History NightmareFuel / Warhammer

* No mention of the Great Maw? A comet with a face that, when it hits the earth, creates a huge desert full of mutated beasts, then burrows through the earth, leaving a huge pit the size of an inland sea which is rimmed with undulating rows of teeth. And the Ogres worship this thing, and make pilgrimages to it. And what's more, it is rumored that it has burrowed through the core of the world and out the other side making a huge, fanged whirlpool. And, looking at a map of the warhammer world, you can see that the approximate location of this whirlpool is an area of sea marked 'no ships return from here'.

* While later fluff and editions transferred it over to Nurgle, early editions listed mercy/compassion as one of the things Khorne was god of... How fucked must a world be for the god of bloodshed, slaughter, rage, destruction and patron to all [[TheBerserker Berserkers]] to count as a god of mercy?
** Actually, now that ı think about it, Khorne's sphere of worship never extended to mercy and compassion. At best, he is the god of honor and justice (Let's forget about Solkan, who may or may not exist at all). At worst, he is the god of all the bloody examples above.

* The Necrosphinx, a winged, centauroid animate sphinx. With a scorpion-like tail with a venomous sting, arm blades that can decapitate a dragon and a stone body that can deflect a hit from a warmachine or a large monster. The worst part is how they're animated. They're rumored to be given animus by the Tomb Kings' most malevolent gods, who have turned them into unthinking, unfeeling, unceasing engines of destruction and death. It's said that if it wasn't for the incantations of the Liche Priests, they would kill everything and everyone in their path without stopping. One bit of lore had a Tomb Kings's troops go to fight a Lizardmen army, then the Tomb King and his forces went missing. Another king rallied his troops to find the missing army. He found the slaughtered remains of both armies, all troops dead, everything cut to pieces... and a lone Necrosphinx standing in the middle of the carnage.

* The Necrosphinx, a winged, centauroid animate sphinx. With a scorpion-like tail with a venomous sting, arm blades that can decapitate a dragon and a stone body that can deflect a hit from a warmachine or a large monster. The worst part is how they're animated. They're rumored to be given animus by the Tomb Kings' most malevolent gods, who have turned them into unthinking, unfeeling, unceasing engines of destruction and death. It's said that if it wasn't for the incantations of the Liche Priests, they would kill everything and everyone in their path without stopping. One bit of lore had a Tomb Kings's troops go to fight a Lizardmen army, then the Tomb King and his forces went missing. Another king rallied his troops to find the missing army. He found the decimated remains of both armies, all troops dead, everything cut to pieces... and a lone Necrosphinx standing in the middle of the carnage.

* [[LoonyFan Grail Pilgrims]]. These suicidal [[HeroWorshipper hero worshippers]] follow Grail Knights around, praising their achievements and hoping to bask in the glory of the Lady even as they go into battle. They collect anything a Grail Knight tosses aside, from ruined armor to the rinds of fruit, and praise and sing in song even their crudest curses. Funny so far? When the Grail Knight they follow is injured and thrown off their horse, they invariably scramble over and take every item of value so that they might bask in ''that'' item's glory. The gravely injured Grail Knight, a hero of unparalleled chivalry and honor blessed by the Lady themselves and granted uncountable blessings, in unceremoniously trampled underfoot, and are more often killed by their followers than any wound, sometimes being interred alive inside "Reliquae" so that the madmen that follow them can worship their "blessed" bodies. And there is [[BlueAndOrangeMorality nothing wrong with this in their eyes]]. They're simply "venerating the Lady" (even though they accidentally kill her most devoted followers).

* Grail Pilgrims. These suicidal [[HeroWorshipper hero worshippers]] follow Grail Knights around, praising their achievements and hoping to bask in the glory of the Lady even as they go into battle. They collect anything a Grail Knight tosses aside, from ruined armor to the rinds of fruit, and praise and sing in song even their crudest curses. Funny so far? When the Grail Knight they follow is injured and thrown off their horse, they invariably scramble over and take every item of value so that they might bask in ''that'' item's glory. The gravely injured Grail Knight, a hero of unparalleled chivalry and honor blessed by the Lady themselves and granted uncountable blessings, in unceremoniously trampled underfoot, and are more often killed by their followers than any wound, sometimes being interred alive inside "Reliquae" so that the madmen that follow them can worship their "blessed" bodies. And there is [[BlueAndOrangeMorality nothing wrong with this in their eyes]]. They're simply "venerating the Lady" (even though they accidentally kill her most devoted followers).

* The [[https://warhammerfantasy.fandom.com/wiki/Sepulchral_Stalkers Sepulchral Stalkers]], huge guardian statues that look like the spawn of Medusa, only far larger, better armed, and heavily-armored. These creatures watch over the tombs of Nekehara, slithering under the sands most of the time, impossible to detect. When they do strike, they explode out of the dunes and lay about with a man-sized polearms. But wait, that's not the worst part. Any mortal that gazes into the eyes of a Stalker is immediately turned to sand. Even a brief glance is enough to do it, or at least turn a limb or two into dust. So not only are you and your friends being hacked apart by a huge snake-man monster, if you even ''look at it'' as you try to fight back, you could get instantly [[Film/AvengersInfinityWar snapped]]. [[SarcasmMode Good luck!]]

* Chaos Dwarfs are essentially the darkest interpretation of their untainted kin you can imagine, married to possibly the most advanced weaponry and demonology in the setting (outside of the Skaven and Chaos Daemons, respectively). The Dwarves are determined, honor-bound, and masterful in their crafting. The Children of Hashut are merciless, willfully immoral, and utterly bent on dominating all other races to their control. They slaughter droves of slaves just to keep their vast forges working. Much like Chaos worshipers, the blood and agony of sacrifices if quite literally the lubrication that allows their society to function, only its scaled up to an industrial scale that would make the Nazis envious. They summon daemons, which they then bind to huge living suits of armor, sometimes several at a time, each enraged abomination powering a different part and all working in sync. They scheme and plot against each other at every level, yet still resolutely hold true to oaths of loyalty, only they're a lot more creative about working around the wording of those oaths.
** However, unlike the Dwarves, they don't wait for generations to introduce or update new technology. Oh, no. If it works, then it goes into mass production, because like their kin, ''everything'' they make is flawlessly constructed. Improved Hellcannon? Improved Dreadquake Mortar? Even more lethal and destructive K'Daai daemon? As long as it works, they'll build them and sell them and use them without hesitation.

* While the Skaven are generally played for laughs - let's face it, this is an entire race of Rat-faced [[TheStarscream Starscreams]], how could that not be funny? Then you read the army book. Specifically, [[NoCelebritiesWereHarmed Hieronymous Bouscus]] screaming, over images of the utter abhorrence that is the Skaven city. One of their major clans will gleefully rip your brain out and stick it in a giant rat-horror ''ForTheEvulz''. Another one considers KillItWithFire, [[ShockAndAwe Kill It With Lightning]], and Kill It With Poisonous Gas entirely sensible ways of dealing with ''everything'', not caring if their own troops are caught in the blast. And then there's the pure shit-yourself-in-terror story of how the Skaven came to be...

** Supposedly, they were created by the Chaos Dwarfs to improve discipline and cohesion among their greenskin slaves. [[GoneHorriblyRight This bit them in the ass big time]]; the Black Orcs [[TurnedAgainstTheirMasters led the other greenskins in a massive uprising against their masters]], and the rebellion came very close to destroying the Chaos Dwarf empire, reaching as far as the doors to the Temple of Hashut. Only the betrayal of the Hobgoblins saved the Chaos Dwarfs from complete annihilation. While the Chaos Dwarfs were able to put down the rebellion, the Black Orcs escaped and have been an enormous menace ever since.

* Gorgers. Basically, if a baby Ogre is born without a paunch, the Ogres will sacrifice it to the aforementioned Great Maw by throwing it down into a cave. Usually, they die. Sometimes, they find a tunnel into an even deeper cavern, often filled with Warpstone. And, of course, there are the many other baby Ogres living down there too who have suffered a similar fate. And the warpstone mutates them into even bigger, larger versions of Ogres. Of course, there's not much to eat down there besides, well, each other. So basically, ''they fight and eat one another'' until the largest eats everyone. And then, ''whomever survives, breaks free to the surface''. '''''AND HE'S STILL HUNGRY'''''.

** There are two bright spots among the peasants; one named Huebald and an unnamed male peasant who invented the Bretonnian treburchet. The former was knighted after saving a noblewoman from Beastmen, and the latter was genius who invented a new weapon that single-handedly protected a village from a Norse raid. As for what happened to them... Huebald didn't survive his first battle. For saving a village, a chapel and inventing a new weapon, the peasant was rewarded a fattened pig and two copper crowns - in-universe historians didn't even bother to get his name, and in Bretonnia that pittance is more wealth than the average Bretonnian peasant can hope to see in a lifetime.

* Grail Pilgrims. These suicidal [[HeroWorshipper hero worshippers]] follow Grail Knights around, praising their achievements and hoping to bask in the glory of the Lady even as they go into battle. They collect anything a Grail Knight tosses aside, from ruined armor to the rinds of fruit, and praise and sing in song even their crudest curses. Funny so far? When the Grail Knight they follow is injured and thrown off their horse, they invariably scramble over and take every item of value so that they might bask in ''that'' items glory. The gravely injured Grail Knight, a hero of unparalleled chivalry and honor blessed by the Lady themselves and granted uncountable blessings, in unceremoniously trampled underfoot, and are more often killed by their followers than any wound, sometimes being interred alive inside "Reliquae" so that the madmen that follow them can worship their "blessed" bodies. And there is [[BlueAndOrangeMorality nothing wrong with this in their eyes]]. They're simply "venerating the Lady" (even though they accidentally kill her most devoted followers).

* Grail Pilgrims. These suicidal HeroWorshippers follow Grail Knights around, praising their achievements and hoping to bask in the glory of the Lady even as they go into battle. They collect anything a Grail Knight tosses aside, from ruined armor to the rinds of fruit, and praise and sing in song even their crudest curses. Funny so far? When the Grail Knight they follow is injured and thrown off their horse, they invariably scramble over and take every item of value so that they might bask in ''that'' items glory. The gravely injured Grail Knight, a hero of unparalleled chivalry and honor blessed by the Lady themselves and granted uncountable blessings, in unceremoniously trampled underfoot, and are more often killed by their followers than any wound, sometimes being interred alive inside "Reliquae" so that the madmen that follow them can worship their "blessed" bodies. And there is [[BlueAndOrangeMorality nothing wrong with this in their eyes]]. They're simply "venerating the Lady" (even though they accidentally kill her most devoted followers).

* The Empire - a hallmark of [[CrapsaccharineWorld a Crap-Saccharine World]] with cultists, witch hunts, occasional pogroms and horrors lurking behind each corner.

* Peasants can in theory become knights, escaping the squalor and poverty of their station. In practice, this has only happened three times in over 1,000 years and it's implied some nobles will see them as upstarts and [[MakeItLookLikeAnAccident covertly try to get them killed on the battlefield]].

* One word: grudges. Dwarfs are ''very'' focused on claiming {{revenge}} for [[DisproportionateRetribution even the most minor or unintentional "crime" against them]]. They once razed Fortress Kreighof to the ground. Why? Because the Elector Count of Ostermark hired Dwarf craftsmen from Karak Kadrin to build it, promising them twelve dozen wagonloads of gold as payment. He ended up underpaying -- by ''two and a half pennies''. Such a petty slight being a ''casus belli'' is pretty scary. It's enough to make one want to avoid interacting with Dwarfs at all costs.

* You wouldn't think Wood Elves would be a good source of this, but the ''Warhammer'' take on them delivers. The elves themselves aren't so bad except for the fact they're unpredictable and AxCrazy, basically [[Literature/TheLordOfTheRings Legolas]] mixed with the mutants from ''Film/TheHillsHaveEyes2006''. It's Athel Loren's native... life, which you should worry about. Dryads initially appear as beautiful women and invite hapless fools into the forest with them, only to suddenly transform into horrible monsters and rip their victims to shreds. Some of the treekin are so insane that they just attack everything around them, including other treekin, and decorate themselves with the entrails and skeletons of their victims. They aren't Chaos corrupted, it's just what they're like. What's worse, it's suggested that Athel Loren has deep-running roots connecting it to the forests of the world, and it's ''expanding to encompass the entire planet'', as it's growing outwards and even little outcroppings are beginning to spring up on other landmasses - you could be a sailor on the other side of the world, innocently embarking on an island to go looking for coconuts, and suddenly find yourself in a forest from hell.

* Warhammer had the particular nasty idea of introducing the turnskins, regular humans that mutate into these things ''well into their lives'' for no apparent reasons. To have your entire family and friends turning against you, and even if you manage to survive and join the other beastmen they'll probably [[MadeASlave turn you into a slave]]...

* Standard Dwarfs are unable to use magic, but the Chaos Dwarfs have a ruling class of mages, thanks to their god Hashut. However, since Dwarfs were never meant to use magic, the sorcerers suffer from a curse that gradually turns them to stone. The ultimate fate of every Chaos Dwarf sorcerer is to eventually be transformed entirely into rock, then placed along the road to Zharr-Naggrund.

** Supposedly, they were created by the Chaos Dwarfs to improve discipline and cohesion among their greenskin slaves. [[GoneHorriblyRight This bit them in the ass big time]]; the Black Orcs led the other greenskins in a massive uprising against their masters, and the rebellion came very close to destroying the Chaos Dwarf empire, reaching as far as the doors to the Temple of Hashut. Only the betrayal of the Hobgoblins saved the Chaos Dwarfs from complete annihilation. While the Chaos Dwarfs were able to put down the rebellion, the Black Orcs escaped and have been an enormous menace ever since.

[[folder:'''Greenskins''']]
* Black Orcs. Take some of your typical orcs, give them greater intelligence and discipline, make them even meaner and more brutal than most of their kind, and make them some of the best fighters among the greenskins. It's a good thing they're not very common...
[[/folder]]

[[folder:'''Ogre Kingdoms''']]
* Gorgers. Basically, if a baby Ogre is born without a paunch, the Ogres will sacrifice it to the aforementioned Great Maw by throwing it down into a cave. Usually, they die. Sometimes, they find a tunnel into an even deeper cavern, often filled with Warpstone. And, of course, there are the many other baby Ogres living down there too who have suffered a similar fate. And the warpstone mutates them into even bigger, larger versions of Ogres. Of course, there's not much to eat down there besides, well, each other. So basically, ''they fight and eat one another'' until the largest eats everyone. And then, ''whomever survives, breaks free to the surface''. '''''AND HE'S STILL HUNGRY'''''.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:'''Greenskins'']]

** Even among Dark Elves, the Shade tribes are considered savage. In addition to the usual Dark Elf depravity, several tribes are cannibals by choice; they mutilate their slaves for the sake of it, and their method for determining strong children? When babies are born they're left outdoors on the first night of their lives. Any babies that survive until morning are deemed fit to be raised among the tribes.

* The Lizardmen. Go ahead, laugh. We'll see you laugh when they sacrifice you, Aztec style, to their god of blood. And your family. And your friends. And, if you're Skaven (because they really hate you), ''masses of your race at a time.'' Not enough? They couldn't care less about you, or anything outside of Lustria. They even have a rule that details how they don't give a shit, ''because that's how they are''. And these are among the ''good guys''. Admittedly, it is pretty easy to avoid this fate by ''not'' going into their hellish jungle homes and screwing with their stuff and trying to steal their gold. There have been several instances of humans going into Lizardman territory and coming out alive and rich because they had the sense not to piss them off. The Conquistador expys on the other hand did not fare well. Not that they [[WorthlessYellowRocks care about the gold]], but they write on gold tablets, and care about what's written on them very much.

* This army can be a chiroptophobe's worst nightmare. There are Bat Swarms - swarms of vampire bats, the largest of which have a wingspan the size of a man's outstretched arms. Unlike most vampire bats, they will also attack during the day, when their prey is alert, and they will strip the flesh off their target's bones if they can. Even larger are the Fell Bats, ''undead'' vampire bats that also eat flesh and have a body larger than a motorbike. The Vampire Counts newest monster, the [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Terrorgheist]]. [[http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-VqGKo3HSJh8/Ti2P9tUVC0I/AAAAAAAAAMM/tumgnKJCuRo/s1600/Terrorgeist++scary%2521.jpg Here it is.]] And then you read up on the backstory... [[note]] They're dragon-sized undead bats that eat people and drink blood, yet they're completely silent, except for one thing; They have a scream like the Tomb Banshee's below that can kill anyone that hears it... but theirs is much louder. They can also have a poisoned bite, a HealingFactor and can explode into a swarm of bats when killed [[/note]]. BatOutOfHell indeed.

** The situation they faced when they first awoke [[AndIMustScream enslaved against their will for all eternity to Nagash, the man who destroyed their kingdom, killed most of them and broke the covenant between them and their gods]].

* Lets not forget the supposed origin story of the Skaven. It's pretty horrific too. A peaceful town where humans live above ground and dwarves below in harmony decides to build a great cathedral. It takes many years, and they almost despair until a mysterious stranger offers to complete the tower in a single night if he is allowed to add his own dedication to the gods. The townspeople agree and the tower is built with a great horned bell. The Bell tolls 13 times. Darkness floods the streets over the next few days. Warpstone falls from the sky in a horrific hail. Humans and dwarves turn against one another as deaths and violence escalate. After months, the humans force their way into the dwarven side of the city to demand aid, and only find gnawed bones, ruins, and thousands of bloodthirsty ratmen. The humans were annihilated that night.

[[folder:'''Wood Elves''']]
* You wouldn't think Wood Elves would be a good source of this, but the ''Warhammer'' take on them delivers. The elves themselves aren't so bad except for the fact they're unpredictable and AxCrazy, basically [[Literature/TheLordOfTheRings Legolas]] mixed with the mutants from ''Film/TheHillsHaveEyes2006''. It's Athel Loren's native... life, which you should worry about. Dryads initially appear as beautiful women and invite hapless fools into the forest with them, only to suddenly transform into horrible monsters and rip their victims to shreds. Some of the treekin are so insane that they just attack everything around them, including other treekin, and decorate themselves with the entrails and skeletons of their victims. They aren't Chaos corrupted, it's just what they're like. What's worse, it's suggested that Athel Loren has deep-running roots connecting it to the forests of the world, and it's ''expanding to encompass the entire planet'', as it's growing outwards and even little outcroppings are beginning to spring up on other landmasses - you could be a sailor on the other side of the world, innocently embarking on an island to go looking for coconuts, and suddenly find yourself in a forest from hell.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:'''Beastmen''']]]

** They treat their own footmen as CannonFodder and [[TheDungAges keep their peasants in squalor]]. For one, the peasants have a ridiculous 90% tax rate, if they get chosen to be in the military, their wage is small (and their lords and nobles will make them pay for expenses, except funerary expenses; those are taken from their families).
** Peasants can in theory become knights, escaping the squalor and poverty of their station. In practice, this has only happened three times in over 1,000 years and it's implied some nobles will see them as upstarts and [[MakeItLookLikeAnAccident covertly try to get them killed on the battlefield]].

** In light of the above, they are assumed to be the good guys...

** There's also their attitude towards friendly fire. In game, it's forbidden to shoot into melee, because you don't want to hit your own troops. Skaven, IIRC, have a special rule called "Life Is Cheap", saying that you not only can, you should shoot into melee and fry your own troops, since that's the best way to slaughter the enemy, and damn your own troops.
*** The Skaven [[WeHaveReserves have reserves]]. They also have psychotic decaying monks, lightning cannons, poison gas grenades, mutant rat-monsters, and silent ninja that come in the night and nail you to the bed with a warpstone-coated sword, ensuring that in the unlikely event you survive, you'll transmute into a horrific monster.
*** It's strongly hinted that the Skaven instinctively wage perpetual war and throw their lives away because they breed like... well, rats. Their two choices are grinding away their population in war or having a population explosion and dying of starvation.
*** Clan Moulder's hat is creating monstrous creatures: they mutate ogres into part rat and part ogre; worse yet is the hell pit abomination, a gigantic monster with multiple rat heads, and the rest of its body is made of... well, there are these huge creatures called blindworms crawling around the same tunnels as the Skaven; a group of Skaven and a small army of their slaves went out one day, the survivors pulled one of these things back, and they put whatever parts of the damn thing they could into the abomination. The damn thing makes the regular chaos spawn look pleasant, that tells you how terrifying that thing is.
** Let's talk Skaven, shall we? Long ago, the foolish ruler of a city-state called upon their aid then refused to pay them. In retaliation, the Skaven attacked and ''took'' their payment. The city itself was mostly intact, but the Ratmen took every single one of their children...
** Lets not forget the supposed origin story of the Skaven. It's pretty horrific too. A peaceful town where humans live above ground and dwarves below in harmony decides to build a great cathedral. It takes many years, and they almost despair until a mysterious stranger offers to complete the tower in a single night if he is allowed to add his own dedication to the gods. The townspeople agree and the tower is built with a great horned bell. The Bell tolls 13 times. Darkness floods the streets over the next few days. Warpstone falls from the sky in a horrific hail. Humans and dwarves turn against one another as deaths and violence escalate. After months, the humans force their way into the dwarven side of the city to demand aid, and only find gnawed bones, ruins, and thousands of bloodthirsty ratmen. The humans were annihilated that night.
*** And the Skaven Empire covers most of the globe. They don't have land on the surface of the world, though. They are under every major human city, in fallen dwarven holds, residing under the holds that still stand... If there is a town or city somewhere, odds are good that there are skaven underneath. They're down there, getting more and more ready to overtake the "lesser races" of the world through an unending flood of bodies.

[[folder:'''Bretonnians''']]

[[folder:'''Chaos''']]
* Chaos. It's just as horrific as it is in 40K, except that now, they have armies of goat-headed psychopaths lurking in the forests. Let's not forget that at least some of those goat-headed psychopaths are born of human parents...
** Warhammer had the particular nasty idea of introducing the turnskins, regular humans that mutate into these things ''well into their lives'' for no apparent reasons. To have your entire family and friends turning against you, and even if you manage to survive and join the other beastmen all they'll do is to turn you into a slave...
** The random mutations can be quite chilling: you teeth stick out of your skin, lose two eyes and get a new one eye which only sees the winds of chaos, or transform into a mindless mass of gibbering flesh.
** How are new Beastmen are born? Usually it's between a male and female Beastmen but due to latter being few in numbers, most male Beastmen find other disturbing means to breed by either [[BestialityIsDepraved mating with four legged mammals like goats and sheep]] or [[RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil raping]] [[MarsNeedsWomen captured human females]].....
* While later fluff and editions transferred it over to Nurgle, early editions listed mercy/compassion as one of the things Khorne was god of... How fucked must a world be for the god of bloodshed, slaughter, rage, destruction and patron to all [[TheBerserker Berserkers]] to count as a god of mercy?
** Actually, now that ı think about it, Khorne's sphere of worship never extended to mercy and compassion. At best, he is the god of honor and justice (Let's forget about Solkan, who may or may not exist at all). At worst, he is the god of all the bloody examples above.
** An even more terrifying thought is that the incomprehensibly malicious and devious Tzeentch is the god of ''Hope''. And this is still canon too.
** Did we mention that Ruinous Powers and their daemon servants are malicious like this because the psyche of living? By their nature, they have to reflect the psyche of living in the most extreme way possible, and hey, they do. They wanted Archaon to bring the End Times so they can purify themselves of their own corruption.
* The entirety of the ''Liber Chaotica''. The 'author', Richter Kless, delves further and further into daemonic lore in order to write his book, and steadily loses his mind in the process as daemons contact him in his dreams and the book itself becomes an artefact of chaos. A sample:
--> I think it is important to mention something about the book. It has undergone a great change. I noticed it as soon as I opened the cover. The pages, where once they were clean, crisp parchment, had turned rotten. Only a short space of time has elapsed since I last saw the book, but it is as if it was kept in a damp room for many years. The pages are damp and moist with water; and the smell! I was forced to turn the leaves using tweezers, as I did not want the corruption to taint me. Towards the end of the book the rot seemed worse. The pages were covered in a viscous green slime. During the late hours, with the candle burning low, I swear I could see tiny things crawling in the slime, burrowing under the pages, spreading their infection.
** The last page that Richter wrote is covered in deranged scrawlings and sketches of deranged-looking daemons. An 'editor's note' states that Richter has gone completely insane, and all the man did was ''write a book about Chaos''!
[[/folder]]

[[folder:'''The Empire''']]
* Likewise, the Empire - a hallmark of [[CrapsaccharineWorld a Crap-Saccharine World]] with cultists, witch hunts, occassional pogroms and horrors lurking behind each corner.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:'''Ogre Kingdoms''']]
* No mention of the Great Maw? A comet with a face that, when it hits the earth, creates a huge desert full of mutated beasts, then burrows through the earth, leaving a huge pit the size of an inland sea which is rimmed with undulating rows of teeth. And the Ogres worship this thing, and make pilgrimages to it. And what's more, it is rumored that it has burrowed through the core of the world and out the other side making a huge, fanged whirlpool. And, looking at a map of the warhammer world, you can see that the approximate location of this whirlpool is an area of sea marked 'no ships return from here'.
** And then there are Gorgers. Basically, if a baby Ogre is born without a paunch, the Ogres will sacrifice it to the aforementioned Great Maw by throwing it down into a cave. Usually, they die. Sometimes, they find a tunnel into an even deeper cavern, often filled with Warpstone. And, of course, there are the many other baby Ogres living down there too who have suffered a similar fate. And the warpstone mutates them into even bigger, larger versions of Ogres. Of course, there's not much to eat down there besides, well, each other. So basically, ''they fight and eat one another'' until the largest eats everyone. And then, ''whomever survives, breaks free to the surface''. '''''AND HE'S STILL HUNGRY'''''.

[[folder:'''Skaven''']]
* While the Skaven are generally played for laughs - let's face it, this is an entire race of Rat-faced [[TheStarscream Starscreams]], how could that not be funny? Then you read the army book. Specifically, [[NoCelebritiesWereHarmed Hieronymous Bouscus]] screaming, over images of the utter abhorrence that is the Skaven city. One of their major clans will gleefully rip your brain out and stick it in a giant rat-horror ''ForTheEvulz''. Another one considers KillItWithFire, [[ShockAndAwe Kill It With Lightning]], and Kill It With Poisonous Gas entirely sensible ways of dealing with ''everything'', not caring if their own troops are caught in the blast. And then there's the pure shit-yourself-in-terror story of how the Skaven came to be...
** There's also their attitude towards friendly fire. In game, it's forbidden to shoot into melee, because you don't want to hit your own troops. Skaven, IIRC, have a special rule called "Life Is Cheap", saying that you not only can, you should shoot into melee and fry your own troops, since that's the best way to slaughter the enemy, and damn your own troops.
*** The Skaven [[WeHaveReserves have reserves]]. They also have psychotic decaying monks, lightning cannons, poison gas grenades, mutant rat-monsters, and silent ninja that come in the night and nail you to the bed with a warpstone-coated sword, ensuring that in the unlikely event you survive, you'll transmute into a horrific monster.
*** It's strongly hinted that the Skaven instinctively wage perpetual war and throw their lives away because they breed like... well, rats. Their two choices are grinding away their population in war or having a population explosion and dying of starvation.
*** Clan Moulder's hat is creating monstrous creatures: they mutate ogres into part rat and part ogre; worse yet is the hell pit abomination, a gigantic monster with multiple rat heads, and the rest of its body is made of... well, there are these huge creatures called blindworms crawling around the same tunnels as the Skaven; a group of Skaven and a small army of their slaves went out one day, the survivors pulled one of these things back, and they put whatever parts of the damn thing they could into the abomination. The damn thing makes the regular chaos spawn look pleasant, that tells you how terrifying that thing is.
** Let's talk Skaven, shall we? Long ago, the foolish ruler of a city-state called upon their aid then refused to pay them. In retaliation, the Skaven attacked and ''took'' their payment. The city itself was mostly intact, but the Ratmen took every single one of their children...
** Lets not forget the supposed origin story of the Skaven. It's pretty horrific too. A peaceful town where humans live above ground and dwarves below in harmony decides to build a great cathedral. It takes many years, and they almost despair until a mysterious stranger offers to complete the tower in a single night if he is allowed to add his own dedication to the gods. The townspeople agree and the tower is built with a great horned bell. The Bell tolls 13 times. Darkness floods the streets over the next few days. Warpstone falls from the sky in a horrific hail. Humans and dwarves turn against one another as deaths and violence escalate. After months, the humans force their way into the dwarven side of the city to demand aid, and only find gnawed bones, ruins, and thousands of bloodthirsty ratmen. The humans were annihilated that night.
*** And the Skaven Empire covers most of the globe. They don't have land on the surface of the world, though. They are under every major human city, in fallen dwarven holds, residing under the holds that still stand... If there is a town or city somewhere, odds are good that there are skaven underneath. They're down there, getting more and more ready to overtake the "lesser races" of the world through an unending flood of bodies.

[[folder:'''Undead''']]
* In general:
** [[OmnicidalManiac NAGASH]]. Just look at his character page.
* Vampire Counts
** This army can be a chiroptophobe's worst nightmare. There are Bat Swarms - swarms of vampire bats, the largest of which have a wingspan the size of a man's outstretched arms. Unlike most vampire bats, they will also attack during the day, when their prey is alert, and they will strip the flesh off their target's bones if they can. Even larger are the Fell Bats, ''undead'' vampire bats that also eat flesh and have a body larger than a motorbike. The Vampire Counts newest monster, the [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Terrorgheist]]. [[http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-VqGKo3HSJh8/Ti2P9tUVC0I/AAAAAAAAAMM/tumgnKJCuRo/s1600/Terrorgeist++scary%2521.jpg Here it is.]] And then you read up on the backstory... [[note]] They're dragon-sized undead bats that eat people and drink blood, yet they're completely silent, except for one thing; They have a scream like the Tomb Banshee's below that can kill anyone that hears it... but theirs is much louder. They can also have a poisoned bite, a HealingFactor and can explode into a swarm of bats when killed [[/note]]. BatOutOfHell indeed.
** The Corpse Cart is also pretty creepy. It used to just hold dead plague victims, but since Sylvania is super-saturated with necromantic magic, the bodies it carried became a BlobMonster [[BodyOfBodies made out of zombies]] on it. Then the drivers became semi-undead creatures and replaced their horses with zombies. In the fluff, it brainwashes people into feeding themselves to it.
** The Tomb Banshee. Ghosts of witches and other assorted evil women, Tomb Banshees are malicious and independent thinking unlike some undead. They're ghosts so they can't be hurt except by magical means, but the worst part is their scream; anyone who hears it gets hurt or dies of fright if they don't have an iron will or aren't fearless or mindless.
** The Black Coach is pretty horrific; in-lore the mere sight of it can cause a person to die of fright or make family members turn on each other in bloodlust. It's also used as a vessel to help a fully dead vampire come back to life.
* Tomb Kings
** In life, the trial for a suspected murderer was to push them into a pit of scorpions. The belief was that the Tomb King pantheon's god of murder had the form of a scorpion, and scorpions wouldn't harm his followers. If the person survived and climbed out, it was said to be a sign of his favor and that they were guilty, and punished by being thrown into a pit of snakes. The innocent died from scorpion stings, vindicated by their painful deaths.
** The situation they faced when they first awoke [[AndIMustScream enslaved against their will for all eternity to Nagash, the man who destroyed their kingdom, killed most of them and broke the covenant between them and their gods]].
** The Casket of Souls. A golden box, inlaid with jewels and precious stones, ornately carved, [[BreadMilkEggsSquick which holds the trapped souls of people who have wronged the Tomb King or Queen that owns it]]. For anyone killed by the owner's forces in battle, this is the fate of their souls, [[AndIMustScream trapped forever with no hope of escape]] (save destroying the near-invulnerable casket, and even then the freed souls will kill anyone or anything near them in a maelstrom of revenge). What's worse, the trapped souls are weaponized; some Tomb Kings bring the Caskets to battle and have the Keeper, a priest assigned to attend the Casket, open them up. When they do, the souls rush out and try to escape, plunging through living people, desperate for release. Anyone they pass through ages rapidly and dies as their life is sucked out. Worse, anyone killed this way is guaranteed to have their soul trapped by the Casket as well. Even soulless beings like daemons or some undead aren't immune as it sucks away the magic that sustains or animates them.
** The Necrosphinx, a winged, centauroid animate sphinx. With a scorpion-like tail with a venomous sting, arm blades that can decapitate a dragon and a stone body that can deflect a hit from a warmachine or a large monster. The worst part is how they're animated. They're rumored to be given animus by the Tomb Kings' most malevolent gods, who have turned them into unthinking, unfeeling, unceasing engines of destruction and death. It's said that if it wasn't for the incantations of the Liche Priests, they would kill everything and everyone in their path without stopping. One bit of lore had a Tomb Kings's troops go to fight a Lizardmen army, then the Tomb King and his forces went missing. Another king rallied his troops to find the missing army. He found the decimated remains of both armies, all troops dead, everything cut to pieces... and a lone Necrosphinx standing in the middle of the carnage.

[[folder:'''Wood Elves''']]
* You wouldn't think Wood Elves would be a good source of this, but the ''Warhammer'' take on them delivers. The elves themselves aren't so bad except for the fact they're unpredictable and AxCrazy, basically [[Literature/TheLordOfTheRings Legolas]] mixed with the mutants from ''Film/TheHillsHaveEyes2006''. It's Athel Loren's native... life, which you should worry about. Dryads initially appear as beautiful women and invite hapless fools into the forest with them, only to suddenly transform into horrible monsters and rip their victims to shreds. Some of the treekin are so insane that they just attack everything around them, including other treekin, and decorate themselves with the entrails and skeletons of their victims. They aren't Chaos corrupted, it's just what they're like. What's worse, it's suggested that Athel Loren has deep-running roots connecting it to the forests of the world, and it's ''expanding to encompass the entire planet'', as it's growing outwards and even little outcroppings are beginning to spring up on other landmasses - you could be a sailor on the other side of the world, innocently embarking on an island to go looking for coconuts, and suddenly find yourself in a forest from hell.

** There are two bright spots among the peasants; one named Huebald and an unnamed male peasant who invented the Bretonnian treburchet. The former was knighted after saving a noblewoman from Beastmen, and the latter was genius who invented a new weapon that single-handedly protected a village from a Norse raid. As for what happened to them... Huebald didn't survive his first battle. For saving a village, a chapel and inventing a new weapon, the peasant was rewarded a fattened pig and two copper crowns - in-universe historians didn't even bother to get his name and in Bretonnia THAT PITTANCE IS MORE WEALTH THAN THE AVERAGE BRETONNIAN PEASANT CAN HOPE TO SEE IN A LIFETIME!