Horus Heresy series - Why is Chaos presented as the more reasonable side?

[TheDungen]

Well no one worshipping the chaos gods wouldn't make them go away as long as the emotion s that form them exist so will they, but without outright worship they'd propably decline to a level more like the lesser gods making chaos as a whole less dangerous. (and non sentient)

each chaos god seems to have been raised from the lesser gods (blown out of proportion) due to a specific event in the past. most is only hinted upon the only we know for sure is slaanesh. Without worship they would've eventually have declined and a balance would've been re-established. Worship counteracts this.

But the gods of chaos are really not interested in the material world they're interested in the warp, but since each one sees his brothers grabbing for mortal souls he does it to. Since he sees his brother's champions slaying in their name he wants his champions to do the same.

You cant say chaos is good, no more than you can say its evil its simply a force of nature. It becomes evil when mortals chose to interfere with it. Since when they do they are setting the scales into motion, upsetting the balance.
I could be wrong but i think the beings of the warp is incapable of creative thinking of their own. Everything they do is a reflection of something the mortals do, every idea is a rehash of something they learned from mortals. Take the fact that they command Abbadon to launch black crusades. Who do you think gave them that bright idea?

[Veteran Sergeant]

True, but when he seeks it, he finds it. REALLY finds it. And it is honest with him. Not manipulative, not decietful. Honest.

Wait, what? I think we've found your problem here. Reading. Tzeentch lies to Lorgar from the start. He tricks him so hard it's almost as if Lorgar had never watched the two door scene in Labyrinth with Bowie. That scene from Aurelian is so heavily laced with lies it's amusing. But the lies played right into Lorgar's arrogance, his need for validation and acceptance, and his childish, petty, misplaced hatred of Guilliman. Chaos didn't tell the truth to Lorgar... But realistically, Lorgar was a weakling. He was so emo he might as well have worn a black trenchcoat and bitched about conformists. When he was rejected by the Emperor, he sulked off looking for validation and somebody to appreciate him. He harbored a seething, jealous hatred of Guilliman because his brother was so much better than him, and they both knew it. However, it was painfully obvious that the Ultramarines destroyed Monarchia because they were told to, and not because Guilliman cared enough to want to humiliate his lesser brother, or because he wanted to.

Horus was an arrogant fool who was tricked into thinking that he had no place in the post-Great Crusade Imperium. Angron is a cardstock, one dimensional caricature of a person. Kurze is a sociopathic murderer. Fulgrim was an egotistical, decadent fool that was easily manipulated. I mean, we haven't seen much of Mortarion or Perturabo yet. Magnus is the only sympathetic one. He meant well at least. He just didn't consider the magnitude of his actions.

So aside from Magnus, I don't know how we see any of the traitors as "justified" or "good guys" or really even "reasonable". They all succumbed to tragic flaws because they were blinded by arrogance. So at best they are tragic protagonists, neither good, nor evil. But they aren't the good guys. The only one of the loyalist primarchs that has come off as a "bad guy" is Russ, but that's only because he's a violent, pompous ass. But we already knew that.

[Kaapeli]

The best lies are the ones that have the most truth in them. Chaos gods are infinetely wise so they know how to push buttons and make people see things their way logically.

But I think there's one aspect that many people here haven't perhaps even thought about:
Maybe, just maybe, the Emperor and the Imperium aren't even the good guys with purest of motivations? Imperium is after all quite a nasty and authoritarian place to live. And Emperor appears to want people to serve him and rule all the galaxy whether they want it or not. Imperium conquered violently countless good and even utopian human societies during the crusades and destroyed many peaceful aliens, mutants etc. on the way too. Life in the Imperium is very harsh, totalitarian and even nightmarish.
It's very easy to see a happier and more peaceful way for humanity than the dystopian Imperium and it's megalomanic Emperor.

And then there's also the question if chaos is always truly and irrevocably evil.
Chaos doesn't necesseraly want to destroy everything and everyone all the time. Chaos can offer many (happy) things other than destruction, corruption and death too. Things like immortality, relief from pain and disease, freedom, power, pleasure, material wealth and yes even some order since order is just one aspect of chaos. Chaos can be a pretty cool guy that makes your wishes come true when taken in moderation.
From the fluff there appears to have been some quite happy and paradise like societies that served chaos. Which makes a case for Chaos offering much more than always just war and hell that it's usually depicted causing.

[stormblade]

Yeah they totaly gave it such monikers as 'Primordial Annihilator' or 'The Great Enemy' for no apperent reason.

[sweave]

chaos isn't evil in of itself.
the problem is that there is no such thing as a teaspoon of chaos.
it will eventually consume everything around it to fuel itself.
and communal benefits are rather low as each individual strives to attain personal power.

as for the emperor from what i remember his entire existence is predicated on the preservation of humanity. now given the circumstances of what just occurred ( the age of strife) and how humanity was being driven to inevitable extinction i can see how he would take the stance of, "no matter the cost" to preserve the human race.

[sweave]

The only one of the loyalist primarchs that has come off as a "bad guy" is Russ, but that's only because he's a violent, pompous ass. But we already knew that.

i don't actually see russ as that way.
in fact he would've rather saved magnus than destroy him
but that part of the original story was left out of the book where horus changed russ's orders from bring back to face punishment/censure/a spanking from daddy to kill the bastard.

also it kept hinting at russ being much more than the barbarian act he was putting on.
i kinda took this to be a throwback to the original russ concept where he was a general in the imperial army (remember the tank named after him)

[Kaapeli]

chaos isn't evil in of itself.
the problem is that there is no such thing as a teaspoon of chaos.
it will eventually consume everything around it to fuel itself.
and communal benefits are rather low as each individual strives to attain personal power.

I would disagree a bit about the consuming everything part. There are even good (or at least they are perceived as good) chaos gods like the gods of Eldar most of whom got consumed by the big four. I don't think the Eldar gods were about consuming everything. At least not in a bad way.
If Chaos would spill over to the material world it would consume it yes. But chaos can also be used in smaller dosages for good like many psychic races and good gods do.

as for the emperor from what i remember his entire existence is predicated on the preservation of humanity. now given the circumstances of what just occurred ( the age of strife) and how humanity was being driven to inevitable extinction i can see how he would take the stance of, "no matter the cost" to preserve the human race.

But predicted by whom? The only force recogniced in 40K offering such knowledge, shaping future beyond thousands of years and spawning beings like the Emperor is Chaos itself. Since the Emperor is really a powerful psyker who's power comes from the Immaterium he's actually using Chaos (or is being used by) too for his vision of "good".

Is there a chance that the Emperor might be wrong? Or is it possible that "his future" is just one of the endless possibilities? The Emperor could even just be part of the grand plan and product of Tzeentch.

I think these are philosofical questions that many of the traitor Primarches must have thought long and hard too before turning against the Emperor.

[MvS]

I would disagree a bit about the consuming everything part. There are even good (or at least they are perceived as good) chaos gods like the gods of Eldar most of whom got consumed by the big four. I don't think the Eldar gods were about consuming everything. At least not in a bad way.
If Chaos would spill over to the material world it would consume it yes. But chaos can also be used in smaller dosages for good like many psychic races and good gods do.

I suppose this comes back to the old discussion about the differences between gods that develop through specific beliefs of mortals and who are bound strictly by tradition and expectation and those gods who develop 'between the cracks'. The gods who are raw and unbounded emotions pooled together into super-massive Warpstorms without mortal cognizance are 'Chaos' where other gods are sort of blend - entities of the Chaos-As-Warp rather than entities of Chaos-As-Excess-And-Taint.

So even before we get onto the discussion of whether or not the Eldar Gods were in fact 'Old Ones', we have the difference between gods who were created (albeit subconsciously) through culture/storytelling to explain and serve mortal interests, and gods who were created completely subconsciously, unintentionally and unwittingly through the constant 'leak' of emotions into the Warp. The former were given consciousness and identity by mortal belief, faith, tradition and expectation, while the latter attained their own consciousness and started to influence mortals to serve and feed them.

So yes, your point is well made that not all'gods' made in and from the Warp are entirely destructive, but then again not all gods are the 'gods' we most closely associate with the uncontrolled extremity and nightmarish mortal Id that we refer to as 'Chaos', which are all consuming. They are like fires. They don't really sit back and consider whether or not they should consume, they just go ahead and do it.

But predicted by whom? The only force recogniced in 40K offering such knowledge, shaping future beyond thousands of years and spawning beings like the Emperor is Chaos itself. Since the Emperor is really a powerful psyker who's power comes from the Immaterium he's actually using Chaos (or is being used by) too for his vision of "good". and the Is there a chance that the Emperor might be wrong? Or is it possible that "his future" is just one of the endless possibilities? The Emperor could even just be part of the grand plan and product of Tzeentch.

That's a very good point, but I think it misses some nuance to the imagery. The Warp is an infinite realm of possibility and probaility besides anything else. There are future echoes of many possibilities in its depths, the more likely or more possible futures echo more 'loudly' for those with the ears to hear them. So there is a distinct possibility that the Emperor (or indeed any other seer) to see future possibilities which aren't essentially just 'fed' to them by the Chaos Powers.

We also have to remember the fact that the Emperor's actions weren't just predicated upon what he saw in the future, they were also 9and I would think more profoundly) predicated upon what had already happened to humanity. He knew that the disturbances and sentiences of Chaos had started to notice and consume human souls tends of thousands of years before the Great Crusade. He lived through the fall of humanity and the horror of the Age of Strife, where humanity was almost destroyed by a poisonous cocktail f its own technological hubris, aliens and the sudden growth in psykers who empowered and opened up gateways (deliberately and otherwise) to the entities of Chaos. The Emperor took control and did what he did to stop the horror of the Age of Strife and save humanity, not just to try to direct humanity into a golden age. that was the optimum goal of course, but saving humanity from self-annihilation had to come first.

But again, your point is a good one. I personally think that the reason the Emperor punished Lorgar so extremely by venting his displeasure on millions of innocent humans on Monarchia was perhaps because the future-echoes of the Imperium of Man as we know it in 40K became too loud for him to ignore. I think he saw the absolutely suppressive, horrifically regressive, institutionally ignorant, unbelievably superstitious and fundamentally militarised theocracy of the future Imperium, with him worshiped as an intolerant and absolute deity who demanded billions be sacrificed in his name, and I think he eventually panicked - or, at least, as close to panicking that an entity like the Emperor could come. I think he had an inkling that Lorgar's beliefs would lead to this future and that Lorgar's deification of the Emperor would form the basis of this future horror - both of which are correct - but that the Emperor didn't/couldn't/was prevented from seeing that this future would come about because of his genocide on Monarchia and ritual humiliation of Lorgar and the Word Bearers.

So it isn't simply that the Emperor was wrong or completely deluded by Chaos. I think it was more that he, like the Primarchs, saw many truths in the Warp but was had his attention misdirected away from certain important facts and possibilities. Although I imagine this process was much more subtle and long term in relation to the Emperor that it was with his sons.

I think these are philosofical questions that many of the traitor Primarches must have thought long and hard too before turning against the Emperor.

Some of them, yes. Some had other more pressing issues to contend with such as daemonic possession and taint (Fulgrim) and/or neurological implants (Angron) and/or psychoses from a hideously dysfunctional childhood mixed with godlike powers (Curze).

The Primarchs had weaknesses and character flaws like any other mortal being, but in order to get too those weaknesses Chaos had to appeal to them reasonably. The Primarchs were, after all, engineered to be exceptionally intelligent, fiercely independent and with a strong interest in uniting humanity against oppression. The Chaos Gods had to wrap as many truths around their lies as possible in order to sugar the pill.

The greatest flaw of pretty much all of the Primarchs seems to be much the same as that of their father - hubris. They all felt, one way or another, that their way was the best and/or only viable way for various reasons. Yes each of them had their own subtle angle on this, and some (like poor Angron) had been physically altered and abused in a way that would make them more susceptible to corruption, but the age-old axiom of 'those whom the Gods would destroy they first make proud' seems to hold true in the Horus Heresy mythology too. Lucifer's sin in Lorgar's sin, and Horus' sin, and Curze's sin, and Alpahrius/Omegon's sin and so on to various degrees.

[Kaapeli]

To the original question "Why is Chaos presented as the more reasonable side". I'd like to answer with a short clip from a movie. It's an excellent scene where the Devil actually explains his actions logically so he seems like the good guy next to an uncaring/mad god.
From Devil's Advocate. Al Pacinos speech:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RGR4SFOimlk

"The Devil: Let me give you a little inside information about God. God likes to watch. He's a prankster. Think about it. He gives man instincts. He gives you this extraordinary gift, and then what does He do, I swear for His own amusement, his own private, cosmic gag reel, He sets the rules in opposition. It's the goof of all time. Look but don't touch. Touch, but don't taste. Taste, don't swallow. Ahaha. And while you're jumpin' from one foot to the next, what is he doing? He's laughin' His sick, ****in' ass off! He's a tight-ass! He's a SADIST! He's an absentee landlord! Worship that? NEVER! "

"The Devil: You sharpen the human appetite to the point where it can split atoms with its desire; you build egos the size of cathedrals; fiber-optically connect the world to every eager impulse; grease even the dullest dreams with these dollar-green, gold-plated fantasies, until every human becomes an aspiring emperor, becomes his own God... and where can you go from there?"

""Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven", is that it?"

"The Devil: Why not? I'm here on the ground with my nose in it since the whole thing began. I've nurtured every sensation man's been inspired to have. I cared about what he wanted and I never judged him. Why? Because I never rejected him, in spite of all his imperfections. I'm a fan of man. I'm a humanist. Maybe the last humanist."

Switch "Devil" for "Chaos" and "God" for "Emperor" and it's propably the same speech that Chaos gods gave to the Primarchs that got them.
They made Emperor look like he was denying the Primarches' own wishes and holding back their personal visions for humanity. They promised things the Emperor had denied or forbidden. And they didn't judge if one Primarch was religious (Lorgar) or other interested in forbidden sorcery (Magnus), they embraced such things.

[Messiah]

But I think there's one aspect that many people here haven't perhaps even thought about:
Maybe, just maybe, the Emperor and the Imperium aren't even the good guys with purest of motivations? Imperium is after all quite a nasty and authoritarian place to live. And Emperor appears to want people to serve him and rule all the galaxy whether they want it or not. Imperium conquered violently countless good and even utopian human societies during the crusades and destroyed many peaceful aliens, mutants etc. on the way too. Life in the Imperium is very harsh, totalitarian and even nightmarish.
It's very easy to see a happier and more peaceful way for humanity than the dystopian Imperium and it's megalomanic Emperor.

This right here. I've never seen the imperium as the good guys. Why? Because if you read every single book from Rogue Trader and onwards, it is an uncaring empire build upon the deaths of billions. It is an opressive dictatorship in which a single life is worth nothing, you have no way to improve your situation either, because you are born into your role and the so called protectors of humanity have nothing to do with humanity anymore, they dont even share humanitys basest feelings anymore.

A least Chaos promises freedom.

[Yodhrin]

I don't see it as being a matter of reasonable or otherwise, there is no rational thought process which leads to joining Chaos willingly, those who do so are invariably mad, grief-stricken, or have been so thoroughly manipulated that they either don't realise what's happening until their body is already the nice cosy new home for a daemon, or the realisation of their actions up to that point make them fall into the first two.

I think the issue is that, until this series, we've only ever seen one side of the coin, on either side of the conflict. The loyalist Primarchs were all exemplars of a positive aspect of humanity, the Traitors all a negative, but now we're seeing that they each seem to have one dominant positive AND negative trait. The Lion is a tactical genius with, as you say, all the empathy of a spoon. Magnus still acts as a vessel for all humanity's hubris and overconfidence, but we also see his aspect as a rational seeker of knowledge. Horus is a great leader, capable of inspiration far beyond any mortal man, yet he's tainted by a deep yearning to be adored and will use his great powers of influence in service of that flaw at a whim. Fulgrim is our desire to improve ourselves, our aspiration, but also our pride, our vanity. Lorgar is the embodiment of faith, with all the inherent issues that has. Mortarion is our determination in the face of adversity, but also our judgmental and reactionary nature. Angron is loyalty and rage. Kurze is justice and revenge. We're so unused to seeing the alternate side of these characters that they stand out to us far more than they're presented in the story, and that makes us see the traitors in a more sympathetic light, and the loyalists in a more cynical one.

I find the fascinating part about all of this is that, in almost every respect, Chaos is the "Good Guys". Which is part of the reason it's so compelling. The emperor, and all of the ideals he represents, is hardly good at all. We are forced to choose between freedom and safety, I find it silly that the safety of the human race is "good". Certainly no more so than freedom. The emperor does all in his power to bend man kind to his will, chaos simply wants people to do what they were going to do anyway. The loyalist seem like idiots because they either refuse to question the emperor, or they think that the survival of the human race trumps any other concern. The eldar had a much better "good" philosophy on all of this, they accept that it's their race's time to die and that chaos is not a thing that can be defeated.

I can't agree, this isn't a choice between freedom and safety, it's a choice between survival under restriction or absolute slavery. Nothing about Chaos is freedom, once you fall you are forever bound to the will of the entities who inhabit the warp, you are a pawn, a plaything, to be rewarded or turned into a mindless lump of quivering flesh-jelly at a whim. Chaos is the illusion of freedom. Freedom as a philosophical construct annoys the piss out of me anyway, it has too many potential definitions to be a worthwhile baseline for anything, and it's almost always used as an excuse for the most heinous and reprehensible behaviours humanity has to offer; by some standard of freedom, a starving Somali farmer is more free than me, bound as I am by the laws and regulations of a modern western democracy, restricted in word and action, constrained by the social mores of vast numbers of people who I think are cretinous ******, but you can't eat freedom; freedom is not a blanket, or a fire, or four walls and a roof, nor is it a vaccination, or a method of transportation. In the context of 40K, Chaos is the freedom of the starving Somali farmer; the freedom to die, to kill, or to be made subject to someone stronger or with access to more resources than you can muster alone. As I say, it is the illusion of choice, of freedom, because paradoxically once you give people enough freedom, they use that freedom to take it away from others.

[MyNameDidntFit]

If humanity were inclined to show their devotion by beating the other gods champion at chess the gods would be perfectly fine with that (except maybee khorne).

I think Slaanesh is more into porn than pawns...

... although, "Knight takes Queen"... hmm... maybe no so far out of her/his ball-park after all...

[TheDungen]

You cant see the chaos gods as individual entities like that, they might have personalities and identities but so can a city or country seem to have once watched from afar. Chaos is a group conciousness created from the souls of living humans. Added to that is the souls of humans released into the warp at their death they then need to latch unto something (Emotion mass of thesoul times emotion mass of the grouping then the product divided by the emotional distance to the grouping squared?) and will latch unto the closest chaos god (or lesser grouping) in identity.

The problem arises from the fact that humanity have evolved a warp affinity but no potential to control what emotions they project into the warp. In time they will like the elder races for an example eldar evolve into a fully psychic race with an ability to control what they let bleed over and the ability to survive on their own in the warp.

While each chaos god is immense made up of portions of millions upon millions of souls, it still is but a fraction of the entire psychic presence of humanity. If humans could control their full psychic might they could stave a chaos god though willpower alone. In fact if they could they could probably obliterate a chaos god if they coordinated it.

And chaos isnt the warp, chaos is imbalance within the warp caused by said psychic deficiency in humanity, normally I don't think it'd have been a problem when a single species evolved a warp presence cause the older races would've held the warp in balance. But humanity went into the galaxy (during the golden age of technology) not only breeding like rats but probably wiping out any elder races as they found them (some of which would otherwise anchored the warp). The eldar on the other had were already falling into depravity so they didn't exactly help things.

And yes some of you will say the eldar cant control what they project; they created Slaanesh. And the answer is yes they can they just didn't bother.

when the emperor started the great crusade there were basically no stable warp present species left and slaanesh had just come into being. The Birth of slaanesh had also destroyed the eldar gods (who i think is the old ones surviving on their own on the warp) and with them further weakened the balance of the warp. He simply realised that humanity wouldn't survive long enough to evolve away from the problem as the situation was. And may i say that it was bad timing for the eldar to create slaanesh when there were already three chaos god running rampart? In fact it nearly seems like to much of a coincidence.

The thing is that you cant fight chaos like the imperium does today, if you do evil for a greater cause then the negative emotions caused by the action will still bleed over into the warp and make the chaos gods more powerful (cause greater imbalance between positive and negative emotions) My guess is that without the imperium the situation wouldn't be nearly as bad as it is today.


most of this is sheer speculation, but seems like a likely explanation considering what I've read (the evolution thing I remember reading)

[TheDungen]

Oh and i think demon princes are created by the 'gods of chaos' feeding enough power to a mortal soul for it to be able to survive in the warp on its own, the power likely either comes from souls released into the warp or from the 'god' itself.


lesser demons are in interesting thing i guess they could be seen as pouring water (in this case emotion) from a few different glasses into a jug and then pouring a glass from it. Which water molecules that came from which original glass would be very difficult (or rather impossible) to discern.

oh also if i had been breaking chaos up into math formulas in the imperium the inquisition would probably have decided to make a visit.

[MrSteelfist]

I think the Emperor, by creating the Primarchs/Space Marines, realised he was unleashing a necessary evil upon the galaxy and that if his ultimate plan had come to fruition then we may have seen a much better galaxy for humanity. Also Chaos is just the embodiment of extremes of character so isn't "evil" as such, merely an exaggerated expression of human nature taken to such degrees as to be considered taboo.

[Sqallum]

I think Mortatrion had a justified reason to turning to Chaos - he saw that the weak were ruling the strong, and that went against his beliefs and views. Also, the Emperor personally humilated him.

Curze was justified. True, he was sometimes mad, but he was right because he saw the Imperium for what it truly was. A corrupt, hypocritical empire, who, having used the services of his Legion to bring control, then tried to dispose of them in one of the most unjust events in 40k. As a result he and the Night Lords fought against it.

Angron may have been a bit physco, but there was nothing he could do.

Read Butchers Nails. It explains that they, the Butchers Nails are implants in his head that prevent him sleeping. So he has not slept for 200 years.They cause him constant pain that he can only get rid of in combat, so that is why he must kill ALL THE TIME.

Furthermore, the Big E basically said to him : ' Yep, your and your friends are fighting against evil oppressors. So lets watch them get slaughtered, just for fun. It is like Spartacus, completely. The slave leading his people against the slavers. The only people who Angron had ever cared for he watched get slaughtered, due to the Emperor.

The Great Crusade deserved to fail, in short. It was a remarkably arrogant undertaking - exterminating all species that are not human. It was simply very flawed from the outset, creating super warriors and demi-gods to conquer the stars before handing the galaxy to humans. Their conquest, to petty administrators. And what would have become of the Legions once the war had finished? Consigned to peace keeping? I think this contributed to why the civil war started, due to the horror of what they would do when the Great Crusade ended. Another contributing factor was that the SM feared becoming obsolete at the end of the Great Crusade, so rebellion gave them a use.

[Buddha777]

To the original question "Why is Chaos presented as the more reasonable side". I'd like to answer with a short clip from a movie. It's an excellent scene where the Devil actually explains his actions logically so he seems like the good guy next to an uncaring/mad god.
From Devil's Advocate. Al Pacinos speech:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RGR4SFOimlk

"The Devil: Let me give you a little inside information about God. God likes to watch. He's a prankster. Think about it. He gives man instincts. He gives you this extraordinary gift, and then what does He do, I swear for His own amusement, his own private, cosmic gag reel, He sets the rules in opposition. It's the goof of all time. Look but don't touch. Touch, but don't taste. Taste, don't swallow. Ahaha. And while you're jumpin' from one foot to the next, what is he doing? He's laughin' His sick, ****in' ass off! He's a tight-ass! He's a SADIST! He's an absentee landlord! Worship that? NEVER! "

"The Devil: You sharpen the human appetite to the point where it can split atoms with its desire; you build egos the size of cathedrals; fiber-optically connect the world to every eager impulse; grease even the dullest dreams with these dollar-green, gold-plated fantasies, until every human becomes an aspiring emperor, becomes his own God... and where can you go from there?"

""Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven", is that it?"

"The Devil: Why not? I'm here on the ground with my nose in it since the whole thing began. I've nurtured every sensation man's been inspired to have. I cared about what he wanted and I never judged him. Why? Because I never rejected him, in spite of all his imperfections. I'm a fan of man. I'm a humanist. Maybe the last humanist."

Switch "Devil" for "Chaos" and "God" for "Emperor" and it's propably the same speech that Chaos gods gave to the Primarchs that got them.
They made Emperor look like he was denying the Primarches' own wishes and holding back their personal visions for humanity. They promised things the Emperor had denied or forbidden. And they didn't judge if one Primarch was religious (Lorgar) or other interested in forbidden sorcery (Magnus), they embraced such things.

1) Great movie first of all; and 2) I think that speech does sums up the "truth" that chaos presents in that the chaos gods allow humans to give into their primal states and love them for it, in exchange of course for unwittingly increasing the gods power as well as your soul probably.

The traitor primarchs, who all have extensive daddy issues of varying sorts, all fall prey to that "truth" of chaos; especially when compared with the strict distant father that the big E is shown as.

However, I think it's important to note that this "truth" and reasonableness" that chaos presents is so utterly false when compared with the reality the emperor was trying to build. IE: Humanity must be reunited, by any means necessary, to prevent a rouge faction from helping, even unwittingly, strengthen the chaos gods; humanity must give up belief and faith itself lest chaos gain a stronger foothold; the pursuit of knowledge IS often dangerous; humans, not super-men, must rule lest the soul of humanity whither; etc.

Thus, while the big E miught seem as the Devil's Advocate so eloquently puts, "just a kid with an ant farm," he is in fact the only thing that stands between humanity and destruction and all his insane rules and notions and even absence are there to protect everyone; a concept that the traitor primarchs never grasp. After all, vanity is my favorite sin.

[f2k]

Problem is that the ”evil” side often speaks directly to human emotions, thus seeming reasonable as opposed to the ”good” side which is all about denying your instincts.

Also, let’s not forget that this isn’t truly about “good” versus “evil”. There are a lot of grey shades in between. The Emperor wasn’t a nice guy. The Space Marines aren’t nice guys. The Empire isn’t a nice place to be...

One thing I have always disagreed with in these books is the portrayal of the Emperor. He seems surprisingly limited in his view of the overarching situation. The Primarchs themselves are impetuous and manipulated by their situations, but it's at least believable. The Emperor being so out of touch with all that went on right under his proverbial nose is petty hard to swallow, and I secretly hope that a later book focusing on him will offer an explanation.

This was explained in one of the old Horus Heresy stories from somewhere around White Dwarf 150 or 160 (the only Heresy fluff worth reading in my opinion). Basically, the Emperor had reached the end of the line. He could no longer predict the future – it was all darkness and confusion. The loyal Primarchs looked to him for guidance but he couldn’t give any because he didn’t know what to do. He did not foresee the Heresy and Horus had him caught like a fly in a spider's web.

Thus, when Horus lowered the shields on his Battlebarge the Emperor, despite being virtually certain that it’s a trap, teleported onboard as that was the only action he could think of at that moment. Come what may, the war had to be brought to a conclusion...

[Freak Ona Leash]

I find the fascinating part about all of this is that, in almost every respect, Chaos is the "Good Guys". Which is part of the reason it's so compelling. The emperor, and all of the ideals he represents, is hardly good at all. We are forced to choose between freedom and safety, I find it silly that the safety of the human race is "good". Certainly no more so than freedom. The emperor does all in his power to bend man kind to his will, chaos simply wants people to do what they were going to do anyway. The loyalist seem like idiots because they either refuse to question the emperor, or they think that the survival of the human race trumps any other concern. The eldar had a much better "good" philosophy on all of this, they accept that it's their race's time to die and that chaos is not a thing that can be defeated.

To be fair, Chaos doesn't say "we want you to do whatever you want anyways." Chaos wants extreme emotions and extreme actions in order to feed the other-dimensional warp entities that ultimately control them. The Emperor is, fair enough, a tyrant. However, the fact that the Chaos primarchs often seem like the sympathetic ones while the Loyalist ones seem like bastards is an awesome part of 40k. As other posters have pointed out, I think it heightens the pathos of the series and of the setting as a whole: there were good and bad people on both sides, and ultimately circumstances forced even the good ones into making awful choices. Angron may have always been nuts, and Curze as well, but the Lion is clearly a bastard quite often and Russ is as well. Lorgar is actually one of my favorite Primarchs because he is one of the few I could see actually existing outside of the Great Crusade: had he been able to abandon his attachment to organized religion, he could've channeled his passions into a more helpful path and I think his natural inclination towards peace-making (as evidenced by his slow rate of conquest, but the incredibly high quality of life of planets such as Monarchia) would've made him an effective leader during peacetime. Others, such as Angron and Curze, or the Lion and even someone like the Khan, were too focused on war-making and too far removed from humanity to ever function otherwise.

[Ozeryk]

I think the forces of Chaos in the 40K universe are a defnite seperate reality. I keep thinking about the movie Event Horizon. The "intelligent" energies that manifest, whilst travelling thru the warp or thru uncontrolled psychic activity are energies that are detrimental to humans. Detrimental = destructive. The entire concept of demons manifesting in reality is almost like a Moth to a candle. They cause a huge mess untill there is a burnout and they get sucked back into the warp. I think the Emperor and Magnus did not really know what was out there in the warp until all were called togeather at the council of Nikea. I think the flaw of the Emperor was his communication of his edict: he could have been a bit more forthcoming. He had created sons out of the very stuff of the warp & inevitibly some of his creations turned against him. Same story with the christian god and the devil. The whole tale is a classic retake on a multitude of myths.