Editing Nobledark Imperium Notes (section)

==== How other species see the Old Ones ====

The Imperium tends to lionize the Old Ones a bit more than they should, mostly due to the influence of the eldar, who looked up to the Old Ones during the War in Heaven. The Imperium tends to project its own moral values onto the Old Ones, thinking that the race that left the Necrontyr to suffer on a radiation-blasted world, [[Nobledark_Imperium_Member_States#Tarellian Religion|left off mortal representatives of their uplifted races in their stone carvings]], and [[Nobledark_Imperium_Forces_of_Chaos#Rise_of_Khorne|intentionally created Khorne]] had the same moral compass as them. It's more likely you have a situation similar to the Forerunners in [[Halo]], with some Old Ones who were benevolent and some who were cruel, but the species as a whole seem to have had a number of assholes. After all, [[Nobledark_Imperium_Forces_of_Chaos#Be'lakor|look at the one who survived]].

The Eldar claim the Old Ones willed them dominion over the galaxy when they died. It’s unclear where they got this idea, because the Old Ones sure as hell weren’t planning to die during the War in Heaven, and it's unlikely they thought their servant races would survive in any scenario where they themselves would not. There are several potential options here. One is that this is simply another case of the eldar exaggerating about their own history to give themselves legitimacy in their claims to the galaxy. Indeed, it's possible the Eldar came to the conclusion that "this is our galaxy now" when they stuck their head out of the Webway after the War in Heaven and found that all of the other races were either gone or regressed, and over sixty-five million years the historical cause and effect was lost. Another is that the Old Ones were even bigger bastards than anyone thought and told their servant races this as a false motivator. A third possibility is that the Old Ones intended all of their uplifted races to share the galaxy in the event they died, and the Eldar twisted or misinterpreted the meaning to mean just them. Or possibly the Old Ones meant that the galaxy would be theirs (as in, the Old Ones plus the servant races) collectively, with [[Slann|the servant races under the guiding yet iron-firm hand of the Old Ones]]

The Old Ones made the Webway, as well as several other high-power artifacts. This is one of the reasons the Eldar are so leery about allowing access to the Webway, they know how to make new gates into the Webway (and even that takes time) and patch minor holes, but they don't know how to make a new one if the whole thing is broken. It's the equivalent of a mechanic who knows how to change a tire or fix an engine, but can't manufacture a car from scratch. The Webway is alive and is capable of mitigating the damage, but even it can only do so much. Indeed, high end Old One technology (such as Tzeentch, Malal, Nurgle, Khorne, the Webway, the Blackstone Fortresses, and the Tuchulcha and other Webway making equipment on Caliban) all seem to exhibit certain hallmarks. Manipulate the Immaterium to a degree people didn't know possible? Check. Use raw warp power? Check. Not made of adamantium, wraithbone, or any other known materials? Check. Alive? Check. You could even make the argument that the eldar and the other uplifted soldier races fit these criteria.

Hilariously, the Webway only ever seems to target Necrons using Dolmen Gates (even in vanilla), at least directly, it still tries to mess with the heads of anyone who tries to use it. This suggests that the Old Ones only told the Webway to keep out Necrons, Chaos not being a thing during the War in Heaven. So the Crones who are balls-deep in Chaos can go running through the Webway, and the Webway only ever seems to note "huh, those Eldar have a serious radiation exposure problem. They should probably have that looked at".