Is the Emperor suffering from "The hunger"

[Cthell]

So I was reading the fluff entry for Dark Eldar in the new rulebook, and noticed that it was a lot more explicit about the Dark Eldar's "hunger" (I don't know if this was previously expanded in the new DE codex?) and how it's basically caused by souls "aging"

I also read the bit about the Golden Thrones "appetite" for psykers increasing as time went on, and it hit me.

The emperor is in a similar position to the Dark Eldar, i.e. they both have bodies that have stayed alive longer than they should; so I wondered if the Emperor has the same problem - needing the suffering of others to rejuvenate his soul. After all, I would think that even the Haemonculi would agree that having your soul slowly sucked out of your body would count as a pretty good torture.

Am I crazy, or does it sound possible?

[Hendarion]

The DE souls get drained by Slaanesh because of the connection between them, not because they are so old. The Emperor (hopefully) has no connection to Slaanesh. See for example Eldrad Ulthran. He is/was older than most of any Dark Eldar and did not suffer from soul-draining.

But the Emperor suffers from a lot of other things:
1) Megalomania and his wish to become a god.
2) Being a near-dead corpse on a weird ancient machine that starts to fail.
3) Being the Emperor of a rotten empire and bureaucratic hell.

[Harwammer]

The DE souls get drained by Slaanesh because of the connection between them

Yes, it's established She Who Thirsts is after them but that's not the be all and end all of it. Within the webway, the Dark Eldar were largley immune to the passage of time, with the exception that their souls began to age and wither.

[Cthell]

See for example Eldrad Ulthran. He is/was older than most of any Dark Eldar and did not suffer from soul-draining.

Is Eldrad really that old? I know there was a bit of fluff about him having warned the Emperor that Horus would betray him, but that would make him over 10,000 years old. I was under the impression that most Eldar didn't live longer than a couple of millenia?

[The bearded one]

But the Emperor suffers from a lot of other things:
1) Megalomania and his wish to become a god.

I thought that was what he didn't want, to the point of actively forbidding his worship (making the ultimate perversion of his initial ideals into the imperium we all love today all the more ironic and nasty).

[nagash66]

But the Emperor suffers from a lot of other things:
1) Megalomania and his wish to become a god.

Ah eldar players, always mixing up which race is in the god making business.

[Hendarion]

I thought that was what he didn't want, to the point of actively forbidding his worship (making the ultimate perversion of his initial ideals into the imperium we all love today all the more ironic and nasty).

Ah eldar players, always mixing up which race is in the god making business.

Well, I'm trusting Erebus from the 2nd Horus Heresy book and what he said on Davin to comatose Horus. Call me a heretic.
Imo Erebus was exactly right - The Emperor pretending that he didn't want to be portrayed as a god, but secretly wanting exactly that to happen. Erebus showed Horus exactly how the future was going to be.
So... yea, what the Emperor said and what he really wanted to me is a pair of two different shoes.
If I'm wrong, whats all that Star-Child-theory about? If the Emperor doesn't want to be worshipped as a god and doesn't want to become a god, then the Star-Child theory is a big joke, because the Emperor could decide to ascend to a Warp-God or not. If he wouldn't want, the whole theory is missing every base of discussion. You can't force someone to become a Warp-God, can you?

Anyway, it was more of a joke than anything seriously related to the initial question about soul-hunger. The Emperor was already multiple 10.000 years on earth before he started the psycher-killing. If it would be his age that requires him to do that, then he probably should have done it in his 30.000 years of living before already, not just in the last 10.000. The fact that it requires more and more offerings for me is just a sign that the Emperor (or whatever requires these souls) is losing strength (or getting greedy).


@Cthell: We don't know, but I think it's possible that Eldrad really is that old.
About the drain: Harlequin-souls are not known to wither within the Webway. We also know DE suffer from it harder if they are not within the Webway. So if anything, then the Webway works protective against the drain. Also since Exodiths and CWE do not have that drain, what else than the debauchery connection between the Dark Kin and Slaanesh shall cause it? It's not as if each Dark Eldar is far older than his Craftworld cousins either, so pure age can't be the reason.

[TheDungen]

What is a god? He is in the warp and cna survive on his own there, then people start worshippign him and their power gets added to his, he could chose not to use the power i guess but he cant do much to stop them from channelling their belief into him. and the fact that they do is also likely to change him.

[stormblade]

Or Golden throne might simply be malfunctioning.
Like a canistar that has a small leak which became wider over time.

[Idaan]

@Cthell: We don't know, but I think it's possible that Eldrad really is that old.
About the drain: Harlequin-souls are not known to wither within the Webway. We also know DE suffer from it harder if they are not within the Webway. So if anything, then the Webway works protective against the drain. Also since Exodiths and CWE do not have that drain, what else than the debauchery connection between the Dark Kin and Slaanesh shall cause it? It's not as if each Dark Eldar is far older than his Craftworld cousins either, so pure age can't be the reason.

Eldrad appears in "Fulgrim" where he tries to warn the Primarch about Horus falling to Chaos. He's already an old Farseer there, but this is of course because Graham McNeill doesn't know when the Fall happened. I always read the original quote in 3e Eldar codex to be a hyperbolic statement by a tortured Eldar Ranger trying to get back at his captors, but it's canon now.

[TheDungen]

I think its as simple as the emperor is dying. The golden throne isnt stasis. He will eventually decline, he just have to survive long enough to make sure humanity survives.

[Sean_OBrien]

Eldrad appears in "Fulgrim" where he tries to warn the Primarch about Horus falling to Chaos. He's already an old Farseer there, but this is of course because Graham McNeill doesn't know when the Fall happened. I always read the original quote in 3e Eldar codex to be a hyperbolic statement by a tortured Eldar Ranger trying to get back at his captors, but it's canon now.

Back in WD 286 it says that Eldrad was over 10 millenia old - that was in 2003 so before Fulgrim was written...granted it was after the 3rd Edition Codex. You also have the Torturer's Tale which indicates that Vect is also over 10,000 years old (he was alive before the fall).

http://web.archive.org/web/200712150...le/default.htm

Most Eldar don't seem to live nearly that long - but it isn't unique for Dark or Craftworld Eldar apparently.

[Askil the Undecided]

Well, I'm trusting Erebus from the 2nd Horus Heresy book and what he said on Davin to comatose Horus. Call me a heretic.
Imo Erebus was exactly right - The Emperor pretending that he didn't want to be portrayed as a god, but secretly wanting exactly that to happen. Erebus showed Horus exactly how the future was going to be.
So... yea, what the Emperor said and what he really wanted to me is a pair of two different shoes.
If I'm wrong, whats all that Star-Child-theory about? If the Emperor doesn't want to be worshipped as a god and doesn't want to become a god, then the Star-Child theory is a big joke, because the Emperor could decide to ascend to a Warp-God or not. If he wouldn't want, the whole theory is missing every base of discussion. You can't force someone to become a Warp-God, can you?

Did you ever consider that the Emperor wasn't asked?

The Star Child is a psychic gestalt formed from the same psychic energy that the Emperor formed from "the untainted warp" whether he wants to die and be subsumed back into it as a new god is immaterial. If the star child is real it will happen, when he finally passes on whether he likes the idea or not.

It isn't like death tends to give one much of a choice.

[Memnos]

Another potential theory about the Emperor's hunger 'increasing':

The Emperor doesn't need squat from these Psykers.

Untrained psykers and weak psykers are the biggest danger to the Imperium and the number of them are increasing every year.

Rather than risk the inherent danger of these weak and untrained psykers, they're being gathered up in the universe's biggest concentration camp, not because the Emperor needs them - Not because of some cosmic power, or because of some great Good that can be achieved.

But simply because the Imperium doesn't know what else to do with them.

The reason the Emperor's hunger is 'increasing' is because the number of untrained and weak psykers is increasing.

"Inquisitor: The number of psykers is increasing every year!"
"All right. That's a real danger. Let's gather them all in one place and toss them in the woodchipper."
"But won't they fight back?"
"Tell 'em it's for the Emperor or something. Maybe it makes the Astronomicon's light. I don't care. Just get it done."
"Yes, sir."

[Hendarion]

That should make one wonder: If they kill untrained psykers of a bazillion different attitudes, what do their souls form? Feed the Emperor and create another nexus in the warp? Based on what? The only things they probably have in common are:
1) They are Imperial citizens
2) They are psykers
3) They get burned
Dunno about you, but I doubt they all love the Imperium or love to be burned for the Emperor of Mankind either. So whom do they feed in the Warp and to what do they combine?
1) Nothing, they merge with whatever each soul separately fits the best?
2) Tzeentch, since they are all psykers?
3) A new god of sacrifice or revenge?

[Fear Ghoul]

My take on the whole things is that both the Dark Eldar and the Emperor are slowly leaching their souls to the Warp for various reasons, and they consume the souls or energies of others to fill in the gaps. Since the rate of soul loss increases with age, the Emperor requires ever more psykers to feed on with each passing century, as do the oldest Archons.

[MvS]

Essentially the Emperor is dead. It really is a corpse on the Golden Throne not a dying ancient man or a man in a coma.

It's only because the 40K setting is one of psychic powers, sorcery, souls, gods and daemons as well as technology from 40,000 years in the future that the idea of the Emperor has any stake in Realspace at all. I seem to remember from some of the older imagery a reference to there being just a few cells remaining alive in the withered brain of the Emperor's carcass, and while this is the case he is not free to simply release his corpse and flow into the Warp properly.

Most of his super-soul is already in the Warp somewhere, but its ability to act independently or become fully conscious and sensate is limited by the chains holding the Emperor to his corpse. So whereas the Golden Throne was a valuable tool in the decades after the Horus heresy to allow the Emperor to communicate (even if only partially) with his subjects, over the millennia it's become a sort of prison that prevents the Emperor from truly being alive or truly being freed by death. He can neither truly effect the Realspace nor be truly born into the Warp.

The sacrifice of psykers to the Golden Throne (not to be confused with the Astronomicon) isn't much to do with the Emperor or his wishes any more (I think) so much as the fuel needed to keep the lights green that say there are some cells left alive in the Emperor's husk. It seems the one job the Emperor has left and seems relatively able to do is directing the Astronomicon. For a while I thought this was just an illusion and that the choirs on the Astronomicon did the job themselves irrespective of the Emperor, but since the last rulebook stated that as the Golden Throne flickered so did the Astronomicon I guess we can say that whatever remains of the Emperor's sentience and power is now largely mono-tasked with keeping the galaxy's lighthouse functioning.

That should make one wonder: If they kill untrained psykers of a bazillion different attitudes, what do their souls form? Feed the Emperor and create another nexus in the warp? Based on what?

That's an interesting question. I tend to think that the souls are either burned away completely by feeding the Golden Throne (and/or Astronomicon), or else they essentially merge with the Emperor's own soul somehow. What that does to the Emperor or what it might mean if the Golden Throne ever stops working is anyone's guess.

[stormblade]

So whereas the Golden Throne was a valuable tool in the decades after the Horus heresy to allow the Emperor to communicate (even if only partially) with his subjects, over the millennia it's become a sort of prison that prevents the Emperor from truly being alive or truly being freed by death.

there is also that nasty bit of business with the collapsed webway and deamons spilling in.

[MvS]

there is also that nasty bit of business with the collapsed webway and deamons spilling in.

How could I have forgotten that??

I suppose we could add that to the list of things that the Emperor (or whatever's left of him) is utterly absorbed with.

[aim]

How could I have forgotten that??

I suppose we could add that to the list of things that the Emperor (or whatever's left of him) is utterly absorbed with.

You could say that its going to suck to be on Terra when he finally goes. The interplanetary porch light gets turned off so noone can find their way home to help and all kinds of warp gribblies spill out from the throne room. I'd imagine they'd be pretty pissed after a 10000 year wait in line for the buffet to open too.

Wasn't there a picture of the golden throne at the start of one of the older rule books where the thing say in it is basicly a skeleton with some ragged bits of flesh hanging off of it?