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 Bromsy wrote:
Angron had the only sort of clear view of the Emperor.

Angron is the only Primarch with a character arc that isn't a bungled mess, partly due to being handled by a single author instead of being written by committee.

One sees the chaos gods as a form of cosmic horror, or a methaphor for the inevabilaty in nihilism/pesemism (think in the dust of this planet) then the emperor would be nietches über mench that keeeps fighting on, and horus is not. Horus embraces the cosmic horrors and.brings it about like any doomed chtulu cultist. Gulliman is simmilary also an über mench. (Note I am using the word ik it's original form. Not in the propaganda 1940's way. Or in the very litheral way that alle spacemarines are physically altered.)

 Wyzilla wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
I think it's relatively easy to understand why Horus did what he did, but that doesn't mean his logic was justified. Yeah the Emperor had flaws but what Horus did was hardly an appropriate response. Like others have said though, if it weren't for Chaos getting a back door into his soul it probably wouldn't have happened.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Wyzilla wrote:
Horus' "reason" was getting shanked by a Chaos-tainted blade and then going on a Chaos initiated LSD trip which completely duped him into turning on the Imperium (and depended upon him being an idiot apparently who couldn't see through a blatant ruse). So unless Guilliman gets shanked by a daemon blade and goes on a Chaos drug trip, I don't think he's going to be seeing Horus' "motivations", which was really just being strung along like a puppet.

You ignore the fact that the altered mental state affects what he would perceive as a ruse. To an outside observer a person's hallucinations or paranoia are obviously false, but to the person experiencing them it seems crazy not to believe them.

I've been in an altered state while on a serious morphine high after surgery. You can absolutely tell if a hallucination is a load of bollocks. And there's definitely no reason to take anything you "meet" in such a high seriously at all or believe a lick of what's said. Horus also sin't some junkie with a torched brain, but the pinnacle of human biology married equally with the Warp. That he fell to Chaos in such a swift obvious manner merely speaks of him being an utter moron, courtesy of the Black Library's incompetence when it comes to writing characters with substance to them.

So your one time experience with morphine grants you total insight into mental disfunction. I thought there was more basis for your theory so I'm honestly a little put out here. I guess we can agree to disagree.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 Wyzilla wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
I think it's relatively easy to understand why Horus did what he did, but that doesn't mean his logic was justified. Yeah the Emperor had flaws but what Horus did was hardly an appropriate response. Like others have said though, if it weren't for Chaos getting a back door into his soul it probably wouldn't have happened.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Wyzilla wrote:
Horus' "reason" was getting shanked by a Chaos-tainted blade and then going on a Chaos initiated LSD trip which completely duped him into turning on the Imperium (and depended upon him being an idiot apparently who couldn't see through a blatant ruse). So unless Guilliman gets shanked by a daemon blade and goes on a Chaos drug trip, I don't think he's going to be seeing Horus' "motivations", which was really just being strung along like a puppet.

You ignore the fact that the altered mental state affects what he would perceive as a ruse. To an outside observer a person's hallucinations or paranoia are obviously false, but to the person experiencing them it seems crazy not to believe them.

I've been in an altered state while on a serious morphine high after surgery. You can absolutely tell if a hallucination is a load of bollocks. And there's definitely no reason to take anything you "meet" in such a high seriously at all or believe a lick of what's said. Horus also sin't some junkie with a torched brain, but the pinnacle of human biology married equally with the Warp. That he fell to Chaos in such a swift obvious manner merely speaks of him being an utter moron, courtesy of the Black Library's incompetence when it comes to writing characters with substance to them.

So your one time experience with morphine grants you total insight into mental disfunction.

And here I was thinking there was actual backing for your theory.

All Horus was suffering from was a drug trip at most. Especially given his superhuman warp-infused biology (Primarch blood is literally warp energy) he especially shouldn't have been so grievously affected by the dreams to have his logical though processes compromised. As-written in the second book, Horus is nothing more than an utter moron unfit for command, who can be easily manipulated and duped into turning against his species, father, and brothers. Which is largely in lockstep with other portrayal of the Primarchs, as the Black Library seems largely incapable of doing Primarchs any justice in writing and have no sense of slow build up or drama. Merely heel faced turns with little warning or reason to them. It was far better under the old canon where it was left ambiguous and undefined.

 Niiai wrote:
One sees the chaos gods as a form of cosmic horror, or a methaphor for the inevabilaty in nihilism/pesemism (think in the dust of this planet) then the emperor would be nietches über mench that keeeps fighting on, and horus is not. Horus embraces the cosmic horrors and.brings it about like any doomed chtulu cultist. Gulliman is simmilary also an über mench. (Note I am using the word ik it's original form. Not in the propaganda 1940's way. Or in the very litheral way that alle spacemarines are physically altered.)

Of course marines, primarches etc didn't really know what chaos and their gods are. For all they know they are just weird form of alien life form. Idea of kicking alien lifeform out once you have used them isn't that illogical when you have spent couple century kicking aliens to death...

Horus decided that the Emperor was a tyrant and a liar because a deamon told him so. He then decided to murder his brothers that thought otherwise. Then to murder other legions that thought otherwise. Then to destroy the Imperiums military making it easy for other alien forces to mess it up. Then decided that litteral demonic warp abominations would make a better Imperium then the Emperor.

Guess who cleaned up his mess? Guilliman did.

Guilliman also nearly started another civil war so lets not go too far.

 Nerak wrote:
Horus decided that the Emperor was a tyrant and a liar because a deamon told him so. He then decided to murder his brothers that thought otherwise. Then to murder other legions that thought otherwise. Then to destroy the Imperiums military making it easy for other alien forces to mess it up. Then decided that litteral demonic warp abominations would make a better Imperium then the Emperor.

Guess who cleaned up his mess? Guilliman did.

That is grossly oversimplified, Chaos tried to corrupt all of the primarchs at one time or another, Lion El Johnson is pretty much told this, Horus already had his doubts he also says as much BEFORE he has his Deamon trip, the seed was already there, chaos just twisted it and fuelled the fires of his ambition, he didnt fall for the warp trip (again he pretty much states this during the trip) but he did fall to the corruption of said trip, the more he steeped himself in the warp the more corrupted he became, to the point that his ambition to become the new Emperor was surpased by his ambition to become a God, by that point he was insane by the traditional sense of the word.

Personally I would like to see exactly how each primarch was tested (we already know a few, like Peturabo and the Lion) and how they resisted (in the case of the lion they literally could not offer him anything)

We also have a vague idea on how they tried to corrupt Sanguinius (and that Horus interfered and wanted Sang dead so he wouldn't have a rival).

 Melissia wrote:
We also have a vague idea on how they tried to corrupt Sanguinius (and that Horus interfered and wanted Sang dead so he wouldn't have a rival).

Ah very good point!

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

Spoiler:

 Wyzilla wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
I think it's relatively easy to understand why Horus did what he did, but that doesn't mean his logic was justified. Yeah the Emperor had flaws but what Horus did was hardly an appropriate response. Like others have said though, if it weren't for Chaos getting a back door into his soul it probably wouldn't have happened.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Wyzilla wrote:
Horus' "reason" was getting shanked by a Chaos-tainted blade and then going on a Chaos initiated LSD trip which completely duped him into turning on the Imperium (and depended upon him being an idiot apparently who couldn't see through a blatant ruse). So unless Guilliman gets shanked by a daemon blade and goes on a Chaos drug trip, I don't think he's going to be seeing Horus' "motivations", which was really just being strung along like a puppet.

You ignore the fact that the altered mental state affects what he would perceive as a ruse. To an outside observer a person's hallucinations or paranoia are obviously false, but to the person experiencing them it seems crazy not to believe them.

I've been in an altered state while on a serious morphine high after surgery. You can absolutely tell if a hallucination is a load of bollocks. And there's definitely no reason to take anything you "meet" in such a high seriously at all or believe a lick of what's said. Horus also sin't some junkie with a torched brain, but the pinnacle of human biology married equally with the Warp. That he fell to Chaos in such a swift obvious manner merely speaks of him being an utter moron, courtesy of the Black Library's incompetence when it comes to writing characters with substance to them.

So your one time experience with morphine grants you total insight into mental disfunction. I thought there was more basis for your theory so I'm honestly a little put out here. I guess we can agree to disagree.

 EmpNortonII wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

Spoiler:

 Wyzilla wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
I think it's relatively easy to understand why Horus did what he did, but that doesn't mean his logic was justified. Yeah the Emperor had flaws but what Horus did was hardly an appropriate response. Like others have said though, if it weren't for Chaos getting a back door into his soul it probably wouldn't have happened.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Wyzilla wrote:
Horus' "reason" was getting shanked by a Chaos-tainted blade and then going on a Chaos initiated LSD trip which completely duped him into turning on the Imperium (and depended upon him being an idiot apparently who couldn't see through a blatant ruse). So unless Guilliman gets shanked by a daemon blade and goes on a Chaos drug trip, I don't think he's going to be seeing Horus' "motivations", which was really just being strung along like a puppet.

You ignore the fact that the altered mental state affects what he would perceive as a ruse. To an outside observer a person's hallucinations or paranoia are obviously false, but to the person experiencing them it seems crazy not to believe them.

I've been in an altered state while on a serious morphine high after surgery. You can absolutely tell if a hallucination is a load of bollocks. And there's definitely no reason to take anything you "meet" in such a high seriously at all or believe a lick of what's said. Horus also sin't some junkie with a torched brain, but the pinnacle of human biology married equally with the Warp. That he fell to Chaos in such a swift obvious manner merely speaks of him being an utter moron, courtesy of the Black Library's incompetence when it comes to writing characters with substance to them.

So your one time experience with morphine grants you total insight into mental disfunction. I thought there was more basis for your theory so I'm honestly a little put out here. I guess we can agree to disagree.

I have a little more experience and a little more insight. *Drug* hallucinations are hallucinations that you can tell that it is a hallucination. Going in, you understand where its coming from, the things you experience are often too surreal to seem real, you can feel the drug, etc. I've tried a few.

I've also had fever hallucinations. Fever hallucinations are an entirely different experience. There may be a slight sense of an elsewhere sense of self, but its almost impossible for that to take precedence because you are sick and weak and everything is stronger and what you see isn't surreal. Even if it is fantastic (being surrounded by goblins deciding how they want to cook you), you lack the capacity to realize those things are fantastic at the time. Horus would have been experiencing the latter. He was dying.

 Wyzilla wrote:

 EmpNortonII wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

Spoiler:

 Wyzilla wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
I think it's relatively easy to understand why Horus did what he did, but that doesn't mean his logic was justified. Yeah the Emperor had flaws but what Horus did was hardly an appropriate response. Like others have said though, if it weren't for Chaos getting a back door into his soul it probably wouldn't have happened.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Wyzilla wrote:
Horus' "reason" was getting shanked by a Chaos-tainted blade and then going on a Chaos initiated LSD trip which completely duped him into turning on the Imperium (and depended upon him being an idiot apparently who couldn't see through a blatant ruse). So unless Guilliman gets shanked by a daemon blade and goes on a Chaos drug trip, I don't think he's going to be seeing Horus' "motivations", which was really just being strung along like a puppet.

You ignore the fact that the altered mental state affects what he would perceive as a ruse. To an outside observer a person's hallucinations or paranoia are obviously false, but to the person experiencing them it seems crazy not to believe them.

I've been in an altered state while on a serious morphine high after surgery. You can absolutely tell if a hallucination is a load of bollocks. And there's definitely no reason to take anything you "meet" in such a high seriously at all or believe a lick of what's said. Horus also sin't some junkie with a torched brain, but the pinnacle of human biology married equally with the Warp. That he fell to Chaos in such a swift obvious manner merely speaks of him being an utter moron, courtesy of the Black Library's incompetence when it comes to writing characters with substance to them.

So your one time experience with morphine grants you total insight into mental disfunction. I thought there was more basis for your theory so I'm honestly a little put out here. I guess we can agree to disagree.

I have a little more experience and a little more insight. *Drug* hallucinations are hallucinations that you can tell that it is a hallucination. Going in, you understand where its coming from, the things you experience are often too surreal to seem real, you can feel the drug, etc. I've tried a few.

I've also had fever hallucinations. Fever hallucinations are an entirely different experience. There may be a slight sense of an elsewhere sense of self, but its almost impossible for that to take precedence because you are sick and weak and everything is stronger and what you see isn't surreal. Even if it is fantastic (being surrounded by goblins deciding how they want to cook you), you lack the capacity to realize those things are fantastic at the time. Horus would have been experiencing the latter. He was dying.

I also have had fever dreams. While completely batgak insane you can still clearly tell they are nothing but madness, and are something to be resisted and escaped from. The issue is that, especially as a superhuman demigod literally made for war and leadership, Horus should have been more than capable than rejecting his vision as the absurd thing it was (albeit possibly dying in the process depending on how the healing process worked). And it wasn't even a good manipulative vision as there was enough red flags flying over its content to have alerted any remotely competent, rational human being to the fact it was complete BS and that Erebus was a snake in need of killing. Yet Horus folded like wet toilet paper and put up zero resistance with his willpower and doesn't question Erebus' bold-faced blatant lies, even after he already realized he was lying.

The whole gak-show doesn't speak well of Horus' intelligence, even if he was under extreme duress, it's his job to make decisions in extremely stressful situations as the Warmaster. That and it's disgustingly obvious how large and impregnable Erebus' plot shields are.

I think the ambition part hits it on the head. Love for the Emperor kept Horus' ambition in sway and chaos stripped that away with their insidious dreams. Once gone, they merely showed Horus what he could do with that sort of power instead. The smoke was there to see but nobody saw the flames until Istvaan.

It's probably a coincidence that a lot of the Primarchs to fall were ambitious in their way; Fulgrim, Magnus, Lorgar, Pertuarbo. They all thought they knew more and they all certainly wanted more than their current standing allowed under the Emperor. Chaos merely showed them a way to change the status quo. This by no means takes away from the fact that they then liked what they were doing.
It also ties in nicely with the Lion having been branded as suspicious for so long, he certainly would have fallen into the ambition crowd but luckily had enough of his better Brothers around to keep him right(I think personally he struggled to fathom these types of things).

I don't think anyone particularly gave up(except Magnus and Lorgar at various points), certainly not Horus. I dont think igniting a war that would rage across the millennia against one of the most powerful 'people' going is giving up, Horus simply thought he could do better for Humanity and his brothers if he were in charge and worked damn hard to make it happen.

Correct me if I'm wrong, I'm not listing points as they sometimes change depending on the author. Just my overview, enjoyed the series ☺️

 Garviel wrote:
I think the ambition part hits it on the head. Love for the Emperor kept Horus' ambition in sway and chaos stripped that away with their insidious dreams. Once gone, they merely showed Horus what he could do with that sort of power instead. The smoke was there to see but nobody saw the flames until Istvaan.

It's probably a coincidence that a lot of the Primarchs to fall were ambitious in their way; Fulgrim, Magnus, Lorgar, Pertuarbo. They all thought they knew more and they all certainly wanted more than their current standing allowed under the Emperor. Chaos merely showed them a way to change the status quo. This by no means takes away from the fact that they then liked what they were doing.
It also ties in nicely with the Lion having been branded as suspicious for so long, he certainly would have fallen into the ambition crowd but luckily had enough of his better Brothers around to keep him right(I think personally he struggled to fathom these types of things).

I don't think anyone particularly gave up(except Magnus and Lorgar at various points), certainly not Horus. I dont think igniting a war that would rage across the millennia against one of the most powerful 'people' going is giving up, Horus simply thought he could do better for Humanity and his brothers if he were in charge and worked damn hard to make it happen.

Correct me if I'm wrong, I'm not listing points as they sometimes change depending on the author. Just my overview, enjoyed the series ☺️

No I agree with you and thats pretty much what i have taken from the series so far.

About the Lion though, Chaos never stopped tempting him, just personal opinion here but I get the feeling that he was there first choice, not Lorgar, given where he landed, how he grew up in the wilds with the constant whispers of chaos in his ear (his words), this led his lack of human empathy (for the most part) and emotion, so when they offered him everything in his mind he just thought

"what can you really offer me, power? I am already powerful, mighty armies? I have My angels already, to break the shackles that my father has put on me? Why, I do this through choice, I do this for humanity, not the emperor, what can you really offer me?"

 Formosa wrote:

 Garviel wrote:
I think the ambition part hits it on the head. Love for the Emperor kept Horus' ambition in sway and chaos stripped that away with their insidious dreams. Once gone, they merely showed Horus what he could do with that sort of power instead. The smoke was there to see but nobody saw the flames until Istvaan.

It's probably a coincidence that a lot of the Primarchs to fall were ambitious in their way; Fulgrim, Magnus, Lorgar, Pertuarbo. They all thought they knew more and they all certainly wanted more than their current standing allowed under the Emperor. Chaos merely showed them a way to change the status quo. This by no means takes away from the fact that they then liked what they were doing.
It also ties in nicely with the Lion having been branded as suspicious for so long, he certainly would have fallen into the ambition crowd but luckily had enough of his better Brothers around to keep him right(I think personally he struggled to fathom these types of things).

I don't think anyone particularly gave up(except Magnus and Lorgar at various points), certainly not Horus. I dont think igniting a war that would rage across the millennia against one of the most powerful 'people' going is giving up, Horus simply thought he could do better for Humanity and his brothers if he were in charge and worked damn hard to make it happen.

Correct me if I'm wrong, I'm not listing points as they sometimes change depending on the author. Just my overview, enjoyed the series ☺️

No I agree with you and thats pretty much what i have taken from the series so far.

About the Lion though, Chaos never stopped tempting him, just personal opinion here but I get the feeling that he was there first choice, not Lorgar, given where he landed, how he grew up in the wilds with the constant whispers of chaos in his ear (his words), this led his lack of human empathy (for the most part) and emotion, so when they offered him everything in his mind he just thought

"what can you really offer me, power? I am already powerful, mighty armies? I have My angels already, to break the shackles that my father has put on me? Why, I do this through choice, I do this for humanity, not the emperor, what can you really offer me?"

It's worth noting Ruinstorm saw Gulliman, the Lion and Sanguinis tested again.

 Garviel wrote:


It's probably a coincidence that a lot of the Primarchs to fall were ambitious in their way; Fulgrim, Magnus, Lorgar, Pertuarbo. They all thought they knew more and they all certainly wanted more than their current standing allowed under the Emperor. Chaos merely showed them a way to change the status quo. This by no means takes away from the fact that they then liked what they were doing.

Lorgar wasn't ambitious. He was quite the opposite. He was the child who loved his father the most. All he wanted was to worship the thing he loved the most.

Fulgrim, Magnus, and Horus were ambitious, sure. I never got from Perturabo, though. It seems like all he wanted was a fair share of the recognition... and to build things.

I have yet to read about Mortarion's fall.

Angron and Curze both just wanted to die and were passing the time until they did. The Emperor could have tried a lot harder to fix either one than he did.

I think the Emperor would have done better by doing absolutely nothing at times.