So I Just Finished Aurelian...

[Volt]

OK. While I know this forum is dedicated to the Imperium, I'm just curious, was tredecillion eldar supposed to be literal, or hyperbole just to emphasize that "there is a lot of eldar". Or was ADB just throwing us nerds who know how big that number is a bone to laugh at? And yes, I'm quite behind on the Horus Heresy.

 

 

 

Lorgar felt a small smile take hold. ‘Two hundred thousand. How many in the entire eldar empire?’ A whole species. Trillions. A decillion. A tredecillion. A goddess was born in the brains of every living eldar, and tore itself into the realm of cold space and warm flesh"
Aurelian Pg.33

 

That's more Eldar than there are atoms in the universe. I may like the pointy eared bastards, but damn, that's a lot of them. It certainly does explain though how one orgies a Chaos God into existence if "true" though. You couldn't even keep those guys in reality, I'm pretty sure they'd create the largest black hole in the history of the universe and threaten its continued existence, you'd have to shove them into the warp. And even then it'd still be pretty crowded. Even with a sixty million year jump on humanity, they'd have to be pretty promiscuous to get that big.

 

Although, if true, it also points to some pretty nasty level of power for Chaos if after consuming a tredecillion, or even just a decillion souls, Slaanesh is still the weakest chaos god.

[Son of Carnelian]

I think "trillions" is more accurate. I'm pretty sure that everything else is a red herring from the most unreliable of narrators. 

[Volt]

I think "trillions" is more accurate. I'm pretty sure that everything else is a red herring from the most unreliable of narrators. 

Not necessarily. The webway is massive, and Humans, Orks, Tyranids, all number in the quadrillions. No reason why Eldar wouldn't at their height, especially considering they never truly "died".

[Chaeron]

It would surprise me as to numbers being ludicrously high. Compare the imperium of man at it's height to what they would have been, and how many spirit and seer stones exist now, probably equal.

[Lucien Eilam]

That's more Eldar than there are atoms in the universe.

 

Nah, that's not right. Possibly you're thinking a long scale tredecillion (10^78) and atoms in the galaxy (~10^76)?

 

Tredecillion is 10^42 short scale, a typical estimate for atoms in the observable universe is ~10^80.

 

On the short scale, a tredecillion Eldar would mean ~0.0002% of the Milky Way was Eldar biomass.

 

Which is obviously still an enormous number, but at least possible, especially for an ancient, galaxy-spanning civilisation that wasn't constrained by realspace, never mind planets. They captured multiple suns in the webway just to light Commorragh.

 

EDIT: Also, it's a count of souls consumed by the birth of Slaanesh. That doesn't necessarily mean living Eldar.

[Volt]

 

That's more Eldar than there are atoms in the universe.

 

Nah, that's not right. Possibly you're thinking a long scale tredecillion (10^78) and atoms in the galaxy (~10^76)?

 

Tredecillion is 10^42 short scale, a typical estimate for atoms in the observable universe is ~10^80.

 

On the short scale, a tredecillion Eldar would mean ~0.0002% of the Milky Way was Eldar biomass.

 

Which is obviously still an enormous number, but at least possible, especially for an ancient, galaxy-spanning civilisation that wasn't constrained by realspace, never mind planets. They captured multiple suns in the webway just to light Commorragh.

 

EDIT: Also, it's a count of souls consumed by the birth of Slaanesh. That doesn't necessarily mean living Eldar.

 

Except before the Fall, Eldar didn't permanently die. They reincarnated into new bodies.

[Lucien Eilam]

Eldar souls that entered the Warp reincarnated. It doesn't necessarily follow that all Eldar souls always did so immediately - there are references to the Eldar Wraith constructs being created to fight the Necrons pre-Fall. Something must have been driving.

[A D-B]

Totally boring answer. One of my friends is a physicist. I asked him how many citizens would live and die over the course of a galaxy-spanning empire that could also live in a parallel universe, and that had had lasted X-thousand years, and he came back with that a few weeks later.

 

That's more Eldar than there are atoms in the universe.

 

Nah, that's not right. Possibly you're thinking a long scale tredecillion (10^78) and atoms in the galaxy (~10^76)?

 
Tredecillion is 10^42 short scale, a typical estimate for atoms in the observable universe is ~10^80.
 
On the short scale, a tredecillion Eldar would mean ~0.0002% of the Milky Way was Eldar biomass.

 

Which is obviously still an enormous number, but at least possible, especially for an ancient, galaxy-spanning civilisation that wasn't constrained by realspace, never mind planets. They captured multiple suns in the webway just to light Commorragh.

 

EDIT: Also, it's a count of souls consumed by the birth of Slaanesh. That doesn't necessarily mean living Eldar.

 

 

Already answered, I see. My bad!