Gotrek The Slayer Returns To Seek His Doom In Age of Sigmar
February 15, 2018 by dracs
That's right, the greatest Slayer the World That Was ever saw is once again taking up his axe and entering the Age of Sigmar in a new audio drama Realmslayer.
Back in the days of Warhammer Fantasy Battles, Gotrek, together with his companion Felix journeyed the world in search of a great death for the slayer, facing the most dangerous monsters and evil villains there were.
Gotrek finally met his end with the World That Was, stepping into the Realm of Chaos to fight the demons that dwelt there... or so everyone thought!
Here is the statement from Black Library:
"Fabled hero of the Warhammer Old World, Gotrek Gurnisson is reborn and cast into the Age of Sigmar for a brand-new, feature-length audio adventure.
Gotrek Gurnisson was the greatest monster slayer of the age, who met his doom at the End Times. The heroic Duardin stepped forth into the Realm of Chaos to fight the daemons gnawing at the world’s ending and satisfy his death oath, leaving behind his companion Felix Jaeger. Now Gotrek has returned, having outlived the old gods and the Old World. Spat from the ruinous depths with his redemption unfulfilled, he emerges into the Mortal Realms, a strange new world where gods walk and dark forces are ascendant. Nothing is as he remembers. His oaths are dust, and the lands are torn asunder by Chaos.
Yet when Gotrek learns of human champions being elevated to immortality for Sigmar’s fight against this darkness, the so-called ‘Stormcast Eternals’, he knows why fate has brought him into this new age. To find Felix. For only then can he find the peace in death he seeks. But is there more to Gotrek’s apotheosis than even he can fathom? Has he truly been chosen by Grimnir and for what purpose?
This audio drama boxed set contains a four-part story read by a stellar cast, recounting the much-anticipated return of Gotrek Gurnisson."
Are you happy to see Gotrek return? What do you hope to see happening to the great slayer in this new series of adventures?
"Gotrek finally met his end with the World That Was...or so everyone thought!"
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I’m not happy,no. Its incredible how gw plays around with their background, changing things just to get some more cash. Gotrek and Felix are icons of the Warhammer World, and there is where they should stay. They had their own time and history. Long live the Slayer and his companion.
I have to say I am a massive Gotrek fan, although Snorri was always my favourite. This news however is something I’m finding hard to process. A very very small part of me is filled with curiosity as to what his new adventures will be like, what he’ll think on meeting the new dwarf tribes, what they’ll think on meeting him, but a mostly wish he’d been left alone his last two books left him with a bittersweet ending that was perfect and finally, finally he had found his end. This news kind of feels like those stories are invalidated, and I guess that’s why I’m struggling to to feel happy about this.
Look, Snorri, Trolls! 😀
Does anyone else think realm slayer is over the top?
I stopped reading after William King stopped being the author as i couldnt get on with the second author. Absolutely loved the books and if they are going to carry them on it had better be very very good.
Was? the only thing killing more than Gotrek is pappa nurgle.
hmm. do you think there’s a Forgeworld character set in the pipeline perhaps, Gotrek and Stormcast Felix?
GW have done a couple of different version of Gotrek and Felix and models down the years, so it is certainly a possibility.
Turns out that zombie angel stormcast Felix is actually the Celestant Prime! Dum-dum-duuuum!! ‘who the hell is this dwarf, why is he so fond of me?’
I don’t have a problem with Gotrek popping up in the Mortal Realms – he was always the least successful Slayer in Old World history with regard to his death oath, so it doesn’t surprise me at all that he still hasn’t found the end he craves even after the Old World itself died. He also offers an interesting perspective on the Mortal Realms from a character who still remembers the World that Was. It will doubtless all appear very strange to him. It will be particularly interesting to see what he makes of the Duradin (that he will doubtless feel should still call themselves Dwarfs. If it was good enough for their ancestors, it is good enough for them). The Kharadron Overlords in particular might be something of a shock for Gotrek – all this innovation, with no respect for the traditions of the Engineering Guild? And it is one thing to love gold, but has the aggressive capitalism of the Kharadron crossed a line into honourless, grubby mercantilism? The Fyreslayers would probably bother him even more – they have the look of Slayers, but few of their values or beliefs. Gotrek will have a lot of adjusting to do, and he has always been a somewhat traditionalist and reactionary personality. That offers plenty of potential for character drama.
And then we get to Felix. It is doubtful he will be as Gotrek remembers him, and for his part might not remember Gotrek at all. If Felix has become Stormcast, then he might have been Reforged often enough to begin to lose his humanity. For all that Gotrek loved to mock Felix for his Manling ways, I doubt Gotrek would take such mental mutilation of his only friend in all the Realms very well. At all. Gotrek being Gotrek, someone is likely to wind up on the receiving end of his axe in short order.
Even after Gotrek finds Felix, you have a ready made new quest line – finding a way to restore Felix’s memories and in the process restore the man to the personality Gotrek remembers.
Like it or loath it, at the end of the day Gotrek and Felix are still part of GW’s IP, and they can use those characters in whatever manner they see fit. If you really can’t stand the notion, all you can do is refuse to read/listen to the new stories, and simply leave your own experience with them concluded when Gotrek assumed the mantle of Grimnir at the end of the Old World. For myself, I am more than happy to see what Black Library plan to do with the characters going forward.
No Bill King, No Gotrek. Fact.
*looks at eight other books of shelf … hrmmmm … Perhaps “fact” isn’t the best selection of word. The series may have stopped for you with Giantslayer (which was William King’s worst in my opinion) but it did continue, and excepting Orcslayer (which seemed to have the author trying to find traction) I quite liked Nathan Long’s run. Some of the one off stories that didn’t quite slot into the timeline were a bit on the nose too
I am personally dubious as to how successful transporting this character to new world will be, I will wait and see. , but it had better be impressive, I love the character too much.
Gotrek and Felix stories just don’t feel right when written by someone else than William King.
As others have said the Bill King stories were eaily the best, he owned those characters
No. There is no Warhammer World in Age of Sigmarines. Not truely. By their disrespect they forfeit any ethical claim to the former qualities.
Although it would have been the easiest thing in the, well, world to build the new setting in the sense and soul of the venerable one. Yet, no!, in true fashion of every shortsighted self-centred reformer and blind willfull child they chose to smash everything to pieces and brutalize the grace that was. That by itself disqualifies for any honest right on the former achievements. And regaining just a fraction of it requires a huge amount of hard work proving a changed attitude and good faith.
Years ago I proposed that AoS needed their own version of Gotrek and Felix, I even tried to make my own version of the pair, where the human was the berserker with a death wish and the dwarf the more… pragmatic one: Check them out here.
The one thing I tried to keep in my version, and the one thing GW’s not keeping in theirs, is the (initial) low status of the adventurers. When Gotrek and Felix started, they were bums. They were fugitives on the run, but the law was spread so thin in the Empire almost no one noticed. In Nuln they had to get jobs in the sewer patrol, and they got fired (the only two patrollers ever fired)!
Yeah, they killed a bunch of monsters, and sometimes, just sometimes, saved people, but they were still two scoundrels running across the Empire. Bringing them back as some megaslayer and stormcast isn’t so much missing the point as missing critically. Like, we’re talking misfire here.
I’d eventuell say it’s friendly fire.
It’s somewhat funny although sad. In the end there’s still gallows humour.
I think you naild the big problem with AoS here: the underlying mega vibe.
Aside from that, it’s indeed a tiny bit interesting to see takes on the old concept and how they combine with AoS – especially since G&F really are possibly *the* epitome of the Warhammer World exactely in the ways you mention. It’s so contradictory it seems like irony.
Gotrek seems to stand for the ‘veteran’ fans and maybe they use this to change the world a bit back. There’s hope still…
Books ceased to be good a long time ago, as in when Bill king stopped, belongs in the old setting. No matter what characters they bring back the new setting still isn’t warhammer or of interest to me.
They should have left the poor dwarf where he belongs. (Yes I used the “D” word! Not whatever they are called now…)
For me this was one of the characters that epitomised Warhammer. He should have died with the old world.
hell turn up and say “i dont know what you are ,but im a BLOODY DWARF TROLL SLAYER”!!