Oriental Empire of Man (aka Warbow?)

Kislev = Kislev.

Slavs were a major foe for the Ottomans. Egypt was part of the Ottoman Empire since the early 1500s, which is to say, the entirety of its greatness.

If anything, Chaos should be based off the Turco-Mongol Timurids. The Timurid invasion of the Ottoman Empire nearly ended the Ottomans, until Timur died and his coalition fell apart.

Chaos recruits from the tatar-like nomads that inhabit the wastelands east of the the Empire. A rider that has earned the favor of the Chaos gods is rewarded with a devil-horse, which is far larger, faster, and more durable than normal horses (counts as monstrous cavalry). Over time, the horse and rider becomes symbiotic with each other. Think "It that rides as one", but not quite to that degree.

The man on top of the horse also grows in size, and shoots arrows the size of javelins from bows that mortal races can't draw.

I actually suggest using african folklore for dwarfs:

>Throwing clubs.
oriental-arms.com/item.php?id=3014

>Why build a temple when you can carve it out of the bedrock?
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bete_Giyorgis_01.jpg
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Monolithic_churches_in_Ethiopia

>the local smith guards his metalworking techniques as secrets which may give him a mystical status, like a mage and his apprentice. One of these secrets is using mud from termite hives to build his furnace. Instead of ordinary metalurgy and mages, one can consider magic users are artificers.
sacred-texts.com/etc/mhs/mhs10.htm
Note: this isn't really exclusive to african folklore, but the african continent has more beliefs about the special/mythical/magical status of smiths than elsewhere.

>Btw, WE WUZ BLACK SMITHS, you know, inventing carbon steel and shit, for the last couple milennia.
books.google.com.br/books?id=VepgBQAAQBAJ&pg=PT352&lpg=PT352&dq=Anthropologist Peter Schmidt steel&source=bl&ots=KH9bzoFjV2&sig=N7YVeUM11UG_eFLRbSmpUtvpCW4&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiwk6Hm1tHWAhUFF5AKHXd-DWYQ6AEIRDAF#v=onepage&q=Anthropologist Peter Schmidt steel&f=false

>Mmoatia are "dwarves " or "fairies". All over west africa we have these cognate hairy dwarves. They like caves and mountains in Mali, but in Ghana they love forests. The black dwarves are cool and might kidnap you to teach you magic sometimes.

>Red dwarves and white dwarves are sociopathic little fuckers who love stealing and tormenting people. Their master is the evil forest god Sasanbosam. As far as I know, they're like a mix of dwarves and elves/fairies.
>Follow very specific rules, and you can get great magic/power out of them.
>Fuck up the specific rules about how to deal with them, and you're fucked. Except instead of "OOOH YOU BROKE ELF LAWS NOW YOU'RE STUCK IN ELFLAND FOREVER!" they just eat you.

Further south, you have the jungle from which beastmen may come. Here is some african monster lore for beastmen:

>Be afraid of the hippo. It fucks up crocs and lions, runs faster than you, is very territorial and agressive. It kills more people each year than crocs, lions, elephants etc.
youtube.com/watch?v=1gdTOHWYVLM
This should be the minotaur equivalent.

>Flies kill horses, rhinos and zebras are unlikely to be domesticated? Who gives a fuck. Elands and giant elands are your fantasy/alternate history beasts of burden and mounts. Cooler, well-adapted to local environment and distinct.
vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/middle-earth-roleplay/images/4/4d/Giant_eland_2.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20160515161322
sargassosart.deviantart.com/art/Ventus-Cultures-341525180

>Africa has a lot of monsters that devour people whole, like the Ugungqu-kubantwana, which is pretty much a living island walking on land.
abookofcreatures.com/2016/03/18/usilosimapundu/

>African monsters
abookofcreatures.com/tag/african-folklore/

>african witches
warosu.org/tg/thread/30685000
>I actually forgot that one. I've read accounts of african witches creating a wide variety of zombies and other monsters as minions. There's also stories where killing a witch just creates a powerful evil spirit. I read a Hausa legend about how witches have small mouths of razor sharp teeth all over their backs. They can cause blight, storms, and plagues. And almost all of them shapeshift into creatures of the night or ride on them. The reference I've got here shows them with talking owls, baboons, and hyenas to deliver messages. And just about all of them are cannibals. There's an account of witches using nightmare demons to kill their enemies in their sleep through sheer terror.

>African vampires have iron teeth and hooks instead of feet
vampireunderworld.com/african-vampires/
wraithdt.deviantart.com/art/African-Vampire-Hunter-551202284

Beastmen origin:

TOTEMISM
>Most African clans at some point thought their ancestor was some sort of animal, or was saved by an animal, or their ancestor saved the animal. This created an affinity with the creature.
>The Bush soul is usually a bigger, stronger, and more powerful version of the real thing with sometimes a noticeable peculiarly like albinism. Most typically have wild animals for bush souls, bust women often have domestic animals for bush souls.
>People have the ability to project their "bush soul" into the totem of their clan.
>Killing a bush soul will kill the person attached to it, but killing a person's body while they're projecting their bush soul causes the bush spirit to run wild and even become a malevolent spirit.
>Sorcerers can capture other people's bush souls and use them to do their bidding, or sell them.

Basically, chaos witches made monsters out of people's bush souls.

This could help:

>For many centuries a leopard cult has existed in West Africa, particularly in Nigeria and Sierra Leone, wherein its members kill as does the leopard, by slashing, gashing, and mauling their human prey with steel claws and knives. Later, during gory ceremonies, they drink the blood and eat the flesh of human victims.
unexplainedstuff.com/Secret-Societies/The-Leopard-Men.html

Bretonnians become a Samurai charicature?
The three types of Elf somehow feel off, though.

This, Organutangs.
Kislev can still be slavs/russia yeah
The Roman depiction of Carthaginians was as savages who were too cowardly to fight for themselves and sacrificed children to their gods. This depiciton became so prevalent we actually have no idea what Carthaginian religion was actually like.

The elves would be... hmm, what predates the Ottomans?

Shit like the Akkadians (with Gilgamesh and Enkidu Aenarion and Caledor), the Dark Elves could be the Assyrians, and Nomadic wood elves

Elves are embodied spirit soldiers. Ulthuan is heaven, Naggaroth is the underworld, and Athel Loren is a mystical mountain country, or even just the material world in general.

Immediately, the Eastern Roman Empire. They say themselves more of successors to the Abbasid Caliphate though. Especially after they usurped the office.

>It doesn't really make a whole lot of sense.
Neither does Chaos or much of Warhammer as is

I do like the idea of the invaders coming from the South, but the problem is that the "African barbarian" stereotype doesn't really include leaving Africa much

no matter what you do with Africa it becomes a stereotype, it may be best to remove it from the world entirely. Make them the Sea Peoples from antiquity, have them come from the Mediterranean somewhere?

We need Africa for the badass bush beastmen tho

>Debate is still on on the Slaan equivalents.

The one good thing about that movie.

>The Roman depiction of Carthaginians was as savages who were too cowardly to fight for themselves and sacrificed children to their gods

To be fair, archaeological digs have actually found disturbingly large numbers of child bones in and around religious structures of Carthage.
The Romans absolutely exaggerated the shit out of /something/, that's their whole schtick, but there's an element of truth in there somewhere.

you and a bunch of others have already suggested orangutans and I want you to know you're correct and also handsome

There's also the fact that pretty much every single culture that kept records and has encountered the Carthaginians mentioned the child sacrifice thing. It's more or less certain.

The Romans however greatly exaggerated both this and all of their other supposedly "evil" traits. They painted them as being like something between the chaos dwarfs and skaven, whereas the real picture was probably just of a highly successful city of maritime merchants.

I thought that the elves=giants thing was set in stone? Or was that only when you were discussing a 40K equivalent? Because I do dig the "high elves/eldar are frost giants, dark elves/eldar are fire giants" thing.

>Orcs and goblins pending a comically violent yet ultimately rather affectionate stereotype, American Deep South is a good candidate but hard to place in a setting inspired mostly by the Mediterranean and West Asia. Hungarians? It'd explain why they keep fighting with the not-Turkish over a shitty mountain pass.

You would be extremely hard pressed to find a suitable racial stereotype, especially here. The greenskin depiction is actually (surprising, I know) a very nuanced combination of stereotypically "good" and "bad" traits, placed under the lens of dark comedy. It takes both a lot of balls and a lot of subtlety not just to be able to pick the group you want to turn into orcs, but to do this without going into the extremes of either making them irredeemably sucky (like what happened when someone suggested basing them on "gangsta culture", as people couldn't detach themselves enough from their opinions on black people to make it actually funny) or full on admirable noble savages (which I promise you is what would happen if you let Veeky Forums try and turn them into Southern stereotypes, as most of Veeky Forums loves the South and wouldn't be able to depict it in a less than favorable light)

>as most of Veeky Forums loves the South and wouldn't be able to depict it in a less than favorable light

what

>Probably not-so-good-suggestion: dwarfs are even more literally Jewish than before and are depicted as some kind of exiled race of scholar-merchant gnomes who give the king loans until he decides it's easier to call a pogrom than to pay them back.

Jewish and Arabian folklore are surprisingly light on the "little people" myths that have been popular basically everywhere else. So if you want that, yeah, you literally got to go with no shit Jewgnomes.

I love the look on his face

Does that mean Cathay would finally get represented?

No. Never Ever. Get out weeb

Is it weeb when they want to see China?

more like weib amirite

Yes

You know, the closest thing Turkey had to Sylvania would be... Transylvania, which they invaded more than once.

Although if you want to retain Sylvania's relation to the Empire (as a sort of dark mirror of the same culture), you're going to have a bit of a harder time. Turkey per se doesn't have any myths we'd identify as proper "vampires". Greece does, but contrary to popular belief they're not the same culture.

So why not make the Vampires greeks?

And instead of blood they destroy your economy

Vampires come just to settle their debt with Turks, user. Blood debt

Like I said, not the same culture. Part of Sylvania's shtick is that they're like the Empire, but ruled by vampires. If we really make this setting a "mirror universe" where the relations between things are equal, that means the vampire nation needs to be part of the Empire equivalent, which is Turkish.

Speaking of which, I don't know about making a bow their sacred weapon. Part of the deal means this should also be the basis of a far-future equivalent game, no? And while you could justify warhammers being used in a dark future alongside firearms as the melee option, justifying a bow would be a lot harder (if you already have firearms, a bow is just redundant)

Scimitar then?

Also, would the dark mirror of the Ottomon Empire be uhh.. the ERE?

Bows were the most important weapons to the Turkish steppe peoples, the most mystical and holy, and considered the most heroic. There's really no way around it. Better just find some shitty excuse ("Warp") for bow wielding space marines.

this is fantasy anyway who gives a shit about the 40k version?

I was just following the logic of making things as close equivalents as possible. Almost everything in fantasy has a 40K mirror, especially the thing the gameline is named after.

40k came later, let some other nerd worry about it!

The name doesn't have to refer to a literal weapon. You call the fantasy game "Bow of the Prophet", or something kitschy like that, then you make "Bow of the Prophet 40K" but this time the eponymous bow refers to what the space marines are called (individuals are "arrows"), or they have bow shaped starships or whatever.

40k doesn't even have the titular "warhammer". There ARE Thunderhammers, but they aren't THE Hammer. There's no "Warhammer" In 40k, 40k is just Warhammer in the year 40k.

Meanwhile, there is a Warhammer in Warhammer - the Warhammer Ghal Maraz

Bow shaped starships is pretty badass.

Isn't that the Necrons' thing?

no Necron ships are Croissant shaped

>Space Marines are the "arrows" of the Padishah-Emperor, raining from above to strike at the enemies of mankind

>Padishah-Emperor
Yeah, thanks for reminding me we went full circle with references here.

>mfw it just now clicked for me Padishah Emperor was a historical title
>mfw Sardukaar were Jannisaries
>mfw Paul was Muhammad
>MFW absolutely none of this actually occurred to me until this moment and I read Dune when I was a teenager
aaaaa
AAAAAAA

AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Wouldn't something like a "Prophet-King" be more fitting with the theme of (presumably) turning the Imperium into a space caliphate instead of space Vatican?

Also, I know you're going to call this bait (it's not), but what about making the space marines/space mujahedin explosive? Part of the fun GW had was taking stereotypes back in the 80's that nowadays would seem outrageously offensive and implementing them in such a way that it was clear they legitimately thought some of them were cool. So, holy shaheed suicide bombers -> space mujahedin have an implant that goes off like a nuke when they need it to. Imagine what a spectacular ending that could be to all those heroic last stands. The space mujaheddin get swarmed by not-tyranids... then bam, the cleansing flame of the Prophet-King takes them all.

>mfw Sardukaar were Jannisaries
>mfw Paul was Muhammad
Well it just clicked for me now too

>have an implant that goes off like a nuke when they need it to

WRRRRYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY

>Wouldn't something like a "Prophet-King" be more fitting with the theme of (presumably) turning the Imperium into a space caliphate instead of space Vatican?
If we're talking historically, there really isn't an equivalent to the Vatican for the Middle East. The ruler and "head of the religion" were pretty synonymous, with his piety backed up by supportive religious authorities. Though I could be talking out of my ass because I only have a surface level knowledge

True, didn't think about it. I guess it's better for lone operatives than people who might be fighting in battalions.

That's what I meant. The Emperor would be more of a Muhammad like figure than a Jesus. Horus would be his son, leading a schism based on some kind of internal religious disagreement.

this is somewhat accurate because 1. Islam has never been very unified, sectarian split began almost as soon as Muhammad was dead - over who his successor was, in fact, and 2. Until recently, it was tradition that the Clergy would not take part in civic government as it was felt it would pollute/corrupt the spiritual realm with worldly concerns. Imams were meant to be spiritual and moral advisors who offered guidance to rulers, but the actual high ranking church people would not be synonymous with the state. It was one of those unwritten sort of rules.

Obviously, it got broken eventually *coughIrancough*

[surprised shrieking]

I-I mean I KNEW Paul's religion was always a metaphor for Islam it was kind of hard to miss with the whole JIHAD and the desert dwelling fanatics but holy shit I never got that the Landsraad and the Padishah Emperor were Turkey/The Byzantine Empire and Paul was the rise of Islam

Wasn't it all practically spelled out in the books? Is that really that much of a revelation?

I didn't know jack shit about Muhammadans when I read it
Still don't but I didn't then either.

>the Landsraad and the Padishah Emperor were Turkey/The Byzantine Empire
You mean Persia/Byzantine Empire because title of Padishah Emperor combines both of their rulers at the same time

Like I said, I got the Jihad part but I legit thought Padishah emperor was a made up title

>but the actual high ranking church people would not be synonymous with the state
Late era Ottoman Empire also had to outright depower the ulama politically, socially and institutionally to even attempt to get modernization going. For 40k, they'd probably be the stand-in for the Ecclesiarchy.

I knew Paul was meant to be a Muhammed-esque figure, but all these historical references (Janissaries, Byzantines) just never occurred to me,

So... in Muslimhammer 40K, would the Mechanicus be Jewish dhimmis? The mistrusted, secretive not-quite-foreigners-but-not-quite-part-of-society religious group that creates all the technological advancements people begrudgingly use?

Mamluks. They're perfect for vampires too - their ruling class are apex warriors that actively recruit.

>would the Mechanicus be Jewish dhimmis
Mechanicus would be scholars collecting and preserving pieces of not!Persian and not!Greek scientific knowledge of ancient times

Weren't those Jewish dhimmis (except in astronomy and medicine, which they were all over for some reason)?

>Weren't those Jewish dhimmis
Were they?

I was gonna suggest the Sassanids, but, Mamluks... some sort of, former slave caste that sought ascendancy via vampirism to seize control?

Their Vlad figure is an ancient right hand man of some ancient Emperor who feels the Empire is his right because he was there man, he knew the Emperor, they fought in 'nam together?

>Their Vlad figure
Why do you look for Vlad somewhere else when you can just use Transylvania for Sylvania?

>Mamluks

There's your Blood Dragon equivilants

I'm not sure I understand the question.

Like we said, it's more geographically accurate but it doesn't follow the setting rule of leaving the relations between factions intact. Transylvania isn't a historical part of Turkey (no matter how much the Turks would've liked that)

>In the Middle Ages, the Mamlukes took up the practice of furusiyya "chivalry", although Mamluk knights were slaves until their service ended. The Arabic term for a knight was fāris (plural fursān), The faris and the notion of furusiyya originated in pre-Muslim Persian brotherhoods. Within the Muslim world, the fursān became prized as ideal warriors.

>The fursān – whether free like Usama ibn Munqidh or enslaved professional warriors such as the ghilman and mamluks – were trained in the use of various weapons such as the sword, spear, lance, javelin, mace, bow and arrow, and tabarzin or "saddle ax". (The Mamluk bodyguards known as the tabardariyyah.) They were also trained in wrestling, and their martial skills were honed first on foot as piéton and then perfected when as mounted warriors.[15] They were popularly used as heavy knightly cavalry by a number of different Islamic kingdoms and empires, including the Ayyubid dynasty and the Ottoman Empire.

>pre muslim Persia
>Persia

THE PERSIANS ARE VAMPIRES

I'm not sure either if it was Jewish dhimmis. Got it?

They're already Bretonnians. So this is more Mousillon than Sylvania.

It seems like a fair bet, the Jews had a tendency to do that wherever they went. They have a lot of flaws but they did manage to maintain near universal literacy throughout their entire history, unlike almost any other culture. It's a lot of help when it comes to preserving knowledge.

>Brettonia
>Persia
Why not the Egyptians?

Wew friend. I'm a muslim but I don't want to ruin a good thread. Please forgive me if I incite a shit storm.

In Islam, there is no separation between state and religion. Muhammad was at various points, a goat herder, trader, insurgent leader, city leader, general (he actually fought in battles and was wounded, at one point was protected by female nurses who took up arms as the final line of defence), and statesman in addition to prophethood. In order to rule in a just manner, you obligately need to be pious. All laws refer to the Quran the same way you guys refer to the Constitution now.

Regarding, the schisms, before his death, Muhammad chose Abu Bakar, his trusted Companion as his wordly successor. There were some camps who thought, Ali (Muhammad's cousin and son in law) should be the caliph instead, due to the family relations. This camp eventually became the Shiah sect.

However, in Islam, there is no formal priesthood. It was specifically banned by Muhammad to avoid the centralization and accumulation of power and wealth seen in the Catholic church. Anyone can become a clergy provided you are learned (which led to the Al-Azhar university giving out the 1st modern uni degree) but you get no other extra worldly benefits and you can marry etc.

I hope I did not ruin the thread, but just to clarify some points. Thank you.

Plus, if you make the machanicus jews you can have them refer to robots as "golems", machine spirits as "gilgulim" and viruses as "dybbuks", which is pretty balls.

>Transylvania isn't a historical part of Turkey
You can just play with the story of Vlad's brother who was literal buttbuddy for Sultan. Being a vassal or client state of an empire is as good as being one of its parts.

>metaphor for Islam
It was called Buddislam and was preached from Orange Catholic Bible.

not at all, truth usually makes for much more interesting fiction. If that makes sense.

It's better to have a basis on real facts for your made up fantasy stories, it tends to result in something more nuanced and authentic than when it's based on parroted misconceptions. Case in point, Legend of the Five Rings, which is basically ruined for me by the blatant inaccuracies

Even assuming your fiction is based on cliches and stereotypes like Warhammer is supposed to be, start with the genuine thing and then warp it from there.

>the kabbalistic transcendence through the sephiroth into unity with god is manifested in the transcendence of flesh through cybernetics
>the sacred science of gematria looks for the hidden connections between the lines of code
>the tefilin is a literal antenna that connects to the machine god

>unlike almost any other culture
Yet unlike other cultures they don't convert and don't accept fresh blood from the outside. Admechs are centered around core idea, not their origin.

>Buddhism

Now THERE'S an idea. We could make the Brettonians some kind of Buddhists, and their "Knights" are wandering Wuxia heroes?

Youxia I believe they're called

>humanity's quest for unity with the machine god began with the initial sin of biting from the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge, recorded in the most ancient archives from 40,000 years ago in occult sigils

>We could make the Brettonians some kind of Buddhists
Hindus are closer geographically if you want.

Those are already not-Lizardmen Monkeymen though

Could this be a time for... Greco-Buddhist Bactria!?

True, but there are a lot of ways of interpreting that idea. I think if you go with the Jewish metaphor (I personally like it for the golems thing), you focus more on the desire for ever greater perfection within the individual, rather than perfection of the whole. The perfection of the universe (Tikkun Ollam) will follow naturally once people find perfection in unity with god, a concept that exists in the kabbalah.

So in this version, the mechanicus equivalents are highly insular and don't receive converts lightly (or maybe they only recruit from their own planets, where genealogies are meticulously recorded over millennia to direct their "perfected" evolution towards ever greater compatibility with the machine), but are even more immortal and contemplative than the magi of the imperium.

You know that still doesn't solve the issue of Jews not accepting Muhammad equivalent as their prophet which lead him to bloodshed in our timeline. In 40k it would translate into not!Emperor bombing Admech cities on Mars.

>not!Emperor
God Caliph of Mankind or God Sultan of Mankind?

What about Crimea as Sylvania? The Crimean Khanate looked protection from the Ottomans and were largely independent during quite a lot of time.

I thought a large part of the admech’s deal is that they worship the omnissiah instead of the GE, and the entire Imperium would very much LIKE to bomb them if only they weren’t the ones who kept everything working? its actually a pretty good metaphor for the Jewish presence in many of the countries they lived in. Everyone hates them, but by the time you realize it they’re holding the economy together