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How do?

Apologies, but this is a hopefully short mind vomit.

I know Stormcast have their detractors. And fair enough. But, narratively? They set the scene.

In Oldhammer, the non-Chaos Gods had no role. They didn’t do anything, ever. And that world got blown up.

Mere months later, the Stormcast debuted. Sigmarines. Golden Tossers. Call them what you may.

But? They were the first example we had of mortals empowered by a God that wasn’t completely insane. Their gifts are measured, defined, and helpful. Followers of Chaos? Yeah. Your eyes are now Weasels. Because it’s a gift! Doesn’t matter the bestower has less of an idea of what might be helpful than your Great, Great Granny buying you an album. You’re eyes are now Weasels, and don’t you dare complain.

The Stormcast are the first examples of those that follow a deity that actually thinks about things. And that seriously changed the dynamic of the background, for better or worse (my opinion doesn’t overrule other opinions and that). No longer is it Plucky McPluckyson,5’4” with some steel against the souped up degenerates of the Chaos Gods. Oh no. Now, it’s Beefy McBeeferson, and his fellow super charged mates breaking face.

Like it or not, but I feel they help make the setting work better.

The difference that I note is that in the old world it was normal people vs the chaos gods. There was a dark feel ... a feeling of hopelessness. We didn't have superheroes to save us. We didn't live in a D&D 5e world.

Now, the warhammer world is dead, and the new warhammer world is a D&D 5e world where you play the super heroes vs the dark gods (and additionally have a leg up on them rules-wise currently)

Does that make them narratively important?

I suppose to set the scene that the world is now about super hero protagonists yes.

And just like how people disliked classic D&D because they couldn't be super heroes until later in the game, so too the tabletop miniatures playerbase latched on to always being a super hero from step one as well.

It was one of the unique things about Warhammer that the real power, the real Gods, were inscrutable and insane, and as likely to turn you into a horrific spawn as they were to make you transcend your humanity.

The struggle against them by the other forces was all the more compelling because they could not rely on divine intervention, and to be fair, neither could the Chaos Warriors, because as you say, they could just be arbitrarily mutated.

I am fine with the new setting being this sort of weird planescape-esque high fantasy place. I think it can be cool. But the Stormcast are a pretty boring and blatant Space Marine copy and I don't think they are as cool or interesting as the Space Marines are. I would be more interested in them as pitiless "Daemons" of Order who are just as bad as the Chaos Gods, or an army of Golems under the control of some inscrutable master.

Fantasy did not need a space marine analogue. But hey, apparently I am a dumbass who does not understand the market, because loads of people love them and obviously enjoy having fantasy space marines to play with.

The old non-Chaos gods did stuff. Warrior priest of Sigmar prayed to Sigmar and got to light poor, unsuspecting zombies on fire as a result. Morr, while not relevant in the game, had background snippets about helping mortals successfully fight undead. Usirian turned Prince Apophas into a heap of beetles. Maybe not the most savory example, but it's still better than weasels for eyes. The gods of Nehekhara in general weren't particularly active themselves, but bestowed their powers on the Nehekharan priesthood. Asuryan judged princes, Vaul made magical artifacts for the elves, Khaine certainly seemed to bestow power on some elves, the blessings of that hussy Brettonians prayed to were tangible, and so on.

The difference to the Chaos gods is that it's usually temporary boons that may or may not be worth writing home about. It's not as blatant and graphic as lolweaseleyes. It also establishes a contrast between the worship of Chaos and other gods, with the former acting on moments of glory while the latter demand long periods of dedication.

Sigmarines are really just Chaos Warriors of Order, devoid of any and all subtlety. Instead of murder powers or disease powers they get lightning powers, because that relates to the realm their god laid claim to. There's no functional difference between the Sigmar and the Chaos gods, they're using the same means to impose their order on the world and screw over their rivals in the process.

Sigmarines are without a doubt narratively important. The way Age of Sigmar's background is written, people can't tie their shoelaces without the help of Sigmarines. They're very important to the tone of the setting because they establish that you can either fight Chaos successfully because you're a Sigmarine or you can't because you're everyone else. Age of Sigmar's setting as it was presented to us from the start would be unthinkable without Sigmarines.

I wish chaos warriors were as good as sigmarines.

I was originally uninterested in the Stormcast faction, but after reading a book or two around the Soul Wars I started to warm up to them. Despite being the heroes of the setting they feel tragic at the same time. Slowly losing themselves every time they are reforged, their past lives but a small glimmer in the back of their mind at best.

Well it's true the Stormcast are the perfect example not just the Chaos gods can make their own otherworldly soldiers. In Old Battle's world, you have to admit that only the Chaos gods have their own dedicated troops that aren't mortals. Which was a bit weird since other gods clearly existed and in the old RPG, they had their own immortal servants.

But narratively, I'm not sure the Stormcast are that important. I mean, sure they're strong and can be deployed nearly anywhere by Sigmar's hand, but you could have replace them with any mortal army using a shenanigan way to go where they are needed (Realmgates are such shenanigans, by the way).

And I'll be honest, I never took seriously all the drama they're making about the Reforging, like they were "losing a part of themselves everytime they die". Well, it still beats truly dying and become some nightmarish horror in the hands of Nagash, to me. The fact they keep implying Stormcast die so often also lessens the "hero amongst heroes" status they should have given their background. Yes, it means they are used in the deadliest battles mortals can't hope to win, sure, but still.

To me, you can have much more weight by focusing on mortals, since what they can lose is way more in comparison to any other Stormcast. The horrors are greater the lower on the ladder you are.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
How do?

Apologies, but this is a hopefully short mind vomit.

Never apologize for an opinion. While I may not agree, I respect it and hopefully you would respect mine, so no need to apologize.

I know Stormcast have their detractors. And fair enough. But, narratively? They set the scene.

I don't believe it is. There is no need for Stormcast Eternals. Age of Sigmar was just a lazy attempt to sell Fantasy Marines. GW didn't want any effort put into it.
If GW actually put some effort into the new fantasy setting it could be done. Stormcast Eternals could have become an army, but it should never have been Fantasy marines. Just makes Age of Sigmar and 40K more boring for me. It would be nice for difference. At least Fantasy Battles and 40K were different, just the races were sort of the same. But now, they are almost the same, just one is fantasy sci fi, and the other is high fantasy. The "good guys" are knights with giant shoulder pads, battling the Chaos gods and what ever else.

In Oldhammer, the non-Chaos Gods had no role. They didn’t do anything, ever. And that world got blown up.

I don't understand. Mind you I hardly know anything about Warhammer Fantasy, but what about the non Chaos gods? Just because the world got blown up doesn't mean that Fantasy Space marines were needed. With so much rich lore, a new univers could have been made. Again, lazy writing that took what, 4 days to make? Shame really.

Mere months later, the Stormcast debuted. Sigmarines. Golden Tossers. Call them what you may.

I use to call them that. Someone got upset, and I thought, why disrespect what they like, so I stopped and call them Stormcast Eternals now.

But? They were the first example we had of mortals empowered by a God that wasn’t completely insane. Their gifts are measured, defined, and helpful. Followers of Chaos? Yeah. Your eyes are now Weasels. Because it’s a gift! Doesn’t matter the bestower has less of an idea of what might be helpful than your Great, Great Granny buying you an album. You’re eyes are now Weasels, and don’t you dare complain.

Ah, but is Sigmar sain? I say he is a coward. A false god who is scared and he hides behind his troops that he kidnaps and violates. (not to upset anyone, this is the way I view it. Not saying it's fact.)

[spoiler]
The Stormcast are the first examples of those that follow a deity that actually thinks about things. And that seriously changed the dynamic of the background, for better or worse (my opinion doesn’t overrule other opinions and that). No longer is it Plucky McPluckyson,5’4” with some steel against the souped up degenerates of the Chaos Gods. Oh no. Now, it’s Beefy McBeeferson, and his fellow super charged mates breaking face.

Do they really? I thought they were mind wiped, but not a perfect mind wipe. So a bit different from "good guy" space marine, but becoming a chaos space marine with independent thought. Of course I can be wrong since I don't have any books that update the Stormcasts, so haven't kept up to date with the fluff.

Like it or not, but I feel they help make the setting work better.

I don't really like it, but it has become more bearable. I still believe they don't make the setting work at all better. The way I see it they are just mindless warriors that are conditioned to be told what they do, by a god who is a coward. Again, my opinion only, not saying it's fact, but that is what I do to make Age of Sigmar more bearable for me.

Again, not saying you are wrong, love a good debate, and I respect your opinion. I just respectfully disagree with it. Love to hear your counter arguments.

 Eldarsif wrote:
I was originally uninterested in the Stormcast faction, but after reading a book or two around the Soul Wars I started to warm up to them. Despite being the heroes of the setting they feel tragic at the same time. Slowly losing themselves every time they are reforged, their past lives but a small glimmer in the back of their mind at best.

The idea behind them has potential. I don't know about Black Library but I wish the main studio didn't focus so much on the punchy stuff in army books and actually engaged in world building. The current book struck me as pretty uninteresting for learning about their character and culture and too invested in telling you how exactly this or that unit is awesome at beating things to death.

My hope is that as the Age of Sigmar progresses we see Stormcast starting to fail and other factions rise to the front lines against Chaos. Lets not forget one of the strengths of stormcast is they don't (outside of very specific situations) die; they just get remade. An army of the dead that cannot be stopped that is continually remade and recruiting new faithful - an infinite army.


All ready to fall to a God's Madness against Chaos as more and more of their humanity is stripped away and they are left more hollow and filled only with their rising seething hatred of all things Chaos. A burning hatred so strong they can and have already burned thousands and crushed the innocent under their metal boots to prevent any Chaos uprising.



Indeed one might see a time that even their most staunch allies could turn on them. Especially once the forces of Chaos are beaten back enough that the regular mortals of the Realms can rise to hold the line on their own. When they no longer "need" the Stormcast; when enough generations have passed that only the oldest aelf can remember the times of Chaos. Whilst generations of humans know only their own power; only their own growing fear of Sigmar's legions.



And that's without forgetting that whilst Chaos was crushing much, they didn't rule all, some forces survived the Age of Chaos, often in isolation. They might well rise up in time. Forming new alliances and pushing for their own territories.





I think Stormcast at launch were a cheap shot at marines, but they've got story potential to be much more than just marine copy-cats. I also think it will get stronger as a setting as other factions rise up and take up mantels.

GW has gotten much better about writing in the flaws of Stormcast. Some of the novels and short stories are really, really good with that. But even at the start they did have their issues, and they did fail. Especially whenever Archaon showed up and continued to be everything Abbadon wishes he was. I like them being in the setting. One of the things I disliked about the Old World was that it seemed to want to say non-Chaos gods were nonexistent and impotent while at the same time having their effect be very tangible on their followers. AoS has dispensed with that strange element and simply laid out that the non-Chaos gods are there, doing stuff, and still vastly weaker than the Chaos gods. The theme that they must work together to win is still there, and that the innate insanity and self-consumption of Chaos is the only thing which prevents them from mopping the floor with all opposition in short order.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 auticus wrote:
I wish chaos warriors were as good as sigmarines.

Basic Chaos Warriors (the unit) are on similar footing to Liberators, at least.

That was part of the lure of Chaos, that the gods were not "dead" and would give you boons and blessings you could see around you and upon your own body. The idea was that the big lure of Chaos was this instant mortal gratification of power and wealth and status and such. Meanwhile the good gods offered more background protections and more after-life benefits. Things that, unless you were atop priest, you'd likely not see save for a priest laying hands to cure ills - which in a world of magic you might deduce is just a magical spell and nothing "gold". At least not compared to the Chaos God of Change who offers you magical powers you can use right now, way beyond those weak priests with their silly chants to a weak god.


AoS has powerful gods so the draw to Chaos is less, indeed thus far we've not actually seen so much corruption as we have more conquest. Chaos is most certainly still corrupting, but it seems to be more presented (at least in the AoS era) as more that chaos just has huge established legions to work with at present.

It is still true though, none of the other gods simply gift power directly. And the temptation of power, for many, if worth the risk of weasel-eyes. Which having typed out I really want to convert now.

Even Sigmar doesn't gift it. Stormcast have to give up their afterlife and their full independence to become Stormcast. Whilst its shown that they can fall from grace and love and have some degree of autonomy, its also shown that they are very much "his" servants. They are almost akin to Demons in that they embody a part of Sigmar within themselves and the more they are reforged the more that that is all which is left to them.

The Everqueen is almost similar, but more resigned to her Dyrads and groves alone. In fact her bond is so strong that as Nurgle corrupted her forests he corrupted her as well, sending her into a spiralling depression that he festered and feasted upon for hundreds of years. Even now she appears to not be as strong as Sigmar and, whilst she's fighting back, she's still far from retaken her realm - much of which is still rotten.

Stormcast are narratively important because they are made to specifically to counter Sigmar's enemies. They are a manifestation of Sigmar's frustration at his defeats and his hope for a brighter future.

At the beginning of the age of chaos(near end of the age of myth), the mortal armies fought hard against chaos. But so great and sudden was the chaos invasion that the mortals were easily overwhelmed. Chaos cultist rose up in the countless trillions, realmgates exploded outwards to release daemon legion after daemon legion and perhaps most terrifyingly, the exalted grand marshal of the apocalypse had come to the realms.

Mortals must eat, sleep and grow tired during battle. And so they fought and they died in the trillions and trillions. faced with doom, the God-king's people prayed to him for salvation. And Sigmar answered, he descended upon the servants of the dark gods and hurled them back. But Sigmar could only be in one place at once, for every battle he won, he lost a hundred more. In the end he lost his hammer.


Sigmar put everything he learned from his defeats into the creation of his stormcast. They are an extremely powerful war-machine, capable of being used a blunt weapon and at the same time,they are flexible. From Liberators who can rival Chaos Warriors, to rangers that can turn into wind and cross entire mountain ranges in moments, to warrior mystics and wizards who can banish ghost. Sigmar thought this through, he made an army that could fight on multiple fronts and that can walk into hell, fight devils and win.

Another thing about stormcast is that they have personal motivations for fighting, they lived full lives. Many of them were normal people that lost everything to chaos(and nagash when it comes to the "anvils of the heldenhammer"). From kings and knights to farmers and traders.

The Stormcast are naratively important because the entire game and all of what passed as background at launch was designed to sell stormcast armies.

At launch Stormcasts were effectively Thousand Sons, they were blanks except for the higher ranking members. The releams were a knock off of planescape.and MTG that existed purely so the Sigmarines had somewhere to fight.

Thankfully AoS bombed at launch and everything got a soft reboot.

 Eldarsif wrote:
I was originally uninterested in the Stormcast faction, but after reading a book or two around the Soul Wars I started to warm up to them. Despite being the heroes of the setting they feel tragic at the same time. Slowly losing themselves every time they are reforged, their past lives but a small glimmer in the back of their mind at best.

I definitely agree. I don’t like the golden aesthetic (they look waaaay better in the alternate color schemes) but they have a neat background.

They’re all like Beric Dondarrion.

 Overread wrote:
My hope is that as the Age of Sigmar progresses we see Stormcast starting to fail and other factions rise to the front lines against Chaos. Lets not forget one of the strengths of stormcast is they don't (outside of very specific situations) die; they just get remade. An army of the dead that cannot be stopped that is continually remade and recruiting new faithful - an infinite army.


All ready to fall to a God's Madness against Chaos as more and more of their humanity is stripped away and they are left more hollow and filled only with their rising seething hatred of all things Chaos. A burning hatred so strong they can and have already burned thousands and crushed the innocent under their metal boots to prevent any Chaos uprising.



Indeed one might see a time that even their most staunch allies could turn on them. Especially once the forces of Chaos are beaten back enough that the regular mortals of the Realms can rise to hold the line on their own. When they no longer "need" the Stormcast; when enough generations have passed that only the oldest aelf can remember the times of Chaos. Whilst generations of humans know only their own power; only their own growing fear of Sigmar's legions.



And that's without forgetting that whilst Chaos was crushing much, they didn't rule all, some forces survived the Age of Chaos, often in isolation. They might well rise up in time. Forming new alliances and pushing for their own territories.





I think Stormcast at launch were a cheap shot at marines, but they've got story potential to be much more than just marine copy-cats. I also think it will get stronger as a setting as other factions rise up and take up mantels.

I like that. I like that a lot. I can imagine that being the case at one point. Itd be a good way to introduce real human armies while no special characters exist yet. The time that has passed should not affect any non mortal too much, and can explain why we havent yet seem a freeguild book (until now, I guess)

But at the moment AoS is just straight up trash.

I would be more interested in them as pitiless "Daemons" of Order who are just as bad as the Chaos Gods

And that's why I say people who are into Grimdark have no imagination. They just can't imagine a setting where everyone isn't smeared in gak and eating gak and having constant gak-rains fall on them.

Cronch wrote:

I would be more interested in them as pitiless "Daemons" of Order who are just as bad as the Chaos Gods

And that's why I say people who are into Grimdark have no imagination. They just can't imagine a setting where everyone isn't smeared in gak and eating gak and having constant gak-rains fall on them.

That seems mean. I can just as easily claim people who don't like grimdark are dumb because they can't imagine anything where things aren't exactly what they seem and clear cut and nice.

I'm new to this whole universe so maybe I don't "get" it but here's my impression...

Everything that happened at End Times and beyond seems to lack love. I wasn't all that keen on the Warhammer Fantasy universe before-hand (finding 40K a little more compelling in my position from the side-lines) but it was unambiguously a universe written with a lot of love and had the great craftsmanship of a story that is told through game-play as well as through literature.

Sigmarines seem to be the result of impersonal market research rather than real, creative drive. It seems like somebody concluded that Sigmarines would increase sales by some respectable percentage and then built a story around that conclusion -- rather than crafting a universe that would be fun to play in and let the factions and model designs emerge naturally from there.

When it's said that "sigmarines must exist in order to have the current narrative landscape," I consider that incontestably true because the story was built around the desire to sell models with a paldron fetish.

There is some contention on whether the grimdark way of the old setting is better than this contemporary Marvel movie feel. I honestly believe either tone could work fine _provided_ the story is crafted with heart. Because the setting isn't crafted with love, I think the old guard is probably misdiagnosing the current soullessness of the world by blaming the new Saturday morning cartoon flavor.

I came to Warhammer as a refugee from Legend of the Five Rings which always had a theme of mortal men rising to confront divine powers and I loved it. That was _because_ the story was written intelligently and passionately and told primarily through game-play.

When I sit down to a game of Underworlds (the only non-Blood Bowl game from GW I'll play), and I break out one of my many Sigmarine warbands, these are the things I notice:
1) There are a lot of Sigmarine warbands. Why are they so numerous? Is it because Sigmar "reforges" them so often that the population is just that high? If so, why isn't there a game mechanic that insinuates this?
2) Their mechanics are a tad on the boring side. They're just psychotically tough and accurate and do a lot of damage. That's their thing. Sometimes, they also change the dice you roll under the guise of "magic" but the resulting game-play is the same either way.

I don't understand what makes Sigmarines people or what makes them even non-human as the act of reforging may scar them and deplete them of their humanity. These are fine concepts but the mechanics don't reinforce this in any obvious way so it just ends up making their game-play feel sterile and wholly uninterested in making a home in the story/narrative. When the very characters in the universe can't be bothered to engage the story, why should I?

The mechanics don't tell me much about their personality, ambitions, or values. Contrast this with the concept of "Dakka" where Orkz will roll a squick-ton of dice but each die may have a low probability of landing a "hit." This is a beautiful example of storytelling through game-play: You _feel_ the high rate of fire, low precision personality of Da Boyz when you play the game.

I don't think the fundamentals of what's going on in AoS are bad. Maybe I only think that because I'm still something of an outsider. But I do think that not enough effort has been made to showcase the merits that may exist for this storyverse's premise.

 ishpeck wrote:
I'm new to this whole universe so maybe I don't "get" it but here's my impression...

Everything that happened at End Times and beyond seems to lack love. I wasn't all that keen on the Warhammer Fantasy universe before-hand (finding 40K a little more compelling in my position from the side-lines) but it was unambiguously a universe written with a lot of love and had the great craftsmanship of a story that is told through game-play as well as through literature.

Sigmarines seem to be the result of impersonal market research rather than real, creative drive. It seems like somebody concluded that Sigmarines would increase sales by some respectable percentage and then built a story around that conclusion -- rather than crafting a universe that would be fun to play in and let the factions and model designs emerge naturally from there.

When it's said that "sigmarines must exist in order to have the current narrative landscape," I consider that incontestably true because the story was built around the desire to sell models with a paldron fetish.

There is some contention on whether the grimdark way of the old setting is better than this contemporary Marvel movie feel. I honestly believe either tone could work fine _provided_ the story is crafted with heart. Because the setting isn't crafted with love, I think the old guard is probably misdiagnosing the current soullessness of the world by blaming the new Saturday morning cartoon flavor.

I came to Warhammer as a refugee from Legend of the Five Rings which always had a theme of mortal men rising to confront divine powers and I loved it. That was _because_ the story was written intelligently and passionately and told primarily through game-play.

When I sit down to a game of Underworlds (the only non-Blood Bowl game from GW I'll play), and I break out one of my many Sigmarine warbands, these are the things I notice:
1) There are a lot of Sigmarine warbands. Why are they so numerous? Is it because Sigmar "reforges" them so often that the population is just that high? If so, why isn't there a game mechanic that insinuates this?
2) Their mechanics are a tad on the boring side. They're just psychotically tough and accurate and do a lot of damage. That's their thing. Sometimes, they also change the dice you roll under the guise of "magic" but the resulting game-play is the same either way.

I don't understand what makes Sigmarines people or what makes them even non-human as the act of reforging may scar them and deplete them of their humanity. These are fine concepts but the mechanics don't reinforce this in any obvious way so it just ends up making their game-play feel sterile and wholly uninterested in making a home in the story/narrative. When the very characters in the universe can't be bothered to engage the story, why should I?

The mechanics don't tell me much about their personality, ambitions, or values. Contrast this with the concept of "Dakka" where Orkz will roll a squick-ton of dice but each die may have a low probability of landing a "hit." This is a beautiful example of storytelling through game-play: You _feel_ the high rate of fire, low precision personality of Da Boyz when you play the game.

I don't think the fundamentals of what's going on in AoS are bad. Maybe I only think that because I'm still something of an outsider. But I do think that not enough effort has been made to showcase the merits that may exist for this storyverse's premise.

I think that pretty much hits the nail on the head quite eloquently.

Contrast this with the concept of "Dakka" where Orkz will roll a squick-ton of dice but each die may have a low probability of landing a "hit."

But Stormcast are demigods (2W basic) clad in heavy armor (4+ with reroll of 1 for basic dudes), whose basic tactics are keeping a shieldwall up (Liberators soaking up wounds and capturing objecives in game) while more specialized warriors deal with other threats (each type of Paladin has unique ability that synergizes with the whole army at some levele). Their on-table abilities tell of their basic purpose perfectly. If anything, more accurately than just equating orkz with dakka. I have no clue how it looks now in 8th ed, but I remember orkz used to be the butt of many jokes, because for an army of blood-hungry barbarian warriors who love to chop foes down, they had some of the worst CC abilities in the game.

No offense, but it seems to me you decided to read a quick lore recap, and never bother looking into the actual BL books or battletomes.

I found that I liked Stormcast much more after beginning a Skirmish warband, where I made it a point to replace every helmet with a bare head, and buy all the ones I can find with no helmet. Suddenly they didn't look like Fantasy Cybermen, but just freakishly large people, with personality.

They seem more space mariney to me on account of the small looking heads.

SC are slowly getting less boring in the fluff but there’s still miles to go.

pm713 wrote:
They seem more space mariney to me on account of the small looking heads.

If it's my minis you are commenting on, everyone I have shown them to locally actually think the Space Marine heads are actually more realistic on Stormcast bodies than on the proportionally tiny Space Marine bodies. After things like Primaris and Stormcast, Space Marines look like bobblehead figures (on top of the long gorilla arms).

Stormcast really suffered from the crazy over the top antics of things like the Realmgate novels, where they did things like climb cliffs for three days with no rest, or march for a week straight. It's possible to be more humanized and still remain heroic.

I like to see them as something more like the Knights Radiant from the Brian Sanderson Stormlight novels.

On examination I suspect my impression of the Stormcast in general as a band of context-less murder-hobos whose lore exists as an excuse to have shining angelic badasses show up from the sky, beat up all the bad guys, and vanish without having to deal with anything as un-badass as "backstory", "personality", "consequences of ones actions", or "caring about anything other than killing bad things" is probably a consequence of how GW writes army books. The endless repetitive rhapsodic descriptions of how badass (this person) happens to be that blend together into a soup of over-the-top marketing language also killed any respect I had for 40k Space Marines; I like the 30k lore better because it's written like history books instead of like a marketing brochure and the novels are better.

I should go find a Sigmar novel or two and see if there are actual people in them instead of the cartoonish cardboard cutouts in the army books.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 AegisGrimm wrote:
...I like to see them as something more like the Knights Radiant from the Brian Sanderson Stormlight novels.

The Knights Radiant are people who chose to take an oath and who have personalities and lives before they gained shiny magic badass powers (I mean, except for the ones whose powers started showing up when they were small children), and they aren't part of an army with a unified command structure with a god giving strategic direction. To borrow the First Ideal it's a matter of journey before destination; the Knights Radiant are governed by a set of principles and interestingness, conflict, and drama is created by what they choose to do with those principles, but the Stormcast are defined by a set of actions rather than ideals/principles and come across as inhuman automata because the focus is on what they do rather than why.

The Stormcast also have a god on their side giving direction while the Knights Radiant don't have a sophisticated understanding of the nature of the universe and are sort of scrambling in the dark.

I don't think the Stormcast 'detractors' were against them on the basis that they weren't 'narratively important', were they? By far the greater complaint was that they changed the narrative into one that people weren't as interested in.

For me, I didn't like that it shifted the focus away from a sense of how people actually lived. The pseudo-medieval cities of the Old World were exaggerated, but there were still ordinary people living their lives. Sometimes (often) those lives were interrupted by war against vastly superior foes, and the sacrifices that had to be made to overcome those challenges carried a sense of pathos.

Now, those narratives don't really exist. Ordinary people have become invisible in the setting, though I'm keen to see how that changes with Cities of Sigmar. But in general, stories of heroic sacrifice are difficult to tell when you can end conflicts by summoning an endlessly-recycling army of gilded lightning-demons to bash the feth out of the enemy.

 AnomanderRake wrote:
On examination I suspect my impression of the Stormcast in general as a band of context-less murder-hobos whose lore exists as an excuse to have shining angelic badasses show up from the sky, beat up all the bad guys, and vanish without having to deal with anything as un-badass as "backstory", "personality", "consequences of ones actions", or "caring about anything other than killing bad things" is probably a consequence of how GW writes army books. The endless repetitive rhapsodic descriptions of how badass (this person) happens to be that blend together into a soup of over-the-top marketing language also killed any respect I had for 40k Space Marines; I like the 30k lore better because it's written like history books instead of like a marketing brochure and the novels are better.

I should go find a Sigmar novel or two and see if there are actual people in them instead of the cartoonish cardboard cutouts in the army books.


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 AegisGrimm wrote:
...I like to see them as something more like the Knights Radiant from the Brian Sanderson Stormlight novels.

The Knights Radiant are people who chose to take an oath and who have personalities and lives before they gained shiny magic badass powers (I mean, except for the ones whose powers started showing up when they were small children), and they aren't part of an army with a unified command structure with a god giving strategic direction. To borrow the First Ideal it's a matter of journey before destination; the Knights Radiant are governed by a set of principles and interestingness, conflict, and drama is created by what they choose to do with those principles, but the Stormcast are defined by a set of actions rather than ideals/principles and come across as inhuman automata because the focus is on what they do rather than why.

The Stormcast also have a god on their side giving direction while the Knights Radiant don't have a sophisticated understanding of the nature of the universe and are sort of scrambling in the dark.

Sorry, I meant Knights Radiant more like Dalinar's visions of the past, where they were at their heroic apex, dropping from the sky into a settlement, armor and weapons glowing with Stormlight, existing to help protect the smallfolk from the monsters in the night. Back when they were a dedicated force with a command structure, etc., even if things happen later in the books to change some of the context of the Knights of the past.

I've decided in my personal Skirmish games (the best place to do so) that they are going to be represented much more like that. More of a Legion of low-level Superheroes in magical armor who have pledged themselves to Sigmar as Paladins/Clerics and been granted superhuman martial gifts and heroic stature. Less like they are just fantasy Space Marines or Clone Troopers where most of them are faceless Order versions of Chaos warriors led by the couple fleshed-out heroes. The majority of Stormcast presented by GW are horribly 2-Dimensional.

I have even thought about changing the storyline of the Realms in my personal games (I only have a small crew to play with, not a game club) to have the Age of Sigmar happen just after the Age of Chaos starts to ramp up, rather than after the total dominion of Chaos for hundreds of years. Sigmar sees the coming storm, and to stop it, and unlike the official storyline, he decides to be proactive, so he sends his Stormcast to all the Realms among the people to be heroic ideals for the free folk to form up around, rather than a faceless horde of golden troops being hammered against tides of Chaos forces. But the process of reforging and soul-loss still gives the Superheroes the dark and tragic undercurrent that Warhammer is based upon.

Frankly, I think it's the Chaos side of things that makes the Realms hard to relate to and forces the Stormcast to be what they are (narratively). Instead of crumbling old kingdoms who are suffering in recession from how the time of Myth ended when all the Gods broke their alliance and started feuding across the Realms, we instead have every realm looking like the Chaos Wastes or planets in the Eye of Terror, with crop fields "salted" with the gore of thousands, deserts made of ground bonemeal, and lakes of blood or bile. Giant festering pimples that erupt like volcanoes? Endless waterfalls of blood? It's a Flanderization of Chaos that in the old world didn't fully happen outside of the Chaos Wastes, it was only hinted at for drama. Stormcast ended up being the "Good" version of that Flanderization, and are super,super awesome cool and all things badass instead of just Humans 2.0.