Just throwing out a million ideas, feel free to ignore me
I dont really like any of the whole "fingers in the pie" imperial things, i mean, they do too much already, are involved in everything, is it really necessary to have them take another hand in thier own destruction by creating another enemy so on, so forth?
i dunno, i think it would be cool if the nanobot creation/houses/whatever were of the cythor fiends own creation
I kinda envision the ghoul worlds as being burnt out husks, or empty rocks, perhaps remnanents of a supernova or a stars destruction? again l ike people suggested maybey highly radioactive on the surface, and thats why they live deep underground?
High levels of radiation + them could be why they are such powerful creatures, that adapt and change very well to thier surroundings (maybey even having become immune, over time, to the surface radiation. After the first couple purges and cleanses of thier planets, when the imperials set foot on thier core planets and found them empty, it was, of course, because they were lying in wait. -of course you could also make them stealthy (natural or artificial camoflauging? being hidden but detecting through radar means could be NASSTYY)
If highly adaptable, perhaps theres quite a few distinct "species" or bloodlines that these fiends follow? The biggest and strongest of thier societies (thier patriarches or primes or whatever) being the pinnacles of thier adaptability to thier environments. These guys are large and in charge.
That could let you have bloodlines, and physically different units down the lines.
Nanobots? why not, i could actually see them using them, perhaps these also help witht he camoflague, help the primes controll the lessers.
Heres a quick rundown of some things we know
Cythor Fiends were a race of extraordinarily evil aliens who lived in a desolate region in the north eastern corner of the Segmentum Obscurus known as the Ghoul Stars. High Marshall Helbrecht of the Black Templars Space Marines led a crusade against them a few years prior to the Third War for Armageddon. The few surviving records of the crusade describe the Cythor Fiends as humanoid Bat-creatures with leathery wings attached to their arms, which were topped with a long, curved claw with which to eviscerate enemies. They had bulging ice-blue eyes and many sharp shard-like teeth sticking out of their leering jaws. They bred in vast numbers and had a preference for swarming the enemy with massive wave attacks. Little is known about the Cythor Fiends' society or way of life, but Imperial Intelligence suggests that their civilization was based on the principles of Warlordism and "Rule of the Shrewdest". Fierce warlords commanded millions of bloodthirsty warriors armed with spike-shooting carbines and their wing-talons. Helbrecht lead the crusade to their homeworlds, but once they arrived found them strangely empty...Codex Black Templars pg44, other references?
If we take into account thier vast breeding we could easilly throw in some fluff about selective breeding, if they are constantly breeding, and doing so selectively, it would also be easy to create differences between them (like dog breeding)
If you also look at my physiology of a fiend post theres lots of room for fluff on how they can advance quickly-- just like tyranids use dna to evolve perhaps these things can use that cortex thing i talk about to glean information from races, effectively stealing technology, technovamps!
How smart/tricky is that, imperials come, devastate some planets, bunch of imperials dying (of course along with expendable fiends) imperials get to the core planets, find them empty, leave, deep below the surface, the fiends, safely hidden away, start harvesting the imperial technology, producing it, and breeding more fiends to eventually extract revenge, fiends come back in another wave...an angry...angry wave
Long and short, theres high tech races, theres biological races, theres a mechanical race......why not a biomechanical race!
Edit--- God too many things flowing from my brain today, i will not be offended if you choose to disect these ideas up, and use some/none of them
on the chiropterans?
perhaps the fiends did need another kickstart to put them into contention as a force to be reckoned with
the chripterans perhaps, fleeing from imperial scrutiny chose the ghoul stars because they knew they were empty, and semi isolated, so they chose to set down upon these worlds, to continue furthering thier perverse technologies
enter the fiends, unknowing to the chiropterans of course, fiends are below, fiends attack, and feed upon the chiropterans, long story short, fiends start to gain some nanobots, start to like, grow in power, glean the tech, almost wipe chiropterans out, decide they need them to further thier tech, enter an arrangement
no i see the chiropterans as immortal techmarine types, being given all thier needs by the cythor fiends to continue thier long lives and technology
