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Q'Orl

2020-08-07T05:30:38Z

2605:E000:1C0C:9A36:0:0:0:1044: /* Anatomy */

{{Infobox 40k Nations
|name=Q'Orl Swarmhood
|image=[[File:Q'orl Queen Sillhoutte.JPG|300px|center|]]
An image from ''Xenography'' used to demonstrate what a Q'Orl emblem might look like, if they indeed use such things.
|bgcolor=
|fgcolor=
|Capital=Loqiit
|Official Languages=Q'Orl Lexicon
|Power=Great Power
|Size=Eye of Terror-Sized
|Head of State= Q'Orl Queen
|Head of Government=Q'Orl Queen
|Governmental Structure=Totalitarian Kypselocratic (aka hive-ruled) Absolute Monarchy
|State Religion/Ideology= Superiority of the Swarmhood
|Demographic=[[Q'Orl]]
|Military Force=[[Q'Orl]] Forces
}}
[[File:DissectedQOrl.jpg|350px|left|thumb|The only picture we have of the Q'Orl. All dissected and examined. If they continue to expand as usual then the future will be a [[Starship Troopers|massive bug war]] between the Q'Orl and the Nids.]]

The '''Q'Orl''' are an insectoid hive race that is noticeable for having a substantially '''''big''''' empire. With the emphasis on '''BIG'''. Out of all the xenos out there, the Q'Orl has the largest self-sustaining government; where others such as [[Orks]] are extremely disorganized with tons of infighting, and the majority of the [[Necron]] Dynasties are still having their eons-long rest, the Q'Orl are the only ones with the ambition of becoming the next galactic superpower. You may ask, "But what about the [[Tau]]?", well, the fact is that the Weeaboos are sandwiched between the [[Imperium]] and [[Tyranids]], fighting their own [[Farsight|splinter faction]], and struggling to keep hold of their measly two dozen planets all the while contending with the reality that they are next door neighbors to the [[Sautekh Dynasty|largest and most powerful Necron Dynasty,]] in all honesty the Tau have little hope in actually becoming a major polity through direct military means. However it has been proven that starting size is only a moderate inconvenience to empire building if you've got advanced enough technology behind you (e.g. the British Empire), so while a long shot they can not fully be counted out.

The Q'Orl, on the other hand, not only have their incredibly large territory (as in "big enough to take up a visible chunk of the galactic map") located in the [[Segmentum Pacificus]] just a block or two away from [[Holy Terra]], but they also have highly advanced technology, heavy fire power, extremely fast reproduction rates surpassing [[human]]ity by a long shot, and even future plans for a [[Great Crusade|galactic conquest]]. As you can imagine, the Imperium is shitting themselves over an actual rising great power that is right next door to the heart of the Imperium. They would have started a new Crusade on the Q'Orl, but with [[Abbadon]] commencing his [[Black Crusade|13th temper tantrum]], the financial and resource cost/waste on the [[Damocles Crusade]] (which was against the Tau, a polity several hundred times smaller and weaker than the Q'Orl), the re-awakening of the Necron Dynasties, the rise of [[Ghazghkull Mag Uruk Thraka|Ghazghkull's]] Ork empire, and the Tyranids joining in the merry clusterfuck... they have their hands a little too busy. The Imperium just have to clench their butt cheeks and pray that the Q'Orl do not get their hand on Warp technology, since that is the Q'Orl's only military weakness. Unfortunately with the recent kidnappings of Imperium [[Navigator]]s and reports of Q'Orl ships having salvaged/reverse-engineered Imperium Plasma Fusion engines, humanity can kiss their asses goodbye.

Their high technology and large empire has made the Q'Orl one of the best candidates for a future 40k army, other than the [[Rak'gol]]. But alas, Games Workshop has yet to implement them despite having a bigger galactic role than the Tau, which is ''somewhat fair'' since the Tau Empire's purpose on the board is to take the place of the old Minor Xenos factions through the use of the Tau themselves and their Empire's "members."

Still, bit of a shame. Mantic's [[Z'zor]] would make a nice [[proxy]].

==History==
What is known about the Q'Orl, based on the few Imperial records, is that they evolved from [[Matt Ward|primitive invertebrates]] native to their homeworld of Loqiit - which the Q'Orl view in the same way humans view Holy Terra, both with regards to religious significance and defense. Whilst all are born equal, there are several distinct strains that develop within the larval nurseries. This is done through the use of [[List of /tg/ Cuisine|hormonal soups]] exuded by the queen, which lays several thousand eggs every day. Queens are the only "female" strain, and all other strains are "male", but no further details are known about their reproductive cycle. At an unknown point, they developed space travel capabilities and created what are only known as "elegant chainships".

As they expanded into space, they began placing planetary marker-stones, deep-space [[monolith]]s, and archaeological sites containing a rich amount of Q'Orl text. These texts all proclaim the announcement of the ''"Superiority of the Swarmhood"'' (the Q'Orl seem to have taken a few pages out of the [[Imperial Truth]]), their ownership of select regions of space, and their ultimate aim: conquering the galactic hub. Their empire was known as the Q'Orl Swarmhood and they were centered around their single holy world.

According to one text, four thousand years ago at the end of the 37th Millenium, they became afflicted with some form of disease that may be [[Chaos|Chaotic]] in origin. It is speculated that the disease was transmitted originally from Human settlers and may be attributed to [[Nurgle]]. During this time, they were assisted against this possibly-Chaotic-disease by another race, which is believed to be the [[Eldar]]. After the war was won, the allies demanded [[Heresy|payment in the form of a Q'Orl queen]] to make an "uncorroded swarm", possibly a race resistant to disease or Chaos. This saw the Q'Orl dissolve their alliance and defend their queen, though the erstwhile allies conducted a treacherous act that stole away the queen (<s>hardly</s> very treasonous since the <s>Q'Ori betrayed them first</s> demand came after the war was ended). Despite the loss of the queen, a newly formed queen-egg was laid, bringing the reign of the next matriarch. The Q'Orl have remained forever [[butthurt]] about the loss of their queen ever since.

At some point, an [[Administratum]] colony-ark along with a fleet of ships as part of a seeding project was dispatched into the space held by the Q'Orl Swarmhood. Upon learning of this, the Q'Orl became [[Rage|less than pleased at seeing parts of their territory being held by human trespassers.]] In retribution, they massacred an estimated thirty thousand pilgrims before a single colony-ark managed to escape, becoming the only survivor of its fleet. During the fifth year of Explorator Mari Alitz's travels of Segmentum Pacificus, on [[Sebastian Thor|St Thor's Eve]], the colony-ark was encountered in a desolate region of space, where they stayed for twenty days, though they never encountered a Q'Orl specimen. The massacre of Imperium pilgrims and the aforementioned Navigator kidnappings had shaken the Imperium: the Q'Orl weren't to be fucked with and would get their appendages on Warp technology no matter the cost, and had showcased their incredibly strong ambition. Whether they know what they will find when they do start to cross over into the warp is at this moment unknown.

With the Great Rift, it is likely the Q'Orl are getting introduced to the business end of Daemonic weapons as Heretic or not no human in the 42nd Millenium would want to see Xenos prosper. But seeing how heavily armed and insulated the Q'Orl is from the Warp combine with how fractious both Chaos and the Imperium is in their current state, its safe to say that the Space Bugs are having the perfect political opportunity to slowly expand their territories. I mean, if the Imperium is Space Byzantine and Chaos are the Barbarians at the gates, than it is safe to say that the Q'Orl are the Space Ottomans. Whatever some may think, the Great Rift is a terrible thing for the Imperium astrostrategically speaking, losing half your territory overnight whilst contending to the fact that spacial choke points such as [[Vigilus]] now exist ain't a good thing even with [[Roboute Guilliman|Grandpa Smurf]] at the helm. Right now the saving grace for the Imperium is that R&D on FTL Warp Drives takes a long ass time and Terra is betting on the fact that Loqiit's trouble in getting a functioning Warp Drive would allow the Imperium to master a strategy of containment. Invading Loqiit directly through a Crusade is a big no-no due to the Imperium's previous experience with the Q'Orl as well as the fact that the Swarmhood has their forces and logistics more concentrated compared to the Imperium's overstretched territories. Unless the Imperium wants to get their backs broken when their forces and territories are already stretched thin, split in two and waging wars everywhere, than containment is the best course of action for Terra rather than a Crusade that would end in disaster.

As aforesaid, it is shown that the Q'Orl can in fact make their race more resistant to Chaos, if the Eldar are anything to go by with their 'uncorrupted swarm'. Although it does not make them immune to Chaos, it sure as hell makes corruption a pain in the ass, especially taking into account of the Q'Orl's hive minded collectivism. Contrast this with the Tau who would happily stumble into the lion's den, the Q'Orl at least know what the fuck they are dealing with. Of course, with politics being in play, it is not surprising that the Q'Orl rejected the deal made by the Eldar lest they become pawns in their games. [[Troll|The Eldar ignored it anyway and kidnapped their Queen]] (More can be read below).

==Anatomy==
[[File:QOrlSwarmhood.jpg|400px|left|thumb|Yeah. We aren't joking when we said that their empire is fucking big. Big enough to be the size of the [[Eye of Terror]]. Now you know why the [[High Lords]] are running around screaming in terror.]]
Q'Orl are, first and foremost, insectoid. The Q'Orl's primary sensory node contains six ocular orbs, each of which are horizontally paired and contain photoreceptor rods of specific primary wavelengths. There is also a trio of scent-organs with greasy cilia-layers within that connect directly to the neutral cerebral column. The primary form of communication is through a form of chemical and olfactory signalling, making direct human interaction impossible. However, they do possess a simple runic language, which is based entirely upon a mathematical principle that relates each element of a Q'Orl's life based on a prime number.

Their thorax contains a chitinous endostructure with ultra dense muscular mass that possesses eight limb structures, four of which serve as triple-jointed perambulatory legs. The other four limbs contain manipulator extremities. The abdominal sac allows for thoracic joints, which in turn provide 180 degree movement. Infused technology at the abdomen suggests a bio-mechanical port, possibly for weapons, vehicular interface or device operation.

The species possesses multiple dexterous limbs with the presence of complex bionic technology, suggesting a highly intelligent and advanced species. It was also believed that they are short-lived, but highly industrious; they live in vast honeycomb structures that orbit their secret homeworld, in which the bodies of the dead are lovingly deposited. Like modern Earth insect colonies like ants, bees and termites, each Q'Orl male adult drone can live for roughly ten years, making their lives brief but fast, which is reflected in their ideology. The exception to this rule was the queen, who lived for hundreds or possibly thousands of years.

The species is divided into numerous breeds which include warriors, drones and a queen; the queen herself produces thousands of eggs everyday, and newer strains are customizable through the use of a hormonal soup that was fed to the developing larva. As an example, a newer breed was later discovered by the Imperial Navy - small maggot-like creatures called Q'Orl Mind Grubs, which can infest humans or navigators. This allows them to control other races with vocal commands or pheromones, which is one possible method of bypassing their inability to navigate through the Warp.

[[China|They have a sense of ancestor-worship where progress was made by continuing the half-finished projects of their forebears.]] The Q'Orl believe in a form of racial glory where expansion and glory were the only justifiable outcome for the deaths of billions of their kind. This makes them a dangerous threat to the Imperium of Mankind in the future.

==Technology==
As previously mentioned, the Swarmhood is known to have created space vessels that are both highly advanced and heavily armed. Other than lacking Warp drives (although they are working on it), Q'Orl technology often relies on heavy firepower. One of their most notable forms of technology are their previously mentioned "chainships". These chainships are typically constructed with a series of interconnected segments that allow them to separate on command into component parts. A typical tactic used by the Q'Orl is to uncouple their Chainships into separate segments in order to avoid capture by fleeing in different directions. These elegantly designed Chainships, as mentioned several times already, lack the means to travel through the Warp, which has restricted the expansion of the Swarmhood. This deficiency has allowed their enemies to escape their vessels by departing through the Warp. However, recent encounters have seen them modify their ships with technology that appears to be of Imperial origin. This has led to the growing fear that the Q'Orl have begun to use captured or even salvaged Imperial warp-engines that are being incorporated into their space craft.

==Eldar, Q'Orl, and Tau relationship==
As previously explained, the Eldar had a thing or two with the Q'Orl. We know that they worked with the Q'Orl initially before stealing their queen for a ''very clear purpose''. It is unknown why the alliance dissolved and ended up with the Eldar doing a 40k kidnapping, although political foulplay may be involved ranging from the Q'Orl suspecting that the Eldar was trying to make the Q'Orl political puppets through their queen or the Q'Orl trying to prevent the Eldar in gaining such important weapons so they can monopolize it themselves. However, there are some theories explaining why the Eldar would do a thing like this that would piss off a future galactic great power with superpower ambitions. The most popular one is that the Eldar [[What|experimented on the Q'Orl queen to create the floating space pope we all know as the Tau Ethereals.]]

This theory is somewhat supported in that the Q'Orl has a special organ meant to control each other through pheromones and scent. What do the Tau Ethereals have that no other Tau has? That's right, a special organ that was speculated to mind-control the lesser Tau castes through subliminal pheromones; thus when the [[Farsight]] lost his Ethereal, he suddenly got a strong sense on independence and suspicion of his former leaders. And you know when the Eldar kidnapped the Q'Orl queen? The 37th millennium, or roughly the same time the Imperium discovered the Tau when they were still screwing each other in caves before the Warp Storm arrived on T'au. The Q'Orl was also reported to be quite numb to the [[Warp]], which is the same characteristics of the Tau. While the theory is largely unproven, this has led some to conclude that the Eldar kidnapped the Q'Orl queen in order to use her organs to experiment on the Tau as a weapon against Chaos. The Eldar really are so egotistical they'd rather make something that could easily become their enemy (which it did) instead of asking the Imperium for help (which would be given simply because fuck Chaos). Sad if true.
==Gallery==

===Q'Orl Artwork===
<gallery>
Image:Q'Orl_Lexicon_and_Breeds.png|Q'Orl Lexicon and breeds. [[Original character, do not steal|Looking uncannily like the Terreocti from Deltora eh?]]
Image:Q'Orl_Abdominal_Weapon.JPG|If you thought a Wasp stinger was bad...
Image:Q'Orl_Larvae.JPG|A baby Q'Orl. It's one hell of a grub.
</gallery>

===Q'Orl Fan Art===
<gallery>
Image:Imperial_Q'Orl_Flag.png||Fanmade image of what the Q'Orl Flag/Iconography would look like.
Image:Q'Orl_soldier_by_tutzdes.jpg|Q'Orl soldier by tutzdes.
</gallery>
[[Category:Warhammer 40,000]][[Category:Xenos]]
{{Template:40k-Governments}}
{{Template:Important Species in 40k}}

Archon Tahril

2020-08-07T05:17:23Z

2605:E000:1C0C:9A36:0:0:0:1044:

[[Image:Archon Tahril.jpg|thumb|300px|right|The Old Bastard. Slightly less retarded than [[Firaeveus Carron|Carron.]]]]

{{Topquote| Tahril you fucking idiot! Why did you position our headquarters right next to the fallen Mon-Keigh that'll feed our souls to the god we've been actively trying to avoid for thousands of years? I FUCKING HATE YOU TAHRIIIIL!!!!| Asdrubael Vect when Tahril gets half their base taken over by a bunch of Guardsmen}}

{{Topquote| Well Shit| Tahrill immediately after}}

'''Archon Tahril''' is a raid commander serving [[Asdrubael Vect]], heading up the forces of the Black Heart Kabal in the Kaurava System of ''[[Dawn of War]]: Soulstorm''. While he shares the same weakness of many characters in Soulstorm in that his personality isn't very fleshed out, he ironically is better-characterized than most, if not ''all'' of the other commanders in the campaign, with the lone exception of [[Gorgutz 'Ead 'Unter]], who carried over from ''Dark Crusade'' and ''Winter Assault.'' He's especially notable for being one of, if not the ''only'' commander in the entire game to have a dialogue exchange with any of the enemy commanders, as he openly shit-talks Farseer [[Caerys]] during her speeches about how her opponent isn't as graceful as the Eldar is.

Compared to the other characters in the campaign, Tahril is smug, arrogant, and sly. Canonically, he's someone who's old as ''balls'', even by Dark Eldar standards, has survived dozens of assassination and usurpation attempts, and is always prepared to get shit done. He didn't get to his position as Vect's head officer by being stupid, and anyone able to stay on Vect's payroll for any extended period of time is going to be either as masterful a [[Eldrad|prick]] or someone who's survived the periodic attempts at [[Troll|dicking with him]], so you know he's not to be fucked with.

Humorously, Tahril only really considered two of the other commanders in the sector a threat: Farseer Caerys, and Chaos Lord [[Firaeveus Carron]]. Caerys he [[Rape|particularly wanted as a personal plaything]], and was concerned about the Farseer fucking up his plans. Carron he considered a threat less because of [[Derp|his intelligence]], and more because Carron's entire army was at his fucking doorstep and had every intent of wrecking his shit.

If he is successful, the Kaurava System as a whole is stripped heavily of life, the bulk of it, regardless of race, brought back to Commoragh for slaves and sport. Tahril is well-rewarded and retires to his private abode, presumably to celebrate with [[Lhamaean|a harem of Dark Eldar skanks]] and a few captive Sisters of Battle. This is canonical ending, as in every other Vect dies, and c'mon, he's too big of a figure to die like that. Well, it would be if Gorgutz wasn't the confirmed winner, so we can only assume that either that wasn't actually Vect at Kaurava or Vect managed to get away.

==Service==
When Farseer Caerys brought her forces to stop the Kauravan [[Necron Lord]] from bringing his tomb complex back online and threatening the region, she inadvertently paved the way for her own downfall. Caerys' heavy-handed attempts to bring in additional forces activated a suite of other Webway Gates, which were quickly used by the other armies for interstellar travel during the conflict, as the Warp Storm was preventing conventional interstellar travel. Unfortunately that much activity inevitably drew the attention of the Dark Eldar, who viewed the system in conflict in much the same way a Vulture looks at a battlefield.

Quickly, the Dark Eldar set up on Lacunae, the moon orbiting Kaurava IV, where a Master Gateway was set up. Using it, they could strike across the system with more-or-less impunity, killing and abducting as they saw fit, and bringing slaves and spoils back to the moon for transport home to [[Dark Eldar|Commoragh]]. To keep his forces vitalized and on-task, kabal [[Haemonculus]], Gruemanael, built an extensive torture grounds, where countless slaves could be tortured and murdered for entertainment, curiousity, and, of course, [[Grimdark|nourishment]]. With the ongoing chaos brewing across the system, the initial conflict went well, and the Dark Eldar quickly gained ground. Tahril, obsessed with the chance to capture a Farseer for his own amusement, went after Caerys immediately, adding another front as he engaged in battle with the Necrons and Craftworlders as well as the forces of Chaos while the system eventually devolved into a nine way free for all melee across the four inhabitable worlds of Kaurava.

However, Tahril, like everyone else wrote the Orks off as a joke. Though omnipresent throughout the system, the Orks were simple and crude barbarians, and while Gorgutz had made a good showing of himself on Lorn V by crushing Crull's World Eaters and bloodying the Blood Ravens, Imperial Guard and Craftworld Ulthwe's forces, he was defeated by Captain Thule on Kronus. This proved to be a fatal mistake as Gorgutz began to sweep through Kaurava II. Wiping out half of the Blood Ravens and crushing Shas'O'Res'Ka's forces, Gorgutz had already secured the strongest position of any of the contestants for domination of the system. And with every continent and province conquered, Gorgutz's WAAAGH! only grew larger as more Orks rallied to him or were born from the spores of war.

One by one, all other warlords in the Kaurava system were defeated by Gorgutz. Stubbs and all of his tanks, men, and baneblades were overrun and trampled by the ceaseless green tide and their pretty little factories were soon put to work producing more and more machines of war for the WAAAGH! The Sisters of Battle were ground into the dust by the Ork horde, with even their miracles of faith being unable to stop the ever growing and constantly expanding green tide. Even the Eldar, Necrons, and Forces of Chaos soon found themselves under attack by the Orks, and soon enough the 'Ead 'Unta found out where the Drukhari were hiding.

Though whether the Necron Lord, Caerys, Carron, or Tahril fell first to Gorgutz is unknown; the Dark Eldar proved to be no match for the green tide. As a people who love battle and are all but fearless, the Dark Eldar's weapons of intimidation and torture were only of so much effectiveness against so vastly numerically superior an enemy. The Orks smashed through the Dark Eldar's limited defences and freed captured Boyz from their cages before Tahril could present them to the wych cult arenas. There was no stopping the Orks now. As Gorgutz's horde became an endless sea of rowdy green hooligans and Tahril's kabal collapsed beneath the weight of trying to dam the flood, even Vect himself was downed by the Orks and had to flee before he could be overwhelmed, forcing Tahril to flee to Commorragh with the shame of having been bested by the Orks.

As for his warriors whom he left to die, the Orks soon entertained themselves with seeing how far they could throw them in the moon's reduced gravity after trapping them in their own cages for sport or capturing the Kabal's prized warbeasts in an attempt to tame them.

==Statistics==
At a glance, Tahril looks like any other Dark Eldar Archon; high melee attack power, some good abilities, and remarkable defenses for a unit in this army. Unlike the base model, however, Tahril is ''substantially'' more durable and powerful. Not only does he get better weapon upgrades, and, indeed, benefits from others mid-fight (like Poisoned Blades), he gains benefits that specifically boost his attached Incubi Bodyguards, further increase his ferocious melee power, and and even give him what is basically a clone of the [[Warp Spiders]]' Haywire Grenade. His melee damage is arguably the highest of any commander once his retinue is factored in, making his team capable of cutting even the most brutal of forces to shreds, and his only weakness is that he doesn't detect, have morale resistance, or morale immunity. Tahril can be further boosted by Combat Drugs from his [[Wyches|Wych]] buddies, though, which essentially double his damage output and make him and his team completely morale immune. Throw an upgraded Tahril at anything, use the Corrosion Soul Power, and laugh as Tahril rips absolutely any enemy in the game to fucking pieces.

{{Template:Dark Eldar-Characters}}

[[Category: Dark Eldar]]
[[Category: Dawn of War]]

Hrud

2020-08-07T02:18:13Z

2605:E000:1C0C:9A36:0:0:0:1044: /* Origins */

[[File:Hrudtd2.png|300px|right|thumb|A Hrud, as documented by Imperial scholars]]
The '''Hrud''' are a race as old as, if not older than, humanity itself. They were a creation taken over from the old [[Rogue Trader]] days and into modern [[Warhammer 40,000]].

Initially, they were the Space [[Skaven]], and garnered little attention. Then along came [[Xenology]], an out-of-print [[Black Library]] book which detailed the findings of an Inquisitor on his pan-galactic, [[Heresy|semi-heretical]] travels to understand what makes aliens tick; mostly by probing, disemboweling, dissecting, and doing generic alien-abduction-type things to random xenos scum. In his travels, he encountered the Hrud, a jellyfish-like race of decaying spine-creatures, and that is how GW sees them now. The Hrud managed to avoid the axe, and skirted the edges of unpopularity to such an extent that GW actually gave them a face-lift as 40k became less [[Warhammer Fantasy]] in space and more [[grimdark]], unlike their long-lost brethren the [[Squats|Squa-]] {{BLAM}}.

Now, if only GW could get off its ass and make an army for them. They're definitely high up on the "most popular army-less races" list, and are arguably even more influential on a galactic scale than [[Tau|certain playable factions]].

==Origins==
<blockquote>
'''''"Apparently, the Hrud's original homeworld was in a region of space the [[Eldar]] warned the Adeptus Mechanicus' Explorators to avoid, but the Explorators did not trust the xenos' warning and entered the star system anyway, precipitating the first contact between humans and Hrud sometime during the [[Great Crusade]] in the 31st Millennium. Classified as a hostile alien species after they destroyed the Explorator mission to their homeworld, the Astartes of the [[Iron Warriors]] Legion undertook a xenocidal war against the Hrud warrens on Gugann during the Great Crusade that nearly exterminated the species. However, Iron Warriors garrisons also suffered defeats at the hands of the Vulpa Strait migration of Hrud on Krak Fiorina, Stratopolae, and the Fortress World of Gholgis in the final years of the Great Crusade, proving that the Hrud remained a threat to the Imperium."'''''
</blockquote>

Yep, sounds about right. Typical Iron Warrior mentality. Attack ferociously instead of just nuking/exterminatus the shit out of the major threat.

The Hrud are a nocturnal race of scavengers and parasites. The Hrud are known to be very mysterious, many know of them, and few know about them. Imperial mothers scare their kids by telling them that a Hrud will steal all of their left socks or something if they don't eat their protein-paste. Hrud have a very strong connection to the [[warp]], which manifests as the ''"ssaak"'', or ''see mist'', an aura of darkness which surrounds the Hrud in question. Hrud can slip through narrow spaces with ease, and their ''ssaak'' have a chameleonic affect that lets them hide by surrounding themselves in shadow or pretending to be a torchiere lamp. Once, a captive Hrud was able to conceal itself in a fully lit, white-walled cell. This ability could be created by the Hrud warp connection, their chemical poisons, or biological light-tricks; nobody knows for sure. Hrud are also [[Star Trek|silicon-based]], which is actually possible.

The Hrud religious beliefs state that the Hrud were created by a benevolent pantheon of gods, known as the ''"Slah-haii"'', meaning "[[Old Ones|most ancient]]", which included a [[Kurnous|Horned God]], [[Khaine|Red Handed God]], [[Vaul|Artisan God]] and a [[Cegorach|Laughing God]] who all intended for the Hrud to live in sunlight and plenty...

Well, ''somebody'' just couldn't stand for happiness in the [[grimdark]] future, so the Slah-haii were beset upon by the ''"Yaam-khek"'', or [[Necron|Mirror Devils]], who proceeded to [[War in Heaven|boil, mash, and stick the Slah-haii in a stew]] of curbstomp and death, at "coincidentally" ''(wink wink)'' about the same time as the [[Eldar]] gods were being similarly [[rape]]d. All, of course, but one, '''Qah.''' Qah figured out that grimdark meant grimdark for everybody, and turned the Hrud into nocturnal scavengers to have them avoid being similarly bawleeted.'''*''' Qah then told the Hrud that he had better things to do for a while, and he would be back when the time came for the Hrud tribes to unite and take down the Yaam-khek for good. This of course was a blatant lie, as he went not two minutes before meeting Slaanesh in the same dark alley that he/she/it met [[Khaine]] in. Qah was then shattered into a [[Umbra|bajilion pieces]] by [[Slaanesh]] and banished into the realm between the Warp and realspace, but outside of the [[Webway]].
'''*'''<sup>''The Hrud would use this same strategy of hiding in a hole to avoid [[Games Workshop]]'s Axe of +9001 [[Retcon]]ing.''</sup>

Being near the Hrud is a thoroughly unpleasant experience, as they have an entropic field which will [[Nurgle|age, decay, and pretty much wreck all nice things]] within the vicinity at an accelerated rate. Hrud can extrude a wide multitude of poisons from their bodies, and this eventually becomes a prevalent fog in the air of Hrud-infested areas. It has been incidentally mentioned that Rogue Traders and various shady individuals, even inquisitors, have been known to gather these poisons for their own use, which trade is of course insanely dangerous and highly illegal by the standards of the Imperium. For humans who grow up in or near these places, these poisons will become adapted to, and eventually create a chemical dependency. Said humans will suffer withdrawal if deprived. If a Hrud is killed, its body will rapidly liquify, making dissection and study difficult, at best.

Things get really weird when you learn that they aren't migrating through space, they're migrating through '''time'''. So it's entirely possible that all the Hrud encountered are the same individuals manifesting in different time periods (and incidentally may actually be heavily degenerated humans). This also means they don't exactly die since they exist at several points in time at once. "Kill" one, and it'll continue to exist in the past and future like nothing happened.

It's anyone's guess as to whether they're migrating forwards or backwards, though- even the Black Library authors who came up with the fluff confirming all this can't agree. And of course, there's the matter of what could be so horrible that they'd need to indulge in time travel just to get away from it...

==Techno-Warpy Goodness==
In a weird twist, Hrud are both technologically advanced and technologically backwards. While the average Hrud is covered in rags, and would rather hide in a dark corner than build a house, the Hrud race are fantastic at reverse-engineering and scavenging. Unlike the Orks, who can durr and hurr their way to a [[Plasma Cannon]], Hrud ''actually know how things work.'' That's more than can be said of even the [[Adeptus Mechanicus]]. Due to the lack of ammunition and repair facilities, the Hrud usually end up wielding whatever weapon they stole fused with their own technology (which looks more industrial, ancient and slimy than a [[Forge World]])

When they don't want to steal something, they use what are called '''Fusils''', which are warp-plasma muskets. The plasma moves between the Warp and realspace to bypass armor and shields. This same technology was used to make Warp Cores used by the [[squats]]. When the Mechanicus tried to tinker with the same technology, they '''DATA EXPUNGED''' a whole planet ([[Ganymede]]). [http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Kryptman Inquisitor Kryptman] claimed that Hrud Fusils are a synthesis of Melta and Plasma technologies and use a lance-like beam to chew through armor, but he probably mistook another Hrud weapon for the Fusil.

Hrud weapons are both common enough (Hrud are everywhere) and useful enough (does your plasma ignore cover?) that they tend to end up in all sorts of strange places. They find their way to Inquisitors, assassins, alien mercenaries, small dogs, what have you.

General Hrud technology is compact, and in-between Orky contraptions and Imperial gadgetry in reliability. They make heavy use of both the Warp and standard technical knowledge in their machines, creating an aesthetic that is similar to both a gritty techno-industrial mess and the ancient artifacts from [[Elder Scrolls|Skyrim]], because Emperor knows you cannot get enough Skyrim.

==What the Hrud are up to now==
Hrud commonly live in underground cities called '''Juunlaks''', made of tunnels, dirt, and dark. Juunlaks are found near centers of population in the host civilization, but never in very large numbers. Because the Hrud couldn't care less about what they leech on to, ''Juunlaks'' and/or Hrud infestations have been found on, but not limited to: Imperial [[Hive World]]s, [[Ork]] Worlds, [[Space Hulk]]s, large Battleships of all races, the planet of [[Tau|Es'Tau]], and [[Craftworld]] Saim'Hann. [[Eldrad]] was known to have eliminated the Hrud present on Saim'Hann, likely because he wanted to have the nice things on Saim'Hann that the Hrud would have made unhaveable. Due to the frequency of nomadic Hrud infestations on Imperial ships and Hrudite physiology, Imperial crews have given Hrud the hilarious and thoroughly Rogue Trader-esque nickname "Bendies." Most races consider them vermin, and use words like "infestation" to describe places where Hrud gather. They will try to exterminate them, but Hrud usually keep to themselves, and rarely, if ever, wage war on other races.

The Hrud believe that ancestry and family-ties are all-important, and they keep immaculate records on nearly everything. They are a tribal race, and shy away from contact with other Hrud tribes and empires. Conversely, single Hrud will flock together to form new tribes or join pre-existing ones. Record-keeping is a huge part of Hrud society, to the point where Hrud records are more reliable than Imperial records, and more precise than those of the Eldar. Even Hrud legends and folklore and religion are, when not fully factual, referencing true events. This mass-memory is somewhat fractured, as different tribes maintain records about their branch of the Hrud species, and when tribes split, they take copies of the pertinent information and carry on from there. This is not a terrible problem, though, and the totality of the records make the history of the '''"Raheed"''', or "masstribe."

Every so often, a Hrud tribe will reach critical mass and split, one half executing a '''Peh-ha''', or mass migration. This is probably because they have become too populous, and must split to avoid detection. And presumably to get way from that one uncle who always wants to play [[Monopoly]] at family reunions. The irony is that once they leave, everyone and their grandmother steers clear of them. That many Hrud in one place can seriously mess you up, and in combat they are usually covered in shadow, and invisible until they're two feet away from you with a stolen pistol to your skull. Large enough migrations are known to start ruining whole planets worth of nice things from orbit.

On planets, they mainly survive on petty thievery, power-sapping, and mostly being a filthy xenos parasite. They do get hired on occasion as assassins, but they never hang around long enough to be anything more than a reputable killer for one-off jobs. Hrud are known to adopt humans or members of other races into their tribes and Juunlaks, where they are treated as '''zanhaads''', or slave/pet/whatevers. Unfortunately the constant exposure to Hrud emanations and toxins means that the zanhaads develop a chemical dependency on them, ensuring that few run away.

The Hrud are very vulnerable to one of the newer threats to the galaxy: [[genestealer]] cults. Familial structure, parasitism, communal living, and hiding in the shadows are all seized upon traits for the cults. As a result, genestealers have begun to integrate increased natural stealth, and even shadow-warping, taken from Hrud DNA.

A sneak peak of the 9th Edition Rule Book also mentions a conflict in the Laeviner Archipelago between an [[Eldar]] alliance against [[Hive Fleet Ouroboris]]. Why do the Eldar care so much a bout a tiny chunk of space? Because its home to what the Eldar call 'Those Who Evade the Crone', a race of xenos whose genitic make up causes an entropy field. Sound familiar? Obviously if the Tyranids get their hands on this genetic makeup it would be [[Rape| bad to say the least]]. The Eldar have also supposedly been culling 'Those Who Evade the Crone' so that they don't spread out of the Laeviner Archipelago, which could explain why we've heard so little of the Hrud.

==Notable Encounters==
* From 935.M41 to 938.M41, [[Creed|Ursarkar E. Creed]] fought the Hrud.
* Hrud are kind of [[awesome]] when their migrations get large enough, citing a 101.M40 record wherein a mass-migration forced a whole [[Freebooterz|Freeboota Klan]] off-track to Haakonath, the homeworld of the [[Star Phantoms]] [[Space Marine]] Chapter. When the marines swiftly dispatched the Ork threat, the Hrud came down in full force, dragging with them a ''temporal-warp rift that was made from their collective entropy fields.'' This caused so much derp on Haakonath that the Star Phantoms had to retreat ''and'' lose their homeworld, making them "one of only a handful of Chapters who survived a full-scale Hrud migration alone."
* In Graham McNeill's Mars trilogy, the Hrud were somehow involved in a convoluted and insanely complex and OP machine called the Breath of the [[Old Ones|Gods]] that a batshit insane Mechanicus Adept created over several thousand years beyond the [[Halo Stars]] which very nearly wrecked pretty much the whole universe before being fought back by a rare alliance of Eldar, Black Templars, Mechanicus, Cadians, and a badass rogue trader crew.
* In 783.M41, the Hrud caused the '''Infestation of Ursula Spinal''', an event which led to ''three full regiments'' of [[Valhallan Ice Warriors]] to age until their standard-issue balls of steel fell off.

==Gallery==
<gallery>
File:DissectedHrud.jpg|This is what happens when a Hrud is dissected. As you can see, it is the most intact specimen to date. And a fukken mess.
File:Hrud_aliens.jpg|An old-style Nocturnal Warrior of the Hrud. Also an [[Ambull]].
File:Nocturnal_Warrior_of_the_Hrud.jpeg|More detailed Nocturnal Warrior
File:Hrud_Warrior.jpg|The first Hrud model, from [[Rogue Trader|the old days.]]
File:Hrud_mugshot.jpg|HELLO THERE
File:Hrud.jpg|Official Hrud art.
File:Hrud8.jpg|An actual model of a modern Hrud. Use of [[Green Stuff]] was kept to a minimum.
File:Yukio_HrudAuxilia.jpg|Hrud SPEES SKAVEN, now in new, good models!
Happy_Hrud.jpeg|An example of Hrud stealth
Nocturnal warriors of hrud by babymordred121.jpg|Some Hrud with [[Umbra|their god]] and [[Enoulian|pets]] in tow
Space Skaven.jpg|Early Hrud comcept art
</gallery>

==See Also==
* [[Xenos]]
* [[Xenology]]
* [[Umbra]]
* [[Squat]]
* [[Saharduin]]
* [[Rak'gol]]
* [[Rogue Trader]]
* [[Skaven]]

==External Links==
* [http://forums.tauonline.org/minor-races/79750-attempt-settling-hrud.html This might explain how Hrud are all at once several different races.]
* [http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Hrud#.Uw5rmfldUTo What the other wiki has to say about them.]
* [http://www.coolminiornot.com/131005 SPEES SKEHVEN]
* [http://warhammer40k.wikia.com/wiki/Hrud What the ''other'' other wiki has to say about them.]

{{Template:Important Species in 40k}}
[[Category:Warhammer 40,000]][[Category:Xenos]]