u/Marvynwillames

I will admit that while I can not pick a specific comment, for a good years I met people from time to time arguying that the STC system was focused in low tech for colonization during the Dark Age, reasoning being, that if they are supposed to be OP, why aren’t we finding the cool stuff from novels, like Mechanivores?

First off, we got these descriptions from the core rulebooks, as posting the entire thing would be too big, I will simplify, the full text is on the links.

https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/1hh3n6c/multiple_excerpts_the_stc_template_across_time/

https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/10fewuf/old_lore_codex_imperialis_the_stc_system/

https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/znqw9k/book_excerpt_warhammer_40000_core_rulebook_6th/

>During the Dark Age of Technology humanity travelled throughout the galaxy: founding new colonies and exploring new worlds. Many of these colonies failed to establish themselves. others were lost, whilst a few grew into independent civilizations with distinctive cultures. Most however. established a subsistence economy and simply stopped. In such an environment the impetus for change was very low; everything the citizens needed was at hand. their new world supplied them with food. and the store of knowledge brought from Earth enabled them to maintain a high technological base without a technological society. In part this was a result of the Standard Template Construct system carried by every colony.

>The heart of the STC system was an evolved computer program designed to provide construction details for the colonists. its prime function was to enable the colonists. to build efficient shelters, generators and transports without any prior knowledge and using almost any locally available materials. The user simply asked how to build a house or a tractor and the computer supplied all the necessary plans – in short it was idiot proof. Many humans attribute the entire Orkish civilization to early STC systems — but the truth will never be known.

>The Age of Technology ended in inter-human war and anarchy. The STC systems. that had helped to build it either lapsed into disuse or decayed so that they became increasingly unreliable and quirky. On some worlds they were maintained, but most suffered damage by enthusiastic software specialists or subsequent jury-rigging. Hard copies of the information they. contained survived much longer. and were frequently copied and passed down from generation to generation. Today, in the Age of the lmperium. the familiar designs of the SIC are still discernable in the shapes of vehicles. spacecraft and buildings. The Adeptus Mechanicus on Earth make it their business to collate and utilize STC material - it is their equivalent to a holy text. a font of all knowledge (which is exactly what it was intended to be).

>One result of the STC system and its pivotal place in human development is that many worlds now utilize designs and machinery of a similar type. Of course. The millennia have wrought changes in the basic utilitarian devices proscribed by the STC. but many humans adhere religiously to the old designs. STC designs were intended to be able to cope with anything - by the standards of the day they were rough and ready, big and brutish, hard to damage and easy to repair. Because they were intended or use by unqualified people their power-plants mere based around commonly obtainable materials, employing steam power, wind power, water power and combustion engines. High-tech material was described too (although rarely used) and designs were provided for full-scale nuclear power-grids and fission processors. However, few people understood these, and the need for power was supplied quite easily by conventional means. Consequently hard copies were rarely taken and gradually written texts became lost or hopelessly distorted.

>(...)

>The weapons. vehicles and much of the equipment described in this book have their roots in the STC system. Fighting vehicles often look like tractors and prime movers because that's exactly what they were copied from! STC designs can be produced in almost any material; wood, plastic, concrete, steel, plastic. etc. and can be replicated on almost any world that has raw materials of some kind. Uncorrupted STC systems are unknown and after so many years will probably remain so. Nonetheless. finding such a system is regarded by many Tech-priests as their ultimate goal - a sort of quest for the holy grail. Legends surround the existence of lost, functioning SIC systems, but whether they have any basis in truth is anyone's guess.

Warhammer 40,000 Rogue Trader (1987)

>STC systems were created during the scientific high-point of the Dark Age of Technology. During this time thousands of human colonies were founded on distant worlds. Many of these colonies railed to survive, some work lost, and of those that survived most achieved only a subsistence level economy. Yet almost all of thebe colonies managed to retain a high level of technology thanks to the huge base of computerized information carried from Earth. This massive computer databank was known as the Standard Template Construct (STC) system.

>The STCs are often said to embody the sum total of human knowledge. This is probably true as far as technical accomplishment goes. Although most colonists required little more than designs for agricultural machinery, programs were included for all sorts of advanced constructions such as nuclear power grids and fission reactors. However, the early colonists' needs were simple and were met by conventional energy forms and relatively low-level technology.

>Today there are no known surviving STC systems, and only n very few examples of first-generation print-out. On some worlds information about the ancient STC systems is regarded as holy and design copies are guarded as secret and sacred texts, housed in the inner sanctums of temples.

Codex Imperialis (1992)

>Created at the developmental apex of the Age of Technology, the Standard Template Construct (STC) system was a way to ensure that all the recently far-flung human colonies across the galaxy could build anything they needed. From air-purifiers to military grade weaponry, hab-buildings to plasma reactors. The user simply asked the machine how to build what was needed and it would calculate everything - from locally-available materials to the means of manufacture and assembly - it would present the most efficient way to achieve what the settler asked. The STCs were designed so that the least accomplished user could still fabricate the vehicle, building, or weapon they needed. For all intents and purposes, the STCs were the sum total of man's technical know-how at its zenith of power.

>Every human colony had at least one STC system, although most colonists never tapped into anything like the more advanced constructs, finding the more rudimentary machines and weapons far more useful. It is highly probable that few of the theoretical or most highly advanced works were ever attempted. Over the passage of time, a majority of the STC machines were lost, destroyed in battle or by natural disaster, or began to fail, overcome at last by corrupted databanks, too much jury-rigging in place of knowledgeable maintenance, or simply the fatigue of thousands of years of use. Those lucky planets that still maintained even a partially working STC system grew to guard it jealously as the Age of Technology slipped into the anarchic madness that was the Age of Strife. Soon, the galaxy-wide realm of Man was fractured, each world cut off from all but the closest planets by warp storms or worse. The madness, warfare and Warp-spawned invasions, along with the great backlash against technology, ensured that few of the great works of the previous era survived.

>Today, there are no surviving STC systems. It was common practice, however, beginning in the Age of Technology, for colonies to produce hard copies of many of the more standard designs. Over the years, these have been copied repeatedly, with varying levels of accuracy. Yet, as commonplace as many of these designs once were, now any copy is a rarefied item, even more so for any that carry precious first-generation printout information. During the Great Crusade and later, during the period known as the Forging, thousands upon thousands of previously colonized planets were reclaimed for Humanity. Many STC templates were found amongst these worlds and, it is rumored, even some partially working systems were unearthed. These long-lost troves of forgotten technology were discovered mostly buried amidst the ruins of greatly regressed worlds, but on occasion they were found enshrined within locked vaults, guarded by those to whom the name STC, or even the Purpose had longed passed out of understanding. Any such findings are greedily collected by the Adeptus Mechanicus; the Tech-Priests rush such treasures back to their secretive forge worlds, where they can be thoroughly studied, hoarded, worshipped and copied.

>One result of the STC system, and its pivotal place in human development, is that many worlds utilize designs and machinery of a similar type. Of course, the millennia have wrought changes in the basic utilitarian devices proscribed by the STC, but many humans adhere religiously to the old designs. STC designs were intended to be able to cope with anything - given the unpredictable nature of colonies in previously unexplored space. Therefore, designs were often big and brutish, hard to damage and easy to repair. Examples of recovered STC template technology still being built and in use today include such military hardware as the Rhino Armored Personnel Carrier and the Land Raider, as well as the Atmospheric Pumps that still keep the air (almost) breathable in even the largest hive-blocks The Adeptus Mechanicus are driven by t quest for knowledge and, in an era when innovation and invention are almost nonexistent (being viewed as highly suspicious, if not outright dangerous), then it is no wonder that the Tech-Priests hold STC templates as holy items. A working STC system is the ultimate embodiment of their endless mission - truly the font of all knowledge (which is actually what the original devices were meant to be).

Warhammer 40,000 6th, 7th and 8th ed all use this text (2012-2017)

>Such relics of the Omnissiah are viewed as sacred treasures; armies are readily sacrificed to ensure their acquisition. Most precious of all are the remnants of Standard Template Construct machines that have survived the millennia. These remarkable STCs allow auto-fabrication of devices that Humanity can well use in their war for survival; many of the Imperium's most ubiquitous weapons and war engines are still produced in this fashion.

Warhammer 40,000 9th edition rulebook (2020), same text is repeated on the 10th ed (2023)

So, the general idea for STCs is that they are both the machines that build something and the database with the information, the decay of the STCs is a result of jurry rigging.

>Created using long-lost technologies, the STCs were given to colony ships during one of Mankind’s earlier expansions across the stars. Encoded into the imperishable hardware of each machine were the blueprints for all manner of things the colonists might need, from power sources and habitats to armoured vehicles and weapons. In an age during which so much knowledge has been lost to the slow entropy of time, each STC represents a priceless artefact, and in the case of the Van Saar STC, a near infinite source of wealth.

Necromunda House of Artifice (2020)

The weird one out, them, is the recent book Genefather, which is, as far I can remember, the one work that seems to go against the idea.

>A suspicious frown lowered Oswen’s eyebrows. ‘Are you sure this is human technology? Have we been tricked? Is this instead the unclean work of the xenos?’ He looked fearful and disappointed.

>‘No, this is not xenotech,’ said Qvo. ‘At least, I don’t think so.’

>‘It doesn’t conform to any kind of STC artefact I’ve read about or any of the ancients’ construction protocols.’

>‘Cawl always tells me that we have become overly focused on the standard template construct system.’

>‘But it is sacred!’

>‘It is,’ said Qvo, ‘but the archmagos’ point is that the STC system was only one thing our ancestors could do. The system was deliberately simple. It was a colonist’s tool. Would you base all your opinions of the Imperium on what you would find on a frontier world?’

>‘I suppose not.’

>‘We do not know what else our ancestors could truly achieve. Look at this place.’

Genefather (2024)

The best explanation I can get is that Guy Haley basically wants to avoid the question of the powerful one off stuff we keep getting in novels just not showing up anywhere else, like the Castigator Titan or the Void Claw in Vigilus.

Something that comes from time to time is a claim by some fans, that the Imperium’s policy on xenos is a result of “The xenos that were allied to mankind during the Dark Age of Technology betrayed them during the Age of Strife.” A most curious claim, but, how true is it?

The Core Rulebooks

To start, the Dark Age is, as the name implies, a time we know very little, most relevant to it is the timeline that every Core Rulebook possess, do they mention some great alliance with xenos? The full excerpts for them all would be too large, so only the relevant part is shown, the full is on this link:

https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/x03l3z/from_where_comes_the_daot_humans_made_peace/

>Age of Technology

>Humanity explores and settles the glory encountering many of the races of space at the same time. A widen age for scientific achievement and expansion, perfection of the STC system now permits an almost explosive expansion as humanity heads for the stars and a new beginning.

>Development and subsequent cultivation the navigator gene allow human pilots to make longer, faster warp jumps than previously thought possible. Navigator families, initially controlled by industrial and trading cartels, eventually become independent forces in their own right.

>Discovery of warp drives accelerates the colonization process early independent or corporate colonies become federated to Earth. The first alien races encountered. The first alien wars begin.

>Humanity reaches the far edges of the galaxy completing the push to the stars begun over a thousand years before. Human civilization is now widely dispersed and divergent - with countless small colonies as well as many large, overpopulated planets. wars with alien races continue, but pose no threat to the stability of human space. All at once two things happen simultaneously – humans with psychic powers begin to appear on almost every world, and civilization begin to crumble as result of widespread insanity, demonic possession and anarchy. At this time the existence of warp Creatures and the dangers they pose to the human mind are not fully understood.

Rogue Trader Core Rulebook (1987)

DARK AGE OF TECHNOLOGY

>Mankind realizes its destiny amongst the stars, colonizing world after world at a rapacious pace. Warp space is tamed and the first alien races subjugated. An age of expansion and plenty begins. Psykers emerge amid the race of Man, and the attention of the dread powers is drawn towards humanity.

5th ed Core Rulebook (2008)

AGE OF TECHNOLOGY: M15 - M25

>This era is referred to as the “Dark Age of Technology” so often that its original title might seem incomplete. There are few reliable records and even they seem to contradict themselves with regularity. What is known is that from roughly M18 onwards, Mankind discovered the Warp and how to enter it. Slowly, through many disasters, humanity learned to use the Warp to make faster than light journeys out of their own star system. During this time, the first alien races were encountered.

>(...)

>For the rest of the age. Mankind spread across the stars, becoming widely dispersed and divergent**. There is evidence of many wars, but none that threatened the stability of human space. The existing records list xenos enemies long since extinct, along with more familiar names such as Eldar and Orks.** Inter-planetary trade was established and great fleets carried goods to and from the ends of the galaxy. As planets became overpopulated, the recently invented construction mediums of plaststeel, plascrete, ferrocrete and rockcrete were used to build colossal cities the proto-hives.

>As quick as Mankind's expansion had been, it was eclipsed by the speed of its collapse. The decline was so rapid, so utter and so nearly complete that little of those colonies or the civilizations they spawned remain. Speculation is rampant, but there are few facts. What is known is that human psykers were first mentioned towards the end of M22, making a sudden appearance on almost every human world within a relatively short span of time. By the end of M23 there was widespread anarchy, descriptions of what must he Daemonic possessions and great turbulence in the Warp. Some records also cite betrayal by the machines and a great war with robotic armies. Whether factual or allegorical, the histories leave no doubt on one point: the golden age had come to a spectacularly swift and brutal end.

6th/7th ed Core Rulebook (2012-2014)

>AGE OF TECHNOLOGY: M15-M25

>This era is referred to as the ‘Dark Age of Technology’ so often that its original title might seem incomplete. There are few reliable records dating back to this epoch and even they seem to contradict themselves with regularity. What is known is that from roughly M18 onwards, Mankind discovered the warp and how to enter it. Slowly, through many disasters, Humanity learned to use the warp to make faster-than-light journeys out of their own star system. It was during this time that the first alien races were encountered.

>(...)

>For the rest of the age, Mankind spread across the stars, becoming widely dispersed and divergent. Evidence exists of many wars, but none that threatened the stability of human space. Amongst the records are lists of xenos enemies that have long since gone extinct, along with more familiar names such as Aeldari and Orks. During this time period, interplanetary trade was established and great fleets carried goods to and from the ends of the galaxy. As planets became overpopulated, the recently invented construction mediums of plasteel, plascrete, ferrocrete and rockcrete were used to build colossal cities, which became the proto-hives.

>As quick as the expansion of Mankind’s domain had been, it was eclipsed by the speed of its collapse. The decline was so rapid and so nearly complete that little of those colonies, or the civilizations they spawned, remain. Speculation is rampant, but there are few facts. What is known is that human psykers were first mentioned towards the end of M22, making a sudden appearance on almost every human world within a relatively short span of time. By the end of M23, there was widespread anarchy, descriptions of what must be daemonic possessions and great turbulence in the warp. Some records also cite betrayal by the machines and a great war with robotic armies. Whether factual or allegorical, the histories leave no doubt on one point: the golden age had come to a spectacularly swift and brutal end.

8th ed Core Rulebook (2017)

>AGE OF TECHNOLOGY: M15-M25

>The first indications of Human warp travel date from the early millennia of this age. They hint at gruesome disasters and many setbacks, yet it is clear that eventually the technology was perfected. The cultivation of the Navigator gene and the establishment of the Navigator Houses came soon after, allowing vast leaps in interstellar travel and the establishment of a full-blown Human empire amongst the stars.

>As Humanity’s power and influence grew. so too did it’s hubris. The indomitable spirit of Human endeavor has ever risen to the sternest challenges; interstellar exploration, trade and - inevitably - warfare presented challenges like nothing Mankind had faced before. Planetary colonization proceeded at a ferocious rate. it seems likely that, during this era. the Human race splintered and reformed time and again into warring or competing power blocs and planetary empires, But nothing could destabilize Human space as a whole.

>Human scientists, engineers, inventors and innovators became the new gods. They worked alien technologies into their race’s devices to increase their -efficacy with little thought to the risks. They modified their species’ genome to ever greater degrees. fashioning vast armies of tailored gene-troopers whose Humanity was all but lost amidst the array of freakish alterations worked upon their bodies and minds. They invented Standard Template Construct machines - or STCs ~ that allowed Human colonists to rapidly fashion everything they needed to dominate new worlds from whatever natural resources were available. They developed sentient nano-plagues. World sundering energy Weapons and endless ranks of fearsome Men of Iron that could be unleashed upon those who refused to bend to their wills; alien and Human alike. They fashioned thinking machines of vast intellect that administered to the every need of colony worlds transformed into glittering utopian paradises.

9th ed Core Rulebook (2023)

Until now, no indication of some major alliance, or betrayal, by aliens, what we have is a very vague “They met and fought xenos” and, for the 9^(th) and 10^(th) ed, “Mankind was also divided into groups.”

The Codexes also indicate it:

>Whatever the truth, it seems certain that some terrible catastrophe during this period deprives the greenskins of their leading caste and forces them into a crude and endlessly warlike cycle of existence. Certainly, those scattered records that survive from the Dark Age of Technology cite Orks as a tribal and rampaging xenos race, whose behaviours would be depressingly familiar to the Imperial commanders of the 41st Millennium.

Codex Orks 8th ed

>During the Dark Age of Technology, the human race was almost annihilated by its own hubris. Though Mankind’s first steps away from its home world were faltering, natural adaptability and belligerence of spirit soon saw it flourish in the void. Science and technology advanced at a breathtaking pace, enabling the conquest of increasingly far-flung planets. The vast reaches of the galaxy shrank as Mankind’s capabilities grew, and alien races were driven back into the shadows by the fierce light of human progress.

Codex Custodes 9th ed

So where do these alliances come from?

Despite claims that the Eldar and/or Orks had peace treaties with mankind at this time, I was unable to find any, but I did find some curious excerpts on their complicated relation with the Eldar

https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/1aweofs/multiple_excerpts_the_relations_between_pre_fall/

The one source I could find of a non-aggression pact with xenos was this, which does not specify any of the races involved.

>22nd to 25th – The Dark Age of Technology

>The first Navigators are born, allowing human spaceships to make even longer; quicker warp jumps. Mankind enters a golden age of enlightenment as scientific and technological progress accelerates. Human worlds unite and non-aggression pacts are secured with dozens of alien races.

Deathwatch Core Rulebook, page 290.

Lexicanum lists First and Only as the source for the Cybernetic Revolt being defeated by a coalition of powers of the galaxy, but I was unable to find a copy of the book.

So, where does the great betrayal come?

Unknown, and, going by other works, it seems that mankind was just as hostile to xenos as vice versa.

>The Predator first saw service during the Dark Age of Technology, when it was the standard battle tank of all Mankind's fighting forces. It was first built as a response to a newly encountered threat from a violent and warlike alien race — the Orks. barbarous savages who lived only for war and battle. Mankind's forces were having great difficulty in combatting the Orks' reckless headlong charges. Seeking new tactics and new weapons to defeat the Orks. the Predator came into being. With extra armour and heavy weapons a Predator could resist attacks from most Ork weapons, and the savages' primitive armour was no match for the autocannon and heavy bolters. It is a design that has withstood the test of time well. The first Predators were constructed with a small troop carrying capacity, but during the campaigns of the Great Crusade this capacity was gradually lost in favour of more ammunition stowage space. especially if the Predator was mounted with sponsons which became standard during the Great Crusade.

(…)

>The earliest known use of the Rhino in combat is recorded in the ancient Liber Armorum. According to this august document it was by human colonists on Torben's World against unidentified indigenous xenos creatures of a primitive technology level. The Rhinos formed the spearhead of the human colonists‘ attacks. against which the primitive alien firearms were useless. The Rhinos smashed the alien settlements and Torben's World was completely purged of the xenos, leaving the colonisation to progress unimpeded.

>Over the following 100 years. use of the Rhino spread to human military forces. Early commanders adopted the basic chassis design as an armoured fighting vehicle, fitting various weapon systems and augmenting the vehicle's engine power. in time. the Rhino became the standard transport of Mankind's fighting forces. STC systems provided early armies with many Rhino variants still in use today. such as Predators. lmmolators and Whirlwinds. Many other variants are now lost in the depths of time.

Imperial Armour Volume 2 (2004)

>Discovered in the early years of the Age of Technology, Alpha Shalish was originally known as the crimson planet, for it glowed a deep red hue when glimpsed from orbit. Warmed by the energies of two suns, the planet was verdant, rich in both flora and fauna. The pioneers who named Alpha Shalish and marked it for prime conquest did not need to employ any of the atmosphere-fixing wonders invented at that time - neither the oxy-converter, self-sustaining hab-domes, nor ion discharging reactors. There was strong resistance to human colonisation, however,by xenos species whose very type has been lost over the years. Early resistance was rectifed by planet scorching - a slash and burn bombardment that, a decade later when the colonists arrived,left an unpopulated world, ripe for cultivation. The new settlers found ancient xenos ruins predating their arrival by many thousands of years, but these were dozed over and buried beneath their new endeavours. Progress was swift in those days, and expansion was spurred by the discovery of rich mineral mines in the neighbouring systems. As the largest and most inhabitable planet on the clearest Warp route, Alpha Shalish was soon a thriving port world.

6th ed Core Rulebook

But them, certainly, in-universe the characters must talk about this great betrayal, right?

Not really, when in-universe justifications for xenophobia are shown, they are just “Xenos are hostile” and “the Emperor says so”

>Abaddon was not smiling. ‘The Emperor, beloved of all,’ he began, ‘enfranchised us to do his bidding and make known space safe for human habitation. His edicts are unequivocal. We must suffer not the alien, nor the uncontrolled psyker, safeguard against the darkness of the warp, and unify the dislocated pockets of mankind. That is our charge. Anything else is sacrilege against his wishes.’

>(…)

>‘And one of his wishes,’ said Horus, ‘was that I should be Warmaster, his sole regent, and strive to make his dreams reality. The crusade was born out of the Age of Strife, Ezekyle. Born out of war. Our ruthless approach of conquest and cleansing was formulated in a time when every alien form we met was hostile, every fragment of humanity that was not with us was profoundly opposed to us. War was the only answer. There was no room for subtlety, but two centuries have passed, and different problems face us. The bulk of war is over. That is why the Emperor returned to Terra and left us to finish the work. Ezekyle, the people of the interex are clearly not monsters, nor resolute foes. I believe that if the Emperor were with us today, he would immediately embrace the need for adaptation. He would not want us to wantonly destroy that which there is no good reason to destroy. It is precisely to make such choices that he has placed his trust in me.’

Horus Rising (2006)

>I adored them for it. Throne, I wasn’t immune. These weren’t us. These were the aliens, the non-humans, the others. These were what had preyed on us in the years of darkness, who now stood before us and security at last. They were the vermin, the rats in the hold, the disease-carriers. The sooner they were all gone the better.

Sanguinius: the Great Angel (2022)

Indeed, we are told that xenos took advantage of the weakness of mankind, but does it includes any betrayal?

>If humanity's rise was rapid, its fall was equally swift, and the blackness that followed swallowed its very history, leaving only fragments of myths and unfathomable machinery buried amongst ancient ruins. Legend tells of dark ages, lost millennia where Mankind was scoured, its repressed populations enslaved, hunted for pleasure, or worse. Those who survived were little more than superstitious barbarians, feral hunter-gatherers or petty robber barons squatting upon the wonders of a lost era.

>(...)

>Next, Mankind’s unstoppable armies embarked upon a crusade across the stars,reclaiming their lost realm of old, freeing scattered planets from the clutches of alien overlords and restoring lost colonies to former glories across the galaxy. So ended the dark times that came to be known as the Age of Strife.

6th ed Core Rulebook

And them, turns out there are two sources detailing a reasoning for some of the xenos who attack mankind during the Age of Strife, and it is a curious one.

>It was through the application and control of the sciences that such an age was achieved yet, in time, the promised wisdom of technology proved a poisoned well of power for humanity. It is said that Mankind made itself as unto gods, able to harness the power of the stars and fashion servants from clay and iron, infusing them with counterfeit life to slave away as the foundation of humanity’s empire. In time, Mankind strayed too far in its unchecked quest for knowledge, elevating itself not to the divine but rather casting itself down for its reckless excess and insatiable ambitions

>[...]

>As humanity fragmented, hundreds of xenos races and enemies hitherto unknown seized their chance for revenge against humanity for its past conquests or to plunder unprotected worlds and enslave their populations.

Legions Imperialis Rulebook (2023)

>The existence of warp creatures and the dangers they posed to the human mind were then barely understood. On worlds with large concentrations of emergent psykers, the entities from beyond were able to breach the barrier between the Immaterium and corporeal reality, and it cannot be known or guessed how many worlds were ravaged or swallowed whole by their incursions.

>As human civilisation fragmented, hundreds of xenos races and enemies unknown seized their chance for revenge on humanity for its past conquests, or to plunder unprotected worlds and enslave their populations.

-Horus Heresy: Age of Darkness (3.0) (2025)

If I missed a relevant information, tell me.