Honestly, it's a bit strange there aren't Ratmen, isn't it? Did the Horned One make a deal with Chaos to not create mutants that muscle in on his race? Maybe the Skaven specifically hunt any strains of those they find down. Heck, maybe there are in fact Ratmen, and that's part of why the conspiracy of silence passes muster. 'That was just a pack of ratmen' can work when someone goes to check the bestiary and indeed finds a strain like that.
I'd be willing to bet that a ''real'' ''ratman'' would indeed be distinguishable from a Skaven if both exist and could be compared. Probably no prehensile tail, probably a more even mix of rat and humanoid features rather than more like bipedal rats with thumbs,
probably wouldn't have the extreme hunched posture of a real skaven, etc, etc.
Then again we also don't see pigmen or dogmen in the empire despite the fact that farmsteads being turned into putty by magic allegedly created the beastmen to begin with and the old world has plenty of pigs and dogs.
If anyone would be willing to explain this to me it would be greatly appreciated.
I find the Beastmen as a force in the world to be highly confusing in general.
Like whats actually the difference between a bovigor and a minotaur in truth? Size alone, if a bovigor eats troll flesh or warpstone or something and grows really big is he suddenly a minotaur? What if a minotaur were to somehow shrink, assuming it survived would it still be a minotaur.
Is the real difference that bovigors can't transform into things like cygors or ghorgons, at least not without first becoming minotaurs?
If it really is just size alone why bother having different terms at all?
Why are they all typically nicknamed ''cloven ones'' when things like centigors and harpies are very much considered beastmen and entirely lack cloven hooves? If those are mere allies and not ''true'' beastmen
what doth a true beastman make?
Why do they hate humanity and civilization itself so consistently, does their physiology make influence of chaos worse on their minds than any other creatures? Like some are abandoned by humans so I get that, others probably have the voiced of the gods in their ears....
But why is it so consistent? Why aren't there like beastmen transformed from adult humans(since this does indeed happen) who maintain faith in other powers like the gods they knew in the old world? Like aside from the ulrican werewolf dudes since they channge back and forth.
Does that mean every transformed beastman is fundamentally a human whom the other gods have abandoned?
It seems to maybe happen in Ind with them not all going mad? Could that be from the winds of magic being weaker there in the tropics?
Is that what actually unifies them as a collective of species? The hatred of civilization?
If they are all mutants and most are birthed from human wombs exposed to warpstone and or hybrdisizing why are they're so many strains that are...mostly very consistent in anatomy?
I mean I have suspicions that it's because the chaos gods need a
supremely loyal set of chaff beings to distract people while building up powerful but less loyal forces made of creatures like humans and ogres which seem to have more free will and thus need more corralling but that's just a headcanon.
That supreme very consistent loyalty we see at least within the old world is in itself super odd to me. You'd think you'd at least have like beastmen dedicated to the darker elven gods of destruction and pain and murder in addition to just chaos followers.
I want to say harpies seem to sometimes follow khaine but again I come back to feeling confused as to if those really are beastmen.
I feel like their should be some canonical answers to questions this relatively basic to a whole faction somewhere right?
Uh, sorry for this....I may have gotten a bit distracted in an unhelpful way but I can't stop thinking about this. Warriors of chaos have a clear set of rules to ascention and seem to for the most part need to serve a particular god to get there
Other humans mostly stay the same over their lives without taking extreme measures, lizardmen have a VERY regimented life, even skaven can be defined mostly consisently.
But even wrapping my head around what a beastmman is as opposed to a skin changer or regular mutant is tough on my brain.
