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Just finished Old Earth where the Emperor tells Vulkan his purpose

Additionally Magnus's was to

Whats the other Primarch's purposes.

Gulliman I suspect was intended to be his master administrator.
Dorn was to build fortifications

those are the two most obvious

Russ was to be his executioner. One of the few to align properly to his role

Sangarius was to inspire the masses (altough that's a pretty open concept)

Horus was to be his 'centuar', which seems to have been a reference to either 'chief warlord' or 'right hand errand boy' depending on how you read it.

Some are pretty obvious, ala Guilliman. But, I wonder for example what Lorgar, Angron, Curze, and Mortaion's roles were supposed to be? They had a lot of stuff happen to them before the emperor even found them that altered their temperament drastically.

Also, what was Perturabo supposed to be? Chief scientist/Architect? Wasn't the emperor already fufilling that role? How would that role overlap with Ferrus Manus' and Dorn's responsibilities?

Given any of this is a retcon from originally just having 20 primarchs because it was cool, it's never going to look particularly satisfying.

There aren't 20 meaningful roles to assign.


And we don't see anything LACKING as a result of the loss of 2 primarchs - no great holes in the emperor's work or the imperium as a result of not having special super unique dudes....

The primarchs are being burdened with so much extra crap to make them even more special and bestest, it's getting old.

They ruined one of my favourites by making him immortal...

One thing to keep in mind the original plan was to raise all 20 (21 assuming they noticed Alpha legion had two lol) in a highly controlled environment under his direct supervision. Now he probably would have farmed that out to Malcador but he essentially would have molded them into exactly what he wanted.

Instead thanks the chaos gods intervention he ended up with 21 kids who had various degrees of personality disorders and extreme emotional issues. He made the best of it going forward but probably should have been a bit more liberal with purging a few.

and chances are some of the Primarchs would have turned out VERY VERY differantly. no matter where you are on the nature vs nurture debate you reckongize that nurture is going to have an impact on you

01. El'Johnson: The Prototype
02. Lost
03. Fulgrim: The Architect.
04. Perturabo: Commander of the Garrison
05. Khan: Commander of the Marches
06. Leman Russ: Executioner.
07. Rogal Dorn: Praetorian Guard.
08. Konrad Curze: Retribution
09. Sanguinius: Judas Goat
10. Ferrus Manus: R&D
11. Lost
12. Angron: Emotional Support
13. Roboute Guiliman: Administration & Logistics
14. Mortarian: Agriculture
15. Magnus: Soul Engine Fuel
16. Horus: Serfing, Posing
17. Lorgar: Propaganda
18 Vulkan:
19. Corax: Vengeance.
20. Alpharius: Secret Service.

Curze, Angron, and possibly Mortarion should have been executed as soon as they were found. They were broken before the Emperor even found them, and trying to salvage them was a waste of time.

Perturabo, Lorgar and possibly Magnus should have been given a chance to overcome their massive personality flaws, but ultimately would have probably ended up being executed too. Perturabo's paranoia and brusque personality, Lorgar's need to believe in a higher power, and Magnus' thirst for knowledge at any cost made them unsuitable for the positions of importance they were given. None of them succeeded at curbing their flaws and the fact that all three ended up turning traitor was proof of that.

Horus, Fulgrim, and Alpharius only turned to chaos because of contrived circumstances and probably would have been fine had those circumstances not arisen.

Nature vs nurture is an interesting debate, I think both are important. I personally believe it to be analogous to sculpting, where nature is the material you are given, and nuture is how it is sculpted. You can be given the most beautiful marble, but unless it is sculpted correctly, it will remain an ugly chunk of stone. Whereas, the opposite is also true: You can be given a turd and sculpt it into a beautiful piece of art, but ultimately it is still a turd.

Nature only gives a set of characteristics and a range of outcomes, and nurture dictates how those characteristics evolve and what outcome is reached within the range of outcomes. Someone who is naturally aggressive (a characteristic) could wind up as either a serial killer or a cop/bouncer. Same characteristic, different outcomes.

IMHO Horus' fall was poorly written but his reasons for his fall are understandable, he had doubts about his place after the great crusade. I suspect Horus would have, had chaos not gotten to him when they did eventually become a problem. I think he would have taken poorly to retirement

Nurglitch wrote:
01. El'Johnson: The Prototype
02. Lost
03. Fulgrim: The Architect.
04. Perturabo: Commander of the Garrison
05. Khan: Commander of the Marches
06. Leman Russ: Executioner.
07. Rogal Dorn: Praetorian Guard.
08. Konrad Curze: Retribution
09. Sanguinius: Judas Goat
10. Ferrus Manus: R&D
11. Lost
12. Angron: Emotional Support
13. Roboute Guiliman: Administration & Logistics
14. Mortarian: Agriculture
15. Magnus: Soul Engine Fuel
16. Horus: Serfing, Posing
17. Lorgar: Propaganda
18 Vulkan:
19. Corax: Vengeance.
20. Alpharius: Secret Service.

I've heard Angron caleld a lot of things, but an Emotional Support Animal is a new one.

BrianDavion wrote:
Gulliman I suspect was intended to be his master administrator.
Dorn was to build fortifications

those are the two most obvious

Leman Russ: Bird Dog. Not someone who bird dog's a project. I mean literal bird dog.

BrianDavion wrote:
IMHO Horus' fall was poorly written but his reasons for his fall are understandable, he had doubts about his place after the great crusade. I suspect Horus would have, had chaos not gotten to him when they did eventually become a problem. I think he would have taken poorly to retirement

They weren't going to be retired. They were going to go live on a farm in the country with a nice family.

Hellebore wrote:
Given any of this is a retcon from originally just having 20 primarchs because it was cool, it's never going to look particularly satisfying.

There aren't 20 meaningful roles to assign.


And we don't see anything LACKING as a result of the loss of 2 primarchs - no great holes in the emperor's work or the imperium as a result of not having special super unique dudes....

The primarchs are being burdened with so much extra crap to make them even more special and bestest, it's getting old.

They ruined one of my favourites by making him immortal...

Indeed. I liked them better when they were just geneseed incubators and generals in his warlord armies. Of course I liked marines better when they were mind scrubbed killing machines recruited from prisoners etc, like Sardauker. But hey thats just me.

Nurglitch wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:
IMHO Horus' fall was poorly written but his reasons for his fall are understandable, he had doubts about his place after the great crusade. I suspect Horus would have, had chaos not gotten to him when they did eventually become a problem. I think he would have taken poorly to retirement

They weren't going to be retired. They were going to go live on a farm in the country with a nice family.

In a farm that breeds xenos for them to kill, obviously.

Just got reminded from First Heretic.

We can mark Logar down as some kind of Internal Diplomat. Book mentions he was bred for Loyalty and diplomacy, to strengthen others. Apparently the 'loyalty' bit was over-engineered and we can also add him to the list of 'oopsies' primarchs.

One of my favorite things about Horus Hersey is learning just how deeply the Emperor screwed things up

 ChargerIIC wrote:

I've heard Angron caleld a lot of things, but an Emotional Support Animal is a new one.

I think this is covered in Slave of Nuceria.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ChargerIIC wrote:
One of my favorite things about Horus Hersey is learning just how deeply the Emperor screwed things up

The Emperor admits to Ra in MoM that he knew the risks the Primarchs could pose if they grew up without his guidance. But without them there was an even greater risk of the Great Crusade failing. They were crucial to his plans to reconquer the Galaxy. Once the Eldar fell, he was on a tight schedule and had to establish the Imperium before some other race (like the Orks without the Eldar to control them) got there first.

 ChargerIIC wrote:

Nurglitch wrote:
01. El'Johnson: The Prototype
02. Lost
03. Fulgrim: The Architect.
04. Perturabo: Commander of the Garrison
05. Khan: Commander of the Marches
06. Leman Russ: Executioner.
07. Rogal Dorn: Praetorian Guard.
08. Konrad Curze: Retribution
09. Sanguinius: Judas Goat
10. Ferrus Manus: R&D
11. Lost
12. Angron: Emotional Support
13. Roboute Guiliman: Administration & Logistics
14. Mortarian: Agriculture
15. Magnus: Soul Engine Fuel
16. Horus: Serfing, Posing
17. Lorgar: Propaganda
18 Vulkan:
19. Corax: Vengeance.
20. Alpharius: Secret Service.

I've heard Angron caleld a lot of things, but an Emotional Support Animal is a new one.

I've heard it said his aspect of the Emperor was 'Loyalty' both as a joke and as a serious statement.
Joke side - Big E had no loyalty so neither did Angron. Badum tsst!
Serious side - Angron was broken when the Big E found him but even with his damaged mind and butcher's nails his loyalty was absolute, problem was the Emperor never earned it, he just dragged Angron away from the fellow slaves that he was loyal to then gave him soldiers and demanded Angron lead them in his service.

Cuddly.

It would be interesting so see what kind of stories could be written providing extenuating circumstances for the Emperor's actions regarding Mortarian and Angron. Curze, well, he hand things in hand when the Emperor arrived, apparently, but telling the Emperor he knew what was going to happen and going along anyways...

Yes, what would have been the issue with beaming down support to Angron and his troops. He was going to take over the world anyway.

Apparently the world was already rendered compliant so supporting Angron would have been politically problematic

 Frazzled wrote:
Yes, what would have been the issue with beaming down support to Angron and his troops. He was going to take over the world anyway.

Unless they retconned this it was always my recollection that Angron not only was not any were close to conquering his planet, he was about to die when the Emperor intervened. The Big E would likely have been far better off letting that hppen long term.

BrianDavion wrote:
Apparently the world was already rendered compliant so supporting Angron would have been politically problematic

Making one of your posthuman demigod generals hate you for the rest of his life is politically problematic.

In dark imperium plague war Guiliman mentions that the primarchs had overlapping functions, redudancies built into the system. He talks about himself and Dorn specialising in adminstration.
In my mind it works kinda like this

Dorn: defence and admin
Guiliman : admin and empire building
Logar: empire building and inspiration
Sangunious : inspiration and foresight
Konrad : foresight and stealth warfare
Corvax: stealth warfare and ????
Lost primarch
Mortarian: ????? And attrition
Perturabo: attrition and technolgist
Ferrus: technologist and reserch
Magnus: reserch and pysker
Lost primarch: pysker and plotting
Alpharius:plotting and secret manuvering
El'Jonson: secret manuvering and tactical prowess
Horus: tactical prowess and fast attack
Khan: fast attack and hunting
Leman: hunting and brotherhood
Angron: brotherhood and discipline
Fulgrim: discipline and creativity
Vulkan: creativity and defence

@ Stormblessed15: it would definitly make sense this way.

I have not read the Horus Heresy books yet but regarding this topic I have a question, especially to the point brought up by Karhedron:

The Emperor admits to Ra in MoM that he knew the risks the Primarchs could pose if they grew up without his guidance. But without them there was an even greater risk of the Great Crusade failing. They were crucial to his plans to reconquer the Galaxy. Once the Eldar fell, he was on a tight schedule and had to establish the Imperium before some other race (like the Orks without the Eldar to control them) got there first.

I still do not understand, why the Emperor did not ditch the original primarchs the moment they were kidnapped by the chaos gods. I mean he planned and plotted for centuries to millenia and was/is a great geneticist. I don't think it would have been that hard for him to create exakt copies of all 20/21 starting immediatly after they gestation capsules went missing. This way he would have lost a couple of years tops compared to finding his first series of primarchs. And since he would most likely still have genetic material of the first series lying around, they would still be linked to their respective legions and it should not take that long to reach the gestation pod state again.
This second Primarch series would have been under his supervision from the start without influence of destabilizing factors. Simultanously it would still have been a good idea to track down the first series of Primarchs and "take care of them", maybe even use the more stable of them, but not as commanders of his legions. And he does not seem to me as a person whose "fatherly love" would keep him from ditching his first creations.


Getting the original series just always seems a dumb risk to me. Is there anything in the HH books explaining why he did not start all over? Was his schedule really that tight? Did he at that point not have the recources to create clones of the necessary quality (which I find hard to believe)?

I still do not understand, why the Emperor did not ditch the original primarchs the moment they were kidnapped by the chaos gods. I mean he planned and plotted for centuries to millenia and was/is a great geneticist. I don't think it would have been that hard for him to create exakt copies of all 20/21 starting immediatly after they gestation capsules went missing. This way he would have lost a couple of years tops compared to finding his first series of primarchs. And since he would most likely still have genetic material of the first series lying around, they would still be linked to their respective legions and it should not take that long to reach the gestation pod state again.

Primarch are not only flesh and DNA, there are also a huge amount of warp shenanigans (energy and rituals) involved, which once done would be impossible to duplicate (it is stated explicitly in of the novels).

w1zard wrote:
Perturabo, Lorgar and possibly Magnus should have been given a chance to overcome their massive personality flaws, but ultimately would have probably ended up being executed too.

Uh, wot? Perturabo only rebelled because he was treated like , easily worst of all primarchs. Give him post of chief scientist/architect and tell him to build Imperial Palace, and he gladly stays loyal. Ditto for Magnus, Emps was idiot with the whole decree, had he kept Magnus close to keep eye on him nothing would have happened.

Horus, Fulgrim, and Alpharius only turned to chaos because of contrived circumstances and probably would have been fine had those circumstances not arisen.

Alpharius was disloyal gak since the start. And actually, if FW books are to be believed, Horus was messed up by Emps stupidity. He was found as a child, and instead of being given secular, Imperial Truth education, he was sent to cannibal gangs to make them loyal to him (giving Sons of Horus one of the worst legion foundations). I wonder how they could not fall to chaos given they were cannibal cave dwelling mafia degenerates to begin with, why not just use Terrans?

Pyroalchi wrote:
I still do not understand, why the Emperor did not ditch the original primarchs the moment they were kidnapped by the chaos gods. I mean he planned and plotted for centuries to millenia and was/is a great geneticist. I don't think it would have been that hard for him to create exakt copies of all 20/21 starting immediatly after they gestation capsules went missing. This way he would have lost a couple of years tops compared to finding his first series of primarchs. And since he would most likely still have genetic material of the first series lying around, they would still be linked to their respective legions and it should not take that long to reach the gestation pod state again.
This second Primarch series would have been under his supervision from the start without influence of destabilizing factors. Simultanously it would still have been a good idea to track down the first series of Primarchs and "take care of them", maybe even use the more stable of them, but not as commanders of his legions. And he does not seem to me as a person whose "fatherly love" would keep him from ditching his first creations.

You're assuming he had both time and second set of (im)material components that went into building them. He might have easily lacked either. Also, even if he did, they could have ended up the same, except sent to even worse worlds. Would you risk giving chaos even more pawns?

Also, Bile tried to do the same and found out it's impossible. Out of all primarchs, the only ones that 'somewhat' worked were the dead ones, and the books heavily suggest it's because the bodies attracted something to them. Maybe there can be only one 'vessel' in existence, no matter how many extra bodies you produce.

That's why I asked the question. Thanks for the answers, that clears it up for me.

 Irbis wrote:

w1zard wrote:
Perturabo, Lorgar and possibly Magnus should have been given a chance to overcome their massive personality flaws, but ultimately would have probably ended up being executed too.

Uh, wot? Perturabo only rebelled because he was treated like , easily worst of all primarchs. Give him post of chief scientist/architect and tell him to build Imperial Palace, and he gladly stays loyal. Ditto for Magnus, Emps was idiot with the whole decree, had he kept Magnus close to keep eye on him nothing would have happened.

Oh, I absolutely agree with you on the Perturabo being treated like crap part, but you cannot deny that he had major personality flaws that allowed that resentment to fester into hatred. He never wanted to be a general, but instead of refusing he accepted and grudgingly got on with it, burying that resentment deep. The resentment caused him to push others away, which in turn caused them to not like him. The way he was treated by others caused his paranoia to flare up (he had good reason to be paranoid, he suffered multiple assassination attempts and betrayals on Olympia) and distance himself from others further. He also took it all out on his inferiors when they failed or disappointed him (the decimation was a good example), which isolated him further. Then he just kept taking crap assignment after crap assignment, and instead of standing up for himself or requesting someone else do it he just let the resentment build and build. This all swirled around in a negative feedback spiral until he finally exploded (massacre of Olympia) and sealed his fate. Perturabo may have been treated the worst out of all of the primarchs except for possibly Angron, but the reasons why he ended up turning traitor was entirely his own. If Fulgrim, Ferrus Manus, or Dorn were in Perturabo's position I'm not convinced they would have turned.

Magnus on the other hand would have never stopped pushing for warp knowledge short of the Emperor teaching him everything and serving as his private tutor. Magnus' thirst for knowledge was just too strong, and I don't see Magnus' story ending any other way than the way it did short of the emperor revealing everything (all of his plans) to him. That obviously was not in the Emperor's plan and thus... the fate of the 1K sons.

I'm not saying this as a hater either, Magnus and Perturabo are my first and second favorite primarchs respectively.

Emperor: Oh Hi Perturabo. Didn't see you there. Have you seen Gulliman? We are due for some fatehr-son bonding time.

Perturabo: A moment please, Father...

Emperor: Damn it. Hurry up and speak.

Perturabo: What is my purpose?

Emperor: To be a backup in case I can't find Dorn. Now get out of my sight and find one of my beloved sons.