Whatever you think of Age of Sigmar as a game, I think we can all agree the fluff surrounding the end times was a complete disaster. From inconsistent character motivations and actions to story lines being introduced in one book only to be dropped in the next, it’s a big mess. As someone who encourages others to avoid rushing to judgment until they try to see things from another person’s point of view, I figure I would try putting my money where my mouth is and seeing if I can come up with a better ending for the story then the GW writers did. Now I will need some constraints:
Constraints:
- The old world must be destroyed, and the new setting must be similar to Age of Sigmar (a more open setting was a major goal after all)
- I cannot add new characters.
- As many existing characters as many as possible must share similar fates (being generous and assuming their ends were due to intentional story beasts and not due to narrative convenience).
So, the change I would make is small but significant. In the original story, Chaos wins by using an ancient Old One device to create a warp portal beneath Middenheim. The heroes try to stop them, but fail at the last minute and thus everything is lost. My story would go similarly, the chaos plot is to use the device (although they do not understand its true purpose) to open a portal to the warp. However, while the heroes are fighting to secure the device, they realize it is a doomsday weapon that the Old Ones installed as a last-ditch defense against chaos. They also realize it is not opening a portal to the warp but instead about to activate and destroy the world. The good guys try to stop it but the same stupid betrayal occurs. The device activates.
Rather than creating a portal to the realms of chaos this device acts like a cosmic flensing machine. It rapidly strips the souls from the bodies of all those in range, before collapsing the Old World. As the vortex widens it starts devouring daemons too. As an anti-chaos weapon, it separates the component souls from the chaos gods themselves. When it hits a daemon, it splits them into smaller and smaller pieces. You could have some fun here and have Tzeentch try to stop the vortex with magic only to be betrayed by Slaanesh who views it as the ultimate masochistic experience (creating a nice parallel and highlighting how the chaos gods are victims of their own vices). Another option, is to have the machine explode before completely devouring the chaos gods (although it greatly weakens them all). As per the original fluff the Skaven escape by tunneling Skavenblight between realms, the Lizardmen are safe on their ships.
As the dust settles, we pick up right where Age of Sigmar begins. Sigmar is a lone survivor in the abyss, holding on the core of the Old World. But this time the realms are awash in a sea of souls. Every once-dead character is back in the game as they are slowly drawn to the 8 realms. As before, Teclis and the other incarnates trap as many pieces of Slaanesh as they can preventing it from reforming fully while the other gods are able to reform in reduced capacity (this can also be explained by Slaanesh willing hurling itself into the machine as per my previous note).
Why is it better?
I think this setting is much better for a number of reasons. The first of which is that in blowing up the Old World the writers made it clear the stakes were meaningless. If Chaos can blow up the world and kill everyone, with the story still advancing why should we ever care? My change preserves the stakes as the old world ends in a draw with everything still to play for in the new universe. Furthermore, it provides a rationale for the appearance of new units as the Chaos Gods themselves try out new things as their different portions recombine. For other races, this opens up the setting to any character coming back in a manner that (while still narratively convenient) makes more sense. While I don’t believe this change is perfect, it does open up even more story lines and interesting wrinkles to explore while not leaving quite so bad an aftertaste in older players mouths.
What do you think? Can you think of a better way to carry out the end times?
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