Warhammer The Old World Towns Of The Empire

The Empire of man in Warhammer the old world is one of most fascinating factions in the lore. The empire is not your bog-standard human faction. There is the separate states of the empire, each of these have many differences.

Let’s start with sigmar Heldenhammer, I’ll be brief, he did create the empire, but he is not pertinent to the story at hand. Plus I got stick for the mannfred one. Sigmar killed orcs and united the human tribes. The empire was born. The time period I will be looking at is 2200 and after. The real fun begins in 2271 with the great war of chaos. Though there are several different dates the 8th edition rulebook states 2271, the 6th edition empire army book says 2301.

What is the empire? The empire is the largest realm if the old world from brettonia to kislev. Within it’s borders are many different biomes and townships. All adapted to their environment. Here is a few of the Empire towns.

Mordheim, the once greatest city of Ostermark. The corruption in the highest ranks, and riots in the lowest in the walls at the end of 2000th year after Sigmar coronation. Then behold the empires greatest omen was seen, the twinned tail comet. The depravity of the citizens of mordheim, only grew. Daemons slunk in the shadows, only to come out to cavort with men, women, dog, and donkey. With joyous glee. The clock struck midnight and the comet struck the town. Mordheim became the city of the damned. Where only ill fortune and misery lived. And skaven lots and lots of skaven.

Nuln the once centre of the empire, while that honour now belongs to Altdorf. Nuln remains a major trading hub. Travellers from wissenland, Stirland, averland, and even further converge to trade. Nuln is also home to the imperial gunnery school. A huge amount of forges where veteran gunsmiths maintain the artillery trains. Thanks to the dwarves massive steam powered air pumps are installed throughout. These vent acrid fumes and smoke out of the forges and into Nuln. This leaves some areas nuln covered in the thick black smoke. North of Nuln is the Reik, a river so wide that it cannot be bridged. At Altdorf where the reik divides into many smaller channels, these are bridged. It is with pride that the citizens of Nuln say that the capital bridges cannot cross the Reik.

Talabheim, the eye of the forest because, checks notes it is surrounded by a forest. It is actually inside a massive crater that is many miles across. Around the rim of the cater Talabheim has built up the town’s walls with gun towers. Which is more of defence against what lives in the forest than any invaders. The crater is huge, enough room for not just the town but farms as well. The river Talabec circles the crater and at the southern part of the crater is the fortified settlement of Talagaad. From here is the only entrance into the crater, a thin road through a fortified gate.

Marienburg, is a harbour town. At the mouth of the river Reik. Marienburg is the largest cityport in the old world. It is also the most corrupt, and dangerous cityport. I don’t think they put that in their brochures. Often called the City of gold, because it’s rich and is the only place in the empire where goods from Ulthaun and Cathay can be found easily obtained. Technically not part of the empire, when they colluded ie bribed Emperor Dieter the 4th to secure ie buy their independence. When this came out in the open dieter was kicked out and prince Wilhelm 3rd of Altdorf became emperor. Since then there has been many attempts to restore Marienburg as a member state of the empire. The cityport remains fiercely independent.

Finally Altdorf the capital of the empire. This is actually a lie. The emperor is selected from the elector counts and the capital is where the emperor takes court. So the capital has changed many times over the centuries. When Mandred ratslayer was elected the capital moved from Altdorf to Middenheim. When got bored of life and died, there was the anarchy of the time of three emperors, because picking an emperor was too difficult. Magnus the pious ascended and the Capital moved to Nuln. Then the nonsense in Marienburg happened and the capital moved back to Altdof, where the princes of Altdorf believe it should remain. No idea why.