White Dwarf 6 - Termagants, Juggers, Fiends and Blue Horrors

If you ask anybody when did Termagants, Juggers, Fiends and Blue Horrors first appear in a Games Workshop publication the answer will likely be in the mid 80’s, however that wouldn’t strictly be correct. Reading through White Dwarf 6 from 1978 I came across a D&D article by Lew Pulsipher called “A Place in the Wilderness”. 

As it is before my time (and not being into D&D) I have never read the early articles however this one caught my attention as it had an illustration of a Termagant.


Illustration by Polly Wilson

So after grabbing my attention by an early reference to a Termagant I started reading the article. To my surprise there was also reference to Juggers:
Illustration by Polly Wilson

Now Jugger is just a shortened version of Juggernaut so easily a coincidence but then there is mention of a Fiend and Blue Horror. Obviously the latter is now associated with Tzeentch so did this article or book inspire the name for the Realm of Chaos demons?

The book that the article took inspiration from was The Dragon Masters by Jack Vance first published in 1962.


The great thing about this book is that it sort of fits in to a Warhammer 40k story. You have aliens (The grephs) that enslave humans and breed them to create variant slave classes including mechanics, Giants and mounts. Meanwhile the planet, which they take the humans from, have captured some of the raiders and over generations have bred variant classes of the aliens themselves including Termagants, Spiders, Blue Horrors, Fiends and Juggers.

As with many things with Warhammer from this period we have the Realm of Chaos 80’s blog to thank for some insider knowledge. Despite some similarities, according to Tony Ackland, inspiration wasn’t taken from Jack Vance’s work:

“I recall Bryan lending me several James Branch Cabell books. Interesting reading but more philosophical than straight fantasy. We both had read a lot of Jack Vance, and Robert Sheckley, but although both of us were fans of their work they never really played much or any part in the development of Warhammer.” ROC80s blog

So complete coincidence then?……

At any rate the story would certainly make great scenario for campaigns in WH40k.








Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Hidden Wiki - White Dwarf 100

Image
White Dwarf 100 Many moons ago there was a paper boy who saved up his meagre earnings, slaving away 6 days a week in all weathers, accompanied by his trusty collie cross, to buy the latest White Dwarf. This was early 1988 and White Dwarf 100 was about to be issued. Technically not my first White Dwarf but probably the one that really got me interested in the hobby. Not only was it jam-packed with great articles, colour pictures but also came with a free ‘Eavy Metal poster. Sadly my happiness was short lived as I idiotically kept the poster in my pocket, lost it at school, and found it burnt with only a small part remaining. Many years later it was one of my first purchases on eBay. So what does this have to do with the Lost Minis Wiki? Well my addiction to identifying miniatures prompted me to identify the miniatures shown on the poster as well as the Eavy Metal article. Looking for a way to keep a record it made sense to utilise the Lost Minis Wiki. This would also help record when mi...
Read more

Guide to Identifying Miniatures

Image
How to identify miniatures. As with anything it all depends on whether you want to put the effort in yourself or you want to put minimal effort in. This guide has three main sections, the first section will cover the basics, the second section will cover the way with least amount of effort on your part. The third section is if you prefer searching for yourself, particularly if you think you have worn out the good will of the community by putting in too many ID requests 😉. The Basics Whichever way you decide to do it take a photo or the front, back and base/tab. This will help you when asking others to help identify and for future reference save you having to get the miniature out every time. Obviously I am assuming it is not in packaging but then you wouldn’t be searching unless you want to know more about the history (which should be easy to find). This is mainly from the viewpoint of identifying fantasy and science fiction miniatures as that is what I know and the Lost Minis Wiki pr...
Read more