In Inq.War (IMO The Best 40k Novel there is), The emperor speaks with thousand different voices, arguing with each other, saying different things.
Why? Because, as y'all probably know, the emperor was "Created" back in 8000B.C by all the shamans (psykers) in the world (terra) committing mass suicide and getting reborn into the same body.
Not all of them remained sane after roughly 50000 years.
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Unable to look up, Alicia, first amongst the Emperor's Brides, fell to her needs before her god, tears streaming down her face.
Minutes stretched into hours as she knelt there, her sobs the only sound in the vastness of the throne room. Then, after what seemed like an eternity, a faint noise emanated from the husk wired into the golden device above her. Was it a sigh? No, a whisper! So faint that it was barely there at all. Alicia checked her sobs instantly as she strained to hear the deity speak.
"I tol 'em. I tol 'em. Bugrit! Millennium hand and shrimp."
The Emperor of Man fell silent once more.
Alicia exchanged a long look with her fellow Brides. As one they turned to their Custodian guide.
"Vandire must die."
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I always thought that simply seeing the Emperor was enough.
I mean she though that Vandire was the holiest champion of the Emperor, some random marine like dude turning up and claiming to guard the Emperor and saying 'oh yeah, you need to kill your holy boss', is not really going to convince her.
However being taken to the throne room (an honour granted to so few) and gazing upon the Emperor himself, even if he said nothing she would probably still be able to feel his psychic might, that alone would vouch for the validity and trustworthiness of the Custodes. Perhaps He even flashed a single stark image into her conciousness, to instil her with drive and urgency.
Anything more I think lessens the impact of the scene, for someone who has truly dedicated her entire life to serving her religion, simply meeting her god is far more powerful to my mind than any words he might have to say to her.
It may just have been doubt - she and the others could see what Vandire was doing and who he was but could not doubt him while they still believed he was chosen by their god.Originally Posted by Lord Zarkov
Standing before the Emperor though, they were free to think things through and change their minds - you can't doubt your god's intentions in the presence of said god after all. It's entirely possible the Emperor had nothing to do with any of the events and that it was the leader of the Custodes alone that took the action after meeting the sisters and realising their motivation in all of this.
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Maybe not in your version...
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Arrrgh! Don't mention that accursed book!
The fifth time your wife bangs on about wanting to see Alexander Skarsgard play the lead character in that naff book...
More seriously I think the most likely thing is that he imparted visions using his psychic power rather than spoke directly, which, given what is said about his current state in, well, everything but Inquisition War seems unlikely to be possible; otherwise why does he never say anything when they bring the psykers in every day? If he has things to say, why doesn't he tell the Custodes?
I guess you could interpret the scene in Inquisition War as a psychic vision that just fooled Draco, but it doesn't matter too much; old, weird book is old and weird.
As for the issue of religion, as someone else said, his "current" stance on it was written up after the first Age of Apostasy background, but more than that they are reconcilable: It's possible that he didn't want to be worshiped as a god in the past but now doesn't mind, possibly because he is partially dead and thus has much more influence over the Warp, to the extent that it's not unreasonable to think of him as a god in the same sense as the Chaos gods, which would explain some "miraculous" happenings since his semi-death. Maybe the widespread worship of him actually created an alter-ego in the Warp that somehow merged with the old, semi-mortal Emperor. Alternatively, maybe he just changed his mind and now thinks that it helps hold the Imperium together in his semi-absence; things have changed a lot, after all. Well, there are a lot of possibilities there. Anyway, he needn't have told Alicia that the Ecclesiarchy was bad or wrong (and, well, apparently didn't, or else she just kept quiet about it, but given her character it's unlikely that she wouldn't act on something the Emperor told her, and thus try to bring about the destruction of, or at least refuse to serve, the Ecclesiarchy, even if she didn't speak of it).
Last edited by Aluinn; 30-07-2012 at 03:32.
How Flayed Ones infiltrate:
Maybe the Emperor had foreseen her coming, and before he coma'd out, hung a sign around his own neck:
"Hi Alicia. Kill Vandire."
Also:
= disturbing.
"Bangs" might not have been the best choice of words...
Moving on, with Alicia and friends meeting the Big E its quite possible that seeing the God Emperor threw into stark reality how very human Vandire was.
To elaborate, the Daughters/ Brides had been told he's the champ of the Emperor and, as such, view him as the epitome of a servant of the Emperor. Vandire was very clever in setting himself up as an exemplar and therefore unnassailable to any claims of his flaws or challenges to his loyalty. When confronted with the true power and majesty of the Emperor, the image of perfection Vandire crafted is shattered by comparison. Hence, his actions and orders became questionable and were found wanting by the Saints.
My take on the whole thing anyway.
She walked in and found all the primarchs playing poker and the empreror dealing, except magnus who was banned cause he was caught scrying on horus' hand.
On the Emperor and Religion.
The Emperor hated religion for basically 2 reasons.
1, stifled human development and the Emperor is all about the manifest destiny of mankind.
2, if you don't know about chaos, literally don't know a single thing about it what so ever, you are protected from it.
If humanity didn't know about Chaos, their ignorance would have been one of their greater weapons against it.
Well, Horus Heresy comes around and suddenly you can't keep people stupid anymore.
So the next best thing is you direct them towards a far more beneficial purpose with their worship.
That and the Ecclesiarchy is so entrenched at this point you can't remove it without wrecking the entire Imperium. It's what holds the Entire Imperium together spiritually.
And consider this, the Custodes could have gone and wiped out all the Brides with barely any trouble but instead chase a peaceful solution. The head of the Custodes leaves his own men as hostages to the Brides and he himself, outnumbered six to one rather doubtful and capable warriors clad in Power Armour and toting Bolters, leads them all the way to the very throne room of the Emperor.
Speaks publicly in support of the Brides when most the political figures want them disbanded at best.
Speaks publicly in support of Thor.
Speaks publicly in support of Thor's idea of not only keeping the now Daughters of the Emperor on as the private army of the Ecclesiarchy but even increasing their realm of authority to include all of the High Lords.
The Custodes and the Sisters are more or less on first-name basis now.
And consider that the Custodes are the closest to the Emperor. You think if the Emperor had any real problems with the Ecclesiarchy then it would have been heard by now.
Go back to the ashamedasylum
I think the issue with the Emperor's feelings about being viewed as a god has to be tempered against his ends justify the means approach to everything. Its echoed many times from the imperial point of view that even though its corrupted from the original vision of the Imperium, without all of the things that exist curently the Imperium would have crumbled after the Emperor was interred. So I imagine the Emperor has accepted the current state of the Imperium as a regrettable means to justify the continued survival of humanity in the absence of him being able to take a direct action.
As for Alicia, I imagine that upon entering the throne room she andher sisters were overwhelmed all at once by staring at a corpse who is thier god, incomprehensible ancient and alien technology that is the throne itself, and the immense psychic pressure that the Emperor emits across the galaxy while standing at ground zero. I would suspect his is why the other sisters never speak afterwards, as it was simply too much for them to reasonably handle. I would also imagine that she was granted a vision of what would happen if Vandire should live, which would be a civil war that would have crippled the Imperium and lead to the downfall of mankind much earlier. That image would be enough for her to know that the Emperor's will is to stop Vandire. Then she storms off with her drooling sisters to go write history, leaving the Big E to sit and realize he just helped form the Sisters of Battle who will even more insanely worship him as a god which he hates.
No wonder he is slightly or more insane. In order to keep humanity alive he has comprimised eveyrthing he stood for, is reduced to a corpse on life support, has to man the galactic lighthouse, holds back the warp non-stop, and his sons never visit (well the living/missing ones that don't want him dead.) He has to be like Hector in Breaking Bad. Once a big shot reduced to miserable existence watching all he loves die. The only thing he can look forward to is eventually having one of his enemies show up and getting to blow them up.
I agree with the previous poster.
Whatever the Emperor's plans had been during the Great Crusade, the realities have changed now. He's pretty much dead, existing more as a drifting mind and soul than a mortal entity. The Imperium is facing more threats now than ever it did while the Emperor lived, and the only thing holding the Imperium together (however horribly) is the united ideology in the manifest rightness of the Imperium because it is presided over by their one true 'god'.
Destabilising that would be catastrophic. It may well be that all the ant hills will have to be kicked over at some point, and humanity may have to topple and fall before it can rise up again. But until then I don't think whatever is left of the Emperor wants to rock the boat too much.
Complete Rules for the Chaos Legions make a return at last!
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The highest rank a Sister can hold is that of a High Lord - technically they exist alongside the Ecclesiarchy rather than completely beholden to them.
As mentioned before though, you almost wonder if the Custodes were the ones who instigated the change to bring the church around and that the Emperor was never involved at all. For all anyone knows Thor himself could have been a direct agent of the Custodes all along.
Seconded, I've wanted to see those for ages, more so than the HH stuff; similarly I'd be much more excited about Forgeworld doing AoA rather than HH...
I'm currently trying to flesh the era out a little so our group can play a few games set in the AoA, should hopefully have something to share on the blog soon...
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Emperor gave everyone milk and cookies and explained the whole thing about religion out in very simple terms.
Order. Unity. Obedience.
I still maintain that if he communicates at all, the Emperor in the 41st Millennium sounds like Foul Ol' Ron from the Discworld novels.
Complete Rules for the Chaos Legions make a return at last!
Updated and revised for the 6th Edition.
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