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Just as the title implies, I was wondering if Horus saw his error in the end and regretted ever letting Erebus tempt him?

Hmmmm. Interesting question. I don't know,but if I had to choose an answer I don't think he did.
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Eldar+ Dark Eldar player

I could see it swinging either way, I think he did, just to late and the big E killed him before he could repent. I'm also a Sanguinius fan, so I'm a bit biased towards he's just a dick.

I recall reading somewhere that says he did in his final moment, like most people who turned to Chaos, but cant remember where.

Hmmm I could see him realizing what he had done at the last minute and becoming so overcome with grief that he allowed the Emporer to kill him

TheAngrySquig wrote:Just as the title implies, I was wondering if Horus saw his error in the end and regretted ever letting Erebus tempt him?

Yep, he did. According to Horus Heresy: Collected Visions, IIRC Horus didn't just regret it, he begged the Emperor to finish him, for what he had done.

That actually makes me respect Horus a bit more, knowing that he saw what he had done

Like Void_Dragon has said, Horus did feel regret at the very end. Now, I'm not sure whether it was before or after the Emperor's final psychic attack that destroyed his soul completely. I know the Emperor believed he could not be redeemed until after Horus killed Ollanius Pious, knowing then that such cruelty was too far. Either the Emperor attacked then, and Horus returned to sanity in his last moments, begging forgiveness, or the Emperor finished him after he came back. Maybe his attack wasn't yet complete at that moment.

TheAngrySquig wrote:Just as the title implies, I was wondering if Horus saw his error in the end and regretted ever letting Erebus tempt him?

Well, the story tells that moment before Emperor obliterate Horus souls the Chaos Gods left his body and he drop a tear when he saw his father. For that only moment, the Emperor could see his favorite son one last time...

Void__Dragon wrote:

TheAngrySquig wrote:Just as the title implies, I was wondering if Horus saw his error in the end and regretted ever letting Erebus tempt him?

Yep, he did. According to Horus Heresy: Collected Visions, IIRC Horus didn't just regret it, he begged the Emperor to finish him, for what he had done.

That doesn't mean he regretted anything he did it just means he didn't want to be a pawn of chaos anymore since they had been driven from him. Horus had way too many issues with the emperor for me to logically buy him forgiving him on the spot like that.

TheAngrySquig wrote:That actually makes me respect Horus a bit more, knowing that he saw what he had done

Wow it makes me think the opposite of him i now see Horus as weak and cowardly. But as far as I knew horus slayed Sanguinious but, Sanguinious out of Horus' armour which allowed the Emperor to take advantage of that but not before Horus dealt a fatal blow to The Emperor which is why he sits on a golden toilet now.

he did... just before the Emperor destroyed his soul

Horus managed, solely through his daemonic gifts, to kill Sanguinius. But there are speculations that Sanguinius could have killed him but knew that if Horus didn't kill him, The Emporer wouldnt have seen that Horus was irredeemable.

TheAngrySquig wrote:But there are speculations that Sanguinius could have killed him

That pretty much goes straight against the background. One depiction of it says that Sanguinius would have had no chance had he been fully rested, yet alone when he was exhausted after days of fighting.

Its also what would have happened if horus had managed to kill the emprah. The influence of chaos would leave him, showing him all the terrible things he had done. Then he would have gone mad with regret and started a new civil war which would destroy all of humanity within a century. (or at least I have heard)

So pretty much as soon as Horus rebelled the IoM was screwed?

Through the torrent of the Emperor's psychic assault, Horus howled in pain and remorse. He painfully uttered his last words: I have been. . . a fool. I was so wrong... everything is ruined. I have betrayed you... my father. I do not ask for forgiveness. . . end my torment. . . kill me now! I am too weak to resist them. . . they call to me. . . please end this.

Extracted from the final chapter in HH-Collected Visions.

It gives a pretty clear answer to your question.

That's pretty intense. My other question is if it was Horus at all. Did the Chaos Gods take over his body and use him as a marionette or was Horus in control?

I respected the old horus the one that fought for humanity, not as a son that had father issues at least he died with faith.

TheAngrySquig wrote:That's pretty intense. My other question is if it was Horus at all. Did the Chaos Gods take over his body and use him as a marionette or was Horus in control?

You just answered your own question.

Yes

TheAngrySquig wrote:That's pretty intense. My other question is if it was Horus at all. Did the Chaos Gods take over his body and use him as a marionette or was Horus in control?

Yes and no.

Chaos prefers to corrupt, not completely control.

What Horus was was a perverted distortion of the original Horus, corrupted by the Ruinous Powers.

At least, that's the impression I get.

Horus was same like Fulgrim, he was infested with Daemon when he was wounded. The Daemon slowly bring him under it's control until controlled him completely in the end, just like Fulgrim.

The only difference si that Horus was controlled by all 4 Chaos Gods at the end.

So it was only a tiny piece of him when he died?

Brother Coa wrote:Horus was same like Fulgrim, he was infested with Daemon when he was wounded. The Daemon slowly bring him under it's control until controlled him completely in the end, just like Fulgrim.

The only difference si that Horus was controlled by all 4 Chaos Gods at the end.

Fulgrim was corrupted the moment he entered the Laer temple. He was weak of will and easily corrupted.

That said, you are right, it is like Fulgrim. In that he became a perversion of his original self.

Void__Dragon wrote:

TheAngrySquig wrote:Just as the title implies, I was wondering if Horus saw his error in the end and regretted ever letting Erebus tempt him?

Yep, he did. According to Horus Heresy: Collected Visions, IIRC Horus didn't just regret it, he begged the Emperor to finish him, for what he had done.

Correct!

Brother Coa wrote:Horus was same like Fulgrim, he was infested with Daemon when he was wounded. The Daemon slowly bring him under it's control until controlled him completely in the end, just like Fulgrim.

Wrong.

Fulgrim was not only corrupted, he literally became possessed by the daemon in his sword.

Horus never became possessed by any daemon. The wound from the Anathame was not meant to corrupt him or to infect his mind with warp energies, it was simply meant to put him in a deep trauma and weaken his body and mind so that the Davinite priests could "introduce" him to Chaos. During his coma, Horus was then confronted with twisted visions and demi-lies/truths to influence his point of view on the IoM and slowly make him more receptive to Chaos.
The four Chaos Gods simply played on his frustration and confusion after his appointment as Warmaster and his "abandonment" by his father to turn him away from the IoM.

Once Horus had crossed the thin line between order and Chaos, his constant mingling with the warp and daemons certainly twisted and corrupted him, to the point of madness. This is why, when the Emperor dealt him a mortal blow, Horus regained his sanity and wept when he realized the full extent of the horrors he committed.

"Chaosy Horus" was still the same Horus as during the Great Crusade. No daemonic possession or full-fledged corruption. He had simply been manipulated, twisted and thrown into madness by Chaos, but it was still the same dude.

Fulgrim wasn't weak of will, he was put into a Crusade with severe doubts in himself because of problems with his gene seed, having to live up to the reputations of the other legions with fewer men.

Horus either regretted it or was truly sadistic, because he lowered the shields of his battle barge when attacking Terra. Either he was giving his father one last chance or he wanted to feel his death, no one's sure. He regretted it before he died anyway.

And Horus couldn't have been Horus if he'd been possessed. People were weirded out by the daemon-Fulgrim, Horus wouldn't have been able to lead them if he'd been a puppet.

The older fluff in the Space Marine (Epic) and Chaos Codex left it more open-ended. It said that Horus lowered the shields at the point the Imperium was pretty much done for, but it speculated whether it was Horus wanting to witness his father's death, or perhaps that he felt some last vestige of regret over what he had done.

However, as has been posted above, this has been retconned somewhat with the HH CCG book. As the plots of the book series have pretty much completely followed the descriptions in the art book, I see no reason to believe that we will see a reversal in that regard. We will mostly likely see a continuation of Alan Merrett's 'vision' of what the HH series should be.

Personally, I think it's a great shame, and the use of cackling chaos daemons and magic swords that sap the will of the user (essentially removing the need for a logical story arc and any connection emotionally to the characters involved) is paramount to 'a wizard did it'. For the depth of writing talent they have working on this project I expected more.

I have had this discussion at length on other forums but will re-iterate it here. You have to consider for a moment the treachery of Horus and what it represented. The entirety of the 40k universe, the reason that humanity is gradually being ground into dust and on a one-way ticket to oblivion, is because of Horus' decision to turn against his father. The absolute, most important decision in the history of humanity, and one that encapsulates the grim and dark future of 40k was made when Horus decided he could make a better job of it. Under the stewardship of the Emperor and the Primarchs, they had trampled everything and everyone who had stood in their way. The galaxy was in their grasp, and they let it slip away. Consider for a moment what Horus did. He had fought for hundreds of years alongside his creator, the bond that must have existed between them must have been stronger than anything which could be created in the course of a human lifetime. He went back on everything he knew, everything he had had helped to create, and ultimately went as far as to do the unthinkable - to kill his own progeny, even plot the death of those closest to him who would not blindly follow his direction (Loken). And why? in False Gods we get some mention of bureaucrats taking control of the Imperium away from the soldiers who helped make it. The Emperor returns to Earth giving the highest honour he could bestow on his favored son, and Horus has is visited by visions of what the Imperium can be expected to become if the Emperor continues his course. And that's it? ....

It should be fairly obvious that the causality involved doesn't quite add up. Despite this being a story about super-humans stomping around the galaxy, we already know them to have aspects of character that are essentially human - they have many of the same worries, fears and aspirations. To be honest, the books wouldn't be readable if they did not, having a connection between reader and the characters involved is one of the essential components of storytelling. But going on the reasoning for Horus deciding to become a traitor, the reader would have been left thinking "hang on a moment..", because it was simply not believable. And so, the introduction of a variable, an 'x-factor', something that cannot be attributed to logical reasoning. Horus is stabbed by a magic sword, and wakes up a few days later with black circles around his eyes. He then begins sitting in front of large and imposing fireplaces, with the back of the ostentatious leather chair turned so it's not immediately apparent whether it is occupied to anyone entering the room until he starts to speak.

Without going on and making my post into a large block of text that no-one will bother to read, in conclusion I just think it's a missed opportunity. As the Heresy era is being fleshed out, we are gradually finding out the Emperor isn't quite the golden boy we had supposed him to be, and some of the logic behind his decisions was questionable. The ostracising of Magnus, or taking Angron so his slave army was destroyed are just two examples. Think how much more evocative the story of the Iron Warriors, who were used as bullet shields and a battering ram against the toughest worlds for hundreds of years. Who had their spirit broken, until they turned against their commanders. One of the oldest story telling tropes - the ill-treated slave turning against their master due to the inherent strength of the human spirit. Something similar could have been done for Horus - a gradual braking down of his spirit, or a succession of F-ups by his creator and enemies at the gate which meant that he took that course of action for genuinely conscionable reasons. It would have contained human drama, something that will always be far, far more evocative, more epic, than otherwordly concepts of anathaema swords and whispered promises by Daemons. Certainly, when the book series finally reaches the end, I think whether Horus regrets or not when he is finally destroyed is meaningless. He has already been removed from causality, from any kind of emotive connection to the reader, and that in my view represents a rather large failure of story telling.

He died in the end.