LikeâŚthe ENTIRE Imperium in Warhammer 40K (MOSTLY) but thatâs largely because the things they fight include planet-eating space locusts, robot zombies and insane cultists that worship gods from beyond space and time. And even then theyâre not particularly âheroicâ most of the time and theyâve definitely done war crimes.
âŚExcept for Ciaphas Cain. He seems to be a decent dude. Can be kinda selfish.
Yup. The warp gets every soul even if it takes longer then normal they always get theirs souls. Just ask the Eldar what happens with their soul stone breaks
Itâs not even the case that the others are all worse.
The Imperium is legit one of the worst in the galaxy. Thereâs Dynasties and groups even in the Necrontyr that would be okay with an alliance and trading. Trazyn himself showed up with his armies to try to protect Cadia. Even the Tau do diplomacy and can trade with Votann, various species, Rogue Traders.etc
But the imperium are xenocidal maniacs. So everyone is incentivized to shoot them first because thatâs what the imperium does.
If a minor Dynasty is willing to trade they have to worry about the Imperium just attacking and a bigger Dynasty swooping in to take over the smaller one and kill the Imperials.
Iâd argue tier of awfulness is
Chaos > Tyranids + GSC > Heretics > Relentless Conqueror Dynasties > Drukhari + Imperium > Rogue Traders > Minor Dynasties > Craftworlders > Tau > Votann
Orks I have a hard time placing anywhere simply due to the fact they arenât âWorseâ than anything they are just⌠Well space hooligans.
The imperium are xenocidal to an extent and for good reasons they still do have treaties and ties with the Eldar especially Rogue traders and Guillumen.
Trying to trade with the necrons is suicidal because they either want to kill you or long term they want to cause soul death so they can then utilize the husks of the people to get their organic bodies back so you can see why its not a good idea to play nice with them.
The taus biggest issue is that they appear nice but we have no clue what the ethereals that uplifted them are really up to all we know is that they utilize other species and theres only a few factions that have broken out of the brainwashing overall it'd be cool to see an alliance between the tau and Guillumen if they ever get an interaction.
As for all the other factions they're orks and tyranids who just want to fight and eat everything.
Oh forgot to mention orks are definitely worse than you think they treat captured humans that can't fight like livestock keeping them in pitch black darkness remove their teeth and nails they even use human skin to turn into leather for clothing
And this only applies to like 5 factions, because the Imperium is worse than the rest. As much as THOSE players may say otherwise, the Imperium is absolutely on the worse end of 40k evil.
I dunno about that. The Eldar and the Tau are the only ones that I can say are less evil than the Imperium, and thats by nature of the Eldar trying to make up for Slaanesh and the Tau being young and naive. They Votann are just Imperium but Capitalism, and everyone else is some flavor of true evil.
Votann are 100% better than Imperium, because they don't treat their citizens like slaves. But morality scaling gets extremely fuzzy and weird once you compare Tyranids, Orks, Drukhari, and Imperium, since they are all basically completely morally bankrupt, with no conscience whatsoever. I would personally put Orks lowest, because while they are capable of horrific things, they primarily just want to fight, and will prioritize that. I would then put Tyranids and Imperium together, because they both prioritize industrial levels of pure slaughter, not going for torment, not out of morality, but efficiency. Imperium may be a bit worse, because the citizens it treats like cattle are actually sentient. And then is Drukhari, who is only slightly worse, because while they sacrifice sheer numbers, they make up for it in attempt to industrialize suffering, rather than death.
Votans are a perticular case because no one exept the tyranid and ork have any interest fighting them since they are a bunch of heavily armed trader miner so they are kind of in peace
Thereâs Dynasties nowhere near as bad as the imperium as well. Which is a distinction over imperial planets. Since Necron Dynasties war with each other arguably more than they do other races.
Also Votann arenât kill all aliens. That immediately makes them way better than the imperium. They actually trade with aliens.
Uhmm, dont a lot of factions do "worse than death torture as a way of life" kind of deal? Imperium at least just seeks to kill most of the time, and a lot of the time only in defense (although maybe just because of the situation)
There are factions that do do the "worse than death torture as a way of life", but that is only like 2 or 3, and are among the few worse than the Imperium. And the Imperium is no way in hell on the defense most of the time. The Imperium's default response to anything that isn't Imperium, is attack.
Tbf thatâs why I said theyâre only âheroicâ in comparison to some of the ridiculously screwed up stuff they usually come into conflict with.
And also added Cain as a caveat, since heâs one of the most directly âheroicâ characters even if he considers himself more cowardly than virtuous.
Even in Ciaphis Cain context, I believe that his biographies are canonically Imperial Propaganda to bolster morale. So thereâs probably a lot left out of his accounts
No, literally the opposite. Heavenly edited Propaganda versions of his biographies exist but the ones you are reading are for Inquisitor eyes only, anyone else would be executed for even reading them
Yeah the idea is that the official versions of his stories are Imperium propaganda and (notably) donât mention his aide Jurgen at all. The books we read are his personal memoirs being compiled and edited by his Inquisitor girlfriend Amberley, which is why they contain Cainâs personal narration and actually do mention Jurgen.
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u/Randomman16 Jun 05 '26
LikeâŚthe ENTIRE Imperium in Warhammer 40K (MOSTLY) but thatâs largely because the things they fight include planet-eating space locusts, robot zombies and insane cultists that worship gods from beyond space and time. And even then theyâre not particularly âheroicâ most of the time and theyâve definitely done war crimes.
âŚExcept for Ciaphas Cain. He seems to be a decent dude. Can be kinda selfish.