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Hey everyone, was reading a thread about the Chaos gods and the Emperor and it got me thinking. The chaos gods have been interfering with the our galaxy for hundreds of thousands of years and they seem quite concentrated on doing everything in their power to destroy it. But the universe is massive with millions of other galexies.

So my question is do the Chaos gods have influence in other galaxies and do you think they are terrorising other races in different galaxies. Or are they limited to our galaxy and other warp beings inhabit other galaxies and what they are are dependent on the xenos in that galaxy project into the warp. If you think of it this way it really does show how insignificant the imperium is to the chaos gods and it is like we are just play things to them ha.

Hope I made that clear enough

Cheers

Yep, the Ruinous Powers don't pay that much attention to the Milky Way, or even the Materium as a whole, in the grand scheme (Great Game). I think the fact that they pay any attention at all makes the Imperium seem pretty damn important, actually.

Chaos is the representation of anti-life, they goal is to bring everything to an end in every galaxy. Whether our chaos gods exist in other galaxies, I would that no, there are different chaos gods in each galaxy.

Maybe we should ask the Tyranids.

Mr Nobody wrote:Chaos is the representation of anti-life, they goal is to bring everything to an end in every galaxy.

No, that's not it.

Is the Imperium that important? There must be a more advanced civilisation somewhere in the universe. Its also interesting that in the First Heritic the daemon says that the Emperor is the most powerful psyker to have ever lived. So no one as great as him in the whole universe? Not even He-Man?? I thought he was the master of the Universe

All four ganged up on the Emperor. Yeah, he's pretty important.

Something to keep in mind is that the Chaos Gods are the Warp, which exists outside of time and space, i.e. the whole of the Materium. As it turns out the Material Universe is a bit of an uninteresting backwater compared to the rest of the universe, so if the Chaos Gods are going to take any notice it'll either be for giggles or because it gives them some advantage in the War in Heaven (presumably as a great source of Daemon Princes).

Yeah your right, I really do love the Emperor, hope he gets some more love and screen time in the HH novels.

I like the idea that the chaos gods are different in each galaxy dependent on the species living their, sort of a reflection and representation of the dominant species (which i suppose they are).

Another question that I was pondering (with my understanding of the warp) is why the Emperor not a god or represented in the warp, apart from the astonommican. If peoples feelings such as fear, depravity etc can shape and create the chaos gods, why doesnt peoples love and faith of the Emperor create a new human god? He is Worshipped buy the vast majority of humanity that is a lot of humans worshiping the Emperor.

Well, Gadge, you had better start here:

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Star_Child

*depending on who you ask*
The Emperor is older than any of the chaos gods and when he killed Horus they all shat bricks, meaning he should be able to take on all 4 of them.

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Ancient_history
8000 BC - birth of the big E
8000 BC - 1400 AD - birth of the 1st 3 chaos gods

That is interesting, never heard of the star child before (a bit 2001 ha). Hope some of this is hinted at or confirmed in the HH novels when they finally write about the Emperor going onto the golden throne.

But it still doesnt answer why a new god isnt created, if negative feelings creat daemons etc why doesnt good/positive/hopeful feelings create nicer daemons that benifit humanity.

1. The Chaos Gods have always existed.

2. Lexicanum is bunk.

3. The Chaos Gods aren't dependent on the Material Universe in any way. They don't feed on emotions, they are emotion: they cause emotion.

I'm not sure that they are the cause of emotion (or if that's what you meant). Also, the notion that the Immaterium is atemporal doesn't really seem to mean anything--is this really GW's stance, that the Warp is outside of time?

The way i seen it was that peoples emotions had an effect in the warp and created daemons thats why they look like classical daemons and monsters because thats how the humans imagine them. The Eldar created Slanesh through their culture of depraved antics and feelings, so why is there no Imperium equivelent, both good and bad feelings creat daemons.

Manchu:

Yes, see Codex: Chaos Daemons for GW's statements regarding the nature of the Warp.

If we take Aristotle's Four Causes, the Chaos Gods are clearly each of the formal, material, efficient, and teleological causes of emotion.

My literal-mindedness is getting in the way. How can a thing move if it cannot be here in one moment and there in another, all as a result of there being no moments?

Regarding emotion and causality, I'm not sure what your sources are. GW seems to state the opposite relationship again and again.

I think that it depends on the Chaos god your talking about. Gods like Nurgle or Slannesh pay alot of atention to our galixy becuase Slannesh wants to kill off all eldar kind of biting the hand that feeds him and Nurgle wants to take care of all of his followers as if the were his children. Now gods Like Tzeench or Khron dont play a very big role in the material realm because they just dont realy care anough to. Khorn is to bissy trying to take everything over and Tzeench is pissed because he doesnt know every thing yet.

Manchu:

The ascription of "movement" in the Warp is a metaphor. GW clearly states at the beginning of Codex: Chaos Daemons that Daemons and the Warp can only be described metaphorically.

Perhaps you can cite where GW states the opposite of the Chaos Gods causing emotion.

Nurglitch wrote:1. The Chaos Gods have always existed.

2. Lexicanum is bunk.

3. The Chaos Gods aren't dependent on the Material Universe in any way. They don't feed on emotions, they are emotion: they cause emotion.

1. well thats not true, slaneesh was created by the eldar and is about 11k old

2. most is very good, some areas need more citations, just like most wikis

3. slaneesh proves otherwise

@Nurglitch: I cannot at the moment, being at work and away from my dear Daemons dex and army book. But I am referring to descriptions that all rise toward the Eldar history-myth of the birth of Slaanesh.

So if Slannesh can be created my question is why is there no imperial god created by all the positive emotions towards the Emperor?

Thanks for all the replies, nice little debate haha, some interesting stuff to think about

@Bluntman: As near as I can tell, the story about "birth" of Slaanesh is about the Eldar rather than about Slaanesh. Except inasmuch as there is some relationship via the psychic existence of material minds to immaterial ones, which (@Nurglitch) is what I am getting at.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Nurglitch wrote:Daemons and the Warp can only be described metaphorically.

This is well and good up until they materialize. Then we're no longer dealing with metaphors, mytholgical storytelling aside--and, even then, there is the material(ish) existence of the Eye of Terror to consider.

C:CSM 3.5: ''In the deepest eddies in the ocean of the warp, are formed conciousnesses, created by the emotions of the 'young races' that echo their deepest passions''

''in time, the eldar people sank to the lowest depths of depravity and in an instant the sleeping power awoke. the chaos god slaanesh was born''

the nature of the interaction between the chaos gods and the material world is pretty clear and well covered in fluff. the birth of slaanesh isn't a myth, one moment the eye of terror wasn't there, the next moment it was. 'cite where GW states' maybe you should read the chaos codexes.

@nurglitch: the chaos gods do cause emotions in as much as they give praise and benifits to those that perform the actions they want, so that the chaos gods are 'fed' more.

@bluntman: Yeah, this is what I meant by metaphors are fine in the Warp but don't work in the Materium.

The passions that fed into the "birth" of Slaanesh, however, were surely present before the fact--and, I might add, one would guess in overwhelming quantity; why would Slaanesh not exist prior to some point in the Eldar chronology? That the Eldar focused these passions to such a degree at such and such space-time coordinates, resulting in a caving in/out of the boundaries between the planes/facets/aspects of reality, however, could make sense. Slaanesh was "born" as in Slaanesh took an active interest in the Eldar--Slaanesh was born to them.

In any case, the point of the story is to make sense of Eldar history rather than the metaphysics of the Warp.

Even codex Chaotic demons states ( page 7 ) that Slaanesh was not always there. But there is also the warp as " timeless sphere", where everything is past,present and future at once. Now, its not possible to ignore the order of events. But this CD dex claims it because its chaos and nothing is more chaotic than ignoring order.

Seems intended to keep it unimaginable.

'OTOH, its proven that demons cannot "timejump" to redo any failed mission they got. Demons also get banned and cannot return instantly.
Time exists. IT may not always flow in the same direction or with the same speed as in the material realm. But it isn't stasis.

The warp was a calm place. Back in the time when old ones and necrontyr deemed a war needs to be put to another level and raised the carnage with more and more involved parties.

1hadhq wrote:Seems intended to keep it unimaginable.

This is why I like reading Nurglitch on the matter: unimaginable is not good enough.

Manchu wrote:@bluntman: Yeah, this is what I meant by metaphors are fine in the Warp but don't work in the Materium.

The passions that fed into the "birth" of Slaanesh, however, were surely present before the fact--and, I might add, one would guess in overwhelming quantity; why would Slaanesh not exist prior to some point in the Eldar chronology? That the Eldar focused these passions to such a degree at such and such space-time coordinates, resulting in a caving in/out of the boundaries between the planes/facets/aspects of reality, however, could make sense. Slaanesh was "born" as in Slaanesh took an active interest in the Eldar--Slaanesh was born to them.

In any case, the point of the story is to make sense of Eldar history rather than the metaphysics of the Warp.

because slaanesh represent lust and decadence, that is the important point, up until the eldars empire only a small portion of races had decadent lives, the majority lived hard lives, the great eldar empire ment that ever eldar (minus craftworlders and exodites) had nothing to do and was able to do whatever they want, that amount of highly psychic beings all living truelly decadent lives led to the birth of slaanesh.

Gadge wrote:That is interesting, never heard of the star child before (a bit 2001 ha). Hope some of this is hinted at or confirmed in the HH novels when they finally write about the Emperor going onto the golden throne.

But it still doesnt answer why a new god isnt created, if negative feelings creat daemons etc why doesnt good/positive/hopeful feelings create nicer daemons that benifit humanity.

In my opininion current Chaos Gods represent full human and alien(well mostly human because they are the biggest race currently which feeds Chaos Gods)psyche,but with some aspects taken to the extreme.

BluntmanDC wrote: up until the eldars empire only a small portion of races had decadent lives, the majority lived hard lives

This doesn't seem at all convincing. It's reminds me of old people saynig "you young people today!"

Gadge wrote:That is interesting, never heard of the star child before (a bit 2001 ha). Hope some of this is hinted at or confirmed in the HH novels when they finally write about the Emperor going onto the golden throne.

But it still doesnt answer why a new god isnt created, if negative feelings creat daemons etc why doesnt good/positive/hopeful feelings create nicer daemons that benifit humanity.

The chaos gods feed off extremes of emotion. So a bloodthirsty berserker raising holy havoc will benefit khorne more than someone who is defending their loved ones from harm because its the right thing to do for instance. There are hints of beneficent warp entities out there. but they are small in number and need to keep their heads low so they don't get noticed and eaten by daemons. Remember the warp is now looking like this due to the War in heaven. Reflecting all of the extremes and depravity that were perpetrated by the races of the materiel realm. Except like attracts like and the warp is a swirling maelstrom full of entities that will eat a mortal soul whenever the chance is given. Which is why the astronomican is so important for guiding ships in the warp. When the warp was calmer in past ages mankind it seems it didn't need such a beacon to use for travelling long distances in the warp.