Warhammer: The End Times / YMMV

Alternate Character Interpretation: It's been noted by some readers how Tyrion, who is cast as the villain of ET:Khaine by virtue of his drawing the Widowmaker and leading the Aestyrion, is the only character who actually feels in-character and reacts in a reasonable fashion to the events of the story. To wit, the most militarised High Elf kingdom abandons the defence of Ulthuan against a daemonic invasion after being embarrassed at Court by a political rival (practically a daily occurrence among the High Elves normally), and then later defects to Malekith, their greatest enemy. It swiftly turns out that Teclis, Tyrion's own brother, was responsible for this, as well as the death of Tyrion's own daughter, before Tyrion's lover, Alarielle, defects to Malekith's side as well. Tyrion drawing the Widowmaker after all this feels less like the actions of a deranged tyrant and more like those of a man who has been betrayed or abandoned by everyone he loved, and who sees taking up the sword to be the only way left to him to save the world. Even his brutal execution of Korhil can come off more as his being driven into a rage by the very last person who he could depend on having betrayed him as well.
Anti-Climax Boss:
- For all the fanfare to Nagash's return he's knocked the race to be the Big Bad thanks to the Skaven destroying his pyramid and forced into an Enemy Mine against Chaos.
- Archaon's main army does surprisingly little in the story, with the vast majority of the damage already being done by the Skaven, Greenskins, Order infighting, and Nurglites by the time he decides to march down.
- Despite how unstoppable the Skaven are made out to be for most of the plot, they are reduced to little more than cannon fodder once they join forces with Chaos. In fact both factions are defeated by the forces of Order and their allies, with Chaos only winning thanks to a last minute betrayal by Mannfred
Ass Pull:
- The revelation that Malekith was always Asuryan's chosen to be the next Phoenix King after his father. The idea that if he'd only stayed in the sacred fire for a few more seconds, thousands of years of torture, hatred, war and millions of deaths could have been avoided left a lot of High Elf fans very unhappy as it meant that their archenemy was always supposed to be their leader. It also angered Dark Elf fans who now know their faction leader was right.
- Vlad being Vashanesh, the former husband of Neferata that earlier lore made pretty clear he made up. Especially since her actual follower Ankhat had been pretty clearly established to be either Vlad or the first of his bloodline in the Time of Legends books just a few years before.
- Malekith is able to buy Caledor's loyalty for his invasion of Ulthuan via a huge number of dragon eggs that the Dark Elves had apparently been hoarding. Even though it had been established a great deal in prior lore that the High Elves devoted a massive amount of time, resources, and skilled personnel towards keeping the Dark Elves from stealing any further eggs after they made off with a clutch during the Sundering, which they had created the Black Dragons from.
- The entire idea of the Incarnates of the winds of magic, especially with characters who never have magical abilities, the worst examples being Ungrim Ironfist and Thorgrim Grudgebearer, who become the Incarnates of Fire and Metal respectively, despite the background of Warhammer has always established that the Dwarves are unable to manipulate the winds of magic, and the rare few that did, the Chaos Dwarfs, turned gradually to stone in the process.
- For years, it was established that Mannfred died in the battle of Hel Fenn (death by Rune Fang to the head) and centuries later he was resurrected (in previous editions there is a short story of this written by William King, with the presence of Gotrek and Felix). In "The End Times" they change this for no reason and simply say that Mannfred survived Hel Fenn battle, faked his death, and was all these years acting from the shadows. Now the question is how did he manage to survive that his head was split in half because of the Runic Fang of Stirland. He also still apparently fought the pair at some point for unrelated reasons.
- Araloth travels through the Realm of Chaos and returned perfectly, without the power of chaos affecting him physically, mentally and/or, spiritually. Apparently, traveling to the land of demons, source of all magic, corruption and mutation is not big deal. And remember that we are in the End of Times, when it is supposed that the power of Chaos to be at its peak. Also, in that plane of pain and horror he was helped by a figure that is heavily hinted to be Kaldor Draigo from 40000, the Mary Sue to end all Mary Sues.
- A great deal of the conflicts in the first part of the story is driven by daemons invading the world in advance of the Warriors of Chaos making their move. However, it had been established at length in prior lore that the Great Vortex at the centre of Ulthuan had been created to prevent precisely that from happening, draining excess magic out of the world so that daemons could not materialize. This meant that whenever the forces of chaos did want to summon daemons, it took a great deal of ritual and preparation by their sorcerers to saturate the area with enough magic that the daemons would be able to hold their form.
Broken Base: The Downer Ending of the End Times campaign where Chaos wins and the world is destroyed pretty much made a LOT of people unhappy, especially fans of the non-Chaos/Skaven factions. Not to mention the fact that at the end of the final book, the forces of good were on the verge of victory, and then cue Age of Sigmar, it says the heroes lost. On the other hand, many people also found the campaign quite ballsy in finally delivering the apocalypse that had been alluded to in the background for over 30 years.
Creator's Pet: Complaints about the Skaven faction becoming this quickly came out once the books came out. They destroy the Lizardman Empire, the Dwarf Empire, Bretonnia, Morrslieb, Tilea, Nuln, and Estalia. They also blow up Nagash's Black Pyramid and get to take out the Goblins from being major players in the story as well, while also playing large (but not primary) parts in the falls of the Empire and Cathay. They also are responsible for the deaths of several major figures and characters, all in anti-climatic ways (usually a Skaven assassin just appearing out of no-where and killing them). While the Skaven have always been written as a faction that could in theory become the biggest threat to the world if they worked together (something that had never happened prior to this campaign; even in events like the Skaven Wars they did at least as much damage to themselves as their enemies), the fact they take out more factions then any other, even the main Big Bad Chaos, left many fans frustrated at what seemed to be the writers using them to wipe out most factions. In the finale they also survive the end of the world, meaning they are the only mortal faction would be considered the winner in the End Times.
Designated Hero: Lileath is supposed to be a hero of sorts, but her plans and actions cause many of the stories biggest issues. To elaborate:
- The Wood Elves being weakened and leaderless because of Ariel and the Oak of Ages' poisoning at Lileath's hands, which is never actually explained and so comes off as her killing one of her own side for no reason, which eventually leads to them joining in the Elven Civil War.
- The destruction of most of Bretonnia by Arkhan seeking to restore his master, who also causes the High Elves and the Dwarfs to nearly go to war over whose fault Aliathra's kidnapping was, preventing them from working together properly in the aftermath.
- Then Nagash's return, which costs the lives of several of the High Elves' greatest heroes, and leads him to kill or subjugate all the Undead factions. This also leads to Tyrion drawing the Widowmaker when he discovers that his daughter is dead because of his brother, causing the Elven civil war.
- Said Elven Civil War might not have been as bad if it hadn't been for Teclis' plan to unbind the Vortex, which goes horribly wrong and leads to the destruction of Ulthuan and the deaths of a great many of the surviving Elves.
- Nagash then goes on to indirectly cause Balthazar Gelt to start studying Necromancy, which leads to the fall of the Auric Bastion when it's discovered, leaving the Old World wide open to the Forces of Chaos.
- Nagash also scuppers the Dwarfs' attempt to open Valaya's Gate and reawaken their slumbering Goddess, stealing her power for his own.
- This all lead to some fans wondering if there was some kind of big twist coming, that maybe it would be revealed Lileath was deliberately sabotaging the forces of Order in order to give her new Haven a better chance of survival. Instead, Lileath's Haven is unceremoniously eaten by the Chaos Gods without her realizing, and the plotline essentially just trails off.
Designated Villain: The Aestyrion fight to resist Malekith's takeover as the legitimate Phoenix King. In spite of the fact that Malekith is still an Evil Overlord, the Aestyrion are apparently wrong for not bending the knee to the guy who has already caused the deaths of countless High Elves because he felt slighted, ran a slavocracy that pillaged practically every nation in the world (from Cathay to Estalia) for millennia, gave the Skaven a path to power by causing the war between the High Elves and Dwarfs, allied with Chaos repeatedly out of spite, and instigated a reign of cruelty and horror six thousand years long. Even with the narrative bending over backwards to make Tyrion and his followers as evil as possible via Jumping Off the Slippery Slope, they don't even come close to matching Malekith's laundry list of atrocities.
Ensemble Dark Horse: There exists a small fanbase for the Aestyrion, the amalgamation of High and Dark Elves who follow Tyrion after he draws the Widowmaker, despite the narrative bending over backwards to cast them as the villains in the Elvish Civil War. This is probably due to several reasons, such as how a lot of players understood and shared their outraged reaction to Malekith becoming Phoenix King, that they were led by Tyrion, one of the most popular heroes of the setting, and because of their cool name.
Fan Nickname: Mannfred von Carstein is derisively known as "Manlet von Carstein" because his sheer pettiness was crucial in causing the End Times to succeed which included resurrecting Nagash (of all people!), driving Tyrion into drawing the Sword of Khaine, killing Balthasar Gelt and Vlad von Carstein (both of who are much more popular and successful than Mannfred could ever HOPE to be), and finally tampering with the Vortex to destabilize it into a world-ending vacuum. This made him an infamous character that the fandom LOVES TO HATE because he's a whiny, egotistical sociopath who decided that if he couldn't have everything in the world for himself, then NO ONE ELSE CAN. Also, Mannfred's capacity for treachery and arrogance is such that even the Skaven would be disgusted by him which really says a lot about his character.
Fanon Discontinuity: Certain segments of the WFB fandom are more than willing to consign End Times (and its successor, Warhammer: Age of Sigmar) to the same status as Storm of Chaos. The success of Total War: Warhammer and The End Times: Vermintide contribute to this.
Franchise Original Sin: The End Times has been criticized as too dark and depressing. Being a dark setting is nothing new for Warhammer Fantasy or Warhammer 40,000. The franchise is always set in a Crapsack World and the audience is told up front that the threat of Chaos cannot be defeated, only delayed. Where fans felt End Times went too far however was that Chaos was given victories on a silver platter it didn't deserve where defenders of the world acting uncharacteristically stupid. The reveal that the world exists only as long it provides the Chaos Gods with amusement, after which they destroy it and the most any of them can do is flee to a new world was met considerable distain. Furthermore, while 40k was a Crapsack World, Fantasy was always portrayed as being more optimistic in nature, meaning that, while still dark, the setting often included elements that showed that the forces of Order still had a chance of winning, and that most races could, in theory, form a united front if needed. This was backed up by the course of every major Chaos invasion attempt prior to this one, from their initial entrance to the world to the Storm of Chaos. It was always shown that they could only make progress when Order was disunited, and that when the free peoples banded together, they were always able to beat Chaos with relatively little effort.^note Some sources, such as the Daemons 7e army book, even state that the Realm of Chaos itself was shrinking in the aftermath of major Order victories like the Great War.^note As a result, Chaos, while always set up as a force that can't be permanently eradicated, was consistently presented as beatable. Thus being presented as being outright unstoppable and going to win in the end left people questioning what the point of being invested in anything that comes after like Age of Sigmar, since with Chaos being present, it means the same events will happen again. Age of Sigmar itself walked back on this direction quite a bit, but the damage to Fantasy was done.
Funny Moments:
- The vampire Count Nyktolos, appearing only in The Return of Nagash, is blatantly an imported Count von Count from Sesame Street. Complete with monocle, purple fuzz covering him ("grave mold"), and a compulsion to keep an accurate count of the army's zombies in the middle of a battle.
- Sigvald's death. While he is crying his eyes out because he broke his hands beating Krell to death (apparently forgetting that he can regenerate), Throgg appears behind him and smashes his head into paste before pissing on his headless corpse.
Nightmare Fuel: There are a few instances during the End Times. See here.
They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
- As the setting is infamous for never breaking the status quo a lot of fans were more than a little disappointed that End Times brought huge changes to setting like the various Elf factions being forced to work together and Vlad becoming an Elector Count, and none of them will ever be explored because the world is destroyed.
- Giles le Breton, the local King in the Mountain, returns to lead Bretonnia in its darkest hour. He is then never mentioned again until an offhand comment in the last novel that he and his remaining Grail Knights have teamed up with the vampiric Blood Knight bloodline for a last stand. His return has no impact on the story whatsoever, and seems to be done purely to get the Bretonnia faction separated from the final battle.
The Un-Twist: The non-Chaos gods turn out to be gods. The twist is that much of the fan base thought they were minor chaos gods, but it turns out they aren't connected to the Warp at all. What they actually are is never explained, and they disappear from the story without explanation after part 3. It's later hinted that the Gods of the setting are the survivors of a previous world destroyed by Chaos, and in a bit of Eternal Recurrence whoever survives to escape the End Times will turn into the new Gods of the world that follows. Which sort of what happens with Warhammer Age Of Sigmar.

YMMV / Warhammer: The End Times

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