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Since the earliest inceptions of the lore I was fascinated with the state of the emperor after is entombment into the golden throne. We now know that after Guillimans return to Terra, he has spent some time at the golden throne with Trajann Valoris to talk to his father.
If we presume this story to be true, then we know that the emperor is in fact alive, in some sense (I just bring this up, because for some time people have theorized that he was actually dead and the ecclesiarchy just kept up a convenient lie). Now the emperor was probably the most powerful psyker in the galaxy during his life before the golden throne, and now he has been fueled by million upon millions of psykers so I would argue that it is fair to presume that his presence in the warp has gotten even more powerful in the last 10.000 years.
So my question is this: do you think the emperor in his current state similar to the four chaos gods? He might not be as powerful as them but we know that his presence shines in the warp to create the astronomican and he's anathema to demons. He also apparently can create sort of an imperial version of a demon prince (Celestine). So in theory if his consciousness was not forced to create the astronomican to enable warp travel and in addition try to keep the webway gate closed he built on terra, could he have supported or empowered his followers in a more direct way like the four chaos gods?

In theory.

The psykers only keep the astronomican beacon lit I don't think they add to Emps power over time.

I would imagine the Corpse God keeping the breach beneath Terra sealed and warded takes up a lot of his time as does counteracting the billions and billions of plots chaos have going at anyone time (operating past, present, future and other simultaneously).

I assume that Big E is currently breaking even.

I think the Emperor's power is somewhere between 1 and 2 Chaos Gods.
I'm not sure he'd actually do more though. He already has his equivalents to Demon Princes running around and Demons too.

pm713 wrote:
I think the Emperor's power is somewhere between 1 and 2 Chaos Gods.
I'm not sure he'd actually do more though. He already has his equivalents to Demon Princes running around and Demons too.

I am curious, what do you mean he has his equivalents of demon princes and demons running around too? I am just aware of celestine, or are there others?

The Emperor is no more 'alive' than Tony Bland was.

Take him off life-support, he dies all John Doe Jersey.

When Guilliman met with the Emperor, he noted that the Emperor became stronger after he sat down on the Throne.
In a recent book about the siege of Terra, it was said that the Emperor was too strong for the gods of Chaos to kill him in the Warp and therefore they needed Horus to kill him in the physical world.

darkoms wrote:
When Guilliman met with the Emperor, he noted that the Emperor became stronger after he sat down on the Throne.
In a recent book about the siege of Terra, it was said that the Emperor was too strong for the gods of Chaos to kill him in the Warp and therefore they needed Horus to kill him in the physical world.

Imperial agitprop.

Personally, I find the new fluff of the Emperor being aware of his surrounding and capable of having a conversation somewhat disappointing.

The idea that he was completely functionally cut off from anyone and anything, so that both his current psychic/mental state AND his opinion (or lack thereof) on the realities of the Imperium in the 41st Millenium were a complete mystery and anyone's guess, was much more intriguing imho.

I liked the idea that he can interact in a blunt way by doing things like making someone into a Saint or summoning a Warp Storm but was incapable of more precise interaction.

 Esmer wrote:
Personally, I find the new fluff of the Emperor being aware of his surrounding and capable of having a conversation somewhat disappointing.

The idea that he was completely functionally cut off from anyone and anything, so that both his current psychic/mental state AND his opinion (or lack thereof) on the realities of the Imperium in the 41st Millenium were a complete mystery and anyone's guess, was much more intriguing imho.

Fair point, but you could argue that maybe directing his awareness to talk to Guilliman was something he can not do anytime, but requires extreme amounts of effort. And he actually never really "talked" to anyone directly except Guilliman and the Sisters of Battle that eventually killed Goge Vandire in the Age of Apostasy (presumably, since they turned on Vandire after they went to the throne). And both those events are several thousand years apart, so maybe he is sowhat aware of the reality of the imperium, but can only communicate with important persons directly when it is absolutely necessary, because it takes that much effort?

 Esmer wrote:
Personally, I find the new fluff of the Emperor being aware of his surrounding and capable of having a conversation somewhat disappointing.

Depends on just how aware he is, or how he converses and with whom.

 Esmer wrote:
The idea that he was completely functionally cut off from anyone and anything, so that both his current psychic/mental state AND his opinion (or lack thereof) on the realities of the Imperium in the 41st Millenium were a complete mystery and anyone's guess, was much more intriguing imho.

I think that is pretty much the same as when he was alive though. Everything was the bigger picture, rather than concern about anything detailed outside his own plans.

I did like the mystery of the Emperor like others have said, but I do think the suggestion that he has become more power but has been stripped of all humanity by the millenia of agonised torment on the throne is pretty cool. Even if he did come back to life now he wouldn't be the eloquent Emperor people loved, but a rabid monster that thought only of its own survival...

 Kroem wrote:
I did like the mystery of the Emperor like others have said, but I do think the suggestion that he has become more power but has been stripped of all humanity by the millenia of agonised torment on the throne is pretty cool. Even if he did come back to life now he wouldn't be the eloquent Emperor people loved, but a rabid monster that thought only of its own survival...

He wasn't exactly human before....

Tiberias wrote:

pm713 wrote:
I think the Emperor's power is somewhere between 1 and 2 Chaos Gods.
I'm not sure he'd actually do more though. He already has his equivalents to Demon Princes running around and Demons too.

I am curious, what do you mean he has his equivalents of demon princes and demons running around too? I am just aware of celestine, or are there others?

They're called Living Saints (and are still pretty rare). Celestine is the most famous, but not the only one. There's Saint Sabbat for example.

be intreasting to finally get the celestine book and see if the oft supposed "she's an emperor deamon" theory turns out to be right

pm713 wrote:

 Kroem wrote:
I did like the mystery of the Emperor like others have said, but I do think the suggestion that he has become more power but has been stripped of all humanity by the millenia of agonised torment on the throne is pretty cool. Even if he did come back to life now he wouldn't be the eloquent Emperor people loved, but a rabid monster that thought only of its own survival...

He wasn't exactly human before....

No, he was the combined souls of Australopithecus africanus psykers that reincarnated over the millennia until they mass suicided and combined their souls in the body of a homo sapien boy.

Which is to say, cosmologically speaking, he's no more remarkable than an Eldar exarch or an infinity circuit, which are themselves a bunch of souls from a reincarnating psyker race all combined into a single thing.



Worship of the Emperor and the original Emperor are two separate things.

The warp can't zero in on the concept of your worship and attach your psychic energy to it, it's far more primordial than that.

Khorne is the name people give to the concept of rage that, by acting violently, you empower. The chaos gods are so fundamental that worship is just specific actions that people do. There's a reason blood for the blood god exists -because spilling blood fuels khorne whether you want it to or not.

What the imperium have created isn't a superpowered Emperor person, but a warp entity representing totalitarian faith and zealotry that they identify as the Emperor.

If abstract worship worked as an empowering tool, belakor would be a god by now and any alpha psyker that sets up a cult of worship would become one too.

It doesn't work because murder feeds the murder storm in the warp which we call khorne and despair feeds the despair storm we call nurgle. They are so fundamental to conscious thought and emotion that they feed off your existence.

The emperoraswarpgod concept is a highly localised, abstract concept around faith and zealotry that only the imperium sustains. It has to be actively fed, it can't be passively fed the same way the chaos gods are

We only have guilimans word for it that he is aware and can talk. He’s a corpse and the star child is waiting to be reborn!

Hellebore wrote:

pm713 wrote:

 Kroem wrote:
I did like the mystery of the Emperor like others have said, but I do think the suggestion that he has become more power but has been stripped of all humanity by the millenia of agonised torment on the throne is pretty cool. Even if he did come back to life now he wouldn't be the eloquent Emperor people loved, but a rabid monster that thought only of its own survival...

He wasn't exactly human before....

No, he was the combined souls of Australopithecus africanus psykers that reincarnated over the millennia until they mass suicided and combined their souls in the body of a homo sapien boy.

Which is to say, cosmologically speaking, he's no more remarkable than an Eldar exarch or an infinity circuit, which are themselves a bunch of souls from a reincarnating psyker race all combined into a single thing.



Worship of the Emperor and the original Emperor are two separate things.

The warp can't zero in on the concept of your worship and attach your psychic energy to it, it's far more primordial than that.

Khorne is the name people give to the concept of rage that, by acting violently, you empower. The chaos gods are so fundamental that worship is just specific actions that people do. There's a reason blood for the blood god exists -because spilling blood fuels khorne whether you want it to or not.

What the imperium have created isn't a superpowered Emperor person, but a warp entity representing totalitarian faith and zealotry that they identify as the Emperor.

If abstract worship worked as an empowering tool, belakor would be a god by now and any alpha psyker that sets up a cult of worship would become one too.

It doesn't work because murder feeds the murder storm in the warp which we call khorne and despair feeds the despair storm we call nurgle. They are so fundamental to conscious thought and emotion that they feed off your existence.

The emperoraswarpgod concept is a highly localised, abstract concept around faith and zealotry that only the imperium sustains. It has to be actively fed, it can't be passively fed the same way the chaos gods are

While that may be true, there is also the fact that the golden throne has been "fed" by millions upon millions of psykers over the last ten thousand years. One could argue that those souls could have directly empowered the presence of the emperor in the warp even further since he is also directly linked to the throne.
Also I agree that the presence of the emperor in the warp can not feed of the same raw, primordial emotions the big four chaos gods can, but the thousands of years of worhip seemed to have had some effect. Like I said I would not consider the emperor equal to the big four, but rather something like an upcoming rival who is a massive annoying thorn in their side.

Andykp wrote:
We only have guilimans word for it that he is aware and can talk. He’s a corpse and the star child is waiting to be reborn!

Jaq Draco would like a word....

Andykp wrote:
We only have guilimans word for it that he is aware and can talk.

Except how that part of the story is written.
It's from Guilliman's internal stream of consciousness, not him recalling it to someone else. He has literally no reason to lie when he's simply remembering a story, and we, the reader, get to peek into his thoughts.

Maybe he was fed an illusion, but I doubt this. It's the Imperial Palace. Any kind of interference in the throne room itself is incredibly unlikely.

Personally i would attribute the Big E's power level to that of archeon in sigmar. The Big E is not the level of a Chaos god, but he has become so powerful in the warp that he is now beyond the power influence of the chaos gods in that they simply cant smite his ass outta existence anymore and has his own portion of the warp carved out for just himself.

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

Andykp wrote:
We only have guilimans word for it that he is aware and can talk.

Except how that part of the story is written.
It's from Guilliman's internal stream of consciousness, not him recalling it to someone else. He has literally no reason to lie when he's simply remembering a story, and we, the reader, get to peek into his thoughts.

Maybe he was fed an illusion, but I doubt this. It's the Imperial Palace. Any kind of interference in the throne room itself is incredibly unlikely.

Lies! The only way to save the human race is to destroy the emperors body and allow the star child to be reborn! Round up the sensei. You can’t trust what guiliman says anyway, he was just emotional and under the influence of naughty eldar tricks.

 Backspacehacker wrote:
Personally i would attribute the Big E's power level to that of archeon in sigmar.

I know Laurie Goulding is fond of the theory that the Emperor is actually the Everchosen of the 40K setting, analogous to Archaon except that he chose to rebel against the Gods rather than willingly serve them.

(The obvious corollary of this is that Horus was set up from the start to be the sacrifice that ensured the Everchosen's ascension, the Sigmar/Valten analogue in other words, except that he screwed it up by actually turning to Chaos.)

Andykp wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

Andykp wrote:
We only have guilimans word for it that he is aware and can talk.

Except how that part of the story is written.
It's from Guilliman's internal stream of consciousness, not him recalling it to someone else. He has literally no reason to lie when he's simply remembering a story, and we, the reader, get to peek into his thoughts.

Maybe he was fed an illusion, but I doubt this. It's the Imperial Palace. Any kind of interference in the throne room itself is incredibly unlikely.

Lies! The only way to save the human race is to destroy the emperors body and allow the star child to be reborn! Round up the sensei. You can’t trust what guiliman says anyway, he was just emotional and under the influence of naughty eldar tricks.

All jokes aside if the thorians were to succeed in doing this, the webway gate beneath the golden throne would open up again and flood terra with demons right?

Guilliman would totes be the first being in the Galaxy to have some god-type-thing "tell" him exactly what he needs to hear to justify exactly what he wants to do.

It's all Imperial agitprop.

Tiberias wrote:

Andykp wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

Andykp wrote:
We only have guilimans word for it that he is aware and can talk.

Except how that part of the story is written.
It's from Guilliman's internal stream of consciousness, not him recalling it to someone else. He has literally no reason to lie when he's simply remembering a story, and we, the reader, get to peek into his thoughts.

Maybe he was fed an illusion, but I doubt this. It's the Imperial Palace. Any kind of interference in the throne room itself is incredibly unlikely.

Lies! The only way to save the human race is to destroy the emperors body and allow the star child to be reborn! Round up the sensei. You can’t trust what guiliman says anyway, he was just emotional and under the influence of naughty eldar tricks.

All jokes aside if the thorians were to succeed in doing this, the webway gate beneath the golden throne would open up again and flood terra with demons right?

If you believe that the emperor is more than a slow rotting corpse. And even if it did demons on the throne world wouldn’t matter because the star child would be born else where and earth wouldn’t be as important. It’s my fave theory but mostly because it is just a theory. So 40k if true. Reversing a corpse that if they let it die fully would lead to salvation.

Andykp wrote:

Tiberias wrote:

Andykp wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

Andykp wrote:
We only have guilimans word for it that he is aware and can talk.

Except how that part of the story is written.
It's from Guilliman's internal stream of consciousness, not him recalling it to someone else. He has literally no reason to lie when he's simply remembering a story, and we, the reader, get to peek into his thoughts.

Maybe he was fed an illusion, but I doubt this. It's the Imperial Palace. Any kind of interference in the throne room itself is incredibly unlikely.

Lies! The only way to save the human race is to destroy the emperors body and allow the star child to be reborn! Round up the sensei. You can’t trust what guiliman says anyway, he was just emotional and under the influence of naughty eldar tricks.

All jokes aside if the thorians were to succeed in doing this, the webway gate beneath the golden throne would open up again and flood terra with demons right?

If you believe that the emperor is more than a slow rotting corpse. And even if it did demons on the throne world wouldn’t matter because the star child would be born else where and earth wouldn’t be as important. It’s my fave theory but mostly because it is just a theory. So 40k if true. Reversing a corpse that if they let it die fully would lead to salvation.

Unless you're on earth and a demon eats your soul.

Andykp wrote:

Tiberias wrote:

Andykp wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

Andykp wrote:
We only have guilimans word for it that he is aware and can talk.

Except how that part of the story is written.
It's from Guilliman's internal stream of consciousness, not him recalling it to someone else. He has literally no reason to lie when he's simply remembering a story, and we, the reader, get to peek into his thoughts.

Maybe he was fed an illusion, but I doubt this. It's the Imperial Palace. Any kind of interference in the throne room itself is incredibly unlikely.

Lies! The only way to save the human race is to destroy the emperors body and allow the star child to be reborn! Round up the sensei. You can’t trust what guiliman says anyway, he was just emotional and under the influence of naughty eldar tricks.

All jokes aside if the thorians were to succeed in doing this, the webway gate beneath the golden throne would open up again and flood terra with demons right?

If you believe that the emperor is more than a slow rotting corpse. And even if it did demons on the throne world wouldn’t matter because the star child would be born else where and earth wouldn’t be as important. It’s my fave theory but mostly because it is just a theory. So 40k if true. Reversing a corpse that if they let it die fully would lead to salvation.

Now wait a second, I am only somewhat familiar with the star child theory, but does that theory state that the presence of the emperor in the warp is not linked to his body on the golden throne? Because that would not make a lot of sense to me, also Terra being flooded with demons would still matter in my opinion.
Though I agree that it is very grimdark in an awsome way that, if the star child theory were to be true (which I personally do not believe), letting the emperor die would lead to the salvation of mankind, which is made impossible by the theocratic, fascistic and stagnant nature of the imperium of man.

Correctly if I'm wrong but I recall Bobby G recalling the emperor speaking to him being both mentally and physically taxing and an over all unpleasant experience. If a Primarch is having physical discomfort with having what was portrayed as a fairly brief conversation, I'd imagine that anyone else trying to sort out what he's saying is going to end up bleeding out of their ears.

Tiberias wrote:


All jokes aside if the thorians were to succeed in doing this, the webway gate beneath the golden throne would open up again and flood terra with demons right?

Nope. Vulkan's failsafe would trigger and most of the Sol system would be vaporized instantly.