CDO Forums

Perhaps he was spawned from the Dwarfs themselves (as opposed to Chaos Dwarfs specifically) then made contact with the Chaos Dwarfs when he thought they were suitably corrupted to be receptive to his message?

I wouldn't consider the Old Ones (the actual beings) to be gods, they were merely aliens with very high level technology and magical power (despiet the absence of the 8 winds at this point).  It was these two factors that allowed them to accomplish all that they did before their departure.

However after their departure (and prehaps before as well), due to the ferverent belief in them from the Lizardmen and  the men of Albion (many of whome saw them as gods), and to a lesser degree the other peoples of the Old World (& Ulthuan) as well, warp presences would have developed in thier name and upon reaching the threshold power level would have become the 'true' gods that carry out miracules in their names.

OK, I was assuming that the person who put the info on Warseer was quoting the armybook, as I said I don't have the book to check.

  It could still be warpstone, prehaps with something in it? It's typically vague so people can believe what they want: it could be daemonic, or it could be alien.

Firstly (from waht you've said) it could still be a warpstone comet and be correct by the accounts; on beliefs though: they dont directly affect the material world (just like in RL, lots of people have believed in various religions - that doesn't make them true), but if they believe that the Maw has some connection with the crater, then there will be a connection (due to their beliefs moulding the aetheric entity) but that gives not extra credence to the Maw being the crater.  Also Mordhiem isn't the only warpstone impact, it's always been in the background that bit fall off Morrsileb and hit the world.  For another major example, see Cripple Peak

  Well firstly, they didn't all break up on impact.  There have been small shards that have fallen and remained whole, and again the big example of Cripple Peak which was a huge chunk that remained whole.  Also the Mordheim comet did burrow a fair bit into the earth, see the Pit.  Plus all such impacts, regardless of their substances, burrow fairly deep into the ground due to their massive impact velocity

But the majority of such impacting bodies are made of warpstone.

And you're welcome to that opinion, but remember that Warhammer's not meant to be high fantasy, and I would argue that that's no bad thing, especially with what is added.

No, I don't think so. To have the Daemon Prince of a god become a god would be strange and entirely against all other existing fluff; for a start, Be'lakor is the first Daemon Prince; he's the bee's knees, the dog's bollocks, etc, when it comes to them.

My take on the Maw can be found on the Ogre Stronghold:

All gods are created by emotions and worship. All of them!

Look, imagine the Realm of Chaos as a surface of gel, below the ‘roof’ of the Material Plane (The Warhammer World). Emotions are like drops of condensation forming on the roof, that drip through it’s cracks into the Realm of Chaos. Where they hit depends on their nature – and wherever they hit, there are ripples. Small ones, admittedly, but ripples nonetheless. After time these ripples make actual indentations in the gel, slopes and dips and deep chasms, places where water begins to gather, weighing it down further still. These places are (continuing the metaphor) gods. Or daemons, or spirits, or elementals, or whatever you want to call them – it’s more a difference in scale and emphasis than any real difference. That is why the Greater Four Chaos Gods are so powerful – drops have been forming ripples to feed them ever since the first sentient creatures felt anything.
Belief is better than emotion for gods, in that no matter its nature, it is directed to a certain area by the god it is directed to. Rage would normally fall somewhere near Khorne’s slice of the Realm, trickling (depending on the emotion-feeler’s background, subconscious, etc, as well as the specifics of the rage) into Ulric, Khaine, etc. However, if the emotion-feeler screams “For Nurgle!” and really means it as he smashes the other bloke’s head in, a large amount of that will be redirected to Old Papa.
Worship is even better – real, traditional, systemised worship takes belief and emotion and carefully directs it toward the god, in an even more concentrated stream than just belief. In this way it is dangerously close to magic, or at least the kind practised by the priests of various gods, except that it channels energy from here to there rather than the other way around.
Sacrifice is the best. It takes the directedness of worship and combines it with the force of belief and emotion that seeing another man’s head bashed in or his throat cut on an alter induces, not to mention the energy from the sacrificed man himself. If emotion is a raindrop, sacrifice is a hose.

This is how gods are born. If there is no ever-present, powerful emotion to form the Realm of Chaos into a god (as was the case for the Chaos Gods, lesser and greater alike) then they must rely on worship and belief. A shepherd finds a lost sheep in the mountains, and takes a short while to build a small cairn of stones there to appease any helpful spirit that might have aided him. A small pocket of belief builds up, and a god is formed, whether sculpted from raw Chaos or some other, pre-existing but believerless god who steps into the gap. Perhaps a city will be built near, or even around the cairn, and it will turn into a shrine, and then into a temple, and the belief and worship will build up. Or perhaps the cairn will lie forgotten, and the god will become a spirit, an imp, a folktale, and will then be forgotten, kept alive by nothing more than a carving on a rock or a line in a song.

This is why reported cases of Chaos worship are so extreme. Like drug dealers, the Chaos Gods do not wish their clients/worshippers to give them a little emotion, a little worship, a little sacrifice – they are greedy and impatient, and they want it all.

This is also why successful gods are the toughest. If the cairn is forgotten, the god will be lost, adrift and eventually reabsorbed into a stronger one. If the city is conquered, however, it is just as likely the god will be adopted as will be cast aside. Even if he is, his presence will have permeated the city, in every statue, song, and mind. Even if the city is burned to the ground, the things it made and did that survived may keep him ‘alive’ long enough to find worship elsewhere.

For all this talk of gods “finding” worship, do not imagine the Realm to be some kind of masquerade ball, with gods putting on new masks as dances as it suits them, tittering at their foolish worshippers who actually believe they care for them. Quite to the contrary. Most gods, those formed by worship, will be defined by their worshipper’s beliefs of them. It is not a choice, but rather a fact of their being – they are defined by belief. If they are believed to be honest, they will be honest. If they are believed to be tricksters, they will be tricksters. It doesn’t matter if a Kislevite house-spirit was once an Indish sun-god; as far as he is concerned, he is, and always has been, a helpful house-spirit. Humans may find this abhorrent, but gods are not so concerned with their individuality as they are their survival. The reason the Chaos Gods can be so malevolent, even toward their followers, is that they no longer fear for their survival – they are literally too big to fall.

Some gods may seem odd in that they were once mortal beings – Sigmar is the greatest case, although the Dwarven Ancestor Gods and Elven Aenarion are others. This can largely be explained by pointing to the soul. On death, the soul drips through into the Realm of Chaos, where, unless it is particularly strongly attracted to another god (priests, for example, or sacrifices), it will likely slide into the abyss of one of the Chaos Gods and be promptly ripped to shreds by ravenous daemons hungry for power.

However, in the case of these once-mortal gods (we’ll call them demi-gods, however misleading that name may be) their souls made its own dent in the Realm, carved out by their force of will, and the vast amount of belief behind them, which later became organised worship. Of course, belief defines gods (to an extent, they define it, as well), so the Sigmar of then may well not be same as the God Sigmar – if everyone believed (and it was a point of Sigmarite doctrine and supposed historical fact) that Sigmar had red hair, the god would likely manifest with red hair, whilst the actual, mortal Sigmar had blonde hair.

But just as emotions, etc, can manipulate the world in the Realm of Chaos, the energies of the Realm of Chaos can manipulate the Material Realm. More readily than ours theirs, in fact, due to the gaping gates from that world to this at each pole. These are the energies that Wizards manipulate through the ritualistic, directed energies described under worship, and Priests manipulate more bluntly through the sheer battering power of immense belief (described under, well, belief). It is also this energy (let’s call it magic for simplicity) that allows daemons and other creatures to manifest, or avatars to be imbued with the powers of their god. The more powerful the warp entity, the deeper their dent in the Realm of Chaos, the more ambient magic they will require to exist in the Material Plane. This is the reason that sacrifices are often used to summon daemons for any length of time – a ritual using the belief channelled to literally push more magic into the surrounding environment. This is the reason for the fact that Dryads are rarely seen outside of the highly-magical Athel Loren, and for the instability that affects the daemon armies of the North. The fact that such armies can exist at all is a wonder, but best credited to the fact that, while technically individual warp entities, most daemons are little more than crevices in the chasms of their respective Chaos Gods.

*Looks at own gargantuan post*
*Looks at td's post*
*Breaks down into tears*

There are four types of 'Werewolf' in the Warhammer World.

1. Vampires, often of the Von Carstein bloodline, with the Wolf Form bloodline power or the Talisman of Lynci. Vampires who can take the form of wolves.

2. The Were. Garbling monstrosities with some animal characteristics (e.g. claws, fur and teeth) these are basically a distinct variety of Chaos Spawn that tend to show up in Norscan Tribes.

3. Amber Wizards are known for their shapeshifting/totemic abilities, which would allow them to take on the form (or at least characteristics of) a wolf.

4. The Children of Ulric. The closest to 'classic' (i.e. Hammer Horror) Werewolves. Humans with the ability to shapeshift (sometimes partially, sometimes fully, sometimes both) into wolves, as well as command normal wolves. Considered abominations by the Church of Sigmar, often protected and venerated by the Cult of Ulric.