Narrative Playbook is a regular column written by Martin from Narrative Labs, taking a look at the many and varied aspects of narrative play in the many worlds of Warhammer. This week Martin shares some fascinating thoughts on what makes the story of a themed Warhammer army or custom character more engaging. Check out Narrative Labs on Twitch, Twitter and Facebook for the latest streaming times, and for some fantastic interactive narrative gaming.

Creating stories is at the heart of what drives me as a narrative player – whether it’s writing lore about the locations I battle in or watching a new story unfold on the table, my love of stories captures my imagination and enthusiasm. One key aspect of this is giving my armies their own stories.

A week prior to writing this I did a Narrative Focus Show on Narrative Labs where I talked about some of the narrative armies I had created and the stories behind them. I’ll be honest, it ended up being a bit of a directionless waffle at points and certainly not my most coherent set of thoughts, but if nothing else it did make me think about what makes a good narrative army.

Reflecting on it both before and after the show, the armies I talked about were what I would call ‘deliberate narratives’ – maybe it’s not the best term, but it’s the best I could come up with at the time. A deliberate narrative army is one where the story, or at least the context, is all pre-defined from the start. I talked a lot about the Cavalcade of Loss, a Nighthaunt army I deliberately built around the concept of a mournful funerary procession.

This concept of ‘deliberate narratives’ also covers armies that are created based on someone else’s work. I love the idea of running a Gaunt’s Ghost Imperial Guard army for Warhammer 40,000 or maybe having Archaon the Everchosen at the head of a great Slaves to Darkness horde. However, with either of these armies the context is already written by the authors who have created these characters.

While I do enjoy bringing armies like these out once in a while, creating an army around a deliberate and often pre-defined narrative is missing a key ingredient that makes my other narrative armies a real pleasure to bring out – and that’s an ever-evolving storyline.

The Cavalcade of Loss is a great example of the problem with ‘deliberate narrative armies’. You can read more about the army in their entry on the Great Weave site, but broadly speaking it’s a mysterious Nighthaunt procession that appears (seemingly at random) across the mortal realms, hunting down the souls of heroes and leaders before vanishing again, their true purpose a constant mystery. I love the concept behind the army, but it doesn’t really change. They appear, they claim their prize (or more often than not don’t!) and then they fade away. This isn’t necessarily the best way to run a narrative army. For me, the best narrative armies (as with any character or story) are those that take on a life of their own and change the more you tell stories with them.

Let me tell you a story about a necromancer named Vrem (not the best name I know – I didn’t have an awesome Realm of Plastic name generator to hand at the time) and the Wight King Kriel. Vrem and Kriel started their narrative life as part of an Age of Sigmar Skirmish campaign (in the days before Warcry). All I knew at the time were their names and that, over the course of the campaign, I would grow the warband by adding Nighthaunt spirits recruited from trapped souls to do battle against the other warbands. I had no intention that they would have a life beyond that skirmish campaign. Yet from that small beginning a legend was created.

They went on an expedition into the ruins of Shadespire (the setting for the original campaign outlined in the Skirmish rulebook) looking for something. At the time I didn’t know what I wanted them to be looking for. I didn’t even know by the time I’d finished the campaign. All I knew was that I’d fallen in love with the characters and their story.

In the beginning Kriel was just a Skeleton Warrior champion. He died in every skirmish and it became a bit of a joke that, after the opposing warband had moved on, Vrem would shuffle back into the ruins, cast his dark spells and raise Kriel back again – with some kind of grumbled curse on the champion’s name.

From there emerged the story of Vrem the Necromancer, given a quest (probably a curse) to accompany the Wight King Kriel on his journey to discover his true power. Kriel became mute in the narrative – his voice was stolen so he couldn’t tell anyone who he was or who he had been, even if he knew (which as far as I know, he doesn’t). Vrem had to bring him back every time he was killed – he had to. There would be terrible consequences if he ever failed to do so, although what these would be is something that has yet to be determined.

Since then I’ve returned to the story of Vrem and Kriel several times, always trying to discover more about who Kriel is, what makes him important and why an unknown patron has tasked Vrem with this quest. Every time I bring them into a campaign or one-off game, their story advances and changes. I never really know quite what I expect to happen, but I find having them on the tabletop fires my imagination and helps push forward their story - it also helps when Warhammer Community previews a new mounted Wight King character!

Why do I keep coming back to them? Certainly it’s true that I like the theme of the army, and the cohesive sense I get from seeing the now Deathrattle-centric army on the table, but the same could be said of the Cavalcade of Loss and I find myself reluctant to use them as much. The real reason I love them is because those characters, created from a barely thought out idea for a minor campaign, now have a life of their own. Their story continues to fascinate me, because I don’t know what their story is. It’s yet to be written.

As I mentioned on that rather waffling narrative focus show – there is more than one way to create a narrative army. Some create a pre-defined lore (as I did with the Cavalcade of Loss), some start hobbying and let the miniatures tells the story. There are probably lots of other ways narrative armies come into being (and please do share your stories in the comments below).

However, for me, the best narrative armies are the ones that evolve from small beginnings, often by chance, and the armies grow with the stories. Vrem and Kriel’s army started out as mostly Nighthaunt, but then evolved into a full Deathrattle army. No doubt when the Soulblight Gravelords are released with all the promised new Deathrattle forces, their army will grow once again, each iteration progressing their story further.

Much like the Cavalcade of Loss there is a lot of mystery in their story, lots of unanswered questions, but unlike my Nighthaunt funerary procession these questions aren’t deliberately planted. Instead they’ve emerged naturally over time, and because of that I feel I have far more flexibility in how and when to answer those questions. Resolving the mystery of what the Cavalcade of Loss is would really bring their story to an end (although it may spawn ideas for many more stories). Vrem and Kriel on the other hand have mystery to them - but it’s just one aspect of an evolving story and providing a resolution to any of those questions would just move their story on another step.

It’s that, I think, that really brings my thoughts together on why I believe those narratives that grow and evolve are better than those that are deliberate and fleshed out before the story starts, when it comes to my own narrative armies. The deliberate stories often come with their end already defined, even if the journey might still be interesting. Worse, some have no space to evolve and change at all (which makes Tzeentch very unhappy). The evolving stories, on the other hand, can continue ever onward and even if old characters perish and new leaders emerge their narrative can keep you telling stories with them for as long as those characters call to you.

What do you think? Do you have a preferred way of creating narrative armies and using them in your storytelling? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

You can see the Cavalcade of Loss in action in the Vaults of Nessalam Narrative Campaign over on the Narrative Labs website.