Editing Warhammer Fantasy Battle (section)

==Meta History==
[[File:Warhammer History Shorthand.png|thumb|right|500px|tl;dr]]
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===Prehistory===

===Proto-Warhammer===

===1e===
First edition was dropped in 1983 and man, it is weird by modern standards. No [[The Empire (Warhammer Fantasy)|Empire]] or [[Bretonnia]], instead you have [[Albion]] (which is more reminiscent of medieval England than Roman-era one) and [[Nippon]] armies. [[Slann|Slanns]] are a rip-off of [[Slaad]] and aren't [[Lizardmen]]. None of the named characters are canon anymore (with minor exception of [[Harry the Hammer]]). There is still something to it, something [[Rogue Trader]]-esque. This IS Warhammer Fantasy Battle how it was originally intended to be.

===2e===

===3e===

===4e===
Released in 1992, this was the edition that started to turn WFB into its most recognisable form. Most of the playable factions (with some exceptions like [[Bretonnia]] and [[Ogre Kingdoms]]) can trace their origins back to this edition. There are still differences, of course, such as [[Chaos]] (except [[Skaven]] and the dorfs) and [[Undead]] being one faction, but those are mostly minor. Hell, even [[Kislev]] debuted here, as a part of [[The Empire (Warhammer Fantasy)|The Empire]] roaster. This is also the first edition to have army books separated from rulebooks. Oh, and also [[Chaos Dwarfs]] call this edition home.
===5e===

===6e===

===7e===

===8e===
8th is one of the most played editions of Warhammer fantasy, due to it being the most up to date version (read; has the most units) and it's easily the most controversial. 8th shares a lot of similar problems to 40k 5th edition, as around this time GW decided to start messing around with their settings and introduce [[Khornate Knights|extremely]] [[Necrons|controversial]] [[Matt Ward|fluff]]. In addition to this a lot of the Army Books and Codexes from this time were extremely lackluster in rules and balancing, where almost every army had problems with their army rules and/or extremely poor internal balance. The edition also heavy favours hoards of infantry and strong artillery, which meant most games devolved into one of the most universally despised styles of play, gun lining, as one side is forced to panic rush up the board to get into melee, while the other side sits still shooting all the most dangerous units off the board with a smug look on their face. From a model perspective most of the new models were really good, with the war sphinx for the [[Tomb Kings]], the [[Lizardmen|Lizardmen's]] menagerie of dinosaurs and the [[Dwarfs|Dwarfs']] heavy infantry all looking fantastic, there were a few models that were disliked for looking a bit too goofy like the Skycutter, but overall the new models were very good. 

So while 8th is generally considered a bad edition, it simply being bad isn't really enough to justify why large parts of the community loath it to the extent it is. The true hatred was caused by [[The End Times]]. Now while the ET is generally considered its own sub-edition, in a similar vein to the [[Storm of Chaos]] for 6th, it was introduced as a supplement for 8th, so the end of Warhammer Fantasy is part of 8th edition. And everything that was bad about 8th was doubled down on with the ET with bad fluff, unbalanced rules and most of the new models were generally poorly received, resulting in the ET being hated by almost all fantasy players. And since 8th was already widely considered a poor edition, killing off the world at the end of it was a real fucking kick to the ribs. 8th was the end of Warhammer, and it went with a whimper, not a bang.

===[[The End Times]]===

This period is also known as when everything goes tits up. Games Workshop, fed up of with players whining that the game was stuck dead in its canon, said "enough" and decided to give the players what they wanted. Thus did they make the End Times towards the end of the 8th edition, a supplement to existing armies which fluff-wise tells how everything is now moving to a grand finale. Check out the [[The_End_Times|End Times]] page for more details, but to summarise:

- Mannfred von Carstein resurrects Nagash, making a world conquering host of the undead while also slowly becoming an ultimate god of death and undeath with eyes on the prize of kicking the chaos gods out of the warp and taking their place. In order to do this, he nerfed the Tomb Kings and absorbed them into the Vampire Counts to create his own army - '''the Undead Legion'''.

- The Empire has been overrun by the forces of Chaos, but at the last moment Karl Franz becomes the living avatar of Sigmar and the wind of heavens, burning all Chaos from Altdorf. Much later on, he is revealed not to be an avatar of Sigmar but Sigmar himself. 

- The Orks and Goblins do what they always do and get ready for a big fight, wiping out the Chaos Dwarfs and several minor human kingdoms. 

- Malekith turns out to be the rightful king of the elves, and following a civil war culminating in the deaths of several Elf gods the three Elf races have reunited into a single force. The Vortex is unbound, Ulthuan and Naggaroth have respectively sunk and been overrun by Chaos, and now all the elves are living together in Athel Loren. Teclis reveals his master plan to bind the Winds of magic into specific people. These Incarnates would be empowered by their respective Winds to the point where they can stand a chance against the full power of the Chaos Gods.

- The Dwarfs can't decide what the hell they are doing besides chewing their beards and drinking at first, but eventually end up joining the Empire. 

- The Skaven have [[Tyranid|nommed]] pretty much all the minor human kingdoms and are rising in one super ratty horde to take over the world. They also '''blow up the Chaos Moon''' in a display of awe-inspiring idiocy that horrifies even the Daemons of Chaos.  

- After most of the Lizardmen sacrifice themselves stopping most of the Warhammer world from becoming a smoldering crater, the survivors go 'fuck this' and fly off into space. 

- The Ogre kingdoms have blown up with every volcano erupting at the same time and so they are mass-migrating again.

- Everyone who isn't with Chaos is forced to join their forces with the Incarnates in a last stand at Middenheim, where a third Warp Gate was hidden. Mannfred ruins the ritual that would have saved the Warhammer world from annihilation, and the Chaos Gods manifest to personally fuck everything up. The world is destroyed, and the stage is set for [[Age of Sigmar]].