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Baneblade

2016-07-22T11:00:50Z

2601:147:4200:6280:A85C:5EFC:EBD0:6FC6: /* Stormblade */

[[Image:Baneblade Motivator.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Pew pew, bitches.]]

"IT IS THE '''BEEEEEINNNBLEEEEHHDDDEEEE'''!" ~ [[Apollo_Diomedes|Captain Diomedes]] of the Blood Ravens.

The '''Baneblade''' is a big fucking [[Imperium of Man|Imperial]] tank in the Warhammer 40,000 universe, known generally for an impressive arsenal (OF GUNS), and [[Vance Motherfucking Stubbs|disappearing en masse]]. Besides ''looking'' totally kickass, it stomps a lot of ass too. It is supposedly one of the oldest and largest tank designs used by the Imperium, despite that it's actually medium-sized according to the old Epic fluff. Then again, the "big" tanks in Epic were closer to moving, gun-mounting cathedrals. This is an actual tank. A manly tank. ''The'' manly tank. If only the Mechanicus had looked at the Battle Cannon, looked at the Baneblade, and scaled-down the Baneblade design and slapped on single-barrel heavy weapons instead of twin-linked and a long-barreled Battle Cannon.

==Origins==
The Baneblade first appeared in the ''Space Marine'' edition of [[Epic]], where it was the Imperial Guard's standard super-heavy tank (it says a lot about the universe that there's such a thing as a "standard" one). This version was armed with a turret-mounted Battle Cannon (with the same stats as the one on the [[Leman Russ Battle Tank]], despite the turret being the ''size'' of a Leman Russ), two Lascannons, and a bunch of dice worth of "Bolters" to deal with swarms. Despite obviously having a big gun on the lower hull, there was no representation of it in the tank's rules. Fluff described the hull as the size of a city block.

Being a standard version, there were variants at that point, and only three:

* The '''Stormhammer''' was effectively a moving fortress, and the precise armament is hard to say given the odd way the game treated "Bolters;" anything from an officer's [[Bolt Pistol]]s to ''both'' a Leman Russ' [[Heavy Bolter]]s was one attack dice with the same stats. This means this particular monster might have up to 24 Heavy Bolters (or alternately 12 bolt pistols) in addition to two turrets with two battle cannons each. Basically, you park it in a place and then forget about that place, since it is now Defended.
* The '''Shadowsword''' was one of two Titan-killing variants, armed with two [[Lascannons]] and some "Bolters" like the Baneblade, but with the rear hull built up into a giant casemate mounting a fixed Volcano Cannon, a giant laser weapon normally mounted on Titans.
* The '''Stormblade''' was a second variant of the fixed-weapon hull, and proof of how incredibly fucking HUEG the old Epic fluff made the Baneblade chassis; no fruity Lascannons for this one, the sponson weapons were a rack of missiles and a fucking ''[[Battle Cannon]]''. Your main gun was a Titan-grade Plasma Blastgun with a Hellion anti-Titan missile slung on the top. Potential drivers had to produce written proof that they were [[meme|bad enough dudes]] [[/v/|to save the President]] before they'd even be considered. [[Forge World]] makes a Stormblade, but it just sits there (eating an entire sack of dicks) because it knows it will never be cool enough to have a sponson-mounted Battle Cannon.
The Chaos legions have their own version called the '''Decimator''', which is, in fact, an early pre-production model super-heavy tank that would later lead to the development of the Baneblade. It has replaced its bolters with lots and lots of Reaper Autocannons, resulting in it being far nastier against medium armor, though its main cannon is not turreted, meaning the entire tank has to turn to fire it.

==Design==

[[File:4DdD2uO.jpg|right|500px]]

Here are a few fun facts about the mighty Baneblade:

*At the time of the [[Great Crusade]], there used to be ''entire <s>companies</s> battalions'' of Baneblades (it was described as being the "mainstay" of the Imperial Army). Nowadays, regiments with [[Vance Motherfucking Stubbs|anywhere near a hundred Baneblades]] are virtually unheard of, and any Imperial Guard force can count itself lucky to have just one in their possession. If a Baneblade gets lost in combat, chances are that the Mechanicus will throw a bitchfit and pull out all stops to recover the hulk. This was the case seven years before the Third Armageddon War, when an entire Imperial Guard Army Group of approximately 30,000 men were deployed to Golgotha to retrieve Yarrick's Fortress of Arrogance and a bit of STC teleporter tech (although guard didn't know about that last part). From two tank battalions, lead by a Shadowsword tank called Angel of the Apocalypse and supported with a full mechanized battalion of elite Kasrkin Storm Troopers, only a pair of tanks and couple of hundred men survived. <del>Rather justified </del>. It was not and that is the point of the novel Gunheads that describes the sorry ordeal. They traded an elite tank force that was desperately needed in Armageddon, for Yarricks precious relic, so that some smug general could score some political points. Worse than that, the Baneblade was only a carrot to get the AdMech some meatshields for their Xenos Teleporter Stealing Fun Time. Repairing a Baneblade is easier than making a new one, but trading a full tank army for one, is not worth it. This seems to be a constant trope in 40K - sending a large amount of bodies to retrieve one body. See "squads of Space Marines fighting and dying to retrieve the body of an already-dead comrade so their geneseed can be retrieved, even though dozens of other Marines are dying at the same time".
* Production of Baneblades continues to the 41st Millennium. Although the STC has been shared with a select few of the countless forgeworlds in the Imperium, the majority of Baneblades still come from Martian forges. As a result, the [[Macharius Heavy Tank]] was re-discovered/developed explicitly for armored regiments that needed something meaner than a [[Leman Russ Battle Tank]] but needed scientific notation to denote their place on the Baneblade delivery list.

==Warhammer 40,000==
Scratch-built Baneblade models with homebrew (read: unfair) rules have been kicking around since roughly ten minutes after it was introduced in Epic, but it wasn't until [[Forge World]] was founded that [[Games Workshop]] ever considered releasing an official model. The Baneblade then became available as a plastic kit from GW itself, along with a six-option kit for the casemate fixed-hull variants. With the [[Warhammer 40,000 6th edition|sixth edition]] re-release of [[Apocalypse]], GW redid the kit again to make all eight of their official variants (everything in the list below except for the Fellblade, Plaguereaper, Stormblade, and Stormhammer).

=== Variants ===
[[File:Baneblade_Variants.jpg|400px|right|thumb|Just 13 more spaces to fill.]]

There are currently ten official variants (nine of which have models), with the names being a nightmarish jumble of "Bane," "Sword," "Storm," "Shadow," "Blade" and "Hammer" to the point it's difficult remembering which is which.

==== Baneblade ====

The modern '''Baneblade''' mounts what's known as a "[[Baneblade Cannon]]" (representing belated recognition that the thing in the turret is really huge and so probably not a Battle Cannon) with a coaxial Autocannon, the same two Lascannons it always had, two Twin-linked Heavy Bolters in each sponson and another two on the hull front, and a [[Demolisher Cannon]] where the Mysterious Not-A-Weapon was once mounted. This leads to the well-known [[Dawn of War|ELEVEN BARRELS OF HELL]], though the vehicle has options for two more sponsons to be mounted (each with another Lascannon and Twin-linked Heavy Bolter) plus a pintle mounted heavy stubber, which raises the bar to eighteen. This option can only be taken on the GW plastic kit, as the old Forge World models were shorter, sillier-looking, and had no place for them. These were given their own pattern in the fluff, and thrust upon an unsuspecting Forge World (the ''other'' kind) to make and produce for all eternity.

The Baneblade is so awesome [[Commissar Yarrick]] uses a customized, "commandeered" Baneblade as his own transport. It's known as THE FORTRESS OF ARROGANCE and it makes Heretics and Xenos wet themselves. Although Yarrick did leave the thing parked on a world of Orks by "accident".

==== Banehammer ====
The '''Banehammer''' fields the [[Tremor Cannon]] in a forward-set casement, a weapon that can turn a huge segment of the battlefield into a patch of flying rubble, slowing down the enemy long enough for the rest of the army to destroy them. It can also carry 25 soldiers, and has enough room in the rear deck to let ten of them stand outside and fire.

==== Banesword ====

The '''Banesword''' is a siege tank: its [[Quake Cannon]] can be fired as a barrage weapon at a massive range to destroy up to 15' away, use this to troll the [[Warhammer Fantasy Battles|WFB]] players on the next table.

==== Doomhammer ====

The '''Doomhammer''' is a tank-killer. With a modest 5" blast but stats befitting a tank hunter, the [[Magma Cannon]] can reduce all but the largest of titans to scrap. It can also carry 25 soldiers, and has enough room in the rear deck to let ten of them stand outside and fire.

==== Fellblade ====

{{Main|Fellblade}}

The '''Fellblade''' is the [[Space Marines]]' main super-heavy tank, not used very much since the [[Horus Heresy]]. It's not so much a variant of the Baneblade as a sibling tank, with a unique [[Forge World]] kit to make it and a couple of its own unique subtypes.

==== Hellhammer ====

The '''Hellhammer''' has the same profile as the Baneblade -- it doesn't have a big armored casement like the others, but rather the same comically-small pivoting turret. It uses the [[Hellhammer Cannon]], which is shorter, but no less deadly than the Baneblade Cannon, and strikes harder but on a smaller area, giving exactly zero fucks about the cover in between. Basically, if you shoot it at a unit, and that unit is not a superheavy, you have killed that unit. And any sense of friendship you may have had with your opponent.

==== Plaguereaper ====

The '''Plaguereaper''' is a Baneblade variant exclusive to the forces of [[Nurgle]]. It's a corrupted baneblade chassis with its baneblade cannon replaced with a giant pus-cannon, which bathes a large area with a contagion that causes the body of whoever's afflicted by it, to erupt in boils and their flesh broken down before their very eyes in seconds.

There is no official Plaguereaper model; official pictures of it depict an excellent conversion by a GW employee.

==== Shadowsword ====

The '''Shadowsword''' is a [[titan]]-killer. With a D-strength [[Volcano Cannon]], and the ability to upgrade its BS, the Shadowsword has a very good chance of bringing down even the biggest of titans. This guy is your friend. It will be there for you when something absolutely ''must'' die and must die ''now''. GW and Forgeworld both make kits for these -- the GW kit can make seven other tanks, but FW's kit has a bigger engine and a bipod for the cannon to rest on.

==== Skullhamma Battlefortress ====

What happens when orks get hold of the massive engine of armoured destruction that is the Baneblade? They make it twice as big and fast by making improvements (welding armour plates and guns where there's a gap) and faster (giving it a ridiculous super-charged engine so big it probably houses several lost gretchin communities).

==== Stormblade ====

The Forge World '''Stormblade''' is armed with [[Plasma Blastgun]], a [[plasma]]-hurling death weapon that eats [[MEQ]]'s, hordes, hordes of MEQ's, and even light tanks for breakfast. With better range than the Stormlord and a blast radius so big that [[Grey Knights|Plasma Siphons]] feel even worse about existing, it excels at killing hordes of anything in [[Apocalypse]]. Even vehicle hordes. There is also a Legion Astartes version because Forge World got tied of making additional versions of the [[Fellblade]].

==== Stormhammer ====

The '''Stormhammer''' is a [[Solar Auxilia]] tank for 30K. It differs from the old epic version in that it only has three barrels of battle cannons - a twin linked two shot hull mounted battlecannon and the S9 AP2, 7" blast Stormhammer cannon with shred and pinning. The standard secondary weapons are six [[multilaser]] sponsons which can be swapped out for heavy bolters or heavy flamers for free or lascannons for a cost, a coaxial multilaser and a hull mounted lascannon. Optional toys are a pintle mounted [[C.S. Goto|multilaser]] or heavy flamer and up to 4 (!) HK missiles. All the firepower is rounded out by a 6+ invulnerable save against blast and template weapons, and the ability to reroll failed dangerous terrain tests. The sponson weapons can be traded out individually, letting you choose any combination of multilasers, heavy flamers and lascannons you want. It fills the same role as the Baneblade as a general purpose superheavy, with a gun for every target. The Stormblade offers more flexibility in loadout, and having 6 individual sponsons allows it to engage even more targets compared to the Baneblade. The original Stormhammer was outfitted with two twin-Battle Cannon turrets and four pairs of Heavy Bolters, along with options for pintle storm bolters and four more sponsons, meaning it could mount seventeen fucking bolters if you were willing to pay for it. The problem? Its turrets all pointed different directions. Parking this thing in the intersection of a city table and pointing its turrets down the streets, however, was as good as denying the area to the enemy completely, unless somebody brought a Deathstrike.

==== Stormlord ====

The '''Stormlord''' is designed with but one purpose: to waste [[MEQ]]s. With the most dakka seen in Imperial armies (hell, ANYWHERE) in the form of a [[Vulcan Mega-Bolter]] (that can fire ''twice'' if the tank sits still), the ability to have up to 20 of its 40 passengers fire from its fighting platform and the option to have four lascannons, this tank WILL END enemy infantry!
This is probably one of the best super-heavy tanks in the game due to the amount of fire power that you get. 30 s6 ap3 shots at 60" range, 9 s5 ap4 shots at 36" range (twin linked) and 2 s9 ap2 shots at 48" range. Then you get 20 models shooting out of the top. Though you wonder how the passengers fit without taking up room for extra ammo...

==== Stormsword ====

The '''Stormsword''' excels at city fighting. It is able to turn entire building blocks to dust with a single shot. The tank's main weakness is the short range on its [[Stormsword Cannon]] and lack of Demolisher co-axial.

==Dawn of War series==
===DoW I===

In the Dawn of War PC game the Baneblade is the IG super-heavy unit, equivalent to the [[Chaos]] [[Bloodthirster]] [[Daemon]], or [[Eldar]]'s Avatar of [[Khaine]]. Only it's better because instead of a winged Daemon cow or a big flaming homosexual in a loincloth, it's a fucking giant tank. It is literally the best of these master units in the game, and it will go toe-to-toe with any other such unit and kill them before they kill it. Every time.

Its a well known fact that the crew members of Baneblades are chosen exclusively on the grounds of how big their balls are. This makes them able to shout "[[FAIL|Failure]] is the weakness of the enemy!" "Ready to unleash ELEVEN barrels of hell!" and "All guardsmen, Follow ME to GLOOREEEEY!" and being the only badass non-Hero unit in the entire [[Imperial Guard]].

===DoW II===

The Baneblade was introduced in DoWII's second expansion: Retribution, as the Imperial Guard's super heavy unit and one of the superunits, a title it shares with the Swarmlord, the Great Unclean One, the Avatar of [[Khaine]] once more (notably, the Avatar along with the Baneblade are the only returning superunits from the first Dawn of War series), the Battlewagon, and the Land Raider Redeemer (which is a different variant from the one in Dawn of War). It makes a centerpiece appearance in the second mission of the campaign where a renegade one chases your characters around while the crazy Scottish driver yells "IDDACARE WHOO YOU ARE! FELL DA MIGHTA'DA BANEBLADE!!" [[FAIL|It then gets sodomized by rudimentary anti-armour turrets]]. On the upside, if you're playing space marines, you get to watch the Emperor's Fury running around a jungle path being chased by a giant tank (Benny Hill music optional, but encouraged).

It's still a moving fortress of rape that can decimate multiple tanks at a time and blow hordes of enemy units to bits and the strongest and toughest vehicle in the game (since it can't transport infantry like the Battlewagon and Land Raider Redeemer, it compensates with more firepower). The main difference is that while its main weapons systems (the BEHNBLADE cannon and the Demolisher Cannon) do much more damage than before, they don't function like the rest of its guns, they're used for special abilities that require manual targeting to fire, and cannot be fired at targets within minimum range. On top of that, this Baneblade has only TEN BARRELS OF HELL: the co-axial autocannon is there but is non-functional, which considerably reduces the overall firepower of this beast. Needless to say, the Baneblade requires a ton of support to use effectively, or otherwise it will be taken down in melee/at close range by just about anything (though all super units need support as well, so that's nothing new). Also, it's size means it can have difficulty maneuvering on certain maps (DoW II maps tend to not have as much open space as the original's).

The Baneblade has achieved a bit of a mini-meme status because of Captain [[Apollo Diomedes]] of the [[Blood Ravens]], who has this tendency to scream: ''"EET IS THE BEEEEHHHHNNNBLLADDDE"'', [[Indrick Boreale|in the most awesomely hilarious voice]] possible, whenever he sees one. Unfortunetly, this meme is already old and overused.

==The Novel==
The novel, titled Baneblade, is about lt. Lo Bannick and his quest to redeem himself from the grievous sin of killing his cousin in self-defense. He does this by signing on to the nearest imperial guard unit and starts the novel commanding a squadron of [[Leman Russ]]es and then after an Ork ambush he gets a spot as third gunner on the ''Mars Triumphant''.

In short it's written so you could fap to how [[awesome]] the Baneblade is. Ironically, the real star of the book is a dangerously intelligent Ork Wierdboy who's aware of the Emperor's presence in the warp and is trying to use vast amounts of a psychic amplifying crystal to literally turn himself into an Orkish Emperor. And he doesn't even die in the end.

==External Links==
* [[Baneblade Homebrew]]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xpGr8MBE65k Russia made a scaled-up RC variant. Makes me wonder what the US did wrong not to get one too.]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZpBngmCpUrU Captain Diomedes' hit single: IT IS THE BEEEIIINBLADE!]
* [http://www.blacklibrary.com/warhammer-40000/baneblade.html A Black Library's novel: BEEEIIINBLADE!!!]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyHRQgDhHZ0 THE BANEBLADETERIUM!]
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNxAd6O0LLU How to build all eight versions of the Baneblade with just one Baneblade ]

==Gallery==
<gallery>
Image:Winterassault.jpg|[[General Sturnn]] likes it hot and heavy.
Image:Baneblade.jpg|ALL GUARDSMEN!
Image:Baneblade2.jpg|FOLLOW ME TO GLORY!
Image:Shadowsword.jpg|Make a compensation joke at your own expense.
Image:LOLBaneblade.jpg|The track is broken and the sponson turret has a beef with the driver. This is an official image, by the way.
Image:Yarrick34b.jpg|Yarrick's fortress of WHERE ARE MY PRUNES
Image:Baneblade full cover.jpg|''<s>Multiple'' Baneblades. Start panicking.</s> Neh, that must be Vance Stubbs missing Baneblades
</gallery>

{{Template:40k-Imperial-Vehicles}}
[[Category:Warhammer 40,000]][[Category:Imperial]][[Category:Vehicles]]

Baneblade

2016-07-22T09:26:02Z

2601:147:4200:6280:A85C:5EFC:EBD0:6FC6: it is the BEE*blam*

[[Image:Baneblade Motivator.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Pew pew, bitches.]]

"IT IS THE '''BEEEEEINNNBLEEEEHHDDDEEEE'''!" ~ [[Apollo_Diomedes|Captain Diomedes]] of the Blood Ravens.

The '''Baneblade''' is a big fucking [[Imperium of Man|Imperial]] tank in the Warhammer 40,000 universe, known generally for an impressive arsenal (OF GUNS), and [[Vance Motherfucking Stubbs|disappearing en masse]]. Besides ''looking'' totally kickass, it stomps a lot of ass too. It is supposedly one of the oldest and largest tank designs used by the Imperium, despite that it's actually medium-sized according to the old Epic fluff. Then again, the "big" tanks in Epic were closer to moving, gun-mounting cathedrals. This is an actual tank. A manly tank. ''The'' manly tank. If only the Mechanicus had looked at the Battle Cannon, looked at the Baneblade, and scaled-down the Baneblade design and slapped on single-barrel heavy weapons instead of twin-linked and a long-barreled Battle Cannon.

==Origins==
The Baneblade first appeared in the ''Space Marine'' edition of [[Epic]], where it was the Imperial Guard's standard super-heavy tank (it says a lot about the universe that there's such a thing as a "standard" one). This version was armed with a turret-mounted Battle Cannon (with the same stats as the one on the [[Leman Russ Battle Tank]], despite the turret being the ''size'' of a Leman Russ), two Lascannons, and a bunch of dice worth of "Bolters" to deal with swarms. Despite obviously having a big gun on the lower hull, there was no representation of it in the tank's rules. Fluff described the hull as the size of a city block.

Being a standard version, there were variants at that point, and only three:

* The '''Stormhammer''' was effectively a moving fortress, and the precise armament is hard to say given the odd way the game treated "Bolters;" anything from an officer's [[Bolt Pistol]]s to ''both'' a Leman Russ' [[Heavy Bolter]]s was one attack dice with the same stats. This means this particular monster might have up to 24 Heavy Bolters (or alternately 12 bolt pistols) in addition to two turrets with two battle cannons each. Basically, you park it in a place and then forget about that place, since it is now Defended.
* The '''Shadowsword''' was one of two Titan-killing variants, armed with two [[Lascannons]] and some "Bolters" like the Baneblade, but with the rear hull built up into a giant casemate mounting a fixed Volcano Cannon, a giant laser weapon normally mounted on Titans.
* The '''Stormblade''' was a second variant of the fixed-weapon hull, and proof of how incredibly fucking HUEG the old Epic fluff made the Baneblade chassis; no fruity Lascannons for this one, the sponson weapons were a rack of missiles and a fucking ''[[Battle Cannon]]''. Your main gun was a Titan-grade Plasma Blastgun with a Hellion anti-Titan missile slung on the top. Potential drivers had to produce written proof that they were [[meme|bad enough dudes]] [[/v/|to save the President]] before they'd even be considered. [[Forge World]] makes a Stormblade, but it just sits there (eating an entire sack of dicks) because it knows it will never be cool enough to have a sponson-mounted Battle Cannon.
The Chaos legions have their own version called the '''Decimator''', which is, in fact, an early pre-production model super-heavy tank that would later lead to the development of the Baneblade. It has replaced its bolters with lots and lots of Reaper Autocannons, resulting in it being far nastier against medium armor, though its main cannon is not turreted, meaning the entire tank has to turn to fire it.

==Design==

[[File:4DdD2uO.jpg|right|500px]]

Here are a few fun facts about the mighty Baneblade:

*At the time of the [[Great Crusade]], there used to be ''entire <s>companies</s> battalions'' of Baneblades (it was described as being the "mainstay" of the Imperial Army). Nowadays, regiments with [[Vance Motherfucking Stubbs|anywhere near a hundred Baneblades]] are virtually unheard of, and any Imperial Guard force can count itself lucky to have just one in their possession. If a Baneblade gets lost in combat, chances are that the Mechanicus will throw a bitchfit and pull out all stops to recover the hulk. This was the case seven years before the Third Armageddon War, when an entire Imperial Guard Army Group of approximately 30,000 men were deployed to Golgotha to retrieve Yarrick's Fortress of Arrogance and a bit of STC teleporter tech (although guard didn't know about that last part). From two tank battalions, lead by a Shadowsword tank called Angel of the Apocalypse and supported with a full mechanized battalion of elite Kasrkin Storm Troopers, only a pair of tanks and couple of hundred men survived. <del>Rather justified </del>. It was not and that is the point of the novel Gunheads that describes the sorry ordeal. They traded an elite tank force that was desperately needed in Armageddon, for Yarricks precious relic, so that some smug general could score some political points. Worse than that, the Baneblade was only a carrot to get the AdMech some meatshields for their Xenos Teleporter Stealing Fun Time. Repairing a Baneblade is easier than making a new one, but trading a full tank army for one, is not worth it. This seems to be a constant trope in 40K - sending a large amount of bodies to retrieve one body. See "squads of Space Marines fighting and dying to retrieve the body of an already-dead comrade so their geneseed can be retrieved, even though dozens of other Marines are dying at the same time".
* Production of Baneblades continues to the 41st Millennium. Although the STC has been shared with a select few of the countless forgeworlds in the Imperium, the majority of Baneblades still come from Martian forges. As a result, the [[Macharius Heavy Tank]] was re-discovered/developed explicitly for armored regiments that needed something meaner than a [[Leman Russ Battle Tank]] but needed scientific notation to denote their place on the Baneblade delivery list.

==Warhammer 40,000==
Scratch-built Baneblade models with homebrew (read: unfair) rules have been kicking around since roughly ten minutes after it was introduced in Epic, but it wasn't until [[Forge World]] was founded that [[Games Workshop]] ever considered releasing an official model. The Baneblade then became available as a plastic kit from GW itself, along with a six-option kit for the casemate fixed-hull variants. With the [[Warhammer 40,000 6th edition|sixth edition]] re-release of [[Apocalypse]], GW redid the kit again to make all eight of their official variants (everything in the list below except for the Fellblade, Plaguereaper, Stormblade, and Stormhammer).

=== Variants ===
[[File:Baneblade_Variants.jpg|400px|right|thumb|Just 13 more spaces to fill.]]

There are currently ten official variants (nine of which have models), with the names being a nightmarish jumble of "Bane," "Sword," "Storm," "Shadow," "Blade" and "Hammer" to the point it's difficult remembering which is which.

==== Baneblade ====

The modern '''Baneblade''' mounts what's known as a "[[Baneblade Cannon]]" (representing belated recognition that the thing in the turret is really huge and so probably not a Battle Cannon) with a coaxial Autocannon, the same two Lascannons it always had, two Twin-linked Heavy Bolters in each sponson and another two on the hull front, and a [[Demolisher Cannon]] where the Mysterious Not-A-Weapon was once mounted. This leads to the well-known [[Dawn of War|ELEVEN BARRELS OF HELL]], though the vehicle has options for two more sponsons to be mounted (each with another Lascannon and Twin-linked Heavy Bolter) plus a pintle mounted heavy stubber, which raises the bar to eighteen. This option can only be taken on the GW plastic kit, as the old Forge World models were shorter, sillier-looking, and had no place for them. These were given their own pattern in the fluff, and thrust upon an unsuspecting Forge World (the ''other'' kind) to make and produce for all eternity.

The Baneblade is so awesome [[Commissar Yarrick]] uses a customized, "commandeered" Baneblade as his own transport. It's known as THE FORTRESS OF ARROGANCE and it makes Heretics and Xenos wet themselves. Although Yarrick did leave the thing parked on a world of Orks by "accident".

==== Banehammer ====
The '''Banehammer''' fields the [[Tremor Cannon]] in a forward-set casement, a weapon that can turn a huge segment of the battlefield into a patch of flying rubble, slowing down the enemy long enough for the rest of the army to destroy them. It can also carry 25 soldiers, and has enough room in the rear deck to let ten of them stand outside and fire.

==== Banesword ====

The '''Banesword''' is a siege tank: its [[Quake Cannon]] can be fired as a barrage weapon at a massive range to destroy up to 15' away, use this to troll the [[Warhammer Fantasy Battles|WFB]] players on the next table.

==== Doomhammer ====

The '''Doomhammer''' is a tank-killer. With a modest 5" blast but stats befitting a tank hunter, the [[Magma Cannon]] can reduce all but the largest of titans to scrap. It can also carry 25 soldiers, and has enough room in the rear deck to let ten of them stand outside and fire.

==== Fellblade ====

{{Main|Fellblade}}

The '''Fellblade''' is the [[Space Marines]]' main super-heavy tank, not used very much since the [[Horus Heresy]]. It's not so much a variant of the Baneblade as a sibling tank, with a unique [[Forge World]] kit to make it and a couple of its own unique subtypes.

==== Hellhammer ====

The '''Hellhammer''' has the same profile as the Baneblade -- it doesn't have a big armored casement like the others, but rather the same comically-small pivoting turret. It uses the [[Hellhammer Cannon]], which is shorter, but no less deadly than the Baneblade Cannon, and strikes harder but on a smaller area, giving exactly zero fucks about the cover in between. Basically, if you shoot it at a unit, and that unit is not a superheavy, you have killed that unit. And any sense of friendship you may have had with your opponent.

==== Plaguereaper ====

The '''Plaguereaper''' is a Baneblade variant exclusive to the forces of [[Nurgle]]. It's a corrupted baneblade chassis with its baneblade cannon replaced with a giant pus-cannon, which bathes a large area with a contagion that causes the body of whoever's afflicted by it, to erupt in boils and their flesh broken down before their very eyes in seconds.

There is no official Plaguereaper model; official pictures of it depict an excellent conversion by a GW employee.

==== Shadowsword ====

The '''Shadowsword''' is a [[titan]]-killer. With a D-strength [[Volcano Cannon]], and the ability to upgrade its BS, the Shadowsword has a very good chance of bringing down even the biggest of titans. This guy is your friend. It will be there for you when something absolutely ''must'' die and must die ''now''. GW and Forgeworld both make kits for these -- the GW kit can make seven other tanks, but FW's kit has a bigger engine and a bipod for the cannon to rest on.

==== Skullhamma Battlefortress ====

What happens when orks get hold of the massive engine of armoured destruction that is the Baneblade? They make it twice as big and fast by making improvements (welding armour plates and guns where there's a gap) and faster (giving it a ridiculous super-charged engine so big it probably houses several lost gretchin communities).

==== Stormblade ====

The Forge World '''Stormblade''' is armed with [[Plasma Blastgun]], a [[plasma]]-hurling death weapon that eats [[MEQ]]'s, hordes, hordes of MEQ's, and even light tanks for breakfast. With better range than the Stormlord and a blast radius so big that [[Grey Knights|Plasma Siphons]] feel even worse about existing, it excels at killing hordes of anything in [[Apocalypse]]. Even vehicle hordes.

==== Stormhammer ====

The '''Stormhammer''' is a [[Solar Auxilia]] tank for 30K. It differs from the old epic version in that it only has three barrels of battle cannons - a twin linked two shot hull mounted battlecannon and the S9 AP2, 7" blast Stormhammer cannon with shred and pinning. The standard secondary weapons are six [[multilaser]] sponsons which can be swapped out for heavy bolters or heavy flamers for free or lascannons for a cost, a coaxial multilaser and a hull mounted lascannon. Optional toys are a pintle mounted [[C.S. Goto|multilaser]] or heavy flamer and up to 4 (!) HK missiles. All the firepower is rounded out by a 6+ invulnerable save against blast and template weapons, and the ability to reroll failed dangerous terrain tests. The sponson weapons can be traded out individually, letting you choose any combination of multilasers, heavy flamers and lascannons you want. It fills the same role as the Baneblade as a general purpose superheavy, with a gun for every target. The Stormblade offers more flexibility in loadout, and having 6 individual sponsons allows it to engage even more targets compared to the Baneblade. The original Stormhammer was outfitted with two twin-Battle Cannon turrets and four pairs of Heavy Bolters, along with options for pintle storm bolters and four more sponsons, meaning it could mount seventeen fucking bolters if you were willing to pay for it. The problem? Its turrets all pointed different directions. Parking this thing in the intersection of a city table and pointing its turrets down the streets, however, was as good as denying the area to the enemy completely, unless somebody brought a Deathstrike.

==== Stormlord ====

The '''Stormlord''' is designed with but one purpose: to waste [[MEQ]]s. With the most dakka seen in Imperial armies (hell, ANYWHERE) in the form of a [[Vulcan Mega-Bolter]] (that can fire ''twice'' if the tank sits still), the ability to have up to 20 of its 40 passengers fire from its fighting platform and the option to have four lascannons, this tank WILL END enemy infantry!
This is probably one of the best super-heavy tanks in the game due to the amount of fire power that you get. 30 s6 ap3 shots at 60" range, 9 s5 ap4 shots at 36" range (twin linked) and 2 s9 ap2 shots at 48" range. Then you get 20 models shooting out of the top. Though you wonder how the passengers fit without taking up room for extra ammo...

==== Stormsword ====

The '''Stormsword''' excels at city fighting. It is able to turn entire building blocks to dust with a single shot. The tank's main weakness is the short range on its [[Stormsword Cannon]] and lack of Demolisher co-axial.

==Dawn of War series==
===DoW I===

In the Dawn of War PC game the Baneblade is the IG super-heavy unit, equivalent to the [[Chaos]] [[Bloodthirster]] [[Daemon]], or [[Eldar]]'s Avatar of [[Khaine]]. Only it's better because instead of a winged Daemon cow or a big flaming homosexual in a loincloth, it's a fucking giant tank. It is literally the best of these master units in the game, and it will go toe-to-toe with any other such unit and kill them before they kill it. Every time.

Its a well known fact that the crew members of Baneblades are chosen exclusively on the grounds of how big their balls are. This makes them able to shout "[[FAIL|Failure]] is the weakness of the enemy!" "Ready to unleash ELEVEN barrels of hell!" and "All guardsmen, Follow ME to GLOOREEEEY!" and being the only badass non-Hero unit in the entire [[Imperial Guard]].

===DoW II===

The Baneblade was introduced in DoWII's second expansion: Retribution, as the Imperial Guard's super heavy unit and one of the superunits, a title it shares with the Swarmlord, the Great Unclean One, the Avatar of [[Khaine]] once more (notably, the Avatar along with the Baneblade are the only returning superunits from the first Dawn of War series), the Battlewagon, and the Land Raider Redeemer (which is a different variant from the one in Dawn of War). It makes a centerpiece appearance in the second mission of the campaign where a renegade one chases your characters around while the crazy Scottish driver yells "IDDACARE WHOO YOU ARE! FELL DA MIGHTA'DA BANEBLADE!!" [[FAIL|It then gets sodomized by rudimentary anti-armour turrets]]. On the upside, if you're playing space marines, you get to watch the Emperor's Fury running around a jungle path being chased by a giant tank (Benny Hill music optional, but encouraged).

It's still a moving fortress of rape that can decimate multiple tanks at a time and blow hordes of enemy units to bits and the strongest and toughest vehicle in the game (since it can't transport infantry like the Battlewagon and Land Raider Redeemer, it compensates with more firepower). The main difference is that while its main weapons systems (the BEHNBLADE cannon and the Demolisher Cannon) do much more damage than before, they don't function like the rest of its guns, they're used for special abilities that require manual targeting to fire, and cannot be fired at targets within minimum range. On top of that, this Baneblade has only TEN BARRELS OF HELL: the co-axial autocannon is there but is non-functional, which considerably reduces the overall firepower of this beast. Needless to say, the Baneblade requires a ton of support to use effectively, or otherwise it will be taken down in melee/at close range by just about anything (though all super units need support as well, so that's nothing new). Also, it's size means it can have difficulty maneuvering on certain maps (DoW II maps tend to not have as much open space as the original's).

The Baneblade has achieved a bit of a mini-meme status because of Captain [[Apollo Diomedes]] of the [[Blood Ravens]], who has this tendency to scream: ''"EET IS THE BEEEEHHHHNNNBLLADDDE"'', [[Indrick Boreale|in the most awesomely hilarious voice]] possible, whenever he sees one. Unfortunetly, this meme is already old and overused.

==The Novel==
The novel, titled Baneblade, is about lt. Lo Bannick and his quest to redeem himself from the grievous sin of killing his cousin in self-defense. He does this by signing on to the nearest imperial guard unit and starts the novel commanding a squadron of [[Leman Russ]]es and then after an Ork ambush he gets a spot as third gunner on the ''Mars Triumphant''.

In short it's written so you could fap to how [[awesome]] the Baneblade is. Ironically, the real star of the book is a dangerously intelligent Ork Wierdboy who's aware of the Emperor's presence in the warp and is trying to use vast amounts of a psychic amplifying crystal to literally turn himself into an Orkish Emperor. And he doesn't even die in the end.

==External Links==
* [[Baneblade Homebrew]]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xpGr8MBE65k Russia made a scaled-up RC variant. Makes me wonder what the US did wrong not to get one too.]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZpBngmCpUrU Captain Diomedes' hit single: IT IS THE BEEEIIINBLADE!]
* [http://www.blacklibrary.com/warhammer-40000/baneblade.html A Black Library's novel: BEEEIIINBLADE!!!]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyHRQgDhHZ0 THE BANEBLADETERIUM!]
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNxAd6O0LLU How to build all eight versions of the Baneblade with just one Baneblade ]

==Gallery==
<gallery>
Image:Winterassault.jpg|[[General Sturnn]] likes it hot and heavy.
Image:Baneblade.jpg|ALL GUARDSMEN!
Image:Baneblade2.jpg|FOLLOW ME TO GLORY!
Image:Shadowsword.jpg|Make a compensation joke at your own expense.
Image:LOLBaneblade.jpg|The track is broken and the sponson turret has a beef with the driver. This is an official image, by the way.
Image:Yarrick34b.jpg|Yarrick's fortress of WHERE ARE MY PRUNES
Image:Baneblade full cover.jpg|''<s>Multiple'' Baneblades. Start panicking.</s> Neh, that must be Vance Stubbs missing Baneblades
</gallery>

{{Template:40k-Imperial-Vehicles}}
[[Category:Warhammer 40,000]][[Category:Imperial]][[Category:Vehicles]]

The God-Emperor of Mankind

2016-07-22T07:18:24Z

2601:147:4200:6280:A85C:5EFC:EBD0:6FC6: White trash needs to stop defacing pages.

[[File:Lord of Mankind.jpg|400px|right|thumb|Liberating the galaxy is one thing, but he was so powerful he never once stopped looking ''fabulous'' while doing it.]]
<div style="text-align:center;font-size:1.10em;font-weight:normal;font-style:normal;font-family:serif;margin-top:1em;margin-bottom:1em"><span style='color:gold;font-size:100%'> I have come to eradicate Religion as it is the bane of Man, warped in superstition, ignorance and fear! - The Emperor before the Treason of Horus'''</span> </div>

<blockquote><i>
We believe in one Lord,
the Emperor, the Almighty,
ruler of heaven and earth,
of all that is, seen and unseen.
We believe in one Lord, Emperor of Mankind,
the only Lord of creation,
eternally begotten of Humanity,
Human from Human, Light from Light,
true Lord from true Lord,
begotten, not made,
of one Being with Humanity;
through him all things were made.
For us and for our salvation
he came down from heaven,
was incarnate of the Holy Spirit
and came among us.
For our sake he has faced down Chaos;
he withstood death and was enthroned.
To this day he lives on
in accordance with the Scriptures;
he resides upon Mother Terra
and is seated upon the throne of Humanity.
He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead,
and his kingdom will have no end.

We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Emperor, the giver of life,
who proceeds from Humanity and from Terra,
who with Humanity and upon Terra is worshiped and glorified,
who has spoken through the prophets.
We believe in one holy true and divinely guided Ecclesiarchy.
We acknowledge one path for the defense against Chaos.
We look for the justice for our dead,
and the life of the worlds to come.
<br/>++ Ayhmen ++</i><br/>
-- the [[Imperial Cult|Creed]] of the Mankind's Council of Nicene of Holy Terra</blockquote>

''"A leader is a dealer in hope."''

-Napoleon Bonaparte

The '''God-Emperor of Mankind''', also known as '''Tha Emprah''', '''Emps''', '''The Big E''', '''E-Money''', '''Augustus Imperator''', '''Master of Mankind''', '''Space <s>Vladimir Lenin</s> Jesus,''' and also sometimes called '''The Great and Glorious Big Mac Daddy King Emprah of all things Epic and Awesome''' (ahem, ahem), or [[Heresy|if you are not a fan of him]], '''The Anathema''', '''The Carrion Lord''', '''The False Emperor''', '''The Golden Shit Faggot''', '''Corpse on the Throne''' and '''Donald Trump''', is the figurehead ruler of the [[Imperium of Man]] in the [[Warhammer 40k]] universe and is the only sustaining [[Tzeentch|Hope]] for Humanity as Faster than Light Travel is [[Astronomican|entirely dependent on Him]]. The [[Administratum]] He established, continues to govern the [[Imperium]] in His name, but it is generally accepted that the absence of the Emperor's proper guidance is what has turned the Imperium into the [[/b/|hellish mess]] that it is. In the [[Imperium]], questioning whatever your superior yells at you, is "moronic" and [[heresy|heretical]], and is typically punished by [[blam|peace]] (at least in the material realm). It goes without saying that would The Emperor be up and about in the 41st millennium, He would wow, much disappoint, very raeg. Most fa/tg/uys expect Him to [http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0191520/bio speak in a generic deep, stentorian voice].

==The Entire History of the Emprah==
[[File:Majestica.jpg|250px|left|thumb|Big E gets all the bitches.]]

According to older (read: 1st & 2nd edition) [[fluff]], the being that would eventually become known as The Emperor was born in 8000 BC in Anatolia (modern-day Turkey). Allegedly, this was the result of hundreds of human shamans committing ritual suicide to be reborn as a single individual capable of protecting humanity from the [[Chaos Gods]]. However, [[Skub|the validity of this fluff is frequently questioned]], given it hasn't been "official" since second edition. That being said, nothing has explicitly contradicted this story, and the only other theory is that the Emperor is a [[Perpetual]], meaning an immortal ''-but ultimately human-'' psyker with countless lifetimes' worth of knowledge and power and the ambition to use it. However, this theory seems unlikely, especially given the Chaos Gods apparently view the Emperor as an equal/rival, an honor they give to none of the other known Perpetuals, and the ''Horus Heresy'' novels have dropped hints that the Emperor is actually a "we."

The 1st & 2nd edition fluff also mentions that He guided humanity throughout history under a number of guises, such as Jesus, Muhammad, Buddha, etc. (and, it ''has'' to be assumed, [[Conan the Barbarian]]). (It is also possible that He was Russian emperor Peter I, purely based on the fact that imperial Russia's symbol was the two-headed eagle, and Peter I was considered huge (or great, depending on translation)).

Sometime around the 11th or 12th century, He battled a shard of the [[Void Dragon]] in modern-day Libya. He eventually defeated it and locked it on [[Mars]] (somehow...?), allowing the [[Adeptus Mechanicus]] to control machines... eventually. Of course, it's not entirely clear whether this is true or not -- it's entirely possible that ALL of the Emperor's history is a lazily-crafted lie He throws around because no one can debunk it. Although given how [[Awesome]] it sounds, we're going to say it is.

In any case, for the most part He more or less stayed out of the way of humanity's progress during the next 30,000 years of history, including the [[Dark Age of Technology]], though hot-off-the-press fluff indicates He might have been traversing outer space in old-style NASA rockets with the other Perpetuals, to eventually coming to find the planet '''Molech''', where He passed through a gateway that led ''directly'' to the fortresses of the four [[Chaos Gods]]. Here He either challenged, bargained, or stole portions of power from a source claimed by the gods as their own. When He finally emerged, in His possession was the power needed to create His 20 Primarchs. This would earn Him the ire of the duped/defeated Ruinous Powers, who would never see the primarchs as His children, but as children belonging to the Gods themselves.

He returned to Terra at the closing years of the [[Age of Strife]]. With Terra cut off from the rest of the Human empire and the Terra itself ruled by warring "techno-barbarians", in a post-apocalyptic wasteland, the E-money decided to reveal Himself, using His mastery of genetic engineering to create the [[Thunder Warriors]], the predecessors of the Space Marines. Using "join-me-or-die" tactics, He managed to conquer the entirety of Terra during the event called Unification Wars. Then, He made contact with the Mechanicum of Mars and calling Himself the [[Omnissiah]], convinced them to build Him weapons and space-ships. Around this time, He also created a doctrine, the [[Imperial Truth]], which states that religion, faith, and superstition must be all banned, because they have never succeeded in unifying the human race during all of Emp's lifetime. Simply put: the whole "Peace, Love, and Religion" mumbo-jumbo has never worked and now must be eradicated.

Exception where's He's not a perfect badass? [[The Last Church]]. It is permissible to substitute the voice of whatever angry militant atheist appeals to you most/least for the duration of this one (short) story. Also, according to that same story, this asshole wiped out Scandinavia, [[Viking|right when Scandinavia was getting fun again]]. According to the Horus Heresy books that mention the Unification Wars, He burned down a lot of things on a partially recovering Terra.

But, before He set out to conquer the stars with the newly-formed Imperial Army (which contained both [[Imperial Guard|ground forces]] and [[Imperial Navy|space-borne fleets]]), He decided to create the twenty [[Primarch]]s, using Himself as the genetic template, while splitting the additional power He ''stole'' from the Gods into 20 portions, infusing each piece with a fragment of His own personality, to allow them, in turn, to congeal and gestate (just like how daemons are born!) into the indomitable souls of His future Primarchs. Then, He bound each such vessel/soul to their godlike bodies/shells as they formed in their gestation capsules. Let this sink in: each primarch is basically a unique daemonic soul, bound to a super awesomely tough material body. Though with this power ''apparently'' stolen, The Big Four will inevitably and continually be pissed at Him for using their power for His own ends. So the Chaos Gods snatched the primarchs away (via time-travel-as-a-vision shenanigans, don't even try to explain it here, just read ''The First Heretic''), inside their incubator pods and all, from the secret lab underneath the Himalayas, to scatter them away across the galaxy. Luckily for the Emperor, some genetic code was left over from each primarch, so from that He created 20 Legions to serve as the elites of His army: The [[Space Marine|SPEHSS MEHREENS]]. So, with His armies and space-ships complete (minus the Primarchs, which He hoped to find), He embarked upon the [[Great Crusade]], to once again make humanity great again.

As He found each Primarch, He assigned them command of their respective Legions and to act as His generals, in the quest to unify humanity in the Great Crusade (although, at some point, one of them was executed and the other disappeared, leaving only 18 Primarchs and Legions after 100 years of the Great Crusade). A military campaign of a grand scale, this is also when the SPESS MEHREENS were most awesome and at their peak. [[just as planned|Just when things seemed to be going well]], the [[Horus Heresy]] took place, where 8.5 of the Primarchs and their respective legions rebel against the Emprah. In the end, the Emperor fought and slew [[Horus]] (who was daddy's favorite) but at a great cost. The Emperor was mortally wounded to the point that He had to be put permanently on a life support system known as the [[Golden Throne]]. On that day, an untold amount of manly tears was shed.

Subsequently, 10 thousand years later, without the Emperor's leadership, the Imperium eventually degraded into the theocratic, [[grimdark]] empire we all know and love today, in the 41st millennium. In the 500th year of the 41st Millennium (the exact middle of the millennium), which is a few centuries before the Time of Ending began, visions and signs reach out to all walks of life and social status to the Imperium of the Emperor crying, whether it's to lowly denizens of an underhive having dreams about it, to respected sanctioned psykers reading it from the Imperial Tarot, to shamans on feral planets instinctively knowing that the extra rain pouring down lately are tears of sadness from their "sky god".

While interred on the Golden Throne, the Emperor's psychic-essence prevents [[daemon|daemon kind]] from directly assailing [[Terra]], while additionally sustaining the psychic-beacon known as the [[Astronomican]], that makes warp travel within 50,000 light years around Terra possible.

It is common knowledge, that the Emperor is the most powerful psyker alive, humbling even the [[Eldar]]. It is also suggested that He has guided humanity in a guise of people like Julius Caesar, [[Conan the Barbarian]], [[meme|Chuck Norris]], Christopher Lee and Jesus. It is uncertain as to whether or not His internment on the Golden Throne is a good thing. Some believe that if He were to die, the [[Imperium]] would be truly fall into darkness, whereas others believe that if allowed to finally die, He would reincarnate and return to unify the galaxy once more, stronger than ever. Whatever the truth, [[Games Workshop]] are probably never going to advance the story, so speculation has little worth. Unless you take Warhammer Fantasy as an example, where the time-line ended. Badly.

==The Emprah Himself==
:''"The Emperor was a brilliant scientist, a powerful warrior, and great psyker, but he was a terrible [[Venus' Burn|father...]]"
:-[[Roboute Guilliman]], giving the most short yet accurate biography of the Emperor.

[[File:Climax.jpg|250px|right|thumb|A typical father-and-son chat between Empy and Horus.]]
After He shaved his goatee, His chin radiated [[Astronomican|a brilliant light]] through the [[Warp]]. The [[Imperial Navy]] uses this light as a beacon to guide them through that beautifully terrible place. He is sometimes referred to as the Emprah, a joke derived from the voice acting in the ''[[Dawn of War]]'' game, ''[[Dawn of War: Soulstorm|Soulstorm]]'', specifically [[Indrick Boreale]]'s final speeches.

The Emperor is said to be so powerful that He could [[C'tan|destroy suns with ease]], though He has never actually done so. The [[Chaos Gods]] are scared as fuck of the guy, calling him respectively "The Anathema", as in the polar opposite to [[Chaos]]. The [[Eldar]] fear that if the Emperor were to die, a new [[Eye of Terror]] would pop out with Terra at it's center and possibly a new Chaos God would be born.

After He was nearly killed by His son, He was placed upon the Golden Throne and hasn't moved for the past 10 millennia. Most of the fluff maintains that His existence on a day-to-day basis since then is a living hell (by comparison, the torture astropaths go through when becoming one, would be like a trip to the dentist). It's the mother/father/uncle/2nd Cousin of all mindfucks, so bad that even an Inquisitor would likely go insane as a result (or anybody else for that matter) and yet He carries on. Why? He may be the universe's most powerful vegetable, but that doesn't mean that He will just take a sit and die. Oh no, it's exactly the opposite. It gives Him a fuckton of work to do, and along with being THE lighthouse in the Warp, guiding the Imperial Navy, He also needs to make the aforementioned astropaths, as well as keeping all the [[daemon|nasties]] of the Warp where they're supposed to be (i.e. not invading realspace to make the lives of all living things miserable). He also does it for the good of humanity (sounds kinda familiar, doesn't it?). In the last year of M41, tech-priests discovered that the Golden Throne is failing and the Emperor is dying. There is a chance of the Emperor returning to life, as well as the risk that He will die forever. If the latter would be the case, then everyone in the galaxy will become a Chaos sex toy/punching bag/plague vector/science experiment. Note that if the Emperor recovers, He'd be several hundred times more powerful. Emps was born of a group of psykers combining their might and souls in one ritual act. Since then, Empy has probably gained about 365 gigafucktrillion souls since he got put on that Throne (see: leveling in Dark Souls).

:''"He's been up to all sorts of things, our beloved father. Consorting with xenos, resurrecting ancient technology. Don't believe that he is blameless in this...''
:-Magnus the Red

For all His desire to guide and protect humanity, there is a lot of proof, particularly from the Horus Heresy books and some short stories, that the Emperor was not Space Jesus, but Space Hitler. He [[Nazi|declared humanity to be superior to all xenos]] (setting the basis for our genocidal xenophobia and the hatred of nearly every xenos race by default), planned to destroy every shard of religion by force of arms if needed, planned to reunite humanity under His rule no matter what anyone else wanted/thought of that (again by force of arms if needed), cared little for the primarchs being His actual sons (thinking of them as generals and tools rather than biological offspring, and screwing over several of them in His efforts to recruit them / making them follow orders (hence causing some of their later betrayals)), carried out many unorthodox, morally questionable experiments and much much more...
For example: He helped Corvus Corax turn his home-world (and moon) into a great place to live, but for some reason didn't bother doing this for [[Iron Warriors|Olympia]] or [[Night Lords|Nostramo]]... in both cases this contributed to the Primarchs of those worlds to turn traitor. Plus, while He kept the already moral-as-fuck Vulkan at His side for decades, risking the Salamanders' existence in the process, He totally neglected His least stable sons, i.e. the ones who really needed at least [[Magnus|SOME]] [[Angron|level]] [[Perturabo|of]] [[Lorgar|fatherly]] love/guidance. And that whole sorcery issue that divided the Primarchs, kept Mortarion estranged from Him and led to the [[Space Wolves|Wolves]] destroying Prospero? Could probably have been avoided if He'd listened to [[Jaghatai Khan]] and a) told His sons the truth about the Warp and His plans with the human Webway (we don't even know what the lost Primarchs are called, isn't that enough proof that they can all keep a secret?) and b) explained that they all had psychic potential and c) showed them all how to use it responsibly.

His reign eventually [[Inquisition|killed more humans]] (not even counting those who were innocent) than the entire total of humanity's dictators in history. Even during the Unification Wars, several Terran cultures were wiped out completely (Orioc on Antarctica, for example, was razed to the ground for being religious, just to make a point, even after it's forces were defeated and it's people ready to surrender), while simultaneously being pretty terrible at incorporating non-Terran elements. For example, there's basically no trace left of the Interex, Auretian Technocracy and Diasporex.

No matter with whom your allegiance lies, you, the reader, you can't deny that the Emperor's mentality of believing that "small (small as in billions versus trillions, though the death toll of the Imperium's wars are probably in the untold bazillions by now) sacrifices are all made for the greater good" is kinda asshole:y? ([[Tau|Now where have we heard that before?]]) All of this is still excluding the genocides and culling of untold number of alien civilizations, empires, kingdoms, communities, species and races since the start of the Great Crusade... that ended abruptly anyway, with Horus taking up the rebellion and initiating a human genocide on a galactic level. So indirectly, alien justice was served, when humanity got the same treatment as the aliens they invaded earlier.

Plus, He really didn't think the post-Ullanor phase through at all, except for appointing Horus as Warmaster and Dorn as Praetorian. At the very least, He should've had Guilliman take over administrative duties to avoid taxes being imposed prematurely on newly compliant worlds, seeing as the civilian administrators helped to alienate a lot of his soldiers. And let's not even start talking about the alienation and His utterly incompetent and pinheaded mismanagement of the Word Bearers, that led to the Chaos Gods taking root in the ranks of the primarchs to start with... But maybe He planned for The Heresy to start, [[Tzeentch|who knows]]?

To be fair, the whole reason humanity (and the Emperor) hates aliens is because during the Age of Strife, numerous xenos races exploited humanity's trust and made raids, lollygags, loots, and generally were being a nuisance. Then the Emperor comes along and decides that the best way to stop all that from happening again is to wipe out all xenos that might even think to pose a threat to the fledgling Imperium. However, those few xenos species that did not pose an immediate threat to humanity were usually made protectorates similar to the Tau government (unless they resisted, were in the way, possessed a planet, influenced human culture at all, or were intelligent at all, in which case [[Exterminatus|the results]] were predictable). Ever since His ascension, the Imperium forgot about the part where harmless aliens could be tolerated. But on the other hand, [[Orks|the]] [[Necron|most]] [[Tyranids|common]] [[Tau|xenos]] [[Dark Eldar|are]] [[Eldrad|dicks]] and aren't exactly willing to buddy up with the Imperium themselves. Plus, at least according to ''Horus Rising'', the idea of letting xenos exist and then eventually grow stronger is wrong on every level to the Imperium (hence the whole mess with the Interex/Diasporex).

To be even more fair (and meta), the triumvirate of Horus Heresy authors tend to have their own interpretation of the Big E. Graham McNeill generally portrays Him as competent and benevolent (if flawed), Dan Abnett portrays Him as competent but bloodthirsty, while Aaron Dembski-Bowden portrays Him as a vicious, needlessly cruel imbecile.

Ironically, the whole hatred-of-all-xenos thing helped to tip the Word Bearers into Chaos worship, as Chaos' emissaries presented themselves as mankind's only protection against aliens.

==Worship of the Emperor==
[[File:646545.jpg|thumb|300px|What the Emperor looked like before Horus decided to [[Rip and tear|bitchslap]] Him. Notice the giant skull. How did that skull get so big? Is it a plastic faux-skull, or is it an alien skull? (What He doesn't want you to know is that The E is actually a midget, the armor is a mech and that that's a regular-sized skull) Anyway, back to the topic. You don't get to see the Emperor out of armor very often.]]
Humans worship the Emperor as the one true God. Now, the only reason the Imperium worships the Emperor is that after His fight with Horus and His internment into the Golden Throne, they pretty much forgot what the Emperor taught them when He preached the Imperial Truth. Ol' Empy did not actually tell anyone of the Chaos Gods as part of His plan to starve them, withholding the information even from the Primarchs in hopes of protecting them from corruption by hoping that ignorance is bliss. Unfortunately, this became part of why the Horus Heresy happened in the first place. Some saw that the Emperor [[Mortarion|lied to them by holding the truth hidden]], some did [[Magnus|not know how to handle the temptation]] the Gods conveyed, some did [[Fulgrim|not even know that they were manipulated]] all this time and by whom, some would [[Lorgar|try to seek out something to place their faith upon]], not realizing what would needed to be done to become chosen in the eyes of the Gods. Plus, it's pretty damn hard to fight against something if you don't know that it exists. The Horus Heresy novels also mentioned the [[Interex]], another atheist empire who understood that threat of Chaos, but treated that information secularly and scientifically: they told every citizen everything that was known about "Kaos", and thus resisted the taint altogether.

E-money wanted mankind to be [[Star Trek|a utopia of science and reason]], by eliminating cultists (and thus summoning of daemons), uncontrolled psykers (and thus random daemonic possessions), and warp travel by creating the Human Webway (and thus eliminating all human contact with Chaos when traveling through the Warp). He wanted to isolate humanity from the Chaos Gods, cause who gives a shit about the Ruinous Powers if they're stuck in the Warp with no way of getting out?

Unfortunately, The Emperor did not realize that Chaos runs off emotion, all everyday emotion, and not ''just'' worship; the stronger the emotions, the stronger the Gods get. That's why The Imperial Truth was never destined to succeed in starving the Gods to death, but rather suppressed existing emotions in, for example, [[Lorgar]] before exploding and turning back on itself (and getting the Gods what they wanted).

Additionally, He made a critical mistake in disregarding the human need to believe in something greater than oneself, and despite His best efforts, nothing was enough to fill the place of religion in human society. Ironically, the best solution would be not to suppress faith but to redirect it towards something else, but because of his natural awesomeness, unmatched psychic powers and enigmatic nature, that "something else" ended up being the Emperor himself. After He went off being the most powerful psychic cucumber in the universe, and lost direct control of the Imperium, belief in Him sort of helped the Imperium stand together against all odds, even if it basically dropped 99.9% of humanity's IQ in the process. With the Warp being what it is, the act of worshiping the Emperor supercharged His power in the Immaterium to the point of being truly godlike, even while His body is still stuck in it's current physical state of near-death. The Imperium's faith in the Emperor is basically their biggest anchor of bravery and perseverance in a universe where humanity is constantly beset by:

*[[Tyranids|Unimaginably massive swarms of voracious space locust who exist only to feed and multiply it's biomass]]...
*[[Necron|Older-than-Chaos-itself zombie-terminator robots set on culling all life from the galaxy]]...
*[[C'Tan|Diabolical celestial beings literally as old as the stars, whose single desire is harvesting all living souls]]...
*[[Orks|A race of nigh-unkillable barbarians, genetically engineered to have pastimes, ambitions, job skills, and dreams only be about rip and tear]]...
*[[Tau|Technologically superior space communists wanting to assimilate everyone in their quasi Hindu-Communist empire and who take after Billy Mays]]...
*[[Eldar|Snooty and uncaring space elves that can read minds and who eat, sleep, and to have Heterosexual Sex in the Missionary Position in planet-sized battle cruisers]]...
*[[Dark Eldar|Psychotic, hedonistic space elves who routinely torture others to the point of death for sheer amusement before grinding their remains into refined cocaine]]...
*[[Chaos|Fanatical zealots that knowingly devote themselves to all that is insane]]...
*[[Daemon|Nightmare horrors made real who will rape and eat, usually simultaneously, any sentient being they get their goat-hooves on]]...
*[[Chaos Space Marines|Deformed, demented traitors clad in power armor and aided by the evilest forms of weaponry and sorcery ever conceived]]...
*[[Rak'gol|Homicidal alien, lizard, insect, cyborg type monster-pirates that horribly kill you for fun]]...
*[[Games Workshop|Malignant, omnipotent intelligence from beyond the cosmos, exerting all the power at their disposal to prevent any faction from breaking the stalemate or upsetting the dreadful status quo]]...
*[[Sly Marbo|And fuck knows who the guy in the cardboard box is]]...

Without their faith in the Emperor after His internment into the Golden Throne, the fragments of the Imperium would have fought against each other again like in the pre-Great Crusade days and subsequently devolved into what they were before the Emperor revealed Himself. So yes, much like IRL religion, it gives them hope and courage to fight on and survive in a universe that leaves the [[grimdark]] faucet running everyday and night.

It's worth noting that good ol' Empy wouldn't have had nearly as much of a problem with all this unwanted worship if He hadn't, just as a quick example, insisted on wearing horrifyingly ornate solid gold armour and a big glowy halo at all times. Or on carrying a flaming sword of righteousness. Or on building continent-sized monuments to His vanity. Or on decking all His personal troops and favored genetic experiments in as much bling as they could possibly carry. Or on being eleven fucking feet tall. If you look like space-Jesus and act like space-Jesus, people are going to take those observations to their extreme conclusions, like what Lorgar did when he wrote the ''Lectitio Divinitatus'', which can be summarized as "Ordinary men can't blow up suns and carry big glowy halos at all times, only a God can, therefore the Emprah is God." This is made even more relevant given that the fluff very strongly implies that the Emperor '''was''' Jesus.

That said, to Games Workshop's credit His being [[Ultramarines|buttfucked by His own hubris and disregard for the humanity He claimed to be guiding]] in this manner was probably [[Grimdark|intentional as a classic tale of Greek Tragedy]].

==The possible death of the Emperor==
[[File:Emperor of mankind flaming sword armor.jpg|500px|right|thumb|Badass and glorious.]]
With the Golden Throne being consistently worn out, and the Tech-priests too power-armor-on-head rebooted to do anything about it, it is certainly possible that the Emperor may die one day, which will obviously result in all of the Imperial worlds and factions to cry tears of disappointment and subsequently devolve into chaos (maybe even with a capital "C"). There are however, 3 possible outcomes of what can happen if the Emperor eventually dies:

===The new Eye of Terror===
Conventional wisdom and the [[Eldar]], says that in the event that the Emperor dies, a new Eye of Terror will be created with Terra at it's center, plunging Holy Terra and all nearby planets/systems(?) into the Warp. The current main rulebook says that all of reality will be plunged into the warp if the Emperor dies. Even the [[Ecclesiarchy]] agrees that if the Emperor were ever to die, humanity would be FUCKED at the barest minimum.

This is supported by the fact that the '''Golden Throne''' ''(itself a portal to the Webway)'' was broken by [[Magnus]], causing a warp tear to open on Terra, which the Emperor has had to spend every second for the last 10,000 years concentrating on to keep from getting any bigger (while the [[Adeptus Custodes]] have spent the same amount of time chopping up daemons that slip through the crack). They will not be able to stop a full daemonic invasion if the rift would open fully.

Additionally, a new Chaos God could be created (just like with the Eye of Terror and the Eldar), which will most certainly be a God of all the Grimdarkness in the galaxy, ensuring that it would eclipse all of the powers of the other Gods, as the Emperor would finally be the God of all. This is especially true, since nearly everything that is grimdark stems from Chaos and the entire WH40K setting is itself a massive pile of it... That or Malal would burst back into existence, which does have some possibility of happening, since Malal was/is the Chaos god of Atheism, which was the "truth"-part of the Emperor's "Imperial Truth" doctrine.

Some also fear that a fifth Chaos God's presence would just crush reality by merging the Materium (reality) and the Warp into a singular dimension. But that's unlikely, since the birth of the latest Chaos God, Slaanesh, did not destroy reality and he/she/it/xe was fueled by the near extinction of a race far more psychically powerful than humanity. On the other hand, Slaanesh was forced to battle Khorne and most of the Eldar Gods during it's first birth moments. That would not be the case if the 5th Chaos God would be born.

===Regeneration===
No, not the [[Doctor Who]] kind. The Horus Heresy novel 'Vulkan Lives', heavily implies that the Emperor is a [[Perpetual]], just like John Grammaticus, Vulkan, Oll Persson and [[Anval Thawn]], all of who were able to survive deaths that should have completely obliterated their bodies. So all He simply needs to do is for his current material body to die normally, and wait a couple of hours/days and He'd be reborn again (in the "get up off the ground and dust Himself off" sense (Though one has to wonder why the Emperor would have had Himself interred in the Golden Throne in the first place if He thought He'd heal. Probably to power the Astronomican?)). All of this is still speculation (duh). Vulkan, for instance, was driven mad by the torturous experiences he had endured thanks to Night Haunter, and they were child's play, compared to sitting in unthinkable agony, unable to move or speak for ten thousand years while feeling Himself rotting away. And don't you forget [[If the Emperor had a Text-to-Speech Device|that nose itch]]. However, a more commonly held belief is that He will get up, re-establish the [[Imperial Truth]], and [[Great Crusade|just be]] [[Commissar|a cool guy]].

In fact, a whole faction of the [[Inquisition]]: '''Thorianism''' exists to investigate this possibility; looking for possible signs that the Emperor's consciousness can be transferred elsewhere, allowing Him to walk among his children once more. (That said, they don't know about the existence of Perpetuals and would rather look for a new body to place the Emperor's soul into.)

Opponents to Thorianism generally see that encouraging this is a terrible idea, as having the Emperor rise in a physical form would only cause a schism in the Imperium, as many people would not believe it to be true, having been ruled and brainwashed by the Ecclesiarchy over thousands of years, which would lead to another major [[Horus Heresy|civil war]].

===The Star Child===
Although years of GW-marketing and [[retcon|fluff "upgrades"]] have made the third claim rather dubious, many fa/tg/uys and optimists still hold out on the theory stating that when the Emperor screwed Horus's soul to the wall, part of the Emperor's soul was also cast into the Warp. This Soul Fragment is called the Star Child, a god waiting to be reborn, or perhaps be reincarnated back into a human body (anyone call for one scout Mkvenner). If the remains of the Emperor were ever to die, the tiny spark of soul left in his body would re-unite with the greater whole within the Warp, and according to [[fluff|prophecy]], for the four Chaos Gods into stalemate, while the races of the galaxy would be left to battle it out in one last great Ragnarök scenario (called the End Times).

This theory is tied closely to the Illuminati, a group of either supremely enlightened individuals or dangerous mutant heretics (depending on which side of the [[Inquisition]] you're on). The Illuminati plan to catch all of the Sensei and sacrifice them upon the Golden Throne at the moment of Emperor's death.

In a bizarre fusion of new and old fluff, it has been revealed that the Illuminati were a minor Tzeentch cult and the Sensei were effectively brainwashed soon-to-be sacrifices in an attempt to bring Tzeentch to the materium. Needless to say, they have been purged by the Inquisition. The fluff in the Jac Draco books revealed that the Ordo Hydra (a small splinter faction of the Illuminati who seek to turn humanity into a psychic hive-mind) is a Tzeentch cult, but that the general Illuminati population - including many Ordo Malleus Inquisitors and the Exorcists [[Chapter]] (as well as their unknown successor chapters) are genuinely incorruptible by Chaos and are freely permitted to access the Black Library along with Harlequin Solitaires. The Inquisition Trilogy was retconned away.
It's just like that frustrating moment you experience when you don't know if the Squats have been nommed by Tyranids or have never existed in the first place.

== Gallery ==
<center><gallery>
File:Golden Throne-Imperial Webway.jpg|The Big E upon the Golden Throne (before the decay set in)
File:Emperor of Mankind Classic Portrait face.jpg|The guiding light in the Imperium of Man shines forever bright
Image:1220179589932.jpg|The Emperor protects man from all.
File:Emperor of Mankind Contemplation.jpg|"Why IS IT that hot dogs come in packs of 8, and hot dog buns come in packs of 12? So people will have to buy 3 packs of hot dogs and 2 of hot dogs buns, hereby promoting imperial production of course!"
Image:Horus and the Emperor.jpg|Son, I am disappoint.
Image:Wh40k-emperor.jpg| Yearbook photo.
Image:When you ruin his groove by Lutherniel.jpg| His groove, do not ruin it.
File:Emperor_Decree.jpg| Emps laying down some rules, mid combat from the looks of it
File:Go Ahead Make My day Emperor.jpg|That is EXACTLY the same look that's on Batman's face when he's about to put the beatdown on someone!
File:Emperor of Mankind model action figure.jpg|He makes for one helluva action figure
Image:8.jpg|<s>The Em-purr-or of all Catkind!Nyuh!</s> {{BLAM|HERESY!!!}}{{BLAM}}
Image:1271118030729.jpg|Just imagine if the Chaos Gods didn't scatter the primarchs through out the galaxy... Wait where's that little scamp Omegon? (just off picture, sneaking up behind Guilliman)
Image:God-Emperor_Goldlich.jpg|Death is no excuse to stop bein' pimp.
File:God_Emperor_Interred_On_Golden_Throne.jpg|Thinking to himself, "I really, REALLY hate Horus!"
Image:Emperor blackwhite.jpg|He might be the most powerful psychic vegetable in the universe but the Custodes can't give him a decent hygiene program.
Image:The Immortal Emprah.jpg|<s>Not so divine now, is he?</s> {{BLAM|HERESY!}}{{BLAM}}
Image:Emperor_miniature.jpg|Roll d6; stays on the field on seven or less
Image:emperor_old.jpg|A real man never dies, even when he's killed.
Image:emperor.png|Down but not out.
Image:Emperormini.jpg|In all His miniature glory
Image:Carrionlord.jpg|<strike>The Carrion Lord with his two left arms.</strike> {{BLAM}} how the fuck did that heretic get past the custodes?
File:Painting.jpg|This painting sold for $900, that lucky ca/tg/url...
Image:Emperor_model.jpg|Probably the best model of him yet
Image:slowemperor.jpg|Oh God-emperor, how did this get here? I am not good with computers.
Image:Emperor_Sagan.jpg|Search your feelings, you know it to be true.
Image:EmpsVSigmar.jpg| You all know you wanna see how this pans out!
Image:Emprasque3.jpg|How do you kill what can not die?
Image:Slavegirl Emperor.jpg|Emperor [[Rule 63]]! NO EXCEPTIONS!
Image:Femprah.jpg|Not actually the God-Emperor; besides it is Heresy to believe that The Immortal God Emperor looks like Cher.
Image:Femprah_by_Mr-Culexus.jpg|Oh, give it a fucking rest...
Image:Emperor_upon_his_other_throne.jpg|Yeah. We get it. The Emperor sits upon the Golden 'Throne'.
Image:1377291976783.jpg|Unbeknownst to many 40k fans, ol'Emps is fairly amicable when he meets an elf/eldar who isn't a complete failure.
Image:First_Founding_Problems.jpg|Perhaps with a better armor design, Emps might not have been late for [[Horus]]'s after school soccer games and things might have turned out differently.
File:Rainbow Emperor.gif| The Emperor in Rainbow Form
Image:Konya.jpg|The symbol of the town Konya in Turkey. In Central Anatolia. Emprah's birthplace. CONNECTION, BITCHES!
Image:Hittite eagle large.jpg|The symbol of ancient (1600BC) Hittite Empire from Anatolia, which, unknown to many, is Emperor's first try at conquering the world. CONNECTION, BITCHES!
Image:Emperor mao.jpg|In alternate universe 32-B, Mao Zedong rules the People's Republic of Mankind
</gallery></center>

==See Also==
* The [[Imperium]], for the empire he founded.
* [[Sigmar]] Unbroken, his [[Warhammer Fantasy Battles]] counterpart.
* [[Emperor's To-Do List]]
* [http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/25959559/ This thread] which makes the Emperor even cooler.
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_2nM1GEllg/ A series on Youtube, it shows what would happen if the Emperor had a Text to Speech device.]
* [[If the Emperor had a Text-to-Speech Device]] article in 1d4chan.

{{Imperium}}

[[Category:Gods]]