Making Dark Eldar

are the tubeborn grown to babies or to full adulthood?

is the process accelerated?

and if they are babies, then who raises them? I cant see the parents doing it, somehow...Nor Wracks

I like to believe that they are grown from foetus and eccelerated into early adulthood. I don't think that there would be anybody to raise them so it would make sense for them to have the strength to stand on their own two feet and learn from instinct, allowing those strong enough to survive long enough to gain trrue knowledge of how to survive as Eldarith Ynneas.

It's not really stated (at least, I don't know of anywhere that states it) but these are my thoughts on the process.

Tube-born are grown from embryos to full adulthood in a few years.

Edit: The answer from Phil Kelly himself.

Yikes

Still Its better than `not` thinking about what they would do to younglings in the Dark City (Think RL myth)

I bet if you were to ask a Craftworlder what is the worse thing about DE culture, I bet it would be their attitude to reproduction.

And since, Eldar require input of genetic material thoughout gestation, I assume DEs know who their daddies are. (He lives on the other side of town...)

It"s not much discussed in fluff, but there are bitz of information to unlock the secrets of DE children.

The process is accelerated the same way bodies are accelerated I imagine, I don't think anybody will condradict this. If you can accelerate healing, why not do the same with babies growing?

As far as I know trueborn are born the old fashion way, from real parents. I remember a discussion about this however where people said they would use surrogate mothers. It's fairly easy to hide something in Commoragh, especially if it's something as insignificant as a child.

Not sure how Trueborn are accelerated, whether the embryo is accelerated outside of the body or something.

Other dark eldar don't have any knowledge on their parents, as testtube babies are produced in masses, genetric traits are passed over controlled by the ones who take care of these babies. Most logical would be to use archons DNA to produce the best warriors, but there's not much fluff on this, it's just my best guess.

Childhood must be pretty harsh, but it's a harsh city, have to be strong to survive, but I'm sure even kids are tough individuals. Kind of thinking of saiyans, even their kids had a bad attitude, arrogance and plenty of strength. After a couple of years, they can take care of themselves.

On parents, testube babies don't don't, don't care, trueborn probably know, don't care either, except if their heritage can serve some purpose.
Vect wants to remain leader forever, he has no kids he cares about. Some of the old aristocratic descendant Archons, do keep their sons behind their back, as a back up in case things go bad and somebody has to take over. it's probably still some form of tradition. Some of the kids may try to kill their dad to take over, but in most cases the dad is too smart for them. Ironically usually a smarter individual from outside the family does find a way to kill them, thne the son can take over, without doing any killing himself.


Wracks are only servants of the Heamonculus, they're not used by archons. A heamonculus may use warrior though, but archons have enough other warriors to pick from if they need something done.
There may be exceptions to this rule for sure, but it's not the case for most archons.
Archons do posses eldar slaves to do some delicate tasks.


BTW this thing on reproduction, I remember this guy on an old forum I was on, he wrote a fantastic piece of fluff on Dark Eldar Love. It was just so well written, later on it was accepted and published as a short story in some Black Library book. The important thing I remember from it, was the fact that Dark Eldar don't really love in the convetional way, assault is not far from it, they impose themselves completely to the woman they want, using their strength to get what they want. The strong survive, and impose their will to the weaker ones.

Craftworlders are very tricky when it comes to reproduction, they are just so difficult when it comes to love. The Eldar paths make verything a lot more complicated than it already is. Like everything with eldar, Love is lot more complicated than human love.

Dark Eldar reproduction is extremely effective and the fact that they can revive people make everything so much worse (for other races, enslaved or killed by the Dark eldar)
DE are revived a lot easier within Commoragh itself. All Kabal members are cunning individuals, they have either a deal with some heamonculus or their Archon simply doesn't want to lose his troops. remember within Commorragh a kabalite warrior is an elite individual. A lot of units have very logical reasons to be revived, take all the commonly used warriors used as a retinue for most archons, his incubi, his mandrakes, they're always revived as a priority, since he needs them.
An archon can chose to not revive some troops if he suspected them of threason, which in a way, he wanted them dead anyway.
Coven indiividuals are probably easily revived, I'm pretty sure the common wracks have a better regeneration than most dark eldar anyway, all due to body manupulations.

I would agree with Khain Mor that it's likely that the development of the children is sped up, especially as they are released as adults.

I think that even though it would be possible to increase the speed with which Trueborn are developed it would not be wise to do so, especially if you want to maintane status. If you're a Trueborn that grew normally without outside influences inside of your mother's womb and you had a brother that was sped up, would you not feel superiority over him? I think that they could do it, but it might create more societal differences.
I would certainly not think that the embryo is extracted as that undermines the being grown inside of a DE woman aspect of Trueborn.

Quote :

All Kabal members are cunning individuals, they have either a deal with some heamonculus or their Archon simply doesn't want to lose his troops.

Very few Warriors actually have enough influence to get a place within the regenerative chambers, though. Even the codex says: "... few heave the influence needed to ensure regeneration in the lairs of the Haemonculi." Most Kabalite Warriors are expendable. Why let those that are getting killed off stay in your Kabal? You're undermining your strength when you could bring in more Warriors and see which of those survive.

Quote :

remember within Commorragh a kabalite warrior is an elite individual.

They're elite compared to some other race's basic troops, but they aren't that special. They start of as any other DE citizen, street fighting and starting gang wars, and then a Sybarite notices them and demands that they join them. They are the lowest rank with a Kabalite military structure.

Cavash wrote:

Why let those that are getting killed off stay in your Kabal? You're undermining your strength when you could bring in more Warriors and see which of those survive.

As Phil Kelly said in that Round Table interview I linked above, one reason would be that that warrior is known, proven and "trusted".

Cavash wrote:

They're elite compared to some other race's basic troops, but they aren't that special. They start of as any other DE citizen, street fighting and starting gang wars, and then a Sybarite notices them and demands that they join them. They are the lowest rank with a Kabalite military structure.

While it's true that they're the lowest rank within a Kabal and thus not that special compared to the rest., the codex suggests that they are actually elite even among other Dark Eldar:

"Each Warrior will have carved out a fearful reputation for himself in the war-torn halls of High Commorragh, and has proven himself time and time again as a merciless fighter. [...] The most martially gifted Dark Eldar of each sector are selected to become Kabalite Warriors. Male or female, Warriors are tall and athletically built, more powerful in stature and violent of temperament than their city-bound peers."

That excerpt (particularly the latter part) suggests that there are numerous other Dark Eldar who simply aren't good enough to become Kabalites, and are left to go about their business in Commorragh.

Indeed, I would agree that, but I would certainly not say that they are elite by any standard when you look at what else resides within Commorrite society. I know that they're better tha the normal citizen, but they're not elite.

It doesn't mean they couldn't have reincarnation contracts though. Certainly there is some sort of limiter on them, as clearly the Haems charge an arm and a leg (::rimshot: but I would suppose that a Warrior who was successful and focused enough could squirrel away enough to arrange for a contract on himself.

Frankly, I would think even members of the lesser merchant classes could pull it off as long as they, again, can manage to pay the price. It seems fairly clear that it's not just for Archon level individuals is, I suppose, my point.

Phil and Jes suggest as much. They may not even need to "save up" for it since Haemonculi have a tendency to ask for more abstract payments, like a piece of one's soul or a laugh (to paraphrase the men themselves).

One would tend to suspect that there is a hidden price in those, and only warriors of worth in the politics of Commoragh are likely to get the 'deals'.