The Age of Sigmar lore and novels thread 2

[Random]

On 1/6/2021 at 4:04 AM, Bayul said:

Can anyone convince me to continue Dark Harvest? I'm in chapter 14, so pretty much in the middle of the (audio)book. Nothing interesting happened yet and I am losing interest. The last scenes were

  Reveal hidden contents

Blackwood meeting three mysterious dogs and him speaking with Kurnoth. He spend the night in an inn where he and his sidekick found some kind of puppet in their room.

Is this story written in a Blair Witch Project manner? Because I can't listen to 12 more chapters in which a broody protagonist is hardly finding any clues.

I'm listening to the audiobook and I'm currently in chapter... uhh 4 hours in.

While I'm not bored of it like you are, I'm still waiting for the "horror" to happen to warrant the "Warhammer Horror" tag. Nothing against Reynolds in this regard, but while its certainly grittier than other books, it really just reads like another BL novel. It's my first WH Horror novel though so I'm not sure if they ever truly go there.

 

And now for something completely different: Anyone else a bit disappointed that some factions ended up roughly in the same places they were before? Skaven, despite their big role in the End Times, are pretty much in the same place they were in the Old World. Sitting underneath cities and scheming to overthrow the surface kingdoms. Only that they now also have their own floating rock, and don't dig through dirt but SPACE ITSELF to get somewhere.  - At least from what I read so far. Seraphon likewise, seem to be in the same "stand by" position the Lizardmen used to be in.

Some people say AoS changed too much, where I'm thinking it didn't change enough in this regard.

[Baron Klatz]

Skaven and Seraphon got some choice wins.

Skaven were a big factor in the Age of Chaos in letting their Nurgle allies basically blitzkrieg much of the Realm of Life to where they still have such a devastating grip on it today and were the Archaon's crazed lynchpins in corrupting Behemat with their mecha spider cities and parasite engines warping country-sized land portions so they could impact the slumbering God-beast's massive body.

Then they capped it off by foiling Nagash's last steps to conquer all the realms and now with chaos on the defensive they have to wait for their chance again while they expand their holdings through the realms be it their grey leaders convening in Hysh, gaining more territory in Eight-points'industrial catacombs, claiming new precious minerals and tech from Chamon by battling Flesh Eaters for the lost ruins and finding better gnaw-hole routes even if they end up digging into a Seraphon temple ship in aetheric orbit or drain a undead sea into Skavenblight.

Seraphon are completely different in how active they protect the Order cities from chaos and interact with the people, booby trap chaos realmgates to cut off their transportations, teleport down to stop followers of Slaanesh from getting artifacts to see Slaanesh's prison and with the help of the Stormcast Jordain were able to flood a section of the Realm of Chaos with pure Azyr magic and claim it (probably the only successful invasion of chaos itself ever. Though points to Katakros for giving it an impressive try ).

They're more secretive about it than the Stormcast but they protect the Mortal Realms just as much as they do, thus why they ally often as celestial brothers-in-arms.

One my favorite lore entries is just them meteoring down to save a random city from being literally consumed by chaos.

"A Hole in Chamon - The frozen city of Aslandas vanishes into a giant sinkhole ringed with teeth. The maw grows until a meteor crashes into its depths, and sounds of battle carry up from the dark."

 

On another neat note, the upcoming TempestFall VR game has a dev blog where they're detailing the history of the Mortal Realms and lead up to how it'll tie in to their new game. I thought that was a very commendable effort on their part.

https://steamcommunity.com/games/1337100/announcements/detail/4475982739454679490

 

Edited February 19, 2021 by Baron Klatz

[Whitefang]

On 1/6/2021 at 11:04 AM, Bayul said:

Can anyone convince me to continue Dark Harvest? I'm in chapter 14, so pretty much in the middle of the (audio)book. Nothing interesting happened yet and I am losing interest. The last scenes were

  Reveal hidden contents

Blackwood meeting three mysterious dogs and him speaking with Kurnoth. He spend the night in an inn where he and his sidekick found some kind of puppet in their room.

Is this story written in a Blair Witch Project manner? Because I can't listen to 12 more chapters in which a broody protagonist is hardly finding any clues.

I think most early part of the novel are just for atmosphere which you seldom see in the setting of AOS, so yeah not many things happened

The dark past of the protagonist is also quite intriguing and “horror” for aos we normally see

But towards the end everything rapidly go wrong and horrific. It was quite a exciting blast, at least in my personal opinion.

[Random]

Just finished Dark Harvest and it was "ok".  It certainly didn't do anything unique besides the fact that it was set in the Mortal Realms.

If you're familiar with horrorstories, you can predict this thing with 99% accuracy as all the characters in it, have their typical roles without a hint of deviation from them. There's the companion who's obviously only in the novel so he can die, for the "oh no" effect. Or the worshipper of something evil, who gets killed by the thing he worships. The novel used these archetypes and tropes like stepping stones, skipping from one to another.  It wasn't bad, but not something I'm gonna revisit.

The best thing about it was that it featured an old god and Sylvaneth. Which is a nice change of pace from the usual Chaos worshipping. Which brings me to: Anathemas.

An anthology alternating between stories in AoS and 40k. And it immediately shows why AoS has simply more to offer in this regard as 90% of 40k's stories revolve around Chaos. Even when the force behind the events isn't revealed you still think "That's Tzeentch's doing!". Whereas the stories in the Mortal Realms offer a wider variety of immediate dangers that fit into "Horror".

Unfortunately, the stories are utterly generic and predicable and feel more like exercises in writing for Goosebumps than Warhammer Horror.   One of the stories starts out with a case of domestic violence and the victim being sent out to deal with a murder of crows. Immediately my mind went to the trope of the kid befriending the crows and/or commanding them into killing his abuser. And voila, of course that's what happens. Right down to the T.

Halfway through and so far nothing has really gripped me.

[ian0delond]

Dark Harvest is a Wickerman. If you don't enjoy wandering in a town of weirdo because of an irrelevant quest, it is not a book aimed for you.

Edited February 23, 2021 by ian0delond

[Random]

On 2/23/2021 at 4:18 PM, ian0delond said:

Dark Harvest is a Wickerman. If you don't enjoy wandering in a town of weirdo because of an irrelevant quest, it is not a book aimed for you.

I certainly enjoyed the exploration of a cult worshipping an ancient god. I'm a sucker for these kind of stories, and that's what kept me reading. What I didn't enjoy was the utter mediocrity and predictability of it. It may be good book for someone who doesn't read much. Also, "its not for you" is a very nonsensical argument to make just because someone didn't enjoy a book that you personally liked. I like Horror, Warhammer as well as cult based stories, etc. I just didn't particularly like this book.

I dropped Anathemas, as the stories proved to be too tropey and standard for my tastes. Not a single story I read was original, and I just found it pointless.

Next on the list are Lady of Sorrows and Overlords of the Iron Dragon, which are promising as I loved all the books of Clint Werner I've read so far.

Edited February 25, 2021 by Random

[xking]

4 hours ago, Random said:

I certainly enjoyed the exploration of a cult worshipping an ancient god. I'm a sucker for these kind of stories, and that's what kept me reading. What I didn't enjoy was the utter mediocrity and predictability of it. It may be good book for someone who doesn't read much. Also, "its not for you" is a very nonsensical argument to make just because someone didn't enjoy a book that you personally liked. I like Horror, Warhammer as well as cult based stories, etc. I just didn't particularly like this book.

I dropped Anathemas, as the stories proved to be too tropey and standard for my tastes. Not a single story I read was original, and I just found it pointless.

Next on the list are Lady of Sorrows and Overlords of the Iron Dragon, which are promising as I loved all the books of Clint Werner I've read so far.

So are you liking AoS books/lore 

[Marius au]

3/4 way through Soul wars and enjoying it.  Perhaps the most enjoyable part is the kind of humanising/fleshing out the stormcast.  They were human but now completely different, probably more so in outlook.  Almost like the opposite of vampires in how they view mortal humans.  Would recommend it.

[Random]

Finished Gloomspite.

And I did not like it very much. It's probably the most transparent army advertisement I've read since some Space Marine novels. It wasn't even an honest attempt at writing a novel set in the mortal realms. The main character was the destruction brought by the Bad Moon, the chaos unfolding under its light, the city of Draconium turning into a giant mushroom colony, and its people being slaughtered and harvested. Basically just Battletome fluff text.

But point by point:

• The novel has only two parts. It stretches what should only be the very first act, "the set up", in which weird things happen around town (that nobody ever learns anything  useful about...), out to the entire first half of the book and then dives straight into the climax, which lasts the other half. A middle is non-existent.
• The main characters are hilariously useless. Literally everything they do fails. They bring a message to Draconium, that neither them or anyone in the city knows the meaning of, rendering it completely redundant once the events unfold. They get tasked to protect the regent: and fail terribly. They lead a group of watchmen into an obvious trap and everyone gets butchered. One of them tries to blow himself up in an act of hollywood heroism to kill the evil bad guy - and fails. And so on...
• The heroes are extremely one dimensional. Borik, every time he opens his mouth just talks about how they're mercenaries and should leave - that's his entire role. Romilla is just a mother figure for Eleanora and her role just barking at anyone doubting her "daughter". Eleanora: just another badly written genius in the history of badly written geniuses.  As Hollywood has decreed, every genius needs some form of OCD, be cuhrayzee eccentric or otherwise weird or obnoxious. That's apparently how geniuses have to be written and we can't stray from that - ever!
• Set ups that are completely dropped. Eleanora who gets bitten by a random(!) spider not affiliated with the Gits, talks  about making an insect repellent. The reader of course thinks that this will have a pay-off as the Gits are accompanied by neverending waves of insects that are described constantly in the novel. In scriptwriting this is called a "set up" for something that has a pay-off. Does it? No. Despite her talking about it multiple times, its just never mentioned again. Also, her spider-bite she almost dies of gets magically healed by Sigmar himself and turns into lightning. Bravo Andy. Bravo!

There's much more I could highlight, like how convenient many things are like characters getting caught and stripped off all their gear but for that device they need, which the gits conveniently missed. Or character deaths being completely pointless.

Only read this if you're interested in Gobboporn, and wanna witness the destruction the bad moon brings. The characters, the story, and the quality of the novel itself take a backseat. I wasn't surprised to learn that Andy Clark is a background writer for GW's settings as Gloomspite feels exactly like Battletome fluff text, needlessly stretched out to novel length.

[Fellman]

Is Broken Realms Belakor the first time after Black Pyramid by Josh Reynolds that we can read about Gardus Steel Soul 

[NinthMusketeer]

Huh, I really liked Gloomspite exactly because of the main characters. I liked how they did fail, not everything went according to plan. They didn't miraculously put the pieces together; they only saw what they could from their perspective (it is easy for us to see what is happening; we've read the battletome!). And they don't have ridiculous plot armor; because the author establishes halfway through that he is willing to kill off main characters the reader actually doesn't know who is going to make it (if anyone). That alone magnified the suspense for me tremendously. As opposed to something like Realm-Lords where characters have "I AM GOING TO DIE" or "I AM GOING TO LIVE" written on their faces from the onset. Not having a mental sketch of the rest of the plot halfway through is a big draw for me. And it was fun getting a 'victim's perspective' on the Bad Moon without it being restricted to a three-paragraph-sidebar of battletome fluff.

Edited April 12, 2021 by NinthMusketeer

[xking]

https://ageofsigmar.lexicanum.com/wiki/Karaznethil

[Baron Klatz]

Thought i’d resurrect this thread because most of the news is book related(fitting for the newest NightHaunt hero )

Really great humble bundle deal up for those who might have missed it today.

 

And the hyped Gothgul Hollow novel is on the way.

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2022/01/26/what-is-mhurghast-as-the-darkness-creeps-closer-we-delve-into-this-new-warhammer-horror-series/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=black-library&utm_content=blmurghast260122

 

Also loving the more spooky look at Shyish here.

“It takes place on the lonesome Null Island, a place that already exists on maps of Shyish but has never been explored before. Gothic Horror relies upon its atmospheric settings, and the wild Shyishian landscape – with its melancholy moors, twisted forests of ossified trees, and gibbet-lined roads – naturally lends itself to the genre. 

The Hollow itself is a made-up region, though. We wanted the freedom to create locations specific to the plot and local folklore. An example is the Blood-rock Peaks, an ancient site of ritual sacrifice, which is perilous to navigate even without being haunted by its awful history. We took inspiration from places like the Derbyshire Dales”

 

Wagonfolk Gulf remind me of Josh Reynold’s except of people in the Realm of Death back in 2017.

”Are there mortal cities in Shyish? What would they look like?
-Randolph Carter
Yes, a good many. And, as with most of the realms, the cities are diverse in appearance and nature, depending on their location. Some are shrouded mortuary cities, ruled by undying aristocracies of vampires or Deathrattle families, while others are mercantile-fiefdoms, ruled by elected councils. There are theocratic city-states, controlled by organised priesthoods who worship Nagash-Morr, and nomadic wagon-cities which trundle eternally across the vast swathes of desert that mark much of Shyish. There are the iceberg-citadels of the Great Chill Sea, and the hive-like Deep Towns, carved into the mountains of the far south.”

While on that Death Realm note, quick summary to the Ossiarchs position right now after their White Dwarf update:

“> -the Lumineth strategy worked; the Ossiarch Empire is rife with insurrection, many monuments are still rubble, and with much strength committed to the Arx Terminus they can't quickly deal with this
> -the Triptych still hasn't been fully rebuilt
> -it's suspected Archaon intends to strike at Gothizzar, though nobody knows how that'd be possible
> -with Nagash gone the OBR legions no longer enjoy his favor as they once did and other undead want to capitalize on that, but OBR are also more autonomous for the time being
> -Arkhan's secret HQ is rumored to be located in Anadiria, where the Null Myriad hold sway
> the power vacuum has seen adversaries like Sigvald's Decadent Host and the Tarkan warglutt run wild
> -Katakros is still paining from being struck down by Archaon, but he's also having strange episodes of visions and whispers that even being picked apart and transferring bodies can't seem to fix, and his thoughts will stray to his mortal home in Ghur
> -Kragnos had a run-in with the Ivory Host's claim in Bjarl that did a number on them
> -to replenish and up their game they're experimenting more with realmstone and monster bones with very few but gradually mounting breakthroughs”

 

Also nifty thing on the “Monster” short story is it deals with an early Soulbound that worked for Sigmar & Grungni back in the Age of Myth who’s soul-connected to his axe like in their recent supplement.(and could be a Kratos shout-out 😛 )

 

Edited January 28, 2022 by Baron Klatz