After a longer-than-planned detour into the darkest parts of the Drakwald, the truest children of Chaos have emerged from the treeline, bellowing bestial prayers to the dark gods. The Great Bray-Shaman JTY is here for the final two articles in the Old World Almanack series – for the first run of nine Arcane Journals, that is – joined by a special guest, the wizened old Warhammer historian Gadge,* who happened to be in the vicinity when we conducted the interview.
JTY: Beastmen have always been among the major antagonists in the Old World, and they’ve been part and parcel of the lore surrounding the World of Legend since the very beginning. They are the children of Chaos, birthed in the cataclysm that unleashed the Ruinous Powers upon the world. They are the dark things that live in the woods, and an ever-present threat to humans, elves and dwarfs.
Gadge: Even in the very earliest Warhammer fiction in the 1980s, they’re the boogeymen in the forest. For instance, they were THE bad guys for many years in Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, trying to take down the Empire of Man from within.
JTY: They’re uniquely Warhammer, the stuff of dark folklore and fairytales brought to life. While outlandish creatures such as Tzaangors and Slaangors inhabit the Mortal Realms, in the Old World we focus upon the goat-headed beasts of Chaos Undivided. This Arcane Journal is where the Beastmen get to shine – and we’re really happy to have them be a core part of our narrative, because they’re always there, lurking in the deep, dark forests, always preparing their next rampage.
Gadge: Narratively, the Skaven vanished from the surface world three centuries before the period covered by the Old World, which is why they’ve become a myth, because no one in the realms of Man has seen one! But the Beastmen are right there in the Empire, burning down neighbouring villages.
JTY: Beastmen, by contrast, are a very real and tangible threat. The secret war against Morghur the Shadowgave was mere decades before Settra’s invasion of the Border Princes. Every time he’s killed by the Wood Elves, he comes back again somewhere else. So in this Arcane Journal, we discover that he’s just been reborn as a horrific, mewling babe, whom Kralmaw – a new character from this period – is searching for even now within the dark woods...
Gadge: Having been part of the World of Legend for such a long time, the Beastmen have gone through plenty of changes over the years. They were really weird in the 80s – there were miniatures with fish heads, centaurs, a camel man, a slug man, even a tiger man…
JTY: They’re clearly defined now as primal and goatlike, which is true of Beastman across the planet, but they’re most prevalent in the Old World, in the primordial forests in and around the Empire and Bretonnia, which have been around forever. There’s a lot of wyrdstone in the depths of these forests.
They stalk out of the forests to attack villages, which simply go missing in the night. This is what happens in the Arcane Journal – with Chainmaker’s invasion of Westerland and the looming threat of the Shadowgave reborn, the Beastmen are even moving into the Laurelorn Forest, which is definitely not somewhere they should be.
The journal is told from the perspective of terrified human survivors of these attacks. There are roads that weave through the forest, and the Empire needs to get its lumber from somewhere. Villagers do try and protect themselves, but they’re unprepared for the numbers of Beastmen now emerging from the deep wood…
It’s a constant battle to keep the woodland cut back. The people of the Empire do everything they can to keep them at arm’s length and cull the herds, but they’re pure rage, they create nothing – all they do is destroy.
Gadge: The Knights Panther would go out on these crusades, clearing Beastman enclaves deep into the woods, and they’d be back again in a few weeks or months. You just can’t clear them out for good.
JTY: They’re far from their full power at present – as Chaos gets stronger, so too will the Beastmen.
Gadge: I love the idea that the Wood Elves are a more benevolent force of nature, while the Beastmen are nature turned on its head. They’re two sides of the coin.
JTY: Wood Elves are sometimes capricious, but they represent the natural order – the world as it’s intended to be. They’re not nice, but they are a force for good in the world, and their motives are pure.
We spend time talking about what the Beastmen are and where you find them. We discuss their origins, nature, appearance, hunting grounds, the brayherds, their champions, and the Darktongue language itself.
Gadge: Darktongue goes back to the original Realm of Chaos books from 1988 and 1990! The nice thing about it is that it’s quite easy to freehand; if the Beastmen can carve it into a tree, you can paint it onto a banner.
JTY: We’ve updated the old material, and put the new sigils on the transfer sheet. There are sigils for all the types of Beastmen now – the Caprigor sigil from Realms of Chaos has become the sigil for Bestigors, for instance.
Thanks guys. We’ll pick this conversation up later in the week, when we go into more detail on Kralmaw, Ghorros, the Armies of Infamy and other rules in the new Arcane Journal.
* Not his real job title.
