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Dytalus wrote:While I agree it would make things far more interesting fluff and game wise, I can't see GW ever doing it. It's too much change to the core fluff, and would be a huge risk for them financially.

What risk? All the model lines would still be fully supported, and all the codexes still valid. It would also break the annoying setting deadlock that's been turning local players off 40K and onto Warmachine et al, as they have a living storyline that actually progresses occasionally.

It IS a progression of the core fluff, but all the old fluff isn't getting retconned, which is the only way to keep things fresh right now. Hell you cold even have the Emperor come back to lead the loyal humans, reduced in power a bit due to his time dead, and maybe even take him as a SC, with an appropriately kick-ass model... THAT would have the IOM fanboys stacking up their cash, and Big E re-building his empire like it's the old days would probably massibvely boost marine sales/smacktalk without having him be the annoying win-button 'when he wakes he'll auto-own everything' that people keep claiming now. Have him reincarnate as an uber human, and go kick some butt to do the Imperium right this time...

A reborn Emperor reuniting a broken Imperium decades after His 'death' would advance the storyline greatly, but I think what some people are saying is a permanent death for the Emperor. If that happens, then in a few centuries, or even a couple of decades considering mankind's unstable collective psychic nature, the Fall of Humanity would occur, creating a fifth Chaos Power, destroying the human race, and expanding the Eye of Terror across most of the galaxy.

I think the emperor has a plan. I don't think he would risk allbof humanity to risk his life to fight Horus himself.

While its true that GW will never let the plot move foreword, in a purely fluff based argument, heres what i think would occur. In the fluff as is, and this bit is fact, no specualtion, the largest tyranid fleet is about to slam into the milky way, the largest ork waaagh in history is building up everywhere, the necrons are starting to truelly awaken, the Tau are pushing the envelop on their technology, which will soon lead to the 4th sphere expansion, which will be next to unstoppable until the Imperiums giant ass war fleets arrive years later. The 14th black crusade will be starting soon, and a faction of the Eldar are trying to reclaim their fallen empire. With all this going on, The Imperium of man will either be forced to unite with other races (Mainstream eldar, tau, maybe even a begrudging alliance with chaos. Not by any means a tag team, just a momentary cease fire, space marines are space marines till the end after all.), or more likely, the Imperium as we know it will collapse in on itself. While chaos, the necrons, the tau, and the orks duke it out, The Imperium will splinter and fall apart into individual kingdoms, the greates of which shall be Ultramar, where the vast amount of former Imperial forces will gather to hold out. This would be what Leman Russ called "The Wolfe Time". According to fluff, all or most of the loyal primarchs shall return for the final battle. as far as i can tell, the orks will try to fight everything eveywhere, win for a while, but over all be thrown back into obscurity. The Necrons will wake up, and start harvesting the other races, but between the Eldar, The super powered Tau war machine, and the undying legions of chaos, the necrons will also be killed off for the most part. The Tyranids will show up, and again try to fight everyone everywhere, start to win, but eventually be exterminated by Eldar, Tau, and chaos. you have to remember, The Chaos legions will always retunr, daemons never truely die, and there will always be Chaos Space Marines around to ruin your day. After the fall of the tyranids, The Eldar will be the next to go, which will give rise to the birth of the Eldar God Ynead (i forget the spelling), who will be the only thing stopping chaos from whipping the floor with everyone instantly. I do beleive that this is where malal will rear his ugly head, the mostly fogotten fifth Chaos God of anarchy. He is as strong as khonre, nurgle, tzeentch, ans slaneesh put togeather, which should be more than a match for Ynead. But while gods fight their battle, the remianign players in the galactic game, The Tau and Chaos Marines, will war it out. The whole time, humanity will be marshelling its last stand against the terror. The Tau will put up a good fight, but one ynead dies, the full Ruinous powers will devour the Tau race like a whale eating Krill. after that, we are left with the mortal enemies, imperium and Chaos. As much as id love to say Chaos will win, i knwo that something stupid and cheesy would happen, and the emporor will come back to life...After a fight between Daemon Primarchs and Loyalist Primearchs, agaisnt the untold trillions of chaos marines, warriors, and daemons agains the full strenght of the space marines, of course. Th eImperium will win, but only just, and the Warhammer $0k story arc will end with the Second Great Crusade, lead by the emporor and Rogal Dorn.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Theres always the other theory, that the Emporor faked his own death, to end the civil war and buy hi time to gather enough power to smight his foes once and for all

blaze115 wrote:Stuff

Ok, TLDR version because that wall of text would make the Berlin wall cringe:

'GW will never let the plot move foreword'

Yes please deconstruct that wall, are you trying to stop Atilla the hun from invading the thread?

And the bit about a cease fire with chaos.... ...... that is all.

blaze115 wrote:While its true that GW will never let the plot move foreword, in a purely fluff based argument, heres what i think would occur. In the fluff as is, and this bit is fact, no specualtion, the largest tyranid fleet is about to slam into the milky way, the largest ork waaagh in history is building up everywhere, the necrons are starting to truelly awaken, the Tau are pushing the envelop on their technology, which will soon lead to the 4th sphere expansion, which will be next to unstoppable until the Imperiums giant ass war fleets arrive years later. The 14th black crusade will be starting soon, and a faction of the Eldar are trying to reclaim their fallen empire. With all this going on, The Imperium of man will either be forced to unite with other races (Mainstream eldar, tau, maybe even a begrudging alliance with chaos. Not by any means a tag team, just a momentary cease fire, space marines are space marines till the end after all.), or more likely, the Imperium as we know it will collapse in on itself. While chaos, the necrons, the tau, and the orks duke it out, The Imperium will splinter and fall apart into individual kingdoms, the greates of which shall be Ultramar, where the vast amount of former Imperial forces will gather to hold out. This would be what Leman Russ called "The Wolfe Time". According to fluff, all or most of the loyal primarchs shall return for the final battle. as far as i can tell, the orks will try to fight everything eveywhere, win for a while, but over all be thrown back into obscurity. The Necrons will wake up, and start harvesting the other races, but between the Eldar, The super powered Tau war machine, and the undying legions of chaos, the necrons will also be killed off for the most part. The Tyranids will show up, and again try to fight everyone everywhere, start to win, but eventually be exterminated by Eldar, Tau, and chaos. you have to remember, The Chaos legions will always retunr, daemons never truely die, and there will always be Chaos Space Marines around to ruin your day. After the fall of the tyranids, The Eldar will be the next to go, which will give rise to the birth of the Eldar God Ynead (i forget the spelling), who will be the only thing stopping chaos from whipping the floor with everyone instantly. I do beleive that this is where malal will rear his ugly head, the mostly fogotten fifth Chaos God of anarchy. He is as strong as khonre, nurgle, tzeentch, ans slaneesh put togeather, which should be more than a match for Ynead. But while gods fight their battle, the remianign players in the galactic game, The Tau and Chaos Marines, will war it out. The whole time, humanity will be marshelling its last stand against the terror. The Tau will put up a good fight, but one ynead dies, the full Ruinous powers will devour the Tau race like a whale eating Krill. after that, we are left with the mortal enemies, imperium and Chaos. As much as id love to say Chaos will win, i knwo that something stupid and cheesy would happen, and the emporor will come back to life...After a fight between Daemon Primarchs and Loyalist Primearchs, agaisnt the untold trillions of chaos marines, warriors, and daemons agains the full strenght of the space marines, of course. Th eImperium will win, but only just, and the Warhammer $0k story arc will end with the Second Great Crusade, lead by the emporor and Rogal Dorn.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Theres always the other theory, that the Emporor faked his own death, to end the civil war and buy hi time to gather enough power to smight his foes once and for all

Great idea. Maybe it's both. While the Emperor's soul gets a short 'rest' and consolidates his new power (from mankind's collective belief in Him) in the warp, the human race will be pushed to the brink of destruction. Once all of mankind's enemies have exhausted themselves, the Emperor and the loyal Primarchs will return (like the Emperor 'appeared' at the end of the Age of Strife) to reunite what's left of mankind are finally conquer the galaxy.

But no, while the Imperium (or what's left of it) might make an alliance with the Tau and/or the Eldar, it's not gonna happen with the Forces of Chaos.

blaze115 wrote:While its true that GW will never let the plot move foreword, in a purely fluff based argument, heres what i think would occur. In the fluff as is, and this bit is fact, no specualtion, the largest tyranid fleet is about to slam into the milky way, the largest ork waaagh in history is building up everywhere, the necrons are starting to truelly awaken, the Tau are pushing the envelop on their technology, which will soon lead to the 4th sphere expansion, which will be next to unstoppable until the Imperiums giant ass war fleets arrive years later. The 14th black crusade will be starting soon, and a faction of the Eldar are trying to reclaim their fallen empire. With all this going on, The Imperium of man will either be forced to unite with other races (Mainstream eldar, tau, maybe even a begrudging alliance with chaos. Not by any means a tag team, just a momentary cease fire, space marines are space marines till the end after all.), or more likely, the Imperium as we know it will collapse in on itself. While chaos, the necrons, the tau, and the orks duke it out, The Imperium will splinter and fall apart into individual kingdoms, the greates of which shall be Ultramar, where the vast amount of former Imperial forces will gather to hold out. This would be what Leman Russ called "The Wolfe Time". According to fluff, all or most of the loyal primarchs shall return for the final battle. as far as i can tell, the orks will try to fight everything eveywhere, win for a while, but over all be thrown back into obscurity. The Necrons will wake up, and start harvesting the other races, but between the Eldar, The super powered Tau war machine, and the undying legions of chaos, the necrons will also be killed off for the most part. The Tyranids will show up, and again try to fight everyone everywhere, start to win, but eventually be exterminated by Eldar, Tau, and chaos. you have to remember, The Chaos legions will always retunr, daemons never truely die, and there will always be Chaos Space Marines around to ruin your day. After the fall of the tyranids, The Eldar will be the next to go, which will give rise to the birth of the Eldar God Ynead (i forget the spelling), who will be the only thing stopping chaos from whipping the floor with everyone instantly. I do beleive that this is where malal will rear his ugly head, the mostly fogotten fifth Chaos God of anarchy. He is as strong as khonre, nurgle, tzeentch, ans slaneesh put togeather, which should be more than a match for Ynead. But while gods fight their battle, the remianign players in the galactic game, The Tau and Chaos Marines, will war it out. The whole time, humanity will be marshelling its last stand against the terror. The Tau will put up a good fight, but one ynead dies, the full Ruinous powers will devour the Tau race like a whale eating Krill. after that, we are left with the mortal enemies, imperium and Chaos. As much as id love to say Chaos will win, i knwo that something stupid and cheesy would happen, and the emporor will come back to life...After a fight between Daemon Primarchs and Loyalist Primearchs, agaisnt the untold trillions of chaos marines, warriors, and daemons agains the full strenght of the space marines, of course. Th eImperium will win, but only just, and the Warhammer $0k story arc will end with the Second Great Crusade, lead by the emporor and Rogal Dorn.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Theres always the other theory, that the Emporor faked his own death, to end the civil war and buy hi time to gather enough power to smight his foes once and for all

My only particular issue with this is Tau being a superpower and fighting back the 'nids.

Even post 4th sphere expansion their still going to be small empire and if the full weight of a 'nid hive fleet (not just a small splinter like they faced previously.) they'd get smushed.

Ovion wrote:My only particular issue with this is Tau being a superpower and fighting back the 'nids.

Even post 4th sphere expansion their still going to be small empire and if the full weight of a 'nid hive fleet (not just a small splinter like they faced previously.) they'd get smushed.

While I can agree with this for the most part, there's a prediction by Eldrad that makes me think Tau will be more influencial than alot of people are willing to give them. Everytime he looks into the Tau's future he felt a degree of protectiveness towards them, because he sees in them the potential to overcome what the Eldar could not; eventually conquering the darkness within their souls.

They won't get 'smushed'. They'll end up like Craftworld Iyanden, broken and in dire straits. And even if they complete their Fourth Sphere Expansion, they'll be at the very limit of their warp technology.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

KplKeegan wrote:

Ovion wrote:My only particular issue with this is Tau being a superpower and fighting back the 'nids.

Even post 4th sphere expansion their still going to be small empire and if the full weight of a 'nid hive fleet (not just a small splinter like they faced previously.) they'd get smushed.

While I can agree with this for the most part, there's a prediction by Eldrad that makes me think Tau will be more influencial than alot of people are willing to give them. Everytime he looks into the Tau's future he felt a degree of protectiveness towards them, because he sees in them the potential to overcome what the Eldar could not; eventually conquering the darkness within their souls.

Yeah...but predictions don't always come true. The Eldar's prediction have one weakness: Humans. Eldar consider Humans 'thorns' in space-time, ruining the perfect futures of the Farseers, since Mankind's sheer tenacity and stubborn tendency are sometimes enough to break fate. And even Eldrad admitted that Farseers can't see everything (he certainly didn't foresee a small fragment of Slaanesh waiting for him in a Blackstone Fortress).

Tadashi wrote:Yeah...but predictions don't always come true. The Eldar's prediction have one weakness: Humans. Eldar consider Humans 'thorns' in space-time, ruining the perfect futures of the Farseers, since Mankind's sheer tenacity and stubborn tendency are sometimes enough to break fate. And even Eldrad admitted that Farseers can't see everything (he certainly didn't foresee a small fragment of Slaanesh waiting for him in a Blackstone Fortress).

So predictions the Emperor are going to rise again should be discarded, right, cause predictions don't always come true

I don't have proper knowledge on Farseer future sight to comment whether or not they are influenced by humanity as claimed, but didn't the Eldar see the whole, Horus is not a good guy thing coming a mile away?

Tadashi wrote:They won't get 'smushed'. They'll end up like Craftworld Iyanden, broken and in dire straits. And even if they complete their Fourth Sphere Expansion, they'll be at the very limit of their warp technology.

If they're still limited by their warp technology.

Yeah...but predictions don't always come true. The Eldar's prediction have one weakness: Humans. Eldar consider Humans 'thorns' in space-time, ruining the perfect futures of the Farseers, since Mankind's sheer tenacity and stubborn tendency are sometimes enough to break fate. And even Eldrad admitted that Farseers can't see everything (he certainly didn't foresee a small fragment of Slaanesh waiting for him in a Blackstone Fortress).

What? You do know that Eldrad tried to inform the Emperor that Horus was going to turn on him, but had the misfortune of telling Fulgrim instead? It's not that their fortune's are untrue, just ambiguous, until the event comes. And no, he knew he was going to die assaulting the Blackstone Fortress, just not from Slaanesh.

I don't think Eldrad's dead. He's probably in chains somewhere in the warp, or 'enjoying' himself in Slaanesh's palace...and I didn't say all predictions don't come true. Most prophecies do come true, except that we don't know which ones do. We can always believe in fate, but there's always room for random chance (or a Human being...I get the feeling Chaos corrupted the Primarchs because they needed a Human's ability to disrupt the Emperor's vision of the future) to step in and ruin everything.

Don't forget, if the emperor truely dies and leaves his mortal sheel behind (instead of this corpse like living on the souls of pskers), he could well become the single most powerful god in the universe, because he is worshipped by countless billions, and he has consumed countless psyker souls in the meantime.

He was already immensely powerful when he was mortal. And even chained to the golden throne, his psychic power drives the astronomicon. Freed from the shackles of the golden throne and his mortal form, to become truely immortal, he could be unstoppable.

It would be interesting to see what kind of avatars or greater daemon equivalents (archangels) would he give form to if he was truely a god.

I mean, space marines are already so powerful, and they are only mortal. Immortal beings created by the god emperor would probably be even more unbelievably powerful.

He is half dead, or 90% dead already, and yet the imperium has endured for 10,000 years after the Horus Heresy. Never under estimate this guy.

The chaos gods didn't bother to unite to fight the orks, necrons, or even the eldar (Slanaash alone was sufficient for that race). But in the face of the god emperor, they were forced to unite.

CpatTom wrote:

Tadashi wrote:Yeah...but predictions don't always come true. The Eldar's prediction have one weakness: Humans. Eldar consider Humans 'thorns' in space-time, ruining the perfect futures of the Farseers, since Mankind's sheer tenacity and stubborn tendency are sometimes enough to break fate. And even Eldrad admitted that Farseers can't see everything (he certainly didn't foresee a small fragment of Slaanesh waiting for him in a Blackstone Fortress).

So predictions the Emperor are going to rise again should be discarded, right, cause predictions don't always come true

I don't have proper knowledge on Farseer future sight to comment whether or not they are influenced by humanity as claimed, but didn't the Eldar see the whole, Horus is not a good guy thing coming a mile away?

No, the Emperor prediction should be discarded because it's a lie by Tzeentch.

Personally, I think that the Eldar are full of gak. They predict that Horus is evil, so what do they do? Arrange a meeting with another primarch, who they conveniently failed to predict being corrupted by the thing that eats their souls. They predict that the Alpha Legion will have a large part, so they get them to follow Horus, because clearly killing all of humanity will fix everything, while sacrificing a single Craftworld to the inevitable revenge attack by killing Horus while he's weakened after the Anatheme incident wouldn't be an option at all. What use is seeing the 'future' if they read it wrongly every time and the gods are able to interfere with the visions apparently at will?

True, fluff dictates that 'gods' form because people believe in them...though the Emperor was originally not a god, Mankind's collective belief in Him has turned His soul into a god, so if His body dies, then the Star Child cycle will be completed, turning Him into a god finally.

And the god emperor would be rather scary as a god (power wise) since he has the entire imperium worshipping him.

Tadashi wrote:True, fluff dictates that 'gods' form because people believe in them...though the Emperor was originally not a god, Mankind's collective belief in Him has turned His soul into a god, so if His body dies, then the Star Child cycle will be completed, turning Him into a god finally.

Except the people who believe in the Star Child were purged in the 3rd ed rulebook.

Which was implied to be a cover-up by the Ordo Malleus, who were also implied to know of the Star Child. And the Emperor did mention His cast-out spirit of goodness and compassion to Inquisitor Draco. Even if the Star Child cycle is a lie, the Emperor still has that other spirit waiting to be reunited with Him one day.

The Etheral's are the physical embodiment of the Emperor's cast out spirit of goodness and compassion. Ohhh, trolled. Haha.

And Gork will still Roflstomp him if he tries to push it

It's been said that no other god can even hurt them, and that the Emperor near crapped himself (paraphrase... opened his eyes in fear...) when they remanifested in the Universe.

Orks outnumber humans, after all, and they ALL believe in Gork and Mork, and they're ALL psykers (though weak ones, except for the Wierdboyz) - other orks are gestalt telekenetics and batteries. They generate psyker energy by getting excited, fighting and chanting 'ere we go' over and over again. (PG 36 Ork codex for the current bit on wierdboys btw)

The more fighting and exceitement, the more power. A whole race or psykers that spends all its time fighting, arguing, chanting and getting pumped up would provide a deal more power than a downtrodden raceof mostly non-psykers whose few psykers are mostly killed as batteries (and thus no longer available as a power source).

Add to that that many IOM citizens probably only 'believe' in the Emperor by rote, as the state religion...


Then add that the Starchild hokum hasn't seen a single mention in upwards of a decade of official fluff...

Well, I wouldn't just use this thing about the starchild only. I think the biggest most obvious lead we have about what will happen if the emperor dies finally would be to look at how the god Slanaash was created. That god was created from the rich fodder of the deviant and corrupted eldar of old. And when he awoke into conciousness, he singlehandedly destroyed much of Eldar civilization. The emperor has been feed the souls of thousands upon thousand of psykers for ten thousand years. He is worshipped by billions upon billions of people. There are cardinal worlds where the entire world is essentially one big church.

I think he stands for and defines the concept of Order, bravery and self sacrifice and all the good traits of the human being. As such, since the imperium is far more ordered than it is chaotic (There is essntially a complete structure of rule, and law and order), and there is such a strong belief in the god emperor. Hence, when he does leave behind his mortal shell, he will arise to become a new god, just like how Slanaash was created by the Eldar of old, the god emperor will be created by the imperium. And when he rises to his full power, no longer bound by the golden throne and his physical shell, his power will be truely immense.

Its about order vs chaos. For every one crazy chaos berserker out there, there are thousands more "normal" humans who believe in order. And the number of "normal" humans should greatly outnumbers the number of crazies out there.The emperor stands for order.

I read one 40k book which kind of alluded to this. Forgot the name. This Tzeetch greater daemon said that the chaos gods awaited the day the Emperor would truely die, rise up to take his place amongst the pantheon of gods and face them properly in their eternal war. In the end, the strength of a god is relative to the number of worshippers he has. And the emperor will have by far the largest number of believers compared to the 4 chaos gods.

Even if the Star Child isn't real, yes, the Emperor would most likely be reborn thanks to the fundamental warp concept of belief becoming reality. The Emperor would become the embodiment of everything good and noble in Mankind, just as Slaanesh is the embodiment of the darkness in Eldar souls. As for Gork and Mork, while they can never be truly defeated (being more powerful than all other warp entities combined), they can still be defeated and forced to retreat to another part of the warp while they get new strength.

Um.. they are, by your own admission, more powerful than all of the other warp entities combined.

Who exactly is going to be the one defeating them at all, let alone driving them off?

Holding them off until they get bored and wander off, maybe, or tricking them into a different fight (tzeentch's likely approach).

In general they are more interested in their own followers than the other Warp entities, though. They like watching Waaaghs as a form of entertainment, kind of like a celestial action movie. They'd only come crumping after the credits roll on the episode, unless someone was dumb enough to attack them

Just like Orks, the other gods defeat them by outwitting them, since like Orks they prefer a frontal approach. But even if they're defeated, they're still powerful enough to avoid being absorbed into another god (like the Eldar gods).

I can't see why the Chaos gods would want to do anything about Gork and Mork, personally. I doubt that they're more powerful than Khorne, but I also don't see why Khorne would try to kill an excellent source of dismemberment in the galaxy. Tzeentch would just like watching the Orks feth around with the Imperium's plans by accident, and any death they cause generates fear for Pappy Nurgle. I guess Slaanesh might get a bit annoyed that the Orks aren't into S&M, but the burna boyz do take a lot of pleasure in burning stuff.

Durza wrote:I can't see why the Chaos gods would want to do anything about Gork and Mork, personally. I doubt that they're more powerful than Khorne, but I also don't see why Khorne would try to kill an excellent source of dismemberment in the galaxy. Tzeentch would just like watching the Orks feth around with the Imperium's plans by accident, and any death they cause generates fear for Pappy Nurgle. I guess Slaanesh might get a bit annoyed that the Orks aren't into S&M, but the burna boyz do take a lot of pleasure in burning stuff.

Codex: Orks 4th Edition p.15 states they are more powerful than the gods of other races. Even if the other gods (including the Emperor) don't want anything to do with them, they would probably want to pick a fight with everybody in the warp worth noticing. They're too strong to be truly vanquished, and while they may be outsmarted and defeated, they will NEVER be destroyed, any more than the Orks can be wiped out.

Mork is to Kunnin to be outsmarted like that, and Gork would krump all over anybody who gots in his way. Best you can hope for is that Gork and Mork keep each other busy, if they are fighting together, the Orks are fightin together. The Orks are fightin together, and nobody is standing in the Orks way (well, not for long anyway).

Tzeentch is more cunning than anyone else (well, maybe not Cegorach), and Khorne has more battle experience. The Emperor's no pushover either, and what's cunning for Orks is still obvious for other races. Although, your probably right, they fight each other most of the time.

Simplest move is to pull a 'Gandalf and the Trolls' maneuver, and get them fighting each other, then leave them to it. Add new comments as necessary.

Frankly i don't think they really care too much about the other Powers, unless attacked.