What Is Warhammer: Age Of Sigmar?

While Warhammer 40K continues to be as popular as ever, most of the other Warhammer universes have yet to break into mainstream pop culture. In fact, a lot of people might not even be aware that Warhammer extends well beyond 40K. Well, it does, and in this article we’re going to give you a brief overview of one of its siblings, Warhammer: Age Of Sigmar.

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With Warhammer Age of Sigmar: Realms of Ruins launching soon(ish), we figured now would be the perfect time to discuss the universe and its setting, the Mortal Realms. You don’t need to know anything about Age of Sigmar to enjoy Realms of Ruins, but it wouldn’t hurt to learn about the universe regardless because it has a lot more to offer than just the upcoming game.

What Is Warhammer: Age Of Sigmar?

Age of Sigmar is one of the more recent universes developed by Games Workshop. Released back in 2015 as a tabletop wargame, Age of Sigmar was designed to replace Warhammer Fantasy Battles, which was discontinued that same year. Over time, the universe developed into its own unique thing. Even though it still shares many similarities with Fantasy Battles, at this point it wouldn’t be fair to call Age of Sigmar a mere spin-off.

The Mortal Realms are eight planes of existence inhabited by Age of Sigmar’s various races and factions. All these planes were shaped by Lores of Magic, a concept you should already be familiar with if you’ve played any of the Total War: Warhammer games. For instance, the Realm of Ghyran was shaped by the Lore of Life, the Realm of Ulgu was shaped by the Lore of Shadows, and so on. Most of these realms used to be controlled by the forces of Chaos before the god Sigmar rallied the forces of Order and started reconquering them, ushering a new age in the process. Hence, the name.

Differences And Similarities Between Age Of Sigmar And Fantasy Battles

Many of the races you might be familiar with from Fantasy Battles can also be found in Age of Sigmar. They may look different and have different names, but they’re essentially the same races. In addition, there are some new ones as well, including the Stormcast Eternals who have more in common with Space Marines than any of the races or factions found in Fantasy Battles.

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Each of these races fights on the side of one of the four Grand Alliances. You’ll find Beastmen, Skaven, and followers of the four Chaos gods in the Grand Alliance of Chaos, Humans, High Elves, and Lizardmen in the Grand Alliance of Order, Vampire Counts and Tomb Kings in the Alliance of Death, and Greenskins and Ogres in the Grand Alliance of Destruction. Again, they have different names, but all these races will be instantly recognizable to anybody who’s familiar with Warhammer Fantasy Battles.

Interestingly enough, Age of Sigmar also features quite a few characters you might recognize from Fantasy Battles. A few notable examples include Skarbrand, Kairos Fateweaver, Teclis, and even Nagash. Daemons look pretty much identical to their Fantasy Battles counterparts while some of the other characters look a bit different. You definitely won’t have any issue recognizing them, though. Sigmar himself was borrowed from Fantasy Battles as well, but his role here is obviously a bit more important. After all, they did name an entire age after him.

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