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htj wrote:

iproxtaco wrote:Since when has The Emperor been mortal?

Well, since his body is being kept alive by the universe's largest iron lung, I think it's safe to say that his body is mortal, at least.

I almost peed myself with laughter!


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Anyone have the reference to the book where an Inquistor talks to the Emperor and finds out he has multiple personalities? Somewhere the fluff as states the Emperor was made up of 12 beings and they came together as one...

You guys do realize it doesn't matter what the definition means in this case right? But more so what Games Workshop means to imply about the Emperors lifespan

If the Emperor is immortal/mortal/biologically immortal/theologically immortal/etc is of no value when asked the question 'is the Emperor an Old One?' as the Old Ones were killed.

The main thing is that the Emperor was born to human parents, with the spirits of human psykers, long after the fall of the Old Ones from this the Emperor is not an Old One.

One last point. If the Space Marines are Immortal, and the Custodes are Immortal, I'm fairly certain that The Emperor is the same.

Except that the SM aren't immortal, by any definition. They can be killed. They grow old. They just do it far more slowly. Their natural lifespans have been enhanced, from my understanding.

If they were truly immortal you'd have marines with so many studs in their head (one per century i think? ) that the'd no longer need a helmet

Not sure about the Custodes, as there is very little fluff on them that's definite, but i'd doubt they are truly immortal. I could be wrong, but i'm pretty sre the fluff doesn't say either way.

The Emperor is a corpse possessed by his own soul, anchored there by a very high tech life support system that's failing.

He is a bit of a schrodinger's cat. No-one's sure if he's dead or not until someone opens the box For purposes of the game he's immortal-ish as the timeline has ground to a halt.

For me he's like the old joke:

How's the patient?

He's stable.

He's dead!

Dead is stable..

Loken mentions that all Astartes are functionally immortal, the same biological immortality that Argel Tal, and The Occuli Imperator say the Custodes have. Neither of them die by aging. Iacton Qruze was stilll as vital as an aspirant, so was Garro, so is Dante. You realize that marines don't live that long normally because they're killed in battle, right? It's inevitable. Dante is unusual, he's about 1600 years old IIRC and is going with no signs of physically stopping.

There is conflicting information. Some sources say SM are biologically immortal others say they age very slowly but do die just none have reached that point yet. The BA codex explains that BA have a mutation allowing them to live longer than normal SMs - this means they would have an age limit. It depends which fluff you believe.

It is conflicting. The First HH book mentions the Space Marines immortality several times when speaking about Iacton Qruze. The Custodes have no such conflict, Argel Tal says they're immortal, biologically of course.

You do realise that Black Library doesn't always have the best record on sticking to established fluff 'fact', also


Marines usually die in battle rather than old age, but there are Marines that show signs of old age, and so presumably will die in due course of it. If they don't age they would all still look the same age as when they were recruited.

This would be true if there was established fluff 'fact'.

This is the the conflicting part. They're either not Immortal, or they are, and even under their Immortality there are different meanings. Biological Immortality is the absence of aging. Clearly Space Marines age, so it would mean their bodies are functionally immortal, it will stay youthful forever, if the HH is to be believed. The mind, that's different. Dante's mind is aging, so was Iactons, and the latter had aged features. It's obviously complicated.

Take a look at Logan Grimnir

He doesn't exactly look youthful. Same goes with Marneus Calgar. He's definitely not in his early 20's or younger.

Fluff generally has the recruits being young men, from what I've read.

Yes, i doubt GW are ever going to give a complete answer because it would be very difficult to go either way without going against a lot of fluff.

The fact that they grow older in appearances suggests they can die of older age. If the SM treatment froze aging they would all look young but they don't. From what we know of their capabilities it looks like they do age but they remain physically capable in the neccessary areas. There must be a point where this overcome their ability to keep functioning or they would get so aged they would just fall apart.

Space Wolves have a genetic mutation IIRC. But I see what you mean and I agree, the fluff conflicts all the time, and this is clearly a complicated issue.

Biological Immortality is perfectly possible, there's no actual explanation of the aging effect, but Space Marines, if indeed they are immortal in this sense, would have either rejuvenating telomeres or their chromosomes are copied right to the end of the strand.

If there chromosomes were copied fully they wouldn't appear to age so the treament doesn't stop aging. They may have ways for stopping ageing but the standard process that turns a human into a SM doesn't do it.

Well obviously it does according to the HH. Those are current ways of doing it. There's no explanation in fluff, I would suggest that it doesn't keep their hair or skin free of aging. I also never said that it wasn't complicated, or that what I said was the actual reasons.

I think most of the aged looks come from them being veterans of combat, as they live most of their lives battling or training. Most people who go through troubling times look older I assume it's the same for Marines. The older they get the more battle scars they recieve, and when human skin gets beaten around alot it gets tougher looking it might be the same for marines. I've never seen or heard a Space Marine not in his physical prime they might seem older as they become more battle hardened, but no marine has ever complained about joint pain or any sign of aging.

OP: The Emperor is not an old one, though he may be a god.

As for him being imortal, he at one point MAY have been mortal, but the worship of humanity made him a god. Just like the chaos gods where made by the emotions of sentient races.

No the idea he has become a god is a theory- one which hasn't been mentioned in a long time. Just worshiping something doesn't make it a god. Chaos gods are formed from emotions gathering in the warp. None of the chaos gods were worshipped before they existed. If the emperor was to become a god what emotion would he feed on? The whole range of emotions are already taken by the chaos gods. That's why they are the most powerful - because all the smaller gods are just aspects of them, they are their chosen emotion in its most basic form.

Weren't the Old ones cold blooded?

Yup, also reptilian, alien and exterminated completely by the Necrontyr (and some other bad happenings..)

No reason for that little fact to get in the way of a theory though

I can solve the immortality argument! hes immortal like Duncan McCleod from highlander, he can be killed, but isnt going to die if hes not. so I go with the hughlander deffinition of immortal applying to the emperor

So Horus should have had his head off then

We can only hope his body doesn't decay further (yes..i know it doesn't) or one of the cleaning staff have an accident that pops his skull off. One almighty lightning storm later the IOM will be looking for another boss...

romegamer wrote:I can solve the immortality argument! hes immortal like Duncan McCleod from highlander, he can be killed, but isnt going to die if hes not. so I go with the hughlander deffinition of immortal applying to the emperor

That's the same as the Tolkien definition

wanax wrote: 2. The emperor differs from gods only in having a canon claiming human birth. Sound familiar to Christians?

Christ was not a god. He was just the hand of the father. Or even the mouth of the father. If you call him a god you might as well call christians gods. Well I suppose in a way they are a part of god; the spirit of god. They do his work. But of course, a quote. The spirit IS NOT the father. And. The son IS NOT the father. But all of them are god. So fair enough, I take it back. Christ was god. But not the whole god. I made a common mistake. The mistake the trinity was explained as a reminder.

I'm not a Christian. I'm totally agnostic. But I do like RE.

I suppose your point still stands. It is similar.

And I am listening to Maiden at the moment. So my judgement is a bit redundant.

I hope I have not started the argument again.

Surely the emperor wasn't mortal, the bloke was 4000 thousand years old, long before humanity had the technology to live unaturally long. The guy was around before Jesus wasn't he?

mattyrm wrote:Surely the emperor wasn't mortal, the bloke was 4000 thousand years old, long before humanity had the technology to live unaturally long. The guy was around before Jesus wasn't he?

It's very likely he was Jesus

It's even more likely he was not.

Big E isn't big on peace and cooperation with existing societies. He is an egotistical, xenocidal asshat with magic powers

Let's leave the religious outrage responses out, though, before they really get swinging.

It's strongly hinted that he was along with many other important figures (gw will never actually say the emperor was jesus). Up until the beginning of the great crusade the emperor had wanted to push humanity in the right direction without actually leading it. He had been trying different strategies from behind the scenes but got tired of watching humanity fail so he decided it was time to lead.

The Emperor was very happy to sit in the shadows and only took charge when he came to the conclusion it was the only way. He was happy to tolerate other humans. The great crusades was the moment he decided he'd had enough and was going to force humanity to work together. The Great Crusade would have failed if had accepted other views.

As if IOM fanboys needed MORE of a messiah complex

I'm really not seeing the supposedly strong hints that he was, given the near total dissimilarity (magic powers are the only similarity i can see) but if you'll give me a booklist and page references i'll read up

Given the grasp on history the BL seem to have (sarcasm alert) you could as easily claim that he was stalin, caligula, Sun Tzu..

I quote:
"he was born to mortal parents many, many millennia ago, manifesting his powers as a youth... This account also claims that the Emperor's birth, while a natural process, was actually the result of a scheme created by the wisest and most powerful of living humans at that time; the conclave of shamans. These men, termed 'shamans' by their society, were powerful psykers with great experience of the warp. Finding their souls - and those of humanity - endangered by the growing perils of the warp-gods, these psykers decided to pool their power into one human, a being they called 'the New Man'. Already having gained the power to reincarnate themselves (upon death, the shamans' souls would transfer to the warp, accumulating power enough to reincarnate as human) the shamans entered a suicide-pact. Thousands of them poisoned themselves and sped their souls to the warp at the same time. Presumably pooling their soul-energy and using their reincarnation ability, they brought about the birth of their New Man - the Emperor - one year later."

this is taken directly from lexicanum and should explain where the emperor came from.