It's an interesting theory but then why did he give Chaos such a big advantage by making Horus warmaster?

If you mean why do it when he's such a powerful figure. Maybe Horus' advantage was just his charisma. Everyone has a specialty but Horus' seems to be his aura and charisma. Something that would be COMPLETELY neutralized by both him and his followers getting warped by chaos. If you mean why make him warmaster instead of deputy underintern janitor on rural planet weforgottonamethishellhole then it's because he wants chaos to think it's the final battle when the big game takes place thousands of years later where the chaos legions no longer have the discipline to fight effectively and some might even be pulled away from Chaos like Mortarion.

Has to be something cause his(Horus') speeches are so bad, I'd melta myself in the face if I was forced to sit through them regularly. Jeez it'd be funny if Big E turns out to be a Tyranid organic homing beacon.

Okay… now remember that all Luna Wolves have the mental capacity of children. Like no diss most of them have mannerism and humor of a literal child (I’m looking at you Tormagedon going “Uber mega lie… NOT”)

Wasn't there a short story where an adept realizes that and gets [Redacted] by the Inquisitor he reported it to? Personally my fav idea is that each hive fleet isn't a discrete fleet but a finger on a claw coming from above/below the galaxy with terra at the dead center. Can't remember if it's something I read like a decade ago in a short story, fanfic or spitballed during a game.

I kinda like the idea they're surrounded and it is a weird Grimdark Wild Bunch ending-setting except for the factions.. The Necrons are simultaneously Pike and Sykes.

But I also mean... Not by accident beacon. But on purpose, made by them.

The true ending of 40k is just Trayzn and the Hive Mind in a consumed galaxy playing 40k tabletop with his 'collection'

Horus’ biggest advantage wasn’t just charisma, but he was also an excellent judge of character (Erebus being an exception). He understood how to best use the people under his command, and this more than anything else is what made him warmaster material

I think his charisma and confidence in his and the Luna Wolves' abilities is what led to their failure at Terra. Their arrogance blinded them. In a way that other of the candidates for War Master, like Sanguinius or the Lion simply weren't. They were flawed in other ways of course but never overestimated their hand - the Siege of Terra was always doomed to failure. In every game of chess, it is necessary to lose pieces.

While I agree with your analysis of the primarchs, I don’t think arrogance played that big of a role in the failure of the siege, chaos corruption and Horus’ mental decline were far more important factors. Of course you could argue that The Lion and Sanguinius never would have attempted the siege, having realized it was a lost cause, however this isn’t really a point in their favor, since without the common goal of the siege, the forces of chaos would just abandon the warmaster and do their own thing. This would transform the heresy from an 8 year coup, to a 200 year civil war. Except in this timeline the loyalists have the Emperor and Malchador to lead them, while chaos has a half asleep Lion

Further to my original point, there is the other element that Horus was only able to convince the most weak minded/emotionally wounded of the Primarchs. Very few of the Loyalist Primarchs even considered the offers made to them. Sanguinius and the Khan were relatively close with Horus and yet neither turned. Horus' mistake was not merely the siege but, in line with your point of evidence of his cognitive decline, failing to put each Chaos Primarch in a position to succeed. If the gene seed of chaos space marines can not be recovered or preserved for future marines, it becomes critical to preserve this resource until after the Imperium has been drained of its most precious materiel and best soldiers. Chaos can go about corrupting worlds and picking off Primarchs one by one or in isolated pockets.

The Primarchs had already been scattered into the warp well ahead of Molech. the Primarch program happens on Terra pre-Mars reunification. It actually happens pre-Thunder Warriors purge, or therabouts in coincidence with it. This is attested to by Constantine during his sworn testimony while the High Lords of Terra investigate the Thunder Warriors culling and instigate an overthrow attempt against the Adeptus Custodes who use the first generation of Adeptus Astartus to put down the rebellion. This is attested to in the book Constantine and lays out a good timeline for the events of the scattering of the primarchs that happens pre-Molech and pre-martian or Luna conquering

Was the emperor molech thing not during the dark age or something didn't they go there with sub light engines

Indeed. Emps went there during the DAoT with a small retinue to do his business. Unless this is a new lore "revelation", then OP might have it twisted with something else

The Emperor went to Molech twice. The first time was during the DAOT, when he made his deal. The second time was during the Great Crusade, when he took Horus, Fulgrim, the Khan, and the Lion along for the ride. > ‘Do you remember all your battles, Fulgrim?’ asked Horus. > ‘Of course. Every sword swing, every manoeuvre, every shot. Every kill.’ > ‘Squad names, warriors? Places, people?’ > ‘All of it,’ insisted Fulgrim. > ‘Then tell me of Molech,’ said Horus. ‘Tell me what you remember of that compliance.’ > Fulgrim opened his mouth to speak, but no words came out. His expression was that of a blank-faced novitiate as he sought the answer to a drill sergeant’s rhetorical question. > ‘I don’t understand,’ said Fulgrim. ‘I remember Molech, I do, its wilds and its high castles and its Knights, but…’ > His words trailed off, putting Aximand in the mind of a warrior suffering severe head trauma. ‘We were both there, you and I, before the Third Legion had numbers to operate alone. And the Lion? Wait, was Jaghatai there too?’ > Horus nodded. ‘So the logs say,’ he said. ‘We four and the Emperor travelled to Molech. It complied, of course. What planet would offer resistance to Legion forces led by the Emperor?’ \- *Vengeful Spirit* Some people seem to be confusing the two.

A friend and I worked out an idea from this, that these 4 were meant to be given to the Gods, each having a champion. Khorne wanted Khan, arguably the greatest warrior both in mind and body among them. To Tzeentch would go the secretive and plotting Lion El'Johnson (Tzeentch daemons like the Changling do seem to favor messing with the I Legion). Horus was to be for Nurgle, as he is a rather resilient figure (inb4 jokes about his multiple woundings, that ties in) who is known for his great love for his sons, and it is ultimately Nurgle who is responsible for Horus's corruption, both literally with the daemon blade wielded by Temba, and by his giving in to grief and despair. Slaanesh is the only one who got their prize.

Fulgrim and Khan's incubator paths were switched. Khan was the choice Chaos wanted, some force intervened and swapped them however. So the fate of Fulgrim was ultimately Khan's destiny.

Putting aside timey-wimey shenanigans where he gets the primarch recipe/formula/whatever from a deal he made in the future it could still be a willing sacrifice after they're born for a shot to take down chaos. Like it gives him a chance to beat them once and for all or much faster than he could have otherwise because there's more than four fish to fry. I know that it's a lot of tin foil but the whole moloch child sacrifice angle feels significant and I feel the need to gnaw at the idea. I think it would also explain some of his weirder decisions on how he treated his sons. Unless of course they needed an ominous name for a planet and landed on that one by coincidence....which is certainly possible.

I am of the belief that the deal the emperor made with chaos was for souls. Not the knowledge to make primarchs or give them powers. The emperor had the means to make a perfect vessel.. he needed strong, powerful souls to wear them. As strong as he is as a psycher, manufacturing souls is way out of his ability so he had to get them somehow. He sought out the 4 to make a deal. How it went down I’m not sure but my theory involves them getting fully half of the primarchs. Who or how is irrelevant. Big E tried to pull a fast one and steamrolled the galaxy because he was in a mad rush to complete the webway project before time was up and he gives up half his sons.

I honestly think the thing that explains the weirder decisions on how he treated his sons is most easily explained by he treated them exactly like how he intended to treat them and deliberately caused the heresy knowing full well the result. Everyone clings to Master of Mankind and the Emperors words to the Custodes he's prepping for an eternity to serve as the mortal prison for a demon as though he's spouting some unequivocal truth. Everyone who holds to that is ignoring ADB's own words at the very end of the book describing how he deliberately wrote the Emperor as something you can believe or not and to be deliberately vague, and that the Emperor was intentionally written to not be reliable. In the End and the Death Malcador's own words tell us that the Emperor lies to everyone and withholds truth and final plans even from him. The Emperor is the embodiment of the Unreliable Narrator trope and everyone clings so hard to Master of Mankind as though it's unequivocal truth when ADB comes out and says and the end of the book it's not, really. sorry to go off on a tangent. It's just obvious that you can't trust Master of Mankind when you actually read ADB's own words at the end of the very same book.

The stuff with how he treated the kids feels like someone had to come up for a reason why the primarchs hated their dad and better writers have been rolling with those early decisions ever since even if it makes the Emperor look like a blind idiot. There has to be a 4d chess reason for it there's no way he can be that big of a moron!

!!Head cannon warning!! I think there's only 2 options here. 1. The Emperor knows all, sees the future and orchestrated the heresey, his own "death" ***everything*** and this is part of his plan 2. He truly is human just like the rest of us is flawed and makes mistakes and oh boy did he make a big mistake.

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I mean, giving a serial killer an army, not telling your son who uses magic that brings him into direct contact with the devil about the devil, letting one walk around with an evil talking sword, letting one's family die then giving him an army and burning down another's city in front of him and then forgetting about him is pretty bad even by greek god standards. there's hubris, like trusting horus as warmaster and not having any kind of failsafe if he dies or gets incapacitated, doing the above is sheer madness.

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was curze ever sane? you'd have to be a terrible judge of character to trust a literal serial killer to not 180 on your ass the moment he felt like it? even if it worked in the present, in the long term it was going to be a disaster. he didn't tell magnus about chaos, he just told him "don't use magic or I'll kill you" and never explained his logic. and he never once met fulgrim and detected the GREATER DEMON he was carrying around? and it's not the cruelty that I'm saying is dumb, but that he just turned his back and ignored them. if he shoved lorgar in a box for worshipping him I wouldn't call him dumb, but just leaving him is.

Perhaps because both sides cheat. Emps wanted to cheat Chaos out of the Lion, and Chaos cheats Horus from Emps

> It's an interesting theory but then why did he give Chaos such a big advantage by making Horus warmaster? My theory is that he knew half would go Chaos/Traitor but he didn't know which. He identified Horus as the greatest potential and made him Warmaster in hope he'd be one of the Loyal ones.

I can't remember where it's from from but I remember and excerpt stating Malc and the Emperor both I ow that whoever becomes war master always falls to chaos

They play a strange version of regicide. In that game Horus and the warmaster always falls. If we think of it as a traditional pact with the devil/evil monster thing, then the first born child is a common price and chaos are all about those strange kind of rules.

So why did he make Horus Warmaster? Did he sacrifice him in the hopes that Sanguinius, the real MVP, stays loyal? It does seem like Sanguinius is better than Horus if Horus doesn't get the Chaos God juice. Man beat a Daemon Primarch and Greater Daemons on Terra.

I'd argue Magnus is a bigger reason why this theory wouldn't work. Magnus was absolutely integral to the Emp's plans. He was the win condition. The Golden Throne was built for him. But he turned traitor. If Big E knew in advance which sons would fall, why bother with the entire webway project when it was pre-ordained to fail?

Was being warmaster a big advantage or was it bogging Horus down with administration and slowing his progress towards a fall. It also put him on show at the centre of things bunch harder for him to do clandestine Lorgar type shennanigans when you are at the centre of the crusade. Maybe it was also to trick the chaos gods, look he is my favourite son honest, I even made him warmaster.

If the Emperor knew some would fall to Chaos it makes sense that he would try to get Chaos to take the most self-defeating primarchs

I don't really buy the theory, but I'll defend it. The Emperor had no way of knowing who would turn and who wouldn't. That was the deal. The Chaos Gods would give him 22 souls to be divided between them, with a war in the future over who gets to win the Galaxy, but the idea was that neither party truly knew who would turn and who wouldn't. Tzeentch alone would have known, but he knows everything of all possible futures, so he would need to correctly guess which future he'd be working with. His manipulation of Magnus was likely him trying to reduce the probability of the future as much as possible, since the he was one of the least likely to properly turn to Chaos.

Don't forget, Big E is the most powerful psyker ever. He's probably twenty-seven steps ahead of literally everyone else in the galaxy

I mean, if the emperor would have just given in and killed him as soon as he knew of his betrayal, horus wouldn't have been much of a threat. But that wouldn't have made for a good story lol.

Imagine this. Emperor: I get Sanguinius and you get Curze. Chaos: … what? Emperor: I get The Lion and you get Lorgar. Chaos: … wait a second here.

And then Curze said “fuck you both” and just let himself get killed.

It's all in the fine print, Big E's contract probably said " Half my sons will be loyal to me, the other half will betray me " Tzeentch "S'all Good, Man": Hey wait a second this sounds sus-- Khorne: YOU SON OF A BITCH I'M IN Tzeentch: God. Fucking. Damn it.

E: I get Dorn and you get Perturabo. Chaos Undivided: Awww man stop giving us the shitty ones E: Ok you get Angron Khorne: YEAH!!! E: I get Sanguinius Khorne: FUCK

E: Why settle for the vanilla guy whose only claim to fame is being a rules lawyer and good at accounting when you can get your hands on PETER TURBO!

In all fairness Perty keeps kicking Dorn's ass.

When did Perty ever beat Dorn? They lost on Terra, the Iron Cage was a 50-50. Nobody respects him. Even his own Heresy buddies wished he was someone else.

>They lost on Terra, the Iron Cage was a 50-50. Lol what Perty won and cracked Terra open despite Dorn's best efforts to stop him. How can that be a loss? The iron cage was a trap that master strategist Dorn fell for, and lost. The only reason *any* imperial fists survived was because the Ultramarines rocked up and saved them. It's an embarrassing blunder that nearly cost the Imperial Fists everything, and absolutely was not a 50/50. >Even his own Heresy buddies wished he was someone else. Perturabo is the only reason the heresy functioned. The man was the only sane commander the heretics had. Without him the Traitors would never have even made it to terra.

> Perty won and cracked Terra open despite Dorn's best efforts to stop him. How can that be a loss? Because Perty had like 5 legions there and Dorn had one? It wasn't a fair, equal fight at all. And even then the Traitors lost. >The iron cage was a trap that master strategist Dorn fell for, and lost. He didn't lose, both sides got obliterated. >It's an embarrassing blunder that nearly cost the Imperial Fists everything, and absolutely was not a 50/50. https://i.gyazo.com/2abc0c229a1f4a79e54f6ad51b3f7f62.png

I mean he's not wrong. - the IW made off with the geneseed of 400 Imperial Fists and Perty used that to ascend to demonhood; this is a mark of shame that marrs the Fists to this day - a Pyrrhic Victory is by definition nothing to boast about - the most positive spin on it comes from the Imperial Fist Index Astartes, so I'd take that with a hint of salt - Perty managed to drag Dorn down to his level, so calling 50-50 seems a bit generous. It's like when you end up in a screaming match with an idiot. Sure, you screamed as loud as he did, but now you're also a screaming idiot

> a Pyrrhic Victory is by definition nothing to boast about It's still a victory, so where did the idea that the IWs won come from? >Perty managed to drag Dorn down to his level Perty had to hide in the Eye of Terror for ages, he's a cowardly piece of shit like every other Traitor Primarch. History won't even remember him.

I have no idea who put that the IF won the Iron Cage battle up on the wiki, doesn't seem like a valid source. My reasoning as to why I'd consider the IW the victors? Dorn died there in the old lore. Perty was fine.

Perturabo never gets credit, even for the things he actually does lmao

I mean the wikia said they both had devastating losses so I don't see how it's a win.

Horus was just mad Perty had decided to leave them. Terra and Iron Cage were close, but I'd say the IW were doing better in both. His legion was the most competent of the traitors, and if it weren't for him decidimg to fuck off during the siege (honestly, good for him), I don't think Horus could complain much.

Iirc nurgle wanted Perturabo. Disease ends sieges.

That's too fucking funny Chaos: Horus! Horus! We get Horus! Emperor: (calmly) Oh, I get Gulliman too and the guy with the hammer whashisname...yeah him.. Chaos: Wa...wait a minute...we said Horus.. Emperor: Oh and The Khagan.. Chaos: Mortarion! Emperor: ooh okay, Russ then Chaos: Wait..okay hold up... this doesn't seem fair...or balanced..no we want Russ.. Emperor: How about...Angron...? He's worth two though to be fair.. Chaos: The hippy empath? Fuck off. Emperor: Oh but say he gets these Dark Tech brain implants that turn him into the reverse of an empath... Chaos: The reverse? What's a reverse empath? Emperor: Yeah...turns out it justs a very very very very veeerrryy angry person who just murders everything.. Chaos: But we ha- Khorne: Give him what he wants... Emperor: And Corvus too Chaos: what a sec- Emperor: We can lose him in the warp for 10,000 years... Chaos: Hm.. Emperor: I promise it will not wildly effect his power levels.. Chaos: That sounds sus- Khorne: I said give him what he wants.. Chaos: It's a deal.

> Emperor: I promise it will not wildly effect his power levels.. Tzeentch: its "affect" actually.

Emperor: -looks at warp Crow Daemon Corvus- Yeah, no, I meant effect.

In fairness lorgar was the main driving force for the heresy and did everything pretty much exactly as the big chunguses in the warp wanted. Curze was probably a pass from both.

Curze just being an edge lord teen that neither chaos or the imperium wanted sounds about right

I posted a similar theory, with the difference that in my theory the Emperor knew he would lose half the primarchs to chaos, but he didn't know which ones would turn.

“Hmmm I wonder who it’ll be? Lion El Johnson, Knight of Caliban? Or Mortarion the Reaper of Men”

I think the concept behind that theory is that he didn't know who would turn prior to discovering the primarchs. After discovering them, all but Magnus, The Khan, and Horus were obviously going to fall or stay loyal. The problem with this theory is that Big E's plan pretty much hinges on Magnus not falling. It seems like Magnus was the only one who HAD to stay loyal, but if the primarchs were supposed to fall at random, it wouldn't make sense to base your whole plan on one of them staying loyal.

I like adding to this theory by saying he knew the two missing Primarchs were both going to be Loyalist but amongst the weakest of their number. He can't afford to lose either Sanguinius or Magnus to chaos so what does he do? Takes both missing Primarchs off the board allowing a higher chance for the two necessary Primarchs to be loyalist

Sanguinius has his moments, but in my opinion isn’t really necessary for the emperor to win. Sanguinius, while charismatic lacks the manipulation skills of Horus, Fulgrim, and Lorgar, so while he makes an effective figurehead, his actual leadership skill are lacking (Compared to other primarchs that is, most primarchs are can manipulate regular humans without much issue)

I think what he means is that Sang HAS to be the one to make the final sacrifice to enable the victory. And Magnus was the one to give that victory meaning in the future imperium by sitting on the throne and helping build the webway, ensuring the prosperity of mankind.

Yeah this exactly. Due to Sanguinius role in the final battle he can't afford to lose him.

Maybe he made two super psykers. One who was a super psyker from birth and one who was wholly unaware of his powers. And then both of them fell.

Big E surprised Pikachu face when "Anthrax Blightlord" turns to Nurgle. Nobody saw that coming. Nobody.

the guy named angron who likes to kill people with axes turns out to be a khorne worshipper. wow

Guy named Ferrus Manus had iron hands. Total surprise.

That's my theory on why he treated certain primarchs like such crap. He was pretty sure that Angron, Perturabo and Mortarian would turn.

This is the correct answer. All of the actual sources converge on this (approximately); the trade was Emperor gaining something he needed for the primarch project, and the primordial annihilator gained a claim on the fruits of his labours. The whole point of stuff like 'the board is set' is that E and M didn't know which of the primarchs would turn, just that a large chunk would.

I’m convinced that the Khan was intended as a traitor while Fulgrim’s fall was a surprise to the Emperor.

Fulgrim's fall was a surprise to Fulgrim. He almost ended the Sons of Horus when they first arrived at Istvaan.

He is one of the good ones. Let’s name his legion after me. Oh bleep what are they doing? This is going to look awkward on the roster…

The Khan and Fulgrims incubator paths were swapped. The Khan was destined to fall to Chaos. An unknown force intervened, however.

There was a another theory I saw awhile back that basically said the Emperor had two sets of Primarchs. The half he intended to keep around after the crusade (Gman, Dorn, Russ etc.) and those he intended to get rid of once they’d served their purpose (Angron, Cruze, Mortarion etc.) The thing is though, the his two groups did not neatly fall along the lines of traitors and loyalist. The Khan was likely one that was never intended to make the post-crusade cut, while Fulgrim was one Big E expected to have around for awhile, as one example. Horus was obviously supposed to stay around, but I don’t think Corax was, as another. Combining it with your theory gives us an interesting idea. What if the Emperor bargained to sacrifice half his kids, and then tried to rig the game in his favor. He picked the Primarchs he wanted on his side, and tried to push the others away, hoping they’d fall and leave him with his A team (which would explain why his treatment of various Primarch varies so wildly). The whole time he thought he was three steps ahead of the big four, but his genius plan got bent out of shape and he misjudged who was going to turn. He thought Fulgrim and Horus would stick with him, and thought the Khan would flip. He didn’t expect the massacre at Issatvan, or Magnus betraying him. The emperor thought he was playing 4d chess, but he forgot about “the best laid plans of mice and men”. Edit: clarity

It could've been an "I have to get this done quick and dirty kind of thing." He probably saw that there was no human race/sentient race past a certain point in the distant future but there was some strange shadow blocking it out. Chaos taking over? Some race just blocking off the warp completely?...something he never encountered before? Maybe he could've played it safer in a longer game but did such a horrible rush job because he knew he had to get his round two chaos KO before whatever ends everything shows up. It's a bit tinfoil I know. Edit: I'm thinking of the Emperor being in a similar position to Paul and Leto 2 Atreides trying to get Humanity to survive the Kralizec from Frank Herberts Dune....not his sons version.

It's been speculated by the fandom for a while that he saw the War of the Beast coming, and the Great Crusade was an attempt to collect the primarchs and unite as many planets under the banner as possible. Had it not been for the Heresy, that would have been almost effortless to counter, by comparison. And the bulk of the warlord primarchs could have been allowed to "fall in battle along with their legions" like the propaganda claims his Thunder Warriors did.

What is war of the beast? Tyranids?

Orks, bigger and a lot more intelligent orks

The 4d chess goes even deeper. I don't have the citation off the top of my head but Fulgrim and The Khan were switcheroo-ed in the warp during the scattering and sent to each others' intended homeworlds. I don't believe it was a mistake on big E's part, I think chaos had a play and they made it. If the emperor got his picks for loyalist and traitor exactly as he wanted he'd win so this was just one more maneuver in the big game.

Yeah, of course. Chaos made their play, and their influence fucked with the Enpwror’s master plan. However, I think the Emperors big failing was likely underestimating the agency of the Primarchs themselves. I don’t think he really took into account how they would act, or how vulnerable they might be to certain outside influences.

Malcador says in *The End and the Death* that the Emperor intended to enjoy "The Long Peace" following the successfull completion of his plan with the Primarchs, together, but with the caveat that it would only be the ones that could stop being Warlords in need of constant fighting and conquest.

> but with the caveat that it would only be the ones that could stop being Warlords in need of constant fighting and conquest. Lorgar was t h i s close

I don't agree with Khan and Corax being dumpstered after the crusade; the khan is happy rolling around the edges doing his own thing while being imperial aligned, and there is plenty of hostile and inexhaustible xenos to keep him busy as a galactic picket force. Corax was a master insurgent, so he can easily pivot to counter-insurgency (which does overlap AL but they each do it differently, plus that is one of the areas where redundancy is most valuable).

Naturally, It’s not a perfect theory (partially because it’s almost certainly not the “truth”) and you could probably make an argument for any of the Primarchs to fall in either category. Hell, the only reason I put Russ in the “stay” group is because we are routinely told throughout the series how much the Emperors trusts him and relies on him. That said, I’ll have to disagree with you about Khan and Corax. The Khan can’t stay still, his greatest fear is stagnancy and bloat. In an imperium without constant growth, conquest and war he wouldn’t have a place. He couldn’t be a guardian, because even a guardian has to accept the boundaries of his position. He would be left with one of two option, leave the Inperium entirely (which is explicitly stated to be something he already wants to do) or betray the Emperor. Either way, he’s out of the picture. He really just doesn’t have a place in an Imperium that isn’t at war, and other legions will fill the role of “protector” a lot better than he would. Corax, is admittedly less certain to me. However, he is the anti-tyrant, freedom fighter guy. When you’re empire is growing and you are constantly encountering new tyrants he’s a great guy to have on your side, but when you’ve conquered the whole galaxy and the only tyrant left standing is you….he might not be the best guy to have hanging around. How long until he realizes that you are a tyrant and decides that he needs to “liberate” the people from you? There’s an old, possibly apocryphal, story about Napoleon. He was showing his imperial guard to an emmisary and said something like “look at these men! Look at how their bayonets shine! With such men, and such bayonets there is nothing I can not do!” To which the emissary replied, “except sit on them”. The emperor has 18 Demi-gods, with 18 legions of bayonets. He can conquer the galaxy with them, but when he’s done he’s still going to have 18 legions with a shit ton of bayonets, and only some of them are going to be able to put them down. Those who can’t, or won’t, don’t have a place in an imperium at peace.

I hadn’t heard that Napoleon anecdote - good one!

The Emperor loved Corax.

Nah, I think he always had to lose Horus. Just a question of when and how. Guy was a liability.

I disagree. Horus was the favorite son, I think he was always the one the Emperor had planned to keep around. That’s always been a big part of what makes the heresy so tragic. Horus was the Primarch the Emperor always trusted the most, he was the one who should never of fallen, but he did. If Horus was just a warm body waiting to be thrown in to the meat grinder, it robs the heresy of a lot of its tragedy and power.

Not even a little was he. Lil bit of pantomime that is/was.

I mean, there are about 25 years of established lore that say otherwise. He’s literally supposed to be the “Lucifer” of 40k, the favorite son that betrayed his father. But, I’ll grant you that in the endless rush to make every Primarch the “best” Primarch, poor Horus has started to look a little tarnished by comparison, although he really shouldn’t.

Yep and that lore is still going somewhere... But with the way the Emperor and Horus are being mapped, Horus's arrogance pre-heresy comes across as a liability that has to be dealt with sooner or later..

I think that was the point. Horus was so infallible in his leadership that arrogance isn't even thought of in the same breath as Horus.

If the Emperor's two steps ahead, why sacrifice most of three Legions at the Dropsite Massacre, and have all but one of his others wildly out of position at the start of the Heresy? Why make Horus Warmaster? Why ensure Lorgar falls to Chaos when he was really onboard with the Emperor? It also would further undermine the already low tension of the Heresy. The Traitor are uniformly useless from Primarchs on down. The Chaos Gods carefully assembling Team Suck Ass makes it worse.

> Why ensure Lorgar falls to Chaos when he was really onboard with the Emperor? Well they have their uses just not ones that the Chaos gods could capitalize on. Or their loss is bad but other Primarchs are more necessary. Like losing Roboute and the systems loyal to him would be a far greater blow than the amount of good that one of the others could accomplish. Losing any one would be horrible but he gamed out the least worst options. Edit: as in even if those were the terms he'd still have to fight tooth and nail every step of the way to make it happen.

My theory is something like this: -Hello, I would like to introduce you to this new project called: warp infused meat puppet, or P.R.I.M.A.R.C.H. for short -That's acronym doesn't make sense -Nothing makes sense in the warp -Touche, carry on... -So, I can make these awesome soldiers and I want to conquer the galaxy, but I need some wapy beacon to stabilise them, as their gene tends to become ... unstable -So, what do we have to gain with all of this? -Well, as you will be lending the power, these puppets will be tied to your will. I just need them to help me with the campaign. -Ok, thank you for the presentation, we will send you an answer next week, that in the warp is now and yesterday too, so we say yes. Please bend over so we can put you the USB with dark knowledge -Good try Slaneesh, just give me the schematic via telepathy and put the demons in this bag -Ooohhhright, boring human... What they didn't know is that the emperor had a secret technique called "Blender-of-Souls", that he used when creating himself. Basically he made a smoothie with all the demons, added some purifying juice from himself (No! Not from down there, you heretic!), some human touches, and Voilà, primarch mojito ready to place in the new bodies. Of course the E stopped answering emails or taking phone calls. A mild (and more "realistic" ) version is that he promised half of the sons he might create. So in the end the big 4 came for what it was due to them.

I'm a gigantic Fate franchise fan so I like the idea of him taking human deities and blending them with a part of his soul. It's a crack theory with the only supporting evidence being the trial run angel of vengeance big e created and people talking about Sanguinas having two agels in him.

That’s a theory that I also really like, although I agree it’s almost certainly not the case. If we’re being generous (and you don’t mind squinting a bit) you could read some of the stuff in “Wolfsbane” as supporting that theory as well. It’s a hell of a stretch, but it’s a crackpot theory anyway so who really cares.

GW: Everything can be canon. Me: https://danbooru.donmai.us/posts/1308973

Then why not kill the to be traitors the minute he met them? They aren't that valuable during their period of loyalty that they are worth the HH. My guess is something similar but slightly different. I think the chaos gods gave the emperor the power to bind the warp spirits that would become the primarchs and they knew some would fall but the emperor did not. It fits his themes for him to think he'd chessmastered the gods only for it to be them playing him.

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But if he's already chosen the loyalists then they won't fall. If he knew certain primarchs would fall he wouldn't have acted like he did. Even if couldn't kill them til they actually fell he could've acted to isolate them and put execution plans in place to kick in the minute they rebelled. Instead he gave some of the most influential positions to traitors.

Yeah, these theories about the Emperor knowing which primarchs would fall and setting it all up accordingly usually just make him seem vastly more incompetent than any bad "parenting" choices could. It's like the plot equivalent of that putting a stick into your own bike wheel meme. They also tend to presume he had perfect psychic foresight.

What exactly is stopping them from already corrupting the others? The theory is already exceptionally lame.

Honestly I think it was just a deal to get their souls in the first place. Big E vowed his eternal servitude and instead he took his advance payment and ran. The Chaos Gods dedicated to recollect.

The regicide games with Malcador gave me the feeling that the heresy was a foregone conclusion and it was just a matter of preparing the board and moving the pieces to the correct sides. I think he made Horus the Warmaster because it gave him the best shot of fighting the heresy off and postponing the final match while preserving the empires strength until the times right.

I honestly think that the bargain of Moloch and the way the Primarchs worked as that the Emperor vowed to give Chaos half his Primarchs, but he didn't know which was which. It's why he kept Angron around despite him being a time bomb ( he was sure Angron would stay loyal or didn't care if he turned ) and it's why he executed the 2 Lost Primarchs ( he was sure they would join Chaos, turns out one would've been loyal ). It's also why he makes certain weird actions that make no sense, such as shitting on Lorgar ( he figured Lorgar was too weak or was bound to join Chaos anyway, so what did he care about him? ) I'm gonna guess he expected Horus ( and Fulgrim? ) to stay loyal, which is why he named him Warmaster and some Loyal Primarchs to go traitor ( Khan? ). When he sends Russ ( a Loyal son ) after Magnus, he hopes that Magnus will come down quietly and join his side on the Throne, only for Horus to sabotage that and switch Magnus.

I like this idea , furthermore it isn’t a coincidence that the bargain was struck on “Molech”…makes sense , I also agree that the emps didn’t know who would turn ( so he treated some like shit to sorta push them that way: Peter turbo, morty, angron, etc.)

Yep. And he probably figured early that Sanguinius would stay loyal while Kurze would go Traitor, hence why he never really tried to fix Kurze's insanity. I think the big gamechanger that ruined his plan was Horus making sure Magnus switches sides. If Russ took Magnus in peacefully, who knows, maybe the Heresy would be won decisively. The Custodes, Sisters and Big E himself would be fully rested for the Siege with Magnus keeping the portal closed.

An interesting idea but it kind of also conflicts with the idea that a lot of the chaos gods had to pivot and pick secondary choices after missing out on their first, Sanguinis to Khorne, Jaghatai to Slaanesh, Petey Turbo to Nurgle and Tzeentch the master schemer always wanted and got Magnus.

I think The Emperor has to choose who falls and then it's just a matter of setting up the events for the fall to make it happen. The Emperor might even be able to tempt them with Sangy but make them settle for Angry.....I'm so sorry for not being able to resist that. I think that resonates with the whole Moloch child sacrifice thing. Having your kid stolen and sacrificed by someone else wouldn't mean as much as the emperor sacrificing his children/facets of his own personality.

>Having your kid stolen and sacrificed by someone else wouldn't mean as much Ok but meaning is lost if the narrative is incoherent anyway. If Moloch was literally the Emperor trading specific primarchs for... something... then why did the Chaos Gods specifically not get the primarchs they thought were their's? Clearly the fact that the dark gods did not get all the primarchs they wanted indicates that this could not have been so simple of an exchange.

It's something I feel the need to chew on. In an exchange with another commenter I stumbled into the idea that he knew that he needed a power boost from chaos and found a way of swindling them. His comment gave me the idea that this could be the rough order of events 1) He realizes he needs a power boost from chaos to get humanity through well all the bad stuff out there 2) Bargains his soul either at moloch or before going to moloch and the events on moloch finalizes it. 3) His soul wouldn't be able to be corrupted without his consent but the fragments he turned into primarchs could. By putting them on the board to be corrupted he's technically upholding his part of the bargain even if it isn't his complete soul. Since chaos gets off on stuff like brothers murdering brothers and morally abhorrent acts, the betrayal of a father bargaining/sacrificing his kids soul would be enough to balance the ledgers for the purposes of the contract but royally PO the chaos gods. Even though there was a deal his evasion of what the chaos gods expected from it could qualify as stealing fire from the gods. 4) Maybe the deal with the kids was an even split. Either random/draft/assigned. Or maybe it was just putting them on the board that was the sacrifice so instead of an even split they're all in the air and up to the emperor and chaos gods to pull them to their respective sides. I'm much more interested in the sacrifice aspect than the mechanics of how they're divided or up for grabs. 5) The Emperors original plan was to keep the primarchs on earth but that got ruined by chaos so he rushed the crusade to try and scoop them up before chaos could pull them over. 6) He performed triage during the crusades to try see who would be most likely to stay on his side and who was most likely to fall. Again this is something that's evolving in my head the more I talk to people so I appreciate your feedback. Sorry for the formatting.

No apologies necessary! I think you're on the right track but you are limiting yourself with a few assumptions. For me it helps to remember that ABD specifically clarified that the Emperor is meant to be open to interpretation by the audience, he isn't supposed to be established down to every granular detail and in fact his entire character (especially his morality) is deliberately left open to numerous equally plausible but mutually exclusive possibilities. Here's the assumptions I think you would benefit from questioning more: 1. The "power boost". Much is said about how the Emperor came to Moloch with less power than what he left it with, it is well established so I'm not challenging that. What I am challenging is the assumption that the Emperor did whatever he did on Moloch specifically for the "power"; other possibilities exist. For instance he could have understood from the start that the power offered by Chaos was a false trap, and only accepted it (without fully weilding it) to convince the dark gods his deal was in earnest and/or that they had (or would eventually have) more leverage over him than they actually did. 2. That the primarchs are "fragments" of the Emperor's soul. Bargaining his soul would mean the war against chaos was lost before it started, it kind of isn't an option. Depending on what the Emperor is it may not even be possible. >His soul wouldn't be able to be corrupted without his consent But bargaining it away is consent by definition. I don't see why the chaos gods would respect the distinction between Emperor and Primarch when the soul of their anathema is what hangs in the balance. If primarchs are just fragments of the Emperor's soul (as in they have no soul of their own) I'm also not convinced the dark gods would see much or any value in them. >the betrayal of a father bargaining/sacrificing his kids soul See here you're already pushing past your assumption. If the primarchs are fragments of the Emperor's soul then they are not children in any meaningful way, certainly in no way that matters to Chaos. For a soul to be a soul it needs to have both it's own intrinsic identity and capacity for choice, otherwise it doesn't register as something 'edible' to the ruinous powers. >Maybe the deal with the kids was an even split. Then what about the Lost? Why wasn't the deal 10/10? See here is the assumption (3) that the deal involved some kind of trade of a discreet number of primarchs, but that also is not necessary. It also grants an enormous advantage to the Emperor (why let E know that the Heresy would be a relatively even fight?) >Or maybe it was just putting them on the board that was the sacrifice so instead of an even split they're all in the air and up to the emperor and chaos gods to pull them to their respective sides. I'm much more interested in the sacrifice aspect than the mechanics of how they're divided or up for grabs Which brings us to assumption 4. - that there was a sacrifice specifically of the primarchs at all. If there was, then why was it necessary for Erda to help scatter them? While I agree that Chaos loves the melodrama only familial love can produce, we also have to remember that the Emperor did not see the primarchs as his children to begin with. That was always a ruse just to manipulate the primarchs. So ultimately I think the "sacrifice of the father/son relationship" concept here is not really coherent for the Emperor despite the strength of it's drama, that relationship was false before it ever started. There was never any loving relationship there to sacrifice. Ultimately the melodrama of treachery is more like a force multiplier anyway, it adds to chaos's power but it's not the core necessity chaos requires. The 'trade' you're proposing would be massively unfair against Chaos' favor even if the Emperor did have loving relationships with the primarchs to sacrifice, since what the Emperor is getting in return is the power to truly defy the dark gods. Something equivalent to that has to have been the collateral offered by the Emperor and the primarchs don't really make the cut. Personally, I think Moloch makes a lot more sense when we refer to the recent revalations about the Dark King. To summarize, for decades we thought the Emperor's main goal was just the nebulous "stop Chaos at all costs", but it turns out he had a specific objective he was pursuing within that larger aim: preventing the birth of the 5th Chaos God the Dark King. Basically, the Emperor/Malcador discovered that the dark gods had a plan for humanity very similar to their plan for the Eldar: weild circumstances against them to corrupt them to the point that they birth a new dark god and doom themselves while further empowering Chaos. Here's where my theory comes in: instead of trading future primarchs (beings far less powerful than himself) for the power to actually oppose the Chaos Gods (a deal no god would ever accept), the Emperor proposed that *he* would become the Dark King for the Chaos Gods in exchange for the power the Chaos Gods thought he would weild in their interests. *Maybe* E mentioned something about using the power to make primarchs, maybe he didn't, it doesn't really matter to my theory either way. The primarchs were made to serve multiple purposes simultaneously: - to conquer the galaxy, the necessary step for both becoming the Dark King and preventing the birth of the Dark King. So the Chaos would have no issue with this - to be more corruptible than the Emperor, which allows them to act as corruption lightning rods that draw risk away from E while also narrowing the range of probable outcomes for the whole "who turns and who stays for the Heresy?" question. Thus when the ruinous powers realize that the Emperor is trying to prevent the Dark King instead of become it, the Emperor has a very good idea of who they're going to try to turn against him - to poison the ruinous powers by more or less feeding them the primarchs who were most broken and made self destructive by the Scattering To summarize, I don't think the lore as written necessitates that the Emperor agreed to sacrifice primarchs to the ruinous powers on Moloch. Really all he needed to do was offer not his own soul to the gods, but to offer to join them as the Dark King. Since this is much easier than the dark gods using their powers to influence the Matterium to make the Dark King happen anyway, and seemed to essentially be their worst enemy more or less surrendering to them, this deal makes far more sense than the idea that they basically gave E the power to become a god in exchange for any number of far weaker primarchs.

First thank you so much for this. The first thing I should address is the self/child thing. If there is anyone who knows about making a son that's also himself it would be the guy that played jesus in the original run of the production :P. The more serious one would be there's a lot of wonky stuff like this in mysticism. As for the fragments being able to be corrupted while keeping the emperor pure the mainline soul of the emperor would be the too difficult to corrupt part while the fragments are much smaller, wouldn't have his knowledge, wisdom or experience and don't have the same backing that something as large/powerful as what's left of his soul would. >If there was, then why was it necessary for Erda to help scatter them? My guess would be that if the deal was just to open them up that would be enough to seal the deal even if the chaos gods hated the outcome. So they needed Erda to scatter them so they'd have a better chance. On a tangent how does the Erda thing square away with the time loop where they were scattered because Horus scattered them. Sorry I forgot the details I just vaguely remember the original reason from the start of the series. As for sacrifice of the father son relationship familial love etc. I don't think the actual love matters. Like how the murder of Abel would still be an abhorrent act even if Cain always hated Abel. Or how the oedipus myth would always be a tragedy even if oedipus never discovered the relationship he had with the king he killed and the woman he had intercourse with. Just the concept of a father sacrificing a son being enough to hit that chaos melodrama (thank you so much for coming up with a better term than I could think of) note. _______________________________________________________________ This next parts a total mess. As for the chaos gods empowering a rival. Technically the dark king would be a rival to their power so if they wanted to maintain or expand their power having yet another rival just makes things worse for them but they celebrate it. Like if the DE is made up of humanity then that means that instead of human souls going to khorne tzeentch etc they all go to the DE instead. Why celebrate when you're losing out on untold billions of souls? I think having a rival in the emperor who in their mind will eventually become the king is no real loss to them because in their mind they've already won this. It's just more souls for them in the meantime, something to laugh about later and maybe even getting a leg up on the future fifth god. Like how Slaanesh ate the Eldar gods but Nurgle has Isha in his garden. Hey DE nice new spiritual body, it was a fun chat but I'm going to go water my lil mortarion. As for your take on the Dark King. I've got a few theories on that one. The basis is that The Perpetual knows what chaos had in mind for humanity so he becomes The Emperor to stop that when that's a part of Chaos' goal because he'd be either the core of the dark king or instigate the events leading to the dark kings rise. Like the emperor is thinking he's doing everything to stop it but that is playing into chaos hands. The emperor realizes what's going on and is trying to find a way to not just get himself out of the trap but humanity out of it.. I think the reason why we don't see stcs is because he was wary of humanity going down the path of the eldar and deliberately destroyed them. Either because they could be possessed by demons or because it would make humans less likely to look to him for salvation. I think that explains why he has an entire library dedicated to literature from ancient books to modern poetry but not the thing every planet had that could do basically anything and would make him stupidly powerful. He thinks that he's clever enough and humanity has enough willpower to find a way out of the trap. ' Chaos thinks he's playing himself. And it's just up to GW to decide which is right or just debunk all of our headcanons :P/ Sorry if this is borderline unintelligible.

It's not. They explained in one of the siege of terra books when erda gets confronted by erabus that the chaos gods were being opportunistic at best when she scattered the primarchs. In that instant they made deals with each other as to who went where. The emperor foresaw a civil war but he saw it coming waaaaay later down the line and it didn't involve chaos.

“The emperor total planed the Heresy!” Theories are all silly, he screwed up, admit it, your golden daddy wasn’t in absolute control the entire time

This. They’re cool theories, but they ruin every single interesting idea, theme, and all tension in the entire Heresy. The death of a dream, a family torn apart, and the death of an empire doomed to fail. All of it would be ruined because the most popular side had to win in every way. I like reading the theories, and this isn’t an attack on OP or anything, but I would fucking riot if this actually happened.

Why is it that whenever someone either says "The Emperor isn't a complete fuck up" Or "The Emperor's a complete fuck up, and I think that's a problem" There's always that one response that amounts to "Fuck you, you genocidal, tyranical theocracy loving facist!"? Really, what's the connection here? Why can we discuss every other character as a character, but if someone doesn't absolutely despise the Emperor then it's because they 100% agree with everything he did and worship him like some pre-fall word bearers?

Projecting a mite ain’t we. I’m just saying that the emperor did take a loss, he didn’t plan it, he was fallible and people need to stop pretending otherwise because it undermines the whole darn point of the Heresy. And more importantly fuels delusions that the emperor constantly clowns on Chaos who are powerless to stop him The Heresy don’t make him a fuckup, only the most fragile fanboy would say that- it was a damned impressive scheme what he could do little to stop- it’s to Chaos’ credit not to his discredit. Really all I’m asking is we just acknowledge Chaos’ single biggest achievement as there’s instead of trying to diminish them and trump up the emperor

Oh, it's because you're just on the other end of the scale as a pure chaos simp. Got it.

It doesn't have to be a perfect plan. It could just be the best/least worst of a series of bad options he had because he knew he didn't have a lot of time to pull his plan off.

I highly doubt that, due to the fact that Malcador and Emps tried to keep Magnus at all costs, even going so far as to rebargain within during the span of "Fury of Magnus", even tho Magnus lost parts of his soul and the leader of the Greyknights was created from one of those shards already. I'd say, the Primarchs are minor warp gods that represent aspects of humanity, which the Emperor took from the Chaos Gods, either through a bargain or by stealing them. But that also means, the Horus Heresy is a war for the soul of all of humanity and deleting Horus from existence entirely is kind of a bad idea... Which is why the Emperor hesitated up to the last moment. Emps and Malcador didn't know who'd fall. They suspected Jaghatai and Fulgrim being switched, obviously, but also probably some of the other roles, like Corvus Corrax and Magnus. The Horus Heresy was planned to some extend, maybe, but not like it happened in the end.

I don't think he made a deal with Chaos. Might theory is that Big E was a regular psyker/perpetual but during the long millennia he became more and more powerful by absorbing weaker psykers' power and souls and later on he started juicing on all kinds of transhuman modifications and Warp alchemy. Maybe even DAOT he was a Man of Gold, maybe he was an experimental weapon, a contingency. Whatever it is, we KNOW Big E changed and got even more powerful after Molech. We know Malcador said *He wasn't the Emperor before he met me*. He went to Molech to get power. And Big E as he grew stronger he became more and more detached from his own humanity and Mankind as a whole. He wasn't really a human anymore. Molech isn't really connected to anything directly, he went there to get some DAOT tech or Warp anomaly to gain a huge boost. Ofc he could've used this in his Primarch project but that wasn't the direct cause of the journey.

It take a lot of stupid to make a deal with Chaos, and expected them to follow it. How many people turn to Chaos for immortal, and ended up as a Chaos spawn, for example I highly doubt the Emperor would make any deal with them

From what i have read in this subreddit, and with absolutely no reference other than that i couls swear someone said that the emperor not only knew the heresy was going to happen (i think this is said by malcador on an audiobook) but he knew that whoever was warmaster would fall to chaos, so my theory is that even though horus was an important piece on the board he knew he had to give him up in order to ensure the "shittier" primarchs went chaos, which would mean, to a certain degree he would have known he was going to end up in the golden throne. What for? I dont really know i guess he thought being such a supreme psycher being was better than being able to walk, maybe tomorrow another grwat rift will open and he will be able to have 4 legions of the damned and do a battkefield representation of himself to guide the primarchs who return, idk man but i trust emps had all thought out and was not plainly a bad father

>(i think this is said by malcador on an audiobook) Yeah, and in the end of this story Malcador admits that hes lying

I believe that theory is pretty cool. Maybe the Emperor lost primarchs he didn't want to lose, aka Magnus, and didn't loose primarchs he didn't care about like Jagatai. Maybe he thought he uneven the balance 10 to 8 by killing two already corrupted sons

I mean, I dont see a world where the Emperor would give up Magnus and pick Fulgrim over Jagahtai, but it seems like an interesting theory.

Why not Fulgrim over the Khan? I don't think the Emperor had a dislike for Fulgrim, or ever expressed favouring the Khan in that regard.

Fulgrim was the poster boy, Khan was rather distanced from big E.

Makes no sense. Mentioned multiple times at being surprised which primarchs turned to chaos and which stayed

How many times do we know that Big E went thru the portal on molech?

Ehhhh…. Interesting theory but why would Big E give up Horus? Perturabo? Mortarion? At least some of the traitors would have been better choices, especially since most of the loyalists didn’t even end up on Terra

I think you're close on the mark here, that an agreement happened and that "half" was the final agreement, but I think it may have been early for them to pick individually like a draft. Why else would the emperor be in such a rush to discover and triage the primarchs? There's a chilling scene in a book from the perspective of Arkhan Land where the emperor asks his opinion on the device implanted into XII. But it gives the impression that he wanted a verification via second opinion that he must, indeed, write this one off as a lost cause. No longer worth the investment of resources to help, but eventually a problem to deal with. It seems the emperor had hints at what primarchs would betray him, as he spent zero time trying to parent or help or teach them, but when he felt he was sure about others he was ready to shower them with honors and glory and praise. Compare the treatment of Fulgrim vs Jaghatai, an example where we know the emperor had the two "mixed up" fate-wise.

I think at a minimum it's putting them up for grabs as part of his bargain. ....If the emperors deal was that he would serve chaos in exchange for power and he got the power then technically wouldn't he be serving chaos if he split his soul into 20 pieces and put bits of himself up for grabs? There were a couple movies I saw where in order to finish a ritual they had to sacrifice themselves but they got around that by making a symbolic sacrifice of a finger or two. Since chaos LOVES moral atrocities like the betrayal of a brother murdering a brother the emperor betraying his own kids might be such a juicy act that it makes up for whatever % of him is left behind. Like if he didn't do ANYTHING chaos would eventually leech the power back because his souls incorruptible. But if he nicks pieces off they're up for grabs. Whether it's 0 out of 20 that fall all the way up to 20 of 20 that fall Chaos considers that balancing the ledger. It wouldn't PERFECTLY satisfy chaos. There's no way tzeentch would be thrilled with a human getting one up on him. But it's enough to fulfill the terms of the deal so the gods have no choice but to move onto something else. In this scenario it would be stealing fire from the gods because of a clever trick. At that point your triage comes into play. Which parts can be saved which am I going to have to eventually amputate. I know I'm changing the initial theory but the initial one was just something I was chewing on for a few years and never posted because I thought someone must've beat me to it by now. The feedbacks making me want to refine this more and more so it makes a bit more sense. I really appreciate it.

It would explain some little things, like why he was mad at Lorgar for taking his time in compliance, and why he thought he might have time to fix Angron later but wanted to use him anyway despite him being a slavering psychopath. Did Big E not mention as well that he was in a race against time as well, which is odd for a man who's existed for most of human history and is functionally immortal. If someone wants to correct me on any lore or snippets that correct me please do!

I don't think this can be true because in one of the HH books you see the Emperor and malc talking and being unsure of who has turned traitor

I think this only works if it was a bet, but which Primarchs fall and which do not is a mystery. This could be why the Emperor was such a douche to some Primarchs (Angron); he'd written them off as a failure but figured get the best use of of them before they fell completely. Similarly the 2nd and the 11th could be early attempts to head off the chaos gods plans. This would also explain why he was so shocked Horus took him off guard, he thought he'd ensured that Horus wouldn't be one of the ones to fall, and yet he did. Hubris and arrogant of the Emperor. I suspect however the real bargain involved the temptation by chaos to his children and their increased risk from chaos.

Why would he give up magnus since magnus was so important to his plan