Conquering the Warp

[The_son_of_Dorn]

To me the webway was quite simply a better alternative to warp travel, until it could be mastered. Almost like a "backup" means of travel should the warp every become largely disturbed again.

 

With the Warp itself, I always wonder if Khrone, Nurgle, Slaneesh and tzeentch have good counterparts in the warp. Or maybe they themselves would start to reflect benign gods themselves should the positive elements of existence start to overcome the negative.  If the Eldar had good gods or powerful warp entity begins that could keep themselves in check surely humanity could have some (not the Emperor) if the species as a whole pooled their emotions into the collective good.

 

How that would work or even come to pass if it were even possible I haven't the foggiest...........

[Indefragable]

I thought the Emperor planned to “conquer” the warp by ignoring it. Hence the human webway project.

[The_son_of_Dorn]

I have no frame of reference with info. Erm ignoring it may not be his best idea. Then again big E, although very shiny must not been very bright.

[Xisor]

Good call, Phoebus. I'd assumed for a while now (at least since the Silver Throne in "Faith and Fire") that the Great Crusade (and therefore Legions [and therefore Primarchs]) was ultimately - though not only - an investigative tool.

 

The Emperor needed to scour the Galaxy for knowledge about what had happened, about what could and couldn't be done. At or around the time of Ullanor: He got the last piece (or enough) of the puzzle to make a serious go of things, and so retreated to Terra.

 

If taken that way, it adds enough of a degree of uncertainty and vagueness, but also... hope, that the various actions start to become very plausible.

 

It's even more plausible still if the Emperor's understanding of the warp is actually a lot worse than we typically imagine. If he has a mechanical/intuitive grasp of how the warp works, but doesn't have an insight into its 'big picture', he and Magnus could be a lot more similar than either give credit for...

[Phoebus]

To be clear, I think the Great Crusade was investigative tool that rode on the back of a legitimate effort to unify Humanity.

 

Also, I think you hit the nail on the head with your closing point. The Emperor does not have the understanding of the Warp that we often assume him to. His is a struggle to recover long-lost knowledge. His task is to marry that to his own genius and try to guide his species to one of a constantly shrinking number of futures where Chaos don't lead to their downfall. The tragedy of his existence is that the knowledge he finds is incomplete, the artifacts and weapons he devises imperfect, and his power is unable to stop the Ruinous Powers from interfering with his designs. Worst, his precognition forces him to see how increasingly futile his efforts are.

 

That Terra in M31 has slums around the Imperial Palace, or entire armies of the Solar Auxilia fight in archaic formations, or any number of other instances of insanity or anachronism is not proof that the Emperor is some grossly powerful, bumbling idiot. It's a reminder that, for all his genius, the Emperor rose to power in a nightmarish universe ruled by barbarism and ignorance. He is literally trying to make lemonade out of lemons on a galactic scale.

[Scribe]

To me the webway was quite simply a better alternative to warp travel, until it could be mastered. Almost like a "backup" means of travel should the warp every become largely disturbed again.

 

With the Warp itself, I always wonder if Khrone, Nurgle, Slaneesh and tzeentch have good counterparts in the warp. Or maybe they themselves would start to reflect benign gods themselves should the positive elements of existence start to overcome the negative.  If the Eldar had good gods or powerful warp entity begins that could keep themselves in check surely humanity could have some (not the Emperor) if the species as a whole pooled their emotions into the collective good.

 

How that would work or even come to pass if it were even possible I haven't the foggiest...........

 

They do, but already absorbed into the greater emotional vortex.

 

Khorne is not just Rage, but Honour, and Courage, and the rest of the Gods had positive facets as well.

 

Dig up a set of the Liber Chaotica.

[b1soul]

I would love to read about Khorne followers who focus on honour and courage...instead of mindless, frothing berserkers like 40K Khârn

[Scribe]

./shrug

 

It's been canonical since the early days. Warrior Cults start out on a path that is righteous and about honour and courage, yadda yadda yadda, turn it up to 11, World Eaters.

 

On a long enough timeline, that's the fate of Chaos worship.

 

I cannot recommend enough, especially the 4th book, on the nature of Tzeentch and the powers of the warp in the Liber Chaotica series.

 

I'm 99% sure it's a huge reference for ADB as well, and is essential understanding for the Warps place in the GW mythos.

[Phoebus]

./shrug

 

It's been canonical since the early days. Warrior Cults start out on a path that is righteous and about honour and courage, yadda yadda yadda, turn it up to 11, World Eaters.

 

On a long enough timeline, that's the fate of Chaos worship.

Spot on, Scribe. Spot on.

[bluntblade]

I suspect that it's a bit difficult to Khorne followers to retain any real honour beyond "that man with a sword is a more worthwhile kill than those civilians. I shall butcher him first!" after a while.

[b1soul]

Every loyalist SM is like a follower of honourable Khorne

[mc warhammer]

I suspect that it's a bit difficult to Khorne followers to retain any real honour beyond "that man with a sword is a more worthwhile kill than those civilians. I shall butcher him first!" after a while.

 

 

maybe not honour in the way we recognise it? but in their own special pov?

[Phoebus]

Here's what it comes down to, and it goes back to Scribe's excellent summary:

Does Khorne benefit from each and every instance of rage and violence? Yes. I suspect that there is a world of difference, however, between that and violence for the sake of violence or actual worship of either the action or the deity behind it.

 

Where those worshippers are concerned, again, on a long enough timeline, it goes so far beyond conventional understandings of honor, etc., that words lose their meaning. Sure, an axeman totally lost to Khorne's cult might think there is "honor" to be found in offering his god the most skulls, but what does that mean when 99.99% of them came in the aftermath of the actual battle, when he was just chasing down desperate women and children?

[drooling blood]

The webway, a side use was travel sure. Its main job was a hide away til humanity, or atleast a select few had changed their ways of thinking, mastered the psykic in relative safety.

You can bet your last dollar, that when that happened. He would unleash the numen on all those still in the galaxy. Just like the thunder warriors, primarchs, sm, navigators. Leaving only a enlightened, trained psyker numan race.

[Ascanius]

The tragedy of his existence is that the knowledge he finds is incomplete, the artifacts and weapons he devises imperfect, and his power is unable to stop the Ruinous Powers from interfering with his designs. Worst, his precognition forces him to see how increasingly futile his efforts are.

 

I think the real tragedy of his existence is that he's as determined to enslave humanity to his own design as any Chaos god.

[The_son_of_Dorn]

Humanity as a whole is like a naughty Child. Big E has stepped in as a parent figure and does NOT mind handing out a spanking.  But the goal is not to encourage resentment, it's to allow for personal development to the point where humanity has enough "self control" both mentally/physically/spiritually (erm, sorta?)  to govern itself as an "adult" race.

 

We're like the Eldar, just in reverse. Where they had to be super self aware because of their inherent powers they got lazy when the immediate threat was removed.

 

Humanity, started lazy then  got proficiently more aggressive/self aware via evolution but if we aren't careful will find ourselves in the same boat as the Eldar.

[Mellow]

"The Emperor's most long-sighted plan to counter the insiduous influences of the Chaos Powers was the creation of the Primarchs: genetically engeneered super-humans with god-like powers. The Emperor's intention was to create a whole race of super-humans from the genetic blueprint of the Primarchs. By making them loyal and strong he hoped that they would prove immune to the malign psychic influences of Chaos."

Realm of Chaos : The Lost and the Damned - page 177.

 

So, genocide's the plan ? You could argue it has been retconned and maybe it has, I don't really know for sure. But the goal in MoM is to colonize the webway, not to conquer the warp.

I always believed His intention was to wait for Humanity to evolve to that level itself rather than “creating them from the Primarch blueprint”

[Phoebus]

mhacdebhandia,

 

What I've always offered is that the Emperor operates on a moral scale beyond that of any normal human being. We think of the rights of the individual, and debate the morality of macro-level decisions made by nation-states, such as when a government is actually justified to wage war. The Emperor's focus is galactic in scale. He's performing triage on a species level. You call it enslavement; he would call it forcibly isolating and indoctrinating us so as to minimize the influence of powers who want to turn everything up to 11 until humanity's faces melt.

 

Ultimately, what the Emperor does is a means to an end, with that end being Humanity completing its painful evolution and being free of Chaos. What Chaos does to human beings IS their end.

[Carach]

the warp wasn't always spilling out into the real world with the eye of terror n all. So i would guess he would of looked to the pylons next - closing up the eye of terror doesn't mean killing the warp, or killing himself, or annihilating all of psychic-kind, but web way obviously was project no.1 of the intergalactic puzzle - other ancient pieces of tech lying about the galaxy he was relying on his sons to research into i guess (Pharos Guilliman was looking into, the space station or the whatever it was that gets battered in Path of Heaven's feint attack was originally looked into and heavily fortified by the Dark Angels, cadian spires etc) whilst he focused on goal no.1 - He could revisit these other pieces of tech after his main job is done, he can't deal with them all at the same time.

 

webway though - infinite space and shelter, far safer, more reliable, quicker travel between the stars - huuuuuge boost in communication and logistics that brings 

[bluntblade]

mhacdebhandia,

 

What I've always offered is that the Emperor operates on a moral scale beyond that of any normal human being. We think of the rights of the individual, and debate the morality of macro-level decisions made by nation-states, such as when a government is actually justified to wage war. The Emperor's focus is galactic in scale. He's performing triage on a species level. You call it enslavement; he would call it forcibly isolating and indoctrinating us so as to minimize the influence of powers who want to turn everything up to 11 until humanity's faces melt.

 

Ultimately, what the Emperor does is a means to an end, with that end being Humanity completing its painful evolution and being free of Chaos. What Chaos does to human beings IS their end.

"Tyranny is the means" - The Emperor of Mankind, circa .005 M31

[Ascanius]

mhacdebhandia,

 

What I've always offered is that the Emperor operates on a moral scale beyond that of any normal human being. We think of the rights of the individual, and debate the morality of macro-level decisions made by nation-states, such as when a government is actually justified to wage war. The Emperor's focus is galactic in scale. He's performing triage on a species level. You call it enslavement; he would call it forcibly isolating and indoctrinating us so as to minimize the influence of powers who want to turn everything up to 11 until humanity's faces melt.

 

Yeah, I mean, that's enslavement.

 

I understand the Emperor's justification for his actions; I just reject it. He may be the most powerful individual to ever arise from the human species, with the best chance of succeeding in his goals, and have the best claim of anyone to the right to make those decisions - but I would argue no individual ever has the right to make those decisions, and that events demonstrated sufficiently that no-one had a chance to succeed in those goals, since he didn't. Therefore he doubly lacked the right to do it.

 

Anyway, humanity would be better off extinct than living in the Emperor's vision of its future, even if he had been able to succeed.

[Mellow]

If He was so clever why then was Terra not a Utopian society? He would certainly have been aware of the technology required to make long term changes. Bearing in mind Humanity was on the rise during the Great Crusade so it wasn’t like the Imperium was besieged constantly.

 

Plus He wanted to give the Imperium over to Human normals to run but leaving it in the post apocalyptic state it was in was hardly sustainable.

[Carach]

@Mellow - he had allowed some 'nations' freedom on Terra to a great degree, he had brought back the oceans as part of longer-term plans to re-terraform(?) the planet

 

There were things rolling to right the wrongs of the past but ultimately he didn't have time to do everything at once. His own view on things was that he didn't want to be knocking around as the head of humanity forever. He merely wanted to secure its survival and stability to a point where he could then probably return to being the faceless man of the previous many thousands of years.

[Ascanius]

I mean, that's what Malcador says he wanted, anyway. Who knows if that's trustworthy?

[bluntblade]

People do appreciate that they're asking how the Emperor didn't manage to make a utopia of Terra in a few centuries after millenia of Mankind blasting itself to ruin, right?