In our Lore Explainer series we take a deep look at the lore of various games, settings, and factions. This article is the first in a three-part series looking at the lore behind the Chaos Dwarfs across the Old World and Age of Sigmar. In this second part, we’ll be looking at the faction’s reinvention in the late days of the Old World and the early days of Age of Sigmar.
Welcome back to our three-part series on the lore of the Chaos Dwarfs. Last time around, we talked about the origins of the Chaos Dwarfs in White Dwarf magazine and their position in the mountains of the far north of The Old World. This time around we’ll be looking at the faction’s reinvention at the end of The Old World and Warhammer Fantasy Battles and the start of Age of Sigmar.
So let’s dive in.
Tamurkhan and the Legion of Azgohr
As we mentioned last time, Chaos Dwarf releases were pretty sparse following their fourth edition army book. That would change with the release of Tamurkhan – the Throne of Chaos book, released by Forge World in 2011. Written by Alan Bligh and Rick Priestly, the book was intended to be part of a series which would essentially “reset” the Old World, shaking up the status quo and re-inventing some of its armies. But at some point during development the decision was made to reset with Age of Sigmar instead, and the work here was abandoned… well, kind of. The Legion of Azgorh would essentially become the “get-you-by” army for the Chaos Dwarfs in Age of Sigmar after the death of the Old World, with new rules and warscrolls based on the updated range released by Forge World.
Tamurkhan – The Throne of Chaos was one of two Warhammer Forge supplements released during Warhammer Fantasy Battles’ eighth edition (the other being Monstrous Arcanum), and is a campaign book that chronicles the rise and fall of Tamurkhan, a Nurgle Champion who led an assault on the city Nuln. Among his forces was Drazhoath the Ashen, master of the Legion of Azgorh, a Chaos Sorcerer who rode to battle on a Great Taurus named Cinderbreath. Tamurkhan rode atop Bubebolos, the greatest of all Toad Dragons (and a sick model), and would ultimately fail to take the throne of Chaos, falling in battle to Theodore Bruckner and the power of the Baleflame Amulet.
The Chaos Dwarfs introduced in this book are “malign, dark-souled, and merciless daemon-smiths and craftsmen,” with Dwarfen bodies being slowly mutated by the dark powers of Chaos. They rule the kingdom of Zharr and the land around their sorcerous tower of Zharr Naggrund (the city of Fire and Desolation) is a waste marked with vast open mines, ash pools, alchemical spoil, and rivers of lava. Their empire is slowly expanding as the foul output of their craft continues to spread. They’ve mastered the art of making strange and infernal war engines, binding daemons into their tools of war – something which would be reflected in the Forge World kits released for them.
Drazhoath the Ashen
The star here is Drazhoath the Ashen, master of the Black Fortress and a sorcerer-prophet of Hashut. Drazhoath wasn’t so much a master of the Black Fortress by choice – he was exiled there after falling out of favor and more or less losing at the political game in Zharr-Naggrund as a minor hell smith. Since then he’d risen in power to become Lord of the Black Fortress, becoming a powerful sorcerer in his own right. By the time of Tamurkhan’s arrival, Drazhoath had risen to become the most powerful of the Chaos Dwarf Sorcerer-prophets.
Drazhoath met Tamurkhan’s horde at the great river crossing, leading an army of ornate daemon engines and hobgoblin slaves. The armies clashed, with Drazhoath refusing to yield, and the Chaos Dwarfs were pushed back into the Black Fortress. It was there that a bargain was struck, with Sayl the Faithless acting as Tamurkhan’s emissary and telling Drazhoath that he’d fought well and with honor, and would give him a chance to plunder the lands of the west. Seeing an opportunity for both new wealth and the ability to regain favor and return to the capital and take the position of glory rightly owed him, Drazhaoth accepted.
Working together, the armies cut a bloody swathe across to the west, driving out a Black Orc tribe and gravely injuring the dragon-god Omdra the Dread, ending her scourge upon the Desolation of Azgorh for a time. In recognition for his deeds, the Chaos Dwarfs made for Tamurkhan an axe befitting his stature, to replace his broken blade. They also outfitted the army’s giants with siege armor and tools for scaling and taking down fortifications. They fought their way through a huge horde of night goblins, with Drazhoath saving Sayl’s life and securing a life debt in the process. They finally regrouped and advanced upon the great city of Nuln, second largest in the Empire and famous for its guns and war machines. It was here that Tamurkhan’s advance ground to a halt. Drazhoath’s war machines were great but after an intense duel between gunners they were forced to fall back and repair. In the process they were attacked and decimated and as the battle turned against the forces of Chaos, Drazhoath had his forces retreat, leaving Tarmukhan to his fate.
Changing Aesthetics
Aesthetically this was clearly a reinvention for the Chaos Dwarfs, who in this book and their Forgeworld models are presented as much more in-line with the Chaos aesthetic. They’ve shed their big, silly hats for full-face helms and shields covering massive beards, with spikes and arrows you’d expect from a faction dubbed “Chaos.” The preview version of these were the gunners released for the Warriors of Chaos army. This massive gun fueled by a bound daemon came with three Chaos Dwarf gunners sporting what would become the signature, more serious Legion of Azgorh style, with smaller, helmeted heads and long, ringed beards emerging from the bottoms of them.
The army list released in the book updates the Legion of Azgorh and models them after the force allied with Tamurkhan. As a result they have access to more war machines than before as well as a new unit of fire-elemental constructs called K’daai Fireborn. They were also made available as allies to Warriors of Chaos armies. This updated aesthetic would more or less be their deal through Age of Sigmar, as much of the art from Tamurkhan was repurposed for the updated Warscrolls and Indexes for Age of Sigmar later on.
In terms of updates, this was the largest the Chaos Dwarfs had seen, and that same aesthetic would also be carried into Total War: Warhammer III, where the faction was introduced as a playable faction.
Making the Jump to Age of Sigmar
In 2015 Games Workshop sunset Warhammer Fantasy Battles after a length End Times Campaign, replacing it with Warhammer: Age of Sigmar. The new game replaced the lore of the Old World with an entirely new one based around semi-connected realms, colonized and populated by the original remnants of the End Times. The game was all new, but with some ancient scars and leftover pieces of the world-that-was here and there.
The Chaos Dwarfs didn’t so much fit into this new take on the world, with its Chaos pantheon shifted to include the Horned Rat – though they were listed as a part of Grand Alliance: Chaos. The Chaos Dwarfs were reintroduced here in a “get-you-by” set of rules as the dread Legion of Azgorh, who were once the terror of the Dark Lands of the world-that-was. Bitter and twisted, they were masters of making murderous war engines of unyielding iron whose avarice and cruelty knew no bounds. These included the Forge World models, more or less, led by Drazhoath the Ashen. The Hobgoblins are mostly missing from this set of rules, and are replaced instead by Goblins.
The Legion of Azgorh would see a slight fleshing out in the Age of Sigmar lore in the following years, primarily in the Soulbound rulebooks for Age of Sigmar roleplay. As beings of fire they naturally fit into the Realm of Aqshy, where they resided in the Black Fortress, a spire constructed within the Ashcloud Mountains. The 2018 second edition Age of Sigmar release gave them a bit more lore in their warscrolls but removed their ability to take goblin slaves in their armies.
The Legion of Azgorh were never players in Age of Sigmar, just a force kept on the periphery; loyal to Drazhoath and holed up in their mountain fortress. It’s pretty clear the writers kept them out of the spotlight to avoid calcifying them aesthetically in Age of Sigmar, and that would pay off when the faction was completely overhauled and re-released in the summer of 2025 as the Helsmiths of Hashut.
Return to The Old World
The plan to revamp Chaos Dwarfs in Age of Sigmar was telegraphed somewhat by their exclusion from Age of Sigmar – despite being something of a “shoo-in” for The Old World after its release in 2023, the faction was placed in the “Legends” category, indicating it wasn’t part of the planned release schedule. The lore for the Chaos Dwarfs here is very much kept as their original lore, of a group of stubborn and evil sorcerers ruling over the desolate empire of Zharr-Naggrund.
Final Thoughts
The Chaos Dwarfs finally received some much-needed love late in Warhammer Fantasy Battles, with a newer, much less silly aesthetic that more firmly tied them to Chaos. This was a much cooler look in line with the modern Warhammer aesthetic but did rob them of a little of their magic. It wasn’t until the 2025 overhaul that we’d really see a proper merging of their goofy, big hat aesthetic with more modern sensibilities and sculpting technology. And, finally, available in plastic.
In part three of our series we’ll look at the lore behind the Helsmiths of Hashut, the new and updated version of the faction for Warhammer: Age of Sigmar.
Legions of Azgorh in more detail and examine their lore in both the old world and Age of Sigmar, and talk about where they ended up before the faction’s reinvention.
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