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Karol wrote:
No he took the power, because he created a system with the high lords when everyone is in a permanent clinch with each other. It has nothing to do with who his dad was or that he was his son. It has everything to do with goverment system, and 30k+ custodes, marines, SoB etc pointing their pointy sticks at the high lords at lords of terran who couldn't evaquate. If the lords knew that G-man was coming, then there is a high chance they would have done everything that he died before reaching earth

I mean, Cruze was his fathers son too, and the high lords had no problem with sending assassins after him, way before the heresy of horus became a thing.

Oddly enough we have a saying about pedestals too. It goes a bit like this. If you don't put your people on the pedestal, someone else is going to put theirs on it for you.

Agreed, the High Lords would have most likely tried to prevent him from retaking his seat if given the chance. That said, he was originally put over a Legion not because of his accomplishments but of who his father was. He was put in charge of the Imperium because Dorn was too broken after the fall of the Emperor to keep being in charge.

Nothing about his actual personal skills are why he had the position in the first place.

Salt donkey wrote:
I’m sorry, but I have no understanding of why there people in this thread who believe the imperium could survive if it was less harsh. Think of all of the external threats.


Chaos if left unchecked (or even just not opposed hard enough) can and will corrupt nearly all of humanity (and everything else). It almost did in the past, Horus Heresy, and threatening to do so again.

Orks if left unchecked, will unite and permanently overrun humanity. They almost did in the past (war of the beast) and are
threatening to do so again (ghaz).

Tyranids could easily have the manpower to eat the entire galaxy. Humanity can’t rebuild if there are no green planets or humans left alive in the milkey galaxy.

Necrons can and will take over everything if left unchallenged. It took everything the old ones had to beat them last time, and the imperium isn’t nearly as powerful as the old ones where.

Then you have all the ”minor” problems the imperium has to deal with. Tau, Eldar and many other lesser Xenos constantly cause strain within the many systems, and only stand to become more problematic if they aren’t dealt with quickly. There’s also just plain human selfishness to consider. Lots of rulers within the imperium would rather not have a higher power telling them what to do, and for a lot of them this wouldn’t change if the Imperium was less harsh.

Even comparing this to a more optimistic show like Star Trek, you can see how optimism and good morals can erode when faced with overwhelming external. When faced with threats like the borg and the dominion, the federation starts acting awfully similar to the imperium.

The imperium as it is currently structured rewards fear, paranoia, adherence to tradition over adaptability, distrust on organizations you would depend on in an emergency, and a host of other internal problems that are endemic to high control governance.

You see this happening all the time - if you set up a system whereby there are incredibly, ludicrously harsh punishments for being the bearer of bad news, guess what? You'll only ever find out bad news when you see it FOR YOURSELF, you've just made all your news-bearers totally useless.

A couple historical examples that you can easily see occurring in the imperium:

-The invasion of Normandy could have been much more quickly responded to by the germans if it wasn't necessary for the fuhrer to personally mobilize several particular military elements, and he was asleep and his subordinates were unwilling to wake him up with bad news.

-The strict adherence to production goals in the USSR meant that untold millions of agricultural, factory and other workers were literally worked to death in order to produce more food than was needed just so that they could be adhering to long term plans.

-Some outbreak that happened in wuhan some billion years ago or something honestly I don't remember shmovid or something got so bad before any attempt was made to contain it because local government officials covered it up for fear of losing esteem from higher levels of government.

All these kinds of things could absolutely conceivably happen in 40k regularly, but because it's 40k they generally result in productive planets being burned out into useless husks, unseen enemies destroying imperial worlds, and planets condemned to exterminatus by the people who control them because of something that could have been safely contained.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

Salt donkey wrote:
I’m sorry, but I have no understanding of why there people in this thread who believe the imperium could survive if it was less harsh. Think of all of the external threats.


Chaos if left unchecked (or even just not opposed hard enough) can and will corrupt nearly all of humanity (and everything else). It almost did in the past, Horus Heresy, and threatening to do so again.

Orks if left unchecked, will unite and permanently overrun humanity. They almost did in the past (war of the beast) and are
threatening to do so again (ghaz).

Tyranids could easily have the manpower to eat the entire galaxy. Humanity can’t rebuild if there are no green planets or humans left alive in the milkey galaxy.

Necrons can and will take over everything if left unchallenged. It took everything the old ones had to beat them last time, and the imperium isn’t nearly as powerful as the old ones where.

Then you have all the ”minor” problems the imperium has to deal with. Tau, Eldar and many other lesser Xenos constantly cause strain within the many systems, and only stand to become more problematic if they aren’t dealt with quickly. There’s also just plain human selfishness to consider. Lots of rulers within the imperium would rather not have a higher power telling them what to do, and for a lot of them this wouldn’t change if the Imperium was less harsh.

Even comparing this to a more optimistic show like Star Trek, you can see how optimism and good morals can erode when faced with overwhelming external. When faced with threats like the borg and the dominion, the federation starts acting awfully similar to the imperium.

Salt donkey wrote:
I’m sorry, but I have no understanding of why there people in this thread who believe the imperium could survive if it was less harsh. Think of all of the external threats.

The point isn't that the Imperium survives. It's that humanity survives on its own terms. There is no specific reason the Imperium itself need survive so long as humanity does.

Salt donkey wrote:
Chaos if left unchecked (or even just not opposed hard enough) can and will corrupt nearly all of humanity (and everything else). It almost did in the past, Horus Heresy, and threatening to do so again.

So what? Seriously. Let all humanity fall to Chaos! We'll be... fine, really. Freer, even. Sure it's a blind meritocracy where the strong trod upon the necks of the weak, but at least its not a blind bureaucracy where the politically powerful trod upon the necks of the disenfranchised. Seriously, if all humanity fell to Chaos, they'd still be just as badly off but with a bit more fun around the edges.

Salt donkey wrote:
Orks if left unchecked, will unite and permanently overrun humanity. They almost did in the past (war of the beast) and are
threatening to do so again (ghaz).

They only do this because the Imperium exists. There was no great empire of Orks stomping on human faces during Old Night. Orks try to overrun the imperium because the imperium gives them a good fight. If the Imperium just up and poofed out of existence, humanity would go on, just as it did during the Old Night. And it's not like every planet during the Old Night was a hellscape - read some of the first Horus Heresy novels. There are burgeoning civilizations of humanity that are quite beautiful in form and philosophy, and the Imperium brutally stomps them all out. The Orks did not overrun them. The Imperium did - oftentimes in a manner akin to Orks, ironically.

Salt donkey wrote:
Tyranids could easily have the manpower to eat the entire galaxy. Humanity can’t rebuild if there are no green planets or humans left alive in the milkey galaxy.

This is true, but there's no reason the Imperium needs to be unreasonably brutal to defeat this threat. The Interex, to use an example of a pre-Imperium technologically-advanced human race, could handle this without necessitating the bloodshed and death that the Imperium would require, I posit. In fact, the example of planet Murder in the HH is evidence for my views: the Imperium struggled and lost several companies of its finest superhuman warriors with its best wargear attacking what, for the Interex, was essentially a nature preserve. It'd be like Canada losing entire companies of men to the wolves of Yellowstone before even meeting the United States military.

Salt donkey wrote:
Necrons can and will take over everything if left unchallenged. It took everything the old ones had to beat them last time, and the imperium isn’t nearly as powerful as the old ones where.

Again, true, but there's no reason the Imperium need be so brutal. Indeed, it has allies in this fight - the Aeldari still burn with hatred for their ancient foes, the T'au have been slighted by Anrakyr the Traveller, and as you rightly point out, the very existence of ALL life in the galaxy is threatened, not just human life. By being xenophobic, irrational, and frankly stupid, the Imperium is making this situation WORSE, not BETTER.

Salt donkey wrote:
Then you have all the ”minor” problems the imperium has to deal with. Tau, Eldar and many other lesser Xenos constantly cause strain within the many systems, and only stand to become more problematic if they aren’t dealt with quickly. There’s also just plain human selfishness to consider. Lots of rulers within the imperium would rather not have a higher power telling them what to do, and for a lot of them this wouldn’t change if the Imperium was less harsh.

Why is the Imperium necessary to stave off these "threats"? On balance, I would say Imperial mistreatment and bureaucratic error has lost more human worlds and lives than the Eldar have ever conquered or sacrificed. The T'au's slow, plodding expansion doesn't require an Imperial response - indeed, the Damocles Crusade was so mismanaged as to be a tragic loss for humankind, even if it was a stalemate from an Imperial perspective rather than a Human one. As for the independence of those Human worlds that want to be free? Let them go. Why not? Pointless tyranny? If they think they can stand on their own, they're welcome to try. Invading their planet like a horde of Cadian Orks isn't going to save many more lives.

Salt donkey wrote:
Even comparing this to a more optimistic show like Star Trek, you can see how optimism and good morals can erode when faced with overwhelming external. When faced with threats like the borg and the dominion, the federation starts acting awfully similar to the imperium.

And those are tragic tales, intended to show that such moves, while natural, are not always rational. The Imperium is not rational or humanistic. It helps if you divorce "what's good for the Imperium" from "what's good for humankind" because those two are NOT synonymous.

There are 2 main problems with your arguments unit.

The first one is you are mistaking intent with mistakes. The emperor when he created the imperium, had the intention to elevate humanity to its best possible statues. To do this he felt it was necessary to A) destroy chaos (by removing religion and destroying all chaos followers) B) stomp down all xenos empires and C) unite all of humanity.

While some might disagree with some of this from a real world perspective, it is shown to work within the 40k universe, as humanity is at its best at the height of the great crusade. However the emperor made the mistake of trusting Horus, which caused the imperium to decline to it’s 42k status . In other words no one planned for the imperium to suck this much, it sucks due to a chain reaction caused by the Horus heresy. Now it’s about surviving, not thriving. Which leads to my second point.

2) You’re severally underestimating the external threats of the 40k universe. A lot of the grim darkness of 40k comes from just how bad the enemies of humanity are. When you say it would be better for humanity to fall to chaos, you are saying that it would be better for humanity to live in a literal hell rather than a figurative one. Orks where actually becoming a major threat during the old night, otherwise the emperor and Horus never would have fought that huge ork warlord. The interex would have stood no chance against tyranids. How do I know this? Because the interex stood no chance against marines and tyranids almost whipped out the ultramarines (the chapter most similar to great Crusade era marines) with their weakest hivefleet. I think you’re underestimating imperium Tech with this comparison. Also imperium has made some “weird” tech choices, in large part because the last time humanity used things like true AI, it almost whipped everyone out (men of iron). Finally allying with Xenos makes no sense. Tau want humanity in their empire, not the other way around (this is true for a lot of the more “friendlier xenos, also living under Tau rule isn’t as good as I suspect you think, but that’s a whole other discussion). As far as the Xenos that would be willing to serve under imperial rule, well even the some among the tau are starting to suspect that having alien auxiliaries may not be the option. Even looking past all of this, the imperium has shown a willingness to ally with other Xenos powers when a greater threat appears

Because of these threats, I’m certain humanity would fall if it split apart. This is shown with how bad things are in imperial Nhillius. Most words that split off from the imperium simply fall to chaos or a Xenos threat

This is why comparing 40k to real life doesn’t make much sense. Our survival doesn’t hinge on us being able to defeat super advanced bio space bugs, or a race that can enslave gods and build weapons that destroys stars. We don’t to worry about armies of demons appearing out of nowhere and killing us all. There is no magic that can turn you into a disgusting monster, or create a river of blood that drive insane just from touching it. That’s why the imperium sucks, the emporer wasn’t strong enough to best the horrors 40k has to offer. It’s not because it’s politics don’t make sense (although clearly the fight to survive has ruined imperial politics)

Internal strife, politicking, paranoia, traditionalism, corruption and dogma are the best way to ensure that your empire is at its weakest when dealing with external threats. It doesn't become more of a good idea to institute those kinds of systems when the threats get worse.

it's true that the universe of 40k those things that cause the system are more real than in the real world. In 40k "moral decay" actually does lead to gibberdaemons bursting forth from your flesh and eating everyone, where in the real world, people just play pretend that it does and say things like "it happens after you die, duh, that's why you never actually see it!"

It makes sense that in 40k everyone is paranoid about their neighbor being a witch and paranoid that someone is going to accuse them of being a witch and getting them publicly executed....but it doesn't make the imperium STRONGER that that's the form their governance takes.

And we can also see that other forms of governance that do not involve that level of paranoia exist. The reason Genestealers are able to infiltrate human society and not eldar or tau society nearly as much is because eldar and tau have different systems in place than the imperium that do not allow genestealers to inveigle themselves.

Salt donkey wrote:
There are 2 main problems with your arguments unit.

The first one is you are mistaking intent with mistakes. The emperor when he created the imperium, had the intention to elevate humanity to its best possible statues. To do this he felt it was necessary to A) destroy chaos (by removing religion and destroying all chaos followers) B) stomp down all xenos empires and C) unite all of humanity.

While some might disagree with some of this from a real world perspective, it is shown to work within the 40k universe, as humanity is at its best at the height of the great crusade.

Found your problem: you trust the Emperor because you think Humanity was at its best during the Great Crusade. It was not. Humanity's best was in the Golden Age of Technology, long before the Emperor ever arrived on the scene. He says he wanted what is best, but I will trust no living man who says "I have to own you, and you should let me because I only want the best for you." Humanity was at its best when the Emperor wasn't even written into the play, yet, not to mention off-stage.

Salt donkey wrote:
However the emperor made the mistake of trusting Horus, which caused the imperium to decline to it’s 42k status . In other words no one planned for the imperium to suck this much, it sucks due to a chain reaction caused by the Horus heresy. Now it’s about surviving, not thriving. Which leads to my second point.

The Horus Heresy is as much the Emperor's fault as it is Horus's. This is sort of a major point of the book series, and something I hope you will consider.

Salt donkey wrote:
2) You’re severally underestimating the external threats of the 40k universe. A lot of the grim darkness of 40k comes from just how bad the enemies of humanity are. When you say it would be better for humanity to fall to chaos, you are saying that it would be better for humanity to live in a literal hell rather than a figurative one.

A "hell" that we have seen portrayed in novels. A hell where there are functioning societies, economies, sciences. Simply asserting that it is "hell" rather misses the point, I think.

Salt donkey wrote:
Orks where actually becoming a major threat during the old night, otherwise the emperor and Horus never would have fought that huge ork warlord.

And yet Humanity endured, without the Imperium. I never said the Orks didn't hurt anyone. I said that they weren't so big of a threat that Humanity was suddenly wiped out at sudden disunity.

Salt donkey wrote:
The interex would have stood no chance against tyranids. How do I know this? Because the interex stood no chance against marines and tyranids almost whipped out the ultramarines (the chapter most similar to great Crusade era marines) with their weakest hivefleet.

The Interex stood no chance largely because the Marines were already in their capital city in fairly large numbers. It's like saying "America had a bad military" because Russia declared war while 10,000 Russian soldiers were in D.C. The mistake the Interex made was to trust the Imperium's intentions - the same mistake you are making. Furthermore, we have no idea what interex society would look like after 10,000 years; since they actually believed in scientific progress and were aware of and opposed "Kaos" long, long, long before the Imperium did, it is entirely possible they'd be in a stronger position after 10,000 years of steady improvement.

Salt donkey wrote:
I think you’re underestimating imperium Tech with this comparison. Also imperium has made some “weird” tech choices, in large part because the last time humanity used things like true AI, it almost whipped everyone out (men of iron).

The Imperium's tech was explicitly better in 30k than it is in 40k, and yet they struggled on Murder with said Tech. Furthermore, the Imperium uses AI right now in M.42. Right this very moment, in the lore. They just call it the "Machine Spirit" or "Silica Anima" and ritually care for it instead of actually understanding it (and the ones who do, i.e. Cawl, make more of them!).

Salt donkey wrote:
Finally allying with Xenos makes no sense. Tau want humanity in their empire, not the other way around (this is true for a lot of the more “friendlier xenos, also living under Tau rule isn’t as good as I suspect you think, but that’s a whole other discussion).

So what? Russia wants the Baltic States, that doesn't mean NATO needs to launch the Balticles Gulf Crusade to wipe them out to a man and take horrific losses in the process. The Imperium is unreasonable even when faced with an expansionist evil like the Tau.

Salt donkey wrote:
As far as the Xenos that would be willing to serve under imperial rule, well even the some among the tau are starting to suspect that having alien auxiliaries may not be the option. Even looking past all of this, the imperium has shown a willingness to ally with other Xenos powers when a greater threat appears

Which just goes even further prove that Xenos are not as bad as the Imperial bottom line makes them out to be - and I don't think its unreasonable to cooperate with them even if they don't submit to Imperial Governance. That's like saying the U.S. couldn't join Britain in WWII because Britain wouldn't become a U.S. state.

Salt donkey wrote:
Because of these threats, I’m certain humanity would fall if it split apart. This is shown with how bad things are in imperial Nhillius. Most words that split off from the imperium simply fall to chaos or a Xenos threat

Ehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh I'm going to call [citation needed]. The Imperium certainly says that lots of them do, but humanity was split apart in the past during the Old Night and things were mostly fine. Certainly fine enough that civilizations of beauty, light, color, and philosophy could flourish - the Auretian Technocracy, the Interex, and many others.

Salt donkey wrote:
This is why comparing 40k to real life doesn’t make much sense. Our survival doesn’t hinge on us being able to defeat super advanced bio space bugs, or a race that can enslave gods and build weapons that destroys stars. We don’t to worry about armies of demons appearing out of nowhere and killing us all. There is no magic that can turn you into a disgusting monster, or create a river of blood that drive insane just from touching it. That’s why the imperium sucks, the emporer wasn’t strong enough to best the horrors 40k has to offer. It’s not because it’s politics don’t make sense (although clearly the fight to survive has ruined imperial politics)

It's not a matter of comparing 40k to real life, not really. It's a matter of comparing the best possible human civilization in 40k to the Imperium. So far, the Imperium has failed to convince me, despite its propaganda, that it's the best possible state-of-being for Humanity in M42.

And it bears repeating that that is the POINT of the Imperium in the fiction! When I or other point this out we are not pointing out a flaw in how 40K is conceived or written, but disagreeing with a POV in the fandom that the Imperium are the "good guys" or that their evil is a necessary one.

Agreed. The Imperium is explicitly defined as the "cruelest, most bloody regime imaginable" by the authors. It's in the damn tagline.

My disagreement is not about how well the Imperium is written or even how it is portrayed, but rather with the individuals within the fandom who view it as "the good guys" or Hard Men making Hard Decisions in a Hard World while Hard. In fact, it's obviously a parody of that mindset, justifying needless cruelty and tyranny as Hard Decisions (rather than just wrong ones) and throwing around "the ends justify the means"-style propaganda when someone says 'hey maybe lets not lose hundreds of millions of guardsmen in an avoidable conflict'.

Compared to the Imperium, the Interex had a much better handle on Chaos, superior technology, and a less backwards/oppressive social structure. No cargo culting technology, no policies of extermination. The only thing they lacked compared to the Imperium was the scale and resources associated with constant expansion. I mean, Chaos is only a threat circa M41 because the Imperium was so much worse at dealing with it than the Interex.

I would go so far as to say that anyone who reads those books and comes away with the impression that the Interex society was fatally flawed and the Imperium couldn't possibly survive if it was less ultra-oppressive-religious-fascist than it is has utterly missed the point of the Interex. The Horus Heresy books introduce several new societies for the Imperium to systematically subjugate or exterminate to beat you over the head with the idea that the Imperials are not good guys, their way of doing things is not objectively the best or necessary, and the state of the Imperium by M41 (including the entire Horus Heresy) is 100% the Imperium's own fault.

the_scotsman wrote:
Internal strife, politicking, paranoia, traditionalism, corruption and dogma are the best way to ensure that your empire is at its weakest when dealing with external threats. It doesn't become more of a good idea to institute those kinds of systems when the threats get worse.

it's true that the universe of 40k those things that cause the system are more real than in the real world. In 40k "moral decay" actually does lead to gibberdaemons bursting forth from your flesh and eating everyone, where in the real world, people just play pretend that it does and say things like "it happens after you die, duh, that's why you never actually see it!"

It makes sense that in 40k everyone is paranoid about their neighbor being a witch and paranoid that someone is going to accuse them of being a witch and getting them publicly executed....but it doesn't make the imperium STRONGER that that's the form their governance takes.

And we can also see that other forms of governance that do not involve that level of paranoia exist. The reason Genestealers are able to infiltrate human society and not eldar or tau society nearly as much is because eldar and tau have different systems in place than the imperium that do not allow genestealers to inveigle themselves.

I suppose I should made thesis clearer. I am not arguing that imperium has a good form of government, I am arguing that it is a practical form of government that would naturally develop if humanity had to face the threats of the 40k universe.

Those issues you talk (internal strive, paranoia, corruption ect ) are certainly cracks in payment. They are absolutely making the imperium weaker, but like how pavement gets cracked when it’s hit by a hammer, these cracks appear because the imperium is being hit by all sorts of threats.

Of course your going to be paranoid of your neighbor or human leader. They could be possessed by a demon, an evil sorcerer, or possibly even a genestealer cultist, In fact most factions in 40k actively work to create political strive within the imperium. So yeah there are major problems with imperium logistics, there should be when many major threats are actively trying to create them.

Finally Eldar and Tau A) both don’t have very good governments and B) have Xenos ways to avoid genestealer cult problems.

Let’s start with Tau. They are brainwashed to worship Ethereals. That’s their government and how the root out genestealer cults. They do whatever the ethereals tell them to do, it can sense when another isn’t similarly brainwashed Why is this a problem? Because Ethereals are happy to sacrifice any of their Tau underlings and make mistakes.

For example, in the new fluff, the Ethereals want to use a highly dangerous new invention against it’s creators wishes. Why would they want to do this? Because it can expand THEIR empire faster. What happens? A bunch of Tau underlings die/ get trapped in the warp for a while, and the Tau have expanded to the other side of the galaxy. I don’t see this is being munch better than the imperium.

Eldar meanwhile listen to fortune tellers and have a hard time getting alone with anyone outside of their extended family, They find themselves in many dangerous/deadly situations despite trying their best to avoid them, and don’t have much in the way of innovation (outside of dark Eldar, but they have their own problems). Simply put, They’re a dying race for a reason.

Btw Genestealer cult don’t infect Eldar mainly because of their biology. Eldar have extremely long pregnancies. and new genetic material needs to be added over times. This don’t work with genestealer cults whole “grow the cult with reproduction” Schlick.

I mean, if we're as generous to the Xenos empires as we are to the imperium, they're practically paradises.

If the Tau are just as bad as the Imperium, and are evil for it, why isn't the Imperium also evil?

In other words: if you don't want to live in the Tau Empire because they treat you as badly as the Imperium would, why would you want to live in the Imperium?

Salt donkey wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:

that would naturally develop if humanity had to face the threats of the 40k universe.

This is where you're right

Salt donkey wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:

I am arguing that it is a practical form of government

This is where you're wrong.

The form of government instituted by the emperor and the results are an obvious historical analogy to the kinds of empires we see figures like Alexander the Great, Napoleon, an Ghengis Khan setting up in history (almost like it's some kind of historical analogue).

It revolves, necessarily, on rallying the population around a single godlike leader who can commit no errors and who you can have 100% total faith in, aggressively expanding the reach of the empire based on the leaders vision and making up the costs by seizing resources and committing those resources to more expansion rather than building a sustainable empire.

The greatest suspension of disbelief in the 40k universe is that the imperium post-emperor managed to last even 100 years without fracturing, let alone longer than current human civilization lasts. The Imperium in 42k should be a thousand thousand tiny fractured states, each claiming the legacy of the Imperium with various and sundry versions of petty new "emperors" or "imperiators" or "imperators" or "emperoxs" in the same way that so many words we now have for feudal lordlets sound vaguely like Khan.

Salt donkey wrote:
I’m sorry, but I have no understanding of why there people in this thread who believe the imperium could survive if it was less harsh. Think of all of the external threats.


Chaos if left unchecked (or even just not opposed hard enough) can and will corrupt nearly all of humanity (and everything else). It almost did in the past, Horus Heresy, and threatening to do so again.

Except the reason Chaos is so damn hostile is because the Imperium is so corrupt, violent and gakky. Mortals manifest all these negative emotions, it manifests in the Immaterium and comes back to bit them. If they calmed their gak down, it wouldn't be so bad. The Imperium is chasing its own doom in this regard.

Salt donkey wrote:
Orks if left unchecked, will unite and permanently overrun humanity. They almost did in the past (war of the beast) and are
threatening to do so again (ghaz).

Again, a big part of why orks fight the Imperium constantly is the Imperium is constantly building up their materiel. Orks' priority #1 is to attack the strongest foes they can find, if the Imperium calmed their gak down they'd be fighting against the forces of Chaos, Eldar, or Necrons, or Tyranids, or whatever.

Salt donkey wrote:
Tyranids could easily have the manpower to eat the entire galaxy. Humanity can’t rebuild if there are no green planets or humans left alive in the milkey galaxy.

Necrons can and will take over everything if left unchallenged. It took everything the old ones had to beat them last time, and the imperium isn’t nearly as powerful as the old ones where.

For both of these threats, if the Imperium wasn't so mindlessly hostile towards other aliens, they might have some help.

Fundamentally, the plight of the Imperium can be summed up in "play stupid games, win stupid prizes." And the Imperium is playing a very dangerous, and very stupid, game.

Salt donkey wrote:
Then you have all the ”minor” problems the imperium has to deal with. Tau, Eldar and many other lesser Xenos constantly cause strain within the many systems, and only stand to become more problematic if they aren’t dealt with quickly. There’s also just plain human selfishness to consider. Lots of rulers within the imperium would rather not have a higher power telling them what to do, and for a lot of them this wouldn’t change if the Imperium was less harsh.

The Imperium has cultivated this corruption, though. When the laws are draconian and capricious and nonsensical, corruption becomes the norm, just like how Soviet-era totalitarianism provided a perfect environment for Russian organized crime to incubate.

Salt donkey wrote:
Even comparing this to a more optimistic show like Star Trek, you can see how optimism and good morals can erode when faced with overwhelming external. When faced with threats like the borg and the dominion, the federation starts acting awfully similar to the imperium.

That's more the Tau. The Imperium started off with bad morals; they think torture, murder and oppression are good things in and of themselves, not means to an end.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

the_scotsman wrote:

 vipoid wrote:

Hecaton wrote:
Right-wing government, very warlike, massively authoritarian, emphasis on racial purity. All sounds very fascist to me.

In fairness, the left-wing, Communist USSR was also very warlike, massively authoritarian etc.

(Not saying you're wrong about the Imperium being fascist - just that these characteristics are by no means unique to fascist governments.)

I mean, either we're going with colloquial definitions of political structures or we're going with strict political theory definitions. Tau and the Imperium are colloquially understood as communist and fascist respectively just as russia and germany are colloquially understood as communist and fascist even though neither adhered to the strict poli-sci definitions of every feature of what the theoretical basis of what either form of government was supposed to be originally.

Often, ESPECIALLY when it comes to forms of government depicted in works of fiction, the tyranny of what a large number of people perceive a government to be is just stronger than the strict Um Achkshually definition.

Tau are legitimately only seen as communist because they're perceived as Asian, however, and people think Asia = China = Communist. It's actually entirely wrong, communism is nothing like what the Tau are doing.

Tau have more in common with Plato's perfect form of goverment than with anything related with Communism.

Salt donkey wrote:
There are 2 main problems with your arguments unit.

The first one is you are mistaking intent with mistakes. The emperor when he created the imperium, had the intention to elevate humanity to its best possible statues. To do this he felt it was necessary to A) destroy chaos (by removing religion and destroying all chaos followers) B) stomp down all xenos empires and C) unite all of humanity.

While some might disagree with some of this from a real world perspective, it is shown to work within the 40k universe, as humanity is at its best at the height of the great crusade. However the emperor made the mistake of trusting Horus, which caused the imperium to decline to it’s 42k status . In other words no one planned for the imperium to suck this much, it sucks due to a chain reaction caused by the Horus heresy. Now it’s about surviving, not thriving. Which leads to my second point.

The Imperium during the great crusade was mindlessly violent and promoted slavery. Powerful, sure, but as we saw, it was just propped up by the Emperor and the Primarchs. Without them, it turned into a corrupt, bloated, authoritarian mess. So the Emperor's intent was actually bad, it was not a matter of "good intentions gone astray" but rather "bad intentions being served just desserts."

Salt donkey wrote:
2) You’re severally underestimating the external threats of the 40k universe. A lot of the grim darkness of 40k comes from just how bad the enemies of humanity are. When you say it would be better for humanity to fall to chaos, you are saying that it would be better for humanity to live in a literal hell rather than a figurative one. Orks where actually becoming a major threat during the old night, otherwise the emperor and Horus never would have fought that huge ork warlord. The interex would have stood no chance against tyranids. How do I know this? Because the interex stood no chance against marines and tyranids almost whipped out the ultramarines (the chapter most similar to great Crusade era marines) with their weakest hivefleet. I think you’re underestimating imperium Tech with this comparison. Also imperium has made some “weird” tech choices, in large part because the last time humanity used things like true AI, it almost whipped everyone out (men of iron). Finally allying with Xenos makes no sense. Tau want humanity in their empire, not the other way around (this is true for a lot of the more “friendlier xenos, also living under Tau rule isn’t as good as I suspect you think, but that’s a whole other discussion). As far as the Xenos that would be willing to serve under imperial rule, well even the some among the tau are starting to suspect that having alien auxiliaries may not be the option. Even looking past all of this, the imperium has shown a willingness to ally with other Xenos powers when a greater threat appears

The Imperium is the "cruelest and most bloody regime" imaginable. It's as bad or worse than many planets controlled by the followers of Chaos, in parts.

Your comments about Tyranids vs. Marines ring hollow, because the Tau are generally shown to have an exemplary military record against Tyranids because they fight them intelligently. Less psychotic and more science-minded societies tend to do better against the bugs, both in terms of resisting genestealer infiltration and fighting the swarm in the field.

The Imperium's tech choices aren't "weird," they're backwards and anti-scientific, because the AdMech are more concerned with jealously hoarding knowledge rather than advancing technology. It's that corruption, religiosity, xenophobia, and totalitarianism ruining things once again.

Salt donkey wrote:
Because of these threats, I’m certain humanity would fall if it split apart. This is shown with how bad things are in imperial Nhillius. Most words that split off from the imperium simply fall to chaos or a Xenos threat

The period of time after the Dark Age of Technology gives the lie to that. Other, better societies were rising... but that were stamped out because the Emperor is a jealous god (figuratively).

Salt donkey wrote:
This is why comparing 40k to real life doesn’t make much sense. Our survival doesn’t hinge on us being able to defeat super advanced bio space bugs, or a race that can enslave gods and build weapons that destroys stars. We don’t to worry about armies of demons appearing out of nowhere and killing us all. There is no magic that can turn you into a disgusting monster, or create a river of blood that drive insane just from touching it. That’s why the imperium sucks, the emporer wasn’t strong enough to best the horrors 40k has to offer. It’s not because it’s politics don’t make sense (although clearly the fight to survive has ruined imperial politics)

No, comparing 40k to humanity makes perfect sense, as it was intended, in part, as a dark satire of Thatcher-era conservatism in the UK. Sure, there's space bugs and evil gods and so on, but the main threat confronting humanity (and the reason the Imperium is losing) is humanity's own tendency towards oppression, corruption, and malice.


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 Galas wrote:
Tau have more in common with Plato's perfect form of goverment than with anything related with Communism.

Yup! They even use the Greek (or Indo-Aryan) elemental system, as opposed to the Chinese, which has metal and wood and so on.

The Ethereals are pretty close to philosopher-kings, really.

 catbarf wrote:
Compared to the Imperium, the Interex had a much better handle on Chaos, superior technology, and a less backwards/oppressive social structure. No cargo culting technology, no policies of extermination. The only thing they lacked compared to the Imperium was the scale and resources associated with constant expansion. I mean, Chaos is only a threat circa M41 because the Imperium was so much worse at dealing with it than the Interex.

I would go so far as to say that anyone who reads those books and comes away with the impression that the Interex society was fatally flawed and the Imperium couldn't possibly survive if it was less ultra-oppressive-religious-fascist than it is has utterly missed the point of the Interex. The Horus Heresy books introduce several new societies for the Imperium to systematically subjugate or exterminate to beat you over the head with the idea that the Imperials are not good guys, their way of doing things is not objectively the best or necessary, and the state of the Imperium by M41 (including the entire Horus Heresy) is 100% the Imperium's own fault.

Yeah, this is mostly true, and it's what makes the Horus Heresy setting more interesting than the present 41k timeline, which has been moved into a more standard good vs. evil story by collecting a bunch of protagonists from different factions and bringing them together in opposition to more or less all the bad stuff.

The treatment of Magnus is a great example of this. Magnus is far more of a hero in the Horus Heresy than most of the loyalist Primarchs. He remains loyal to the Emperor even after being mistreated, and, if the Emperor had only listened to him, the Heresy would been nipped right in the bud. Instead, the Emperor disregards his warning because Magnus was willing to break the Emperor's rules to save the Imperium. In contrast, the Space Wolves end up playing right into Horus' hands by failing to question their orders and allowing themselves to be turned into pawns due to their unthinking obedience. It's difficult to look at this and not conclude that the Emperor is ultimately to blame for all of it. It's his insistence on blind, unthinking faith and loyalty - which, bluntly, he never did much to earn - that led to all the events afterward.

Meanwhile in 41k, Magnus has become just another supervillain who shows up...because <reasons>? Why does Magnus try to stop Guilliman returning to Terra? This makes little sense, especially since his whole plan seems to rely on the first bits failing. If anything, Magnus should be happy to help Guilliman along. Guilliman represents the chance of turning the Imperium into the better, more open-minded kind of organization that Magnus wanted in the first place. Magnus' beef is with the Imperial Ecclesiarchy and their unthinking enforcers and enablers, not with Guilliman; if Guilliman's (or at least 41k's Guilliman)'s idea of the Imperium had prevailed, Magnus would still be a happy loyalist. Even if we accept that Magnus is now irredeemably corrupted and no longer has any real motivation besides revenge on those who wronged him, it would make more sense for Magnus to try to use Guilliman for his own ends. But that involves less cackling evil supervillain vs superhero adventure movie. So instead we get this retcon where we're asked to buy that the Imperium didn't used to be this bad and Guilliman is Making It Great Again, which undermines the original story about how the Imperium was never so great after all, in effect trivializing and invalidating a lot of the motivations of the "villains."

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
I mean, if we're as generous to the Xenos empires as we are to the imperium, they're practically paradises.

If the Tau are just as bad as the Imperium, and are evil for it, why isn't the Imperium also evil?

In other words: if you don't want to live in the Tau Empire because they treat you as badly as the Imperium would, why would you want to live in the Imperium?

It's because the Imperium is portrayed as right-wing, so readers with a naturally authoritarian-submissive mindset think of them as a good in and of themselves. It's better to be oppressed by the Imperium than the Tau because the Imperium is favored by God, basically, or at least that's how their minds work, and any cruelty and oppression the Imperium dishes out is now good and laudable.

Hecaton wrote:

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
I mean, if we're as generous to the Xenos empires as we are to the imperium, they're practically paradises.

If the Tau are just as bad as the Imperium, and are evil for it, why isn't the Imperium also evil?

In other words: if you don't want to live in the Tau Empire because they treat you as badly as the Imperium would, why would you want to live in the Imperium?

It's because the Imperium is portrayed as right-wing, so readers with a naturally authoritarian-submissive mindset think of them as a good in and of themselves. It's better to be oppressed by the Imperium than the Tau because the Imperium is favored by God, basically, or at least that's how their minds work, and any cruelty and oppression the Imperium dishes out is now good and laudable.

Eldar societies at least towards their own people are practically paradises. No need for mandatory work and the whole Path system is meant to be one of self development that incidentally also serves to meet the Craftworld's needs. Yes there is the mental strictness involved with the Path system, but Craftworld Eldar society does not engage in the physical violence and oppression of the Imperium towards its own.

Humans under the Tau have been shown as being allowed to have their own protectorate or vassal states as shown by T'ros under Tau occupation in Aeronautica Imperialis. The standard of living went up enough so that the humans fought hard against the Imperium when it came back. Now I suppose it comes down to how much value is placed on humans playing second fiddle to the Tau, and having to give up the idea of human supremacy and autonomy. Imagine of Star Trek's Federation had some other race as the most dominant race instead of the humans. Whether Star Trek or Star Wars or most other science fiction, there is the conceit that humans are somehow special enough to become the dominant race. Now I am not saying the Tau don't have their darker side but again in comparison to the Imperium, it is a far lighter shade.

I personally think the setting makes more sense to view the Imperium as being a D- student when it comes to the survival of humanity. Even in view of the physics of the Warhammer 40,000 universe which is diverges a good deal from our own even ignoring the fantastical stuff.

Sure, the IoM has survived 10,000 years. But it did it in the worst possible way to still actually accomplish it (that's the joke). Hence, being called D- students. If the IoM was just a little worst at this, the empire would have already failed. Sure, they believe this is the only way that humanity can survive, and while some harshness is necessary; most actions are taking the 'it works...barely...for now' approach.

I think it would be like parking your car by sideswiping the garage every time you enter it. It works despite ruining both your car and garage, but you keep doing it because you believe that's the only way your car will fit. You could probably keep parking this way for months, even years before either the vehicle or the structure can't take it anymore depending on how bad the damage done is. It doesn't mean that it is the only or the best way to go about it.

Me, I find the dark humor of that quite fitting with early 40k more clever satire.

Excellent point about systematically shooting the messenger, the scotsman.

That is a hilarious and brilliant interpretation, Saturmorn Carvilli.

I'm on my phone as I write this so I won't try and edit a quote but in response to the Eldar can't be GSC: in one of the Yvrainne books they visit a Craftworld that intentionally infected themselves to be GSC to stave off the threat of Slaanesh (guess the corruption of Nod DNA changes their souls or something?) but Yvrainne rips that out of them in disgust.

So apparently it is feasible for Eldar to see GSC.

 ClockworkZion wrote:
I'm on my phone as I write this so I won't try and edit a quote but in response to the Eldar can't be GSC: in one of the Yvrainne books they visit a Craftworld that intentionally infected themselves to be GSC to stave off the threat of Slaanesh (guess the corruption of Nod DNA changes their souls or something?) but Yvrainne rips that out of them in disgust.

So apparently it is feasible for Eldar to see GSC.

It is mentioned in Codex: Genestealer Cult (page 14, A Diverse Parasitism) that genestealers can pretty much infect any, "ambulatory species of sufficient intellect to be space capable". The section then goes over why non-human species tend to be troublesome to the creation of a genestealer cult. Orks and Kroot sense the wrongness innately. Eldar have lengthy gestation cycles along with naturally being psychically gifted sensing the shadow of the curse long before it gets a chance to take root.

So it would be a long shot for Eldar to be infected by genestealers to allow the creation of a cult. Let alone it spreading very far since the Eldar have so many psykers that would easily sense a would-be Patriarch's mini-hivemind. Volunteering as mentioned above or such as how the Twisted Helix (basically reverse engineered the genestealer kiss for enhanced abilities and basically still becoming a GSC) is one of the easiest paths I could see to there being an Eldar GSC.

 Saturmorn Carvilli wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
I'm on my phone as I write this so I won't try and edit a quote but in response to the Eldar can't be GSC: in one of the Yvrainne books they visit a Craftworld that intentionally infected themselves to be GSC to stave off the threat of Slaanesh (guess the corruption of Nod DNA changes their souls or something?) but Yvrainne rips that out of them in disgust.

So apparently it is feasible for Eldar to see GSC.

It is mentioned in Codex: Genestealer Cult (page 14, A Diverse Parasitism) that genestealers can pretty much infect any, "ambulatory species of sufficient intellect to be space capable". The section then goes over why non-human species tend to be troublesome to the creation of a genestealer cult. Orks and Kroot sense the wrongness innately. Eldar have lengthy gestation cycles along with naturally being psychically gifted sensing the shadow of the curse long before it gets a chance to take root.

So it would be a long shot for Eldar to be infected by genestealers to allow the creation of a cult. Let alone it spreading very far since the Eldar have so many psykers that would easily sense a would-be Patriarch's mini-hivemind. Volunteering as mentioned above or such as how the Twisted Helix (basically reverse engineered the genestealer kiss for enhanced abilities and basically still becoming a GSC) is one of the easiest paths I could see to there being an Eldar GSC.

If we go off of the Ork edition of the Regimental Standard, apparently Orks don't really care too much as long as crumping can be had, and if they start talking about Four-Armed-Gork (or Mork) then it's a good reason to bash the other Ork over the head.

Unit1126PLL wrote:I mean, if we're as generous to the Xenos empires as we are to the imperium, they're practically paradises.

If the Tau are just as bad as the Imperium, and are evil for it, why isn't the Imperium also evil?

In other words: if you don't want to live in the Tau Empire because they treat you as badly as the Imperium would, why would you want to live in the Imperium?

you wouldn't

catbarf wrote:The Horus Heresy books introduce several new societies for the Imperium to systematically subjugate or exterminate to beat you over the head with the idea that the Imperials are not good guys, their way of doing things is not objectively the best or necessary, and the state of the Imperium by M41 (including the entire Horus Heresy) is 100% the Imperium's own fault.

So much of this. After the very first scene of Horus Rising, which begins with the Imperium destroying a perfectly healthy and viable civilization, my first thought was "What a bunch of donkey-caves. These are the guys I'm supposed to be rooting for?" Fortunately the authors have mostly done a great job of fleshing out the characters. But still, I had negative sympathy when Samus started ripping apart several Marines. Throw in the other instances of the Imperium destroying better societies than them, or that one instance when the Word Bearers committed genocide because the people on one planet had used alien DNA to treat some genetic issues, and it's really hard to sympathize with the Imperium as a faction.

yukishiro1 wrote:
The treatment of Magnus is a great example of this. Magnus is far more of a hero in the Horus Heresy than most of the loyalist Primarchs. He remains loyal to the Emperor even after being mistreated, and, if the Emperor had only listened to him, the Heresy would been nipped right in the bud. Instead, the Emperor disregards his warning because Magnus was willing to break the Emperor's rules to save the Imperium. In contrast, the Space Wolves end up playing right into Horus' hands by failing to question their orders and allowing themselves to be turned into pawns due to their unthinking obedience. It's difficult to look at this and not conclude that the Emperor is ultimately to blame for all of it. It's his insistence on blind, unthinking faith and loyalty - which, bluntly, he never did much to earn - that led to all the events afterward.

Meanwhile in 41k, Magnus has become just another supervillain who shows up...because <reasons>? Why does Magnus try to stop Guilliman returning to Terra? This makes little sense, especially since his whole plan seems to rely on the first bits failing. If anything, Magnus should be happy to help Guilliman along. Guilliman represents the chance of turning the Imperium into the better, more open-minded kind of organization that Magnus wanted in the first place. Magnus' beef is with the Imperial Ecclesiarchy and their unthinking enforcers and enablers, not with Guilliman; if Guilliman's (or at least 41k's Guilliman)'s idea of the Imperium had prevailed, Magnus would still be a happy loyalist. Even if we accept that Magnus is now irredeemably corrupted and no longer has any real motivation besides revenge on those who wronged him, it would make more sense for Magnus to try to use Guilliman for his own ends. But that involves less cackling evil supervillain vs superhero adventure movie. So instead we get this retcon where we're asked to buy that the Imperium didn't used to be this bad and Guilliman is Making It Great Again, which undermines the original story about how the Imperium was never so great after all, in effect trivializing and invalidating a lot of the motivations of the "villains."

You're right about 30k Magnus, but 40k Magnus is much different. 40k Magnus is little different than any other Chaos daemon and is completely enslaved to the whims of his god, and I think it's safe to say that Tzeentch did not like the idea of a loyalist primarch coming back and saving the Imperium. This is probably why Mortarion hasn't killed Typhus, despite hating probably wanting him to; because Nurgle sees Typhus as too good of an asset. Daemons have occasionally tried to rebel, but as what happened to Skarbrand, it is always doomed to fail. Magnus might be more reasonable compared to the other traitor primarchs, but at the end of the day, he has pretty much the same agenda as any lord of change or fateskimmer.

I note a shift away from IF the Imperium is grimdark over to WHY it is, bar the occasional 'kids these days', which IMO answers the original premise of the thread quite nicely.

Also it is really great to see so much good discussion and different perspectives on the fluff. I think it is well within the authors' intent that there be a broad spectrum of reaction and interpretation so it is extra cool to see because of that.

This thread is cool.

Yes, Games Workshop has always been good at crafting worlds that invite to interpretation and discussion. 40k is a treasure for stimulating the imagination. It keeps on giving.

Cheers