New to 40k -- why only genestealers?

[я воняю]

I remember seeing somewhere that genestealers were more independant from the hive.
Why are the genestealers even on the space hulk? There doesn't seem to be any food there, except for the occasional terminator snack. There's an awful lot of information to read through, so a brief explanation of the game's setting to get me rolling would be nice.

[NeloneWolffe]

Well, they've been there for a very long time. They most likely ate the original crew, AND used them to breed more of themselves. That's what the Hive uses them for.

[Gryregaest]

The short of it is that it's because the board game it's based on only had Genestealers. If you look at the game simply titled "Space Hulk" on Steam, that's basically a recreation of it.

Originally, Genestealers were their own species - they actually predate the introduction of Tyranids to the setting. After the Tyranids were introduced, Genestealers were retconned into being the advanced forces of the Hive Fleet.

They can operate more independently from the hive, and can lay dormant for long periods of time without food. The reason they infest space hulks is because of the way space hulks will just pop out of the warp as they do. This gives them a chance to move to populated worlds, or infect boarding parties looking for technology or other valuables aboard the space hulk. In either case, once they've infected a person, and that person breeds, their first offspring will be a hybrid, like what we see in the game. Hence the name.

There's a whole elaborate system of the Genestealers exerting psychic control over its human (or other species) relatives, and different traits of different generations of Genestealer hybrids, but the end result is that it establishes a cult that worships the Tyranids as some sort of gods or saviors. They begin to work at destabilizing the planet's society, and act as a psychic beacon for the Hive Fleet. Once the Hive Fleet arrives, the cult will be devoured with the rest of the planet.

Why the hybrids are on the space hulk is a little unclear, as that would imply they have a human breeding population with them, which we never see.

[Sgt Snoke Em]

Originally posted by Stranger:

The short of it is that it's because the board game it's based on only had Genestealers. If you look at the game simply titled "Space Hulk" on Steam, that's basically a recreation of it.

Originally, Genestealers were their own species - they actually predate the introduction of Tyranids to the setting. After the Tyranids were introduced, Genestealers were retconned into being the advanced forces of the Hive Fleet.

They can operate more independently from the hive, and can lay dormant for long periods of time without food. The reason they infest space hulks is because of the way space hulks will just pop out of the warp as they do. This gives them a chance to move to populated worlds, or infect boarding parties looking for technology or other valuables aboard the space hulk. In either case, once they've infected a person, and that person breeds, their first offspring will be a hybrid, like what we see in the game. Hence the name.

There's a whole elaborate system of the Genestealers exerting psychic control over its human (or other species) relatives, and different traits of different generations of Genestealer hybrids, but the end result is that it establishes a cult that worships the Tyranids as some sort of gods or saviors. They begin to work at destabilizing the planet's society, and act as a psychic beacon for the Hive Fleet. Once the Hive Fleet arrives, the cult will be devoured with the rest of the planet.

Why the hybrids are on the space hulk is a little unclear, as that would imply they have a human breeding population with them, which we never see.

I just figured they fed on the crew on there somehow, whether in the warp or before it, then lay dormant as a trap for future feedings.
Unless I'm totally wrong of course

[IronWarrior]

Why don't people use Google anymore?

[Hyndis]

Originally posted by Sgt Snoke Em:

I just figured they fed on the crew on there somehow, whether in the warp or before it, then lay dormant as a trap for future feedings.
Unless I'm totally wrong of course

Explore the ships. There is a tremendous level of detail all around you. The ships each tell a story without words.

Some of the ships had a crew of 10,000 or more. The crew is still onboard. You'll find the crew, in one form or another.

[Hatchetforce]

Originally posted by Hyndis:

Explore the ships. There is a tremendous level of detail all around you. The ships each tell a story without words.

Some of the ships had a crew of 10,000 or more. The crew is still onboard. You'll find the crew, in one form or another.

This goes directly to the heart of that which I stated in another thread. I tend to head away from objectives.

[я воняю]

Originally posted by IronWarrior:

Why don't people use Google anymore?

Did you even read the post? I said "There's an awful lot of information to read through, so a brief explanation of the game's setting to get me rolling would be nice." I've been reading stuff on my own for several days now, but I wanted a brief summary of the game's setting so I could draw connections between what I've read and what I see.

[Gryregaest]

A good source for 40k information for a beginner, curiously enough, is 1d4 chan.org (no spaces, sorry it apparently blocks the word) is a good resource. It's a wiki for the /tg/ (traditional games) board on the chans. There's a wealth of 40k pages, and a lot of them are very to-the-point about information, while being funny.

[Dagordae]

It's a holdover from when Genestrealers had nothing to do with tyranids and were just a random Alien knockoff in the Space Hulk board game.
Their presence on the hulks make no sense in the modern fluff given the lack of space travel exhibited by the species, as the only ones ever found are purestrains. Making the given explanation of them trying to spread pretty nonsensical. They also never explain how they can survive being on a ship exposed to the Warp most of the time.

[Vurt]

well a space hulk travels through the warp the only xenos that will go in a space hulk are orks tyernids or chaos space marines and space marines anything else would likely be driven insane possessed or killed by the mere warp exposure also another reason anything is to get in a space hulk is that the imperial navy normally just bombards the spacehulk and destroys it before anything gets in so the reason is that it is unlikely that anything would go in a space hulk or even be able to get on/in one because most of the time orks dont have space travel there are almost no chaos space marines in imperial space where alot of space hulks appear and also last time i checked tyernids had organic living ships or they just boarded a ship and wait till they hit something

[Vurt]

Originally posted by Dagordae:

It's a holdover from when Genestrealers had nothing to do with tyranids and were just a random Alien knockoff in the Space Hulk board game.
Their presence on the hulks make no sense in the modern fluff given the lack of space travel exhibited by the species, as the only ones ever found are purestrains. Making the given explanation of them trying to spread pretty nonsensical. They also never explain how they can survive being on a ship exposed to the Warp most of the time.

i believe that the tyernids do not have a presence in the warp unless connected to a hive mind that or they have somehow evolved a resistence to the warp or there is not enough exposure to kill them

[я воняю]

Originally posted by Stranger:

A good source for 40k information for a beginner, curiously enough, is 1d4 chan.org (no spaces, sorry it apparently blocks the word) is a good resource. It's a wiki for the /tg/ (traditional games) board on the chans. There's a wealth of 40k pages, and a lot of them are very to-the-point about information, while being funny.

Agreed, 1d4 is suprisingly helpful in it's own hilarious ways
I particularly like the phrases that I discover hidden in page links, like DISTRACTION CARNIFEX.

[Hatchetforce]

"New to 40k -- why only genestealers?"

There is a special history between the Deathwing and Genestealers. The Deathwing originally painted their armor black. But when they returned to their recruiting homeworld they found their people enslaved by Genestealers. They painted their armor white to symbolize they were dead men walking. The battle that followed was brutal and many Terminators of the Deathwing lost their lives but they were victorious. Since that day they have maintained the white armor as a remembrance.

[Zero]

Originally posted by Hatchetforce:

"New to 40k -- why only genestealers?"

There is a special history between the Deathwing and Genestealers. The Deathwing originally painted their armor black. But when they returned to their recruiting homeworld they found their people enslaved by Genestealers. They painted their armor white to symbolize they were dead men walking. The battle that followed was brutal and many Terminators of the Deathwing lost their lives but they were victorious. Since that day they have maintained the white armor as a remembrance.

if that was so, it was retconned, they were turned by chaos in the most recent fluff i've read.

but to the OP; like others have said the space hulk setting, and its IP relies apon the genestealers.

[Hatchetforce]

Originally posted by Zero:

Originally posted by Hatchetforce:

"New to 40k -- why only genestealers?"

There is a special history between the Deathwing and Genestealers. The Deathwing originally painted their armor black. But when they returned to their recruiting homeworld they found their people enslaved by Genestealers. They painted their armor white to symbolize they were dead men walking. The battle that followed was brutal and many Terminators of the Deathwing lost their lives but they were victorious. Since that day they have maintained the white armor as a remembrance.

if that was so, it was retconned, they were turned by chaos in the most recent fluff i've read.

but to the OP; like others have said the space hulk setting, and its IP relies apon the genestealers.

Actually that info comes from the 7th Edition Codex - Adeptus Astartes Dark Angels laying on my coffee table. It was released in August of last year.