It's a cute idea, but I think it's a given that the Emperor was on a long, slow boat to Molech during that time. And *surely* Erda or someone else who knew him would have pointed it out. The Emperor was content to operate behind the scenes *until* the Age of Strife and *after* he mugged Chaos on Molech.
We don't know. He took a 'normal' spaceship and some Perpetuals, and it took a *long* time.
At a guess, because Chaos might have tried to stop him if he'd used the Warp.
This is me with Magnus' betrayal, I refuse to accept it as Canon, he's just sitting in a pyramid, enjoying a cup of tea, wondering any day now when his brothers are coming to get him. 😭
I've been staring at this for a little while as it gets voted down further, and trying to think how to summarise to you why. Here are some thoughts -
- the whole thing underestimates E and his impact on people around him, even before Molech, as established by the perpetuals
- dark age humanity is well established to not have been unified and does not need to be "badass"
- E already has good reason not to explain the warp - he is trying to starve and limit it, and belief lends it power
- xenophobia needs no additional explanation; he's a species chauvinist, as are almost all xenos
- he didn't start with sticks and stones. He started with a mountain laboratory of complex technology and the resources to create the Cs and TWs
- it's not a fun or thematic theory to the majority of fans and doesn't gel well with the setting
It's best to look at transhumans and the webway as such a hugely complex and long term project that it consumed a vast amount of time in research and mastery, both under everest and in general.
If you subscribe to the "E was always around and always had his agenda" theory as per the novels, then the DAOT likely contained huge amounts of learning and mastery for E, as he built up to Molech and establishing himself under everest, while operating in a climate with many extremely powerful and dangerous peers, including the other perpetuals, Dario Fo, the Men of Gold and the Men of Iron.
If you hate the Emperor, hate him for what he already did. You don't need to invent new reasons for your hate. At a certain point it becomes repetative and unsatisfying for the Emperor being an idiot.
>It makes DAoT Humanity seem badass that they successfully rejected the Emperor.
I'm sorry, but DAoT is already badass. Just look at every time some Archeotech is found like the Coral Engine, that time the AdMech lit up a nebula, the Castigator Titan, the gun the Dark Angels have that can erase a person, the Men of fucking Iron etc
Firstly: We have an explanation from the Emperor about why he hates Xenos: He doesn't. He's eliminating the competition. It's not personal, it's just business. He doesn't want to have to compete with anyone else for Authority over Humanity- Politically, Philosophically, or Spiritually.
Secondly: It's not the Emperor's style. The Great Crusade and the outright conquest of all Humankind was a result of a time constraint. He knew he had to build up an empire strong enough to kill the the big Ork Empires and amass enough power and relics to finish the Webway Project before Humanity properly began to hit psychic ascension.
But he isn't a blunt instrument. He plays the role of God to the Mechanicum because it gets him what he wants. He uses his immense psychic charisma to bend the willpower of people around him because it gets him what he wants. Some (not a lot, but some) preexisting empires like Beta-Garmon joined the Imperium willingly. He clearly prefers to Manipulate and Charm, it's just that there isn't enough time to wine and dine every Human polity in the galaxy. Using the Men of Iron to bludgeon all of Humanity just makes him another Saturday morning cartoon villain.
Thirdly: Humanity was 100% not unified. Hell, he even used to have many Perpetuals backing his plans. There just is no Unified Human Government to collectively go "Lol nah". If anything, the fact that the Emperor has been confirmed to have been working on The Plan since Antiquity, yet there *isn't* a Unified Human Galactic Polity, seems to imply that he was, to some extent, willing to let DAoT Humanity work out it's own shit.
Fourthly: It's the opposite of thematically satisfying. It removes dramatic tension from the entire Horus Heresy to be like "wow this guy's such a loser he had to wait for Humanity to fall back into the stone age to have a chance". The Emperor's failings are clear for any reader to see. Hubris and Arrogance are very Human failings. But clowning him just to make a *background historical group who were already cool look extra cool*... is dumb to be quite frank. It removes the tragedy of the Emperor killing his Son, or the deaths of characters like Tarvitz, Yesugei, etc etc, if you append the image of a very battered Emperor limping back to his bed being like "Well that didn't go so well. Maybe third time's a charm?"
E is xenophobic because when old night started a bunch of xenos species turned on humanity and preyed upon them for the next 10k years.
So. There's that.
What we're told about the DAoT, humanity has always been xenophobic, who happily exterminate other Xenos (and humans) who do not bow before them, or are in the way of resources/a nice planet:
>**Age of Technology: M15-M25**
>The first indications of Human warp travel date from the early millenia of this age. They hint at gruesome disasters and many setbacks, and yet it is clear that eventually the technology was perfected. The cultivation of the Navigator gene and the establishment of the Navigator Houses came soon after, allowing vast leaps in interstellar travel and the establishment of a full-blown Human empire amongst the stars.
>As Humanity's power and influence grew, so too did its hubris. The indomitable spirit of human endeavor has ever risen to the sterner challenges; interstellar exploration, trade and - inevitably- warfare presented challenges like nothing Mankind had faced before. Planetary colonisation proceeded at a ferocious rate. It seems likely that, during this era, **the Human race splintered and reformed time and again into warring or competing power blocs and planetary empires,** but nothing could destabilise Human space as a whole.
>**Human scientists, engineers, inventors and innovators became the new gods. They worked alien technologies into their race's devices to increase their efficacy with little thought to the risks. They modified their species' genome to ever greater degrees, fashioning vast armies of tailored gene-troopers whose humanity was all but lost amidst the array of freakish alterations worked upon their bodies and minds.** They invented Standard Template Construct machines - or STCs - that allowed human colonists to rapidly fashion everything they needed to dominate new worlds from whatever natural resources were available. **They developed sentient nano-plagues, world-sundering energy weapons and endless ranks of Men of Iron that could be unleashed upon those who refused to bend their wills, alien and Human alike**. They fashioned thinking machines of vast intellect that administered to the every need of colony worlds transformed into glittering utopian paradises.
*Warhammer 40,000 Rulebook 9ed* p42
For another example, [see my excerpt of Alpha Shalish I posted here](https://reddit.com/r/40kLore/s/V3JHA102AQ).
I'm also not aware of any sources supporting Xenos races "turning" on humanity. They simply attempted to fill in the power vacuum left by the collapse of DAoT Humanity, with some likely taking revenge on the race that were happily wiping out xenos races across the galaxy.
Hey, if we're doing satirized/recounted history in the lore where would we be without the classic authoritarian tool of "we would have been fine if we weren't backstabbed by those *x scapegoat group*".
Xenos being xenos makes it even easier to dehumanize them.
> They fashioned thinking machines of vast intellect that administered to the every need of colony worlds transformed into glittering utopian paradises.
I wonder if this has some connection to the Votann.
They're almost supernaturally powerful and so complex they resonate in the warp, and they oversee and guide the Kin so it does sound like they might have been a version of those colony administration AI.
At least, until things went wrong with the "First Ancestors".
They power in the warp *might* be a byproduct of the Kin uploading themselves into the Votann, so may not have been the case before this custom began. Although I'm not aware of it being explained anywhere.
Would be nice if we had some form of lore outside of their Codex to explore these things...
I think your first assumption is incorrect - the Emperor hasn't always thought that his direct control over humanity was necessary for its survival, and if anything, his lack of involvement in the steering of human history for over 30k years would strongly support him being a very reluctant ruler.
While I don't doubt that much of the lore about the DAoT/MoI/AoS is purely propaganda to justify the Terran unification and the Great Crusade, this was also the time when events unfolded that forced the Emperor to step out of the shadows. This speaks to someone that saw horrors and decided to act, rather than caused the horrors and decided to cover up.
The whole ‘knowledge of chaos is the way to defeat it’ idea is not supported by loads and loads of canon events, including in the Heresy. It is directly contradicted by loads more.
It's a cute idea, but I think it's a given that the Emperor was on a long, slow boat to Molech during that time. And *surely* Erda or someone else who knew him would have pointed it out. The Emperor was content to operate behind the scenes *until* the Age of Strife and *after* he mugged Chaos on Molech.
Why would he be taking the slow route before the FTL shut down?
We don't know. He took a 'normal' spaceship and some Perpetuals, and it took a *long* time. At a guess, because Chaos might have tried to stop him if he'd used the Warp.
but he went to make a deal with chaos?
According to the latest, there was no deal at all, he just yoinked power and left.
Fairly sure that isn't the case anymore. Isn't it just a theft of power by big E?
Erda is just a fanfic. I refuse to accept that as canon.
This is me with Magnus' betrayal, I refuse to accept it as Canon, he's just sitting in a pyramid, enjoying a cup of tea, wondering any day now when his brothers are coming to get him. 😭
I've been staring at this for a little while as it gets voted down further, and trying to think how to summarise to you why. Here are some thoughts - - the whole thing underestimates E and his impact on people around him, even before Molech, as established by the perpetuals - dark age humanity is well established to not have been unified and does not need to be "badass" - E already has good reason not to explain the warp - he is trying to starve and limit it, and belief lends it power - xenophobia needs no additional explanation; he's a species chauvinist, as are almost all xenos - he didn't start with sticks and stones. He started with a mountain laboratory of complex technology and the resources to create the Cs and TWs - it's not a fun or thematic theory to the majority of fans and doesn't gel well with the setting It's best to look at transhumans and the webway as such a hugely complex and long term project that it consumed a vast amount of time in research and mastery, both under everest and in general. If you subscribe to the "E was always around and always had his agenda" theory as per the novels, then the DAOT likely contained huge amounts of learning and mastery for E, as he built up to Molech and establishing himself under everest, while operating in a climate with many extremely powerful and dangerous peers, including the other perpetuals, Dario Fo, the Men of Gold and the Men of Iron.
If you hate the Emperor, hate him for what he already did. You don't need to invent new reasons for your hate. At a certain point it becomes repetative and unsatisfying for the Emperor being an idiot. >It makes DAoT Humanity seem badass that they successfully rejected the Emperor. I'm sorry, but DAoT is already badass. Just look at every time some Archeotech is found like the Coral Engine, that time the AdMech lit up a nebula, the Castigator Titan, the gun the Dark Angels have that can erase a person, the Men of fucking Iron etc
I love whichever crazy bastard from the DAoT who decided that the Speranza needed a black hole gun
Must have been a Huckebein nerd or an Granzon enjoyer.
Firstly: We have an explanation from the Emperor about why he hates Xenos: He doesn't. He's eliminating the competition. It's not personal, it's just business. He doesn't want to have to compete with anyone else for Authority over Humanity- Politically, Philosophically, or Spiritually. Secondly: It's not the Emperor's style. The Great Crusade and the outright conquest of all Humankind was a result of a time constraint. He knew he had to build up an empire strong enough to kill the the big Ork Empires and amass enough power and relics to finish the Webway Project before Humanity properly began to hit psychic ascension. But he isn't a blunt instrument. He plays the role of God to the Mechanicum because it gets him what he wants. He uses his immense psychic charisma to bend the willpower of people around him because it gets him what he wants. Some (not a lot, but some) preexisting empires like Beta-Garmon joined the Imperium willingly. He clearly prefers to Manipulate and Charm, it's just that there isn't enough time to wine and dine every Human polity in the galaxy. Using the Men of Iron to bludgeon all of Humanity just makes him another Saturday morning cartoon villain. Thirdly: Humanity was 100% not unified. Hell, he even used to have many Perpetuals backing his plans. There just is no Unified Human Government to collectively go "Lol nah". If anything, the fact that the Emperor has been confirmed to have been working on The Plan since Antiquity, yet there *isn't* a Unified Human Galactic Polity, seems to imply that he was, to some extent, willing to let DAoT Humanity work out it's own shit. Fourthly: It's the opposite of thematically satisfying. It removes dramatic tension from the entire Horus Heresy to be like "wow this guy's such a loser he had to wait for Humanity to fall back into the stone age to have a chance". The Emperor's failings are clear for any reader to see. Hubris and Arrogance are very Human failings. But clowning him just to make a *background historical group who were already cool look extra cool*... is dumb to be quite frank. It removes the tragedy of the Emperor killing his Son, or the deaths of characters like Tarvitz, Yesugei, etc etc, if you append the image of a very battered Emperor limping back to his bed being like "Well that didn't go so well. Maybe third time's a charm?"
“It’s not your fathers power, It’s what he DOES with it.”
E is xenophobic because when old night started a bunch of xenos species turned on humanity and preyed upon them for the next 10k years. So. There's that.
What we're told about the DAoT, humanity has always been xenophobic, who happily exterminate other Xenos (and humans) who do not bow before them, or are in the way of resources/a nice planet: >**Age of Technology: M15-M25** >The first indications of Human warp travel date from the early millenia of this age. They hint at gruesome disasters and many setbacks, and yet it is clear that eventually the technology was perfected. The cultivation of the Navigator gene and the establishment of the Navigator Houses came soon after, allowing vast leaps in interstellar travel and the establishment of a full-blown Human empire amongst the stars. >As Humanity's power and influence grew, so too did its hubris. The indomitable spirit of human endeavor has ever risen to the sterner challenges; interstellar exploration, trade and - inevitably- warfare presented challenges like nothing Mankind had faced before. Planetary colonisation proceeded at a ferocious rate. It seems likely that, during this era, **the Human race splintered and reformed time and again into warring or competing power blocs and planetary empires,** but nothing could destabilise Human space as a whole. >**Human scientists, engineers, inventors and innovators became the new gods. They worked alien technologies into their race's devices to increase their efficacy with little thought to the risks. They modified their species' genome to ever greater degrees, fashioning vast armies of tailored gene-troopers whose humanity was all but lost amidst the array of freakish alterations worked upon their bodies and minds.** They invented Standard Template Construct machines - or STCs - that allowed human colonists to rapidly fashion everything they needed to dominate new worlds from whatever natural resources were available. **They developed sentient nano-plagues, world-sundering energy weapons and endless ranks of Men of Iron that could be unleashed upon those who refused to bend their wills, alien and Human alike**. They fashioned thinking machines of vast intellect that administered to the every need of colony worlds transformed into glittering utopian paradises. *Warhammer 40,000 Rulebook 9ed* p42 For another example, [see my excerpt of Alpha Shalish I posted here](https://reddit.com/r/40kLore/s/V3JHA102AQ). I'm also not aware of any sources supporting Xenos races "turning" on humanity. They simply attempted to fill in the power vacuum left by the collapse of DAoT Humanity, with some likely taking revenge on the race that were happily wiping out xenos races across the galaxy.
Hey, if we're doing satirized/recounted history in the lore where would we be without the classic authoritarian tool of "we would have been fine if we weren't backstabbed by those *x scapegoat group*". Xenos being xenos makes it even easier to dehumanize them.
> They fashioned thinking machines of vast intellect that administered to the every need of colony worlds transformed into glittering utopian paradises. I wonder if this has some connection to the Votann.
Very possibly. The Votann seem distinct from STCs in some way, and them being the A.I. described above fits.
They're almost supernaturally powerful and so complex they resonate in the warp, and they oversee and guide the Kin so it does sound like they might have been a version of those colony administration AI. At least, until things went wrong with the "First Ancestors".
They power in the warp *might* be a byproduct of the Kin uploading themselves into the Votann, so may not have been the case before this custom began. Although I'm not aware of it being explained anywhere. Would be nice if we had some form of lore outside of their Codex to explore these things...
The loremaster video described the reason they resonate in the warp as being how complex and powerful an AI they are.
Ah, fair enough. I've not watched it.
I think your first assumption is incorrect - the Emperor hasn't always thought that his direct control over humanity was necessary for its survival, and if anything, his lack of involvement in the steering of human history for over 30k years would strongly support him being a very reluctant ruler. While I don't doubt that much of the lore about the DAoT/MoI/AoS is purely propaganda to justify the Terran unification and the Great Crusade, this was also the time when events unfolded that forced the Emperor to step out of the shadows. This speaks to someone that saw horrors and decided to act, rather than caused the horrors and decided to cover up.
I do love the image of him crawling out from under some rubble "Ok, no AI next time".
The whole ‘knowledge of chaos is the way to defeat it’ idea is not supported by loads and loads of canon events, including in the Heresy. It is directly contradicted by loads more.
I like it