Xenos
Xenos is a Greek word which means "stranger" or "alien." "Xenophobia," or "fear of the strange," comes from this root. 4chan's "Paranormal" board is named /x/ after it.
Warhammer 40,000
In Warhammer 40,000, the Imperium of Man uses "xenos" as a catch-all term for any non-human life forms. For example, the Ordo Xenos is the branch of the Inquisition which deals with aliens, and they have whole litanies about what happens to Xenos they get their hands on, like "Mark of the Xenos" (also the name of a Deathwatch supplement).
Please note that "Xenos" is the plural AND singular spelling of the noun and adjective. This practise of using the unified form of this term for both singular and plural is inconsistent with the actual declension of 'xenos', which takes Greek inflections to reflect case and number as a noun, and case, number, and gender as an adjective. The technical plural form of 'xenos' in the nominative is 'xenoi' and accusative as 'xenon.' "xeno-" is a prefix used to denote the xenos origin of something, and Xeno is a character from Tau Quest whose name derives from "xeno-abomination".
If a scenario like that of Alien Nation or Men in Black happened in which extraterrestrials come to Earth in search of citizenship, the word Xenos would quickly become listed as Hate Speech due to the actions of /tg/.
Xenos in the Galaxy
The Xenos factions of the Galaxy tend to only exist in large concentrations on the outer edges of the Galaxy. Presumably this is at least in part because the Imperium has already eradicated all Xenos which existed elsewhere in large numbers. Within the Galaxy itself, barring the Orks, the Xenos make up the smallest percentage of the Galactic population, even combined being far outnumbered by the amount of humans on both the Imperial and Chaos sides. Overall Xenos factions also tend to be the weakest factions in the setting, leaving them mostly playing a minor role compared to that of the Imperium or Forces of Chaos.
As a result Xenos are mostly frontier and minority threats, rarely endangering the Imperium as a whole, and usually only striking at its extremities. Even the largest Xenos Empires are rather tiny when compared to even small Imperium domains and, thus, they tend not to present any kind of existential threat. A noticeable exception to this was, however, the Waaagh!!! by the Orkish Beast Warlords. However, the context of this must also be understood, as at the time of the Beast Waaagh!!! the Imperium was weaker than it had been for centuries, fractured and slow to respond, and also held back from deploying many of its strongest weapons against the Orks. Further the Orks themselves were still defeated, despite their enormous advantage, and in a rather short galactic time span the Imperium not only recovered from the invasion, but actually grew stronger than it had been before the invasion.
Xenos, as a result, more typically are akin to raiders, pirates or tribes, threatening the outskirts and poorly defended areas of the Imperium, but with little ability to actually confront the major military arms of the Imperium. Indeed the Xenos, as a whole, have mostly been only driven further and further out of the Galaxy since the launching of the Great Crusade.
However, as of late some exceptions have begun to emerge; the Tau Empire is a small and inconsequential state, but one that has been expanding rather than shrinking in contravention of normal Xenos style. The Necron Dynasties, though haphazard and patchwork, similarly have been emerging instead of shrinking, and the Tyranid Hive Fleets, though rarely making much headway into the Galaxy, do represent a threat who's scope and scale is difficult to catalogue or understand due to its emergence from beyond the Milky Way Galaxy.
Xenos Roles
Within the galaxy of Warhammer 40,000 Xenos are the least important and influential of the three main factions. Whilst the Imperium are the Protagonists of the setting and Chaos the primary Angtagonists, Xenos tend to fill a spectrum of lesser roles in between these two poles. Broadly speaking Xenos can be divided into three broad categories concerning their Role in the narrative;
The NPC:
These are the Xenos who tend to exist as a largely faceless horde of mooks who are gunned or chopped down in droves, usually with little dramatic tension, and more as a way to demonstrate how badass or awesome the protagonist is. These Xenos tend to play the role of a lesser antagonist, not as dangerous as Chaos, and having little true power, but an antagonist nonetheless. These are the antagonists against whom it is most common for the protagonist to win bloodless victories or overwhelming victories, to demonstrate the difference in strength between the protagonist and these lesser antagonists. Similarly the NPC Xenos also often plays the role of demonstrating how powerful Chaos is, without allowing Chaos to actually beat the Imperium, by either losing or being supplanted by Chaos at a point in a story line, to make clear the true threat was Chaos all along. Orks, in particular, are adept at this tactic of being an initial, rather minor, threat who is then replaced by a more severe Chaos threat later.
Examples incude: * Orks * Tyranids
The Ally:
This type of Xenos usually poses little to no actual threat to the protagonist, although expect the story to usuall start with the protagonist battling them to showcase the protagonist's superiority. The Ally is almost always in possession of some critical knowledge or device, usually relating to a Chaos Threat, which the Ally will prove impotent to handle on its own, instead resorting usually to giving the protagonist the role of actually ending the threat, often after trying and failing themselves. Although a betrayal is not always necessary, and more than enough of these alliances will not have a betrayal occur, expect at times a final twist in which the protagonist also kills the Ally before they can backstab them.
Although in general these alliances tend to be momentary and not have longer lasting ramifications, it should be noted that the recent plot development of the Ynnari subfaction of Eldar seems to have seen the Imperium gain a permanent vassal Xenos faction.
Examples include: * Tau * Eldar * Necron
The Uprising:
These are Xenos who fall into the same category as the oft-mentioned 'there was a Cult Uprising' fluff extracts in 40k. These are characterised by tending to be nothing more than a mention of their existence, before a quick mention that they are now all dead, usually due to some Space Marine force attacking. These Xenos tend to not even have an illusion of threat, such as NPC Xenos, and are very much just hand-waved away the same way Cult Uprisings tend to be.
Due to the very nature of their existence there are few examples of these types of Xenos, seeing as they tend to simply exist as a single name mentioned to have already been destroyed.
See Also
- Rak'gol
- Tau
- Hrud
- Saharduin
- Slaugth
- Orks
- Eldar
- Dark Eldar
- Tyranids
- Necron
- Kroot
- Vespid
- Q'Orl
- Alienhunters
- Monstergirls, which is what happens when xenos meet Rule 34.
- Skaven, apparently.
- Nicassar
- Old Ones
- Demiurg