In 1988, Games Workshop released Realm of Chaos: Slaves to Darkness, the first of two exhaustive sourcebooks on Chaos. It’s an all-purpose sourcebook for two of the four ruinous powers: Khorne and Slaanesh. There are army lists for Warhammer Fantasy Battles and information one demons that is useful for GMs of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay. Perhaps the most interesting thing about this book is that it serves as the introduction of Chaos into the 40,000 universe, revealing that warpspace, the dimension used for fast interstellar travel, is in fact, the Realm of Chaos — the same hostile reality the Empire of the Old World struggled to banish from our own in 40K is regularly exploited as a highway system.

In the worlds of the Warhammer universe, Chaos is the ultimate opponent. In Warhammer Fantasy, I feel like Chaos represents the human impulses that undermine civil society (the veneer of which in Old World is incredibly thin). Whatever the faults of the Empire, it is preferable to the violent dissolution of Chaos, which takes the role of a Dark Power pretty typical of fantasy lit. In 40k, though, things aren’t so simple. The Empire is a fascist monolith and Chaos, repugnant though it may seem, is the antidote for that oppressively ordered “civilization.” Sort of. This conception of the late ’80s is way more interesting and complex than I ever really gave Warhammer credit for (and I think has been consistently eroded away in the name of uncomplicated commerce in the years since).

Anyway, what amazing books. Just jammed with stuff. Lists, mutation rules, all the traitor legions associated with Slaanesh and Khorne. Above all, though, the art. So much, so gnarly, by a GW murder’s row: Ian Miller, Tony Ackland, Gary Chalk, Martin McKenna, John Blanche, Russ Nicholson and like a dozen more, with John Sibbick on the cover. If there was a fever-pitched height of GW aesthetic, its Realm of Chaos. (Also, bonus: the gargoyle from HeroQuest makes quite a few appearances!).