Storm of Chaos: The Poll to end all polls

[Craze_b0i]

It's been debated before but as far as I can see never polled. Is the background better with or without Storm of Chaos included?

[Marked_by_chaos]

Terrible ending. Better off hinted at as a brewing storm.

[Son of Sanguinius]

The beginning had a ton of potential. The middle was interesting but felt like it truly ignored the campaign it was supposed to be based on. The ending was a very poorly executed attempt to halt momentum and revert to the former status quo.

[BigbyWolf]

Without. Although I'm all for global campaigns there's a reason they haven't revisited them after SoC and the Nemesis Crown. They didn't actually change a thing. Even the majority of the characters and army concepts they introduced for SoC vanished shortly afterwards. NC has no legacy whatsoever. The Warhammer world is far too small to change anything drastically, Albion worked because it was deciding the future of a small, but tactically significant island- realistically, whatever happened there would never have a massive impact on the universe. With SoC there was only one acceptable ending- Chaos loses, everything goes back to normal, to have an evil victory would have required far too many changes down the line.

Although I'm not a 40K player, it's obvious that global campaigns work far better in that setting: Invent a sector/ galaxy, fight over it, one side can be completely decimated, but it doesn't matter because it's a pretty big universe.

EDIT: And it's worth noting that the endings to both SoC and NC were extremely poor. SoC has been well publicised, but in my mind NC was even more confusing. One of the good guys chases down a Night Goblin that's running away from the final battle with the crown, good guy kills gobbo, gobbo dies with a terrifying scream that panics all the bad guys and makes them run away, dwarfs take crown.

What happened to the "Ignore little 'un panic?", eh GW? What happened?

[Poncho160]

Im sure that everyone (except the Orc players out there) would like to forget that with thier biggest armies out fighting, the Orcs just walked in to the middle of it all, £%&*@ Slapped the Chosen one and then decided he wasnt worth killing!!! haha

[Athelassan]

I think the background would be better had SoC never happened. But since it did happen and so much has been published about it and its aftermath, I think we're better off keeping it rather than retconning it out at this stage.

[Alderhan]

I prefer the enemy within to the enemy without.

That being said, me and my friends had a lot of fun with the campaign book back in the day.

[Son of Sanguinius]

Im sure that everyone (except the Orc players out there) would like to forget that with thier biggest armies out fighting, the Orcs just walked in to the middle of it all, £%&*@ Slapped the Chosen one and then decided he wasnt worth killing!!! haha

Perhaps one of the worst examples of the background at the end of Storm. Only surpassed by Volkmar staring down Mannfred and at least several tens of thousands of Undead warriors.

Grimgor is a butchery machine. His whole existence is focused on the killing of challenging opponents. Not just out-dueling. KILLING. To have him leave Archaon alive feels like a slap in the face to me as a reader. It really could have only been worse if Valten had left him alive.

[m1acca1551]

I really hope that they revisit storm of chaos now that we have 8th with hordes and storm of magic. As much as i enjoyed aspects of the story but otherwise it was a complete farce. The comeing storm is alot better as long as they revisit it.

[Gorbad Ironclaw]

I always liked the hints that the next big Chaos invasion was building and could be just around the corner, I thought it set the tone nicely for Warhammer. Actually playing it out was a terrible idea (as was most of the characters/armies/plot points introduced) so we are much better off without it. And hopefully it's not to be revisited at all. Leave it as a menacing factor in the background.

[R-Love]

The setting is better off with it. Generally, if the option is going with a bad outcome or completely ignoring it, it is always a better idea to go with what you have. GW put the work into the writing and organizing the SoC, trying to ignore it turns out far worse than any ending could ever have. Were there problems with the ending? Absolutely, the "resolutions" given by Teclis, Grimgor, and Volkmar especially. It also offered up plenty of avenues for interesting stories, but the problem is that they were left hanging. It is wrong to say the ending of the SoC didn't change anything - the northern Empire was in flames, the countryside was still full of roaming warbands, and Archaon was holed up with a large portion of his army in Brass Keep, a stronghold to strike at the heart of the Empire. The Von Carsteins had revealed themselves to the Empire, the Church of Sigmar was torn with strife, and the Prophet of Sigmar had been assassinated. A religious war is looming in Naggoroth, a Chaos Horde had attacked Lustria itself, and the Slann are preparing to take a more proactive role, having taken control of Albion. None of these are sticking with the status quo, they're major changes. The problem is that they were abandoned. The clock was turned back, the SoC was no longer mentioned, and GW did their best to pretend it never happened. But after spending ten years building up the hype to it,* you can't just ignore it afterwards. If they had stuck with the ending, they could have tinkered with the more problematic parts retroactively, and advance the story. But people kept complaining because they didn't like the ending, so GW decided to wind back the clock to shut them up. And then people start complaining that it didn't change anything and GW won't advance the story. Damned if you do, Damned if you don't.

[Lord Squidar]

My personal opinion is that I loved the storm of chaos, even with the funky ending. They tried to do an ending that didn't destroy the world, which was kind of fail and anticlimatic. Still the event was fun.

What GW should do is take a page out of the book of Marvel. They have this idea that there is one overarching story line for the universe and each character, the ones we all know. BUT they come up with all these side events that are only canon to themselves. I.e. the marvel zombies arch. it was crazy fun, you got to see different things, and when it was over, the setting reset to zero hour. You can still go back and read them and enjoy them. GW could have the same. Make a storm of chaos setting that you apply to the main rules, where archaeon wins, and players can play the campaign out like this, but it doesn't change the main story. Gives them more chance to sell books and special models for the events, and more specific areas will boost sales in fringe armies like a lizardmen versus dark elves campaign could be cool (ok they aren't fringe in game power, map location)

[Kaptajn_Congoboy]

The Warhammer world is far too small to change anything drastically

Therein lies the problem, the idea that all changes must be Greyhawk Wars/summer blockbuster/Michael Bay big badabooms. Every source of conflict need not be the next big Chaos/Orc/Generic Badguy (the WHFB world has some of the most passive good guys in existence) Invasion. There is plenty of space in the world to have interesting times happen.

One of the reasons I found the 40k universe less and less interesting as it ossified more and more after they established it in the 90s is because the emphasis on the incredibly grand scale of the setting invariably makes "small"-scale conflicts seem petty and moot, even if they involve a gazillion soldiers and the death of worlds. At least as they are presented so far.

[Fear Ghoul]

Archaon is the Lord of the End Times, the final Everchosen whose coming will foreshadow the end of the world. Nothing short of the destruction of most of the major factions would have lived up to the hype given to him and his "Storm", and as such it is better that GW leaves Warhammer on the precipice of destruction than what we ended up with. Warhammer is more interesting this way anyway, and it is probably the principle reason why GW no longer advances the background. Warhammer is a setting, not an evolving story. Ironically enough, the Storm of Chaos was entirely designed to generate revenue for GW, and yet any other time GW try to make money they get flak for it.

[Jerry]

Valten no!!!! I like the idea of advancing the story line but main characters need to stay alive!

[Urgat]

Without. Although I'm all for global campaigns there's a reason they haven't revisited them after SoC and the Nemesis Crown. They didn't actually change a thing. Even the majority of the characters and army concepts they introduced for SoC vanished shortly afterwards. NC has no legacy whatsoever. The Warhammer world is far too small to change anything drastically, Albion worked because it was deciding the future of a small, but tactically significant island- realistically, whatever happened there would never have a massive impact on the universe. With SoC there was only one acceptable ending- Chaos loses, everything goes back to normal, to have an evil victory would have required far too many changes down the line.

I don't really see the big deal if Archaon had taken Middenheim. Let's just say that when Archaon steps in the flames, nothing happens, and, in the background, you hear Tzeentch laughing "gotcha!". Archaon shakes his fits, swearing that "next time, oh yes, next time!". The few Middenheimer players left get new fluff that they're now errant armies sworn to cleanse the province from the taint of Chaos. Fluff moved a bit forward, everybody's happy, nothing's broken. It's not THAT difficult to make up some fluff that feels like it's moving while not really altering anything. Well, i'm fine with Grom remaining the only one to have ever taken Middenheim ("waits for Arnizipal to pop up" )

Valten no!!!! I like the idea of advancing the story line but main characters need to stay alive!

I completely disagree

[TheDungen]

true they squandered the end but they should've kept going and then smoothed over the end with later fluff rather than doing a rollback. I liked the fact that we as gamers had a chance to affect the warhammer world. I find this static world they're forcign upon us now to be extreemly boring.

also the people saying chaos could never win forgett that chaos didnt win they lost and lost big time. And ofcourse they could've changed things they could've let norsca fall to the order side if order won and kislev fallto the chaos side if chaos won. they could also have ascended archon to a demon prince if he had won. that would've been an execelent settign for a new summer campaign. They shoudlnt be so afraid ti kill of characters int eh army book either. THey've go historical heroes there already, Gorthor, Alith Anar and so on.

[willone]

I luved the idea of Storm of Chaos advancing the time line and reckon GW should hav reconed the story itself to give a better conclusion a year or 2 after the campaign finished.
Personly I think a better ending would have seen Belakor and his Daemons marching beside Archaon to capture Middenheim only too be banished by the the combined efforts of Teclis, Volkmar, Ar-Ulric and the Patriarch of the Collage of Light rather than have Teclis just snap his fingers. Mannfred would have stayed at home to eventually defeat Crom and then begin expanding his borders and building his strength while most of the Empire's army is away. This would have left Archaon without his strongest allies against the combined armies of the Conclave forcing him to fall back to Brass Keep giving Chaos what they never really had before a strong base in the Empire which would just about let Archaon keep his head. Valten could have sacrificed himself heroiclly some how to become a martyr and saint to the Empire and Grimgor could have gone toe to toe with the Slayers of Karak Kadrin for a good fight.

[Craze_b0i]

Keeping SOC but rewriting the ending is an interesting third idea. I still think it would have left most people unsatisfied though, chaos ppl would still think the campaign-system was unbalanced against them so they couldn't win, Empire ppl would still be peeved that despite a resounding victory they still lost half their northern provinces - only managing push Archeon backwards a few miles to Brass Keep. Also problematic is Grimgor, Gav Thorpe had written himself into a corner where Grimgor really had to kill Archeon, but either for marketing reasons or because Gav Thorpe had become too attached to his own characters it didn't happen.

[ryng_sting]

I liked much of the campaign, and the premise it was built on - what if the next Chaos incursion wasn't some vague threat in the future, but actually happening now? Likewise with the introduction of Valten (and his exit) looked at what a Second Coming would actually entail - namely the threat of civil war, and the people he was meant to save wishing he would go away.

The insurmountable problem, however, was that it introduced forward momentum into material that can't, by definition, ever really go forwards. It's a little like soap operas - nothing truly final can ever happen to upset the status quo, else it would end the story.