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Daughters of Khaine

2020-09-29T12:23:10Z

2406:3400:20F:FFC0:B8FE:8852:936:AEE3: /* Origins */

{{Age of Sigmar Faction|Faction=Daughters of Khaine|Logo=Daughters_of_Khaine_battletome_art.jpg|Alliance=Order|Motto=Much bloodier and less NSFW than it appears.}}
{{topquote|She could never take an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth. The weak and flaccid parity would make her nearly puke. She wants an eye for a tooth, and a life for an eye.|Helen Zahavi - Dirty Weekend}}
{{topquote|Let's show the gutless pigs how the warriors of Pah-Dishah can fight! By Tarim, we'll give the devils scarlet wine to drink this dawn...|Red Sonja}}

The '''Daughters of Khaine''' are a nation of aelves (though closer to a collection of scattered religious communes than a nation) led by Morathi who combine the Khainite religion with shadow magic.

They are an army, with a few exceptions, of [[PROMOTIONS|armed aelven women and monstergirls in bikinis]]. As they worship Khaine, to them the clash of arms is the height of their religion, holy rites practiced and perfected with all the high-level skill and grace of aelf-kind. As blades flash, they shed their visage of cold and distant beauty, how they tend to be when not in battle, their ecstatic faces lighting up with each fresh kill. In contrast to even other aelves, especially the Idoneth Deepkin, many Daughters of Khaine have lived far beyond the average aelf lifespan, which is already longer than that of other races (except maybe the males - see below).

==History==
The Daughters of Khaine have carved out their own empire, rising from an obscure cult from days long gone to an emergent power. The faction was founded by [[Morathi]]. After leaving the Great Alliance because [[Nagash]] revealed her dark secret, Morathi sought to establish her own dwellings in Ulgu. Malerion cruelly rejected her suggestion of splitting the rule of the thirteen Dominions, for he claimed all the Shadowlands as his own. Her protests were met with scorn until, as either a jest or a plot to get rid of her, Malerion granted his mother a small parcel of land in the middle of the Umbral Veil, the darkest and most impenetrable of all regions in Ulgu. It was so dangerous that none save Malerion himself had ever returned from those cloying mists with their sanity intact.

Morathi went there and exceeded her son's expectations. She bent the shadows into a protective shroud around her new land. Her only followers were the aelven witch-cults that had maintained their worship of [[Khaine]]. To ensure their loyalty, Morathi built a temple to Khaine, naming it Hagg Nar, and taught them the secrets of navigating the murky currents. Hagg Nar began as a pitiful kingdom, and Morathi brooded over her mean existence. She refused to despair and worked out a plan, the beginnings of which occurred when her son arrived claiming they had, at last, found the lost aelf-souls from the world-that-was, and that they needed Morathi’s aid in order to save them. Acting as the bait, Morathi helped Malerion and the other gods [[Tyrion]] and [[Teclis]] to capture [[Slaanesh]] and imprison him/her between Hysh and Ulgu.

Eventually, in her search for something to change the balance of power, she felt the power of Khaine's heart in her dreams. She put all her effort into finding it and after a long search found the heart of Khaine, the god she had pretended to worship in the past. However it was guarded by Kharybtar, the father of Kharibdysses. Morathi tried to charm the sea monster, and it worked for a time. But when she tried to grab the heart, he attacked. Eventually she defeated Kharybtar by constricting him in her coils, but not before he dealt her a fatal blow. Morathi would've died, but she was able to siphon power from Khaine's heart and survived. Thus did she escape with the heart.

Led by Morathi, the Daughters of Khaine spread outwards from the temple-city of Hagg Nar. Morathi had previously gained the knowledge her son has of shadow-shifting magic, and used it to access the shadow paths that allow swift travel over the vast distances of Ulgu. Fighting all manner of foes across all Thirteen Dominions, the Daughters of Khaine secretly expand, establishing dozens of new temples. Having help capture Slaanesh, Morathi was given some of the elf souls drawn from Slaanesh to remake as aelves who would help her. However Morathi was greedy, and took more than her allotted share. However, some of them had been [[monstergirls|altered by their time with Slaanesh]]. There were those with [[Lamia|serpentine mutations akin to Morathi]], these became the [[Medusa|Melusae]]. Others had bat-like wings and long tails, these became the [[Harpy|Khinerai]]. Their numbers swelled as Morathi drew more than her allotted share of souls from Slaanesh, which [[Not As Planned|of course, tipped off Slaanesh's followers as to where the captured god is hiding and also made it more likely Slaanesh will one day be able to break free]].

==Religion==
[[File:Morathi,_the_Shadow_Queen_from_DaughtersofKhaine_.jpg|300px|thumb|right|"Charge, Daughters of Khaine! For my...uh, I mean, for Khaine's glory!"]]
Unlike some other factions within Age of Sigmar, but very much like others, the Daughters of Khaine are in essence a theocracy. There are many sects of Daughters of Khaine, each worshiping a different aspect of the aelf god of battle and bloodshed. Although the rites and rituals might differ, all the Khainites follow a strict hierarchy in their organisation. They worship Khaine and Morathi is his High Oracle, the one who discerns his will and their overall leader. Though they know about the other gods of Order, they pay no homage to them. Beneath Morathi are the High Priestesses, which include the Slaughter Queens, Hag Queens and Bloodwrack Medusae. They are the keepers of each shrine’s most sacred artefacts, and commanders of the Sisterhood of Blood. The degree of authority held by each of these figures, along with their specific title, varies between the sects, but a single word from Morathi can alter the influence of any other ranking.

Of all the warriors of the temples, the Scáthborn – the Melusai and Khinerai – are closest to Morathi herself, yet they often remain hidden from those outside the cult. The Medusae are made from Aelves converted by Morathi herself; though this is seen as an immense honor Morathi binds them with the most binding of magical oaths, but none among the Khainites would dare question her in this. This is partially due to their forms resulting from daemonic taint which would cause negative sentiment among their allies and the fact that Morathi uses them as something of a secret police. The most public-facing Khainites are the Witch Aelves and Sisters of Slaughter. Their most important shrines are the Cauldrons of Blood, gifts from Khaine himself (at least, what Morathi’s claims each time she gifts one of the great iron cauldrons to the temple of a newly founded Khainite sect). The covenites see it as a sign of their god’s favour that the cauldrons never seem to overflow, no matter how much blood is poured within them following a battle – all assume Khaine himself takes the surplus as an offering.

War covens are the most important organisations to the Daughters of Khaine, their structure laid out by Morathi herself. It is through violence that the Khainites expand their territories, defend their temples and worship their god. Weapons practice and mock duels take up the majority of their daily lives, yet these are not mere military drills, but religious ceremonies, treated with all the gravitas that others might use when reading their most holy of tomes or offering prayers to their god. From their temples in various realms, the Daughters of Khaine scour the Mortal Realms for blood sacrifices. At Morathi's edict, they also search for the shards of their god, scattered across the Realms. They do this for the glory of Khaine and to see him reborn.

[[Just As Planned|But they are nearly all of them deceived]].

Morathi claims to speak for Khaine, and she does wield his unbreakable iron heart, but none know that Morathi’s power is a lie and that Khaine is dead. While their devotions to Khaine could one day lead to his rebirth, Morathi is deliberately preventing that. The reason for this is that she is siphoning the power - either by co-opting it before it reaches the heart or pulling it from Khaine's heart - to reach godhood herself. The prayers that her daughters scream and the ritual offerings they make only serve to enhance her own power, not Khaine’s. Outside Morathi herself, only a handful of the "altered" members of the Daughters of Khaine are aware of this deception, and they, willingly or otherwise, are bound by the most binding of oaths and magic to serve Morathi and keep this secret. Also, the blood surplus poured into the Cauldron's doesn't go to Khaine. It flows back to Hagg Nar through Morathi’s magics, to the Mother of all Cauldrons, the Máthcoir, from which The High Oracle absorbs and repurposes the blood’s energies for her own nefarious gain.

Recently, a few of the members of the Daughters of Khaine have grown suspicious, especially since there are some who have started worshiping Morathi alongside Khaine. However, even something as small as questioning Morathi or second-guessing her role in Khaine's religion brings out Morathi's inner [[Inquisition|Inquisition]]. So far, those members of the Daughters of Khaine who do this get [[Blam|quickly silenced]] by Morathi or the Medusae as [[Heresy|heretics]] (in one story, a Melusae is shown eavesdropping on a priestess' prayers, where she enquires to Khaine about an acolyte's devotion to Morathi rather than Khaine, [[Grimdark|and quickly crystallized the dissenting priestess forevermore to prevent any challenge to Morathi's authority]]). As long as Morathi holds control over Khaine's heart, there is little hope for his revival.

==Society==
Their society is brutal, especially given that it's leader is [[Morathi]] and they worship [[Khaine]]. They serve Khaine with fanatical devotion, which is problematic considering that Khaine is the god of murder. While the Daughters of Khaine crave bloodshed and murder, they serve alongside the forces of Order – albeit tenuously. Given their tendency towards collateral damage (and rumors of kidnapping innocents and gruesome rituals), they are less respected allies and more tolerated because they're useful. Their views on the other major groups are varied. As builders of cities and civilizations, the Daughters of Khaine are at odds with the forces of Destruction. While it is said that they have an aversion to the Death faction because of a dislike for anything death-related since they nearly went extinct, it's more likely that this due to Morathi's personal grudge against Nagash for striking her and outing her true from to the rest of the pantheon. Despite their distaste for the other two, the one faction they truly hate is Chaos; they could give the Stormcast Eternals a run for their money in hating Chaos, and prosecute their crusades with particular violence against the servants of Slaanesh.

If you're wondering why Morathi is mentioned so often that's deliberate; Morathi keeps as much of a stranglehold on Khainite society as she can. It would be out-of-character for her to do anything less (she kind of a control freak). All Khainites are either warriors that serve in their religious order, or they are leathanam (see below). Temples are found only in some realms; confirmed realms are Ulgu, Azyr and Ghyran. When they are not fighting, the Witch Aelves and Sisters of Slaughter usually participate in ritualized gladiator matches or shady pit fights. They also partake of a form of bladed dancing for the entertainment of others. They're essentially a matriarchal elven society with a penchant for manipulation, ruthlessness, aggressive misandry and skimpy outfits who originate from a dark realm and follow the commands of an insane female figure who sometimes mutates her followers to resemble her. [[Drow|Sound familiar]]? (though Morathi isn't a god, she carries the heart of one and seeks to become one herself).

To elaborate: the female aelves tend to dye their hair with blood and, in a throwback to Warhammer Fantasy, have rituals of rebirth keep the covenite sisters youthful in appearance and supple in body. Even among their ranks, there are some who are considered extremists; the Sisters of Slaughters' are members who graft masks of living metal to their faces with boiling blood. While the aelven members are accepted by others, the Melusae and Khinerai are not. When fighting alongside, they are concealed by a glamour so they too appear to be aelves; this could also explain some of their teamkilling tendencies among alliances with other Order factions, as they're keeping the existence of these mutated elves secret.

The cities and temples of the <s>not-Drow</s> Daughters of Khaine are ruled by the female aelves while the male elves are slaves. Remember that leathanam class mentioned earlier? Apart from the Doomfire Warlocks, this class is made up exclusively of '''all''' the males in this faction; disregarded menials who are little more than worker drones (we know what you're thinking; something, something, feminist fantasy). While the women outnumber the men, this is not the paradise [[/d/|some]] think it would be. Morathi deliberately made only a few male aelves, and then only from the weakest and most broken of souls retrieved from Slaanesh ensuring they would be weak. Even male aelves a Daughter of Khaine gives birth to are cursed with this same weakness as Morathi siphons part of their souls to power the Cauldrons of Blood - the true energy powering them rather than the power of Khaine. While some male aelves manage to harness shadow magic and become Doomfire Warlocks, Morathi has them branded with mind-control runes ([[Grimdark|while deceiving them into thinking they're protection against Slaanesh]]). Even then, Doomfire Warlocks have a pariah status because of their gender, which is why they are rarely seen by non-Khainites. While in theory they worship Khaine who is a male deity, again this is superficial since Khaine's power is limited to his heart and he actually has no say over the Daughters of Khaine's actions because of Morathi, who secretly siphons his power for herself.

==Temples==
The Daughters of Khaine are divided into Temples, in a manner similar to Stormcast Chambers or Sylvaneth Wargroves.

* '''Hagg Nar:''' Hagg Nar lies deep in the Umbral Veil, the darkest region of the Shadowlands. The first of the Daughters of Khaine temples, it was built atop the Hellelux, a geyser of shadow magic that spews shrouding mists.
* '''Draichi Ganeth:''' Draichi Ganeth translates as ‘the bladedkillers’. Their main temple is found in the northern barrens of Fuarthorn in Ulgu, but their war pilgrimages and lesser shrines can be found across the realms.
* '''The Kraith:''' The sect known as the Kraith, also called the Crimson Cult, are true disciples of slaughter, and have earned a reputation as the least compromising of all the Daughters of Khaine.
* '''Khailebron:''' This sect has learned well the arts of concealment, stealth and obfuscation. Those who worship at the temples of Khailebron revere the assassin and the unseen killer, and strive to be masters of ambushes and sudden strikes.
*'''Khelt Nar:''' Khelt Nar has become the fastest growing of the sects established by Morathi. It began as Ironshard, a single Khainite shrine founded by the High Oracle atop a flat-topped mountain of iron known as the Rothtor and has since expanded to other Realms, including a stronghold in Ghyran. Khelt Nar is best known for being composed of deliciously brown dark aelves.

==Soulbound==
In [[Age of Sigmar Roleplay]], it's established that Daughters of Khaine are selected to become Soulbound when Morathi decides that a potentially stray from the ranks of her faithful is too dangerous or too useful to just dispose of outright. Soulbound Daughters are selected from the overly ambitious, those who secretly yearned for freedom, and even those who had begun to doubt Khaine's divinity, basically serving as a way to remove potential threats to Morathi's control over the faction. Despite their origins, though, Morathi often goes out of her way to maintain a good relationship with "her" Soulbound (in fact, the Binding actually servers the magical restrains that Morathi uses to control the Daughters as a whole), because, whatever else they may be to her, they are both useful as powerful yet neutral arbiters and as ambassadors of her "good intentions" to the other powers of Order.

Normal Daughters of Khaine are unsure of how to regard their Soulbound "sisters", since they are simultaneously very dangerous, but not rivals due to being forever outside the hierarchy of the temples, apparently favored by the High Oracle but yet also deeply connected to and regularly traveling alongside "outsiders" who shouldn't be privy to the secrets of Khaine's temples. They tend to default to "respectful suspicion" when interacting with Soulbound Daughters.

The Daughters of Khaine have the fewest dedicated Archetypes in the Age of Sigmar Roleplay corebook, with only the '''Hag Priestess''' and the '''Witch Aelf''' open to them.

==Gallery==
<gallery>
File:Medusae Shrine.jpg|<s>Boobflash</s> Bloodwrack Shrine in all its glory.
File:Temples of Khaine.jpg
File:Daughters of Khaine Slaughter.jpg
File:Daughters-of-khaine-4.jpg|Dark Elves, now with 50% more [[Snek|Sneks]].
File:I might you never know.jpg
File:Drkelf.png|A typical Khelt Nar aelf.
</gallery>

{{Template:Playable Factions in Warhammer: Age of Sigmar}}

[[Category:Age of Sigmar]]
[[Category:Dark Elves]]

Age of Sigmar/Tactics/Order/Daughters of Khaine

2020-09-29T12:20:41Z

2406:3400:20F:FFC0:B8FE:8852:936:AEE3: /* Why play Daughters of Khaine? */

{{Age of Sigmar Faction|Faction=Daughters of Khaine|Logo=Daughters_of_Khaine_battletome_art.jpg|Alliance=Order|Motto=Much bloodier and less NSFW than it appears.}}

==Why play Daughters of Khaine?==
* Most of them are [[Hot Chicks]] and [[Monstergirl|Monstergirls]] in bikinis (except the Doomfire Warlocks and Avatars of Khaine, but those are not mandatory units).
* You like the idea of playing an army of bloodthirsty, fanatical murderers but don't like Khorne.
* With the right unit choices, you literally have an army of [[Hot Chicks]] and [[Monstergirl|Monstergirls]] in bikinis!
* You like the continuation of Morathi's story arc, and want to see her make her mark on the setting.
* You always wanted to play as [[Drow]] in Warhammer.

===Pros===

* Morathi is one of the most powerful models in the game. Her main form is almost at the level of the [[Alarielle the Everqueen|big]] [[Archaon|god-like]] [[Nagash|models]].
* Some of the best melee in the setting, only the [[Flesh-Eater Courts|crazy cannibals]] or the best followers of [[Khorne|big red]] or [[Slaanesh|the colossal pervert]] can hit like you do in combat.
* They're a jack-of-all-trades able to fight in every phase with melee, shooting, magic, decent movement and bravery shenanigans.
* A monster that DOESN'T GET LESS EFFECTIVE IF IT TAKES WOUNDS (that also double as a giant angry statue of their god).
* Plenty of movement tricks. Your basic troops (Witch Aelves and Sisters of Slaughter) have the ability to run and charge with only a musician, everything else except the heroes and Cauldron of Blood/Bloodwrack Shrines have movement 8-14, you can reroll 1s to run turn 1, 1s to charge turn 2, plus Deep Striking Khinerai, Khailebron's deep striking ability and Lore of Shadows spells that boost movement.
* The new rules for shooting at characters give the enemy -1 to hit unless the target is a monster. Think the Cauldron of Blood or the Bloodwrack Shrine would count? Nope, they're not Monsters. Keep them close to a unit and watch them get to combat unmolested.
* The Cauldron of Blood, with the right combination of relics, Command Traits and prayers is straight busted, coming in with a nightmarish amount of damage output both in shooting and close combat, powerful support abilities and the ability to heal itself through multiple avenues for 300-330 points.
* Did I mention all of the [[Hot Chicks]] and [[Monstergirl|Monstergirls]] in bikinis?

===Cons===

* These chicks are almost as naked as the fyreslayers, but they dont have fancy runes or 2 wounds to tide them over. Apart from their 6+ fanatical faith save, they have the usual Glass Cannon problem of being flimsy. Our Infantry has a 6+ Save, and the other units - apart from Morathi - are softer than their equivalents in other armies unless you make the right choices (such as Hagg Narr and/or throw in a Cauldron).
* They are rather expensive to collect in dollars, and even spending lots of money on models can still leave you with a comparatively low model count.
* Their shooting is limited and overall mediocre.
* They do not play well with others. If you're playing Daughters of Khaine, you're playing them in a Daughters of Khaine Allegiance army. They are incredibly reliant on their faction abilities to turn them from a bunch of expensive fragile units with some pretty good close combat into a unified army with some of the most brutal close combat in the game. You can ally other stuff into them, don't ally them with other stuff. (Not entirely true, Khinari Heartrenders slot nicely into most Order soup lists as its a good deepstrike bully unit)
* Not a magic heavy army. Bar Morathi (who is mostly in monster form) you only have the Bloodwrack Medusa, who only gives you one spell/dispel per turn without relics or artifacts, and the Doomfire Warlocks who can be very powerful, but get expensive in blocks of 10 (which is what you want).

==Rulebooks==
{{AOSRulebooks|tome=Daughters of Khaine|points=[https://www.warhammer-community.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/5ae12374.pdf Daughters of Khaine Errata]}}

==Allegiance Abilities==
===Battle Traits===
; Fanatical Faith : Daughters of Khaine can ignore wounds allocated to them on a 6+. Sweet.
;Blood Rites : The fantasy variant of "Power From Pain". Every turn your units get a brand new special rule that stacks for the rest of the game.
:#'''Quickening Bloodlust:''' Reroll run rolls of 1.
:#'''Headlong Fury:''' Reroll dice rolls of 1 when charging.
:#'''Zealot's Rage:''' Rerolls 1s to hit. In addition, an Avatar of Khaine always counts as being animated.
:#'''Slaughterer's Strength:''' Reroll 1s to wound. Note that neither this nor turn 3 say "In close combat" so feel free to reroll those shots with your Blood Stalkers.
:#'''Unquenchable Fervour:''' Your units rerolls saves of 1, and do not need to take battleshock tests.

===Command Traits===
#'''Bathed in Blood:''' Increase your wound characteristic by 1 and you can heal 1 wound at the start of each hero phase. Good on a Cauldron of Blood, but there are better ways to get your wounds back.
#'''Zealous Orator:''' Friendly units within 14 inches can use the General's Bravery. Pairs well with a Slaughter Queen on Cauldron of Blood for Bravery 10, which lets you easily get the extra damage from Mindrazor off against most units in the game.
#'''Bloody Sacrificer:''' Add 1 to the hit rolls of the General's weapons. Lot of good options here, but this seems like a waste of a Command Trait, given you can have other better options.
#'''Terrifying Beauty:''' Subtract 1 on hit rolls against the General. Putting this on the Cauldron of Blood will drive your opponent insane. Stacks with the existing -1 against shooting for heroes close to a unit, meaning that everyone shooting at you will have a -2 to hit you.
#'''Mistress of Poisons:''' Add 1 to the General's weapons Damage characteristics. A Slaughter Queen with this will wipe out a unit a turn.
#'''True Believer:''' Ups the turn number for the unit's Blood Rites. Good to get an Avatar of Khaine awake turn 2 and just generally a good choice.

===Gifts of Morathi===
(Can be given to any Daughter of Khaine Hero)
#'''Crown of Woe:''' Subtract 1 from the bravery of enemy units within 7". This range doubles to 14" the first time the bearer slays an enemy model.
#'''Cursed Blade:''' One of the bearers melee weapons adds +1 to hit rolls. If the result is ever 7+ then the weapon does 1 mortal wound instead of the normal damage.
#'''Amulet of Dark Fire:''' The bearer negates mortal wounds inflicted '''by spells''' on a 4+.
#'''Crone Blade:''' One of the bearers melee weapons heals the user by 1 wound each time it slays an enemy model.
#'''Thousand and One Dark Blessings:''' The bearer gains +1 to saves. This should probably be your default option since you'll always have a use for it, and DoK suffer from mediocre saves in general. Makes Heroes mounted on an Cauldron of Blood difficult to take down without a lot of rend or mortal wounds.
#'''Bloodbane Venom:''' If the bearer wounds an opponent but does not slay them, roll a dice after the attacks have been made. If the number equals/beats the victim's wound characteristic then it is slain outright.

===Artefacts of Shadow===
(Daughters of Khaine Wizards, meaning Bloodwrack Medusa since Doomfire Warlocks and Morathi can't take Relics, only)
#'''Shadow Stone:''' Re-Roll dice rolls of 1 for Casting attempts and add +1 to any casting attempts for Lore of Shadows spells. Helpful for making sure you get an important spell off. +1 to Casting the Withering is '''never''' a bad thing. Best way to get Mindrazor off.
#'''Rune of Ulgu:''' Bearer knows one extra Lore of Shadows spell. More options are never a bad thing.
#'''The Mirror Glaive:''' Each time the Bearer unbinds a spell, they can attempt to cast Arcane Bolt or Mystic Shield as if it was the Hero phase. If successful this spell can't be unbound. Sounds awesome but the Medusa can only attempt to unbind one spell a turn. Situational.
#'''Seven-fold Shadow:''' Once per battle, instead of moving you can set them up anywhere on the battlefield more than 9" from Enemy units. This uses up thier movement phase. You already have dozens of ways of teleporting units so this is a pass.
#'''Crystal Heart:''' [[Awesome |Bearer can cast a second spell in the Hero Phase. If they do they roll a d6, taking d3 Mortal Wounds on a 1.]]
#'''Shade Claw:''' The Medusa's Whisperclaw is now -2 Rend. Helps out your Medusa in melee, so worth considering if you have them on a Bloodwrack Shrine.

===Relics of Khaine===
(Daughters of Khaine Priests only)
#'''Blood Sigil:''' Bearer gains one additional Prayer. More options is never bad.
#'''Iron Circlet:''' Bearer re-rolls 1's when seeing if a prayer is successful. Prayers Manifest on a 3+ and all have very useful buffs so this can be helpful
#'''Rune of Khaine:''' Bearer explodes on death. Roll a dice. One 1 nothing happens. On 2-5 the unit that killed them takes D3 Mortal Wounds. On a 6, the unit takes D6. Works against any attack and doesn't have a ranged restriction so going by RAW, [[Just As Planned| your Hero can explode and do the Mortal Wounds against something across the table.]]. Main problem is that you want your Hag Queens alive as much as possible because Witchbrew is just that good. Witch Elves are your cannon fodder, and should really be dying instead.
#'''Crimson Shard:''' Bearer's Blade of Khaine wounds on a 2+. Pretty solid on a Cauldron as they will be getting stuck into melee anyway.
#'''Khaineite Pendant:''' Bearer can Pray three times in one Hero Phase, but the first time you roll a 1 to manifest a prayer, they take d3 Mortal Wounds instead of 1. Extremely useful as your Prayers are all very useful. Being able to spam them is awesome. Probably your default choice.
#'''Hagbrew:''' Add +1 to Wound Rolls for the Bearer's melee weapons. Nice on a Hag Queen on Cauldron of Blood. [[Rape |Turns thew Slaughter Queen on Cauldron into a death machine.]]

===Lore of Shadows===
The Lore of Shadows we all know and love is back! Note that Doomfire Warlocks are Wizards and can take a spell from here despite not being a Hero unit.
#'''Steed of Shadows:''' Casting Value 5. Caster can Fly and has a 16" Move.
#'''Pit of Shades:''' Casting Value 7. Pick an Enemy Unit within 18" of the caster, within line of sight, and roll 2d6. That unit takes 1 Mortal Wound for each point the 2d6 exceeds their Movement. Awesome against tough, but slow units. That Death player who keeps tarpitting you with blobs of 40 Skeletons? This spell was designed for you, followed up with a Bloodwrack Stare.
#'''Mirror Dance:''' Casting Value 4. Pick two Daughters of Khaine Heroes within 24" of the Caster. As long as they aren't within 6" of any other unit, switch their places on the Battlefield.
#'''The Withering:''' Casting Value 7. Pick an enemy unit within 18" of the caster within Line of Sight. [[Awesome |Until the next Hero Phase add +1 to Wound Rolls for '''all attacks''' that target that unit]]. You should always have this.
#'''Mindrazor:''' Casting Value 7. Pick a friendly Daughters of Khaine unit within 18" of the caster. All of that units weapons gain an additional -1 Rend, and all of their weapons gain 1 extra damage if hitting something with Lower Bravery. It's very easy to pump up the Bravery of your MurderElves anyway. Awesome Synergy with the below...This can double the damage out put of Witchaelves or SoS. Our Most used spell and a must have for the -1 Rend alone
#'''Shroud of Despair:''' Casting Value 4. Pick an enemy unit within 18" and within Line of Sight. They take -1 to Bravery until the next Hero Phase. If the Casting roll was 8+, they take -d3 Bravery Instead.

===Prayers of the Khainite Cult===
#'''Catechism of Murder:''' Pick a Friendly Daughters of Khaine unit within 14". Any 6's to hit explode and deal 2 hits.
#'''Blessing of Khaine:''' Pick a friendly Daughters of Khaine unit within 14". They re-roll failed FNP rolls from Fanatical Faith. With Hagg Nar, bucklers and the Cauldron buff, your units now have a 4+, then rerollable 5+ saves. You can take a charge quite happily, then murder whatever dared getting close in your turn with ease...
#'''Martyr's Sacrifice:''' Pick a friendly Daughters of Khaine unit within 14". Each time a model is killed in the Combat Phase, roll a d6. The dead model deals an extra Mortal Wound on a 5+. Stacks with the Bucklers.
#'''Crimson Rejuvination:''' Pick a friendly Daughters of Khaine unit within 14", except for Morathi in either form. That unit heals 1d3 Wounds.
#'''Covenant of the Iron Heart:''' Pick a friendly Daughters of Khaine unit within 14". That unit does not need to take Battleshock tests.
#'''Sacrament of Blood:''' Pick a friendly Daughters of Khaine unit within 14". That unit counts the current battle round as being 1 higher for determining Blood Rites traits. Stacks with other abilities that give this effect.

===Temples of Blood===
Each has unique special rules for your army, a new artifact and allows you to upgrade one of your Warscroll Battalions
;Hagg Nar : When you get to Zealot's Rage on Blood Rites (turn 3) you get to reroll all hits as opposed to 1s. Your general's command trait MUST be the Hagg Nar one, '''Devoted Disciple:''' Your general, and all units within 7 inches, get a 5+ Fanatical Faith save as opposed to a 6+. Cauldron Guard may take a Cauldron of Blood OR Avatar of Khaine. Hagg Nar allows your key unit to do its fanatical faith on 5+ combined with blessing of khaine and the +1 save from you cauldron your 30 witches will have a 5+ save and a 5++ (Reroll fails) fanatical save making the unit able to survive longer. By turn 3 your army is a killing machine and would be already in combat this is when things swing dramatically for Hagg Nar any unit with just a simple witch brew and being hagg nar will be rerolling their hits and wounds. on a unit of 20 witches that is 80 attacks (reroll hits and wounds) and if you add mind razor into the mix no single opponent can survive that number of paper cuts. The fact that Hagg Nar is the most frequently quoted temple needing a nerfbat to the face suggests that it's pretty good.
;Draichi Ganeth : Add 1 to your hit rolls when you charge and if you have a Slaughter Queen, she must take the relic '''The Darksword''', which gives her Deathsword 4 attacks instead of 3. Slaughter Troupe may take up to two units of Witch Elves. One of the better ones as its restrictions are easily worked around (don't want to have to take the Darksword? Don't take a Slaughter Queen) and a lot of practical applications (hitting on 2s, rerolling 1s on turn 3 will make almost every attack hit). Snake heavy armies take note- combine with Hag buffs for Crystal Vision mortal wounds on 3+, 6's count as two and reroll 1's. That's some scary MW output before the sneks start swinging.
;The Kraith : If you're still within 3 of an enemy after you fight, roll a D6. On a 6, pile in and attack again. In addition, one of your heroes must take the relic '''The Venom of Nagenda:''' Once per battle, you can use it to make one of your melee weapons only do 1 attack, but does D6 Mortal Wounds if it hits. Cauldron Guard may take any number of Hag Queens and Slaughter Queens. When the ability goes off, you'll feel like a god, but it'll only go off if you didn't wipe out the enemy unit AND if you roll a 6 and thus isn't as useful as Hagg Nar or Draichi Ganeth (which help you win the fights you already got into) or Khailebron (which helps you get to the fight in one piece).
;Khailebron : Your enemy gets -1 to hit in the shooting phase against Khailebron units and your General's command must be '''Mistress of Illusion:''' Choose a friendly unit within 7. If they're not in combat, pull them off the battlefield and Deep Strike them anyplace outside of 9 inches of the enemy. Works well on Morathi in caster form. Then you transform her, and her bigger base means she is suddenly only 7” away, ready to charge something, tie it up for a long time, if not outright killing it. The possibility alone will mess with your enemy who has to keep lots of stuff back to protect objectives. Temple Nest may take to two additional units of Blood Sisters or Blood Stalkers (or mix). This plugs one of your army's major weaknesses (getting shot to pieces) and the Command Trait can lead to some fascinating tactics, where your opponent never feels safe.

==Warscrolls==
The common keywords of these warscrolls are: '''ORDER''', '''AELF''' and '''DAUGHTERS OF KHAINE'''.

===Heroes===

;[https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls//aos-warscroll-morathi-high-oracle-of-Khaine-en.pdf Morathi, High Oracle of Khaine] : (480pts) After crawling out of the throat of Slaanesh, Morathi has done not bad for herself, she doesn't have much utility but exists mostly to cause carnage. At her most basic, she's a '''WIZARD''' with the ability to cast three spells per turn and unbind twice, adding +1 to her rolls and doubling the range of her spells. Her unique spell is ''Arnzipals Black Horror'' which basically smacks a unit with a random number mortal wounds. Her command ability allows her to pick two friendly '''DAUGHTERS OF KHAINE''' units within 14" and let them make an immediate shooting attack ''(Wanderers are in envy)'' or if they're within 3" of an enemy it allows them to pile in an make a melee attack. She can't use this command ability on herself though. In close combat, she's a devil, throwing out nine 3+/3+/-1/1 damage or D3 damage attacks between her Heartrender and her Bladed Wings ''(note she cannot fly though)'', all the while imposing a -1 to hit when enemies attempt to swing back at her and she can only take a '''maximum''' of three wounds per turn FULL STOP so that it is impossible to take Morathi out in a single turn of combat, to be sure, she is a handful. There is one ''(rather inconsequential)'' downside; Morathi cannot be healed by any means. Though spells which heal are often quite rare in most armies, so it isn't a huge loss; you want Morathi to lose ''some'' wounds anyway because the best is yet to come.
:*Wounds negated by Fanatical Faith no longer count as allocated.
:*Note that while she can only suffer three wounds per turn, there is a way your opponent can get around this. After being cast, predatory endless spells are moved at the start of each battle round, and this happens between turns, so any damage that happens here won't count towards the three wounds per turn.
:*Morathi LOVES the Khailebron Temple and the Khailebron Temple loves her. The biggest problem with Morathi is her point sink. If you don't transform her at the right time, you risk losing out on her contribution to combat in the late game. Khailebron solves that by teleporting her wherever she needs to be to rip things to shreds, in addition to making her nearly impossible to shoot before that time comes. Let her hang out in the backfield (next to your General, i.e. '''do not''' make her your General!), flexing that 36 inch Sorceress Supreme magical range to snipe enemy heroes or buff your own units, then morph her into Shadow Queen mode and pop her up right behind whatever is left of your enemy's lines.

;[https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls//aos-warscroll-morathi-the-shadow-queen-en.pdf Morathi, the Shadow Queen] : Morathi's true form, comes in the box along with the High Oracle version, since you aren't actually allowed to set up the Shadow Queen variant on the table at the start of the game. Instead you roll a dice at the start of each hero phase and if the number is equal to or less than the number of wounds Morathi has taken, then replace the High Oracle model entirely with the Shadow Queen. Alternatively, you can choose to transform her willingly. The giant snake monster is a 12 wound beast ''(unfortunately any wounds taken carry over and are '''doubled''')'' that can Fly and has a lot more dangerous melee attacks and comes with a ranged attack, Heartrender alone has the capability to cause 18 points of damage in a single round of combat, but she also has her venomous tail and the serpents in her hair for more damage, all of which still hits and wounds on a 3+ and are subject to Blood Rites making her all the deadlier as the game progresses. Her ranged attack is worth mentioning, simply removing an enemy model '''of your choice''' from an enemy unit if a dice roll beats their wounds characteristic, no ifs or buts... The Shadow Queen is still a spellcaster, albeit diminished by casting/unbinding only one spell per turn and she has lost her ''Sorceress Supreme'' and ''Enchanting Beauty'' rules. Either way, she is still a force to contend with, especially as like her smaller version, she only takes a maximum of THREE wounds per turn (note: turn, not battleground, so you will die in two battle rounds, but you will kill a lot in return in that time as well!), so short of weapons with cause instant death or remove her from play, so depending on the number of wounds she started with it is practically impossible to take her out in anything less than three turns, added to the fact that the High Oracle version also has this rule you can guarantee that no matter what your enemy throws at you, Morathi will still be on the table in one form or another by turn four in EVERY game she is involved in.
:* Nearly broken in the new meeting engagement format as the game ends after 4 rounds. Sure she takes up nearly half your army but there is almost nothing your opponent can do about her without any instant slain mechanism. And since the board is smaller, she will easily land a charge with her mobility. Unless she comes in at the start of Turn 1, you are always better off transforming her immediately.
:* Morathi is a great counter to the Slannesh Greater Daemon that forces you to fight last on a 2+. Whenever possible, transform her and chase it down. Your opponent can only score 3 depravity each turn from Morathi.

;[https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls//aos-warscroll-slaughter-queen-en.pdf Slaughter Queen] : (100pts)The old Death Hag got split in two, the Slaughter Queen has pair of weapons: The "meh" Blade of Khaine which is pretty much a bog-standard weapon, combined with the a stronger but ridiculously named "Deathsword" which has a slightly better profile and does D3 damage; She is your primary priest, always casting on a 3+ but wounding herself on a 1. Unfortunately, her prayers are... weird, she isn't really a fantastic buffer for friendly units. is an incredibly unreliable way of tossing Mortal Wounds at your enemy and the other is a buff. That can only target her. Though to be fair, the buff is pretty good, increasing her meh knife's damage to D3, essentially matching her Deathsword, which will put the lady at 7 damage D3 attacks, enough to kill bigger units all on her own. Her other good prayer is the ability to fight twice in the combat phase, which you should use if she goes up against hordes rather than monsters. She can also have this ability as a command ability, allowing a friendly unit to pile in during the hero phase. The last prayer is an odd one, forcing your opponent to play "[[What|guess which hand]]" or suffer D3 mortal wounds... essentially a bizarre throwback to old legacy rules. In short, altogether she is a 5 wound 5+ save model who will die to angry thoughts if she gets to close to an actual combat. Leave her at home unless she's your general or you're running Shadowhammer compact; IF you take her as general her command ability makes your Witch Aelves kill more than what a Hag Queen would do, making her a better option in this case. *One thing to remember is that priests get an extra prayer from the list of khainite prayers, and therefore can actually pray twice in your hero phase.
:*She can also attempt to unbind one spell in your enemy's hero phase as if she were a wizard, which is nothing to be sniffed at. If you have Bloodwracks as well, you can effectively shut down your opponent's magic every turn.

;[https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls//aos-warscroll-hag-queen-en.pdf Hag Queen] : (100pts)The slaughter queen's little sister and amazing supporting choice. She doesn't have the Deathsword, the ''Dance of Doom'' prayer, the ability to unbind spells, or any command ability. Instead she has a chalice of Witchbrew which allows a friendly DoK unit within 3" to re-roll wounds until your next hero phase AND makes your units immune to battle shock. Even at 100pts the Hag Queen is still arguably the best hero in the game. She can turn a unit of 30 Witch Aelves into an unstoppable orgy of slaughter. <s>Until AoS2 comes in, two Hag queens are mandatory in pretty much any DoK list.</s> AoS3 is here and hags went to 100pts. This mixed with increase of the shooting meta makes hags an issue. However, for an extra 40pts (140pts total) its recommended to take Morgwaeth’s Blade-coven, the beastgrave unit. Same as a standard had except has a mini unit to assist, and on a 4+ you can transfer wounds from Morgwaeth to the unit. Side unit is two witch aelves, a sister of slaughter and a blood stalker.

;[https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls//aos-warscroll-hag-queen-caludron-blood-en.pdf Hag Queen on Cauldron of Blood] & [https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls//aos-warscroll-slaughter-queen-on-cauldron-of-blood-en.pdf Slaughter Queen on Cauldron of Blood] : (290ts, Behemoth)A centerpiece in every sense of the word. It draws the eye and is absolutely essential for turning an assortment of powerful units into a coherent army. Basically a straight upgrade for one of the Queens with an Avatar of Khaine strapped to the same model; needing to be animated with prayers each turn ''(or wait for Blood Rites to kick in by turn 3)'' This also means that there is practically no situation where the Avatar will be without a Priestess to animate him since they are both sharing the same model in this case, making it a safer bet than marching either of them around solo where one or the other can get picked off. It also has extra attacks thanks to the attendant sisters and an added charge bonus which inflicts Mortal Wounds. It also allows DoK units within a diminishing range to add +1 to their save rolls, so this unit is definitely worth having considering how fragile the army is in general, though there really isn't much more to say beyond the standard rules for the Hag/Slaughter Queens. The Slaughter Queen on Cauldron of Blood is almost always going to be the general in any Daughters of Khaine army. It's buffs, bulk, command ability, and output are just too good not to use.
:*If you are still considering which way to go between the Shrine or the Cauldron. You are mostly weighing up whether you want the Aura of Agony for causing mortal wounds in a radius, or the Bloodshield for giving your sisters a +1 to saves. Everything else is pretty much the sum of the model's parts since the actual Shrine/Cauldron itself has mostly the same profile and attacks in either version simply added to whatever hero is mounted on top of it, which you could have deployed separately. However one big factor to remember is that the Cauldron of Blood can still move around the tabletop without having to animate the Avatar, leaving your Priestess to use a different prayer in her hero phase if you want to.
:*If you want a death-train, make a Slaughterqueen on this thing your general, then give her Mistress of Poisons, the Crone Blade and Catechism of Murder, wait for Turn 3 then charge something; you'll get +1 to the damage of all your melee hits since Mistress of Poisons works for all of the cauldron's attacks, and with Crone Blade on the Avatar's attack you get more than a chance to cause casualties and recover wounds, since it now does 4 damages per non saved attack, compensating for your fragility ( you still have 13 wounds with a 4+ save but some generals can be tougher); factor in Catechism of Murder ( solid, given this model has 19 attacks) and a self cast Orgy of Slaughter and... well, you won't regret skipping one of the temples for this. IF you don't care about the Crone Blade, take a Hagbrew instead.

;[https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls//aos-warscroll-bloodwrack-medusa-en.pdf Bloodwrack Medusa] : (140pts)Your generic Wizard, capable of tossing off a spell that makes it harder for the enemy to wound you, which is also nice, plus Mindrazor or whatever you like. Also, you know how Wizards tend to be useless in close combat and shooting? Well this is Daughters of Khaine and everyone has to pull their weight. Has an absolutely brutal shooting attack, where you roll a dice for every model in a unit and every 5+ is a Mortal Wound, and has a metric ton of close combat attacks, with a theoretical maximum of 16 wounds (average dice rolls will probably render it closer to 5 or 6, depending on what turn it is). You already want her slinging spells left and right, and she can easily be used to quickly clear out a unit of archers or something while your more important units take out tougher enemies. Definitely needs to be on your list.

;[https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls/aos-warscroll-bloodwrack-shrine-en.pdf Bloodwrack Shrine] : (210pts, Behemoth)While you should probably get a Cauldron of Blood first, if you wanted to keep the Queens and Avatar separate you will be left with a Bloodwrack Shrine, either that or you bought a second model. It's only 80 points more than the Medusa on her own. It costs you 2 inches of movement but it more than doubles your wounds, gives you the Shrinekeepers attacks, the Bladed Impact rule AND gives you the Aura of Agony, which causes D3 mortal wounds ALL ENEMY UNITS within a 7" radius on a diminishing die roll, starting at 2+, which coupled with her Bloodwrack Stare means that the Shrine has the potential to be doling out a lot of mortal wounds in a given turn. They are also Wizards now, being able to cast/unbind a single spell per turn.
:* If you've got an extra Cauldron to assemble as one of these, remember that it's only 80 points more than a normal Bloodwrack Medusa, trading in those 80 points and 2 points of movement for double the wounds, the Shrine Keepers attacks and the Aura of Agony. That's pretty cheap all told, and since it's not a monster, it's still harder to shoot in AoS2, so it's worth considering.
:*Remember that a Bloodwrack Shrine can cast Steed of Shadows on itself to fly 16" and get that Aura of Agony + Bloodwrack Stare where it would hurt the most.

===Troops===
;[https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls/aos-warscroll-witch-aelves-en.pdf Witch Aelves] : (BATTLELINE, Min:10, Max:30 120/300) The new battletome went and mixed it up a bit, giving Witch Aelves the Bladed Buckler rule which used to be unique to the Sisters of Slaughter. If you take the Buckler then they get a 5+ save with any roll of a six causing an immediate mortal wound on the attacker. This and the ''Fanatical Faith'' allegiance ability has increased the Witch Aelves survivability somewhat. If you'd rather have them be more killy, you can swap the buckler for an extra sacrificial knife which grants them another attack, up to three per model, which makes them rather choppy for a cheap unit, this can be further upgraded thanks to the ''Frenzied Fervour'' rule which grants them another extra attack whenever they are within 8" of DoK Hero in the combat phase, with each potentially throwing out four 3+/4+/-/1 attacks per turn with rerolls depending on what turn it is, which isn't too terrible for a front-line unit. No matter what option you take they are still fragile though. Big units of 30 are currently staples of the tournament scene so make sure you take big unit so they can reach the enemy.
:*It's worth bearing in mind that if you took bucklers you should always take your save even if the enemy has a good rend value and your Witches actually have no hope of surviving. The save inflicts the mortal wound on a six after any rerolls but ''before modifiers'' such as rend or debuffs, thus you might get a free mortal wound or two on your opponent even though your ladies are caught in the headlights and can't do anything about it.
:*If you do the math, bucklers are better: slightly lower damage output ( a difference of decimals even when counting stacks of bonuses to attacks) but they double your odds of surviving a hit, which will leave more witches on the table for more attacks and chances of mortal wounds; consider giving the buckler to all of your witches or at least most of them.

;[https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls/aos-warscroll-sisters-slaughter-en.pdf Sisters of Slaughter] : (BATTLELINE, Min:10, Max:30 120/300) The counterpart to the Witch Aelves took a different role with the recent update. They lost their bonus to saves in close combat and are just as fragile as Witch Aelves, who now share the Bladed Buckler rule. They can trade their shield in for the Sacrificial knife, which gives them an additional short ranged attack at the expense of some durability. Their unique special rule is that they can be chosen to pile in and fight up from up to 6" away rather than 3", which means they have a massive threat radius without even charging and can jump on to the enemy during his own Combat Phase. A good use of these ladies might be to hover around your own units and perform a counter-charge whenever one of your weaker units gets threatened, dog-piling on the enemy when he thought he had the advantage. Their long pile in means that they're also one of the only units in the game that can bypass the Idoneth Deepkin's Turn 3 combat priority or the weird Gloomspite Gitz Fanatic "Always Strikes First" ability.

;[https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls//aos-warscroll-morathi-blood-sisters-en.pdf Blood Sisters] : (Optional BATTLELINE: Bloodwrack Medusa General, Min:5, Max:20 120). Your gorgon snake-chicks whose job is to be the army's elite melee anchor unit. Armed with Glaives and their Crystal Touch attacks, they can throw out a reliable amount of damage every turn. Glaives have three 3+/3+/-1/1 attacks at 2" range which would be decent before you consider rerolls from Blood Rites or further buffs from prayers. The Crystal Touch is a kicker though, causing an instant mortal wound on every hit. Making Blood Sisters the ones you want to throw at the enemy elite to get maximum advantage of the Crystal Touch (wasting it on cannon fodder units is just a gross waste of mortal wounds in most circumstances). The main problem is that they cost quite a lot for only a few models, yes they have two-wounds each but they are still fragile with a 5+ save(unless you bring a cauldron, which you should) and even with Fanatical Faith they really don't have a ton of staying power (for example despite being an elite unit they are less durable than a Liberator or Chaos Warrior) so you will be feeling the loss of each one heavily. Keep them protected with the massive number of buffs you can pile onto them. Large units are also a must simply because of the MASSIVE discount they get in groups of 20.
:*This is where all your buffs go. Even 5 snake ladies are a strong close combat unit but their damage output can be increased to ridicules levels. 10 snakes with catechism of murder, mindrazor and witch brew in a Hagg-Nar list will have 30 -2 rend 2 Damage attacks, 10 crystal touch attacks, all with re-rolls to-hit and to-wound plus exploding sixes. Sure, lots of eggs in one basket. But if you manage to get this off at the right moment the game will be over as they will have killed everything they can get their scaly hands on. *Don't forget the defensive buffs, with a Cauldron, Haggnarr, and the reroll prayer you can make a big unit of the snake ladies 4+(3+ if you can find a nice big terrain piece) 5++,5+++ which makes them actually ridiculously tough.
:*Consider Draichi Ganeth’s charge bonus for mortal wounds on 3+ rather than 4+.

;[https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls/aos-warscroll-morathi-blood-stalkers-en.pdf Blood Stalkers] : (Min:5, Max:20 120) The ranged snake ladies. Yes you also have Khinerai Heartrenders now, but the Stalkers have the longer range and fewer rules for moving about, making them your primary fire support unit rather than the mobile harassing unit of harpies. Rolling 6+ to hit makes the bow do a mortal wound instead of the normal damage, which is nice to have but shouldn't be relied upon since you can't do massed ranged firepower like some other armies can. The squad leader also gets a Bloodwyrm, which is a little dragon-pet that adds a single reliable close combat attack to her profile, but little else, kind of at odds with the unit's purpose as they are only average melee combatants. They do have a reasonable movement, allowing them to get into desirable firing positions easier and with a high bravery they can good backfield objective holders while delivering ranged support to the front. And while not amazing given their small unit sizes they have reasonable combat abilities for a ranged unit, so there is some consolation in that. Overall don't expect a whole lot of mileage thanks to a combination of small squad sizes, relatively few attacks and the fact they can't be Battleline units, but given they this army isn't heavy on long range shooting just accept them for what they are and just don't go expecting miracles.
:*As ranged units, they are probably best compared to Stormcast Judicators with Skybolt Bows, rather than the mass ranged units found in Free Peoples or Wanderers - they are 2-wound models with decent single-fire range attacks. Stalkers are quicker ''(8" move)'' and balsier ''(8 bravery vs 6 bravery)'' and better in close combat. However they lack the Judicators overall shooting versatility and damage output (they have no alternate ranged weapons or powerfull special weapons). With Fanatical Faith they are probably just as resilient, though that really depends on the Rend value of the weapon attacking them. Anything with even a rend of 1 will pretty much negate the bonus of Fanatical Faith to virtually nothing and these guys aren't really cheap enough to just throw away without thought. And as always Stalkers aren't battleline like Judicators, which is a shame really.
:*With the recent points adjustment to match Blood Sisters, they are now viable in Meeting Engagement. They have an effective range of 32 which allows you to easily land shots on almost anything on the smaller board. Just kill of at least one model and not die from return fire, you will win the Victory Points for having slain models with higher wound count.
:*Take note the Krone has a +1 to hit. This means she hits on a 2+ and score a mortal wound on a 5+ making it possible to land mortal wound on enemy hero who has a Look Out Sir -1 modifier against shooting.

;[https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls//aos-warscroll-khinerai-lifetakers-en.pdf Khinerai Lifetakers] : (Min:5, Max:20 80/280pts) One of the new Khinerai Harpy units. Lifetakers behave pretty much like flying Witch Aelves. With a pair of average attacks and a version of the Bladed Buckler called the Heartpiercer Shield, which is essentially the same thing; granting them a 5+ save that causes mortal wounds to attackers on six. Strictly speaking they are worse in close combat than Witch Aelves, but they can FLY for one, as well as bein able to Deep Strike onto the battlefield anywhere more than 9" from the enemy. The real draw with Lifetakers over other similar units is that they gain +1 damage whenever they charge into combat and can also fall back from combat '''after''' they have completed all of their attacks on a die roll of 4+, so you can escape during an enemy turn and just charge them again on your own. Get enough of these together and they'll be taking anything down.
:* In the new meeting engagement format, these ladies are golden. At 14" movement and a smaller board size in meeting engagement, you are better off deploying them at the edge of the board with a Hag queen. Buffed with Witch Brew and Catechism of Murder, a small unit of 5 will rip any light unit of 10 to shreds. Battleshock will finish the job and you even have a 50/50 chance of backing off to capture the nearby objective. Since they are just 1 wound per model, it works to your advantage when counting wounds to compete for victory points in meeting engagement.

;[https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls//aos-warscroll-khinerai-heartrenders-en.pdf Khinerai Heartrenders] : (Min:5, Max:20 90pts) The other of your two new Khinerai Harpy units. The Heartrender variant are your ranged specialists who can fling their barbed javelins up to 12" doing decent 3+/3+/-1/1 damage; although that's only one attack each. While this is actually pretty decent when you compare them to a similar unit like Prosecutors with Stormcall Javelins, Lifetakers come with even more special rules that make them useful. Firstly, they can Deep Strike, arriving anywhere on the table more than 9" from the enemy when you feel like, which is still happily within their shooting range, which also has their Rend characteristic boosed to -2 for that alpha strike attack. Allowing you to genuinely strategise with where to put them and what they can hurt. They can also shoot after running and fall back after shooting on a die roll of 4+, meaning that although 12" is quite a short range for a ranged weapon you have a chance of darting in and out an inevitable counter-charge when the enemy gets annoyed with you. They also have the Heartpiercer Shield which makes them more resilient though admittedly you don't want this unit in melee because they do so much better as a harassing unit.
:* At 90 points, it's not hard to get your points back for this unit in ways other than simply killing something outright. Drop two Draichi Ganeth Slaughter Troupe 5-Harpy (each with an Allied Assassin) units in your opponents back field and pepper a hiding hero with your Javelins until you can aggro one of his units to come take care of you. Note: Be mindful of your surroundings and don't drop into a bunch of gun lines... but if you do, they'll spend a turn shooting two 80 point units rather than your 300 point blobs of Witch's and Sister's. Anyways, if you get something to bite, let them charge you, then fly/run/retreat out of there ''towards'' your opponents now-isolated Hero, drop your Allied Assassin's on him/her and decide where to go from there.
:* Heartrenders can also serve as line backers, able to move and support your units where needed. Use this when faced against armies that put out more damage than they can handle, sitting them behind your hordes of Witches/Sisters to take the brunt of your opponents abuse and chucking Javelins at them then moving into combat to mop up whatever is left.

;[https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls/aos-warscroll-doomfire-warlocks-en.pdf Doomfire Warlocks] : (Min:5, Max:20 140pts) The only males in the faction. These guys are actually incredible. They are excessively fast at 14" and they now come with two-shot crossbows they are still great, as they're pretty tough and units of them are collectively Wizards. This makes them incredibly versatile already, letting you play small units to either shoot Mortal Wounds or buff your squishy ladies, but the really great part is their unique spell. First, it's casting value 5, so very easy to get off, then you get +1 to cast if the unit has 10+ models and then its a damage spell that scales to your unit size, topping at a flat 6 Mortal Wounds at 10+ models. Six. Mortal. Wounds. If your opponent sees that even once, he will focus your Warlocks down, but that's alright, since it means ignoring your Sisters of Slaughter and as soon as those ladies are in melee, your Warlocks are safe again.
:*Another way to use them is to ignore their trademark spell and see them as a mobile buff support unit. Most time than not DOK tends to be a single directed steam roller which not many units to sit back and cap objectives. This is where The warlocks comes in, they are fast enough to cap and tough enough to stick a little longer vs smaller opposing units compared to using harpies for the similar role esp if they are within range to the blood shield! To top it off their insane 14" movement allows you to position your warlocks in such a way what they can be outside the 30" dispel radius from your opponent and still in range to buff your own units - So use them like the fluff - males whom are only useful as support units to empower our witches and cap objectives so the killing can be done by the girls of khaine.. I mean morathi...
:*[[Eldar |Even though they are Cavalry, there are multiple ways of being able to Teleport them into the face of your opponent on Turn 1]]. Taking a Shadow Patrol with two units of 10 Warlocks and a General with the Khailebron Command Trait can do just this. [[Rape |That is 6 Mortal Wounds plus 40 4+/4+/-/1 Crossbow shots, and whatever spells you loaded onto the second unit hitting your opponent at once]].*

===Behemoth===
;[https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls/aos-warscroll-avataar-en.pdf Avatar of Khaine] : (Behemoth 140pts) So you built a Bloodwrack Shrine and had the statue of Khaine left over? Well GW have fixed that for you. Like 40k Eldar players you can bring your very own incarnation of war and murder to the tabletop. Except this one is an spiky iron golem animated by the prayers of the nearest Death Hag rather than a [[Grimdark|burning daemon animated by the soul of a dead warrior]]. This means that the Avatar '''NEEDS''' to be accompanied by a Priestess and keep her protected, otherwise it stands on the battlefield doing nothing each turn and you'll have wasted your points. This becomes less of an issue if you have the ''Blood Rites'' allegiance ability, which automatically animates your statue from turn three onwards, but seriously, you want this thing moving before then because it's a heavy hitter. In close combat it throws out four attacks at -2 rend and 3 damage, making it your primary character slayer. It also has a ranged attack that spews blood all over the enemy, with six shots at 3+/3+/-2/1 (higher rend than its version on Cauldron) it is nothing to scoff at, making it the near equivalent of whole ranged units in other armies ''(for example: it causes more wounds than a 10 man squad of Glade Guard)''.
:*One problem? The Avatar does very little other than be a simple beaststick, it does provide Daughter of Khaine a +1 bravery bonus within 7" although bravery is not one of the major problems the Daughters have to face ''(poor saves come higher on the list)'' though thankfully the bravery bonus applies whether the Avatar is animated or not, because it's still a giant religious icon of their war god.
:*Buff your Avatar with Mindrazor and watch him wreck everything in range. Thanks to his high bravery, his attacks will nearly always be four attacks with -3 rend and 4(!) damage each. <s>Unless you're up against undead. Or daemons. Or Seraphon.</s> Bravery 11 (10 + 1 thanks to "Idol of Worship") will beat the bravery 10 of any of these units (when not affected by debuffs).

==Battalions==
===From Start Collecting===
; Blood Coven (not legal in pitched battles) : ''A Hag Queen, one unit of Witch Elves and a Bloodwrack Shrine.''

; Brides Of The Blade (from the new Start Collecting) : ''A Slaughter Queen, a Hag Queen, an Avatar of Khaine, one unit of Blood Stalkers or Blood Sisters and a Bloodwrack Shrine.''

Once per battle, the Slaughter Queen can automatically unbind a spell instead of rolling the dice like normal.

===From Battletome Daughters of Khaine===
;Cauldron Guard (540pt. min.) : ''A Hag Queen, two units of Witch Elves and two units of Khinerai Lifetakers.''

Adds 1 to the units in the Cauldron Guards run and charge rolls. Anything that lets you move into combat faster is good. The Witch Aelves can charge after running, making them ridiculously fast (especially with rerolls of 1s) and now your Lifetakers make their charge on an 8 rather than a 9 after landing, letting them more consistently get the charge and their charging bonuses.

;Slaughter Troupe (630pt. min.) : ''A Slaughter Queen, two units of Sisters of Slaughter and two units of Khinerai Heartrenders.''

Lets all the units in the Battalion fall back and still shoot/charge. Given that in 2nd Edition of Age of Sigmar, you can only shoot at units you're in combat with, this lends the Heartrenders a lot of versatility, but the real kicker is in a Draichi Ganeth army (which can also add up to 2 units of Witch Aelves to this Battalion). They get +1 to hit on the charge, allowing you to yo-yo units in and out of combat to keep getting the bonus.

;Temple Nest (870pt. min.) : ''A Medusa, two units of Blood Sisters and two units of Blood Stalkers.''
: Every to-hit roll of 1s made by a enemy unit in close combat (after re-rolls before modifiers) causes a mortal wound. Basically Bladed Bucklers/Heartpiercer Shields for your snake ladies. Useful to make your opponent nervous about directing a lot of attacks at these units. With the new generic Command Ability All-Out Attack that allows enemy to re-roll hit rolls of 1s, this may work towards or against you. If your opponents are starved for CP, you can bait them into using CP to avoid Mortal Wounds, denying them the opportunity to use CP for other purposes.

;Shadow Patrol (770pt. min.) : ''Two units of Doomfire Warlocks and a total four units of Khinerai Heartrenders or Lifetakers.''

One per battle round, you can pull one of these units that's more than 3 inches away from the enemy and set them up anywhere outside of 9 inches of the enemy. Good for making your enemy never feel safe since your units can surround them easily and worth remembering that the wording on both this battalion and the Heartrender's Death From Above rule means they interact: Dropping a unit of Heartrenders with this Batallions means they get -2 rend on their Javelins.

;Shadowhammer Compact (1080pt. min.) : ''Two units of Witch Elves, one unit of Blood Stalkers, one unit of Khinerai Heartrenders, two units of Liberators, one unit of Judicators and one unit of Prosecutors.''
: In each Hero Phase you select one Daughters of Khaine unit and one Stormcast Eternals unit - both units do one of the the following, it must be the same: Move, Shoot, or Charge/Pile in.

===From Grand Alliance Order===
;Bloodwrack Sisterhood (940 pt. min.) : ''A Cauldron of Blood, a unit of Bloodwrack Medusae, a Death Hag, and 3-6 units choose between the following: Witch Aelves Doomfire Warlocks or Sisters of Slaughter.''
: During your hero phase roll a D6 for each battalion unit within 3" of an enemy unit and within 9" of the Cauldron of Blood. On a 6 that unit can immediately pile in and attack as if it were the combat phase. This does not stop them from piling in and attacking again later that turn.

==Super-Battalions==
===From Battletome Daughters of Khaine===

;War Coven of Morathi (3160pt. min.) : ''Morathi, one Cauldron Guard, one Temple Nest, one Slaughter Troupe and one Shadow Patrol.''
ABILITIES
Blood Rituals: If your army has the DAUGHTERS OF KHAINE allegiance, units in this battalion count the current battle round number as being 1 higher than it actually is when determining what abilities they receive from the Blood Rites battle trait (pg 50). This is cumulative with other, similar abilities (e.g. the True Believer Command Trait or the Sacrament of Blood prayer).
Devout Followers: Do not take a battleshock test for War Coven of Morathi units that are within 18" of Morathi (in either of her forms) when the test is taken.

==Army Building==
If it ever come back in stock, begin with the Daughters of Khaine Blood Coven box, and magnetize the Cauldron/Shrine so you can reconfigure it as needed.

Start out with ten Sisters of Slaughter and two boxes Doomfire Warlocks. If you happen to have the Mistweaver Saih from Silver Tower, add her.

Then, add a second box Sisters of Slaughter and a third box Doomfire Warlocks. You now have twenty crazy murder ladies and fifteen crazy mounted murder mages and possibly a Wizard to keep them company.

If you desperately want Witch Aelves, get thirty of them at once. That MIGHT be enough to get them into combat. ''With Khailebron, you are not so vulnerable to enemy shooting = more surviving Witch Aelves, and you can buff them and then teleport them to take out any key units the enemy has (preferably on turn 2+ for that secure charge). Peachy says that he has seen a full unit of buffed Witch Aelves go through a Great Unclean One in a turn, so Witch Aelves are definitely not "bad" as an unit choice. But still take them in groups of 30.''
Witch Aelves are expen$ive as fuck, though, so look for bargains or used models if you want several boxes worth of them.

Two boxes Khinerai Heartrenders add even more ranged damage and allow you play a Slaughter Troupe.

Alternatively, their Start Collecting box can be useful if you want to play a more Melusai oriented army.

==Allied Armies==

*'''Cities of Sigmar:''' Darkshards and Sorceresses give you good ranged support, but their melee infantry moves too slowly to work well with yours. Sorceress on Black Dragon can be fun if you have the points to spare, but anything she can do Morathi does better, her only advantage is being cheaper. Scourgerunner Chariots throw out some good ranged support and 3 of them can take up a lot of room. Shadow warriors can be a alternative to Khinari due to their infiltration rules and shadow ability.

*'''Idoneth Deepkin:''' Ideally you want to grab some Ishlaenn Guard, as those guys will soak up obscene amounts of damage for you. Nothing else is really worth considering.

*'''Stormcast Eternals:'''There are two things Stormcast Eternals can do for you: Tough units to weather attacks for you and ranged support via the crossbows.Vanguard raptors can add high volume of shots or character sniping. Knight-Incantors can add some magic options (like Everblaze comet) and the auto dispel. Same price as a Medusa.

*'''Gotrek:''' Big Daddy Gotrek is back, and is one of the best killers in the game. Takes up half the average army if teamed up with Morathi and makes an awesome hammer and anvil combo. Hes slow through, so build around that.

==External links==
Rules are here

https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls/aos-warscroll-caludron-blood-en.pdf

https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls/aos-warscroll-witch-aelves-en.pdf

https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls/aos-warscroll-sisters-slaughter-en.pdf

https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls/aos-warscroll-bloodwrack-shrine-en.pdf

https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls/aos-warscroll-doomfire-warlocks-en.pdf

{{Age_of_Sigmar_Tactics}}

Humanism

2020-09-29T10:58:23Z

2406:3400:20F:FFC0:B8FE:8852:936:AEE3:

{{Topquote|Mankind is greater than any lowly god-creature! We are the GREATEST species in existence! And the Emperor is the greatest being of our species!|[[If_the_Emperor_had_a_Text-to-Speech_Device|Ecclesiarch Decius XXIII]]}}

{{Topquote|Take the universe and grind it down to the finest powder and sieve it through the finest sieve and then show me one atom of justice, one molecule of mercy. And yet [[human|you]] act, like there was some sort of rightness in the universe by which it may be judged.|[[Discworld|Death, Hog-father]]}}

Humanism as its name indicates it, is the philosophical view that puts primacy over humanity and its role in the order of things, their first steps were taken with the coming of the earlier Greek philosophers who wanted to look for a meaning to life and the universe other than the will of the gods and eventually crystallized with the renewal of interest in classic culture during the early modern age, with different branches developing through the centuries and influencing every aspect of our culture and hence our game worldbuilding for kicks and joy.

In general terms humanism can be organized in three groups:

*Liberal or classic humanism, which is more or less the equivalent to capitalism, democracy and freedom of speech based on the value of human life, this may develop in the most extreme aspects of capitalism, libertarianism and corporativism.
*Left wing humanism, with it's most extreme view in the form of Marxism, the supreme value of the good of the mass of mankind over the individual and the chance for everyone to have their share.
*Right wing humanism, better known in its most extreme as Nazism or biological humanism, which insists in the inherent biological value of some human races over others reflected in the achievements of the particular ethnic, national or social human group.

While the previous division is generalizing many philosophical, cultural and historical aspects while leaving others out it stills puts in evidence that all of these branches base their ideals in the inherent supreme value of human life and the human capability to give sense and purpose to existence, with the divergence coming from how best to implement those ideals.

So far it appears that classic humanism has become the ruling philosophical force of the current epoch, with aspects of both the left and right implemented through the last century in the form of limited government intervention, state control of certain aspects of society, widespread social care and other tweaks to make up for the setbacks and mistakes committed in its earlier iterations. It reminds to be seen how long it will last given the extensive changes, technological achievements which have put into question again what defines being human and people revisiting the questions of whether religion is something humanity can or should get rid of and the existence of actual gods.

But how does this impacts your hobby?

Well, for starters take both Warhammer 40,000's Imperium of Man and Fantasy's the Empire of Man, do you notice the keyword there? Right, these empires were founded not by the will of the gods, but [[Emperor|by human]] [[Sigmar|visionaries]] who promoted the idea of societies where humankind was an end to themselves. Though Sigmar and his Empire weren't humanist; as a human Sigmar worshipped a god (Ulric), several gods and their religions are a major part of the Empire Sigmar founded and Sigmar himself ascended to godhood with a religion centered on him becoming dominant in the Empire. Meanwhile the Emperor was a true humanist plus a staunch anti-religious atheist who tried to purge religion from humanity because he thought humans needed to be rid of it - among other things - to be perfect.

What is more, if you take the red team you may notice they too in their own way reflect the previous line, the Chaos Gods exist as manifestations of the human psyche in its most extreme forms, they are the dark mirror to humanity's nightmares and shortfalls, their instincts and emotions multiplied a hundredfold in the raw stuff of the warp, what is more, the events that occur in both settings, and then in Age of Sigmar as an extension of Fantasy, are dependent on human desires, choices and wishes, the Chaos Gods are impotent by themselves to take over the material plane, they need human intervention to enter into reality, even a mortal champion to guide their extensions in the form of the daemonic legions, be it Archaon, Horus or Abaddon, all three of them are necessarily required by the gods to make effect upon reality and none of the three can be completely controlled by the ruinous powers.

Interestingly you can also play with the word humanism and change "human" with any other species and still have a similar result, for instance see at the Skaven, their nazi-esque society, now replace skaven with human and you will find again humanism taken in its most extreme darwinian application, it's the humans, and the individual in particular, what matters, other sentient species are just things to be exploited and consumed by the superior master race whose manifest destiny is to achieve ascendancy over all of creation, does it ring to you?

The Kharadron Overlords are another intake of the most classic brand of humanism, or in this case duardinism in the form of a corporate meritocracy where the achievement of the individual indicates the true value of a duardin over the will of the gods or aristocratic ancestry, the kharadron don't ask why their gods made things as they are, they were impotent or uncaring to save them in their direst hour (ironically one of their creator-gods Grungni wanted them to have a degree of self-reliance), it's one's capabilities reflected through economic power and technological achievement what defines their place in the order of things, they have been pushed forth with this new mentality during half a millennia and, like with our own modern society if you check historical development statistics, it has pay off with dividends in the form of raw power over the world and increased socioeconomic mobility, all while becoming dependent upon a scarce resource who justify armed expeditions, again, this whole thing may sound familiar to you, see where we are going?

The influence of humanism is also seen through most fantasy media with the modern tendency to chain the power of the gods to the amount of faith people put in them, as some have put it, gods need prayer badly, before humanism this would have been seen as unthinkable as in ancient religions the gods, or the natural order if you have an eastern liking, and hence the universe, weren't dependent on human faith, with the value humanism puts in the groups of individuals it's now the other way around, gods are dependent upon their followers [[Discworld]]-style, while at first this may sounds like non-sense, it has become a recurrent and popular literary device. The appeal is the effort of winning an uncertain victory, with a struggle between different groups of believers and their patron gods creating an extensive and unpredictable narrative (in theory; in practice the story is still subject to the author's ideas).

Finally humanism makes for a sort of fail-safe mechanism against a particular villain speech, [[Edgy|"your gods have failed you/don't exist, your emotions are just chemical reactions, there is nothing beyond this bleak universe, your life has as much value as that of cattle, the entirety of existence is pointless!"]] to this you can expect the hero's following answer [[awesome|"sure, but I still find worth in existence, which is the reason why I am going to kick your sorry ass"]], yeap, that is humanism.

Now, obviously it's not like your average game developer will sit and say "hmmm, I need to put humanism in my game setting", instead it's the fact most developers speculate on human nature when making their setting and ideas from humanism permeate their worldbuilding.

Needless to say, [[Humanity Fuck Yeah]] is to humanism what the Imperium of Man is to the Roman Empire.

Humanism

2020-09-29T10:46:23Z

2406:3400:20F:FFC0:B8FE:8852:936:AEE3:

{{Topquote|Mankind is greater than any lowly god-creature! We are the GREATEST species in existence! And the Emperor is the greatest being of our species!|[[If_the_Emperor_had_a_Text-to-Speech_Device|Ecclesiarch Decius XXIII]]}}

{{Topquote|Take the universe and grind it down to the finest powder and sieve it through the finest sieve and then show me one atom of justice, one molecule of mercy. And yet [[human|you]] act, like there was some sort of rightness in the universe by which it may be judged.|[[Discworld|Death, Hog-father]]}}

Humanism as its name indicates it, is the philosophical view that puts primacy over humanity and its role in the order of things, their first steps were taken with the coming of the earlier Greek philosophers who wanted to look for a meaning to life and the universe other than the will of the gods and eventually crystallized with the renewal of interest in classic culture during the early modern age, with different branches developing through the centuries and influencing every aspect of our culture and hence our game worldbuilding for kicks and joy.

In general terms humanism can be organized in three groups:

*Liberal or classic humanism, which is more or less the equivalent to capitalism, democracy and freedom of speech based on the value of human life, this may develop in the most extreme aspects of capitalism, libertarianism and corporativism.
*Left wing humanism, with it's most extreme view in the form of communism, the supreme value of the good of the mass of mankind over the individual and the chance for everyone to have their share.
*Right wing humanism, better known in its most extreme as nazism or biological humanism, which insists in the inherent biological value of some human races over others reflected in the achievements of the particular ethnic, national or social human group.

While the previous division is generalizing many philosophical, cultural and historical aspects while leaving others out it stills puts in evidence that all of these branches base their ideals in the inherent supreme value of human life and the human capability to give sense and purpose to existence, with the divergence coming from how best to implement those ideals.

So far it appears that classic humanism has become the ruling philosophical force of the current epoch, with aspects of both the left and right implemented through the last century in the form of limited government intervention, state control of certain aspects of society, widespread social care and other tweaks to make up for the setbacks and mistakes committed in its earlier iterations, it reminds to be seen how long it will last given the extensive changes and technological achievements which have put into question again what defines what is human.

But how does this impacts your hobby?

Well, for starters take both Warhammer 40,000's Imperium of Man and Fantasy's the Empire of Man, do you notice the keyword there? Right, these empires were founded not by the will of the gods, but [[Emperor|by human]] [[Sigmar|visionaries]] who promoted the idea of societies where humankind was an end to themselves. There was a distinct difference though with their relations to gods, though; as a human Sigmar worshipped a god (Ulric), several gods and their religions are a major part of the Empire Sigmar founded and Sigmar himself ascended to godhood and a religion around him became dominant in the Empire. Meanwhile the Emperor was a staunch anti-religious atheist who tried to purge religion from humanity and his idea of a perfect humanity had no gods or religion involved.

What is more, if you take the red team you may notice they too in their own way reflect the previous line, the Chaos Gods exist as manifestations of the human psyche in its most extreme forms, they are the dark mirror to humanity's nightmares and shortfalls, their instincts and emotions multiplied a hundredfold in the raw stuff of the warp, what is more, the events that occur in both settings, and then in Age of Sigmar as an extension of Fantasy, are dependent on human desires, choices and wishes, the Chaos Gods are impotent by themselves to take over the material plane, they need human intervention to enter into reality, even a mortal champion to guide their extensions in the form of the daemonic legions, be it Archaon, Horus or Abaddon, all three of them are necessarily required by the gods to make effect upon reality and none of the three can be completely controlled by the ruinous powers.

Interestingly you can also play with the word humanism and change "human" with any other species and still have a similar result, for instance see at the Skaven, their nazi-esque society, now replace skaven with human and you will find again humanism taken in its most extreme darwinian application, it's the humans, and the individual in particular, what matters, other sentient species are just things to be exploited and consumed by the superior master race whose manifest destiny is to achieve ascendancy over all of creation, does it ring to you?

The Kharadron Overlords are another intake of the most classic brand of humanism, or in this case duardinism in the form of a corporate meritocracy where the achievement of the individual indicates the true value of a duardin over the will of the gods or aristocratic ancestry, the kharadron don't ask why their gods made things as they are, they were impotent or uncaring to save them in their direst hour (ironically one of their creator-gods Grungni wanted them to have a degree of self-reliance), it's one's capabilities reflected through economic power and technological achievement what defines their place in the order of things, they have been pushed forth with this new mentality during half a millennia and, like with our own modern society if you check historical development statistics, it has pay off with dividends in the form of raw power over the world and increased socioeconomic mobility, all while becoming dependent upon a scarce resource who justify armed expeditions, again, this whole thing may sound familiar to you, see where we are going?

The influence of humanism is also seen through most fantasy media with the modern tendency to chain the power of the gods to the amount of faith people put in them, as some have put it, gods need prayer badly, before humanism this would have been seen as unthinkable as in ancient religions the gods, or the natural order if you have an eastern liking, and hence the universe, weren't dependent on human faith, with the value humanism puts in the groups of individuals it's now the other way around, gods are dependent upon their followers [[Discworld]]-style, while at first this may sounds like non-sense, it has become a recurrent and popular literary device. The appeal is the effort of winning an uncertain victory, with a struggle between different groups of believers and their patron gods creating an extensive and unpredictable narrative (in theory; in practice the story is still subject to the author's ideas).

Finally humanism makes for a sort of fail-safe mechanism against a particular villain speech, [[Edgy|"your gods have failed you/don't exist, your emotions are just chemical reactions, there is nothing beyond this bleak universe, your life has as much value as that of cattle, the entirety of existence is pointless!"]] to this you can expect the hero's following answer [[awesome|"sure, but I still find worth in existence, which is the reason why I am going to kick your sorry ass"]], yeap, that is humanism.

Now, obviously it's not like your average game developer will sit and say "hmmm, I need to put humanism in my game setting", instead it's the fact most developers speculate on human nature when making their setting and ideas from humanism permeate their worldbuilding.

Needless to say, [[Humanity Fuck Yeah]] is to humanism what the Imperium of Man is to the Roman Empire.

Edgy

2020-09-29T10:31:07Z

2406:3400:20F:FFC0:B8FE:8852:936:AEE3:

{{Topquote|As far as I can make out "edgy" occurs when middlebrow, middle-aged profiteers are looking to suck the energy--not to mention the spending money--out of the "youth culture." So they come up with this fake concept of "seeming to be dangerous when every move they make is the result of market research and a corporate master plan".|[[Daria 40k|Daria]], Episode [3.05] The Lost Girls.}}

{{Topquote|My name is Not Important; what is important is what I'm going to do. I just fucking hate this world, and the human worms feasting on its carcass. My whole life is just cold, bitter hatred, and I always wanted to die violently. This is the time of vengeance, and no life is worth saving, and I will put in the grave as many as I can. It's time for me to kill and it's time for me to die; my genocide crusade begins... here!| The Crusader, aka Not Important}}

{{Topquote|Make it [[World of Darkness|dark]], make it [[Grimdark|grim]], make it [[ANGRY MARINES|tough]] but then, for the love of God, [[Comedy Marines|tell a joke]].|Joss Whedon giving a nice example on how to avoid being edgy even while creating a dark world}}

[[File:Marvel Edge.jpg|200px|thumb|left|Unabashed Edginess from the 1990s]]
'''Edginess''' refers to people trying too hard (and sometimes too aggressively) to make things more tragic, [[grimdark]], controversial or cool. This often takes the form of senselessly driving a vague argument, a plotline or a scenario to its darkest possible outcome, all the while openly expressing their disdain for whoever "the establishment" is, rationalizing villains or finding a middle ground in discourses. Like most internet terminology, it has been beaten to death, resurrected hastily, and then beaten some more. Has no relation to ''[[Hunter: The Reckoning]]''.

Another far less negative use of the term is to describe something on the 'edge' of what's acceptable, pushing established boundaries of convention. For example, by this definition ''Batman: The Animated Series'' was edgy for making an animated series which defied expectations of how true to its base concept and generally well-written a show designed to sell toys could be. Some more examples of this would be Ren and Stimpy (which was crude and vulgar) or Invader Zim (which could get dark in subject matter, and used a fair bit of black humor); in both cases, a decent bit of the comedy was of the "I can't believe that they did ''THAT'' on a kid's cartoon show!" variety. A milder version of this was Sonic the Hedgehog in contrast to Mario. In 1989 the Simpsons was the Edgy take on the classic family sitcom archetype and in 1999 Family Guy had slotted itself in as the Edgy version of The Simpsons. For the 1990s and early 2000s Edgy was a favored term of cynical marketing types which drew the attention of the world's sarcastic snarkers, many of which came to congregate on sites such as 4chan.

An "edgelord" is someone who essentially is guilty of serial attempts to be edgy, like [[that guy]] at your tabletop role playing group who always, without fail, makes brooding loners skilled at violence that have problems with authority (and the authority figures the characters dislike are often stand-ins for real-life ones the creator dislikes; popular targets are the police, [[Capitalism|big business]] and [[religion]]) and a troubled past but without the nuance or skill to pull it off. The end result is they makes themselves look silly. "Art" done by edgelords contain characters who are as dark, brooding and as painfully unhappy as possible, conflicts have zero compromise, institutions are the villains unless the edgelord made them and any conflict of interest will have the worst possible outcome. An edgelord in writing will go out of their way to make the story extra depressing, and subject multiple aspects of it to an increased shock factor when it's clearly '''illogical''' to do so. Needless to say, it can drive a perfect idea to make an entertaining story into the shitter, grating the nerves of even the most jaded audience. When commenting, the "edgelord" will simply push any predicament in the artwork to the darkest, deepest, worst outcome, while describing his fantasies. For example: In an adult and/or bondage predicament picture, edgelords can be found describing a paragraph of horrible fate the captive would suffer, *should* suffer because slaves are shit, and *deserve* abuse, even when the picture was of a predicament with nothing in context. Or he will simply fill the comment of any NSFW picture with his own sick fantasies, surely adding "women DESERVE it".

This is not to say that said dark elements like murder, slavery, rape and bodily harm are bad for literature, but rather that their sloppy execution with no regard to their depth is. As shown above, even the most "edgelord" of concepts can be salvaged and even made bearable with proper handling, especially going by the latter definition - but if you do it enough, the boundaries shift and what was edgy becomes the new norm, and there is always the risk of falling ''over'' the edge. This is why the old definition has fallen increasingly out of favor as time has gone on — people began seeing the dross sold under the title of "edgy", and the idea of what it meant thus moved away from the positive connotations marketing execs desired and closer to the qualities described above. Plus, this is the internet, and people would rather a word just be an insult or a compliment to reduce confusion.

==The Anatomy of Edginess==
Edginess is in some ways like a cargo cult. During WWII in the Pacific, the US military set up bases on remote, but inhabited islands, bringing with them a lot of stuff like planes and cars and so forth that was quite amazing to the stone age natives, to whom the world had been a few dozen square kilometers of land surrounded by ocean, with hazy stories of other such islands. When the military left, some of the natives took to making coconut and wooden radios and flight towers based off of some vague recollection of the military variants, unaware that making the shape alone does not get you the functional item.

In that vein, most of what comes to mind when people envision "edgy" artworks tends to be the result of people who wanted to make ''morally grey'' characters and subject matter, but lack the maturity/experience/focus necessary to NOT end up with anything other than a multiple-personality-disordered mess. Someone with (at best) mediocre creative abilities sees some fiction that makes good use of melodrama, gritty settings, dark humor and such, made by people who know what the hell they're doing and figures "I can do that!", leading to said person haphazardly applying those elements incorrectly. The results of such efforts are either tiresome, unintentionally funny or just painful. The stereotypical teenager, especially one with gothic/emo tendencies, commonly embody this - all too eager for "adult" things (eg: violence, sex, etc.) in their limited perception of such, often born of denial. Individuals who pander to said demographic (or are otherwise just downright hacks) will favor this approach over any sense of complexity, subtlety, nuance and some actual understanding of the human condition.

===Edgy and [[Grimdark]]===
While edginess is frequently associated with invoking grimdark [[Derp|for the sake of it and nothing else]], it's important to remember that this alone does not edgy make. As an example, [[WH40K]]'s [[Imperium of Man]] has reasons to be fair and kind when capable: though it has plenty of genocide, xenocide (completely annihilating species even when they are gentle and kind), torture, forced labor (they draw the line at commercialized chattel slavery, but un-unionized indentured servitude is fair game), witch hunts and militarism that would give Hitler a chubby beyond the grave, said horrors have reasonable justifications. Aliens were buying and selling humans like pets and culling them by the billion, operating slaver outposts even in our solar system before the Emperor came into leading humanity into a roaring rampage of revenge. And regarding souls and the universe after the Heresy, any deviation from faith in the Emperor will ''literally'' send a human to hell upon death, with their soul becoming dæmon food (and/or sex toys).

Any mistreated machinery will attract foul entities and corruption that will fuck you up seven ways till Monday and chew you out; any ill-coaxed [[Machine Spirit]] will jam and blow up in your face; and any laxity will make [[Chaos]] cults pop up by the billion in a week. Then there's [[Necrons|the genocidal robots from another age]], [[Eldar|space elves that would murder a planet on the off chance that their]] [[Farseer]] would break a nail otherwise (and they're still the nice space elves despite that, as their [[Dark Eldar|webway dwelling cousins are even worse - murdering entire planets just because they like the sound of millions of people screaming]]), [[Orks|the ambulatory (AND belligerent) fungi that plague the entire galaxy in a series of wars]], and [[Tyranids|extragalactic horrors that intend to eat everyone's face.]] [[TL;DR]] The Imperium acts like an asshole Hitler/Hirohito bastard child because the alternative is much, MUCH worse.

At the level of narrative, the fact that things are very very bad is a core thematic element of this world. As pointed out there are reasons why things are so miserable in this world which flow logically and despite this there can be points of contrast. Imperials still have the same potential to love and be kind like modern real world humans do. The Tau are hopeful despite the evils of this world. Occasionally pragmatism can overcome the deep seeded prejudices to overcome greater evils, if only for a while. And even if it is preformed by Conscript Guardsmen, Commissars or Space Marines, each the product of horrendous military institutions, can fight to achieve acts of genuine (if still typically brutal) heroism.

Now if you want a senselessly edgy story in the Warhammer 40,000 universe, an example would be the now non-canon [[Khornate Knights]].

===In closing===
There are many paths to success for a storyteller, some of which include going over dark territory in various ways or by innovating and pushing boundaries. However, all of them require care and attention to detail to pull off well. Being dark is not a magic bullet for achieving profoundness without trying.

==Notable Edgelords==

*[[Elric]] of Melnibone, arguably the first one.
*The Punisher (pictured above), depending on the writer.
** The ultimate example of "pointless edge" with this character is writer Garth Ennis' (and Ennis himself is quite the edgelord) professionally published Hate Fic [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punisher_Kills_the_Marvel_Universe "Punisher Kills the Marvel Universe"].
*The Joker, depending on the writer. In particular, look at Heath Ledger's, Joaquin Phoenix's and Jared Leto's takes on him.
** However, both Ledger's and Phoenix's Joker portrayals were "edge with a point". Ledger's Joker was an exploration of human evils regarding terrorism and the various morality problems in dealing with it. Likewise for Phoenix's Joker, except the exploration was on the Origins of Evil. Jared Leto's Joker, on the other hand, was almost textbook pointless "Edgelord".
*[[Drizzt]] clones with extreme Alignment leanings, either towards good or evil.
*Some [[World of Darkness]] characters, particularly Sabbat or Baali.
*Various [[Original character, do not steal|fan-made]] and canon Sonic characters, particularly Shadow.
** If you want the textbook definition of "pointless edge", go look up [[/v/|Shadow the Hedgehog]] for the PS2/XBox/Gamecube. For the unfamiliar: An edgy game about a cartoon hedgehog shooting enemies, yet ESRB rated for Everyone 10 and up.
** And in the game ''Sonic Forces'', which actually lets you play as your OC through a custom avatar, the villain Infinite is a parody of edgy villain sue characters.
*Several in [[World of Warcraft]]. Character-wise the worst offenders - in ascending order - are Illidan Stormrage (in ''"Burning Crusade"'' and the second half of ''"Legion"''), Deathwing (in ''"Cataclysm"'') and Sylvanas Windrunner (the entirety of World of Warcraft). Others include several Death Knights and lots of the Demon Hunters and Forsaken (even their faction names are edgy).
*Several characters from [[A Song of Ice and Fire]], depending on the books or the TV adaptation. Examples from both include Euron Greyjoy, Littlefinger and Ramsay Bolton.
*Half of the [[Animu]] protagonists in existence. Bonus points if the genre is [[Isekai]], triple points if there's a harem involved.
*Reaper from Overwatch
*[[Blackguard]]s
* Warhammer 40k has so, so many there's entire edgelord ''factions'', such as the [[Chaos Space Marine|traitor marines]], the [[Black Templars]] and [[Dark Eldar]] (DE get extra points for their love of selfishness, dark colors and torture). Character examples include Rogal Dorn, Konrad Cruze, Phoenix Lord Maugan Ra, Urien Rakarth and Drazhar.
* Warhammer Fantasy, similar to above but to a lesser degree. Notable examples here include [[Valnir|Valnir the Reaper]], [[Nagash]] and most Dark Elves.
*[[Malal]]. As if the Chaos gods' emotional tantrums are not enough, there exists this guy who out-hates everyone, including himself, with servants who are tougher and stronger than theirs.
*Caesar's Legion and Caesar himself in [[Fallout|Fallout: New Vegas]] (along with some of their fans and the writer who created them).
*[[Star Wars|Kylo Ren]] AKA Krylo Ben AKA Ben Swolo. The writers were doing it on purpose, to play up the First Order's dogmatic North Korea in space schtick, and to that end made Kylo an incredibly unsubtle Darth Vader pastiche. While "Kylo" may be the worst Skywalker ever, there is no denying that the edge is strong in his family. His mom's side are a bunch of crybaby desert backworlders with an incestuous sex drive and his dad was a scruffy, nerf herding spice smuggler - and all were war criminals, some with body counts in the hundred thousands and some with children's blood on their hands... He probably fits the mold better than we'd like to admit. Also his edge is undermined by fact that he never won a fight against [[Mary_Sue|Mar-Rey Sue Palpatine]] which doesn’t help things either.
* Lord Edgelord, later Lord Edgegod from Slackwyrm Keep. He's aware, and <s>he's loving it</s>***CLANG!*** There's no love in edge, only chaos!
* Not Important aka The Antagonist aka The Crusader from Hatred. Imagine every trope related to edgy nihilistic spree shooters, push them to their uncomfortable extremes and then plop the result in a monochromatic mess of a game. What you get is the story about a very unlikable man with dialogue written by less likeable people (including an edgy as fuck death metal band) going around and killing everyone because...fuck you, it's edgy.
* The whole "*teleports behind you* Nothing personal kid. *stabs you*" meme originated as a parody of edgelord characters.

[[Category:Gamer Slang]]

Edgy

2020-09-29T10:28:28Z

2406:3400:20F:FFC0:B8FE:8852:936:AEE3:

{{Topquote|As far as I can make out "edgy" occurs when middlebrow, middle-aged profiteers are looking to suck the energy--not to mention the spending money--out of the "youth culture." So they come up with this fake concept of "seeming to be dangerous when every move they make is the result of market research and a corporate master plan".|[[Daria 40k|Daria]], Episode [3.05] The Lost Girls.}}

{{Topquote|My name is Not Important; what is important is what I'm going to do. I just fucking hate this world, and the human worms feasting on its carcass. My whole life is just cold, bitter hatred, and I always wanted to die violently. This is the time of vengeance, and no life is worth saving, and I will put in the grave as many as I can. It's time for me to kill and it's time for me to die; my genocide crusade begins... here!| The Crusader, aka Not Important}}

{{Topquote|Make it [[World of Darkness|dark]], make it [[Grimdark|grim]], make it [[ANGRY MARINES|tough]] but then, for the love of God, [[Comedy Marines|tell a joke]].|Joss Whedon giving a nice example on how to avoid being edgy even while creating a dark world}}

[[File:Marvel Edge.jpg|200px|thumb|left|Unabashed Edginess from the 1990s]]
'''Edginess''' refers to people trying too hard (and sometimes too aggressively) to make things more tragic, [[grimdark]], controversial or cool. This often takes the form of senselessly driving a vague argument, a plotline or a scenario to its darkest possible outcome, all the while openly expressing their disdain for whoever "the establishment" is, rationalizing villains or finding a middle ground in discourses. Like most internet terminology, it has been beaten to death, resurrected hastily, and then beaten some more. Has no relation to ''[[Hunter: The Reckoning]]''.

Another far less negative use of the term is to describe something on the 'edge' of what's acceptable, pushing established boundaries of convention. For example, by this definition ''Batman: The Animated Series'' was edgy for making an animated series which defied expectations of how true to its base concept and generally well-written a show designed to sell toys could be. Some more examples of this would be Ren and Stimpy (which was crude and vulgar) or Invader Zim (which could get dark in subject matter, and used a fair bit of black humor); in both cases, a decent bit of the comedy was of the "I can't believe that they did ''THAT'' on a kid's cartoon show!" variety. A milder version of this was Sonic the Hedgehog in contrast to Mario. In 1989 the Simpsons was the Edgy take on the classic family sitcom archetype and in 1999 Family Guy had slotted itself in as the Edgy version of The Simpsons. For the 1990s and early 2000s Edgy was a favored term of cynical marketing types which drew the attention of the world's sarcastic snarkers, many of which came to congregate on sites such as 4chan.

An "edgelord" is someone who essentially is guilty of serial attempts to be edgy, like [[that guy]] at your tabletop role playing group who always, without fail, makes brooding loners skilled at violence that have problems with authority (and the authority figures the characters dislike are often stand-ins for real-life ones the creator dislikes; popular targets are the police, [[captialism|big business]] and [[religion]]) and a troubled past but without the nuance or skill to pull it off. The end result is they makes themselves look silly. "Art" done by edgelords contain characters who are as dark, brooding and as painfully unhappy as possible, conflicts have zero compromise, institutions are the villains unless the edgelord made them and any conflict of interest will have the worst possible outcome. An edgelord in writing will go out of their way to make the story extra depressing, and subject multiple aspects of it to an increased shock factor when it's clearly '''illogical''' to do so. Needless to say, it can drive a perfect idea to make an entertaining story into the shitter, grating the nerves of even the most jaded audience. When commenting, the "edgelord" will simply push any predicament in the artwork to the darkest, deepest, worst outcome, while describing his fantasies. For example: In an adult and/or bondage predicament picture, edgelords can be found describing a paragraph of horrible fate the captive would suffer, *should* suffer because slaves are shit, and *deserve* abuse, even when the picture was of a predicament with nothing in context. Or he will simply fill the comment of any NSFW picture with his own sick fantasies, surely adding "women DESERVE it".

This is not to say that said dark elements like murder, slavery, rape and bodily harm are bad for literature, but rather that their sloppy execution with no regard to their depth is. As shown above, even the most "edgelord" of concepts can be salvaged and even made bearable with proper handling, especially going by the latter definition - but if you do it enough, the boundaries shift and what was edgy becomes the new norm, and there is always the risk of falling ''over'' the edge. This is why the old definition has fallen increasingly out of favor as time has gone on — people began seeing the dross sold under the title of "edgy", and the idea of what it meant thus moved away from the positive connotations marketing execs desired and closer to the qualities described above. Plus, this is the internet, and people would rather a word just be an insult or a compliment to reduce confusion.

==The Anatomy of Edginess==
Edginess is in some ways like a cargo cult. During WWII in the Pacific, the US military set up bases on remote, but inhabited islands, bringing with them a lot of stuff like planes and cars and so forth that was quite amazing to the stone age natives, to whom the world had been a few dozen square kilometers of land surrounded by ocean, with hazy stories of other such islands. When the military left, some of the natives took to making coconut and wooden radios and flight towers based off of some vague recollection of the military variants, unaware that making the shape alone does not get you the functional item.

In that vein, most of what comes to mind when people envision "edgy" artworks tends to be the result of people who wanted to make ''morally grey'' characters and subject matter, but lack the maturity/experience/focus necessary to NOT end up with anything other than a multiple-personality-disordered mess. Someone with (at best) mediocre creative abilities sees some fiction that makes good use of melodrama, gritty settings, dark humor and such, made by people who know what the hell they're doing and figures "I can do that!", leading to said person haphazardly applying those elements incorrectly. The results of such efforts are either tiresome, unintentionally funny or just painful. The stereotypical teenager, especially one with gothic/emo tendencies, commonly embody this - all too eager for "adult" things (eg: violence, sex, etc.) in their limited perception of such, often born of denial. Individuals who pander to said demographic (or are otherwise just downright hacks) will favor this approach over any sense of complexity, subtlety, nuance and some actual understanding of the human condition.

===Edgy and [[Grimdark]]===
While edginess is frequently associated with invoking grimdark [[Derp|for the sake of it and nothing else]], it's important to remember that this alone does not edgy make. As an example, [[WH40K]]'s [[Imperium of Man]] has reasons to be fair and kind when capable: though it has plenty of genocide, xenocide (completely annihilating species even when they are gentle and kind), torture, forced labor (they draw the line at commercialized chattel slavery, but un-unionized indentured servitude is fair game), witch hunts and militarism that would give Hitler a chubby beyond the grave, said horrors have reasonable justifications. Aliens were buying and selling humans like pets and culling them by the billion, operating slaver outposts even in our solar system before the Emperor came into leading humanity into a roaring rampage of revenge. And regarding souls and the universe after the Heresy, any deviation from faith in the Emperor will ''literally'' send a human to hell upon death, with their soul becoming dæmon food (and/or sex toys).

Any mistreated machinery will attract foul entities and corruption that will fuck you up seven ways till Monday and chew you out; any ill-coaxed [[Machine Spirit]] will jam and blow up in your face; and any laxity will make [[Chaos]] cults pop up by the billion in a week. Then there's [[Necrons|the genocidal robots from another age]], [[Eldar|space elves that would murder a planet on the off chance that their]] [[Farseer]] would break a nail otherwise (and they're still the nice space elves despite that, as their [[Dark Eldar|webway dwelling cousins are even worse - murdering entire planets just because they like the sound of millions of people screaming]]), [[Orks|the ambulatory (AND belligerent) fungi that plague the entire galaxy in a series of wars]], and [[Tyranids|extragalactic horrors that intend to eat everyone's face.]] [[TL;DR]] The Imperium acts like an asshole Hitler/Hirohito bastard child because the alternative is much, MUCH worse.

At the level of narrative, the fact that things are very very bad is a core thematic element of this world. As pointed out there are reasons why things are so miserable in this world which flow logically and despite this there can be points of contrast. Imperials still have the same potential to love and be kind like modern real world humans do. The Tau are hopeful despite the evils of this world. Occasionally pragmatism can overcome the deep seeded prejudices to overcome greater evils, if only for a while. And even if it is preformed by Conscript Guardsmen, Commissars or Space Marines, each the product of horrendous military institutions, can fight to achieve acts of genuine (if still typically brutal) heroism.

Now if you want a senselessly edgy story in the Warhammer 40,000 universe, an example would be the now non-canon [[Khornate Knights]].

===In closing===
There are many paths to success for a storyteller, some of which include going over dark territory in various ways or by innovating and pushing boundaries. However, all of them require care and attention to detail to pull off well. Being dark is not a magic bullet for achieving profoundness without trying.

==Notable Edgelords==

*[[Elric]] of Melnibone, arguably the first one.
*The Punisher (pictured above), depending on the writer.
** The ultimate example of "pointless edge" with this character is writer Garth Ennis' (and Ennis himself is quite the edgelord) professionally published Hate Fic [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punisher_Kills_the_Marvel_Universe "Punisher Kills the Marvel Universe"].
*The Joker, depending on the writer. In particular, look at Heath Ledger's, Joaquin Phoenix's and Jared Leto's takes on him.
** However, both Ledger's and Phoenix's Joker portrayals were "edge with a point". Ledger's Joker was an exploration of human evils regarding terrorism and the various morality problems in dealing with it. Likewise for Phoenix's Joker, except the exploration was on the Origins of Evil. Jared Leto's Joker, on the other hand, was almost textbook pointless "Edgelord".
*[[Drizzt]] clones with extreme Alignment leanings, either towards good or evil.
*Some [[World of Darkness]] characters, particularly Sabbat or Baali.
*Various [[Original character, do not steal|fan-made]] and canon Sonic characters, particularly Shadow.
** If you want the textbook definition of "pointless edge", go look up [[/v/|Shadow the Hedgehog]] for the PS2/XBox/Gamecube. For the unfamiliar: An edgy game about a cartoon hedgehog shooting enemies, yet ESRB rated for Everyone 10 and up.
** And in the game ''Sonic Forces'', which actually lets you play as your OC through a custom avatar, the villain Infinite is a parody of edgy villain sue characters.
*Several in [[World of Warcraft]]. Character-wise the worst offenders - in ascending order - are Illidan Stormrage (in ''"Burning Crusade"'' and the second half of ''"Legion"''), Deathwing (in ''"Cataclysm"'') and Sylvanas Windrunner (the entirety of World of Warcraft). Others include several Death Knights and lots of the Demon Hunters and Forsaken (even their faction names are edgy).
*Several characters from [[A Song of Ice and Fire]], depending on the books or the TV adaptation. Examples from both include Euron Greyjoy, Littlefinger and Ramsay Bolton.
*Half of the [[Animu]] protagonists in existence. Bonus points if the genre is [[Isekai]], triple points if there's a harem involved.
*Reaper from Overwatch
*[[Blackguard]]s
* Warhammer 40k has so, so many there's entire edgelord ''factions'', such as the [[Chaos Space Marine|traitor marines]], the [[Black Templars]] and [[Dark Eldar]] (DE get extra points for their love of selfishness, dark colors and torture). Character examples include Rogal Dorn, Konrad Cruze, Phoenix Lord Maugan Ra, Urien Rakarth and Drazhar.
* Warhammer Fantasy, similar to above but to a lesser degree. Notable examples here include [[Valnir|Valnir the Reaper]], [[Nagash]] and most Dark Elves.
*[[Malal]]. As if the Chaos gods' emotional tantrums are not enough, there exists this guy who out-hates everyone, including himself, with servants who are tougher and stronger than theirs.
*Caesar's Legion and Caesar himself in [[Fallout|Fallout: New Vegas]] (along with some of their fans and the writer who created them).
*[[Star Wars|Kylo Ren]] AKA Krylo Ben AKA Ben Swolo. The writers were doing it on purpose, to play up the First Order's dogmatic North Korea in space schtick, and to that end made Kylo an incredibly unsubtle Darth Vader pastiche. While "Kylo" may be the worst Skywalker ever, there is no denying that the edge is strong in his family. His mom's side are a bunch of crybaby desert backworlders with an incestuous sex drive and his dad was a scruffy, nerf herding spice smuggler - and all were war criminals, some with body counts in the hundred thousands and some with children's blood on their hands... He probably fits the mold better than we'd like to admit. Also his edge is undermined by fact that he never won a fight against [[Mary_Sue|Mar-Rey Sue Palpatine]] which doesn’t help things either.
* Lord Edgelord, later Lord Edgegod from Slackwyrm Keep. He's aware, and <s>he's loving it</s>***CLANG!*** There's no love in edge, only chaos!
* Not Important aka The Antagonist aka The Crusader from Hatred. Imagine every trope related to edgy nihilistic spree shooters, push them to their uncomfortable extremes and then plop the result in a monochromatic mess of a game. What you get is the story about a very unlikable man with dialogue written by less likeable people (including an edgy as fuck death metal band) going around and killing everyone because...fuck you, it's edgy.
* The whole "*teleports behind you* Nothing personal kid. *stabs you*" meme originated as a parody of edgelord characters.

[[Category:Gamer Slang]]