Rise of / Blood of Phoenix Background Story

[Prot]

I'm trying to catch up on the 'new' Eldar (which guess technically are Asuryani?)

 

Anyway I'm trying to make sense of the very compressed volume of information in the books, and make sure I'm getting this right.

 

Beware, even with my screwy interpretation there is a (albeit small) chance I get some of this correct and therefore spoil some of the storyline!

 

- There's some storyline mixed in between the Rise of the Phoenix, and the Blood of the Phoenix. (For those just checking in, Rise... is the Psychic Awakening book, Blood is the box set.)

 

- I think it's Eldrad that discovers some way of harnessing the psychic energy of a crystal moon, but it means sort of sacrificing a significant supply of craftworlds' Eldar spirits (usually in the construct of these space stations.) 

 

- His goal is to create a big nasty Eldar God/Daemon that is capable of defeating Slaanesh.

 

- Deathwatch go after the Eldar 'cause it's what they do, and decide whatever they're doing must be bad so they kill a good number of Eldrad's peeps, and the process is severed, and a lot of Eldar souls are lost in the process. 

 

 

So does the above sound right? If so, I'm just going to say I haven't read all the dark eldar stuff yet from Phoenix Rising, however, I'm trying to understand... is this old info or new info?

 

The reason I ask is it sounds kind of like this incident is how Yvraine became empowered? Is this true? And a splinter of the experiment's results did find Yvraine and create some of the other eldar Triumvirate? 

 

As you can see I'm a little hazy on the end result. (Could be because I haven't read it all in its entirety) but I find the timing confusing because I thought Yvraine was created/incepted as the character we know her as now, way back at the end of 7th ed?

 

[Commander Dawnstar]

Those are the events of the Death Masque boxed set that came out before the Gathering Storm and are indeed what led to Yvraine becoming empowered in The Fracture of Biel-Tan towards the end of 7th.

 

Phoenix Rising doesn't just cover "new" lore material in its narrative section but also goes over some past events relevant to the current state of the Aeldari.

[Prot]

Thanks. The funny thing is I actually bought that box for the Deathwatch. But I forgot the storyline. I just had this nagging feeling I had read it before. Lol

 

So I am not sure where the recycled material ends and the new stuff starts.

[The Yncarne]

So I am not sure where the recycled material ends and the new stuff starts.

 

that's 40k in a nutshell since at least 2nd edition. 

[Emicus]

That's how history works, the past isn't recycled.. It's still happened no matter how long ago or how often it's remembered.

 

The future is all that is unwritten:)

 

#eldarproverb

[Lord_Caerolion]

So basically, the story is that for ages now, there had been in-universe rumours and theories amongst the Eldar of a new God being born; Ynnead, God of the Dead. Most Eldar who believed this were called crazy, but Eldrad was one of them. The basic belief was that the Infinity Circuits were having the interred souls create a new God, one that would eventually be powerful enough to defeat Slaanesh completely once the Eldar all died out. This wasn't given much credence, partly because the majority of the Eldar thought it'd be pointless to put all their faith in a god that would only rescue them once they're all dead anyway, and so most of the believers were shunned.

 

Now for the new fluff, started in Death Masque, continued in Fracture of Biel-Tan, and culminating in Blood of the Phoenix/Phoenix Rising.

 

Fortunately for what would become the Ynnari, Eldrad was one of these believers, and he had a plan. The crystal moon you mentioned, Eldrad believed would be able to magickally represent an Infinity Circuit, and by using "liberated" soulstones and the crystallized Farseers from each of the Craftworlds, construct a ritual that would be able to essentially replicate this doomsday scenario, just without the whole "genocide of the entire species" thing. Sadly, the Imperium decided to send in the Deathwatch to "America Imperium,   yeah" the Xenos, and the ritual was halted before it could be completed. Instead of "waking" Ynnead, it just stirred him in his slumber.

 

It was enough for Ynnead to notice an Eldar called Yvraine, who had walked basically every path available to the Eldar, basically only missing being an Exodite and a Harlequin. Ynnead blessed her, and showed her another way to save the Eldar from Slaanesh, basically acting as living Infinity Circuits, able to absorb the souls of the dead and keep them inside themselves. Yvraine then started travelling around preaching of the stirring Ynnead, trying to convince the other Eldar that it isn't total suicide. She didn't exactly help with this when she managed to break Biel-Tan apart when extracting one of the mythical Croneswords, simultaneously getting her pal the Visarch a fancy magic sword, shattering Craftworld Biel-Tan apart, and birthing the Yncarne from the fragmenting Infinity Circuit of said Craftworld, which some Craftworlders used to argue that this whole Ynnead thing is nothing but a Chaos/Slaaneshi ploy. Some other stuff has happened, like revealing that Yriel owns another of the Croneswords (his fancy spear), after he died fighting Nurgle daemons and was resurrected by Yvraine and her death-magic.

 

The latest background didn't really add much more to this. The fifth and final Cronesword has apparently been claimed by Slaanesh, removing another "wake Ynnead up" button from the Ynnari, and having Jain Zar fight Drazhar, revealing that Drazhar is indeed a Phoenix Lord himself. Oh, and a bit of non-story about Yvraine and her assorted Eldar pals fighting a Keeper of Secrets only for it to all have been a trick so the Eldar all start arguing again.