Malcador: First Lord of the Imperium.

[b1soul]

I think the Emp valued the Primarchs as fine, costly creations...loved like sons does not really jive with how he actually treated them IMO.

 

The Emperor seems more like Yahweh than Jesus if you will. His "love" did not seem to be a warm, fuzzy kind of love. Though I don't think the Emp was quite as robotic as Arkhan Land made him out to be, I really would not compare him to a loving human father. Or perhaps the loving father is one of many facets to the Emp's muti-faceted soul. After all, the original theory is that he's the amalgamation of many shamans.

 

With all that said, just want to point out that Collected Visions needs to be heavily, heavily discounted as Imperial propaganda.

[Scribe]

 

Here's the rub.

 

You are a 30000+ years old Godlike being.

 

You have orchestrated the conquest of the known galaxy.

 

You have ordered genocide, against not just Xenos, but your own race!

 

You have first hand knowledge of a realm beyond reason, and those that dwell there.

 

You have been betrayed, utterly, and your realm cast down.

 

Everything you have worked toward has been lost, irrecoverable.

 

The avatar of your foe stands before you, and you want to tell me human love stays your hand? You, a being who has destroyed millions of not billions with your orders and actions?

 

Sorry, there is no level of hand waving to get me to buy that.

 

You've been a godlike being for 30,000 years. Finally, you decide to save humanity from itself, and create 20 beings that, for the first time in millennia, are actually capable of approaching your own level, rather than the brief, dim light of standard humanity compared to your own. In a horrific accident, they are scattered before you can fully bring them into the world, but you continue on regardless. In a stroke of luck, one of the very first planets you locate outside the Terran solar system is the home to one of these beings, still in his infancy. You take him under your wing, and raise him to be what you've always intended him to be. You fight side-by-side with your son on countless worlds, saving his life, he saving yours in turn. Other Primarchs are located, but none can truly match the bond between you and your first-found. After 30,000 years of loneliness and isolation, you finally have a son. At the height of his triumph, you name him Warmaster so that he may continue the great purpose you have bestowed upon him, to save humanity as you intended, while you return to Terra to see to more arcane purposes.

 

In your laboratory, things degrade. Your son turns against you, alongside 8 of his brothers. He turns your Imperium to ruin, besieging your Palace, and so in a last chance at saving things from ruination, you fight him. He is Chaos Incarnate, but you still see that glimmer of what he was. The one being that you could truly bond with in 30,000 years of existence. The one best hope for humanity, the pinnacle of your work, born from nothing but your genius so that humanity may reclaim its golden age. He was everything you had wanted, everything you had dreamed of, for millennia. If such a paragon can turn, can become what you see in front of you, might it be better that humanity not be destroyed utterly, to let a more deserving species claim its birthright? You've fought for 30,000 years against the darkness, and now your perfect son, the one who was meant to banish the dark alongside you, together, is consumed by it.

 

Then a normal man, one amongst trillions, comes in. He is nothing compared to the abomination before you, and still he fights. He reminds you of the spark that you fight for. There is still hope, and in reminding you of that, it extinguishes the hope you have for Horus. As Horus annihilates the soldier before you, you annihilate him in turn, and consign yourself to fighting for 30,000 years more.

 

 

The Primarch's were not the one hope for Humanity. The Emperor was. Only He could make the Hard Choices as a Hard Man, that were needed.

 

I remain, unmoved. We dont have too long to find out though. :]

[MrDarth151]

Mrdarth151 sums it up perfectly.

 

I have my moments.

 

Few and far between, but I do.

 

 

i'm not so sure that making it 'more ambiguous' in the writing would help. firstly, people are always going to have personal interpretations and those interpretations will always be varied no matter how plainly you think you might be stating something

 

secondly, i worry it might end up being too on-the-nose. if he's overly concerned with hammering a point home, it runs the risk of taking away from adb's style ... and i personally prefer his lighter touch where these things are concerned.

 

The basic question is: What was the intention when writing the Emperor in Master of Mankind? I have talked with A D-B enough to know for sure that he did not intended a decisive portrayal.

 

And on its own, without taking his intention into account, I think the book fails at that, because it doesn't bring enough attention to the idea that different people view the Emperor differently. There is relatively little difference between conversations with Land and conversations with Ra and Diocletian. For all intent and purpose, it does not look like they have different perceptions of him in major fashion.

 

I would have added a single conversation presenting dramatically different view of the Emperor. I would most likely use someone like Zephon to be a point of view character for it. Or, alternatively, a Custodian with different philosophical viewpoint, perhaps someone akin to Valerian from The Emperor's Legion.

 

I think the book has bigger problems than that, and I still consider it the most disappointing HH novel I have read (Though not the worst), but this one would be solved most easily.

 

 

The Primarch's were not the one hope for Humanity. The Emperor was. Only He could make the Hard Choices as a Hard Man, that were needed.

 

You do realise that this statement is usually used to mock people who write this type of character as pointlessly edgy and usually also pointlessly evil, right?

 

 

I remain, unmoved. We dont have too long to find out though. :]

 

Well, for starters, if the Emperor will just go "I never cared for you, sixteen, time to kill ya!" "Insert lighting zap effect", it will render entire Wolfsbane and large parts of Slaves to Darkness entirely pointless waste of time, right?

[Scribe]

Yes, I forgot my /s and/or smiley.

 

I dont think it will be 'I never cared for you', I think there will be some dialogue, some navel gazing, and hopefully some pretty major reveals or issues posed to the Emperor to make him hesitate. Personally, I hope he (Emperor) admits to the collusion with Chaos, just so I can watch the forums burn.

 

To say it was out of misplaced (sorry about half the Empire dad, dont spank me!) affection? I cannot buy that at this point. You go through 50+ books to point out just how damaging, just how lost, just how irreparably busted the Imperium is, how bad the Heresy was...and then you let the Emperor say 'you know what, we can fix this...together'.

 

I'll put the book down and simply walk away from BL at that point with no regrets, because that will easily be the biggest 'you know you screwed up when' they could possibly put out.

[Ascanius]

I can conceive a reimagining of the old lore conversation (you know, the one where they're not father and son, but old friends) where the Emperor's "Why?" isn't the pained lament of a heartbroken father (or friend) but rather an angry demand that Horus explain himself right this minute as to why he'd turn his back on all the power and glory the Emperor gave him* or why he had to ruin the Emperor's scheme by selling himself to Chaos like an idiot.**

 

You know, more fury that Horus has ruined everything in the name of his weakness for petty power than heartsick regret over what his son has become.

 

* Scenario: the Emperor didn't intend for the rebellion to occur.

** Scenario: the Emperor did plan for the rebellion but didn't expect it to be turbo-powered by Chaos.

[mc warhammer]

 

 

i'm not so sure that making it 'more ambiguous' in the writing would help. firstly, people are always going to have personal interpretations and those interpretations will always be varied no matter how plainly you think you might be stating something

 

secondly, i worry it might end up being too on-the-nose. if he's overly concerned with hammering a point home, it runs the risk of taking away from adb's style ... and i personally prefer his lighter touch where these things are concerned.

 

The basic question is: What was the intention when writing the Emperor in Master of Mankind? I have talked with A D-B enough to know for sure that he did not intended a decisive portrayal.

 

 

 

 

 

 i think the basic question was easily understood, i just don't think it's the right question to be asking. 

[DarkChaplain]

Especially in a thread about Malcador.

[Mellow]

OK I’m not saying there’s not a possibility of Him feeling love to His creations but on the flip side isn’t this “love” they feel just a created sensation (like when He pushes the sensation of love into Horus). I mean some people can think of it as love but isn’t there a chance it’s just concern for something He has spent a fair amount of effort creating and wants to make sure it’s dtill functional as a warlord which is its primary objective?

 

Also, I think perspective plays a large part. He treats the Primarchs very nicely at times to their face but behind their back talks about them as creations to not one but several different characters. Just because you think your cold hearted tyrant father loves you doesn’t mean He spends all that time in his Dungeon (shed) telling everyone how great you are.

 

If there’s one true thing it’s that all His creations have life spans in the “master plan”.