Board Thread:Warhammer 40k General Discussion/@comment-5.65.81.205-20131002091720/@comment-26516936-20160524114243

The Emperor has to should a good deal of the blame for the Heresy but not all. The Emperor's arrogance & inability to empathise or truelly understand the human condition is what led him to make so many glaring mistakes that had a large part to do with setting the playing field for the heresy. But it was the machinations of the chaos gods that sowed that fertile ground & brought about the heresy itself, without their involvement the catastrophe that was the heresy would not have happened.

That is not to say that everything would have been hunky dory by any means, The Emperor's errors & the natures of the various primarchs meant that an explosion was inevitable, but without the chaos gods it would have been comparatively muted & piecemeal. Angron & Curze were definitely destined for the high jump, they were both insane & whatever benefit The Emperor thought they brought to the successful completion of the crusade had long since become damaging to his vision, and The Emperor himself had finally begun to see that. But neither Curze or Angron would have gone quietly & they would have likely taken the bulk of their legions with them & it would have taken something seriously bloody to put them down. Still without the chaos gods they would have fought alone & any damge they inflicted would have been relatively mild when compared to the heresy.

There would have been other confrontations as well but none that would likely go to the depths where ANgron & Curze were headed. There would have been some kind of confrontation with Magnus over his use of sorcery but without the Chaos gods interferance The Emperor would have probably been able to pull him back into line with out to much trouble in end. The bitterness of Mortarion & Perturabo would still have festered & caused problems but it would have been unlikely to have led to out right conflict on a large scale. Without the chaos gods Horus would have eventually come to understand The Emperors plan & fallen into line, while Fulgrim really just needed a good kick up the rear end to get his brain working. As for Lorgar without the chaos gods corrupting him after Monarchia he would likely have either become some sort of hermit or tried to lead a some sort of religious movement or revolution & been suppressed.

What it all boils down to is that while The Emperor did screw up magnificently & in so doing set the stage for the heresy, without the interference of the chaos gods the heresy itself almost certainly would not of happened.