Board Thread:Warhammer 40k General Discussion/@comment-90.211.181.229-20130907201722/@comment-6078851-20131203013249

for all the eldar's ability they are a beaten and dying race because they no longer have the numbers to compete. the eldar argueably have the best stock standard (unmodified in any way) soldiers in the galaxy, but that doesn't help them when they have, comparitively, so few soldiers.

an interex empire would suffer a similar situation coupled with a far higher insurrection/rebellion rate. because they were a non-conquest, multi-species civilisation this sets up 2 problems: 1) non-conquest puts them, immediately, on the back foot in a galaxy that is all about conquest. it doesn't matter how good soldiers are if they don't have extended experience of galactic warfare. 2) a peaceful empire of many species, whenever they are in difficulty faced with mammoth invasions (orks, tyranids, imperium), will inevitably find itself being pulled in multiple directions at the behest of it's member species, all wishing to do right by their own. not to mention that even in such an encompassing empire there will still be plenty of xenophobes within wishing to be seperate and causing problems for the establishment.

the interex would be a nice civilisation to still be around, but in the grim darkness of the 41st millenium reality falls considerably short of 'nice'. :)