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In the past lmperial beastmen were a thing in 40K and the have recently reappeared in Necromunda. Could something similar exist in AOS? I don't remember any mentions of non-chaos aligned beastmen in FB (though I might be wrong) and I am not that familiar with AOS fluff. If one wanted to have such a thing in the Mortal Realms what would be the best way to justify them?

No. Beastmen in FB/AoS are always Chaos related.

 Kanluwen wrote:
No. Beastmen in FB/AoS are always Chaos related.

Could you elaborate? Sure, their origins are related to chaos, but they're mortals, not daemons. Don't they have free will? Cannot they forsake chaos?

I was thinking something like beastmen mercenaries employed by some of the free cities in Ghur.

They're closer to Daemons than they are Mortals truthfully. They embody Chaos. They cannot exist without Chaos being involved. They're not a species that can naturally propagate(unless that's been retconned) and divorcing them from Chaos would be like the Elves divorcing themselves from their pointy ears or Dwarfs from their beards.

They run wild, they despise civilization and order in all of its forms and they basically exist to further the aims of Chaos.

Add to it that there's a lot of mutual enmity between them and the factions of Order and even the idea of "beastmen mercenaries" would fall flat on its face for anyone but the forces of Chaos.

FB had mentions of more civilized beastmen looking things like catmen, monkeymen and snakemen living in the eastern parts of the warhammer world.

Dunno about AoS but what I've come to understand, is that it's built in a way to enable EVERY SINGLE POSSIBILITY to happen in some extent, somewhere, at some point in time. So that geedubs has an endless source to mine for more plastic tat.

So go forge that narrative.

Morgasm the Powerfull wrote:
FB had mentions of more civilized beastmen looking things like catmen, monkeymen and snakemen living in the eastern parts of the warhammer world.

Those weren't "beastmen" in the same way as the Chaos Beastmen. They were naturally occurring species, like Lizardmen.

 Crimson wrote:
If one wanted to have such a thing in the Mortal Realms what would be the best way to justify them?

Off the top of my head... People living under the yoke of Chaos during the long years before Sigmar sent the stormcast out to reclaim it all? Corrupted in body by the taint of Chaos in the land but not in heart?

I had something similar as my excuse to have centaur wild riders and sisters of the thorn, anyway.

Actually, now that I think about it that theme is visited in the backstory of every army I've made in AoS, lol.

Alternatively, some uncontacted tribe from the far fringe of the realm of life, beasts, or anywhere other than death?

Thats strictly a lore idea, mind. Doesn't suddenly allow you to take beastmen with stormcast buddies.

If you want to make them then make them.

 Captain Joystick wrote:

Off the top of my head... People living under the yoke of Chaos during the long years before Sigmar sent the stormcast out to reclaim it all? Corrupted in body by the taint of Chaos in the land but not in heart?

I had something similar as my excuse to have centaur wild riders and sisters of the thorn, anyway.

Actually, now that I think about it that theme is visited in the backstory of every army I've made in AoS, lol.

Alternatively, some uncontacted tribe from the far fringe of the realm of life, beasts, or anywhere other than death?

Thats strictly a lore idea, mind. Doesn't suddenly allow you to take beastmen with stormcast buddies.

Yeah, this was just lore musings for a possible RPG thing. But yeah, I think it might work. In AOS humans seem to be pretty tolerant to all sorts of weird creatures, so whilst such beastmen would probably be mistrusted, it might be possible to imagine a situation where there wasn't a 'kill on sight' policy...

The issue being that it's not a case of "mistrusting" mutants like it is in 40k. These aren't a subspecies of humanity caused by environmental circumstances/exposure like the Beastmen in the Imperium. These are twisted monstrosities created by the taint of Chaos, with a spiteful and vindictive nature.

They hate anything that isn't Beastmen. They raid, they kill, they pillage, they torture, and they maim. They do it because they can and because the things they go after are(in their mind) "untainted" and they do it because they are tainted. They know they're hideous, they know they're unwanted, they know that they're considered nothing more than animals.

Yeah, but no. I mean, that's WHF lore. Now in AoS we have Dark Elves and High Elves quite happily working together. Along with Witch Elves (sorry, "Aelves") who worship Khaine - which has literally been explained as an aspect of Khorne. But they're all okay. Because "Order". So clearly, rather a lot has changed.

 Azazelx wrote:
Yeah, but no. I mean, that's WHF lore. Now in AoS we have Dark Elves and High Elves quite happily working together. Along with Witch Elves (sorry, "Aelves") who worship Khaine - which has literally been explained as an aspect of Khorne. But they're all okay. Because "Order". So clearly, rather a lot has changed.

We don't actually have Dark Elves and Witch Elves "quite happily working together". Their subfactions don't mesh for the most part.
I'd also like you to cite a source about Khaine "being an aspect of Khorne".


Additionally, the Idoneth and Sylvaneth are/were extremely hostile towards outsiders yet still fall under "Order" because they have civilizations and oppose Chaos. The only "good" Elves that Idoneth, for example, are aligned with are the Wanderers(Wood Elves) and Eldritch Council(Swordmasters, Archmages, and Loremasters).

The only time I can think of Khaine being part of Khorne is in 40k where a Khornate talks about how Khaine is just another name for Khorne. But IIRC the Fantasy pantheons are pretty different to 40k aside from the names.