Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Nice, thank you!

Will have to pick that one up I think.

Do it. It's a remarkably good book. The plot is nothing special for a Warhammer book, on paper, but the prose is well put together and before I knew it the book slid down like a tasty meal.

 catbarf wrote:
I feel like the discussion of darker or more ambiguous Stormcast, as animated suits of armor or faceless warriors losing sense of self, misses the forest for the trees. The core purpose of Stormcast is to be unambiguously good supermen. They're Space Marines cosplaying Warcraft, with all the atavistic morally rough edges of the Space Marine concept sanded off. All the lore wringing some pathos out of the Golden Jesus Legion is purely post hoc.

If having blatantly obvious Good Guys weren't the corporate requirement behind the creation of the Stormcast in the first place, they wouldn't have needed Stormcast to begin with.

Dark Souls is a good reference point, as I would argue the cultural impact of that franchise reflects that the average zoomer doesn't actually need a goody two-shoes golden man to identify with. Antiheroes are popular; it's always struck me as a little out of touch that GW felt they couldn't sell their fantasy franchise without squeaky clean heroes.

I think they certainly initially intended them to be heroic good guys. But that wasn't very popular so I think they started to try and backdate some grimdark in there. I'm not sure why they thought they needed them to be super good guys either, given that Space Marines are insanely popular and they're obviously not good guys. I have to say I thought the "oooh, I'm losing my humanity" thing to be really hackneyed and not very interesting. It's too ambiguous and nebulous for it to create any real stakes for me.

I expect the new and improved Stormcast will be even more Space Marine like now. Which to be honest I'm also not very interested in. When I am talking about that stuff I'm talking about what I would have found cool, not really what I think GW were going for or even what I think in a business sense they should have gone for.

It's not really that ambiguous. It's laid out in the battletomes and displayed in full effect in the novels. Anything seems nebulous when you only know it from social media.

Stormcast are not "super good". Not as a whole. Their Stormhosts vary a fair deal. The Knights Excelsior take an infamously Imperius-esque black and white stance to evil, while some like the Hallowed Knights try to be genuinely pure-hearted. The main thing though is that all of them will fight to the death (again, and again...) for the sake of the innocents behind Sigmar's walls.

They are good compared to Space Marines, but Space Marines are horrifically abused and mentally maimed child soldiers who are put through hellish indoctrination and training until their brains are full of hate for any dissident or non-human. Stormcast, in and of themselves, are just people. Decent people chosen for a selfless heart, but wildly varying beyond that, with some being cold as ice and some being maverick wildcards.

I hated SCE when AoS launched, because yeah, first impressions sure were bad on day 1. It was a disastrous launch. No sugarcoating it. At some point late in second edition, though, I happened upon a youtube video by chance (I believe it was DawnStir's lighthearted SCE examylis - presented with plenty of good humour, but displaying the lore fairly and with receipts) and I realised that honestly, from a pure lore perspective, I significantly prefer Stormcast to Space Marines.

While the whole reforging and such was a bit limiting to people making back stories for their own bands or forces, it also added a really tragic aspect too.

One of the project I started and never finished was to say "what if Sigmar ran out of 'good guys', and needed more boots on the ground?" He started taking anyone, bad, good, grey, and to ensure they fought the good fight, he enforced his will on them.

This left some stormcast with this overwhelming desire to help and save people, but with all the memories and feelings of the past atrocities they have done, making them almost suicidal in their urges to fight, so that each reforging washes away more and more of their tarnished past.

I'm not the best guy to talk to about Space Marine comparisons because I think modern space marines are fairly boring and bad too. They're too powerful and it removes any sense of drama or tension from stories involving them. I liked them better when they were less over the top. And less physically massive, too!

To me, Stormcast exaggerate those negative aspects of Space Marines rather than diminish them. And at least Space Marines are saved by the fact that they're obviously so stunted mentally that you could almost feel sorry for them, whereas Stormcast don't really have that aspect - just really cool dudes who are really big and strong with lightning magic and this reforging thing for pathos.

And like again, I don't get how it's so bad to be reforged and lose a little bit when 1) you are already super strong and tough, so you're pretty likely not to die compared to a normal person. and 2) said normal people will lose absolutely everything when they die, and will not come back at all.

My sense of drama immediately swings towards the normals in this scenario because they have far more to lose and are far more likely to lose it fighting against these awful threats. Even mortal chaos followers have more skin in the game than Stormcast.

While you can create any story you wish for your own stories, it is worth mentioning for clarity's sake that we don't actually know if Sigmar at all has the ability to force souls to his bidding to begin with.

He has been taking souls of his foes for Stormcast, but it was something he was clearly cautious about, and only seems to choose those who have a "spark of nobility buried in the dark". Tornus the Redeemed being the most famous example, a former mortal defender who was forced into a Nurgle toxin pit and transformed into a champion of Chaos, only to later be slain by the Stormcast and purified.

Personally, I am kind of glad Sigmar's flaws are only flaws, and not genuine untrustworthiness. "Paladin" archetype characters who either hide their shady nature or turn to bloody extremism have become so ubiquitous nowadays that a paladin played straight feels like a subversion in itself.

(Well, Sigmar is a barbarian, not a paladin, but you get the idea).


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Da Boss wrote:
And at least Space Marines are saved by the fact that they're obviously so stunted mentally that you could almost feel sorry for them, whereas Stormcast don't really have that aspect - just really cool dudes who are really big and strong with lightning magic and this reforging thing for pathos.

They're human characters, varied as humans can be. You kind of have to lean into it to see for yourself, the same way with any other book with people in it. No real getting around that.

And like again, I don't get how it's so bad to be reforged and lose a little bit when 1) you are already super strong and tough, so you're pretty likely not to die compared to a normal person. and 2) said normal people will lose absolutely everything when they die, and will not come back at all.

It's worth reading up on how the afterlife works in Age of Sigmar, because it's part of why this is so weighty (and why Stormcast are not guaranteed to reach it - in fact, rather the opposite seems the implication, based on Ruination Chamber and Lord-Terminos lore), but it's also about the concept of some suffering potentially being worse than death (how many times do you think you could experience dying horribly before you feel you can bear it no more, even setting aside the Flaw?).





Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Da Boss wrote:
1) you are already super strong and tough, so you're pretty likely not to die compared to a normal person

Also I would not take this for granted at all. Stormcast are sent to deal with absolutely horrible fights precisely because of how strong they are, and it results in them often taking terrible casualties. It's not driven to the point of absurdity, but they don't get at all the kill ratios that Space Marines do. Every Stormcast novel I've read has seen significant losses.

And remember that unlike the Space Marines' obscenely limited numbers (thousand-strong chapters for a galaxy-wide war, really?), Stormcast are recruited in force. They are strained, but there are many, many, many more Stormcast than Space Marines, enough that they can actually feasibly carry out the sort of military operations that they are supposed to do, and absorb some losses in so doing. And they have to be that many! For one of their main jobs is being the answer to Chaos Warriors, who can roughly match Stormcast blade to blade, and are terrifyingly numerous due to Chaos' stranglehold on the greater part of the realms.

My problem with the Stormcast us Sigmar's involvement. In WFRP/WFB he was just Conan-as-Jesus, a mior god who only rose to prominence through mortal ;political expediency. To re-cast him as some Zeus/Odin-style Allfather really doesn't 'feel' right to me. A proper 'Age of Sigmar', in my eyes, would have had Solkan as the god trying to impose Law over Chaos, and Sigmar just reborn at around the power level of Archaon, so he could re-live his glory days as just a guy fighting alongside his fellow humans. He could have had a nice model, and everything. Could as served as something of a 'main character' for the world beuing introduced to us at the onset, instead of the 'here's the world, deal with it' we ended up with.

 Ashiraya wrote:

Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Da Boss wrote:
1) you are already super strong and tough, so you're pretty likely not to die compared to a normal person

Also I would not take this for granted at all. Stormcast are sent to deal with absolutely horrible fights precisely because of how strong they are, and it results in them often taking terrible casualties. It's not driven to the point of absurdity, but they don't get at all the kill ratios that Space Marines do. Every Stormcast novel I've read has seen significant losses.

The Kragnos novel does a decent job of showing the whole "they're really just somewhat tougher, stronger humans" with the added caveat that Thunderstrike hasn't been created yet, so they even act more mortal. Still do their duty, but they actively weigh the risks more than they would before because they know they would be caught in the Cursed Skies and be unable to be Reforged.

Also? On the super strong and super tough thing?

Yeah. They are. But so are so, so many of the foes they’re sent to fight.

Whilst I’m soft as mashed potato, I’m a big fella and could, maybe, if pushed, and my antagonist had no fight training? Just about win a fight against another baseline human.

But, one way or the other? Very few of the antagonists in AoS are said baseline humans. They’re tougher, faster, more skilled or stronger, and in varying combinations.

Stormcast, based on my fairly limited reading of the background, are currently blessed from avoiding Marine Hype. They may outclass a given foe in a specific area, but it’s that specific area that matters.

Elves for example are still faster and more accurate. Orcs are, depending on variety, more or less as tough but come in greater numbers. Undead are Undead and so do attrition better, albeit in different ways across their varieties. Chaos? Well, a given Stormcast grunt level is a solid match for a Chaos grunt. But, a Chaos grunt could receive a boom from its god in the heat of battle.

And so the Stormcast aren’t tipping the scales, just balancing them.

 Shakalooloo wrote:
My problem with the Stormcast us Sigmar's involvement. In WFRP/WFB he was just Conan-as-Jesus, a mior god who only rose to prominence through mortal ;political expediency. To re-cast him as some Zeus/Odin-style Allfather really doesn't 'feel' right to me. A proper 'Age of Sigmar', in my eyes, would have had Solkan as the god trying to impose Law over Chaos, and Sigmar just reborn at around the power level of Archaon, so he could re-live his glory days as just a guy fighting alongside his fellow humans. He could have had a nice model, and everything. Could as served as something of a 'main character' for the world beuing introduced to us at the onset, instead of the 'here's the world, deal with it' we ended up with.

To be honest, I think it's narratively fantastic for his character growth, and Sigmar is super interesting every time he makes a novel appearance, like in Soul Wars or Hamilcar.

He is a barbarian king by birth, and that is who he likes being. It's long ago now, but back in the Age of Myth he went romping with Nagash and Gorkamorka, and had a jolly old time.

When Chaos arrived in the realms, Sigmar at first tried to deal with it as he did in the old days, but he found that he'd won the battle he participated in personally only to face a dozen defeats elsewhere for his absence. At the Battle of Burning Skies, Archaon showed up and Sigmar tried to go for the kill with a hammer throw, only for Archaon to trick Sigmar into missing the hammer throw by using Tzeentch magics of illusion, stealing away the hammer with a portal (and Ghal Maraz would not be recovered until centuries later).

Without his divine weapon Sigmar was at the disadvantage and had to withdraw.

This was the very event that led him to creating the Stormcast. He is a god who has to take care of his people now, because if he doesn't, he will lose everything again. He can no longer be a barbarian solving the problem by cracking skulls. He has to use all his abilities to try to coordinate and oversee his empire, using his powers to watch over the realms, to create Stormcast, to intervene very sparingly where he has no other choice (such as when Nagash showed up in Soul Wars - an escalation that had to be answered). He has to grow as a person and be responsible, and try to be the god the realms need, even if it's not necessarily the one he wanted to be.

I think that's good stuff tbh.

 Crimson wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:

 Shakalooloo wrote:
GW just needs to finally acknowledge that the 'Space Marines of Fantasy' are the Chaos Warriors. Evil dudes in baroque suits of armour are just cool (all the way through Dark Souls and beyond!), they have the nostalgia factor of 'they were in Hero Quest', the cover star of first edition WFB was one, and they aren't too difficult to paint.

This. But I suspect the brand-builders at HQ arent comfortable with the idea of promoting the bad guys as the face of a setting in the modern era.

But they do so in 40K; Space Marines are the enforcers of a tyrannical fascist regime.

In the past, yes. These days they are portrayed as the good guys and the tyrannical fascist regime part is quietly overlooked.

MDG: They powered up the antagonists a lot in Age of Sigmar to justify that though. I find that unsatisfying.

In WFB, an Orc is tougher but slower than an average human. They're roughly equal in most other ways, Orcs are a bit stronger but that's it.

A Skaven is faster but weedier. A goblin is just plain weedy, but comes in numbers. Even a Chaos Warrior, scary though they are, isn't so far above a normal human warrior in WFB (and Chaos having the scariest individual combatants was always cool and made sense for a faction that does so much infighting to actually remain a threat).

By boosting the Orcs up to be Ogre sized (I know they've released smaller Orcs since, but that was two editions later!) they changed them and their role in the story quite a lot. And I really didn't like those new, up armoured and upsized Orcs at all. The newer sneakier orcs are fine, I don't really dislike them, but again the stupid names put me off.

chaos0xomega wrote:

 Crimson wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:

 Shakalooloo wrote:
GW just needs to finally acknowledge that the 'Space Marines of Fantasy' are the Chaos Warriors. Evil dudes in baroque suits of armour are just cool (all the way through Dark Souls and beyond!), they have the nostalgia factor of 'they were in Hero Quest', the cover star of first edition WFB was one, and they aren't too difficult to paint.

This. But I suspect the brand-builders at HQ arent comfortable with the idea of promoting the bad guys as the face of a setting in the modern era.

But they do so in 40K; Space Marines are the enforcers of a tyrannical fascist regime.

In the past, yes. These days they are portrayed as the good guys and the tyrannical fascist regime part is quietly overlooked.

Sure. In these days the 40K fluff is pretty intolerable. It is basically (hopefully accidental) fascist apologia. "Look these noble and heroic space nazis being awesome and beating the enemies of the humanity that totally deserve it."

 Crimson wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:

 Crimson wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:

 Shakalooloo wrote:
GW just needs to finally acknowledge that the 'Space Marines of Fantasy' are the Chaos Warriors. Evil dudes in baroque suits of armour are just cool (all the way through Dark Souls and beyond!), they have the nostalgia factor of 'they were in Hero Quest', the cover star of first edition WFB was one, and they aren't too difficult to paint.

This. But I suspect the brand-builders at HQ arent comfortable with the idea of promoting the bad guys as the face of a setting in the modern era.

But they do so in 40K; Space Marines are the enforcers of a tyrannical fascist regime.

In the past, yes. These days they are portrayed as the good guys and the tyrannical fascist regime part is quietly overlooked.

Sure. In these days the 40K fluff is pretty intolerable. It is basically (hopefully accidental) fascist apologia. "Look these noble and heroic space nazis being awesome and beating the enemies of the humanity that totally deserve it."

Its a problem of perspective. For a setting like necromunda the dark humor of living in a dystopian society would be great. But in the grand scale of warhammer, having actually chaos gods plotting to plunge humanity in to a chaotic hell society of various torments, the dark humor is wasted and we start looking for heroes.

GW trying to wrestle with the inherent contradiction of trying to both idealise your cake and satirise it has definitely left modern 40k lore feeling rather uncomfortable with itself.

Crimson is barely exaggerating. Ultramarines are called noble heroes, verbatim. The Ultramarines, paragons and upholders of the "cruellest, most bloody regime imaginable". Those Ultramarines.

 Ashiraya wrote:
GW trying to wrestle with the inherent contradiction of trying to both idealise your cake and satirise it has definitely left modern 40k lore feeling rather uncomfortable with itself.

Crimson is barely exaggerating. Ultramarines are called noble heroes, verbatim. The Ultramarines, paragons and upholders of the "cruellest, most bloody regime imaginable". Those Ultramarines.

A subset of fans is wrestling with the fact that "satire" hasn't meaningfully driven the narrative in 25+ years. Since the Nightbringer era, Space Marines have stopped being grotesque exaggerations and have become straightforward heroic protagonists.

The reality is that GW's most successful IP is built on the premise that theocratic space fascism is not only necessary in the world of the story, it's also cool as hell aesthetically. You can tell this bothers almost everyone, from the suits to the creatives. They can say "Warhammer is for everyone," but the story is the story.

In some ways, this is life imitating art. In the lore, the Chaos Gods spring forth on planets through a seed of doubt or corruption in the mind of a mortal. In Nottingham, an overwhelmingly liberal group of creatives has spent decades refining, cultivating, and evangelizing an aesthetic that they abhor ideologically.

The warp can breach the materium in many ways, including artists who believe they're pursuing a noble cause.

Blessed is the mind too small for doubt.

The setting establishes, via omniscient narration, a primary antagonist that is inherently absolutely evil. As such, the Imperium is not the "cruellest, most bloody regime imaginable". It virtually cannot be, when the alternative is hell.

 His Master's Voice wrote:
The setting establishes, via omniscient narration, a primary antagonist that is inherently absolutely evil. As such, the Imperium is not the "cruellest, most bloody regime imaginable". It virtually cannot be, when the alternative is hell.

Well, this quote was pre-Chaos. And even then, regime and chaos are antitheses - if the galaxy turns into a Realm of Chaos (i.e swallowed by the warp), there'd be no system or order anymore, regardless what mortal followers of chaos may hope or dream of.

 Dryaktylus wrote:
Well, this quote was pre-Chaos. And even then, regime and chaos are antitheses - if the galaxy turns into a Realm of Chaos (i.e swallowed by the warp), there'd be no system or order anymore, regardless what mortal followers of chaos may hope or dream of.

The Chaos Gods enforce order and systems upon their own domains. Their followers in turn enforce order and systems derived from the divine upon their mortal domains. Those regimes exists in the setting. What happens after the setting ceases to exists doesn't seem particularly relevant.

 His Master's Voice wrote:
The setting establishes, via omniscient narration, a primary antagonist that is inherently absolutely evil. As such, the Imperium is not the "cruellest, most bloody regime imaginable". It virtually cannot be, when the alternative is hell.

And it is the decision of the authors to present it that way, so that they can portray their space nazis as heroic and "good."


I think 40K chaos as it is often depicted is just stupid. In FB it was often depicted with more nuance. Sure it was evil, but the Norse and other chaos worshippers were still people, and not necessarily monstrous ones. They had harsh but human lives, and their desire to seek the aid of dark gods was understandable. I think in 40K chaos could be depicted in this light too. The Imperium is objectively terrible, and wanting to oppose it is actually noble and good. And some such people might accept the aid of chaos in doing that, and it should not instantly turn them into gaggling cartoon villains for the noble space nazis to slaughter.

 Da Boss wrote:
I think they certainly initially intended them to be heroic good guys. But that wasn't very popular so I think they started to try and backdate some grimdark in there.

I can't help but feel like 'these golden supermen explicitly described as heroic good guys fighting the actual forces of satan are actually kinda grimdark if you dig into the lore' has much the same energy as 'GI Joe is actually a serious work on PTSD and combat trauma if you read the tie-in novels'.

Not taking a dig at you, I just don't find it especially compelling when the models themselves and the broad strokes of how they're presented still come across as Saturday morning cartoon protagonists.

(And for what it's worth, I do agree that Marines are gradually moving in the same direction. I remember picking up a 3rd Ed starter set and thinking the dudes with Darth Vader helmets, black armor, and glowing red eyes must be the bad guys. Good times.)

 His Master's Voice wrote:

 Dryaktylus wrote:
Well, this quote was pre-Chaos. And even then, regime and chaos are antitheses - if the galaxy turns into a Realm of Chaos (i.e swallowed by the warp), there'd be no system or order anymore, regardless what mortal followers of chaos may hope or dream of.

The Chaos Gods enforce order and systems upon their own domains.

Okay, it isn't clear if those 'domains' are real or just the feverish dreams of mortals to helplessly conceive the warp and its denizens - to no vail. Fluff has been vague about that, especially with the steady WHF influence. I for one ignore some stuff, but that's how 40k works.

 His Master's Voice wrote:
Their followers in turn enforce order and systems derived from the divine upon their mortal domains. Those regimes exists in the setting. What happens after the setting ceases to exists doesn't seem particularly relevant.

They may exist, but are extremely small compared to the Imperium as a whole. And in the Imperium there're worlds who are comparable or even worse for the majority of the population as several of those.

But well, it's AoS rumours here and there seems to be much to swallow for the players. Let's just say we're divided over the actual truth of a (okay, THE) Rogue Trader quote.

 Crimson wrote:
I think 40K chaos as it is often depicted is just stupid. In FB it was often depicted with more nuance. Sure it was evil, but the Norse and other chaos worshippers were still people, and not necessarily monstrous ones. They had harsh but human lives, and their desire to seek the aid of dark gods was understandable. I think in 40K chaos could be depicted in this light too. The Imperium is objectively terrible, and wanting to oppose it is actually noble and good. And some such people might accept the aid of chaos in doing that, and it should not instantly turn them into gaggling cartoon villains for the noble space nazis to slaughter.

I think GW themselves are painfully aware that a subset of their playerbase, potentially a significant one, outright demands that the Imperium be palatable. Horribly fascist, oh yes, and insane, but they demand that it be at least -more- justified than the alternatives, because they simply cannot process picking the faction that isn't the protagonist.

This is why Tau get hammered down when they come across as too nice, and why seemingly every time any kind of revolt or resistance movement happens it's always GSC or Chaos behind it.

And GW, whatever they say, chase the money. So they will cover the fascist regime in whatever condiments are needed for the players to swallow it. And as a result we get lore posters every day across social media telling us how the Imperium is justified in what it does and how the Emperor is a good guy.

I low key hate 40k sometimes. If only the models hadn't been so sick.

(Anyway, I digress, the thread isn't really about 40k.)

 Dryaktylus wrote:
Okay, it isn't clear if those 'domains' are real or just the feverish dreams of mortals to helplessly conceive the warp and its denizens - to no vail. Fluff has been vague about that, especially with the steady WHF influence. I for one ignore some stuff, but that's how 40k works.

There's plenty of information about the Realms presented by omniscient narrators, so no, I don't think it's particularly vague. In any case, the Chaos Gods have principles. They impose rules. They recognise those who follow and persecute those who oppose them. Whether the Brass Citadel or the Garden are physical or metaphysical isn't really that important.

 Dryaktylus wrote:
They may exist, but are extremely small compared to the Imperium as a whole. And in the Imperium there're worlds who are comparable or even worse for the majority of the population as several of those.

Again, one side of the conflict either is, or approaches, absolute evil. Its intents, methods and the outcomes of both are evil, either by nature, or by nurture that is virtually indistinguishable from nature at this point in the setting's timeline. The Imperium's methods and outcomes on occasion mirror those of Chaos, but its intents, at least as far as its subjects are concerned, never do. That alone is enough to differentiate and morally stratify the two.

Edit: I just realised we're in an AoS thread. I apologise for steering us off course.

The discussion on the stormcast actually made me think of the TRPG Exalted, where the Exalted are rare, but also limited. There is only about 200, there will always be 200 and when one dies. Someone else inherit the part of the soul that’s divine, ether someone destined for it, or someone doing something heroic at the moment.
They are also cursed to be a bit evil on occasions, creating a bit of extra story for the RPG. But that’s other stuff.

But i actually wonder if that would have worked better for stormcast, something like 10000 that pass on there divinity.
But making an entirely new one is actually difficult so they are pressed thin in every battle, and even when a new person inherits into it. They are not instantly able to join the battle, they need training, learning and in some cases even need to be found.

Just made me think about it.

 Ashiraya wrote:


This is why Tau get hammered down when they come across as too nice, and why seemingly every time any kind of revolt or resistance movement happens it's always GSC or Chaos behind it.

Hey now.

There was that one time it was about taxes.

 Apple fox wrote:
The discussion on the stormcast actually made me think of the TRPG Exalted, where the Exalted are rare, but also limited. There is only about 200, there will always be 200 and when one dies. Someone else inherit the part of the soul that’s divine, ether someone destined for it, or someone doing something heroic at the moment.
They are also cursed to be a bit evil on occasions, creating a bit of extra story for the RPG. But that’s other stuff.

But i actually wonder if that would have worked better for stormcast, something like 10000 that pass on there divinity.
But making an entirely new one is actually difficult so they are pressed thin in every battle, and even when a new person inherits into it. They are not instantly able to join the battle, they need training, learning and in some cases even need to be found.

Just made me think about it.

A notable issue with [insert number that sounds limited] is that even if GW was willing to commit to something so concrete in a setting they stubbornly refused to define well, from the beginning Sigmarines existed in a setting that was virtually infinite and that upped the number of soldiers, civilians, casualties and the like that features at least in the early narratives to 40k numbers instead of more restrained numbers you tend to see in fantasy settings.

That leaves the question what thousands of Sigmarines are supposed to do about a Chaos host that's several millions strong. Or for the opposite, if they're super powered enough to overcome a hundred or more times their numbers, how would that be represented in the game without repeating the same issue Marines have since they've been so talked up in the background that their rules can't possibly do them justice and still sell significant numbers of models.

Mashing the Realms into a single planet might make something like that feasible, but I don't think it would fit well into the Mortal Realms as they are now.

Stormcast and Chaos are the least of the problem - there's a whole realm of death. In theory Nagash should just be able to drown ANY other faction in skeletons and ghosts. When you math it out it does not take long for the number of undead to overwhelm the number of living. And Nagash and split ghosts from skeletons to double that number.

In theory it should be the Age of Nagash because Sigmar only takes the best and chaos only corrupts the living; the undead would be a countless swarm that would grind all under their ruined boots.

Nagash still has rules about that sort of thing because he's order taken to its utmost extreme.

Nagash also just doesn't really care because in the long term, everything dies. So what if the realms are overrun for ten thousand years? Nagash plans for one hundred thousand years when everything eventually dies out.

Undying King highlights it really well where Nagash doesn't care about a host of Nurglites advancing on a gateway to the underworld he is hiding in because, eventually, the host will be stopped before it gets there. Then a Necromancer breaks his Law, and he gets very angry about it.