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Who does the Emperor love more? Humans or his Space Marine legions?

Humans. The Space Marines were scheduled for termination (possibly via attrition) once their task of cleansing the galaxy of non-human life, and bringing all human worlds into the Imperial fold, was complete.

definatly humans, space marines where a means to an end

 Psienesis wrote:
Humans. The Space Marines were scheduled for termination (possibly via attrition) once their task of cleansing the galaxy of non-human life, and bringing all human worlds into the Imperial fold, was complete.

This. Remember the Thunder Warriors.

The end goal for the Emperor was always towards furthering humanity as a whole. The Space Marines like their predecessors the Thunder Warriors were simply a necessary tool he created to help facilitate the process to reach said goal.

Hell, look at the way he treats most of the primarchs (short of more personal ones like his relationship with Horus) inadequately and by extension you'll see how he views the Space Marines.

Humans.

When he retired, he took the power from the Primarchs and gave it to the High Lords. Horus was just a military leader, which was one of the reasons of the Primarch´s unrest that lead to the Heresy. And remember the Thunder Warriors. The Emperor has a thing for killing his "sons" once they are no longer needed. Another possible reason for Horus to turn, wondering what would be their fate after the Crusade.

So it is humans. Individually, they mean nothing to the Emperor, but it seems he tried to make the species stronger as a whole.

After humans, I would say Custodes are his favorites. It takes a lot of effort to create a Custode, and he kept doing it. They are also quite different from one another. On the other side, Astartes are more or less the same, and they were mass-produced during the Crusade.

Humans. SM are simply one of many tools that serve its purpose protecting humanity. Accidentaly, this tool almost destroyed it.

The Emperor loved humans. That is why he created the SM in the first place.
However, I do not think the Emperor would have discarded the SM after the Crusade. For that, he loved his sons too much.
He might have stopped creating new Astartes however.

I don't think there is any evidence that the Emperor "loved" his sons. He erased two of them from history, tore down the greatest work of the son that loved him the most, making him bow in the dirt in full view of 2 whole Legions. He sent Russ to crush Magnus (you can argue that Horus encourage the massacred but the Emperor couldn't have been any more inflammatory than by using the wolves to bring him to Terra). He pulled Angron from his world without helping those he cared about and then left him without even trying to help. He let Magnus be put on trial and publicly shamed in front of hundreds for what was already a foregone conclusion. He made no effort to nurture those Primarchs that had clearly been mentally scarred for the worse during their time pre-crusade (Kurze and Angron). The Emperor would have sacrificed anyone for his vision. Except maybe Horus, he let Horus rampage into the Sol System and kill millions, only resigning to end his life once he saw Horus had murdered Sanguinius and was beyond redemption.

 KorPhaeron77 wrote:
Except maybe Horus, he let Horus rampage into the Sol System and kill millions, only resigning to end his life once he saw Horus had murdered Sanguinius and was beyond redemption.

Because logic.

It's a wonder he even managed to unite humanity at all with his ways of thinking.

Back to OP, in some ways I think he didn't really give a damn towards the end of the crusade. He seems to have been far more focussed on defeating the chaos gods. Bloody "Imperial Truth"...

For a guy who played a huge role in our human history the Emperor sure made some dumb decisions. His stance on religion is no more different than an average r/atheism user for instance. Guiding humanity behind the scenes my ass. It's most likely propaganda.

He was rather effective at imposing his atheism though.

There's now but a handful of gods that anyone knows about, while 99% of Humanity knows only the God-Emperor.

 Psienesis wrote:
He was rather effective at imposing his atheism though.

There's now but a handful of gods that anyone knows about, while 99% of Humanity knows only the God-Emperor.

Ah, the sickly sweet irony

Well Marines are human. He wasn't seeking to replace base humanity with Marines, but in terms of "love" I would think he'd hold his Marines just as high as humanity in general. They were after all some of the best young men who had given their everything to help him accomplish his vision and who he had reforged by his own hand.

yeah, Garviel Loken said something about the space marines settling down after the crusade

 Cursed Founding wrote:
yeah, Garviel Loken said something about the space marines settling down after the crusade

"A moment of laxity spawns a lifetime of heresy!" - Some random SM in DoW: Dark Crusade.

 da001 wrote:
Humans.

When he retired, he took the power from the Primarchs and gave it to the High Lords. Horus was just a military leader, which was one of the reasons of the Primarch´s unrest that lead to the Heresy. And remember the Thunder Warriors. The Emperor has a thing for killing his "sons" once they are no longer needed. Another possible reason for Horus to turn, wondering what would be their fate after the Crusade.

So it is humans. Individually, they mean nothing to the Emperor, but it seems he tried to make the species stronger as a whole.

After humans, I would say Custodes are his favorites. It takes a lot of effort to create a Custode, and he kept doing it. They are also quite different from one another. On the other side, Astartes are more or less the same, and they were mass-produced during the Crusade.

in fairness dividing the military leaders from the civilian is seen as an important step towards developing a healthy society

BrianDavion wrote:

 da001 wrote:
Humans.

When he retired, he took the power from the Primarchs and gave it to the High Lords. Horus was just a military leader, which was one of the reasons of the Primarch´s unrest that lead to the Heresy. And remember the Thunder Warriors. The Emperor has a thing for killing his "sons" once they are no longer needed. Another possible reason for Horus to turn, wondering what would be their fate after the Crusade.
(...)

in fairness dividing the military leaders from the civilian is seen as an important step towards developing a healthy society

Indeed.

Unless, of course, the military leader wants to keep the power for himself and starts a rebellion.