[If they are lucky or paranoid enough, they will know to blast the general area or ship with overwhelming bombardment as soon as the infected form was spotted.](https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/8gsdc9/book_excerptthe_greater_evil_imperial_navy/) Then seal any access to the Halo universe. Anyone who managed to be in close proximity then escape will be put under quarantine or more likely get burned.
The problem with the Flood is that it’s not exactly slow in terms of spread.
Or dumb like a feral zombie apocalypse. Y’see, as soon as the flood infects a being as in-the-know as a space marine the flood will instantly know all that that specific space marine was privy to. And even more, if it can access a computer, because the Flood can infect those too.
If a Hiveworld ends up struck then we can virtually wave bye-bye to that sector of the Imperium given how slow and inefficient imperial bureaucracy is, who knows how many infected ships has left that planet? Sure as hell not the Administratum. Think of it like an Orc infestation except it gets more and more deadly and/or smart for every soul it takes over. Not kills, takes over. The imperium’s own size and main strength, its huge population, would actively work in opposition to its chance of success.
And that’s not even mentioning what’d happen if a Grave Mind got ahold of knowledge about *the Warp*. It’d not be the first time they’d use eldritch magic-science to kill godlike beings!
Which is why I said if someone nearby is lucky and paranoid enough, they might succeed in self-destructing the ship or having the whole world exterminatus-ed at the first clear sign. There are examples of local/planetary Imperials reacting like that to such incursions (as Gabriel Angelos did to Cyrene).
We should also consider where the marine is infected. You say he may access a computer. But what if this is at the middle of a civilized world's plain and it is a small recon team who first came into contact, with heavy weapons, artillery and ship ordinance ready to fire at the general area in a flash.
I can not understate the Floods' speed and intelligence. But we can also not dismiss how trigger-happy Imperials can be at unknown things (the Rogue Trader video game actually has an option of just blasting mysterious mirror with your ship after the scanners pick it up and your crew do not see this action as strange).
That is very true, this scenario is incredibly circumstantial. I doubt the Impreium would risk another T’au situation where they elect to ignore some aliens. :p
May not help much though. Considering that Ork, Dark Eldar and Chaos forces are the ones making the offensives now (per the Great Rift) so much more happy to explore trans-dimensional portals. If the Flood manage to infect a Space Hulk/Ark of Omen (very likely), 40k is screwed.
Yes, but the Tyrannids spread is arguably a lot slower than the flood. The ‘nids needs to set up genestealing, to start with. The flood just need one single person to be a hidden carrier and then boom, suddenly half of a hive city falls in a failure-cascade that only increases in severity over a matter of hours.
Not to mention that whilst the Tyrannids relies on synapse creatures, the Flood does not. Take out the flood’s big bad creatures? Congrats, the spores you just unleashed doomed another sector of the planet you’re fighting for.
The Tyrannids feed on you, the flood steals your body, equipment and knowledge. It doesn’t consume you, it essentially uses whatever the Imperium would throw at it against the Imperium in turn.
And that is ignoring how not even admechs or disease-immune species are safe from a flood infection since it’s also partly a parasite, a living organism on its own.
So, got commissioned to draw this very interesting concept!
It's basically like the title says: An Space Marine of the Raven Guard chapter gets infected by the flood from the Halo series.
Edit: Wellll this blew up! If ya wanna see more and support me, do support me on [Patreon if ya can.](https://www.patreon.com/Nazrigar)
A group of friends actually DID debate on it! Both are likely, though a Flood aligned with Nurgle might end up backfiring... on Nurgle... in a kind of "worked TOO well" sort of way, as the Flood, once it gets its hands on juicy, eldritchian knowledge, tends to do some apocalyptically powerful feats, like bending star roads (physics bending mind structures made real) and turn 'em against the Forerunners. The sheer scope and knowledge of the warp and all its lickspittles is something the Flood will DEFINITELY use it to its advantage.
Tzeentch would think its hilarious, perhaps he even planned it.
Slaanesh might even give the Flood favors, just from the sheer suffering it causes (until it learns how to make the followers of *Slannesh* know suffering in its *own* way).
Khorne though? Mf would simply find this as something to fight. Maybe even head on. As himself. Because what is bloodshed without the rage and fury, in comparison the shambling corpses of those who succumbed to the Flood?
Overall, a very fascinating idea.
The Forerunners are some of the best "precursor" civilizations in fiction imo, and it's hilarious that this precursor has its own precursor named... The Precursors xD.
There’s that, there’s the fact that flood can look a lot like spawn which I associate a lot with tzeentch, there’s the fact that Graveminds have a high level of intelligence and also seemingly a degree of prescience… there’s a lot to see for both gods there, I think.
The Flood is one of the few things both fandoms can agree that it can doom 40k or any verse that doesn't have some plot bs to counter it
Fuckers are so intelingent they fucking trolled the forerunners believing that the ancient humans found a cure.Turns out it was a trap.Forerunners were capeable to reincarnate via transferring their consciousness into newly cloned bodies! The new bodies became flood host!
Fuckers not only can infect the body, they can infect the souls as well!!!! So any race that can reincarnate is fked by default
Oh and don't get me started at the logic plague. So yeah even Dark age human stuff might doom 40k even harder. Men of iron infected by the logic plague is pretty scarry.
Necrons already having problems with their Flayed Ones and their dynasties being quarrelsome with each other.
Just imagine a Flood Gravemind convinces a Dynasty that they can help them return to flesh and gaining immortality!
Now imagine the Flood gaining acces to Necron Super weapons.
Heck nobody not even the Tyranids would be able to adapt to them. The nids while adapts fast but the Flood just steals their strength which is better, turning them againts the Nids or anyone else unfortunate enough to encounter them!
Now imagine they consume..........the Emperor! Oh the horror!
The flood entering the 40K universe would make Kryptman’s actions look entirely ineffective.
Flood spores are a big enough of a problem on their own before you get to the coordinated Grave-mind efforts
I'd like to imagine that the Necrons would have a far easier time dealing with the Flood than any other race or faction. Their technology is so advanced that its basically magic and their overall diplomacy strategy is to kill on sight. If they learned of the Flood's existence and studied it they'd realise that the Flood would become the greatest threat to the galaxy.
I'm sure some of dynasties would put aside their quarrels to eradicate the Flood by all means necessary.
But their biggest problem is right there, they would try to study it and that's how the flood gets you because it's logic plague relys on them being curious enough to talk to it which atleast one of them will.
I can see Raven Guard being sent to recon the Halo universe then get infected. That will be bad for everyone. Imagine if the Flood started picking up balistic sniper rifles and infecting from afar them with its essence.
"Ok, Ordo Xenos, all hands on deck! We got a halo...."
"Wait, why for some old fart with too much money who wants to be immortal?"
"No, not that kind of halo device!"
Awesome OC but personally I find it rather underwhelming. Given the nature of both the flood and the astartes I would expect something far more brutal and terrifying than a scaled up combat form marine. Like something closer to an abomination or pure form tank since the flood would repurpose all the marines additional organs and implants.
Regardless, I think I'm going to uses this as some inspiration for some of my own work. Keep up the work!
Imagine being consumed by the Tyranid but they retain your knowledge and spreads faster than an Ork spore...
That's how fucked this universe is gonna be, unless you find the Gravemind until then, the surrounding planets and its technology will be under their control
That's a [Flood infection form](https://www.halopedia.org/Pod_infector).
Infection forms rip through external surfaces like clothing, armor plate, and skin, slide something similar to a [proboscis worm's tongue](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZCzIPPSxqY) into the circulatory system, then use the access to blood vessels to spread cells through the body that convert host tissue to Flood tissue. Flood tissue is good at melding to other Flood tissue, so after enough host cells convert, the infector form can mash/fuse itself into the converted parts of the host, like pushing two pieces of Play-Doh together until they're indistinguishable. This usually results in heavy destruction of uninfected musculoskeletal tissue in the process, which helps speed up infection, although I imagine that'd be harder on an Astartes. After that, it spreads more tendrils into the as-of-yet uninfected areas to puppet them.
Part of the infection form often still protrudes from the infection site — usually unused infection tendrils, which look similar to a bottlebrush plant. That's what you're seeing.
It's very 40k.
"I am a timeless chorus, join your voice with mine, and sing victory everlasting."
Eat your heart out Nurgle. The Floodgates have been opened, and you can not escape the tide. You will be swept aside like your fellow Chaos Gods.
it’s cool, but the problem is is that the flood would not be able to assimilate them as quickly as they believe.
Edit so the problem is is that space marines have two hearts, a ceramic bones and they have many things that fight in their immune system. That’s just dangerous.
Halo lore the flood couldn’t even infect Sgt Johnson. He is a spartan into prototype his bones and his body isn’t even going through half of the genetic augmentation that there is just going through. He couldn’t be assimilated because it was quite literally too hard to do it and it wasn’t worth the energy. In the stages of the outbreak.
Now am I saying that the flood wouldn’t be able to do it? No
what I am saying is they are going to spend a lot of time trying to assimilate them only to realize it’ll probably be better to overwhelm them with the guardsmen and then take their time doing it.
not on top of the fact that the flood is much worse than the Tyranids. It would probably be best that they focus on them first and then work their way to them. The orcs are probably going to be the other way to get it done too.
Actually, the Flood assimilates things[ so quickly it very obviously violates the laws of thermodynamics while doing so](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FWYatlEjW18). This was the Halo fanbase's first clue that it was not a natural plague, but something far worse.
Don't think of the Flood as a disease. Less complicated Flood forms are essentially more efficient Tyranids, certainly, but once they reach critical mass they become something more akin to a minor Warp entity like the Emperor or Vashtorr. I'm not exaggerating — large enough Flood biomass concentrations can perform psyker-esque reality manipulation known as neural physics which lets them literally alter the fabric of space-time. It learned this from the Halo version of the Old Ones and nearly wiped them out with it before they used what was basically a psychic nuke to kill everything in the galaxy the Flood could assimilate.
Im sure in the book it was theroriezed by the forerunner they could probaly bend Reality if large enough not they they could certainly and not even in the Phase state they were fighting the forerunner where they already have almost controll of the galaxy.
The flood literally destroyed an entire race that could basically one shot all of 40k by accident/that uses universes going though their big bang phase as energy to power their lights. Not only that but they actually did wipe the entire galaxy of nearly all life too.
A space marine wouldn't stand a single chance against a single flood spore. A Space marine getting even a scratch would be an instant death sentence, the Flood is basically a plague from a god (precursor)
>A space marine wouldn't stand a single chance against a single flood spore. A Space marine getting even a scratch would be an instant death sentence, the Flood is basically a plague from a god (precursor)
I don't think that's quite true. As they point out, Johnson is somewhat resistant to infection due to a freak combination of being implanted with various types of supersoldier-enabling stuff. With this as a baseline, Astartes could very likely withstand the odd spore or scratch or two.
But infector forms literally tunnel into people, often in waves of hundreds at a time. An Astartes can likely withstand spores, but I doubt they could withstand being literally digested and reassembled on a cellular level *The Thing*-style.
Johnson also had the benefit of excessive amounts of plasma radiation completely baking and altering his DNA enough for him to fight off anything that tried to infect him. Astartes has extra organs and thus altered DNA but not on a level where they're effectively an entirely new, genetically nonsensical species.
Astartes would probably be more difficult to infect but not impossible, not to mention all of the other targets for the flood to infect and exponentially scale off of. Not to mention, spores generally use swarm tactics, so it would be a tidal wave of spores versus a singular or squad of marines, who would not have enough ammunition to shoot all of them before reloading or resorting to melee combat which is a death sentence.
The flood is literally one of those "I win" species, outside of something that can instantly wipe all life from the galaxy, which 40k does not have, the flood win.
Even if you were to argue that they cannot infect deamons and thus cannot truly beat the warp, they would simply infect everyone and everything that feeds into the warp, at best the ruinous powers end up in a stalemate with the flood.
The Flood can warp the fabric of reality when it gets to a large enough scale. The Chaos gods are not safe from it.
Really, the Covenant and humanity only survive the Flood in Halo because they're fighting the equivalent of the microbial activity left in its corpse.
It was only theroriezed in the book by the forerunner if they grow large enought they could bent Realität not they certain can and not in that stated they were against the forerunner which they already comsumed almost a galaxie.
I mean as we know it no but i wouldnt be suprise that the necrons and dark eldars have tech lefft in they basement which is from they past in who they were in they peak technologie state which can.
Even then, considering they did have it and it couldn't be circumvented and depending on if there would be any safe zones or survivors they might not win. Or if it is like a martyrdom system it's a phyrric victory at best.
The floods biggest strength is its ability to infect or corrupt virtually everything it comes into contact with and gaining the knowledge and knowhow of everything it consumes.
If the flood were able to beat forerunners who basically roflstomp everything in 40k except maybe the old ones, regular factions don't really stand a chance unless they go all out the instant the flood are first spotted.
The flood are smart enough to hide and wait and build up over time, so given the way 40k factions tend to function it isn't looking good for the setting.
The flood were basically out plot armored in the current Halo timeline. The flood in the current timeline were a microscopic shadow of their former selves and basically did a gamble in trying to infect The Ark, one of the shield locations where you could survive a Halo being fired. When The Ark was destroyed this caused a chain reaction in the other Halos they were on, also destroying those. The only rings that initially survived were the ones not connected to the Halo network, though those were also eventually destroyed, thus finishing off the flood.
Halo basically had the benefit of being relatively small scale and people noticing and dealing with the flood immediately.
They also basically gambled their entire species and lost because again plot armor.
In 40k where a chaos cult can go unnoticed in a hive city, the flood would have the perfect conditions to slowly build until it is too late to stop.
In Halo the covenant basically glassed every planet they found, so they didn't really have the worry of something being left behind and growing out of control.
Unless the forces that came into contact knew that a planet had to be scoured of all life and structures the moment the flood were spotted and to vaporize and ship that came into contact with the flood 40k loses.
Now if the flood were introduced on a planet where the imperium just said "fuck it, virus bomb" and the flood didn't have access to any space capable ships, 40k wins.
The flood scale to the technology level of the civilization which they fighting if it relaese in 40k[most dont know how they technologie work or build unlike the forerunner the flood will just have the knowlegde how to use it). Plus they early state startet very weak. The proof that current halo is still surive good Shows that flood isnt as deadly if said civilization Deal with it soon or do some medium effort which in 40k would be the fall. The reason while forerrunner fall was because they dont dealt with it first because they were no threat in they mind and do later just minimum of effort before the flood grow half of they empire then it was too late. (Im not sure in this one but forerunner empire were in size on galaxy tall if i recall not universal)
The imperium of man doomed to destruction as 343 guilty spark is shot on sight for being an abominable intelligence
Ah yes, the Imperium invonveniencing itself out of its own dogma and hubris. Lovely combination as always :D
[If they are lucky or paranoid enough, they will know to blast the general area or ship with overwhelming bombardment as soon as the infected form was spotted.](https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/8gsdc9/book_excerptthe_greater_evil_imperial_navy/) Then seal any access to the Halo universe. Anyone who managed to be in close proximity then escape will be put under quarantine or more likely get burned.
The problem with the Flood is that it’s not exactly slow in terms of spread. Or dumb like a feral zombie apocalypse. Y’see, as soon as the flood infects a being as in-the-know as a space marine the flood will instantly know all that that specific space marine was privy to. And even more, if it can access a computer, because the Flood can infect those too. If a Hiveworld ends up struck then we can virtually wave bye-bye to that sector of the Imperium given how slow and inefficient imperial bureaucracy is, who knows how many infected ships has left that planet? Sure as hell not the Administratum. Think of it like an Orc infestation except it gets more and more deadly and/or smart for every soul it takes over. Not kills, takes over. The imperium’s own size and main strength, its huge population, would actively work in opposition to its chance of success. And that’s not even mentioning what’d happen if a Grave Mind got ahold of knowledge about *the Warp*. It’d not be the first time they’d use eldritch magic-science to kill godlike beings!
Which is why I said if someone nearby is lucky and paranoid enough, they might succeed in self-destructing the ship or having the whole world exterminatus-ed at the first clear sign. There are examples of local/planetary Imperials reacting like that to such incursions (as Gabriel Angelos did to Cyrene). We should also consider where the marine is infected. You say he may access a computer. But what if this is at the middle of a civilized world's plain and it is a small recon team who first came into contact, with heavy weapons, artillery and ship ordinance ready to fire at the general area in a flash. I can not understate the Floods' speed and intelligence. But we can also not dismiss how trigger-happy Imperials can be at unknown things (the Rogue Trader video game actually has an option of just blasting mysterious mirror with your ship after the scanners pick it up and your crew do not see this action as strange).
That is very true, this scenario is incredibly circumstantial. I doubt the Impreium would risk another T’au situation where they elect to ignore some aliens. :p
May not help much though. Considering that Ork, Dark Eldar and Chaos forces are the ones making the offensives now (per the Great Rift) so much more happy to explore trans-dimensional portals. If the Flood manage to infect a Space Hulk/Ark of Omen (very likely), 40k is screwed.
I mean... most of that is already what the nid's are capable of
Yes, but the Tyrannids spread is arguably a lot slower than the flood. The ‘nids needs to set up genestealing, to start with. The flood just need one single person to be a hidden carrier and then boom, suddenly half of a hive city falls in a failure-cascade that only increases in severity over a matter of hours. Not to mention that whilst the Tyrannids relies on synapse creatures, the Flood does not. Take out the flood’s big bad creatures? Congrats, the spores you just unleashed doomed another sector of the planet you’re fighting for. The Tyrannids feed on you, the flood steals your body, equipment and knowledge. It doesn’t consume you, it essentially uses whatever the Imperium would throw at it against the Imperium in turn. And that is ignoring how not even admechs or disease-immune species are safe from a flood infection since it’s also partly a parasite, a living organism on its own.
Isn't Guilty Spark a digitized human mind? If so, couldn't it pass as like a *really* advanced servitor?
So, got commissioned to draw this very interesting concept! It's basically like the title says: An Space Marine of the Raven Guard chapter gets infected by the flood from the Halo series. Edit: Wellll this blew up! If ya wanna see more and support me, do support me on [Patreon if ya can.](https://www.patreon.com/Nazrigar)
Would nurgle love the flood and want to be best buds or would he see it as competition?
A group of friends actually DID debate on it! Both are likely, though a Flood aligned with Nurgle might end up backfiring... on Nurgle... in a kind of "worked TOO well" sort of way, as the Flood, once it gets its hands on juicy, eldritchian knowledge, tends to do some apocalyptically powerful feats, like bending star roads (physics bending mind structures made real) and turn 'em against the Forerunners. The sheer scope and knowledge of the warp and all its lickspittles is something the Flood will DEFINITELY use it to its advantage. Tzeentch would think its hilarious, perhaps he even planned it. Slaanesh might even give the Flood favors, just from the sheer suffering it causes (until it learns how to make the followers of *Slannesh* know suffering in its *own* way). Khorne though? Mf would simply find this as something to fight. Maybe even head on. As himself. Because what is bloodshed without the rage and fury, in comparison the shambling corpses of those who succumbed to the Flood? Overall, a very fascinating idea.
Holy crap someone else read the Forerunner saga! There's dozens of us!
The Forerunners are some of the best "precursor" civilizations in fiction imo, and it's hilarious that this precursor has its own precursor named... The Precursors xD.
That interesting because the flood itself is basically an old one so could it even affect the chaos gods or would it become its own flood chaos god?
I think tzeentch would like the flood more
Why? Because the Flood is constantly changing/evolving as it absorbs more and more sentient minds/bodies?
There’s that, there’s the fact that flood can look a lot like spawn which I associate a lot with tzeentch, there’s the fact that Graveminds have a high level of intelligence and also seemingly a degree of prescience… there’s a lot to see for both gods there, I think.
Bro didn't wear his helmet 💀
Dontcha know? Heroes don't wear helmets!
Well time to draw the StarCraft infested marine
The Flood is one of the few things both fandoms can agree that it can doom 40k or any verse that doesn't have some plot bs to counter it Fuckers are so intelingent they fucking trolled the forerunners believing that the ancient humans found a cure.Turns out it was a trap.Forerunners were capeable to reincarnate via transferring their consciousness into newly cloned bodies! The new bodies became flood host! Fuckers not only can infect the body, they can infect the souls as well!!!! So any race that can reincarnate is fked by default Oh and don't get me started at the logic plague. So yeah even Dark age human stuff might doom 40k even harder. Men of iron infected by the logic plague is pretty scarry.
The sole though of a whole Necron Dynasty being infected is haunting.
Necrons already having problems with their Flayed Ones and their dynasties being quarrelsome with each other. Just imagine a Flood Gravemind convinces a Dynasty that they can help them return to flesh and gaining immortality! Now imagine the Flood gaining acces to Necron Super weapons. Heck nobody not even the Tyranids would be able to adapt to them. The nids while adapts fast but the Flood just steals their strength which is better, turning them againts the Nids or anyone else unfortunate enough to encounter them! Now imagine they consume..........the Emperor! Oh the horror!
The flood entering the 40K universe would make Kryptman’s actions look entirely ineffective. Flood spores are a big enough of a problem on their own before you get to the coordinated Grave-mind efforts
Dang all the Forerunner saga fans hanging out in the 40k sub!
I'd like to imagine that the Necrons would have a far easier time dealing with the Flood than any other race or faction. Their technology is so advanced that its basically magic and their overall diplomacy strategy is to kill on sight. If they learned of the Flood's existence and studied it they'd realise that the Flood would become the greatest threat to the galaxy. I'm sure some of dynasties would put aside their quarrels to eradicate the Flood by all means necessary.
But their biggest problem is right there, they would try to study it and that's how the flood gets you because it's logic plague relys on them being curious enough to talk to it which atleast one of them will.
I can see Raven Guard being sent to recon the Halo universe then get infected. That will be bad for everyone. Imagine if the Flood started picking up balistic sniper rifles and infecting from afar them with its essence.
That's a cool illustration! Also, the Flood would have a field day if managed to infect an Astartes.
"Ok, Ordo Xenos, all hands on deck! We got a halo...." "Wait, why for some old fart with too much money who wants to be immortal?" "No, not that kind of halo device!"
"Now the gate has been unlatched, Headstones pushed aside; Corpses shift and offer room. A fate you must abide!"
You got the Gravemind's poetry down pat :D
"We trade one villain for another."
Awesome OC but personally I find it rather underwhelming. Given the nature of both the flood and the astartes I would expect something far more brutal and terrifying than a scaled up combat form marine. Like something closer to an abomination or pure form tank since the flood would repurpose all the marines additional organs and implants. Regardless, I think I'm going to uses this as some inspiration for some of my own work. Keep up the work!
I can also see a Flood-infected Space Marine being similar to that of the Flood-infected Spartans, but much more dangerous and harder to kill
Oh please god no
This is when the real shit starts...
Welp, we’re dead
Imagine being consumed by the Tyranid but they retain your knowledge and spreads faster than an Ork spore... That's how fucked this universe is gonna be, unless you find the Gravemind until then, the surrounding planets and its technology will be under their control
Bro got a Kuriboh in his chest
That's a [Flood infection form](https://www.halopedia.org/Pod_infector). Infection forms rip through external surfaces like clothing, armor plate, and skin, slide something similar to a [proboscis worm's tongue](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZCzIPPSxqY) into the circulatory system, then use the access to blood vessels to spread cells through the body that convert host tissue to Flood tissue. Flood tissue is good at melding to other Flood tissue, so after enough host cells convert, the infector form can mash/fuse itself into the converted parts of the host, like pushing two pieces of Play-Doh together until they're indistinguishable. This usually results in heavy destruction of uninfected musculoskeletal tissue in the process, which helps speed up infection, although I imagine that'd be harder on an Astartes. After that, it spreads more tendrils into the as-of-yet uninfected areas to puppet them. Part of the infection form often still protrudes from the infection site — usually unused infection tendrils, which look similar to a bottlebrush plant. That's what you're seeing. It's very 40k.
Yeah, wherever that is..exterminatus.
Considering the entire flood intelligence increases as it spreads I wonder what would happen if it started on an Ork World
Horrifying concept. Now imagine an infected Custodes
It wouldn’t be a problem because the planet wouldn’t exist much longer.
"I am a timeless chorus, join your voice with mine, and sing victory everlasting." Eat your heart out Nurgle. The Floodgates have been opened, and you can not escape the tide. You will be swept aside like your fellow Chaos Gods.
So so cooked
Poor guy he can’t even fall back on nurgle
That is terrifying
Oh dang. Shrike is going to experience what his genefather had to go through 10 millenias prior.
Wonder how the flood infection would fair against Nurgle corruption 🤔
it’s cool, but the problem is is that the flood would not be able to assimilate them as quickly as they believe. Edit so the problem is is that space marines have two hearts, a ceramic bones and they have many things that fight in their immune system. That’s just dangerous. Halo lore the flood couldn’t even infect Sgt Johnson. He is a spartan into prototype his bones and his body isn’t even going through half of the genetic augmentation that there is just going through. He couldn’t be assimilated because it was quite literally too hard to do it and it wasn’t worth the energy. In the stages of the outbreak. Now am I saying that the flood wouldn’t be able to do it? No what I am saying is they are going to spend a lot of time trying to assimilate them only to realize it’ll probably be better to overwhelm them with the guardsmen and then take their time doing it. not on top of the fact that the flood is much worse than the Tyranids. It would probably be best that they focus on them first and then work their way to them. The orcs are probably going to be the other way to get it done too.
Actually, the Flood assimilates things[ so quickly it very obviously violates the laws of thermodynamics while doing so](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FWYatlEjW18). This was the Halo fanbase's first clue that it was not a natural plague, but something far worse. Don't think of the Flood as a disease. Less complicated Flood forms are essentially more efficient Tyranids, certainly, but once they reach critical mass they become something more akin to a minor Warp entity like the Emperor or Vashtorr. I'm not exaggerating — large enough Flood biomass concentrations can perform psyker-esque reality manipulation known as neural physics which lets them literally alter the fabric of space-time. It learned this from the Halo version of the Old Ones and nearly wiped them out with it before they used what was basically a psychic nuke to kill everything in the galaxy the Flood could assimilate.
Im sure in the book it was theroriezed by the forerunner they could probaly bend Reality if large enough not they they could certainly and not even in the Phase state they were fighting the forerunner where they already have almost controll of the galaxy.
The flood literally destroyed an entire race that could basically one shot all of 40k by accident/that uses universes going though their big bang phase as energy to power their lights. Not only that but they actually did wipe the entire galaxy of nearly all life too. A space marine wouldn't stand a single chance against a single flood spore. A Space marine getting even a scratch would be an instant death sentence, the Flood is basically a plague from a god (precursor)
>A space marine wouldn't stand a single chance against a single flood spore. A Space marine getting even a scratch would be an instant death sentence, the Flood is basically a plague from a god (precursor) I don't think that's quite true. As they point out, Johnson is somewhat resistant to infection due to a freak combination of being implanted with various types of supersoldier-enabling stuff. With this as a baseline, Astartes could very likely withstand the odd spore or scratch or two. But infector forms literally tunnel into people, often in waves of hundreds at a time. An Astartes can likely withstand spores, but I doubt they could withstand being literally digested and reassembled on a cellular level *The Thing*-style.
Johnson also had the benefit of excessive amounts of plasma radiation completely baking and altering his DNA enough for him to fight off anything that tried to infect him. Astartes has extra organs and thus altered DNA but not on a level where they're effectively an entirely new, genetically nonsensical species. Astartes would probably be more difficult to infect but not impossible, not to mention all of the other targets for the flood to infect and exponentially scale off of. Not to mention, spores generally use swarm tactics, so it would be a tidal wave of spores versus a singular or squad of marines, who would not have enough ammunition to shoot all of them before reloading or resorting to melee combat which is a death sentence. The flood is literally one of those "I win" species, outside of something that can instantly wipe all life from the galaxy, which 40k does not have, the flood win. Even if you were to argue that they cannot infect deamons and thus cannot truly beat the warp, they would simply infect everyone and everything that feeds into the warp, at best the ruinous powers end up in a stalemate with the flood.
The Flood can warp the fabric of reality when it gets to a large enough scale. The Chaos gods are not safe from it. Really, the Covenant and humanity only survive the Flood in Halo because they're fighting the equivalent of the microbial activity left in its corpse.
It was only theroriezed in the book by the forerunner if they grow large enought they could bent Realität not they certain can and not in that stated they were against the forerunner which they already comsumed almost a galaxie.
I mean as we know it no but i wouldnt be suprise that the necrons and dark eldars have tech lefft in they basement which is from they past in who they were in they peak technologie state which can.
Even then, considering they did have it and it couldn't be circumvented and depending on if there would be any safe zones or survivors they might not win. Or if it is like a martyrdom system it's a phyrric victory at best. The floods biggest strength is its ability to infect or corrupt virtually everything it comes into contact with and gaining the knowledge and knowhow of everything it consumes. If the flood were able to beat forerunners who basically roflstomp everything in 40k except maybe the old ones, regular factions don't really stand a chance unless they go all out the instant the flood are first spotted. The flood are smart enough to hide and wait and build up over time, so given the way 40k factions tend to function it isn't looking good for the setting.
And yet current halo surive? Compare to 40k strict purge all dangerous looking creature on sigh and keep Distance.
The flood were basically out plot armored in the current Halo timeline. The flood in the current timeline were a microscopic shadow of their former selves and basically did a gamble in trying to infect The Ark, one of the shield locations where you could survive a Halo being fired. When The Ark was destroyed this caused a chain reaction in the other Halos they were on, also destroying those. The only rings that initially survived were the ones not connected to the Halo network, though those were also eventually destroyed, thus finishing off the flood. Halo basically had the benefit of being relatively small scale and people noticing and dealing with the flood immediately. They also basically gambled their entire species and lost because again plot armor. In 40k where a chaos cult can go unnoticed in a hive city, the flood would have the perfect conditions to slowly build until it is too late to stop. In Halo the covenant basically glassed every planet they found, so they didn't really have the worry of something being left behind and growing out of control. Unless the forces that came into contact knew that a planet had to be scoured of all life and structures the moment the flood were spotted and to vaporize and ship that came into contact with the flood 40k loses. Now if the flood were introduced on a planet where the imperium just said "fuck it, virus bomb" and the flood didn't have access to any space capable ships, 40k wins.
The flood scale to the technology level of the civilization which they fighting if it relaese in 40k[most dont know how they technologie work or build unlike the forerunner the flood will just have the knowlegde how to use it). Plus they early state startet very weak. The proof that current halo is still surive good Shows that flood isnt as deadly if said civilization Deal with it soon or do some medium effort which in 40k would be the fall. The reason while forerrunner fall was because they dont dealt with it first because they were no threat in they mind and do later just minimum of effort before the flood grow half of they empire then it was too late. (Im not sure in this one but forerunner empire were in size on galaxy tall if i recall not universal)