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Let's say through some miraculous mixup or strange turn of fortunes, you are suddenly given full control of the Imperium of Man.
What would be the first thing you would do?

Re-vitalize Holy Terra? Legal Reform? Increased R&D funding? Nothing?

Let me know your thoughts.

Organize a massive Crusade into the Tau Empire. I don't care if it dooms the Imperium. If the Imperium is going to die we are taking a xenos race with us and the Tau are the easiest target to stamp out.

Bring reform to the Administratum, the Imperial Navy, the Imperial Guard, dismantle the Inquisition and bring all its personnel under the responsibility of the Officio Assassinorum. Bring reform to the Officio Assassinorum, and turn it into an general Intelligence branch of the Imperium. Increase Space Marine chapters, begin a 27th Founding. Increase Deathwatch chapter to legion strength, 10,000 strong. Start a propaganda campaign to increase colonization. Especially to worlds in between trade hubs. Initiate research project to find more efficient ways of terraforming, I imagine this will require bringing in knowledge from the Ordo Xenos and the Martian priesthood. Increase propaganda campaign for the celebration of the Emperor and his Primarchs. Remove Ministorum leaders from seats of power. Reverse positions of authority for the Adepta Sororitas, bringing the Ministorum under the watchful eye of the students it graduates. Remove their ships, and make sure the Sororitas work in close tandem with the Navy and Guard. Bring reform to the Arbites, make sure they conform to standard equipment. Lower tithes on planets across the board, but bring the taxes up to standard. No uneven tithes on planets of the same grade. Increase production demands on the Mechanicus and Forge Worlds. Bring reforms to education across the Imperium. Increase ship production. Demand increase in workers. Demand increase in Navigator population. Fix the Golden Throne.

Well to be honest I would first eliminate all of the non loyal organizations/regiments to me. I would make everyone become the same religion as me. I would remove anyone who got political or social power who I did not approve of. I would start a royal guard. Bolster my military ranks with those loyal to me. Make a military personal higher in status than standard citizens. I would of course focus a large amount of resources to education and jobs on other planets. Bolster my military tech budget. I want the imperial navy and guard to be one in the same again. I assume I would need to remove space marines depends. I would of course have to keep the emperor alive. I would also need to make peace with alien species mainly tau, and some eldar, maybe even over throw the tau with the farsights and make them a puppet government. I would than focus on mastering eldar tech. Kill all phychers no matter what they all must die magic can not be trusted. Higher a vast and very large planetary secret police. There is more but this is all I will put. I would need to get rid of all those undeserving and of course found a new capital on a different planet. Their are to many people an terra and they can't all be trusted. I also need public executions just to make sure that the traitors know their place. I very violent death like tying them to a wheel and beating it. I would also need people regulating the secret police of course, and people regulating them. My Royal guard also need to be big enough and more technologically advanced to take on a large rebellion from my forces. I would also rename it to something more friendly and throw in some puppet leaders like for example I will say we are a republic, but I get a larger vote that can pass everyones although I will let them vote on most politics staying away from them of course, maybe. My new capital needs to be an almost barren hazardous planet where no one will look for me with my royal guard set up to kill anyone who comes close. When I die I will have already selected a list of people with no desire for change so that my rule pretty much all stays the same, and gets some acts to make a full transition to a full fledged republic for when I die. puting an act in place which disbandeds my royal guards and makes the guards to the senators. MY MAIN RULE WILL BE ON A VERY SERIOUS NOTE EVERYONE MUST BRUSH THEIR TEETH NO ACCEPTATIONS AT ALL THEY MUST BE BURNED ALIVE OR SOME TERRIBLE FATE PRISON FOR LIFE OR SOMETHING TO BE DECIDED BUT LONG AND PAINFUL.

I'd stop pouring resources into Space Marines, a hugely wasteful and rather unproductive use of valuable resources that could be more efficiently used elsewhere. I'd expand other branches such as the Sisters, the Imperial Guard and of course the Navy. I'd also ditch the xenophobia angle and try to get some kind of cooperation going with other civil races such as Tau and Eldar. I'd also legalise gay marriage and marijuana.

The Imperium is like a great ship or plane on autopilot. The institutions of the Imperium have their mandates and most actively try to resist change and restore the status quo even without direct command from above. The decentralized nature of the Imperium and its myriad instituations along with their web of feudal obligations and infighting and politicking means the Imperium isn't a true nation state as understood by modern 20th century people. All the singular individuals with the power and force of personality to impose galactic scale changes (such as the Emperor or the Primarchs) are long gone, and the Imperium was restructured after the Heresy to deliberately prevent individuals from having such power in order to reduce the risk of rebellion. The down side of this is of course they also lack the power to enact beneficial sweeping reforms or take major decisions that actually alter the status quo.

The High Lords reign...they don't rule. Although they may issue sweeping decrees, like increasing mobilization to fight the Tyranids as depicted in the Tyranid Codex, these come off more as general ideological mission statements rather than concrete policy. The actual enforcement of these decrees can also be highly variable as these directives can be distorted, minimized, or perhaps even outright ignored as they propagate down the Imperium's organizations. There are numerous vested interests within the Imperium, and anyone threatening these interests may also provoke a backlash such as assassination.

The idea that NO ONE at all is truly in charge of the Imperium is an even scarier and more depressing state of affairs than the simple idea of the High Lords as evil corrupt power mongers deliberately twisting the Emperor's ideas: The Imperium as a system given a life of its own, as a blind unthinking beast, in which the uncounted quadrillions of humans in the galaxy are trapped with no hope of escape.

I would disband the Grey Knights or have them wiped out; legalize worship of Slaanesh.

The Administratum is the biggest, most obvious spanner in the works. Ineffective bureaucracy has been the herald, if not the cause, of the fall of countless mighty empires in our own history. I don't know where you'd even begin with such a colossal organization (or how you could make things better rather than worse) but anything else is pointless while the failings of the Administratum persist. Start there, and to be honest it sounds like more than a single life's work to fix it so the entirety of my reign would probably be spent trying to rejuvenate the red tape.

 LumenPraebeo wrote:
"Reform reform reform."

You say 'reform' like it's a four letter word. What specifically are you reforming in the way these institutions how will you implement these reforms? Saying you'd change something without saying how or what you'd change about it is even less useful than the majority of politician 'reform' platforms.

Probably get killed by an Assassinorum adept.

 LumenPraebeo wrote:
Bring reform to the Administratum...

Too bad at this point the Inquisition would try you as a heretic and execute you for abandoning your faith in the Emperor.

Even if they didnt, this reform alone would probably take a century or more. I dont think y'all are understanding how massive the Imperial bureaucracy is, let alone how massive the Imperium itself is.

Get me some sweet power armour inlaid with gems from a thousand worlds. Laugh all the way to the Daemonpocalypse.

Step one: kill the High Lords of Terra, step 2: issue a ultimatium to Cult of the Machine God either get your gak together and figure out how golden age technology works or be sweep aside/Stomped on. Step 3: Forbid/Outlaw the creation of new Space Marine Chapters to lessen the chance of them turning to Choas

For a Start

There's a lot of vague things being thrown here, so I'll try to get into some specifics:

1. Improve Imperial communications and response times. This I feel is crucial, it establishes a means of carrying out other acts and begins to reduce the bloated slowness that is the Imperium. This takes the form of delegating authority on a sub-sector or regional basis to mobilize military assets, in order to reduce lost time in the bureaucratic limbo. Aiding that is spreading resources so that each of these regions (however they are defined) has adequate resources of navy, guard, astartes and any other branch of military so that they are equipped to deal with 99% of threats locally.

The other aspect is to begin research and development of new means of communication. Astropaths and psychic choirs work, but they are fuzzy and slow, as we've seen. While I have no idea what could be found, I'd say the place to start looking is in the psychic technology of the Eldar, presumably they would have some means of galactic communication on a fast, broad scale. We need that in the Imperium.

2. Re-organize the military leadership, from the top down. Now that we have established regions under combined arms control, those combined forces require a point of leadership. I see no one type of background as a perfect fit, so each one will be selected based on their accomplishments and familiarity within the region, as well as their stability as a leader. Chapter Masters and the like can still command their chapters, but that does not necessarily mean that they will be a de facto regional commander. I've got no problems with a guy like Calgar hanging onto Ultramar, but I don't want a hothead like Logan Grimnar in charge of anything more than his ice ball.

At this point, we have a faster-responding, definitively-led group of regions now. Command decisions within that region are entrusted to whoever is selected to be in charge, and their word is as good is only superseded by mine when it comes to regional affairs. Anyone not on board is either shifted to a different region, eliminated, or put into a force devoted to rapid response or attack. With that, the military stability is handled, at least for the moment. We can go on the attack after we've got a better handle on our own stuff.

3. Clean house on the Cult Mechanicus and the Inquisition. While these seem like very different factions, they are riven by the same dangers as before, that of fighting to defend a decaying status quo, rather than for progress. Radicals of both Mechanicus and Inquisition will be granted larger sway and the ability to pursue their more extreme designs on designated planets that will have minimal impact. You want to try making the ultimate deamonhost to crush Chaos? Great, do it on this uninhabited planet and get back to us when you finish. You want to try out a risky STC that may be corrupted? Awesome. You get this old moon to test on. We change the culture to pursue and value innovation and progress over status quo.

THAT SAID, I am not disbanding them or removing the more conservative elements. Those elements are needed to root out corruption from within. The Imperium is a big place and treason can show up anywhere, we need a force of Inquisitors to terrify and root out those elements. So the Inquisition's job and span would be largely unchanged, save for the overall direction of their goals.

As for the Cult Mechanicus, this would also be a housecleaning of leadership. Lots of glory-chasing and internal politics have made it impossible for the Cult to work together as a cohesive unit. Ambition is a good motivating force, but if it gets in the way of the Imperium, the offending parties are going to have very short careers.

#1 Really only works for the Eldar. Craftworlds tend not to speak to each other anyway. The Eldar Farseers foretell the future and base decisions on those visions , but it's a very local club.

#2: Already exists under the Sector Governor. S/He is already the Imperium's representative in the Sector and can command its military assets to defend its borders, quell uprisings, root out pirates, etc. All the stuff you would expect Army/Navy assets to do.

#3: Suicide. Absolute suicide.

Party like hell using the resources at my disposal. Let's face it, my story wouldn't end happily no matter what I did given how nasty the 40k's version of the Milky Way is, so I may as well have the best night of my life before I'm brutally and summarily killed.

1) I'd stage a competition amongst the Space Marines like once a century. Call it "End-A-Xeno". The Chapter who utterly exterminates the most Xeno cultures wins a prize. Team prizes are an option, too, so some Chapters may decide to work together, or leverage other resources.

2) I would instruct the AdMech to stop with this centralization BS. One Forge World holds the secrets to the best of Technology X? Feth that. Get the schematics, make a bazillion back-ups, and put them in secure repositories across the galaxy. I would also just End the Void Dragon, since it's apparently worthless. Inventive machine-god my arse...

3) I would require a hovering War-Throne. Actually, several different hover-Thrones. There's the War-Throne, the Senate-Throne, the Intimidating-Throne, the Lunch-Throne, etc.

Invite the Nids round for Tea and Sandwiches.

 Psienesis wrote:


3) I would require a hovering War-Throne. Actually, several different hover-Thrones. There's the War-Throne, the Senate-Throne, the Intimidating-Throne, the Lunch-Throne, etc.

Damn, that's a good idea! See, this is the sort of thing a ruler has to be concerned with.

MarsNZ wrote:
I'd stop pouring resources into Space Marines, a hugely wasteful and rather unproductive use of valuable resources that could be more efficiently used elsewhere. I'd expand other branches such as the Sisters, the Imperial Guard and of course the Navy. I'd also ditch the xenophobia angle and try to get some kind of cooperation going with other civil races such as Tau and Eldar. I'd also legalise gay marriage and marijuana.

Considering the size of the entire Adeptus Astartes in relation to the Imperium, the amount of resources they "pour" into them probably doesn't even pass the threshold to make it onto the spreadsheet.

In 40K? Nothing, it's over 10 000 years too late for any fixes at that point, the only sane solution would be to nuke every imperial world and start over, beginning from Australopithecus on some remote world, but there is no time for that with all that gakstorm going on all over the galaxy.

In 30K there would still be some hope. I'd start from kicking the Emperor in the balls for being such a colossal failure (seriously, if Abaddon has no arms then Emperor has no limbs whatsoever), execute primarchs since they were irreversibly tainted by the scattering, and give reins to the Interex since they were the only human civilization that even remotely knew what it was doing.

Nothing because any changes will take forever in the bureaucracy system.

Make appearances , boost moral, take vacations and retire on a paradise planet and call it a day.

Iracundus wrote:
The Imperium is like a great ship or plane on autopilot. The institutions of the Imperium have their mandates and most actively try to resist change and restore the status quo even without direct command from above. The decentralized nature of the Imperium and its myriad instituations along with their web of feudal obligations and infighting and politicking means the Imperium isn't a true nation state as understood by modern 20th century people. All the singular individuals with the power and force of personality to impose galactic scale changes (such as the Emperor or the Primarchs) are long gone, and the Imperium was restructured after the Heresy to deliberately prevent individuals from having such power in order to reduce the risk of rebellion. The down side of this is of course they also lack the power to enact beneficial sweeping reforms or take major decisions that actually alter the status quo.

The High Lords reign...they don't rule. Although they may issue sweeping decrees, like increasing mobilization to fight the Tyranids as depicted in the Tyranid Codex, these come off more as general ideological mission statements rather than concrete policy. The actual enforcement of these decrees can also be highly variable as these directives can be distorted, minimized, or perhaps even outright ignored as they propagate down the Imperium's organizations. There are numerous vested interests within the Imperium, and anyone threatening these interests may also provoke a backlash such as assassination.

The idea that NO ONE at all is truly in charge of the Imperium is an even scarier and more depressing state of affairs than the simple idea of the High Lords as evil corrupt power mongers deliberately twisting the Emperor's ideas: The Imperium as a system given a life of its own, as a blind unthinking beast, in which the uncounted quadrillions of humans in the galaxy are trapped with no hope of escape.

This is a very good point, and really less about the Imperium specifically but dictatorship in general. Leaders are mortal humans - ideologies transcend individuals' mortality by spreading from person to person, generation to generation. Whoever establishes a dictatorship must acknowledge their mortality yet envision the future, and so set in place the institutional propagation and maintenance of their ideology to outlive themselves. Any successors after that are merely avatars of the ideology, subject to the aforementioned institutions and replaceable if they're not up to the job.

 Humble Guardsman wrote:
You say 'reform' like it's a four letter word. What specifically are you reforming in the way these institutions how will you implement these reforms? Saying you'd change something without saying how or what you'd change about it is even less useful than the majority of politician 'reform' platforms.

See how many words I've already put into my post? yea, what do you want? do you want me to write a book for you? I have ideas....and reform is the general word i chose to use. Deal with it.

I'd clone the primarchs I have DNA for and who are confirmed dead (so Sanguinus, Dorn, and Ferrus Manus, I believe?) And actually raise them, like a father, and have them grow up together as brothers. Put them under control of 3 new legions raised in the 27th founding. Then treat the worst first, and throw all three at the Tyranids. Build an ashkasic throne and start absorbing knowledge from the universe. Keep a close relationship with the new primarchs and always be careful never to humiliate them. Offer the Lords of Mars 50 new crusade cleared planets for forge world's in return for a universal system of knowledge exchange.

Realistically, nothing could be done other than maintain the status quo.

The 41st millennium isn't an insane place that just needs a sensible person to come along and fix it. Its actually the best possible outcome given the variables at play.

 Grey Templar wrote:
Realistically, nothing could be done other than maintain the status quo.

The 41st millennium isn't an insane place that just needs a sensible person to come along and fix it. Its actually the best possible outcome given the variables at play.

Madness. Much could be done to address the lack of hover-thrones.

 Psienesis wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
Realistically, nothing could be done other than maintain the status quo.

The 41st millennium isn't an insane place that just needs a sensible person to come along and fix it. Its actually the best possible outcome given the variables at play.

Madness. Much could be done to address the lack of hover-thrones.

I don't know. The Space Wolves have that pretty well covered

I'd gather as much geneseed as possible, forgo the normal extrenuous process of creating space Marines and build a massive "super legion" and have them go reconquer the Imperiums territory.


Forget 1,000,000 Marines. More like 45,000,000,000,000

A lot of these ideas strike me as efforts to cause another Horus Heresy.

This isn't a historical reenactor's website is it?

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
A lot of these ideas strike me as efforts to cause another Horus Heresy.

This isn't a historical reenactor's website is it?

Nonsense! History doesn't repeat itself.


Wherever did you get such a ridiculous notion from?