game is set on world Regalia that is connected with other young realms through portals of the old ones. Young realms are realms that were populated by the old creators and were guided on similar historical paths. They were untouched by chaos but this has changed since the arrival of sigmar (as a new faith) and archaon (as an actual emissary in flesh and blood)

there is no explanation (or just a brief one so that I have missed it) how this all came to be, just a description of the history of Regalia (and to a lesser extent some neighbouring realms)

On Regalia is dominated by hundreds of human kingdoms. Fast travel is possible through a number of stone circles that allows mages to open portal from one to another and a system of streams and seas under the earth that can be navigated by ship. There were a long period of peace curated by the Exoatl (Old Ones) that watched over the world from the North and Southpole. But then suddenly new faiths arrived, lots of human tribes started to pray to Sigmar and to conquer their neighbouring kingdoms. These lands are each independent, but are united in their faith to Sigmar. The history ends with the conquering of the Worlds Edge mountains and the crowning of the first emperor. At the same time, the first agents of Chaos arrived and began to corrupt the native people. A part of the Waaghkins rebelled against the old ones in favour of new gods, the Skaven arrived the first time, and in the south and east a death cult began to spread. The world is in turmoil. There are lots of unfinished story hooks so I think the story will be continued, but that might be wishful thinking.

humans are the majority in this world and they have kingdom and tribes everywhere, most of the known earth-inspired regions like cathay are there, but they are not described as fully flegded feudal nations but constantly changing petty empires and nomadic people ruled by warlords and champions of the gods. there are two factions of humans, the worshippers of sigmar and the polytheistic rest, both are not monocultural, but have different skin colors and cultures. Women fight beside men!

The dominion of sigmar is special, because they are the only ones that are reluctant to allow any other race than humans. They have only one god and their goal is to destroy all other gods and conquer their domains - for the greater good of the world of course. This has nothing in common with the Empire of the old world, except the heraldry, griffons are still en vogue. All tribes and city states and kingdoms are independent, the only common ground is their faith, the emperor is only a warlord with the purpose to expands the dominion towards the east. There a still knightly orders, zealots, witchhunters - so they retain some of their medieval flair but there are no state troops. There is no gunpowder, except from some dwarven imports, but they are known for using large warwaggons on their trek to the east. Kislec, Estalia, Araby, city states of Bretonnia, Norse and tribes of the Reiklands are part of the dominion. There are also some enclaves scattered across the world that are connected with magic portals

The Skaven arrived on their own on Regalia and are basically the same. Haven’t spent much time on them. They have now three gods called the triumvi-rat …..

Dawikorr (dwarfs) and Inneadim (elfs) have their own realms that are connected with Regalia. The Inneadim have outposts in America.

Dawikorr are only a legend on Regalia and nobody has seen them, but there are legends that they aid whorshippers of Sigmar in peril. They deliver the dominions of Sigmar with artifacts. They live underneath the world Karak Korr and guard the Soul Mill. Dawikorr have rules, so they can be fielded.

The Soul Mill is a huge machinery that allows minor deities to feed on the power of dead spirits or let them reincarnate or serve them as guardian hosts. It was built by the surviving dwarves of the old world on command of the Incarnates on a older machinery of the old ones. The dwarfs guard the soul mill and are aligned with Sigmar after the shattering of the Incarnates, but are under siege of the skaven that have found their way on this world and managed to steal two mighty souls that formed their new gods.

Inneadim whorship the dreamers, gods that have dreamt themselves, basically the elven gods. They live on their own world and protect the dreamchild. Under Araloth they founded enclaves on Regalia in search for the archelves, lost gods of their pantheon. They are a darker take on the elves, nightmare are as much part of their culture then dreams. They use necromancy and the death god Ynnead is at the centre of their pantheon. But they still live in symbiosis with the nature. The artwork shows an elf on a feathered mount, not like a chocobo, but more like a feathered raptor. the artbook shows pictures (and rules) from all existing elf armies.

Skaven and Dawikorr are the only races that use blackpowder, the rest of Regalia is on stuck on an ancient/medieval tech level. The Exoatl use magic techno gear. There is a certain level of anachronistic gear but it is not steampunk but powered by ancient magic. The only steampunk elements are in the Skaven and to a lesser extent the neo-dwarven fluff.

Chaos has no foothold in the north but is anywhere and consists of corrupted tribes and companies from every region of the world. The barbarian theme of the nomadic tribes is more associated with khorne than with chaos as a whole. Beastmen and demons are likely part of their faction because they are described in the same chapter (both in the fluff and unit cards), but demons can be summoned by everyone, so I don’t know for sure. And beastmen have very few pictures, so that’s a bad omen.

Waaghkins: orcs, goblins and are the servants of the old gods and live in a strict caste system, orcs are the manual laborers. There is a new race called nigmos: a tall and slender priest caste. Waaghkins travel the undersea, a system of flooded caverns that connects the whole world, on longboats and do the dirty work for the Exoatl. There is an artwork of the three different kinds of greenskins (no squigs and snotlings mentioned): an ork in very strange armour, very front heavy, textured like a symmetric turtle shell, he wields is an axe with multiple disc shape blades, goblin looked like a viking but has a futuristic looking handgun, the third was taller than a ork, female, slender - probably a nigmo. But in the photos of actual miniatures only show the old orc style. There is a subfaction of waaghkins that changed allegiance from the old gods to grimgor incarnate and are much more ferocious than their cousins.

undeads, deamons and spirits, and guardian hosts are used by every faction of the game, necromancy but not summoning is common in the dominion of Sigmar. The Inneadim are famous for their use of animated constructs. These things are not a big taboo in Regalia. However the most fearsome necromancers are (obviously) employed by the Empire of Nehekhara (which is not a desolate wasteland and has no egyptian vibe but is a rich and green country and feels more babylonian to me) and their death gods. But there is no Undead faction per se anymore. Vampires are called Necrarchs now.

Guardians hosts are troops that were granted by a god from another realm or the realm of the dead. They are living beings and have free will, but were brought to Regalia on the command of a deity.


- Lizardmen are not gone. There is a race called Servants of the Exoatl that guard the pole portals on flying pyramids, but no drawings and no fluff page (other races and tribess get at least half a page). They get unit cards for their old units (which confirms that they are simply lizardmen with a new name), but instead of beautiful pages with pictures like the rest of the bunch they get a simple list in the appendix of the compendium book.

Beastmen get the same lowkey treatment, but ogres get pictures and all, but I cannot say with which pantheon/faction they align. They are mortal, so you can use them in any the guardians of regalia army, but I don’t know if this is a stop gap solution or not.