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Hey all,
I've just in the last 6 weeks started getting into AoS, with great enthusiasm. But what surprises me is that it's pitched as noblebright when actually it's a far worse place to be than the 40K universe for the average human.

As with most recent AoS concepts, I'm talking about souls, of course.

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So, in 40K, if you worship the Chaos Gods, are sacrificed to them, or devoured by a Daemon, your soul goes to Chaos. likewise Drucharii will mess your soul up. But if you're a good devout imperial, your soul goes to the Emperor, whether killed by Ork, Tyranid, Eldar, Tau, Necron, or (most likely) another human.

In The Mortal Realms, same as above with regards to Chaos (which, by the way, is still in control of pretty much everywhere and therefore already making the setting more horrible), and if you are a particularly fantastic and devout warrior, Sigmar soulnaps you and forges you into an Eternal.
If you don't meet any of those criteria, your soul goes to Nagash for eternal slavery.

THAT'S IT.

Devoured by Daemons, eternal slavery to Nagash, or - if you're a GREAT WARRIOR *and* devout, so less than 0.1% of the population - you become an Eternal.

99.9% of the population's souls either go to Hell or become tormented undead minions for eternity. And Sigmar made a deal to this end with Nagash back in the day.

To me, that's *way* darker than 40K. And it makes Sigmar into even more of an donkey-cave for dooming all the free peoples to this fate.

Thoughts anyone? I know that Aelf souls are a bit of an exception, and I'm sure there's some others as well, but that seems to be the gist of AoS - a setting more horrifying by far than 40K.

I don't think that's entirely the case.

From what I've read, 99.9% of the time when a soul dies, they go to an afterlife that the individual believed in prior to death, before the soul gradually loses its power and fades away (same with how human souls flicker out within the Warp. They don't all go to the Emperor).

Nagash all in all isn't really that bad of a god. He doesn't screw around with the people and souls in his realm, and as long as you worship him he'll be contempt to just let you be (the only exception is when he raises the dead to do battle, but that's often only brief and no different than Sigmar conscripting souls for eternal war as his Stormcast).

Nagash only gets really pissy when you're taking souls that should rightly go to Shyish, but that's obviously something the average Joe shouldn't be worried about.

Even those souls taken from.the afterlife and conscripted into his Nighthaunt Legions are, whenever I've read about them, described as souls belonging to evil, demented, or generally not very nice people back in life, and whose to say that their existence now as Nighthaunt (where they might be doing the same thing they enjoyed in life, murder) isn't any better than the hell that may have awaited them in the afterlife?

I see your point that Nagash doesn't really care about what you do as long as you prostrate yourself to him, and that the afterlife you end up in will be whatever you believe in and think you deserve.
But he's still in control - until you fade away, you are 100% his slave. Yes, he might not call you up, but the fact he can, that you're completely bound to him, is pretty horrifying all the same and is why I see it as more grimdark than 40k :-D

 Captain Roderick wrote:
But if you're a good devout imperial, your soul goes to the Emperor,

Nope.

Pretty much everyone's soul gets eaten by daemons in the Warp. Luckily, only psykers' souls remain conscious long enough to actually experience it.

As far as we know, the only souls that get 'saved' by the Emperor are his Living Saints (who get hijacked and reincarnated) and the poor sods who get fed into the Golden Throne (who get eaten by the Emperor instead of by daemons). The idea that devout Imperials get to spend eternity sitting by the Emperor's right hand in some sort of 'heaven' is silly Ecclesiarchy propaganda.

MalfunctBot wrote:
I don't think that's entirely the case.

From what I've read, 99.9% of the time when a soul dies, they go to an afterlife that the individual believed in prior to death, before the soul gradually loses its power and fades away (same with how human souls flicker out within the Warp. They don't all go to the Emperor).

Nagash all in all isn't really that bad of a god. He doesn't screw around with the people and souls in his realm, and as long as you worship him he'll be contempt to just let you be (the only exception is when he raises the dead to do battle, but that's often only brief and no different than Sigmar conscripting souls for eternal war as his Stormcast).

Nagash only gets really pissy when you're taking souls that should rightly go to Shyish, but that's obviously something the average Joe shouldn't be worried about.

Even those souls taken from.the afterlife and conscripted into his Nighthaunt Legions are, whenever I've read about them, described as souls belonging to evil, demented, or generally not very nice people back in life, and whose to say that their existence now as Nighthaunt (where they might be doing the same thing they enjoyed in life, murder) isn't any better than the hell that may have awaited them in the afterlife?

I am waiting to see how Josh Reynold deals with the whole Soul War story - Nagash has other aspects but presently seems to be on full control freak tantrum mode and the latest Short story on MP has him going back to his World that was plan of Kill everyone and they all serve me. For obvious reasons this is never popular with the vampires who drink blood and want / need living folks running about, serving them etc!

He did also devour all the whole gods of Death - its interesting to me that Sigmar choose him as the pre-eminant god of death

 Duskweaver wrote:

 Captain Roderick wrote:
But if you're a good devout imperial, your soul goes to the Emperor,

Nope.

Pretty much everyone's soul gets eaten by daemons in the Warp. Luckily, only psykers' souls remain conscious long enough to actually experience it.

Out of curiosity have you got a source for that? Been reading 40k and black library for 20 years, and my understanding is what's written above.
Actually though, since daemons are eddies caused by our worst emotions, the fate of souls in the Warp is dissipation for the main part. Going to the emperor's side may not be the case for the majority as I originally stated, but neither do they all get devoured by daemons. The Warp is not entirely made of Daemonic beasts, they roam around in it and feed as they go.
Any sources you have would be welcome but 40k still seems nicer to me!