Tyranids vs Galactic Empire (SW)

That's debatable, I don't recall the IoM engaging in the destruction of worlds without reason in the same way that the Empire tended to.

The Imperium also has very little interest in controlling the day to day lives of its citizens beyond suppressing Chaos and Genestealer Cults and even that tends to be done mostly on a local level.

well according of EU Republic have a history of 25 000 years

Yes it was. They hadn't even lost Coruscant yet.

Ah yes, because the Empire never glassed or destroyed belligerent or rebellious worlds....

The normal Tyranids I think would be defeated after a few months. Genestealers on the other hand, I suspect that will cause a massive civil war. How long until cults all cross the galaxy unleash a simultaneous rebellion?

How long? Like never. The Empire would not let them grow into such threats in the first place.

IIRC, Genestealers can get past genetic scanners. How would the Empire even track them to begin with? They can't police every ship in the galaxy.

How did this thread happen then: http://forums.spacebattles.com/showthread.php?t=142184 Why didn't anybody say, "Empire stops them cold."?

Ahahahahahaha. SW is one of the worst settings for dealing with plagues and infections with areas that have active spaceports, and some of the EU shows this quite clearly.

Honestly, the 'Nids will have spread themselves far and wide before anyone even knows they're there, and the authories will only realize the scope of the problem when entire sectors of space start acting insane and crazy, planetary riots and civil wars break out, and odd Xeno's that are damn near impossible to kill without heavy anti-armor weaponry start appearing by the hundreds of thousands. And that's discounting the fact that many of these worlds will become Death Worlds, and the presence of the Tyranid Hive Fleets.

So you're looking at hundreds to thousands of worlds already dead and dying before anyone even notices that something utterly wrong is going on. And the actions needed to contain the 'Nids will utterly decimate the Galactic Economy, and you'll get riots and rebellion just by trying to limit the spread of the 'Nids.

Honestly, SW is fucked. Oh, they have the Tech to deal with the 'Nids in a fight, but they're already fucked if it comes down to a fight, and their FTL drives, their Galatic Trade, and their lack of effective screening of every ship and that ships contents is what ultimately is going to bring the SW galaxy down here, as the 'Nids are going to do more damage to SW through infiltratation and economic damage than they'll do with direct combat alone.

This is the same Empire that connived to set-up the very organisation that then brought down the Empire.

I cannot recall if the infected are 'non-detectable' if they're not born into it. It would explain how the Cultists can get into position in Orbital Relays and the like, but then people are also fond of saying "Lol 40K tech & competence is teh suckz" and since the fluff tends to say absolutely nothing other than a vague "Oh yeah, they got access to [x] too" we can't say which is right.

The fact that they can't be "cured" of their condition is apparent though: The IoM can completely replace vertebrae with bionics, can reconstruct an Ork Warboss' jaw with only a tooth fragment, can keep someone from dying after laying several hours on the ground with most of their left (? I think that's what Hark lost to the Loaxtl) side missing, etc. But there's no known way to remove the implant without killing the Host.

Chaos that had access to a Possessed Chaos Space Marine and a Daemon-Mechanicus Hybrid couldn't do so either, but it does show that someone of sufficient willpower can fight off the domination for a very brief period of time (although considering it was a Word Bearer Chaos Space Marine, I personally doubt there are much people besides the likes of Palpatine who could shrug it off).

Standard blasters will be enough to kill a Genestealer, provided they are lucky enough to hit the buggers and that it wasn't a type "evolved" to using extended carapace.

...Genestealers kill Space Marines with Bolters, and you want me to believe that some mook Stormtrooper is a more effective combat soldier than a Space Marine, or that standard hand held Blasters are more powerful than Bolters? And that is not accounting for the fact that they'll only likely encounter a Genestealer in crowded urban and metrpolitan communities that are likely filled with Genestealer Cultists, Hybrids, and Purestrains.

I'm not completely sure I understand, what is the goal of the genestealer cults, and what are they going to do that brings down the Empire?

Two points I need to make here.

#1. Read the thread before commenting, as we already covered the topics you just asked about.

#2. If you read the thread and still didn't understand what was being talked about, you have no place in this discussion and should politely refain from making posts.

And passing Imperial Guard regiments have been used to cleanse planets of Genestealer Cults. Hell, we watch Cain take some down with a laspistol in For the Emperor and the short story in Bringers of Death.

Their durability seems to vary depending on their purpose. Those that are focusing on stealth and data accumulation are going to invariably be worse armed than those who - like the ones in Dark Disciple - are tooled to hunting down a rogue Adeptus Mechanicus member.

We have instances in-fluff of Lasguns being effective against Genestealers. Hell, we have examples in-fluff for people having to set their lasguns right when shooting at 'nids in general to avoid over-penetration of their targeted Gaunt.

See the "Call in the Guard". Storm Troopers aren't Space Marine quality, but outside those stationed on Endor (who had balls of brass for facing down the Ewoks) I'd expect the average stormtrooper to be at least partially comparable to an Imperial Guardsman.

Read and understand Genestealers and their function is fairly simple, they are beacons, scouts and advanced guards for the Tyranids.

I think I understand Tyranids just fine, at least the main tyranid military force, I was just asking for clarification about these cults.

It was my understanding that Tyranids invade worlds and consume biomatter. The Empire would respond to this just fine IMO based upon vastly superior speed.

Genestealers, I'm assuming based on the name, search the galaxy for DNA that might increase the power of the Tyranid race? Why would they destroy the Empire if they haven't destroyed the IoM in the 500+ years the Tyranids have been in the galaxy?

Or Palpatine will know instantly because a giant fleet of alien monsters is kinda hard to miss in the Force.

Actually, I'd wager he'd detect them for the direct opposite reason. "Hm, all's good in this quadrant, now to che- woah. That's not right. There should be a force presence here. Someone ready the Executors."

No, I think you're overestimating the effectiveness, as well as the competence, of the Star Wars galaxy in dealing with the threat the 'Nids represent.

As I've said, SW has the tech to fight the 'Nids, but the threat of the 'Nids to the SW galaxy doesn't purely lie in direct conflict, but in the fact that they know how to hide themselves, and due to SW Hyperspace they'll be able to spread themselves far and wide long before denizens of SW even know they are there, and that the only way to counter that sort of threat potential is to do something the Star Wars galaxy cannot do, which is to shut down or slow interstellar travel, and competently inspect ships coming in and going out of system. The Star Wars galaxy just cannot do that, as the Galactic economy would collapse were that to occur. That is where the main threat of the 'Nids presence lies for the SW galaxy.

It would be a death of a thousand cuts, where the main Hive Fleets can (usually) be dealt with, but the constant 'Nid incursions and infiltrations will create hundreds of thousands of battles, riots, and civil wars, stressing and straining the Galaxy well past its breaking point (and this is discounting Death Worlds springing up). After all, it's the small shit you usually have to worry about in situations such as this.

Tyranids in a galaxy without the ability to monitor or access the Warp act almost like submarines, able to travel unnoticed to their target and attack without warning.

If they've had the chance to devour Hutt Space before the Empire reacts, there's going to be a lot of these timebombs drifting through the Warp, being attracted to Genestealer beacons.

There's also nothing stopping them developing a biological analogue to hyperdrive, obviously its possible, given the example of the Vong in canon.

I forsee the hive fleets being smashed soon after they appear by the far more mobile GE military. It takes 4-5 generations before cultists can pass for humans, so I don't see too many making it into places of power in the Empire where they can do damage, at least not for a long time.

Even if they can't track them, they will be able to have a fleet to respond to any Tyranids coming out of the warp in days at most.

According to Warriors of Ultramar, the Nids normally assemble on the outside of the solar system then attack all at once. They won't even have time to get bugs on the ground before the Imperial fleet engages them en masse.

Biological warp travel is their analogue to hyperdrive. I don't see how they will even begin to detect hyperspace, much less learn how to enter it.

The same way the Nids do anything else. They encounter something, and if they don't already have an equivilant of it, they create one. And with their varied ground forces, they will soon aquire both working technological examples, as well as individuals with knowledge of how it works, and from that they can shape the new creatures/organs that will give them Hyperspace ability.