from there when it comes to the sorts of things they'd do (not including the whole new ways to torture maim and kill mind you, LotR elves are not so much like that..)

weaver95 said:

Therein lies the path to damnation, sin and excess.

But it is tempting, isn't it?

The Laughing God said:

it's just something that occurred to me after reading one of the latest Horus Heresy novels - I wonder what life was like for the Eldar before they screwed up and started down the path to destruction. it must have taken the pleasure cults quite some time to completely corrupt their societies. And maybe not all the planets were into the whole murderdeathkill thing, but were destroyed in the birth of slaanesh anyway.

Some of the Eldar must have seen the Fall coming. I wonder if they just gave up on saving their race and just planned to survive it, or if they gave their all and failed anyway?

The ones that saw the fall and left were the Craftworld Eldar, others went and colonized the Exodite worlds or at least part of them. Those survivors saw the fall of the Eldar and couldn't change it.

They were a post-scarcity society at worst, probably post-singularity too. So go read "Culture" series by Iain M. Banks: something like that, but with added pointy-earedness and more decadent.

weaver95 said:

Yeah, I think those guys are the Exodite Eldar. They just gave up most of their tech and lived simple lives. The Craftworld Eldar, IIRC, really respect and protect them because they see them as wiser than they were. But yeah, they just got out of Dodge. I don't know if any Eldar actually tried to take the entire race off it's course. That would be a monumental task, to put it lightly.

Idaan said:

I was going to say Iain M. Banks' Culture as well. Nice point about the singularity.