Heresy Outcome

[Pacific81]

I suppose in a rational world, one where Chaos gods don't exist - i.e. ours (at least I hope so!) there wouldn't be anything wrong with pushing for an Imperial Truth-type 'enlightenment'. 

 

However, knowing that there are literal demons, of the sort straight from a 12th century church painting, and that he himself is essentially not a 'rational' being (as something that's psychic and immortal) - and that to maintain the empire all of the craft have to travel through seas of those demons that would destroy them but for magic shield technology - then yeah that does sound kind of a stupid to go on that premise for building a future empire. 

 

I think what I usually take from this kind of discussion is that we are giving way, way more thought and analysis to the story than the people that wrote it initially, and the moment you start giving it a shake and looking too closely then you start seeing the cracks. 

[SkimaskMohawk]

I honestly feel like the emperor wanted to shift humanity into the webway. The whole procession zephon sees and describes as a labyrinths is too important and too isolated. And also isn't in a shipyard in any way.

[Kizzdougs]

I still don't know what Emperor's plan actually was:

1. Taking human nature into account, Imperial Truth was just laughably impossible to implement. People just NEED to believe in something and you just cannot erease concept of soul from human mind + even if IT was enforced, it is just impossible to monitor every human being on every planet for any signs of religious activity. Not to mention hiden cults etc.  

2. Unless Emperor's plan was to hide all humans in the Webway I can't see how Webway Project and getting rid of psykers would succeed in denying Chaos gods. I mean, they don't really need psykers to influence humans or to manifest in reality.

 

So?

I think the Imperial Truth was designed to stop humanity fuelling the Chaos Gods while the Emperor worked on establishing a Webway Empire. It wasn't necessarily a long term plan and it didn't have to be perfectly and completely enforced, it just had to stifle the majority of emotions that would strengthen the Chaos Gods for long enough for the Emperor to realise his longterm plan. Humanity was the most virile and of the races at the time of the Great Crusade and represented the greatest opportunity for the Chaos Goads to grow in power. The Emperor had to limit this potential until he had everything in order. Once Humanity was safely hidden away in the Webway, the Imperial Truth would be less of a necessity and the Emperor could probably be a bit more open about the nature of Chaos etc.

 

And yes, I believe that at least the majority if not all of humanity would have lived inside the Webway if the plan had gone to script.

[noigrim]

While the custodes are powerful and all they couldn't have turned the tide on their own. And the Emperor specifically says in the book that without the webway the imperium is doomed since he cant eradicate all psykers and cut humanity away from chaos

[Ascanius]

Even if humanity didn't live within the Webway en masse . . .

 

Imperial Truth enforced throughout the Imperium + all psykers identified and relocated to the Webway + Warp transit no longer required = Chaos effectively cut off from humanity (at least in theory!).

 

The Emperor would be aware that all human emotion feeds Chaos, but think of Chaos like an ocean. Regular humans might splash around in the surf on the beach, but those are literally the shallows and not much of a danger to themselves or others. The odd person goes out too far and gets caught in a riptide and drowns, but realistically the numbers are pretty low.

 

Psykers are like divers, plumbing the depths at an increasing risk - and in this analogy, the traditions of the Rune Priests and Stormseers are like SCUBA gear and safety protocols that protect divers from getting into trouble. For comparison, the unfettered explorations of the Thousand Sons are more like freedivers trying to do it without gear at all, or divers who might have the best gear and go deeper and further than others, but ignore the safety protocols and end up trapped in a cave system they can't find their way back out of.

 

Of course, when a diver screws up it's usually their own life, maybe the lives of their partners, that are put at risk, whereas psykers losing control are like if a diver drowning triggered a tsunami, so the analogy only goes so far!

 

Warp transit is obviously like ocean travel - fairly safe if everything is done properly, but still an essentially perilous endeavour travelling out across a medium that will absolutely kill everyone on board if the ship breaks up. There are no lifeboats in the Immaterium, and sharks are following you all the time.

 

So in this analogy, I guess, the Webway is a network of gravity train routes that bypass the ocean altogether by travelling through the planet - and better yet, one that a much more advanced species already figured out how to build, saving us the trouble of figuring out how you construct a tunnel that can exist in the molten outer core of the planet, below the mantle.

[Jackalwolf]

I covered this topic in the first expedition and got some really solid backing from Laurie Golding:

 

So just thought that after everything that has transcended thus far in the Horus Heresy series we're in a privileged position to start tying knots and understand what the hell is the Emperor about.

 

Particularly, his Great Crusade and the plan for mankind.

 

My understanding is the following:

Humanity is close to ascending to a new level by becoming a psychic race

Currently humanity is not prepared to ascend since they would just fuel the Chaos gods further

The Emperor takes the decision of guiding humanity to that future, by:

Re-uniting humanity and denying the Chaos of necessary emotion via the Imperial Truth and rationality

Making humanity stop depending in the Warp by the use of the webway

Finish his cull of unsanctioned psykers by eliminating all Navigators and Astropaths, hence severing the connection of humanity and Chaos

Starve off the Chaos gods

When humanity is ready and the Chaos gods destroyed or weakened, allow humanity to ascend to it's real potential

That potential could well be everyone is like the Emperor, he is named the "new man" after all in plenty of pieces of lore, so if we reach that point we can fully be human without being slaves to the Warp since we'll be strong enough

 

 

And in simpler terms:

Humanity is a child about to enter teenagehood

There's a lot of bad fellas on the street offering free drugs

Let's keep the kids at home and educate and culture them well

Once they're adults and the drug dealers have starved due to lack of customers, let them roam the streets safe in the knowledge they're stronger and the world less dangerous

 

 

It's not about good or evil for him, it's about necessity. Once we're fully human, we'll be able to be ourselves but until then it's like giving guns to kids in these streets full of drug dealers.

 

To what he said:

 

This is, quite possibly, one of the simplest and best explanations I've ever seen. B)

 

One of my proudest moments as a lore nerd I must admit. All the thread is a good read: https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/thefirstexpedition/the-real-plan-of-the-emperor-t1994.html