Confused about the timeline and events of all the newly minted lore from the Age of Sigmar after Fantasy got blown up? Let’s sort it all out!
So what’s the deal with the lore behind Age of Sigmar? Let’s make some sense of the timeline and story.
Age of Sigmar was released in July of 2015 and there was a lot of people wondering what Games Workshop was going to do with this reboot of Warhammer Fantasy. Well, they took the entire old world, blew it up, made two armies obsolete (sorry Bretonnia and Tomb Kings), and basically made a mess of things. GW released it without any real guidance or structure in terms of playability. It seemed to just be this mess of ideas that they threw at a wall to see what would stick.
The same can be said of the lore and books that came out at the same time, and let’s just say they are less than ideal… It wasn’t until the General’s Handbook came out a year later (in 2016) that the game system started to gain steam and along with it the lore began to gradually fill itself out.
For this article I basically lumped the novels/audiobooks into 4 groups, first is the Realm Gate wars, second is just after the wars, third is right before the Necroquake, and fourth is during or after the Necroquake. Also this ignores the battletomes, rulebooks, etc. that have army specific lore as it would be insane for me to try and read all those and place them within a timeline of the novels, short stories, and audio books.
*A note on audiobooks and short stories. I signed up for an Audible account that is $15 a month and gives me one free audiobook a month along with cheaper audio books if I want to purchase additional ones. I highly recommend this for the more expensive books if you don’t mind listening to them rather than reading them. It can save you a lot of money. Also, keep an eye on humble bundle, I got about 4 short stories and one long one in mp3 format for 12 bucks.*
Realm Gate Wars Books:
In my opinion, the first books released for Age of Sigmar were not very good, they seemed rushed and did not capture what Age of Sigmar was. There is a total of ten and I am personally through 8 of the 10. The first 5 were anywhere from “why am I forcing myself to read this”, all the way up to “eh”. At Warbeast though it starts to get interesting with some character development and going beyond stormcast plus stormcast equals win. (Call of Archaon wasn’t bad either but only because it focused on Vanguard and not more Stormcast.)
A good chunk of these first 10 books are also on audio as well, but the cost does not justify getting them in my opinion. Overall, I think you can skip most of these books, but if you want to dig deeper into the Realm Gate Wars you could probably start off with Wardens of the Everqueen and go from there.
Really the first 4 books don’t really do much other than explain the original starter set (blood warriors vs liberators) and don’t even go into how reforging is taking a toll on the stormcast.
- Gates of Azyr by Chris Wraight (Pre Realmgate Wars) – Also in Audio
- Warstorm by Guy Haley (Realmgate Wars Book 1) – Also in Audio
- Ghal Maraz by Guy Haley (Realmgate Wars Book 2) – Also in Audio
- Hammers of Sigmar by Darius Hinks (Realmgate Wars Book 3) – Also in Audio
- Call of Archaon by David Annandale (Realmgate Wars Book 4) – Also in Audio
- Wardens of the Everqueen by CL Werner (Realmgate Wars Book 5) – Also in Audio
- Warbeast by Gav Thorpe (Realmgate Wars Book 6)
- Fury of Gork by Josh Reynolds (Realmgate Wars Book 7)
- Bladestorm by Matt Westbrook(Realmgate Wars Book 8)
- Mortarch of Night by David Guymer (Realmgate Wars Book 9)
- Lord of Undeath by CL Werner (Realmgate Wars Book 10)
Note that Call of Archaon is a bunch of short stories put together (Beneath the Black Thumb, Eye of the Storm, The Solace of Rage, Knight of Corruption, Trial of the Chosen, In the Lands of the Blind, Blood and Plague, and See No Evil). Also Bladestorm is a series of short stories as well, (Righteous Blood, The Manticore Dreadhold, Iron Tide, Splitskull Pass, Chosen of Sigmar, The Spiral Tower). Finally Lord of Undeath contains the following short stories (The Prisoner of the Black Sun, Sands of Blood, The Lords of Helstone, Bridge of Seven Sorrows, The Beasts of Carth, Fist of Mork, Fist of Gork, Great Red, and Only the Faithful)
Once you read those books the setting is basically established that the Stormcast Eternals are mighty warriors and are winning the battles against Chaos. Also, it covers the Gharl Maraz recovery, the treaty between Sylvaneth and Stormcast, and that the reforging process is not as good everyone had thought.
After the Realm Gate Wars:
- Legends of the Age of Sigmar Omnibus 1 (Contains Sylvaneth, Fyreslayers, and Skaven Pestilens books)
- Black Rift
- City of Secrets (The first book that has Callis and Toll)
- Plague Garden – Also an Audio Book
- Eight Lamentations: Spear of Shadows
- Hammerhal and Other Stories (Has a lot of the same content from the other books)
- Nagash the Undying King – Also audiobook
- Overlords of the Iron Dragon
- Callis and Toll: The Silver Shard by Nick Horth (The third book with Callis and Toll) – Also an Audio Book
- Neferata Mortarch of Blood
- Neferata Black Atonement
* Note the novel Black Rift covers the following short stories (Assault on the Mandrake Bastion, In the Walls of Uryx, Gnawing Gate, Six Pillars, The Scarlet Lord, Ten Skulls, Bridge of Smoke, and The Sulfer Citadel) The novel Legends of the Age of Sigmar Omnibus contains the following short stories (The Keys to Ruin, Wrathspring, The Resolute and the Outcast, Shattered Crucible, Skaven Pestiliens, Four Thousand Days, Heartwood, The Splintered, and The Volturung Road)
Personally, I have read City of Secrets and that is a great read for the low price of 5 bucks. It starts diving a little bit into the non-stormcast personalities as well as what day to day life is like in some of these cities. It is a low cost and great starting point for people that want to dip their toes into the lore of the current game. Hammerhal and Other Stories is also worth the price at 5 dollars as well, but it is defiantly not as good as City of Secrets and some of what it has is also in the realm gate wars books.
My favorite of this bunch was Plague Garden which I listened to in audio format (humble bundle deal) which I was surprised I liked as much as I did. I really liked the crazy environments of Nurgles Realm, and how even within the realm of Chaos there is some order. Nagash the Undying King is a great look into the legions of Nagash and if you are curious about the power struggle in Shyish and between the Mortarchs it is a great read. Finally, Callis and Toll is a good read if you like to see how everyday life is like and how characters that are not stormcast eternals deal with enemies that are much more powerful than them. There is some good humor and the settings go into the nitty gritty details of how cities function.
Then a major character came back to Age of Sigmar in the force of Gortek with the excellent audiobook Realmslayer. At only 5 hours or so I highly recommend not paying full black library price for this and instead of dipping your toes into audible to get it. However, Realmslayer brings back one of the most famous characters from the old world and his take on this strange new land is awesome and it even has the author poking fun at some of the “new” names given to the races. It might be a good place to start for someone who loved Warhammer Fantasy and is curious about AoS lore.
Besides Realmslayer and Blacktalon: First Mark I have not had a chance to dig into much more of these stories as they were originally all released as ebooks one at a time which gets expensive. They are starting to combine these short stories into single less expensive books, which is a nice way of getting cheap people like me to read them. The small stories seemed to be stop-gap measures to begin introducing characters and factions into the setting though pre Soul Wars, and it contains some pretty good writing.
Right before the Necroquake:
- Realmslayer by David Guymer
- Gortek: One Untended
- Shadespire: Darkness in the Glass
- Call of Chaos Series
- Books from Novella Series 1: Heart of Winter, The Bone Desert, The Red Hours, Warqueen
- Blacktalon: First Mark
- Black Pyramid
- Gods and Mortals
- Myth and Revenants (Release is May 2019)
- The Denied
- Guns of the Black Eagle
- The Tainted Heart
- The Palace of Memory
- Hamilcar Champion of the Gods
- Scourge of Fate
- Hungerfiend
*Gods and Mortals contains the following short stories (The Road of Blades, Bear Eater, Pantheon, The Hardest Word, Pilgrim’s Trial, Auction of Blood, God’s Gift, Force of Personality, The Witch Takers, Graves and Gold, Order of the Fly: Tourney of Fate, The Library of Forgotten Moments, Callis and Toll: The Old Ways, Eight Lamentations: The Tainted Axe, Vault of Souls, Black Talon: Hunting Shadows, Obsidan, The Dance of Skulls). Call of Chaos contains the following short stories: (Lord of the Cosmic Gate, The Sacrifice, Godless, The Eighth Victory, Gorechosen, The Crystal Fate, The Prodigal, The Last Gift, Daemon of the Deep, The Gift of Khorne, By the Horns, and The Unending Storm) Finally Myth and Revenants contains the following short stories (The Claw of Memory, Blacktalon: When Cornered, Acts of Sacrifice, The Sea Taketh, The Learning & One, Untended, The Sands of Grief, The Lightning Golem, A Dirge of Dusts and Steel, Ghosts of Demesnus, Blood Gold, Shiprats, and A Deeper Shade)*
I put Hamilcar Champion of the Gods and Scourge of Fate in the pre-Soul Wars section because from the brief story outline it doesn’t mention it anywhere. However, they were released after Soul Wars so they could take place after the Necroquake. Without reading them though I cannot say for sure.
This all leads up to the Necroquake and the start of the Soul Wars, which I am assuming you will see a lot of the characters we have seen in the more recent books come back and dealing with new threats. Soul Wars is the book to read for the introduction of the Sacrosant Chamber fighting the Nighthaunts, and it is a great lead into the next setting. Sacrosant and Other Stories has some short stories from right before the Necroquake as well as some during or right after as well.
Currently, I only have two books in here as I am sure they are finishing off story arcs from before the quake or leading those characters (that sold well) into the time period after the Necroquake. I imagine we will begin seeing a slew of new books coming out in this time period over the next year or two.
The Necroquake:
- Soul Wars
- Sacrosant and Other Stories
I listened to Soul Wars on audible and it was awesome and is easily one of my top three AoS books I have read/listened to. The Anvils Stormcast chamber are not as nice or goodie to shoes as some of the other books have led you to believe. It also really dives into the reforging process and why what happens is happening. It also digs deep into the daily life of Shyish for the common folks, as well as what kinds of dangers they face on a day to day basis.
If you asked me to recommend one book from this entire list to someone new to AoS I would say read Soul Wars. It is currently the most relevant in terms of timeline, and frankly is one of the best written and entertaining ones released. With the darker direction AoS is going in, and the corruption of the reforging process it really gives you the sense that while the Stormcast push was strong and they were winning change might be on the horizon.
There you have it my sort of timeline for these books, it really was hard to put them all in order correctly because there are so many short stories and audiobook only stories. Black Library bringing them into collections is a great start for me to pick them up and read into them, and I am glad they are doing it. I just hope they release some more meat and potatoes books giving you a sense of life after the Necroquake soon.
