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Hey all, Ive been reading the horus heresy series, im currently in the middle of Legion. Im just amazed at how weak minded these primarchs are...am I the only one, who was surprised at how so many of these promarchs just fell into line with horus? Shoudnt their will be a little more resistant to chaos forces? Or were these primarchs flawed from the get-go?

Dont get me wrong, I understand how someone likr Angron could go....but Fulgrim? comments?

Its because they were exposed to the warp when they were younger, thats why they joined forces with Horus.

I only found them weak in terms of the brotherly immaturity they had.. aside from that you must remember for the most part they didn't see Horus as another Primarch and their brother. They saw him as the warmaster. The man who kept the crusade going while father returned to terra. I can imagine(and I believe it makes multiple mentions in the novels) that they felt Horus was more powerful and over all a better leader then the emperor was. "Horus wouldn't abandon us to continue this war, he would stay with us and fight the noble true honourable fight with us. He would not run home to Terra to deal with paperwork".

That's the way I see it anyway.

EDIT: Them being exposed to the warp had nothing to do with it, the only one who was truly exposed to Chaos was Horus

People are naturally attracted to a charasmatic leader. Fulgrim was seduced by Slaanesh not Horus.

Regisimus wrote:Hey all, Ive been reading the horus heresy series, im currently in the middle of Legion. Im just amazed at how weak minded these primarchs are...am I the only one, who was surprised at how so many of these promarchs just fell into line with horus? Shoudnt their will be a little more resistant to chaos forces? Or were these primarchs flawed from the get-go?

Don't get me wrong, I understand how someone like Angron could go....but Fulgrim? comments?

When looking at the Fall of the Primarchs, I think one thing you should keep in mind that while these were extraordinary individuals they were also put into extraordinary circumstances that tested them beyond the limits of even these demigods.

Angron: He was naturally a nasty piece of work even before the Emperor discovered him. During his tenure as the “loyalist” Primarch of the World Eaters, he was regularly criticized by his brothers and by the Emperor as well. Not only did he greatly resent his “family” but he found that his new paternal deity Khorne was more in keeping with his bloodthirsty tactics. In Angron's case, he didn't succumb to chaos as much as he just gave into his true nature.

Alpharius/Omegon: According to “Legion”, Alpharius and Omegon allowed the legion to slip to chaos so that they might be more apt to counter the effects of the traitor legions as one of their own. This was done as a result of the Cabal and their prediction that for Chaos to be defeated, Horus must be victorious. However, while the twin Primarchs may be loyalist, who knows how many of their legion has been swayed by Chaos?

Konrad Curze: Curze was discovered on a planet called Nostramo which was, for all intents and purposes, a world consumed by murder. Curze adopted terror tactics as he grew up in this environment, doing horrific things to those that opposed him. After his discovery by the Emperor, it was apparent that he was already psychologically damaged. Because of this he was never fully embraced by his brother Primarchs. Thus in the end he finally succumbed to his inherent nature.

Fulgrim: While much can be said of the vainglorious Emperor Children's Primarch, he was eventually tainted by the daemon weapon he procured during the Cleansing of Laeran. The sword eventually warped his mind and spirit as it was possessed by a daemon that eventually possessed the Primarch himself after he suffered a psychological break after his brother Primarch, Ferrus Manus.

Lorgar: The most easily turned, Lorgar was the first to turn to Chaos worship since the Emperor was sickened by the worship Lorgar gave him. This wasn't an issue of being weak willed, but rather a decision to have his slavish devotion recognized, even legitimized, by a higher power. In this case, it was by the pantheon of Chaos.

Magnus the Red: The most tragic fall in my opinion, this poor bastard was hated by everyone: the Emperor, the Council of Nikea, and his brothers – especially Leman Russ (also see: asshat). Though Magnus had an affinity for sorcery and psychic feats, he was not evil. In fact, knowing of the betrayal of Horus, he sent the Emperor a psychic message. However, the Emperor ignored this and send the Space Wolves to fetch Magnus so he could answer for his use of sorcery after he was forbade by the Council of Nikea. While Leman Russ was en route to Prospero, Horus convinced Russ that they must destroy the legion... convincing the lumbering oaf that it was the will of the Emperor. After fighting Russ and the Space Wolves, the last remnants of his legion escaped into the Warp. He made a decision to turn to Chaos, but in my opinion he had little other option available to him.

Mortarion: His is a tale of “just desserts”. Mortarion, or Morty as I like to call him, joined Horus out of a sense of displaced loyalty to the Warmaster. If you read the complete background of Mortarion, you'll see that he had some serious “daddy issues”.

Perturabo: Now if there was a weak mind, I would argue that it was Perturabo. This was a Primarch who suffered from intense sibling rivalry. So much so that it was almost effortless for Horus to not only manipulate the Primarch, but also his legion. The Iron Warriors were already disaffected due to their use as custodians for conquered worlds and chafed at the vanity of their brother legions, especially the Imperial Fists and their Primarch, Rogal Dorn (also see: whiny jackass). It was only until he turned his home planet Olympia into a charnel house did he finally turn, but Perturabo was already there in my opinion.

So it's my opinion that most of the Primarchs of the Traitor Legions merely succumbed, or accepted, their own nature before descending into Chaos. Certainly some of them can be considered weak of mind, but then again I can think of a few Loyalist Primarchs that barely know which end of the chainsword to hold.

Well that sums it up pretty well, thanks! Yea I guess deep down inside it annoys me a little bit to see each once of them fall in the HH novels....

Remember that the HH novels are written for young adults. I ate this kind of stuff up when I was in middle school.

True.

I wish they would give more insight into what exactly the emperor is thinking while this is all going on, or what exaclty he is doing on terra.

They leave some hints that he is creating the inquisition, but its mostly just implying that hes sitting behind a desk all day.

I hadn't realized the 'target audience' argument until you just mentioned it.

I usually bemoan the fact that the "falls" of the Primarchs are so sudden. One minute Loyalist, next minute, big evil baddy ripping off people's heads. Even if they are giving into their natures, a little more backstory, examples, heck, even some soul searching might be nice.

Instead, I'm left feeling: "Wow, that was sudden".

[quote=ZahaladeenMagnus the Red:[/b] The most tragic fall in my opinion, this poor bastard was hated by everyone: the Emperor, the Council of Nikea, and his brothers – especially Leman Russ (also see: asshat). Though Magnus had an affinity for sorcery and psychic feats, he was not evil. In fact, knowing of the betrayal of Horus, he sent the Emperor a psychic message. However, the Emperor ignored this and send the Space Wolves to fetch Magnus so he could answer for his use of sorcery after he was forbade by the Council of Nikea. While Leman Russ was en route to Prospero, Horus convinced Russ that they must destroy the legion... convincing the lumbering oaf that it was the will of the Emperor. After fighting Russ and the Space Wolves, the last remnants of his legion escaped into the Warp. He made a decision to turn to Chaos, but in my opinion he had little other option available to him.

this brings me to my next question, did the emperor know about chaos before this? He could have educated his primarchs on how to be better prepared for all of this. Instead, legion by legion fell and turned on themselves. There were some hints in horus rising suggesting the emperor had mentioned creatures in the warp to horus, but its almost as if, the emperor hid this info and wanted this to happen, was he the grand architect of the horus heresy?

Relapse wrote:[quote=ZahaladeenMagnus the Red:[/b] The most tragic fall in my opinion, this poor bastard was hated by everyone: the Emperor, the Council of Nikea, and his brothers – especially Leman Russ (also see: asshat). Though Magnus had an affinity for sorcery and psychic feats, he was not evil. In fact, knowing of the betrayal of Horus, he sent the Emperor a psychic message. However, the Emperor ignored this and send the Space Wolves to fetch Magnus so he could answer for his use of sorcery after he was forbade by the Council of Nikea. While Leman Russ was en route to Prospero, Horus convinced Russ that they must destroy the legion... convincing the lumbering oaf that it was the will of the Emperor. After fighting Russ and the Space Wolves, the last remnants of his legion escaped into the Warp. He made a decision to turn to Chaos, but in my opinion he had little other option available to him.

One thing to remember about Magnus was that he was warned not to use psychic powers. The message he sent to the Emperor came at a time of a delicate operation that would have allowed mankind to be able to use the webway and pretty much aided in true dominion for humanity. The message Magnus sent destroyed wards and other machineries the Emperor had spent decades putting into place and almost caused the Earth to be overrun with demons. The Emperor was trapped for a critical time during the Heresy within the palace as his Custodes battled demons that were spilling into the webway by the his throne. Magnus was a loose cannon that needed to be taken care of. Even with good intent, he had become a pawn of Chaos and was too powerful to be allowed to go on as he was.

Regisimus wrote:this brings me to my next question, did the emperor know about chaos before this? He could have educated his primarchs on how to be better prepared for all of this. Instead, legion by legion fell and turned on themselves. There were some hints in horus rising suggesting the emperor had mentioned creatures in the warp to horus, but its almost as if, the emperor hid this info and wanted this to happen, was he the grand architect of the horus heresy?

Horus, Lorgar, and Magnus for certain but the Emperor - for the most part - endeavored to keep the existence of "spirits" to himself or at least decry it as something that smacked of superstition. I would argue that the Emperor hid it because out of a desire to release humanity from the shackles of base spiritualism and superstition.

But that's just what has been suggested by the HH novels. Part of me believes in the theory that he didn't tell anyone about these "spirits" because he was preparing his own divinity.

I always felt that the fall of the Primarchs was in large part due to their humanity. Vain, pride, and envy all played a role in the fall (or at least some). Many sided with Horus because the Emperor left the Great Crusade to retreat to earth, and they felt it was disrespectful to them that their mission was less worthy than (as they saw it) establishing a bureacracy. After all, the Primarchs were warriors and valued combat and a strong arm more than the ability to organize paperwork.

While I appreciate the attempt Zahaladeen made to explain the basic motivations (I agree on that), I also agree on the sentiment that their fall is usually very sudden. To me, few of the stories work as self-contained ones. They get a bit better if you consider the fluff we all know and when you keep in mind that the newer stories are just momentary snapshots (the transition from one format to the other is imho the reason why so few people like "descent of angels".

But the fall of the "big ones", Horus and Fulgrim, that get a lot of exposure in the first few books, well, I think it sucks.

I think it is more problem of proportions than of the intended audience: All authors do really great work on the emperor. You only see him from far away and every time what he does is a miracle. That seems to be a good way to present a messiah-like figure. The problem is how to step down from that. I think they did it too quickly.

I guess this is a pretty hard job to get it right. For example, I cannot image what Ben counter (if think it was him) must have said when he got to write a story about the perfectionist legion, the emperor's most beloved, degenerating into to a bunch of hair metal weirdos. And for what he got dealt, he did great things. Loved the statue subplot.

Now, the basic premise of a bunch of superhumans being tricked and lured by an evil force seems pretty easy to do: Long established setup by Chaos-> epic failure of a primarch -> break with the father. It's the basic father-and-son story. (I hope they get it right with Magnus)

And they did it nicely starting with the secret warriors covens.... but the second a bunch of zombies entered the picture the traitor primarchs seemed like a bunch of idiots going along with it. And charismatic leaders of ten thousands yet somehow socially inept guys like Ferrus Manus do their part on breaking the illusion.

Maybe it is a problem having comic authors write books: Maybe they still think about images illustrating their story, which takes away the need to textually explain motivations.

Dunno. The Horus Heresy series is still interesting enough to keep me buying the books.

Yea I will most likely keep reading them. They are for the most part very well written. I know I will be flamed for them, but one of my favorites besides horus rising is decent of angels.