Cathay
"Goddamn Mongorians Kurgans! Stop tearing down my shitty warr!"
- – What the Cathayans have to say roughly 12 times every hour or so
Cathay is the uninspired name for the analogue to China in the Warhammer Fantasy universe. That said, it is at least marginally more inspired than their name for the Japan analogue (and only because Nippon is a better known name for Japan than Cathay is for China in Europe).
THEY'RE GONNA BE IN TOTAL WAR WARHAMMER 3
Description
The country is huge (as in the case with a certain real-world country), much bigger than the Empire and the other western lands. To the north is the Mongolian steppes Eastern Steppes and regions of chaos, which are held at bay by the huge-ass Great Wall Bastion of China Cathay which prevents the hordes from pillaging. Why the Empire never took this up themselves isn't explained.
To the west is the Mountains of Mourn, the warpstone deserts and the great maw. Incidentally you can blame the Cathayans for the Great Maw’s existence as one of the previous Dragon Emperors had his celestial wizards summon the thing to punish the Ogres for eating some of his citizens. To the south is a mysterious jungle where the lost city of the old ones is. Eastwards is the sea, with Nippon and the Lost Isles of Elithis.
Of course because such a great place can't be well explored due to GW's anal refusal to be cool, a more detailed look at Cathay is currently unavailable.
The great tragedy...
Games Workshop could probably make some moolah in a way that would not involve fucking over existing canon or jacking up prices by introducing a Cathay army. Even some Dogs of War mercenaries that were Cathayan who ended up in the Europe analogue could be nice. Plenty of cool Chinese warrior types to build on.
But until 2021 they did not.
And that's terrible.
They don't do this awesome thing for three reasons: Games Workshop gives little attention to Fantasy when the Space Marines haven't had their yearly codex update; when they do do fantasy they are too busy doing Orcs/Empire/Undead/Chaos again; and they are too much the short-sighted fools to invest time, money and resources in making something new when they can just increase existing prices again.
Now why would Cathay be a fabulous idea to have as an army
This would be a good idea because the Cathayans, according to the WoC entry in the BRB at any rate, have steam punk clockwork terracotta automaton warriors (again, ripped straight from real-world China). Who doesn't want to have something like THAT in their army. Just as The Empire and Kislev have to deal with Chaotic Norsemen attacking, Cathay constantly has to deal with incursions from the Hung, who are nomadic, Chaos worshipping, steppe people, who are rather well endowed. Furthermore, they have Warrior Monkeys, gunpowder weapons, and Repeating Crossbows which again ripped straight out of Chinese mythology and real-life, and yet for some reason have no Flamethrowers...
They also have giant stone guardian dogs and huge dragons and a distinct subspecies of intelligent one-horned ogre and mighty kung-fu warriors and, and....oh the list goes on!
Your state religion is what now? And who rules you?
The worship of Tzeentch (they call him Chi'an Chi or Lord Tsien-Tsien of the Invisible Empire in older books, which, incidentally, the Kurgan and Hung name for him) is an officially recognized religion there. In Cathay he is described as Lord of the Chorus of 15 devils, and ruler over the five elemental masters (elementals of wood, fire, air, earth and water). He is described as living in a mystical pagoda that sits atop the nether hells where the souls of those who fail him are imprisoned, and his pagoda is decorated with chrysanthemums and lotuses on the lower levels and the bones of his victims and those who failed him on the upper levels. And if that wasn’t enough they let Hung Chaos Marauders sell their shit in Weijin. Which is odd because the Hung are normally so duplicitous that even the Norse and Kurgan don't want to deal with them very often.
They also have a Dragon for an Emperor (who usually takes a human form, and may or may not actually just be a human). (The Mummy 3's Dragon Emperor? Scheming, sorcerous, transforms into a dragon... ) And are mainly based on Ming to Qing era China.
There is a Sun Wukong figure that seized some territory and has a Clan Eshin warlord as an advisor and a trade deal with Clan Eshin.
In Vampire Slayer, Felix sees a statue of a four-armed monkey god, and thinks it is from Cathay.
In the novel Beasts in Velvet, and the short story Red Thirst there is a Cathayan character named Dien Ch'ing(狄恩青). He is secretly a Tzeenchian cultist who impersonated a Cathayan ambassador (which he had murdered and took the name from). He is also a celestial wizard and is capable of using the classic five elemental magic (which are Tzeetch demons who disguised as those elements). From the same novel, it also tells the story of how when the monkey king was but a young prince he was able to trick the 5 elemental demons into fighting one another.
In the Nagash's novel, it is mentioned that Neferata had given some of her vampire potion to erase the debt Lahmia garnered with the Cathayans when her dad bought a shitload of gunpowder weapons from them. The man she gave the potion to Prince Xian Ha Feng, one of the Dragon Emperor's sons sent to negotiate with Lahmia, not only drank the potion but also bought some of it back to Cathay where the vampire corruption soon spread. With enough immortal bloodsuckers (and probably some of Ushoran's spies), Xian started a civil war against his father. This angers the Dragon Emperor so much that he ordered to close their borders with ALL foreigners. The Dragon Emperor apparently died in a freak accident sometime after the civil war according to Ushoran's spies (perhaps has to do with the monkey king?) and a new Emperor was enthroned because of this. Under this new Emperor's reign, the trade with the Nekeharan has opened once again because the new Emperor cares little about the Nehekharans. But hey, at least the Cathayan will get their Black Lotus wine and the Nehekharans gets to eat Cathayan spicy food! Although Prince Xian Ha Feng was never heard of after this, the vampire corruption remains still, to the point they have now even seized a few seats in the celestial court, where they've done nothing but bicker at their Tzeentch worshipping rivals for powers. Their bloodline is named Jade-Blooded, but is considered non-canon or loose canon due to it was introduced in Warhammer RPG before it the novel was written, or GW just doesn't care enough to Cathay.
They also worship the same Orange Simca deity (basically Warhammer’s version of Buddha) as Nippon.
Recent events
According to the eight ed BRB, the Kurgans once mounted a massive raid on Cathay's Great Bastion. Which is funny, because Kurgans are basically Chaos-Turko Slavs to the Norscan's Chaos Vikings. In the end times, they are invaded by Chaos and skaven. Remarkably, the dragon emperor drives out the Skaven and stalemates the forces of chaos, but ultimately loses to Grimgor's massive WAAAGH! The ruins of Cathay become the stage for an endless battle between the orcs and the remaining forces of chaos. Grimgor himself gets teleported away as he had become Incarnate of Beasts, and when the last effort to save the world fails, Cathay is destroyed along with the rest of the planet, revealed in Age of Sigmar to have been called Mallus.
Dammit, Forge World
Tamurkhan: Throne of Chaos, a book from Forge World's fantasy line, quite surprisingly contains a battle scene where the forces of Cathay are involved. A chaos sorcerer dupes a Beastman army into attacking the Tower of Ashshair, a Cathayan watchtower outpost at the edge of the Ogre Kingdoms which it uses to scry on the Old World. Its defenders included fancy bronze cannon that shoot harpoons, "crow-men", stone "temple dogs", elite warriors with back-banners and "thousand-folded" swords, and "Dragon-blooded Shugengan" who wield elemental magics (fire, water, earth, air and wood). In other words, your usual collection of oriental cliches, mostly Japanese. And sadly, it's likely the closest thing we'll get to an official Cathay army list along with the mention of them having elementals under their control in the Vampire Genevieve books.
But then, things get interesting when the Tower's garrison started to get overwhelmed by the Beastmen's numbers. The Tower turns the tide by dropping a frikking' Comet of Casandora into the horde, then starts sending "strange creatures of living stone" that can swim through the ground and minotaur-suplexing "living statues of onyx" to beat the shit out of the survivors. So at least we know that Cathay isn't to be messed with in the Warhammer world.
Total Warhammer 3 AKA: "HOLY SHIT WE'RE ACTUALLY GETTING SOMETHING FOR CATHAY"
During the announcement of Total Warhammer 3, CA confirmed that Cathay will be one of the 6 playable factions. They've been working with GW in bringing the faction to life and making them one of the core races in the game. This is also great news for anyone hoping for Cathay in Warhammer: The Old World. More info will come soon, but this minor faction is finally getting the fleshing out it deserves. Between them and Kislev, this is a lore grognard's wet dream.
With the Reveal trailer, the first CA FAQ and GW discussion on Cathay's design + background we finally get our first proper looks at Cathay.
Front and centre is Miao Ying, daughter of the Celestial Dragon and his wife, and commander of the Northern Bastion (meaning that when Sayl attacked the wall it was her forces that drove him off). She's a dragon that can take a human form like her parents and its been shown that the Celestial Dragon spends his time in the Celestial city and overseeing Cathay while his children take direct control of different provinces (like a certain golden giant and his kids) as her brother Zhao Ming commands the western province and will be the other playable lord.
In the trailer we see rocket batteries, war balloons and those suplexing statues from the Tamurkhan book, in addition to regular human infantry and some lady earth bending. To help establish Cathay's playstyle GW themselves made rules for each unit and for the army (using 8th edition) to aid CA to understand how Cathay should act in-game. Yes there are currently rules for 8th edition Cathay and GW are just sitting on them and not releasing them.
An interesting thing to note is that both Miao Ying and Zhao Ming seem to be based on the Four Dragons from Chinese mythology, who are four children born to the "King of the Dragons" each of whom were granted their own land in a cardinal direction and are associated with an element. Zhao is The White Iron Dragon and the ruler of the Western province (because metal is an element according to the ancient Chinese) and Miao is the Black Storm Dragon and ruler of the Northern province, both of these line up with the four dragons mythology.
This also should tell us a little about the presumably other two dragon siblings, as one would be the Red Fire Dragon of the South and the other would be the Blue Forest Dragon of East. We actually heard of a Jade Dragon in Zhao Ming's lore blog, and CA confirmed this isn't another name for the Dragon Emperor but another kid. Whether or not the Jade Dragon will become playable in game however is unknown.
Canon Lore
With a recent blog release on the Total War blog, we have official lore on these guys. So once upon a time, The Dragon Emperor and his wife lived on the world before the Old Ones came, where it was mostly a frozen wasteland. Eventually, the space hypnotoads came and did their thing, terraforming the planet and creating all of the little races of the Warhammer World. When humans started to show up, The Dragon Emperor learned to take human shape and gathered a few tribes under his banner. When Chaos eventually came, more tribes flocked to him in order to protect their new empire, eventually creating the Great Bastion himself and instilling a section of his magic in order to prevent the Chaos Hordes from breaking into Cathay. Once Cathay started to take shape, The emperor and his wife decided they were happy with the lands they have and decided to settle down to defend them.
The Dragon pair and their kids would eventually rule over the land and teach them the ways of Harmony, to be one with themselves and the land around them and find their natural place in the world. The Dragons aren't tyrants but act more like teachers and wardens to the humans that are beneath them, as they feel they need the humans on their good side to fight Chaos. They've gotten so used to being with humans that they spend most of their time in human form, only going dragon in an emergency. They don't wish to be worshipped as gods, but it usually happens anyway, and the people of Cathay treat them with such reverence that talking shit about them is a good way to get murdered, especially if you're a foreigner.
Unfortunately for big D, while he seems to have done a decent job of instilling harmony in the people of Cathay, he hasn't done a good job of it with his kids because they all fucking hate each other. There are a confirmed nine children, but four of them are missing who knows where. Miao Ying is the most favoured and powerful of the Dragon kids, which has given her a massive superiority complex, and Zhao Ming is viewed as too experimental with his magic and many fear he is losing his mind due to how much time he spends around the Great Maw, snorting lines of warpstone and actually treating his subjects like human beings. The Dragon of the South is called the Fire Dragon and despises Miao Ying as well. They constantly have to deal with invasions from the Southlands from the Monkey King and Naga. The Dragon of the East is the Azure Dragon, the only one with an expansionist mindset, and the one who fought Dark Elves who made their way over the boiling sea. She also tried conquering Araby and once got stranded in Lustria, so Mrs Worldwide. The Final Dragon we know of is the Jade Dragon who rules the centre of Cathay and spends most of their time hating that they are surrounded by idiots and trying to tell their siblings to listen to Daddy. Evidently, they all spoil for mom and dad's attention and bicker a lot.
There is also the slight problem that Tzeentch cults hold a massive amount of power in the empire and has caused no shortage of problems. Not helping that even humans plot to either gain the favour of the dragons or usurp them. This all came to a head when the Dragon Emperor and his wife disappeared, leaving the kids alone to watch the place. This resulted in Cathay's version of the Warring States, as they fight for the throne while Cathay endures an invasion from the North and South.
Eventually, the Dragon Emperor and his wife came home from their four century vacation to find their kids fighting, Chaos armies rampaging in their lands and the throne occupied by a god damn monkey.
Oh yeah, The Monkey King is still canon, but not much is known about him other than him taking over Cathay convinced the other Dragon kids to put aside their differences and fight him, until dad came home and won the war.
So on paper, we have a utopian society of harmony where Dragons and Humans act as one and stand defiant against the forces of Chaos in peace and tranquillity. Once you look closer though, we have a land mass led by spoiled children at each other's throats and only held in line by their parents, along with a fanatical population who are willing to kill any who so much as slightly criticize their rule, and is only held together because of the power and charisma of a single, semi god-like being.
In other words, pretty much what the Imperium would have become if Big E wasn't put on the golden toilet seat.
Gallery
Originally the only images we've had of Cathay and its people were a single picture in the Warhammer rule books and from a White Dwarf article where they showed off somebody's converted army. Suffice to say the converter did a great job, and the pictures are included below. Later on Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay and Total War: Warhammer had their own stabs at what Cathay should look at.
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
Yabo Chao, an ambassador from Cathay in Altdorf.
Links
| Regions and Areas of the Warhammer World | |
|---|---|
| Areas of The Old World: | The Empire of Man - Bretonnia - Albion - Estalia - Tilea - Kislev - Norsca - Border Princes - Worlds Edge Mountains - Karak Eight-Peaks |
| Areas of The New World: | Naggaroth - Lustria |
| Areas of The Eastern Lands: | Cathay - Nippon - Ogre Kingdoms - Dark Lands - Kingdoms of Ind - Khuresh - Eastern Steppes |
| Areas of The Southlands: | Nehekhara - Araby - Badlands - Marshes of Madness |
| Other Areas of the world: | Ulthuan - Athel Loren - Chaos Wastes - Skavenblight - Lost Isles of Elithis |
| Main bodies of Water: | The Great Ocean - The Far Sea - The Sea of Dread - Inner Sea of Ulthuan |