The Culture v's 40kverse

[thorgrim29]

Assuming they have a warp presence, as long as they don't all get corrupted at first they'd just make everyone a blank, giving people a new body is pretty trivial for them. Actually, even if all the humans become cultists, the Minds and other AI would just kill them, figure out how to make them blanks and then clone new ones. It's not like the humans are necessary for them.

[Soras Teva Gee]

Originally Posted by Water_Bear

Obviously they would annihilate most of the other factions militarily, but I'm not so sure they could steamroller the Necrons. Remember; there are only a handful of Tombworlds active out of hundreds or thousands, there is no way to permanently kill a Necron, their tech is much higher than the standard and their C'Tan overlords are literally gods. Not to say the Necrons would win, but they would keep them from taking over the entire galaxy until they Chaos'd themselves to death.

Sorry you obviously don't know the Retcrons!

Throw broadly everything you know about theNecrons out. On the plus side they aren't slaves anymore, they whupped the C'tan and shattered them into a million pieces. That now work for the 'Crons. On the other side though their tech is harder to argue as being as superior now. Their FTL, just the Webway. Most of them *did not* survive the nap in good shape, having broken in the interim.

Best of all they are now divided and feuding like the rest. Finally giving players a reason to paint their models differently and fight other Necron players.

Also while less explicitly retconned I seem to remember they no longer have that warp out when loosing rule or any fluff supporting that when you kill a 'cron it ain't dead.

(this all isn't exactly new info anymore)

[The Glyphstone]

Blank-ness isn't really an induceable thing, though, any more than psy talent is, since they are technically a very specialized form of psyker - it's purely random in nature. The Pariah gene was rectonned out of existence in 5th edition with the release of the Newcrons.

It is true that the AIs and Minds could just wipe out all the organics to avoid corruption themselves, but is that a win for the Culture or Chaos?


EDIT: They do still have fluff that says a Newcron critically damaged but not instantly obliterated will teleport to safety in a tomb, but they can be permanently killed, and you can always smash the tomb world if you have planetcracking ability (which I think Culture does).

[comicshorse]

And why would sophisticated being like the Minds be immune to the lures of Chaos ? ( Apart from maybe being too smart to be fooled )


P.S
And the Necrons are what now ?

[Soras Teva Gee]

Originally Posted by The Glyphstone

EDIT: They do still have fluff that says a Newcron critically damaged but not instantly obliterated will teleport to safety in a tomb, but they can be permanently killed, and you can always smash the tomb world if you have planetcracking ability (which I think Culture does).

Ahh my mistak. Well that's a bit better for them. You could do that before in theory just finding a tomb is hard and tends to be followed with death. (Why Cain and 597th probably are the record holder for killing 'em)

Still their threat level has still been turned down pretty hard.

[Water_Bear]

Originally Posted by Soras Teva Gee

Sorry you obviously don't know the Retcrons!

...

(this all isn't exactly new info anymore)

Ugh. Stupid Games Workshop ruining their own fluff....

Yeah, I play Dark Heresy but actual WH40K is waaay too expensive and time consuming for me to get into. I love the setting, or at least I did (got to read the new sourcebooks apparently), but I don't have the time or money to really keep up with it.

Also, somewhat off topic, are the Culture books actually interesting? Every summary and review I've read makes them look like boring Mary Sues, but the books are popular among people I respect to I'm willing to give them a chance if they don't suck. Basically; a) Is the science good? b) Does the Culture ever lose? c) What is the appeal of the books to someone who isn't interested in their philosophy?

[Rogerd]

Originally Posted by Water_Bear

Ugh. Stupid Games Workshop ruining their own fluff....

Wardhammerhate is pretty prevalent.

Originally Posted by Water_Bear

Also, somewhat off topic, are the Culture books actually interesting? Every summary and review I've read makes them look like boring Mary Sues, but the books are popular among people I respect to I'm willing to give them a chance if they don't suck. Basically; a) Is the science good? b) Does the Culture ever lose? c) What is the appeal of the books to someone who isn't interested in their philosophy?

Think of the Culture as Star Trek without the pants-on-head retardness, willingness to use tech of the week, and not numano-centric. The main reason that 40k cannot win is the reaction times, by the time IoM, or anything in 40k reacts it is just toooooooooo.....slow and late - it's dead already. Battle times are in pic-seconds, and one outlier, or just a bit of Bank's maths that went a bit wonky means they can temporarily clock their drives at trillions of c. Like I say this was a maths retard moment for Bank's, but reaction times are pretty standard.

[jseah]

If I were in charge of the Culture expedition, crossing the inter-galactic, the first thing to do once you arrive is to find a nice empty star with asteroids (pick one without planets, you know which since you've had forever to analyze them) and build/send an automated probe back saying "we're across, still alive; proceeding according to mission plan alpha".
This mission plan will almost certainly involve building more Minds and ships. We have a GSV, which can build anything. 6 ships is far too little to explore a galaxy, even for the Culture.

And then shortly after that, we run into the IoM or pick up transmissions. The chances we hit anything else is lower or close to impossible (Chaos isn't that widespread, 'nid fleets are mostly in interstellar space and chances of hitting them is virtually nil, etc. etc.)

Contact with IoM goes as per normal first contact. Culture stays away and analyzes. The conclusions are for a contact with one IoM non-military ship.
Conclusion: Relatively humanoid race, paranoid and atrocity filled society. Nearly none of the standard freedoms Culture expects are present. Appears to have been in a constant state of war for an indeterminate period of time against a listing of other races, some of which have characteristics of Homogenizing Swarms. The race possibly occupies a significant portion of this galaxy.
Unusual technology for FTL drive. New physics implied. Unusual physics detected when IoM ship engaged its drive, unusual power spike surrounding a socially isolated crew member. Analysis to follow, report findings to home galaxy as Top Priority. Fear indications from fellow crew members indicate potentially unstable technology, recommend caution when investigating.

Proceed with first contact but keep the existence of the Culture a secret in order to learn more. Follow star charts in ship to nearest world and scan it.
Conclusion: Chaos appears to be a Homogenizing Swarm; possible nanotech infection of nearly all IoM planets and ships; attempted detection failure. Recommend to avoid contact with ALL things from this galaxy. Purify materials for construction and conduct full internal checks. Worst case scenario, this expedition is compromised. All communications to home galaxy are to be in data form only.

IoM is a massive empire that is run by *blah blah*
Existence of psykers is intriguing, although possible theories indicate fear of Chaos directed at them. Potential symbiosis with a Homogenizing Swarm? (Must be investigated, no contact, even by agent, should be carried out until this is understood)

Spoiler

Originally Posted by Weezer

Cause that's not the case? 40K almost always wins because their stuff, as shown by fluff, is straight up better than pretty much everything else. However the Culture is the Culture and can doncrazy stuff like directly manipulate the brains of people with electro-magnetic fields across a solar system.

Now now, many end-game Sci-Fi 4X games would take offense at that.

MoO, SEV, Aurora, Star Ruler, just to name a few. All of them have smaller scale than the imperium true, mostly due to CPU limits, but towards the end games for all of them, the tech advantage gets truly ridiculous.

Ranges measured in hundreds of light seconds, missile and torpedo ranges measured in light minutes to hours. Top sublight speeds near C.

Reliable and cheap FTL. (in the case of SEV and aurora, instant travel between systems via jumppoint)

Distant Worlds comes in as a possible contender too. They have FTL drives without the funky limitations of other people's FTL drives (namely, jump from the other side of the galaxy straight into planet orbit). While weapons and shields are debatable (planet buster is an unreplicatable artifact), the FTL anywhere and anywhen is an almost game breakingly huge advantage.

SEV and Distant Worlds gain planet busters around mid tech, SEV gets nova bombs and eventually ring worlds. SEV in particular has mid-game ground troops that rival anything from warhammer (antimatter rockets can be standard issue! mid-game troops throw city buster bombs around like candy)

[Fan]

Originally Posted by deuterio12

So, out of pure curiosity, whatever hapened to the usual arguments of "40K weapons and armor are automatically a zillion times better than everybody else's just because, termodynamics, logic and actual results portrayed in the fluff/crunch be damned".

EDIT: With the orks at least, their "tech" work simply because they think it works after all.

I have a veritable book of quotes to prove you wrong on the portrayal in the fluff bit.

However, the Culture endlessly stomps 40k in a never ending cascade of rapestomp.

A better match up would be The Celestials V.S. The Culture.

[The Glyphstone]

Originally Posted by Fan

I have a veritable book of quotes to prove you wrong on the portrayal in the fluff bit.

However, the Culture endlessly stomps 40k in a never ending cascade of rapestomp.

A better match up would be The Celestials V.S. The Culture.

In a separate thread, of course..

[Kinslayer]

Originally Posted by jseah

Part A

Good plan, overall. But ; There's no SCIENCE! way of detecting psykers, unless you've done it before. How the hell they built the first Psyker-detectors is a mystery.

Edit -- Okay, you can technically detect the psyker via genetics, but there's no way to measure psyker-use aside from the walls dripping blood, or something going strange in general.

Originally Posted by jseah

Part B

You really have to disclude every 4X SciFi game when having this sort of discussion. The only fluff they have is usually blurbs about what's going on, and what your race is like. And pretty much every one of them goes from shooting lasers/projectiles to throwing black holes, supernovas, instant teleporters and whatnot around.

[Soras Teva Gee]

Originally Posted by Water_Bear

Ugh. Stupid Games Workshop ruining their own fluff....

Well the reaction has been more along the lines of "uhm okay-ish I guess" and probably less terrible then I made it sound. If you don't mind them being even moreso the Tomb Kings IN SPACE now.

Problem being the Necron fluff before wasn't all that great before. To wit *they* were *not* a faction it was a few C'tan with minions. I'm old enough to remember when the Necron origin was first introduced and I lost all interest in a race I was maybe about to start playing. Never did get into 40k after that, for which I'm sure my wallet thanks me.

Also someone at GW realized they were more story style villains and less then suitable for a game where all table-top battles are supposed to have a veneer of having actually happened somewhere. So the Necrons not having a reason to fight one another....

[DaedalusMkV]

Originally Posted by Water_Bear

So the Necrons not having a reason to fight one another....

Sure they did. All of the surviving C'tan hated each other. Deceiver tricked Outsider into eating all the other C'tan, driving him into violent omnicidal insanity. Nightbringer hates him for it, tries to eat him back but never actually catches up on account of him being the Deceiver. Void Dragon was asleep and didn't have any Necrons. The problem with Oldcrons wasn't that they had no reason to fight each other (that would be a Tau problem more than anything), it was that there was no room for development or personalization. Want to play 'Crons of a C'tan other than the Nightbringer or Deceiver? Too bad, all dead. What about unaligned 'Crons? Nope, no such thing, they're all slaves of the C'tan. Now go back to playing your uniform, bland soulless walking genocide. Newcrons give players a lot of room for personality and creativity, and as far as I'm concerned that cannot possibly be a bad thing.


There's really not much to say about this actual vs that hasn't already been said. Their GSV means that the Culture can build up a fleet large enough to crush all of the 40k factions militarily within a year. Shouldn't take too much. Then the Culture reengineers and repurposes said factions into productive, peaceful societies. Chaos almost certainly infects the Culture, but it's hard to say whether that results in a Chaos victory or a more stringent social engineering project to wipe out the Chaos Gods by the Culture. Probably because Chaos is so damned unpredictable. Either way, the end result is a Culture victory with the possible result of substantial portions of the Culture being converted to Chaos-worship.

[Water_Bear]

DaedalusMkV, I think you misattributed that quote. I didn't say that, I think it was Sora.

[WalkingTarget]

Originally Posted by Water_Bear

Also, somewhat off topic, are the Culture books actually interesting? Every summary and review I've read makes them look like boring Mary Sues, but the books are popular among people I respect to I'm willing to give them a chance if they don't suck. Basically; a) Is the science good? b) Does the Culture ever lose? c) What is the appeal of the books to someone who isn't interested in their philosophy?

I've only read the first one, Consider Phlebas, and I found it entertaining. Got some good action points in addition to introducing actually interesting (IMO) tech ideas/advancements.

The protagonist of this book at least isn't even a member of the Culture. In fact, he's working on the side of a race that's actively opposing the Culture in a war. So, while you're presented with the Culture's philosophy and whatnot, you also get to hear from somebody who's not buying what they're selling.

After that, I can't say much.

[DaedalusMkV]

Originally Posted by Water_Bear

DaedalusMkV, I think you misattributed that quote. I didn't say that, I think it was Sora.

You are correct. Odd, considering I was directly quoting Sora. Definitely had nothing to do with you.

[HandofShadows]

Next on 40k vs ___________!

40K vs Macross
40K vs David Weber's Fourth Empire
40K vs the Daleks

[Eldan]

Daleks has happened, I think. Another one 40k can't really win, thanks to time travel.

[The Glyphstone]

Not sure about Macross (if it's a Super Robot show, probably wins), but I think the other two are sound losses for 40K.

Vs. the 4th empire...well, when your ships-of-the-line are the size of the Moon (3,475km), those 5km battleships start looking a little puny. Also, they can detonate stars as part of a scorched-earth strategy if need be.


Vs. Daleks.....every vs. the Daleks I've seen devolves almost pre-emptively into TIME TRAVEL. Individual Dalek suits are tough nuts in infantry combat, but I know nothing about their spacefaring technology.

[GloatingSwine]

Originally Posted by deuterio12

So, out of pure curiosity, whatever hapened to the usual arguments of "40K weapons and armor are automatically a zillion times better than everybody else's just because.

The Culture happened.

The Culture are as far ahead of 40k as 40k is ahead of the people it is usually matched against when those arguments come up.

Even in a purely conventional conflict (unlikely to occur, The Culture cheat as a matter of course), most SF civilisations would be entirely incapable of fighting the Culture, like the Eldar they are almost entirely based on their ships, the vast majority of their population lives on General Systems Vehicles, which are also their principal centres of production, they don't really colonise planets (Which are small and weird and get hit by stuff), because they scrape the resources they need from places like asteroid fields, and can use them to make pretty much everything they want (The Culture is a genuine post-scarcity utopia). Every Culture ship is basically self sufficient in and out of wartime, so they have no supply lines, no real points of vulnerability, their actual fixed assets (mostly Orbitals, mini Ringworlds) are militarily unimportant (in the Idiran war they just destroyed them if they were likely to be overrun).

And their weapons tech is pretty damn scary, even a Culture-Idiran war era Rapid Offensive Unit is capable of laying waste to a star system in short order (due to the language involved, I sadly can't post the quote from Use of Weapons that illustrates this...), and those are antiquated compared to the modern state of the art as seen in Surface Detail (a modern Culture offensive warship like the Falling Outside The Normal Moral Constraints essentially turns into a cloud of several tens of thousands of independent units, each with the firepower of a Rapid Offensive Unit.

There are very few SF societies capable of matching the Culture in open war, and they're all basically gods (actual ones, not like the Chaos Gods of 40k, I'm talking about people like the Xeelee or the Time Lords who can basically just rewrite the universe from the beginning of time if they really don't want you in it).

Unsurprisingly, military conflict is not actually a major feature of the Culture novels, which are heavily character focused and driven, and are invariably written from the perspective of an outsider to the Culture or one of the people in the culture dissatisfied with its version of Utopia.

If you want a good start on reading the books, the best one to start with is actually the second one, The Player of Games, which really given its subject should really be required reading for anyone reading this webcomic...

[GloatingSwine]

Originally Posted by The Glyphstone

Not sure about Macross (if it's a Super Robot show, probably wins), but I think the other two are sound losses for 40K.

Macross is really low tech. Their biggest starship weapons (like the Macross' reflex cannon) are equivalent to modern nuclear weapons, and actual nuclear weapons are still considered a Big Deal.

The only weapons in the whole 'verse capable of causing any damage at all are Dimension Eater warheads (basically a weaponised version of foldspace, the 'verse's FTL system, which functions basically the same as a vortex missile in 40k, though they can scale up to destroy planets) and the Grand Cannon, and that was fired once then destroyed by counter fire (it did wipe out about a third of the Zentradi grand fleet, which would mean it destroyed something like a million and a half ships in one shot, but those ships aren't massively tough due to the low tech level of the 'verse, and they were all packed together in orbit.

Vs. Daleks.....every vs. the Daleks I've seen devolves almost pre-emptively into TIME TRAVEL. Individual Dalek suits are tough nuts in infantry combat, but I know nothing about their spacefaring technology.

The thing about time travel is that it becomes pre-emptive no matter how long you wait to use it... Large scale weaponised time travel is one of the ultimate trump cards, and without a force like the Time Lords trying to stop them, there's pretty much no-one who can stand up to the Daleks because of it.

[Selrahc]

Chaos was the only plausible threat to the Culture last thread, due to non-physical threats. I maintain that the Culture is *much* less vulnerable to Chaos infiltration than any 40k or modern day society. Remember that all but a vanishingly small percentage of the citizenry of the Culture are incredibly well adjusted, socially graceful vgeniuses. Family and support networks are set up, and people genuinely care about each other. The ship minds will also provide oversight. Any people in the incredible paradise of the Culture who are tempted out of curiosity will be watched. And knowledge of what Chaos is and does will be found and distributed. Chaos will not find a foothold in the Culture. It offers nothing to them. Immortality? Got it. Pleasure? Got it. Knowledge? Got it. Bloodshed and hurting others? Don't want it. (but can go fight in the Dataverse if you do.) Only real odd bunnies would want Chaos. And those guys are going to be monitored.

[Water_Bear]

Originally Posted by Selrahc

Chaos was the only plausible threat to the Culture last thread, due to non-physical threats. I maintain that the Culture is *much* less vulnerable to Chaos infiltration than any 40k or modern day society. Remember that all but a vanishingly small percentage of the citizenry of the Culture are incredibly well adjusted, socially graceful vgeniuses. Family and support networks are set up, and people genuinely care about each other. The ship minds will also provide oversight. Any people in the incredible paradise of the Culture who are tempted out of curiosity will be watched. And knowledge of what Chaos is and does will be found and distributed. Chaos will not find a foothold in the Culture. It offers nothing to them. Immortality? Got it. Pleasure? Got it. Knowledge? Got it. Bloodshed and hurting others? Don't want it. (but can go fight in the Dataverse if you do.) Only real odd bunnies would want Chaos. And those guys are going to be monitored.

Except Chaos isn't an external threat. All that sex? Pays tribute to Slaanesh. All the anger and bloodlust from Dataverse battles? That's bringing Khorne into your mind. All that free exchange of knowledge? "An open mind is like a fortress with its gates unbarred and unguarded."

Every culture in 40K either has monk-like discipline (IoM/Eldar) is basically in service of chaos (Chaos/Dark Eldar/Orcs) or has no Warp presence to speak of (Tau/Necrons) for this reason; if you have the potential to be a Psyker, your emotions feed the Warp and let it spill into our reality.

The kind of hedonism is okay in our universe (and the Culture's) because emotions aren't dangerous in and of themselves; as long as your actions aren't harmful there's no problem. But with the Warp roiling behind a thin wallpaper of "normal" space, the Culture's over-indulgences would become their greatest enemy, possibly even a new Chaos God if there are enough of them partying at once.

[HandofShadows]

Originally Posted by GloatingSwine

Macross is really low tech. Their biggest starship weapons (like the Macross' reflex cannon) are equivalent to modern nuclear weapons, and actual nuclear weapons are still considered a Big Deal.

I think your underestimating what the main gun of the SDF-1 and similar ships can do. You remember the 1st episode? When the SDF-1 fired, it blew through part of the planet Earth to hit the Zentradi ship. That is why you see the beam erupting from the ocean (not that many people noted, but I did http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjM8PbTw5tU&t=12m16s Sorry it's the RT version). Anything caught in the path of one of the weapons is dead. Shields don't help, armor does not help, being a major diety does not help. (The old Paladium rules state that absolutaly everything is destroyed, no exceptions)

[Tavar]

Isn't it stated/implied that while acts in line with the various forces do give some power, it's negligible unless specifically dedicated to them or, well, very extreme? That might change matters.

[Oracle_Hunter]

Huh, doesn't seem like anyone brought up the "Chaos wins by internal rot" scenario. I've got two posts from the last thread which should sum it up.

Post 1: How to Corrupt the Culture

Spoiler

Corruption doesn't have to be voluntary in WH40K -- that's why it is so sinister.

See, for example, the Eldar. No Chaos God brought about their Fall, but rather it was their decadent ways that caused Slaanesh to be born and consume many of their souls (and their worlds). It is true that you can pledge yourself to Chaos, but it seems that a vibrant enough culture (say, the freewheeling Culture) can be corrupted right under its own nose.

Of course, the Eldar weren't like humans or Orks. Humans are rarely psychically endowed enough to influence the Warp, but every one of them who is (i.e. Psykers) must be constantly on guard lest their brains get eaten by demons. Orks aren't really... sentient... in the same way humans and Eldar are, so it doesn't seem like they have much impact on the Warp unless they are operating en-mass. Plus, they tend not to live very long, even were they to get corrupted.

But what about the Culture? Immortal, decadent human beings and potentially corruptible AIs -- neither of whom are well equipped to deal with the sort of Grimdarkness that is represented by Chaos Possession. It is simply true that they cannot physically conquer Chaos which means that if they want to fight Chaos they will need to create or adapt Psykers. Psykers, unfortunately, are both the strongest and the weakest forces you can array against Chaos. Strongest because they can fight Chaos where it lives; weakest because every Psyker represents a physical link for Chaos to enter realspace.

So, what now? Trying to adapt the Imperium's tactics against Chaos will surely end in failure: the Imperium is only able to maintain Psykers thanks to the Emperor and a draconian process of constant internal purging. Would the Culture permit a permanent Inquisition on its own people? Would it prevent their meatpuppets from being engineered with psychic potential?

How, exactly, does The Culture win this fight? Note that if they simply decide "not to play" then Chaos continues to influence any remaining sentient 40K natives without opposition; if they try to fight fire with fire, I'm not sure they can win against hope (Nurgle) and change (Tzeentch).

Correction: current fluff has removed the "positive" connotations of the Chaos Gods (which is lame, IMHO) but it should be noted that things like Greed and Wrath are totally permitted in The Culture (and possibly encouraged, if you are a female bisexual member of Special Circumstances) which means you could have a GCU or two screaming "Blood for the Blood God" within a matter of weeks

Post 2: Warp Sorcery FTW

Spoiler

Interestingly, the description of Contact forces makes them prime fodder for Tzeentch. People who are constantly meddling in the affairs of others, confident that they are creating a better tomorrow? Perfect

No amount of mental scrutiny is going to catch corruption of the soul if for no other reason than The Culture doesn't believe it exists as a physical property.

Now, why is The Culture going into the Warp? Why, it isn't... the Warp comes to them. You don't need to enter the Warp for the Chaos Gods to speak to you, and you certainly don't need to be in the Eye of Terror to face down demons either. Any Psyker is a potential gateway, and even "mundanes" can use Warp Sorcery. If The Culture doesn't deal with Chaos, then Chaos will deal with it.

Interestingly, this is exactly how Tzeentch can get his talons into The Culture: Warp Sorcery. IIRC, the Dark Heresy rules indicate that Warp Sorcery can be performed by non-psykers while still producing extraordinary effects. To the Culture, this would look like a new science; one unique to the WH40K Universe. It would be no-doubt inferior to Culture Tech but it would be a way for The Culture to interact directly with the Warp -- something they haven't been able to do up to then. If Tzeentch moves in quickly enough, The Culture may be taught Warp Sorcery before they even bother scanning some Inquisitor's archives; more likely though they wouldn't believe such superstitious hogwash even after they razed Terra.

Oh, did I mention that Warp Sorcery corrupts the soul?

Basically the Culture would become puppets of the Chaos Gods within years (if they have human-level Warp presence) or weeks (if they try to develop Psykers).

* * *

I reintroduce this line of argument because it is an interesting and immensely plausible way for the Suetopia of The Culture to get taken down by someone well below their weight class. Amusingly, it works precisely because of the unique characteristics of The Culture and would not work in other noted "heavyweights" like the Lensman-verse.

Enjoy!

[Renegade Paladin]

Originally Posted by deuterio12

So, out of pure curiosity, whatever hapened to the usual arguments of "40K weapons and armor are automatically a zillion times better than everybody else's just because, termodynamics, logic and actual results portrayed in the fluff/crunch be damned".

EDIT: With the orks at least, their "tech" work simply because they think it works after all.

... Nobody ever said "everybody else's." 40k is militarily on a rough par with Star Wars (in space combat, at any rate), which puts it pretty high up the sci-fi power scale (and therefore able to come out on top in a lot of versus scenarios), but the Culture, Xeelee, etc. curbstomp everybody, Imperium of Man included.

[WitchSlayer]

It is NORMALLY a good idea to bet on 40k in vs threads, just due to the amount of scale they throw at things. It is designed to be hilariously over the top, but there are a few things that people will not argue where they lose. The Culture is more or less one of those. That said, there's really no point in 40k vs threads because for some reason it tends to be a curbstomp for one side or the other with no real in-between.

[The Glyphstone]

Yet for some reason it's always the go-to opponent people want to throw into the ring.

[Selrahc]

I really disagree with the idea that Chaos can get real world footholds without somebody somewhere consciously choosing to serve them. The fall of the Eldar was due to them doing *ahem* dark things. Far darker and more depraved than the Culture. The actions might empower the gods in some nebulous sense, but a party won't open a warp rift. It won't cause mutation or mental illness. Even in 40k.

Any other route basically has the flaw that it's running up against Minds. Minds aren't dumb.

Also, the Culture aren't "Sues", a sue is an impossibly perfect self insert character, a concept that doesn't really apply to a civilization. The Culture is just a utopia.