GW would go bankrupt.

 

...and the skies shall rain fire, and the seas will become as blood. The righteous shall fall before the wicked, and all of Creation shall tremble before the burning standards of Hell!

Edit: On a more serious note, warp travel would be impossible without the emperors psychic beacon , causing the planets of the empire to become isolated. Then Tyranids, Chaos, Tau, Necrons ect will slowly take over imperial territory until humans become a minor race in the galactic war. In the end they will probably be more prosperous under the Tau empire then as an autonomous race.

 

yeah, we'd be fucked. The astartes would probably be too lazy to get off their righteous asses to do anything about it.

 

One thing I can see happening is this.

The imperium of man is desparate because the golden throne is falling apart and they have no way to fix it. There are two races in the Galaxy that have the technological know-how to examine, diagnose, and fix the problem. Tau and Necrons. Obviously the Necrons are not going to be inclined to help Humanity stay alive, and the Imperium would have no reason to trust them. So that leaves the Tau.

I know it would be extremely taboo for a xenos to enter the presence of the Emperor, but I believe that in desperation they would allow a group of Tau to save the emperor. Now, after the fact would Mankind keep whatever promises it made to the Tau? Who knows. I think that the Tau are the only Xenos race that Humans can have a successful alliance with for these reasons.

1. Tau have honor. The Eldar also have great nobility, but they are dying out and they have little to gain by joining Humans. The Imperium already leaves the Craftworlds alone, so it wouldn't be that helpful. They both already have a "cease fire" if you want to call it that, and they have very similar enemies.

2. Tau have ingrained in their minds the greater good. If the Tau joined the Imperium they would work with the humans as long as the humans worked with them.

3. Technology. One word would be enough for this point but I figured I would elaborate. The Imperium doesn't know how it's machines work. They could gain much by regaining that knowledge. The Tau on the other hand could learn more of the mass production that the Imperium conducts.

That's my 2 cents. I'm off now.

 

I remember reading somewhere (possibly lexicanum) that a sect of the illuminati believe that half of the emperor's soul is laying dormant in the warp and when his other hald dies, it will join with the other half and the Emperor would become an actual God?

:victory:

 

I remember reading somewhere (possibly lexicanum) that a sect of the illuminati believe that half of the emperor's soul is laying dormant in the warp and when his other hald dies, it will join with the other half and the Emperor would become an actual God?

:victory:

I don't mean to be rude, but the Illuminati are actually, supossedly a secret society in Earth in the present, not in the 41st Mellenium.

Linky.


Now, back on topic, I reckon the Imperium's best bet would be to join the Tau for reasons already stated. However, a few Space Marine Chapters (I'm thinking Space Wolves, Black Templars), would probably never ally with an xenos race.

I didn't state the Ultramarines, because they probably would join the Tau as they've worked with them in the past, and I reckon all of the UM's descendants would follow suit, and so forth.

 

And then there's the raging debate on if it's the Emperor, or if that soul ends up being \ripped to shreds to fuel the ascention of the Carrion Lord that is the twisted version of the emperor that humanity worships.

Having the actual Emperor as a Warp God would kick ninteen BILLION kinds of awesome since I'm sure his first act would be to EAT the Lords of Terra for doing a shoddy job in his absense (that htey possibly engineered in the first place to take total control.)

If it were the Carrion Lord to emerge... for some reason my thought is that would be horribly Bad... think a blending of Khorne and Tzunpronouncable.

 

You really know what the star child/carrion lord would be like, going by GW's tendencies he would probably be one of the following.

1) A greater warp entity compleatly seperated from the other chaos gods to weak to defeat them, but strong enough to allow warp travel and essist in the comming invasion by chaos forces, but to weak to sway the battle compleatly against their enemies (Hence restablishing a stailmate with imperial forces seeming to benifit from mystical assistance, but much weakend from the attempted death blow by their enemies.). Still like their birth of any magor warp eneity expect earth to be destroyed by the surge of energy caused by his assenccion.

2. He dies, the imperium is shatered yet by some miracle the emperors last sacrifies is to sacrifice what remains of his soul to make a safe beacon in the warp as a way to help what remains after the imperium to defend itself from the coming storm.

3) Almost every imperial world is burnt to ash... I know people find this the most possible occurrence, but honestly if it was that grim it would never be allowed to come because the removal of the imperium of man (Normal Humans) would kill a lot of peoples interest in warhammer 40000.

 

I like option 1 for several reasons.

Most obviously the Emperor becomes active and can actually govern as opposed to being stuck on the throne wondering when they're going to add a fresh roll of paper.

Easy way of explaining why his sudden direct guidance doesn't turn the whole of humanity into uberawesomsoldiers, especially if he believes an alliance, albeit one that leaves the imperium autonomous rather than being absorbed into the Tau's empire, is that humanity splinters further. Not everyone believes the Emperor's 'rebirth' istrue and that it is instead some form of trick by the Ruinous Powers to rally to them, or others not wanting to give up personal power and are short sighted enough to feel that they would be better off making their own fiefdom. Plus the powers of chaos would start moving against the Emperor in a more direct manner since... well... he had 'em on the ropes LAST time he came out to play.

So we get the best of everything. Hope that the imperium can actually stop being backassward while at the same time keeping everything more or less balanced as compared to everything else. So sure humanity has it's emperor back... but now it's been made weaker by the splintering and upswing in Chaos activity.


...not to mention the idea of the void dragon waking up on mars or something else happening as a side effect of the wash of warp energies.

 

what do you think would happen to the imperium

It would be, along with you, complety fucked up?

 

I dont get why he cant reincarnate? He would surely be strong enough to survive in the warp long enough to do it?

I remember reading it took 18 or so years for the emperors previous memories to start coming back after he was reborn as the emperor first time around? If so he could give imperial systems a few years to stockpile supplies and make ready for no warp travel for a few decades, then die, reincarnate, and be back before 20 years fit and strong again.

 

Nah. You have to remember Chaos would probably sense the great beacon going out so would go all swarm happy on the now splintered imperium. Plus no telling how long it would take for him to regain his power (if he were as niegh unstoppable as he was right before him and horous fought then there wouldn't have been that instance of Horous saving him from that ork sometime before then.)

Plus if anyone actually communicated with him that would mean he would've stil lbeen able to lead and direct rather than being a corpse with its soul stuck in the warp.

Then again the Thorians could be right and he's been busy directing mortals around and or affecting chance... which would go a long way to explaining why Caiphus Cain had managed to get in even worse trouble at every turn while trying to flee while at the same time always getting that lucky break that he could wedge his talents/knowledge/skill into to come out on top.

 

Just to make a small point -- Humanity travelled the stars before the rise of the Emperor ... and even with the Emperor amongst them, Humanity travelled through the warp. If I'm not mistaken, the Astronomican, prior to the Emperor's supposed 'godhood', was made up of somewhere along the lines of 10,000 psykers.

Should the Emperor die -- my first thought would be that the High Lords would know that the Astronomican works irregardless of the Emperor's life -- therefore no one would effectively realize it, save probably a huge increase in rogue psykers and prophets claiming his death.

Of coarse this also begs the question of why Astropaths are soul-binded to the Emperor, and how that actually works since no book to my knowledge has ever really elaborated upon it and no character has every truly seen it with their own eyes.

I could be mistaken, but assuming I'm right, the Imperium would never know the Emperor died and the High Lords would just continue to play along -- each new member being more strictly chosen from now on to keep the secret.

Of coarse Abaddon would know and he'd be pissed that the Imperium just didn't die instantly.

 

Abbadon needs a reason to be pissed?


...you know... that actually might explain the currrent state of affairs nicely. Emperor already dead and the High Lords keeping things hush hush. Of course the 'soul bindng' would have to be explained, but considering how long the Throne has been in contact with the emperor it's bound to leave imprints, which might explain things.


I always though the soul binding allowed for astropaths to reach eachother easier and over longer distances than their own innate power would account for as well as provide a bit of an added defense against daemonic possession.

 

Abbadon needs a reason to be pissed?


...you know... that actually might explain the currrent state of affairs nicely. Emperor already dead and the High Lords keeping things hush hush. Of course the 'soul bindng' would have to be explained, but considering how long the Throne has been in contact with the emperor it's bound to leave imprints, which might explain things.


I always though the soul binding allowed for astropaths to reach eachother easier and over longer distances than their own innate power would account for as well as provide a bit of an added defense against daemonic possession.

Assuming your theory is correct, than the Golden Throne itself could be the mechanism by which Astropaths are collectively bound -- the corpse of the Emperor merely for show. Therefore the Astronomican could, theoretically speaking, be nothing more than one Astropath looking threw magnified lenses at the soul-light of another Astropath.

The other hole in my theory is that to my knowledge the Emperor's ascension was nessecary in the first place to prevent the Warp from spilling in through the Human Webway that he was creating.

The other, which I may have just accounted for, is the fact that millions of psykers have supposedly been sacrfiiced to Him over the last 10,000 years. Assuming the Golden Throne is simply some vastly ancient machine, then perhaps the corpse of the Emperor is again just a show and the psyker's souls are simply sucked into the machine to feed it so that he will forever hold the warp from spilling into Terra.

See, right there, GW could take that idea and expand the story, continue it. The Emperor died X thousands of years ago and the High Lords have just used him to maintain control. The Astronomican is a complex lie and the Golden Throne, not the Emperor, prevents the Aether from spilling into the Materium.

Hell the next 10,000 years could be spent with the Emperor ressurecting upon some Emperor-forsaken world and slowly, over thousands of years, prepare his path to ascension once again.

 

.....Gak!
Im Trying to remember were I heard it from some book from a while ago saying/hinting that some members of the Inquisition believe they know how to bring the Emperor back but fear that the event would cause a breakdown in Warp Travel and lead to The Imperiums Demise.
Dumbass'es :ireful2:

 

Probably the 'let's kill him so his soul is reunited in the warp and becomes a Warp God' theorum.

 

Hi i am new to this forum but i see so many comments about what if the emporer died etc. Some say GW would go bankrupt and i dont see why. Whats to stop BL from advancing the Fluff for people who care about it and not touching the rule book? I for one dont play table top i just like painting and reading the books. I dont see why advancing the story has to suddenly change the rules and really its only the fluff that would change its not as if a bolter suddenly does less dmg or somthing.

But then again i guess space marines would start to be super expensive points wise to fit the fluff in a rule book. But why not just keep the book as is or something. Or make him resurected and its now w41k lol. although it doesn't have the same ring to it...

 

He would become more powerful than you could possibly imagine. Oh wait, wrong science fiction universe...

 

The Emperors death would probably send out a ripple in the warp that would burn out almost all of the astropaths in the inner-imperium, which would (like most people have said) make current warp travel pretty damn hard.

The imperium would end up devolving into independant worlds (many of which would join the Tau empire), the Astrates would continue but without the ability to travel the warp (which would make pockets of loyal planets kept in line by the astartes), Imperial guard would probably collapse for the most part Except for the forces fighting in the Sabbat worlds? who would just continue to folllow saint sabbat.

Without the emperors mind beacon thing, the forces of Chaos might not be able to find earth so Cadia would take a pounding as they would be one of the only planets that the Chaos legions could find.

After a couple years of devolution and running around like headless chickens some of the older warp tech would be used again, like the stuff that doesn't need people plugged into it.

It would probably leave the....... well its not an empire anymore so....... republic of man??? in a stronger position without its technology taboos anymore, except for some of the planets where people would end up worshipping chaos and machines.

Overall should be more of a positive tho.

 

I think Calgar would take charge

 

Calgar wouldn't know where to start

 

But if the emperor came back as a god, then the Chaos gods could rip him to shreds while he was getting used to being a God, because the Chaos gods are way more powerful in the warp.

 

No they're not, fluff says he's able to take on all four of them at the same time and still win, why do you think they started the Heresy?

 

1) It would never happen, because it would eff up most of the Imperial fluff, which would eff up a lot of people's will to play 40k (most people I know play SM or IG).

1.5) A lot of people I know don't even pay attention to the fluff, so nevermind.

2) I think there would be an epic climatic struggle for humantiy, which the Tau would take advantage of and offer solstace in the Greater Good at different times to the multiple different factions that once made up the Imperium, then they'd all meet and the Tau would be like, 'PUNK'D'

 

Forgive me but no-one seems to mention that for all intents and purposes the emperor IS dead and has been for some 1000 years. Sure his psykic presense is still notable but he is a corpse. A corpse kept fresh with the hunderds of psykers given to the golden throne each day. Try tell me 1000 years of stasis is "life". Besides, has have been mentioned earlier, mankind spread to the stars in the first place and the emperors crusade went out without the aid of his presence as a becon. Humanity would just start adding those 100s of psyker to the chorus.
I do like the idea that he is dead and the High Lords are covering it up...... a very Imperial thing to do.

 

In the daemons codex ther is mentioned that the galaxy will become a realm of chaos upon the emperors death.

It is also mentioned in the fluff that a chaos gods followers is assimilated into the god when they die. The emperors soul reside within the warp so perhaps his soul turned into a chaos god because of all those who die in his name. The emperors followers outnumber those of the chaos gods so he could quickly become very strong. It would also explain where the legion of the damned comes from(the emperors lesser deamons). If true I wonder witch aspect of emotion he would represent perhaps sacrafice. Funny if he onley care about suicide

 

Personally the way I look at it I see the princess bride.
"There's a big difference between mostly dead and all dead. Mostly dead is slightly alive. With all dead, well, with all dead there's usually only one thing you can do."
Hence, if the Emperor is all dead then GW can't do anything with him (besides, he's chit-chatted with inquisitors before) I say he's mostly dead, dead for all intents and purposes, the High lords covering that bit up, but there's JUUUUUUST enough life to keep him tied to the golden throne psychically that he can do exactly squat but cant go into the warp either.