The Culture v's 40kverse

[The Glyphstone]

Aren't the Necrons soulless in part because of the transfer to robot bodies, though? Or am I missing something there?

The old Necrons were soulless because they got tricked by the C'tan - they transferred their minds into the necrodermi and the star gods ate their life force (and presumably their souls along with it). The Newcrons - at least, the basic warrior units - are soulless because they were given a deliberately flawed version of the transferral process that left them as mindless drones. It's ambiguous as to whether high-ranking Newcrons still have their souls or not.

[GloatingSwine]

Say, a particularly charasmatically decadent Culture guy could one day realise that his prowess has become such that he can literally bestow crippling, mind shattering pleasure with a single touch. He's going to be quite a popular guy at the right kind of culture-parties, I imagine.

That's the thing though. People in the Culture can actually have crippling, mind shattering pleasure whenever they want.

Most of them get over such trivia in their first century or so.

[Tiki Snakes]

That's the thing though. People in the Culture can actually have crippling, mind shattering pleasure whenever they want.

Most of them get over such trivia in their first century or so.

See, the point is there are two views on this.

Either that is a defence, because there is less novelty that Slaanesh can add to tempt them, or he doesn't need to tempt them because they are already giving him a way in and it is actually a really, really big vulnerability.

As for which view you subscribe to, you pays your money and takes your choice, basically.

[Oracle_Hunter]

See, the point is there are two views on this.

Either that is a defence, because there is less novelty that Slaanesh can add to tempt them, or he doesn't need to tempt them because they are already giving him a way in and it is actually a really, really big vulnerability.

As for which view you subscribe to, you pays your money and takes your choice, basically.

I'd say the latter since there wasn't even a Slaanesh when the Eldar's decadence caused Him to be born

* * *

Urpriest's point about Tau-uploads is a novel concept (can the Minds even force that sort of action on its meatpuppets? Would they?) it doesn't protect the Minds themselves from being corrupted by Tzeentch. All it takes is one Tzeentch-marked Sorcerer to chat one up and offer to teach it how to understand the Warp and it'll be over. Unless, of course, the Minds are willing to purge their own members ruthlessly... and even if they are, can you imagine what kind of "Culture" a single corrupted Ship might produce? After all, every Ship is capable of rebuilding The Culture from scratch as a failsafe, no?

* * *

I find that I keep turning back to this debate because there is a poetic elegance to it. The Culture is the product of a world without God or any higher purpose -- folks can wallow in hedonistic pleasure and nowhere in the Universe is their lack of Higher Purpose even questioned by Right Thinkers; WH40K is a universe in which everything is (and must be) devoted to a higher purpose -- you will literally lose your soul if you do otherwise. In this conflict between the material and the immaterial it seems that the material is destined to lose if for no other reason that it has no conception of a purpose beyond the flesh.

[Tiki Snakes]

In this conflict between the material and the immaterial it seems that the material is destined to lose if for no other reason that it has no conception of a purpose beyond the flesh.

With the proviso that there is a remote possibility of the Material flying their Uberships of Doom right into the Immaterium and using their death-rays to wreck the immaterium's junk all over.

Given the power of the Culture, they might even be capable of pulling it off.

[GloatingSwine]

The Culture is the product of a world without God or any higher purpose

There are plenty of gods. They're called The Sublimed, civilisations which have trancended physical limitations and moved into the higher realms of being. Typically this is met with an initial burst of enthusiasm (spelling ones name out in constellations, that sort of thing), but then a dwindling amount to do with the physical universe.

The Culture is generally accepted to have reached the point it was capable of this several millenia ago, but regards the fact that the process is almost always civilisation-wide highly suspicious, as it implies some element of coercion.

Y'see, the Culture knows all about things like the Chaos Gods. (Or rather, things much bigger and scarier, because their powers aren't chiefly limited to the immaterium).

[Aotrs Commander]

My real problem is that it's a system that denies the human will. Since they cannot be defeated by human means and they can run perfectly fine without human help, there isn't anything you can do which will make any genuine difference.

And the will of humans matters what, exactly, in 40K? The Emperor - the God-Emperor - of Mankind certainly doesn't qualify as human, and he's a totalitarian dictator (jury's out on whether you want to argue "benevolent" or not...) and surrounded by xenophobic fanatical military orders pretty much whose remit is unswerving obedience to the Emperor, reinforced by countless Imperial Guardsman - often conscripted, not volenteered and frequently used as cannon-fodder - and the Emperor's primary means of law-enforcement is through inquistors and executing heretics...

Heck, Space Marines don't really even count as close to human after all their enchancements, and are pretty much conditioned such that (they believe that) their will is pretty much not their own, but the Emperor's. And if you run to the (other) bad guys, you become their toys, if you survive being murdered in the face by the Imperium.

The ordinary human is basically caught like a pawn between opposing gods, and if they are really lucky, the best they can do to show their defiance is to die bravely but futilily on the battlefield, and hope their souls don't get eaten.

They certainly get less agency in what they get to do than they'd get in the Culture, which is at least permissive, and are somewhat less likely to summarily shoot you in the face if you happen to disagree with something the folk in charge say...

If they're going around bringing other civilizations into themselves and destroying ones they don't like... then yes they are forcing people to have fun. They're just being really disingenuous about it.

They don't though. The first book on the Culture states that the Culture doesn't force anyone to join them, as individuals or races, nor does it stop anyone leaving (unless these paradigms change in later books), and it finds something meaningful or important to for those that really need it to feel a purpose in their lives (which is, as I understand it, what the novel series is mostly about, save the first one).

(Also, the hedonism appears, from what I have read, to be a little bit overstated. From what little I've seen from that first book, it seems just more like that no-one has to work, so they have all the time they want to pursue their hobbies and interests; it seems more like their a society permenantly on holiday or early retirement. Though admittedly, with access to far more crazy recreational technology. Of course, later books in the series may paint a different picture, but that's just my impression from the first one.)

The only reason the Culture went to war that once was because the other guys were basically going around annexing everything in their path into their Empire and enforcing their rule and beliefs on the conquered (who were very much second-class citizens, thanks to the race's own racial superiority complex), and the Culture thought that was, y'know, kinda uncool. Not unreasonably. As the Federation, or the Earth Alliance, or the Systems Commonwealth or the Old/New Republic in their own universes would or have done in the past...

...

Actually, now that I said all that, I'm starting to see a few similaries between the Imperium and the Idirans...!



Given that ten thousand years of human history has pretty much categorically proved humans as a species can't be trusted to govern themselves without fracking it up with varying degrees of incompetance, I've got to hand it to near-omnicisent, virtually infallible, hyper-intelligent super-beings to do a better job than lesser mortals - but as that description covers both Culture (with the Minds) and the Imperium (with the Emperor), I don't think the manifest destiny of the individual, ordinary man in the street to affect the wider universe matters really all that much in either universe.

[Tiki Snakes]

and the Emperor's primary means of law-enforcement is through inquistors and executing heretics...

The Emperor's perhaps, but not the Imperium's. That's what the Adeptus Arbites are for, after all. The Inquisition is more powerful, but also more of a high-level thing than anything so everyday as law enforcement.

In addition to enforcing Imperial Law, there's also the local law, which varies planet to planet and is enforced by the local authorities (however they see fit, for the most part).

Your point stands regardless, of course.

[Squark]

It's ambiguous as to whether high-ranking Newcrons still have their souls or not.

*checks* Actually, not even the Silent King, the Necron Emperor, still has his soul.

Ultimately, the real problem with the chaos argument, assuming my understanding of the Chaos Gods is correct, is I'm not sure they'd particularly want to corrupt the culture. Let's face it, for the most part the Chaos Gods are content with the 40k verse as is. The last time they got off their collective behinds and seriously started working towards a goal was when their very existence was in Jeopardy. Unless the culture started actively working against Chaos and succeeding, I'm not sure the chaos gods would care about them.

[Urpriest]

The old Necrons were soulless because they got tricked by the C'tan - they transferred their minds into the necrodermi and the star gods ate their life force (and presumably their souls along with it). The Newcrons - at least, the basic warrior units - are soulless because they were given a deliberately flawed version of the transferral process that left them as mindless drones. It's ambiguous as to whether high-ranking Newcrons still have their souls or not.

Regardless, this seems to establish that transferring a mind to a new body won't automatically transfer the soul as well. The Culture is as likely to accidentally leave the souls behind as it is to put them in the new Tau frames.

[Luzahn]

And the will of humans matters what, exactly, in 40K? The Emperor - the God-Emperor - of Mankind certainly doesn't qualify as human, and he's a totalitarian dictator (jury's out on whether you want to argue "benevolent" or not...) and surrounded by xenophobic fanatical military orders pretty much whose remit is unswerving obedience to the Emperor, reinforced by countless Imperial Guardsman - often conscripted, not volenteered and frequently used as cannon-fodder - and the Emperor's primary means of law-enforcement is through inquistors and executing heretics...

Oh, no question that the Imperium is a horrendous place to live, and will probably leave you without any agency and possibly eaten by a demon. However, at least in the Imperium humans have the slightest potential to kill enough things to gain some measure of agency. As an individual, the Culture would no doubt be more pleasant. For humanity's sake, however, I'd choose the one where we at least stand a chance of winning.

[jseah]

Culture explores, Part 2

Spoiler

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Extra Galactic Expedition - Report, 2nd Courier

3rd standard week of exploration
The GSV under construction from the nearby asteroids has been destroyed by gridfire following the possible contamination warnings from the Chaos homogenizing swarm. Undetectable nanotech could be present on the asteroids.
All fabrication will take place via energy-matter conversion from Gridfire. This will slow expansion efforts greatly, but it appears from continued observation of the IoM planet that none of the inhabitants of this galaxy are likely to start an Idirian War level conflict. Slow expansion is irritating but can be tolerated until the invisible nanotech hypothesis is ruled out.

All systems relocated to nearby inhabited systems to the original contact planet.

4th week
Fabrication of a GCU is complete.

Corresponding scans of IoM government databases in the nearby planets confirm that the threat of Chaos is widespread in the IoM. Star charts contain minor discrepancies that have been compensated for.
Analysis of IoM ship traffic, including what appears to be a warship, indicate technology levels far below the Culture. Interestingly inefficient, but a non-issue. Layout, component plans and possible manufacturing/improvement pathways were worked out by a Contact citizen from effector scan data. IoM warship spotting is becoming a past-time.
Unknown tech in the FTL drive is coupled with unknown tech built into the hull. Location and form appears to be of defensive purpose but replicas tested (safely far away) did not appear to do anything.
OOC: this is the geller field device

Further indepth analysis of the original contact planet indicates this planet is a farming and mining planet that supplies resources to what they call a Forge World and a Hive World, presumably a production center and population center. A GCU has been diverted to investigate them.

5th week
Another GCU is fabricated.

Frontier worlds and their trade relations to the initial contact planet indicate that the government is incredibly inefficient, corrupt, paranoid and brutal. Witchhunts for Chaos seem to occur *more details on Chaos*
A person they term a "Psyker" has been found in a jail awaiting an event called the Black Ship to arrive. Detailed analysis of this person, backed up by references, indicate that the FTL 'pilot' with unknown reactions in ships are Psykers. A unique genomic signature is associated with them.
None have been found among Culture citizens; experimenting with this signature is forbidden until more is understood about the link from Psyker to Chaos.
We note that this is a point against the invisible nanotech hypothesis.

The GCU has arrived at the Forge World. IoM production centers for their FTL drive and unknown defensive component are being scanned although the religious trappings and lack of understanding of their own technology are hindering reverse engineering efforts. The FTL device apparently cannot operate without a psyker, research to isolate the active psyker element in order to remove the need for a psyker is probably not possible without a psyker to experiment on, which exceeds moral constraints.

GCU scanning a military outpost (why is there a *ground* military outpost when there are no warring aliens on this border? - political objective hypothesized - population control?) reports irregularities in the behaviour of one of its humans. Actions fell outside psychological profile and moral constraints; they seemed superficially similar to Chaos infestation symptoms as per data gained from the IoM, although additional data is required for a firm diagnosis. The citizen's mental backup has been loaded and all irregularities have ceased.
Quarantine efforts have been put in place, although since this GCU was not involved in any direct contact, contamination by invisible nanotech is extremely unlikely.
Alternative hypothesises are being considered. These include nanotech with effector like abilities to unusual physics. The unusual physics appears more likely than would normally be considered since the psykers and FTL drive display unusual physics, as well as an implied but-as-yet-unknown connection to Chaos.

Recommend additional caution when dealing with any unusual physics phenomena. It may be unethical, but consideration is being applied to isolate and Box any further cases in order to see the progression of the Chaos contamination. This is not to be carried out unless consensus is reached in favour.

Spoiler

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OOC:
Boxing is a term I'm going to be using later. This means they move the target human into an isolated box outside the ship and use effectors to simulate the other illusory humans of the ship, the Mind playing them according to psychological profile. The box moves with the subject and contains objects identical to what might be found on the ship.

To the subject, there is absolutely no difference to where it was originally on the ship, it is essentially a perfect simulation. And indeed this lets the Mind simulate a "ship" for the boxed subject while leaving the subject a long way from any contact with anything at all.

Meanwhile, the subject is restored from backup on the ship... obviously, the box will be destroyed by Gridfire when the test is deemed over or dangerous.
(you wouldn't box a subject if you didn't have any other way of getting data, and that means it must be incredibly dangerous, like Chaos)

------------------------------------

OOC:
I don't actually know what the timeframe for Chaos contamination is, so I'm just winging it. And I am assuming it is a mostly random process, biased to weak minds. A Mind will easily detect psychological profile problems however.

The Box idea is one I had for some time, but no SF civilization I am familiar with apart from the Culture are able to pull it off. It's basically a virtual reality box... that's not virtual. In this case, the Chaos contaminated citizen will do Chaos things in a virtual box.
Note how the Mind is careful to make the box appear exactly like the ship. And even if the citizen requests to go to the surface of the planet, the Mind can virtualize the surface in the box from real data. (and even make a puppet on the surface to mimic the actions of the real one in the box; although of course, demon circles drawn by a Mind won't work, but the simulation probably stops there anyway)

Of course, the box can be expanded or shrunk at will. Anything unusual can't be replicated of course, so the box will extend to accomodate it. Yes, they might actually let a corrupted citizen summon a demon or something. After all, they have Gridfire and the citizen has already been replaced from backup.

[Oracle_Hunter]

There are plenty of gods. They're called The Sublimed, civilisations which have trancended physical limitations and moved into the higher realms of being. Typically this is met with an initial burst of enthusiasm (spelling ones name out in constellations, that sort of thing), but then a dwindling amount to do with the physical universe.

The Culture is generally accepted to have reached the point it was capable of this several millenia ago, but regards the fact that the process is almost always civilisation-wide highly suspicious, as it implies some element of coercion.

Y'see, the Culture knows all about things like the Chaos Gods. (Or rather, things much bigger and scarier, because their powers aren't chiefly limited to the immaterium).

AFAIK, being Sublimed is a one-way trip which is why The Culture restricts the Sublimation of its meatpuppets and, in fact, looks down on it.

Yeah, a being the devours souls and periodically manifests either in massive zones of Unreality or by exploding out of people's bodies is clearly less scary than that.

Y'see, this is what I was talking about. There is literally nothing like Chaos or the Warp in Culture-verse: people can do whatever they want and don't have to pay for it anywhere outside of the now. You have "gods" in the form of the Sublimed by they can't come back and do anything -- or appear not to want to -- and thousands of years of orgies and drugs leave no permanent stain on the fabric of the meatpuppets of the Culture. Their hyperspace is just another "dimension" that they can control and weaponize as they will. This is universe conquered by Science and the Now or The Future but never Eternity.

This is not the world of WH40K. Every creature with a soul risks attracting the attention of inhuman (yet deeply human) beings every time they give in to one of their emotions; the only people as depraved as the Culture in the history of the universe had their souls eaten or live in a hidden city sacrificing the souls of innocents to protect their own. The Warp is an uncontrollable and hungry entity that is perilous to traverse and swarms with beings beyond mortal comprehension. The only defense against this reality is iron self-control or the sacrifice of others or both. Science cannot save you and the Now is only a step on the road to Eternity.

The only reason that Chaos hasn't consumed the WH40K Universe is that Life is either too disciplined (Eldar), ruthless (Humanity), or alien (Orks, Tyranids, Tau) to give in. The Culture is none of these, and has no history with dealing with a reality that plays by these rules. It is doomed.

[dgnslyr]

The Chaos Gods derive their power from the emotions of the beings of the Galaxy, yes? So, if the Culture changes the galaxy's people into a galaxy of happy, Culture-assimilated citizens, would the Chaos Gods likewise move towards their positive features (honor, love, hope, life) rather than their negative features (rage, depravity, manipulation, death)? Because that's the only non-supernatural win condition I can see for anybody trying to beat the 40k-verse.

[Oracle_Hunter]

The Chaos Gods derive their power from the emotions of the beings of the Galaxy, yes? So, if the Culture changes the galaxy's people into a galaxy of happy, Culture-assimilated citizens, would the Chaos Gods likewise move towards their positive features (honor, love, hope, life) rather than their negative features (rage, depravity, manipulation, death)? Because that's the only non-supernatural win condition I can see for anybody trying to beat the 40k-verse.

On the old (superior) fluff this means The Culture would need to eliminate Love, Hope, Nobility and Vigor from the Universe. Short of destroying all sentience in their meatpuppets or downloading all their minds into Backup and destroying the puppets this is impossible. In any case it would take a long time to exterminate all forms of life in the Galaxy (yes, even for The Culture) and in that time the Minds and their meatpuppets would still be preyed upon by the Chaos Gods who don't have constraints like time or space.

With the new fluff that Chaos is only bad feelings you would still need to find a way to eliminate fear et al from a Galaxy and some would argue that people without those emotions are "unnatural abominations" so take that as you will. In any case, time is the enemy of The Culture and given their track record of effortlessly and flawlessly dispatching every foe for centuries I'm betting hubris would trip them up when facing a truly alien foe.

[Forum Explorer]

Culture explores, Part 2

Spoiler

Show

Extra Galactic Expedition - Report, 2nd Courier

3rd standard week of exploration
The GSV under construction from the nearby asteroids has been destroyed by gridfire following the possible contamination warnings from the Chaos homogenizing swarm. Undetectable nanotech could be present on the asteroids.
All fabrication will take place via energy-matter conversion from Gridfire. This will slow expansion efforts greatly, but it appears from continued observation of the IoM planet that none of the inhabitants of this galaxy are likely to start an Idirian War level conflict. Slow expansion is irritating but can be tolerated until the invisible nanotech hypothesis is ruled out.

All systems relocated to nearby inhabited systems to the original contact planet.

4th week
Fabrication of a GCU is complete.

Corresponding scans of IoM government databases in the nearby planets confirm that the threat of Chaos is widespread in the IoM. Star charts contain minor discrepancies that have been compensated for.
Analysis of IoM ship traffic, including what appears to be a warship, indicate technology levels far below the Culture. Interestingly inefficient, but a non-issue. Layout, component plans and possible manufacturing/improvement pathways were worked out by a Contact citizen from effector scan data. IoM warship spotting is becoming a past-time.
Unknown tech in the FTL drive is coupled with unknown tech built into the hull. Location and form appears to be of defensive purpose but replicas tested (safely far away) did not appear to do anything.
OOC: this is the geller field device

Further indepth analysis of the original contact planet indicates this planet is a farming and mining planet that supplies resources to what they call a Forge World and a Hive World, presumably a production center and population center. A GCU has been diverted to investigate them.

5th week
Another GCU is fabricated.

Frontier worlds and their trade relations to the initial contact planet indicate that the government is incredibly inefficient, corrupt, paranoid and brutal. Witchhunts for Chaos seem to occur *more details on Chaos*
A person they term a "Psyker" has been found in a jail awaiting an event called the Black Ship to arrive. Detailed analysis of this person, backed up by references, indicate that the FTL 'pilot' with unknown reactions in ships are Psykers. A unique genomic signature is associated with them.
None have been found among Culture citizens; experimenting with this signature is forbidden until more is understood about the link from Psyker to Chaos.
We note that this is a point against the invisible nanotech hypothesis.

The GCU has arrived at the Forge World. IoM production centers for their FTL drive and unknown defensive component are being scanned although the religious trappings and lack of understanding of their own technology are hindering reverse engineering efforts. The FTL device apparently cannot operate without a psyker, research to isolate the active psyker element in order to remove the need for a psyker is probably not possible without a psyker to experiment on, which exceeds moral constraints.

GCU scanning a military outpost (why is there a *ground* military outpost when there are no warring aliens on this border? - political objective hypothesized - population control?) reports irregularities in the behaviour of one of its humans. Actions fell outside psychological profile and moral constraints; they seemed superficially similar to Chaos infestation symptoms as per data gained from the IoM, although additional data is required for a firm diagnosis. The citizen's mental backup has been loaded and all irregularities have ceased.
Quarantine efforts have been put in place, although since this GCU was not involved in any direct contact, contamination by invisible nanotech is extremely unlikely.
Alternative hypothesises are being considered. These include nanotech with effector like abilities to unusual physics. The unusual physics appears more likely than would normally be considered since the psykers and FTL drive display unusual physics, as well as an implied but-as-yet-unknown connection to Chaos.

Recommend additional caution when dealing with any unusual physics phenomena. It may be unethical, but consideration is being applied to isolate and Box any further cases in order to see the progression of the Chaos contamination. This is not to be carried out unless consensus is reached in favour.

Spoiler

Show

OOC:
Boxing is a term I'm going to be using later. This means they move the target human into an isolated box outside the ship and use effectors to simulate the other illusory humans of the ship, the Mind playing them according to psychological profile. The box moves with the subject and contains objects identical to what might be found on the ship.

To the subject, there is absolutely no difference to where it was originally on the ship, it is essentially a perfect simulation. And indeed this lets the Mind simulate a "ship" for the boxed subject while leaving the subject a long way from any contact with anything at all.

Meanwhile, the subject is restored from backup on the ship... obviously, the box will be destroyed by Gridfire when the test is deemed over or dangerous.
(you wouldn't box a subject if you didn't have any other way of getting data, and that means it must be incredibly dangerous, like Chaos)

------------------------------------

OOC:
I don't actually know what the timeframe for Chaos contamination is, so I'm just winging it. And I am assuming it is a mostly random process, biased to weak minds. A Mind will easily detect psychological profile problems however.

The Box idea is one I had for some time, but no SF civilization I am familiar with apart from the Culture are able to pull it off. It's basically a virtual reality box... that's not virtual. In this case, the Chaos contaminated citizen will do Chaos things in a virtual box.
Note how the Mind is careful to make the box appear exactly like the ship. And even if the citizen requests to go to the surface of the planet, the Mind can virtualize the surface in the box from real data. (and even make a puppet on the surface to mimic the actions of the real one in the box; although of course, demon circles drawn by a Mind won't work, but the simulation probably stops there anyway)

Of course, the box can be expanded or shrunk at will. Anything unusual can't be replicated of course, so the box will extend to accomodate it. Yes, they might actually let a corrupted citizen summon a demon or something. After all, they have Gridfire and the citizen has already been replaced from backup.

Please, please keep making these. They are so cool.


Also I really hope they encounter some of the Xenos or Space Marines. Or witness a full out deamon invasion of a world.

[dgnslyr]

On the old (superior) fluff this means The Culture would need to eliminate Love, Hope, Nobility and Vigor from the Universe. Short of destroying all sentience in their meatpuppets or downloading all their minds into Backup and destroying the puppets this is impossible. In any case it would take a long time to exterminate all forms of life in the Galaxy (yes, even for The Culture) and in that time the Minds and their meatpuppets would still be preyed upon by the Chaos Gods who don't have constraints like time or space.

With the new fluff that Chaos is only bad feelings you would still need to find a way to eliminate fear et al from a Galaxy and some would argue that people without those emotions are "unnatural abominations" so take that as you will. In any case, time is the enemy of The Culture and given their track record of effortlessly and flawlessly dispatching every foe for centuries I'm betting hubris would trip them up when facing a truly alien foe.

Well, the idea is that the Chaos Gods as they are now are terrible creatures because they're fueled by the terrible emotions of the galaxy's denizens, who tend to be filled more with fear, rage, scheming, and rape than vitality, honor, hope, and love. If the people are uplifted by the Culture, then they'll generally be happier and feel more happy emotions, so the Chaos Gods who derive their power from them will likewise have more pleasant dispositions.

As it normally is, the gods have both positive and negative aspects, but due to the nature of the setting, the negative parts are more heavily emphasized than the positive parts, to the point where the good things about them are basically unnoticeable, although still technically present. With a happier galaxy of humans and Eldar and Tau, the Chaos Gods would generally embody their happier, more pleasant aspects, while their negative bits are downplayed, basically the reverse of normal 40k conditions.

TL, DR: Bad feels = bad gods, good feels = good gods.

I'm not a 40k expert, I just like reading about it on the internet, because it is a pretty fascinating setting, so I didn't know about the new fluff.

[Shadow of the Sun]

The Culture has dealt with a Sublimed civilization who utilized their agents to take down the Culture. They soundly curbstomped them.

The Culture are hedonists, but they're not exactly debauched. The Dark Eldar represent what the Eldar were when they summoned Slaanesh; the Culture do not as a rule obtain their power, pleasure or what have you via morally reprehensible means. I think this will give them some level of protection

The idea of Data Daemons is interesting, but based on the rules specified in the first post, Data Daemons won't be able to attack the Minds at all. The Minds run in Culture-Universe Hyperspace, which has no connection to the Warp; as such, the Minds are immune to Data Daemon attacks.

If it's the Minds, with no means of being corrupted, versus the Warp, The Minds win. Hands down. It's not even a contest.

[Douglas]

On the old (superior) fluff this means The Culture would need to eliminate Love, Hope, Nobility and Vigor from the Universe. Short of destroying all sentience in their meatpuppets or downloading all their minds into Backup and destroying the puppets this is impossible. In any case it would take a long time to exterminate all forms of life in the Galaxy (yes, even for The Culture) and in that time the Minds and their meatpuppets would still be preyed upon by the Chaos Gods who don't have constraints like time or space.

The idea he was suggesting was not a way to destroy the Chaos Gods, but rather a way to change their nature so that their existence is now a good thing.

[Forum Explorer]

The Culture has dealt with a Sublimed civilization who utilized their agents to take down the Culture. They soundly curbstomped them.

The Culture are hedonists, but they're not exactly debauched. The Dark Eldar represent what the Eldar were when they summoned Slaanesh; the Culture do not as a rule obtain their power, pleasure or what have you via morally reprehensible means. I think this will give them some level of protection

The idea of Data Daemons is interesting, but based on the rules specified in the first post, Data Daemons won't be able to attack the Minds at all. The Minds run in Culture-Universe Hyperspace, which has no connection to the Warp; as such, the Minds are immune to Data Daemon attacks.

If it's the Minds, with no means of being corrupted, versus the Warp, The Minds win. Hands down. It's not even a contest.

I thought the Sublimed didn't interact with the universe they left?

The Dark Eldar are actually worse then what the Eldar did before. And they don't draw power from it but what they need to survive Slaanash's predations.

Data Daemons could attacks the Minds but only if they suffered some exposure to the warp first. This could be as simple as scanning data from a chaos corrupted source.

[Shadow of the Sun]

Forum Explorer: read Look To Windward.

[Forum Explorer]

Forum Explorer: read Look To Windward.

If it's in the library I'll give it a shot. Well I'll try and read the series in order, but honestly it looks pretty bleak that I'll ever end up reading this series.

[hamishspence]

I'm not a 40k expert, I just like reading about it on the internet, because it is a pretty fascinating setting, so I didn't know about the new fluff.

Black Crusade seems to have made a return to the old fluff- with "creativity" for Slaanesh, "martial honor" for Khorne- and so on.

[Battleship789]

Forum Explorer: read Look To Windward.

Well, not really.

Spoiler

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The species that you are mentioning Sublime through death (as long as their soul/mind is kept in a computer/shrine thing, iirc.). Even though the members of the species that remain in the realm of matter can communicate with those who have Sublimed, the tech level of the species is rather low compared to that of the Culture and the Mind on the orbital is quite capable of foiling their plan, even without the mole.

The Sublimed members of the species in LtW barely give their matter relations any help at all in attempting to destroy the orbital. (Though, I hear that other novels contain Sublimed that can interact with the material realm with ease.) They basically tell their non-Sublimed members, "Here is what you must do, good luck!" [I am not going into this further, as it may cross the forum rule boundaries...]

As far as the debate goes, I don't really know anything about 40k and I have only read 3 books that take place in the Culture-verse (Inversions, Look to Windward, and Matter), so I will bow out.

[Parra]

Slaanesh is a god of a realm without physics or time

Just to note, the Minds also have their own sub-dimension that is described similarly. Something to the effect that within it they can create their own universe, with whatever conditions they choose and watch it from birth to death, in the time it takes a normal person to blink.

Say, a particularly charasmatically decadent Culture guy could one day realise that his prowess has become such that he can literally bestow crippling, mind shattering pleasure with a single touch. He's going to be quite a popular guy at the right kind of culture-parties, I imagine.
Next thing you know, tentacles everywhere and your spacetime is full of holes.

Problem here is that a Mind would spot that kind of aberrant behaviour pretty damn fast.

Urpriest's point about Tau-uploads is a novel concept (can the Minds even force that sort of action on its meatpuppets? Would they?) it doesn't protect the Minds themselves from being corrupted by Tzeentch. All it takes is one Tzeentch-marked Sorcerer to chat one up and offer to teach it how to understand the Warp and it'll be over. Unless, of course, the Minds are willing to purge their own members ruthlessly... and even if they are, can you imagine what kind of "Culture" a single corrupted Ship might produce? After all, every Ship is capable of rebuilding The Culture from scratch as a failsafe, no?

Thing is, Minds don't and wont force the other members of the Culture to do anything they don't want to, including forcing physical Tau-Upgrades or Mind wiping. They will provide overwhelming evidence, arguments and otherwise coerice you into what they want. But never force.
Typically the previous body is destroyed afterwards. It can, and has, happened where a person has been copied and transmitted somewhere safe and the person was later assumed to be killed. A new body/drone/vessel is made for the transmitted mind to be transfered too. And then the assumed to be dead person re-appears.

AFAIK, being Sublimed is a one-way trip which is why The Culture restricts the Sublimation of its meatpuppets and, in fact, looks down on it.

As a 'Nation' the Culture looks down on Sublimination, but as individuals, some Minds have Sublimined. And continue to do so in very very small numbers. The Culture Minds to not, in ayway restrict its citizens be it drone, Mind, or 'meatpuppet' in anyway if they choose to work towards Sublimination.

The idea of Data Daemons is interesting, but based on the rules specified in the first post, Data Daemons won't be able to attack the Minds at all. The Minds run in Culture-Universe Hyperspace, which has no connection to the Warp; as such, the Minds are immune to Data Daemon attacks.

Afaik Data Daemons are simply demons that corrupt various AI. While the Culture makes extensive use of AI or vary degrees, neither Drones nor Minds are in fact Artifical Intelligences. So Im not sure who well a Data Daemon would do trying to take over one.
However, pretty much every single bit of Culture Tech has some Degree of AI. Their clothes, their guns, their homes, everything. I think a Data Daemon would quite possibly, and probably be able to infect those systems.
Now the problem with that is that each and every Drone and Mind can simply overide any of those systems on a whim and negate anything they attempt to do.

I thought the Sublimed didn't interact with the universe they left

Typically they dont, but books mention a hand full of worlds that one of the Sublimed races maintain as perpetual war memorials (going so far as destroying ships from other Involved species that get too close)
One of the books even focuses on one of the Sublimed races communing with its non-sublimed decendants and guiding them (to conflict with the Culture, in that books case)

[Megaduck]

Analysis

So, in other words. That this really comes down to is the conflict between emotion and reason.

The WH40K universe runs on the idea that there are things that can not be known, to survive you need to have faith and focus your emotion on something stronger then you.

The Culture universe runs on the idea that anything can be understood. Survival there is made up of rationally studying something and then bringing it under control.

Who wins depend on who you think is right.

If the WH40K universe is correct then the Culture can't understand the Chaos gods so Chaos will come in and corrupt the Culture and then we just have another player in the long dark future where there is only war.

If the Culture is correct then the Chaos gods are merely insufficiently analyzed. Scary and horrible true, but with study they can be defended against and brought under control. Slaanesh will be put into a bottle and used as a temporary spice the culture citizens can use in an orgy if they want before going back to being good and benign people.

[pffh]

Traditionally the soul is a function of the mind rather than the body; I see no reason why a (pan)Human mind in a Tau body wouldn't drag it's soul along after it.

Why would the culture even have souls? Or if they do why would they be compatible with the 40k souls?

[Aotrs Commander]

Oh, no question that the Imperium is a horrendous place to live, and will probably leave you without any agency and possibly eaten by a demon. However, at least in the Imperium humans have the slightest potential to kill enough things to gain some measure of agency. As an individual, the Culture would no doubt be more pleasant. For humanity's sake, however, I'd choose the one where we at least stand a chance of winning.

Winning what, exactly?

And your measure of agency is killing things?

I will just point out that the Culture citizens have more choice in their own destiny than either you OR me, by a long country mile; they aren't beholden to work for their basic necessities (or their luxuries), and if they want to go out and make a difference in the universe, they can.

If you are suggesting that for humanity to have "value", that people must be exposed to suffering and misery... Well.

[deuterio12]

Oh, no question that the Imperium is a horrendous place to live, and will probably leave you without any agency and possibly eaten by a demon. However, at least in the Imperium humans have the slightest potential to kill enough things to gain some measure of agency. As an individual, the Culture would no doubt be more pleasant. For humanity's sake, however, I'd choose the one where we at least stand a chance of winning.

Then you choose chaos. The Imperium is pure stagnation, started by the biggest megalomaniac in fiction that would see the galaxy burn before admiting he did anything wrong, and kill every single human out there for the sake of his lab pets. Pretty much every human is treated as little more than cattle to be worked to death to keep some higher ups and mutants able to maintain their luxurious lifestyles and crush any and every tought of innovation or freedom.

Chaos on the other hand allows one to pursue their own goals. Be it chopping stuff or orgies or researching new things or simply enjoying life. The chaos gods actually want humanity to thrive, because they depend on their emotions as nourishment, whetever good or bad. Chaos doesn't hand out things for free like the Culture either, it makes you work for them and prove your worth.

The old Necrons were soulless because they got tricked by the C'tan - they transferred their minds into the necrodermi and the star gods ate their life force (and presumably their souls along with it). The Newcrons - at least, the basic warrior units - are soulless because they were given a deliberately flawed version of the transferral process that left them as mindless drones.

Which is one of the reasons the newcrons don't make much sense, even by 40K standards.

What's the point of performing the transferral process on your population if they're just gonna become mindless drones? They could've just mass-produced warrior bodies with basic AIs and call it a day.

[HandofShadows]

No, I'm really not. Because we see the results of equivalent weapons used on Earth in the final assault of the Grand Fleet, and they strike with roughly the force of a modern nuclear weapon (the danger of the Grand Fleet is that there are 5 million ships in it). We see this happen in the series. Hell, most of the weapons on Zentradi ships punch roughly metre diametre holes through ordinary modern buildings.

You only see one impact from one Gunship on the surface. The other impacts are actually from the main weapons ships like the Queadol-Magdomilla. Not a gunship like the Quiltra-Quelamitz. (we do see the beam from a Quiltra-Quelamitz blow past a ARMD though and the ARMD is shredded)

The SDF-1's main gun is fired along the surface of the planet and the blast proximity scores a trench under where it passes, if anything it dips into the ocean, but that's all.

You forgot the quarter of mile of island that in front of the SDF-1. And what kind of power is needed to get through miles of ocean and still core a 500meter warhsip with no problem? A LOT more than a simple nuke.

I repeat as well, actual modern nuclear weapons are still a big deal during Space War 1. They are ship killers, most classes of Zentradi vessels can be destroyed with small numbers of modern fighter launched nuclear weapons.

Hmm. In Macross SDF-1 they are nukes (or reaction weapons). Only in Robotech are they called Reflex weapons. Which is it?

Also these weapons are much more powerfull then weapons created today. Nuclear technology does advance and as it does you get smaller more powerful weapons. For instance the first atomic bombs where huge and ranged less than 20 kilotons. Modern nukes created by the US in the 1970's where 10 times more powerfull and could be fitted on a fighter like the Phantom. Modern stuff is even smaller. So while they are "just nukes", they still pack a LOT of firepower. BTW compare the amount of earth moved by nukes in Operation Plowshear to the larger craters in Marcoss. The ones in Macross are a lot bigger, which means much more powerfull.

(Also, being a minor diety really does help, see Macross 7 for details.)

Energy beings don't really count of dieties.

Helpfully, we can also tell that the overall power of the 'verse hasn't much changed by 2052, because we see a Vajra ship helpfully blow up an asteroid, which means it's shooting at something we probably know what it's made of and what the energies involved is, and the shot works out to high single digit megatonnage, which is right in line with the reflex cannons seen in the first series.

I take it you are discounting the weapons used in Macross II then? (I don't blame you ). I would like to see the source of those numbers and if they bothered to include all the relevent factors. BTW have you ever really considered the amount of energy in just a single megaton? It's a lot more than what the first atomic bombs could put out. And those killed cities.

(Also, RPG stats, please, the Palladium RPG is made by people who it's questionable whether they've even watched the show...)

Some of the later stuff maybe. But not the first book which has no small amount of the original source material in the back.