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Given the Emperor's commitment to a powerful and enlightened humankind, including His crackdown on religion, I'm surprised He didn't denounce the Ad Mech's "machine spirits" nonsense and have humankind embrace technological progress again. Of all religions, this really was (and remains) the one holding the Imperium back the most.

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It's mainly because he couldn't afford to out of pragmatism. He helped influence and set up the Ad Mech through his placement of the Void Dragon under Mars so there would be a tech base and infrastructure for him to be ready to co-opt after his victory in the Unification Wars on Terra. Him being able to position himself as the Omnissiah makes it so he doesn't have to get into a protracted military engagement that would likely destroy or severely hamper his ability to harness Mar's industrial resources to allow him to project his forces outside of the solar system through their fleet and ability to support his armies with ammo/armour. It also makes it so the other far flung forge worlds become ready made stopping points for his Crusade.

Remember he was on a time crunch to fill the the power vaccuum that was left from the Age of Strife, as you had the Orks from Ullanor Empire, the Rangdan and other threats that were rapidly building and expanding during this time. It was a necessary evil that the Emperor had to turn a blind eye to secure the fledgling Imperium's spot as the premier power in the galaxy.

Timing, and opportunity.

Looking at his own achievements, The Emperor and his inner circle clearly had a solid understanding of technology, and an adaptive mindset.

But from the moment the Unification Wars began, he was working to an uncertain timetable. I suspect that he could sense the birth of Slaanesh was coming, but couldn’t say exactly when. And he knew that when that happened, the warp storms which had caused so much trouble and isolated areas of the galaxy from one another would blow out.

And so, if his grand plan of unifying mankind was to have even a glimmer of a chance? He and his forces would have to be the ones to hit the ground running, allowing at least initial rapid expansion and hopefully a critical mass of momentum and unity.

Not only was the Priesthood of Mars and its Cult the predominant technological entity within the Sol system, but it had maintained some unity with its sister Forgeworlds, where the Cult Mechanicum also held sway.

So whilst he could have stomped Mars into compliance, it would’ve been unavoidably costly as a conflict, and by no means a sure thing. And given the time it would take, there’s the genuine risk Mars would be able to inform the other Forgeworlds of the attack, and if it fell, to resist the Great Crusade when their time inevitably came.

You’d also be denying yourself the Titan Legions of the Sol System and presumably the others who would be rediscovered during the Crusade.

A pact was the sensible option. They were too powerful and too organised to have as an enemy.

So pact is formed, with The Emperor at least posing as the Omnissiah. From there, you let the pact continue, and subtly challenge the theology overtime. Or indeed, with the Orks contained (Ullanor, and more than enough force to stop such a large Waaaagh! ever coalescing again) and the Webway Project up and running (no more reliance on The Warp), then you’ve the time and resources to take it by force.

I'm sorry, but could you name sources from where you took this info. Really like to read this novels/fluff

Various HH era sources, so a tapestry of written lore and informed assumptions.

Yeah I understand, but I read HH and SoT and there almost nothing about Emperor/Mechanicum shenanigans. We can assuming that He leave them be cause have no time/resources for war with them, but he do that trick with healing knight from house taranis and intentionally represent himself as Omnisiah.

kabaakaba wrote:
Yeah I understand, but I read HH and SoT and there almost nothing about Emperor/Mechanicum shenanigans. We can assuming that He leave them be cause have no time/resources for war with them, but he do that trick with healing knight from house taranis and intentionally represent himself as Omnisiah.

There's some good lore in the Adeptus Titanicus books. Especially if you want to read about the Cult of the Machine God existing wayyyy before the Unification of Earth by the Emperor.

Because Ryza and various Forgeworlds had the Omnissiah stuff before they were reunited with Mars.

Could you referring exact books please? I really like to read some cogs lore

Novels - Mechanicum- Graham McNeil. It's Titan warfare dealing with the Schism of Mars during the Horus Heresy.

Titanicus - Dan Abnett - not a Horus Heresy novel, but the best giant robot combat in 40k.

Game Books -

Adeptus Titanicus - Rulebook
Adeptus Titanicus: Campaign Compendium

If they don't have the Campaign Compendium...

Adeptus Titanicus - The Defence of Ryza and Adeptus Titanicus - Titandeath are the two best reads.

Titandeath also has romance!

Because the authors of the HH series needed to be able to line up with the 40k Mechanicus, and if they suppressed it then they wouldn’t be able to field a whole extra faction of models?

Being fictional, it’s hard to discuss actual motives.

I don’t agree it’s hard to discuss motives.

For his intentions, The Emperor needed ships, armour, arms, ammo, and as fancy examples of the same which can still be mass produced.

That doesn’t just require physical resources (ores, metals, knowledge of what to do with them), but Infrastructure.

The Mechanicum of Mars had that. Whilst not exactly all Happy Clappy Kumbaya unified, Mars was still exactly what The Emperor needed.

Shipyards. Vast Manufactorums. A workforce of staggering scale. The knowledge, however ritualised, to make best use of the same.

That’s not something you just attack for the sake of immediate ultimate control.

But the Emperor cannot have intentions, as he is a fictional character. The writers have plot points to hit, and all the key points were fixed decades earlier. Given how the lore works in 40k, they could have decided that the flying spaghetti monster was in charge of Mars during the Heresy and that the Emperor liked rolling in His Noodly Appendages, and it could probably be slotted in without seeming too outlandish.

It was a corporate GW decision to make the Heresy-era Mechanicum basically the same as the 40k era version. Anything else would then just be made up by the writers to fit the requriements.

Now, a discussion around what other structures could have been described makes sense, but trying to divine the thought process of a fictional character is a hiding to nothing.

Nope. Don’t agree with that at all.

We know The Emperor’s ultimate goal. A galaxy for humanity and humanity alone, carefully ushered through its awakening as a psychic species. Horrific amounts of xenocide and bloodshed, with the promise in the mid to long term of peace, as there’s no-one else to fight, and your own people live lives of contentment, greatly reducing the sources of rebellion.

To do that? We know the Galaxy is vast. Which means you’re going to need a vast expenditure of men and munitions, and everything needed to maintain those.

Mars was organised. Not perfectly. But it was still organised. And it sat at the centre of a Cult which extended to far flung worlds of broadly similar organisation, resources and capability.

If you get Mars on-side, you not only gain its own armed forces and access to its infrastructure in the short term? But as your Crusade expands, its sister Forgeworlds have a high chance of becoming ready made staging posts.

It’s the calculus of necessity. I’ve no doubt if it had come to it, The Emperor would’ve attacked and taken it by force. But negotiating a mutually beneficial pact, in which you insert yourself as a quasi religious icon, and so all but guarantee future influence, makes sense as your First Option. That way, you’ve at least a chance of getting your hands on their goodies and support without smashing everything up first.

Obviously IRL the results were written and now GW is backfilling in the gaps in order to reach the end state we know as 40K.

However we still can get general themes of the Emperor and what appear to be his motives and mistakes. Overall the theme was he was in a rush and greedy, willing to trade compromises in ideology and long term issues for immediate material results. We see this over and over again. Instead of fighting Mars and uprooting their Cult, he inserts himself into it and tolerates it in order to gain control of Mars and all the other forge worlds allied to it. The problem of the religious Cult of technology was a problem to be dealt with later. Multiple Primarchs are discovered with deep psychological issues and simmering resentment but instead of dealing with them (either by destroying them or healing them/addressing the underlying source of their resentment), he does just enough to set them at the head of their Legions and able to keep up the wave of conquests. Again their problems were shelved for "later". In the late stages of the Great Crusade, when it comes to the time of transition to civilian rule rather than Primarch warlords, the Emperor rushes off to his next secret project rather than dealing with the long postponed Primarch issue.

The Emperor over and over again delays fully resolving issues for the sake of short term gain, seemingly confident he can keep juggling things enough to keep everything going while he adds yet another ball or project to the mix. In my own head canon, it is because success gets to the Emperor and makes him over confident. After thousands of years trying to manipulate things from the shadows, only to see the Age of Technology collapse into the Age of Strife, he tries the opposite approach. Instead of trying to stay subtle, he goes for overt brute force and shiny golden armor, and is pleasantly surprised with the speed and magnitude of his success. "I should have done this from the beginning!" First in conquering Terra, then allying with Mars, and the Great Crusade sweeping across the galaxy, the Emperor seems to succeed in everything despite speed bumps like the Primarchs being scattered. Nothing breeds pride, overconfidence, and hubris better than success.

Its the whole idea that The Emperor is a being of immense power armed with the knowledge of thousands of years.

He can't conceive that he would fail beyond short term losses (e.g. losing a few battles). What mattered is the end goal and long term plans, everything else will work out because he's put plans in place.

Turns out that doesn't actually work and that being the worst (as in evil) dictator to ever exist might cause some problems.

Also no matter how super-duper smart he was he still didn't have 1/100000 of the total technical knowledge that the AdMech did. He and his friends could maybe get 1% of the machines to work but for the rest he would have no clue. It's 10,000 years worth of technology spread out across a galaxy.

And the AdMech aren't actually stupid, they're frustratingly good at what they do when they try. They probably "submitted" to the Emperor because it was much more convenient for them to have someone else handle politics while they could spend all day collecting technology.

And who came out on top in that relationship? The AdMech is doing great and the Emperor can't leave his house.

-Guardsman- wrote:
Given the Emperor's commitment to a powerful and enlightened humankind, including His crackdown on religion, I'm surprised He didn't denounce the Ad Mech's "machine spirits" nonsense and have humankind embrace technological progress again. Of all religions, this really was (and remains) the one holding the Imperium back the most.

.

I suspect that if he hadn't been confined to the Golden Throne, he would have done just that. He may have allowed the Mechanicum to keep their ways as it would be easier than yet another war, but I can see him moving the wider Imperium away from such superstitions. Not to mention there wouldn't be much of an Ecclesiarchy...

Pretty much everything boils down to the Emperor not having enough time to fix things.

Lorgar being religious? Not enough time, he was needed for the Crusade.

Angron still having the Nails? Not enough time, he was needed for the Crusade.

Giving Horus the chance to be eased into the position of Warmaster? Not enough time, the Emperor had spent the better part of 200 years not doing the Webway Project.

 Gert wrote:
Pretty much everything boils down to the Emperor not having enough time to fix things.

Lorgar being religious? Not enough time, he was needed for the Crusade.

Angron still having the Nails? Not enough time, he was needed for the Crusade.

Giving Horus the chance to be eased into the position of Warmaster? Not enough time, the Emperor had spent the better part of 200 years not doing the Webway Project.

All of those were choices the Emperor made. He could have chosen a slower pace but he got greedy and wanted to conquer the galaxy quickly and move on to his next project.

For example, he could also have used Lorgar differently instead of humiliating him and throwing his faith back in his face. Lorgar was ultimately hungry for some kind of greater spiritual truth or meaning and even conceding the Emperor as a selfish and manipulative being, he could have used Lorgar far more subtly and wisely. He could for example have told Lorgar about the Chaos gods but framed it as "Yes there are these evil beings that will tempt you and lie to you and try to sway you from my path of righteousness, you must resist their blandishments" etc... Lorgar could have become one of the most steadfast and loyal of the Primarchs because of his faith in the Emperor, and the Emperor could have used that as an asset. Lorgar was doing the slow and steady approach of making each conquered world a zealously loyal world in a quality over quantity approach.

There is a theme running through the Emperor's dealings with the Primarchs and humanity in general, where he simply doesn't understand them. There's an implication that he's so far removed from even the Primarchs that he can't really understand why they'd disagree with him. Unfortunately, I don't think the HH series really capitalised on that theme due to patchy quality and a general lack of central control over the narrative. Lorgar and Angron are good examples of the Emperor just not getting it. Both are clearly damaged in some way, but he just assumes a stern telling off or ignoring the problem will be fine.

Similarly, there's a brief attempt in Mechanicum to show what the future of the Ad Mech may have been, with the more progressive, less dogmatic female tech priest whose name completely escapes me now. Given the timescales the Emperor usually works to, I suspect his plan was to gradually shift the Ad Mech away from their superstition and dogma towards a more enlightened and scientific mindset. He just does the whole Omnissiah thing at first because it's quicker and easier, but then never gets the chance to fix anything. Personally, I think the Ad Mech would have been better written during the HH as being way less dogmatic and superstitious, to really emphasise the fall of the Imperium after the Emperor is put on the Throne. Having a vision of the Ad Mech as a semi-religious organisation that was shrugging off the chains of their old way of thinking, only to have them fall even further down that path after the HH would have added to the tragedy.

I’m not persuaded the frenetic pace of the Great Crusade was driven by greed.

From the outset, The Emperor at best had a rough idea of who and what was out there. The exact level and source of possible resistance (human and Xenos) would’ve been hard to predict.

So instead, you strike hard, strike first, and keep striking. You push your forces, like Alexander The Great, ever onwards.

With every world or system brought into the fold, you extend your supply lines and bases of operation. And before long, you become a juggernaut, a single unified force so vast, few if any can now stand in your way.

It also allows your Crusade Fleets to expand in size and scale, which would surely tempt many more rediscovered human held worlds to give in peacefully. That again allows for further expansion and at less cost.

And as speculated earlier, with Mars allied from the earliest days? Any rediscovered Forgeworlds become vital strong points for resupply of arms, munitions and materials for your hungering forces, further speeding up the whole process.

Did it all go as smoothly as that? No. Not everyone world willingly came into the fold. So you had to kick their head in, as you don’t want to risk an enemy at your back be it human or Xenos.

I do agree that The Emperor was too far removed from the human experience though. He was/is a being thinking in terms of centuries and possibly milennia. Stuff so far down the road of the future us smelly hoomans just can’t see it.

I mean, look at how far we’ve come in just my lifetime. Born in 1980? If you were to pick some random spod off the street from then, and drop them here, today? I think they’d struggle.

They’d have missed almost the entirety of the home computing revolution. The internet would be a thing of wonder. They’d likely struggle to find an office job due to lack of experience using a computer. Heck, even the mass move to unleaded petrol means the smells are very different, let alone the lack of early morning brewing smells (might be an Edinburgh thing, but if the wind was in the right direction, tiny wee me would walk to school to the aroma of brewing).

How do you effectively sell someone with maybe an 80 year lifespan that “it’ll all be alright in a few centuries, trust me bro”?

Much of the 30K Imperium only had the veneer of loyalty as shown by how many worlds quickly changed sides or declared independence/neutrality when the Heresy broke out. For many worlds, Imperial compliance had only been imposed by force from above, sometimes within living memory. The old ruling classes were either forced to kneel, or wiped out and outsiders or quislings put in charge. There had been insufficient consolidation among many worlds and that is where the Great Crusade failed, and just like Alexander the Great, the outerlying regions quickly reverted once the conquerors' armies had moved on.

The Adeptus Mechanicus is an interesting point because the Emperor effectively took control of the cult by inserting himself as the Omnissiah. He then goes on to prohibit many technologies as too dangerous (except for himself of course). The radicals and progressives are the ones that defect to Horus and it is actually the majority of the Mechanicum and Titan Legions. The ones that stay loyal are the conservatives that adhere to the restrictions. After the Heresy, these are the guys in charge and so the Adeptus Mechanicus strangles attempts at progress outside acceptable channels of techno-archeology. The Emperor may have originally wanted a less dogmatic and religious Mechanicum but he chose absolute control over technology first. Now it could be argued that some of his restrictions might have been justified in hindsight given how the Dark Mechanicum has gone, but the way he went about it was heavy handed and alienated much of the 30K Mechanicum.

Iracundus wrote:
All of those were choices the Emperor made. He could have chosen a slower pace but he got greedy and wanted to conquer the galaxy quickly and move on to his next project.

It wasn't greed; it was an attempt to salvage his "grand plan". The scattering of the Primarchs caused huge problems for the Emperor's Astartes project when access to their pure genetic code was lost, and without the ability to mass-produce Astartes, the Imperium was forced to rely on mortal forces and the Custodes for far longer than planned.
That delayed the conquest of Terra, which delayed the conquest of Luna, and so on.
Without the Primarchs at his side, the Emperor also had to lead the Crusade, building his legend as the saviour of Mankind and becoming a figure of worship in the process. Each Primarch had become an individual, rather than a tool to be utilised. They were no longer fragments of his will given form (metaphorically not literally).

For example, he could also have used Lorgar differently instead of humiliating him and throwing his faith back in his face.

Yeah, the Emperor could and should have been a better "dad", that's one of the major points of the Heresy. But the reason why he censured Lorgar is just as relevant. Lorgar isn't found until 857.M30, sixty years into the Crusade, and is among some of the last to be found. Lorgar is also a witness to the death and disbandment of one of the Lost Primarchs and their Legion.
Lorgar had one hundred years with his Legion and was bringing the lowest number of planets into the Imperium because he spent time building temples and spreading his faith. He was warned by the Emperor and by Magnus while being fully aware that religion was the enemy of the Imperial Truth, but he chose to ignore the warning, thinking he knew better.
By the time Monarchia is razed in 964.M30, the Emperor's patience has run out. The Crusade has gone on for nearly two hundred years, and there are still huge threats in the galaxy that need the power of a Legion to defeat, rather than building temples. Lorgar hasn't listened, and the Emperor needed to make an example without losing yet another Primarch and their Legion.
The logic is one of a dictator and warlord, which is exactly what the Emperor always was.

That is greed. The Emperor was still making progress, just at a slower pace than he would have liked. He wanted to hurry up the conquest and get back to Terra and the next phase of his plan. Each of the choices he made was ultimately for the sake of speed because he wanted to get this galactic conquest done with and get back to his real plans. That is effectively the same flaw that Guilliman concludes the Emperor has in the Dark Imperium trilogy, when Guilliman by another normal human character whether the Emperor loves them all. Guilliman concludes the Emperor is in love with his own plans, his ideal of what humanity could be, and not any individual. The Emperor was always chasing the next step in his own plans, and his neglect of the present was what ultimately sparked the heresy because he neglected to deal with the deep fault lines and simmering resentments within his new Imperium in favor of running away to be a recluse in his sanctum and labs on Terra. I am reminded of Palpatine from Star Wars. Little actual interest in the nitty gritty details of ruling a galaxy and instead more interested in pursuing his own secret magical/metaphysical pursuits in secrecy.

The events of the Heresy and now 40K show Lorgar was perhaps right all along as the Ecclesiarchy and the religion based around Emperor worship and based on Lorgar's original writings is what is keeping the Emperor a significant power and still in the Great Game against the Chaos gods. The Gates of Bones novel seems to have a message about this in having the Custodes fail to take down a Chaos antagonist due to its daemonic pacts and wards, whereas the physically weaker Sisters of Battle succeed with their faith. The Custodes can be viewed as the physical expression of the 30K Emperor's ideals of atheistic secular power but they fail, whereas the powers of faith succeed. Similarly, the powers of the faithful is what keeps them going in the area of the Pariah Nexus seemingly unaffected while others succumb or at the very least feel dulled. The 40K Emperor seems to be going the path of fighting fire with fire with psychic Grey Knights and the miracles of the SoB to match the powers and warp powered gifts of the Chaos gods.

An alternative what if scenario if the Emperor had taken other choices of dealing with the techno-religion of Mars first or allowing Lorgar to do it his way might have resulted in a smaller but ultimately more stable Imperium (especially if the Heresy is prevented from happening or is more easily defeated without mortally wounding the Emperor).

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Timing, and opportunity.

Looking at his own achievements, The Emperor and his inner circle clearly had a solid understanding of technology, and an adaptive mindset.

But from the moment the Unification Wars began, he was working to an uncertain timetable. I suspect that he could sense the birth of Slaanesh was coming, but couldn’t say exactly when. And he knew that when that happened, the warp storms which had caused so much trouble and isolated areas of the galaxy from one another would blow out.

And so, if his grand plan of unifying mankind was to have even a glimmer of a chance? He and his forces would have to be the ones to hit the ground running, allowing at least initial rapid expansion and hopefully a critical mass of momentum and unity.

Not only was the Priesthood of Mars and its Cult the predominant technological entity within the Sol system, but it had maintained some unity with its sister Forgeworlds, where the Cult Mechanicum also held sway.

So whilst he could have stomped Mars into compliance, it would’ve been unavoidably costly as a conflict, and by no means a sure thing. And given the time it would take, there’s the genuine risk Mars would be able to inform the other Forgeworlds of the attack, and if it fell, to resist the Great Crusade when their time inevitably came.

You’d also be denying yourself the Titan Legions of the Sol System and presumably the others who would be rediscovered during the Crusade.

A pact was the sensible option. They were too powerful and too organised to have as an enemy.

So pact is formed, with The Emperor at least posing as the Omnissiah. From there, you let the pact continue, and subtly challenge the theology overtime. Or indeed, with the Orks contained (Ullanor, and more than enough force to stop such a large Waaaagh! ever coalescing again) and the Webway Project up and running (no more reliance on The Warp), then you’ve the time and resources to take it by force.

Wait, wasn't the birth of Slaanesh before the unification wars? I understood it was her birth that broke the old human Empire, as it caused a lot of disturbance in the warp, thereby ending space travel and a mass awakening of psykers.

It was Slaanesh starting to come to consciousness which caused the Warp Storms.

The birth was what blew them out, enabling the Great Crusade to start its bloody works.

Now I said earlier The Emperor likely knew Slaanesh was coming - but perhaps it would be more accurate that he could sense something was coming, and what its impact would be.

But, wibblywarpytimeywimey I don’t think anyone could’ve pinned down exactly when.

Hence he revealed himself and started Unification of Terra and the Sol System.

Of all the existing governments and organisations we know about? Only the Mechanicum of Mars could’ve realistically stood against the forces of a united Terra. Sure, The Emperor arguably had more numerous forces. But that doesn’t count for a whole lot in the face of Titan Legions and Knight Households.

Getting the Martian Mechanicum into a mutually beneficial pact would also have meant anyone left in the Sol System faced a stark choice. Willingly sign up, or die.

Not just because the combined might of Terra, Luna and Mars seemed insurmountable? But because right there? The Emperor showed he was willing to negotiate.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

Not just because the combined might of Terra, Luna and Mars seemed insurmountable? But because right there? The Emperor showed he was willing to negotiate.

The Emperor showed no sign of such flexibility or negotiation once something or somebody was nominally under his control. Examples include not explaining Chaos or the warp to the Primarchs or why he was forbidding certain technologies to the Mechanicum (yet also locking such things away in vaults accessible only to him). If he knew how much certain things bothered the Mechanicum or Magnus, he certainly showed no signs of caring beyond simply forbidding certain things and being unable to be swayed from his already made decision. Once somebody joined his side, he seemed to go into full dictator mode, stopped caring, and became an imperious Imperator issuing immutable imperatives.

Well, obviously the Emperor did try to put an end to the Adeptus Mechanicus machine spirits. The problem was, no one told him that the machine spirits have a mind of their own—literally. Some of them take over the machines like they’re in a bad sci-fi horror flick. You know, ‘The Possession of the Battle Tank: Mechanized Edition’—which, let’s be real, sounds like a Saturday morning cartoon for the 40K universe.

Imagine the Emperor walking in, all ready to shut them down, and then his favorite super-heavy tank suddenly turns into a possessed death machine because it’s ‘got a spirit.’ I can already hear the “No, Lord of Mankind, I am not malfunctioning!” from the Machine Spirits as they all decide to ‘go rogue.’

In short, the Adeptus Mechanicus didn’t just ‘invent’ machine spirits—they kind of let them loose... and now they’re everywhere. It’s like someone brought a bunch of AI to life and then gave them permission to make whatever crazy decisions they wanted. What could possibly go wrong? So yeah, the Emperor probably thought, ‘Eh, not my problem. I’ve got a galaxy to run and a whole Chaos thing to deal with.’

All about the calculus.

I still think that without the Primarchs and the resulting Legions, Terra United vs Martian Semi-Academicals is a coin toss dust up.

But whoever won would’ve been severely weakened, and left vulnerable to any other local forces who might want to Come And Have A Go If They Think They’re Hard Enough.

I guess we must also consider The Emperor’s plan offered something the Sol System has been sorely lacking - hope. Hope that a new golden age could be achieved, with The Emperor representing the first tentative rays of that new dawn.

To no longer have to expend your finite and dwindling resources just watching your back. The promise of being once again abroad in the wider galaxy, finding new worlds and new resources.

Sure, the entire Crusade stands as testament that not everyone was willing, and more than a few needed to be beaten into submission, or even extinction. But many came willingly into the fold, just happy that they were no longer alone and isolated. That reinforcements long wished for were finally here, and giving All And Sundry Interlopers the shoeing of their pitiful existence.

To them, would it really matter that The Emperor was a despot? Especially when his staggering power would be protective of the willing?

Because this isn’t Star Trek, finding new worlds and strange colonies. This is a post-fall man given more than a glimmer of a return to genuine glory and dominance.

When you’ve spent centuries barely clinging on against crazy odds, is even a high handed, distant possibly a god arch overlord and Emperor for Eternity really all that unattractive when all he’s really asked is You Join Him? When his plan is an ultimate end to unpleasantness? A galaxy that sure, you children’s children’s children’s children might not live to see, but someone eventually will? An eternity of protection, unity and abundance?

Does the short term cost of generations dedicated to the Imperial War Machine really compare to the thousands of years of rot and decay you’ve already endured?

To quote The Artilleryman from War of the Worlds? Our turn to do some wiping out!
Whoosh with our Heat Ray - Whoosh! And them running and dying, beaten at their own game. Man on top again!

In my headanon, the Emperor is more like the Torquemada from Nemesis The Warlock than a Saviour of All Mankind in the sense the BL novels paint him as. I see him as full of it, and probably everything he ever said to anyone was either a lie, or an attempt to manipulate them.

Therefore, I could totally buy Emperor thinking its too much work to go to war with the Mechanicum. Far better to have them worship you as their god, gain their trust and that, and only dispose of their tainted exsistence and disdain for the purest possible physiology a being can ever have - pure, unaltered Human physiology! ..once you have the rest of the Galaxy in a tight enough chokehold.

Its the same fate he had in mind for the Astartes, had The Great Crusade and everything else succeeded to their logical conclusion.. But that damned Horus had to find out his father was a bigot, Macchiavellian monster and ruined everything..