Anvils of the Heldenhammer: The Ancients Audiobook By Dale Lucas cover art

Anvils of the Heldenhammer: The Ancients

Warhammer Age of Sigmar

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Anvils of the Heldenhammer: The Ancients

By: Dale Lucas
Narrated by: Gabrielle Nellis-Pain
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A Warhammer Age of Sigmar Audiobook

Against orders from her superiors and faced with a horde of the Blood God’s faithful, a Stormcast Eternal undertakes a mission that may prove more treacherous than she could have ever imagined.

LISTEN TO IT BECAUSE

It’s an action-packed adventure following a Stormcast Eternal that must decide whether what they truly believe to be right is more important than their faith in the God-king.

THE STORY

It has been twenty years since Anvilgard – now known as Har Kuron – fell to the Daughters of Khaine, and a terrible secret waits in the occupied city’s depths.

Knight-Incantor Tivrain Greymantle is haunted by the call of her brothers and sisters, who Morathi-Khaine has imprisoned there, knowing that if they were killed or released, her perfidy would be revealed to Sigmar as he reforges their souls. Commanded by her superiors to forget their captured comrades, Tivrain resolves to do the unthinkable: defy Sigmar himself, brave the steaming jungles of Aqshy’s Crucible of Life, infiltrate Anvilgard, and liberate them.

Pursued by her superiors and on a collision course with a horde of Khornate Bloodbound, Tivrain and her companions forge onward, unaware that their mission – and destinies – may prove more treacherous than they could have ever imagined.

©2024 Games Workshop Limited (P)2024 Games Workshop Limited Epic Fantasy
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Pretty great book that had a lot of tension but also cases of cooperation between the different order allies. Made me appreciate the Anvils of Heldenhammer and Anvilgard in a new way.

The politics between Daughters of Khaine and Stormcasts

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Story is a little longer than it needs to be. A few chapters are there just to add pages

Great handling of the loss that Stormcast have to deal with

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I might just be biased because I love the lore of this stormhost in AoS but the conflict internal/external throughout the story was enjoyable. The internal conflict was especially easy to relate to.
Great emotion voiced on the internal thoughts and friction in the mind.

I'm going to listen to it again.

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I’ve listened to a lot of Age of Sigmar audiobooks, especially Stormcast Eternals stories, and one thing used to make them fun: the Stormcast actually felt like Stormcast. They were basically Sigmar’s armored wrecking balls — hard, heroic, relentless, and ready to smash through horrors that would break normal people. That was the appeal. Books like Hallowed Knights: Plague Garden understood this perfectly. Gardus and his warriors faced impossible odds in Nurgle’s realm and kept going with courage, faith, and grit. That’s the Stormcast many readers signed up for.

The Ancients goes in the opposite direction. Instead of divine warriors fighting through hell, we get what feels like a fantasy therapy session. Endless introspection, hesitant dialogue, and characters who often come across less like reforged demi-gods and more like anxious recruits having a bad week in the woods. These are supposed to be the celestial elite, not a lost hiking group from a disaster documentary.

The dialogue does not help. Too often it sounds completely wrong for Stormcast — full of posturing, insecurity, and awkward exchanges that strip away their mythic weight. When Stormcast start sounding like frightened civilians trying to talk themselves into bravery, something has gone badly off course.

Then we get to Har Kuron, where Stormcast have apparently been hiding in cellars for twenty years in a city held by the Daughters of Khaine — another Order faction, no less. At that point I stopped asking “what happens next?” and started asking “what exactly happened to this faction?” The Stormcast used to feel like heroic legends. Here, they often feel diminished, deflated, and oddly fragile.

If you want Stormcast Eternals as towering, uncompromising champions of Order, this is likely to be a frustrating listen. If you enjoy lots of emotional brooding and heroes who seem strangely small for their own mythology, then maybe this works for you. For me, it was a major disappointment.

From Demi-Gods to Drama Queens

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