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I’ve been reading some Horus Heresy novels lately and one thing in particular is kind of holding up my enjoyment of the books.

The space marines are charging through the galaxy telling everyone that there are no Gods or demons, but that is obviously wrong.

So my hang up is why is the Emperor telling the space marines to spread the imperial truth when he should know that it’s bogus?

Does he really not know about all of the sentient warp beings? I thought he was supposed to be some sort of all powerful psycher with a deep understanding of the warp. It doesn’t make sense to me that he personally would not know about the chaos gods, especially after they already messed with him and scattered the primarchs.

Does he know about the chaos gods but is trying to keep them hidden from humanity? This would make a little more sense to me but I haven’t found anything in the books I have read so far that hints at this.

Maybe someone who has read a little more fluff can clear it up for me?

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:Does he know about the chaos gods but is trying to keep them hidden from humanity? This would make a little more sense to me but I haven’t found anything in the books I have read so far that hints at this.

More or less this, he's trying to keep Chaos hidded from humanity because he doesn't want someone to screw up his master plan, a human-controlled webway. He knows LOADS about Chaos, such as the fact that they become more powerful if people worship them, which is the exact reason that he doesn't want people to know about them.

AlmightyWalrus wrote:

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:Does he know about the chaos gods but is trying to keep them hidden from humanity? This would make a little more sense to me but I haven’t found anything in the books I have read so far that hints at this.

More or less this, he's trying to keep Chaos hidded from humanity because he doesn't want someone to screw up his master plan, a human-controlled webway. He knows LOADS about Chaos, such as the fact that they become more powerful if people worship them, which is the exact reason that he doesn't want people to know about them.

Makes a lot more sense to me. Do you know of any specific book where this talked about?

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:

AlmightyWalrus wrote:

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:Does he know about the chaos gods but is trying to keep them hidden from humanity? This would make a little more sense to me but I haven’t found anything in the books I have read so far that hints at this.

More or less this, he's trying to keep Chaos hidded from humanity because he doesn't want someone to screw up his master plan, a human-controlled webway. He knows LOADS about Chaos, such as the fact that they become more powerful if people worship them, which is the exact reason that he doesn't want people to know about them.

Makes a lot more sense to me. Do you know of any specific book where this talked about?

Absolutely no idea, I learned everything I know from Lexicanum or a Codex

Pffttt...the chaos "gods" are just insanely powerful parasitic beings that feeds on human souls. The will burn together with all other heretics!
*cough* I guess he decided to keep shut about the terrors "beyond" in hope that would limit their influence on mankind. To bad it did not work...

Iratus Custodis wrote:Pffttt...the chaos "gods" are just insanely powerful parasitic beings that feeds on human souls. The will burn together with all other heretics!
*cough* I guess he decided to keep shut about the terrors "beyond" in hope that would limit their influence on mankind. To bad it did not work...

Well, it did until those who actually knew about it, the Primarchs, went crazy. I can imagine that the Emperor wasn't too pleased when Magnus smashed his webway thingie by mistake...

It was most likely a purposeful plan to weaken the chaos gods. If you tell everyone something doesn't exist long enough, future generations won't need to be told, therefore fewer chaos worshippers

Spoiler from The Last Heretic
DO NOT READ TO PRESERVE SANITY

The spoiler button is the single best tool on the forum, too bad I don't have the self control not to click it. Very illuminating.

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:

AlmightyWalrus wrote:

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:Does he know about the chaos gods but is trying to keep them hidden from humanity? This would make a little more sense to me but I haven’t found anything in the books I have read so far that hints at this.

More or less this, he's trying to keep Chaos hidded from humanity because he doesn't want someone to screw up his master plan, a human-controlled webway. He knows LOADS about Chaos, such as the fact that they become more powerful if people worship them, which is the exact reason that he doesn't want people to know about them.

Makes a lot more sense to me. Do you know of any specific book where this talked about?

Lord of battles wrote:Spoiler from The Last Heretic
DO NOT READ TO PRESERVE SANITY

Spoiler:

The Big E learned from the chaos gods how to make the primarchs, but then tried to hide them from the big 4 and that ultimately led to the separation of the primarchs. He obviously knew about the chaos gods

Question about that quote:

it's possable that the Deamon lied about that part, but the Emperor certaintly was aware of the existance of the Chaos Gods.

his plan was to starve them out of existance by cutting them off from reality.



the Emperor possably desired to be worshiped eventually, but not until the Chaos Gods were kaput because he didn't want competition.

hence his suppression of Religious beliefs prior to creating the Webway portal.

then he would be worshipped as the "Diem Encarnum"(God in Flesh)

DEUS VULT wrote:

Lord of battles wrote:Spoiler from The Last Heretic
DO NOT READ TO PRESERVE SANITY

Spoiler:

The Big E learned from the chaos gods how to make the primarchs, but then tried to hide them from the big 4 and that ultimately led to the separation of the primarchs. He obviously knew about the chaos gods

Question about that quote:

Spoiler:

Is that what the demons told the word bearers when they were smashing up the lab? Cause a demon isnt exactly a reliable source

I agree Deus. Daemons are not the most trustworthy of beings,
But I do have to say the only way to get rid of the Chaos gods. Is by trying to make every single chaos follower or just enough not believe in the Chaos gods. Then they lose their powers.
But the emperor only missed out that he should of had a tighter leash on the primarchs or given them collars. that way he could of controlled them a bit better.

Asherian Command wrote:

DEUS VULT wrote:

Lord of battles wrote:Spoiler from The Last Heretic
DO NOT READ TO PRESERVE SANITY

Spoiler:

The Big E learned from the chaos gods how to make the primarchs, but then tried to hide them from the big 4 and that ultimately led to the separation of the primarchs. He obviously knew about the chaos gods

Question about that quote:

Spoiler:

Is that what the demons told the word bearers when they were smashing up the lab? Cause a demon isnt exactly a reliable source

I agree Deus. Daemons are not the most trustworthy of beings,
But I do have to say the only way to get rid of the Chaos gods. Is by trying to make every single chaos follower or just enough not believe in the Chaos gods. Then they lose their powers.
But the emperor only missed out that he should of had a tighter leash on the primarchs or given them collars. that way he could of controlled them a bit better.

Or at least handle them in a better way. The 100 year delay on telling lorgar he's wrong might have been the wrong way of going around it.

Above me gots it pegged. Big E coulda stepped up the pace on that one

Above me gots it pegged. Big E coulda stepped up the pace on that one

shows you how bad the Emperor was with his "domestic" affairs....

Give him power over one planet and you gets a galaxy spanning empire....

give him a family and you get a 10,000 year and counting galactic civil war....

Looks like the emperor should of read more of those books that tell you how to raise your teens, although I doubt they have advice for 20 superhuman chaos touched warriors

There's a conversation between Horus and Garviel Loken, starting on page 195 of Horus Rising(the first book), stating that the Emperor does know of Daemons, and other powers in the warp, but doesn't know, or understand everything about the warp.

It's interesting that when asked about daemons, Astartes characters rattle off the same boilerplate about xenos-entities in the Warp being classed as one of the lesser threats...

Nurglitch wrote:It's interesting that when asked about daemons, Astartes characters rattle off the same boilerplate about xenos-entities in the Warp being classed as one of the lesser threats...

Yeah it shows the Emperor was really trying to hide the threat from the IoM

Premise 1a: The Emperor knew full well of the existence, and the nature of the Chaos gods and their servants.

Premise 2a: The Emperor wished to eliminate Chaos as an influencing power in the galaxy.

Conclusion 1: The Emperor must have known through his knowledge of the nature of Chaos that simply pretending it does not exist will cause not eliminate it.

Premise 1b: See Conclusion 1.

Premise 2b: The Emperor sought a direct way to eliminate the Chaos gods.

Premise 3b: The webway is a "halfway" space between the Warp and the material verse, supposedly safer than the material verse from the predations of Chaos (before the actions of Magnus, that is).

Conclusion 2: The webway was a part of the Emperor's plan to eliminate Chaos.

Premise 1c: See conclusion 2.

Premise 2c: The Emperor needed all of humanity involved in his plan, as evidenced by the Great Crusade.

Conclusion 3: The Emperor intended for humanity to move to and exist in the Webway, the ultimate safe haven from which they would thrive and rule, a la the Old Ones.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

My friends, the Emperor may very well have been carrying out the most ambitious plan since the Old One's war against the C'tan. He may have been the most powerful human ever to exist, but give the man some slack. Daddy issues come second to a project at work of these proportions!

I think that the Emperors stance on the matter is that of the crusade, that there are no Gods. He knows of the Warp Entities that call themselves the Gods of Chaos and has more than likely had some form of dealings with them in the past. But he recognises, or tries to convince us, that they are not gods just very powerful beings, like himself.

I would guess that is why the Primarchs were advised to treat Daemons like any other Xenos race, like Nurglitch had pointed out, and to take that attitude when dealing with situations such as the Whisperheads.

Whether or not he took assistance from them is to be seen, as Daemons are not exactly the most reliable source of information like other posters have mentioned.

All Daemons are falsehood. They are lies, given the shape of creatures by the power of Chaos. Fear the Daemons of Khorne for this reason and then fear them once more.
Inquisitor Covenant

Nurglitch wrote:It's interesting that when asked about daemons, Astartes characters rattle off the same boilerplate about xenos-entities in the Warp being classed as one of the lesser threats...

Technically, that's essentially what a deamon is. At least in the 40k realm. They are the parasites/muck that has grown around the decrepitc creation of the Old Ones.

DA's Forever:

Hiding in plain sight, as it were. After all, if everybody knows that daemons are just extradimensional aliens then nobody is going to question why they know it.

Emperor's Faithful:

I don't think that's technically true. Daemons are entities created by the Gods as their servants and emissaries to reality, etc.

Everyone:

I think I'm going to start a thread on the divinity of the Chaos Gods. It seems like a sticking point.