But the thing is, we know two things for certain by Lorefakt*, they lie and they cheat. But on the other hand they live very long lives (as well being able to go under the Haemoculouses knife) and do have the mobility advantage. A space marine is a beast of a man and there is no doubt that one of their elites would be much much stronger than the frail xeno, but in this particular case we are talking about an individual that has been reining champ of 1 v 1 me bro for a couple thousand subrealm of the warp years. Perhaps you are unfamiliar with a favored gladiatorial spectacle of the roman era where a brutish gladiator with sword and shield was pitted against a spear and net fighter, their fight being a dance of asymmetric tactics. Now, on a separate note, Space Marines are indeed tough bastards but unfortunately in the mass of fluff there have been quite overblown depictions of our ever phyrically victorious protagonists. GW themselves must be aware some of their fluff can be easily refered to as bolter porn as they have a sort of exclusive use of unreliable narrators, going so far as to say that some stories may just be propaganda based on something that may or may not have actually happened. The canon parts are the Events, the actual stories are better thought of as "based on a true story" type of inuniverse look at the setting. Point being, since we can reasonably dismiss some depictions of lore we're left with more of a law of averages. A lone Space Marine Captain should not be able to 1 v 1, say, a Bloodthirstier with his bare hands. He's stronger than any human and are indeed capable of being quite quick themselves, but they aren't the unbeatable demigods of loredom that they are sometimes made out to be. So yeah, tough foe to face but besting a space marine captain shouldn't be held as the bar for suedom. *The vain attempt to apply realism to an unreal setting. Example, defining the warp.
Lets see Matt Wards Ultra Smurfs (Uriel Ventris not included) Imperial Fists used as cannon fodder to make other chapters look good The movie Not enough books about imperial fists or Black Templars Dark Angels and their back stabbing way Certain Raven Guards on the forums that seem to think they are alpha legionaries Not knowing who won the 5th chapter vote for loyalists!
The lack of Wh40k licensed apparel but seeings that age of Sigmar got that recently I suppose it's on the way.
In armour, an Astartes has a significant advantage, outside of armour? Well... It really depends on the wargear used. A Craftworld Eldar is physically and mentally faster than an Astartes, except maybe in a straight sprint, since that's more strength than agility based. Dark Eldar have been noted to be physically superior to Craftworld Eldar. Faster, stronger, tougher, more agile, more perceptive. If it's physical in nature, the average Dark Eldar will be better at it than the average Craftworld Eldar. Then there's the fact that Eldar process information far faster than Humans, while this doesn't mean time goes slower to them like you see in movies or read in books, it does technically mean that an Eldar has processed any change in the surroundings faster than the Astartes. A fight between an Astartes and Eldar depends highly on the weapons involved, if they're both "one-shot-kill," weapons it all depends on who hits first. The majority of the time, the Dark Eldar will hit first. We're just lucky that most of the time, Astartes weapons will one-shot any Eldar, while the average Eldar weapon will take a few good hits to bring a Space Marine to his knees. The average Aspect Warrior will give a Tactical Marine a good challenge, the average Dark Eldar Incubi will prove superior to the average Space Marine, a Succubus will run circles around the majority of Astartes.
I believe it is just due to natural selection: there is no place for the weaks in the Dark City, whereas on craftworlds you can walk the path of the dreamer for centuries with no one bothering you
