Unless you have been living under a rock with excellent sound-proofing, you're probably aware of the impending release of Warhammer: The Old World. Pre-orders are already sold out pretty much everywhere, and the products are due to release on January 20 (or February 10 if you live here in Australia, because time works differently here).
TOW has been the subject of rumour and speculation for years now, ever since GW first announced that it would eventually be coming. I've tried to avoid buying into it, largely because the conversations normally centered around wishlists and wild hopes rather than any solid information that had been released. It's only in the last few months that they really started to ramp up the release of details, and honestly what I've seen is more promising than I would have dared hope for. The game definitely sounds like an edition of Warhammer Fantasy Battles.
There are countless details that we won't know for sure until we actually have the rules and can read through them. but I will definitely be giving it a try. I declined to join the stampede of people rushing to get onto the limited list of pre-orders, so it remains to be seen how long it will take me to actually be able to dig into it.
In the meantime, Cancon is on in a couple of weeks and I will again be playing 6th edition Warhammer Fantasy. It may be a little bit difficult to focus on the old edition with a new one arriving around the world at about the same time. Honestly I have also had a lot of trouble deciding on a list that I was actually motivated to play. In the end I've submitted a Wood Elf Forest Spirit list led by Drycha. I used a list like this at an event back in 7th edition, and it resulted in one of the most amusing games I've played. I figure it should be a relatively straightforward army to play in my somewhat distracted state, so hopefully it won't be a complete disaster.
Anyway, at the rate I've been posting, by the time you hear from me again, a new edition of Warhammer will be out! How exciting...
Ring in the New! I'm looking forwards to it too, will be good to get some rank and flank on again.
ReplyDeleteI'm really skeptical about this release. Even by GW standard I thought the original "death" of the Old World was disrespectful of the community. Everyone was encourage to expand/rebase/renew their army for Age of Sigmar and now they should retro-engineer everything again? At the same time many people follow blindly GW whims and kinda "deserve" the artificial obsolescence embedded in GW strategy. That's why I enjoy following your blog, I like how you kept true to the spirit of the game and flirt with many game systems, including old Warhammer editions.
ReplyDeleteI'm curious, does the Old World justify this come back lore-wise? Or it's just getting back at the period right before the End of Time?
I was really skeptical for a long time. The initial announcement of the game was suspiciously on top of the release of a new edition of Kings of War, despite them having nothing to actually show until years later. However, now that it has actually materialised and really does seem to be offering what many people want, I'm feeling less cynical about it. Lore-wise, the game is set 300 years before the End Times. The End Times will still happen just as they did, but this is before that. So in some ways no, it does not justify a comeback in terms of something happening in the lore. But if people want stories and games set back in the setting they missed, this is what they're getting. As for rebasing, I was never really tempted to try AoS and was even less so when they started mandating round bases. So at least all I have to worry about is adapters to change size a bit... I still won't be rebasing thousands of models.
DeleteI like the look of what rules I've seen – a sort of greatest hits of Warhammer third to eighth editions – and I know JT-Y of old and trust him not to bugger it up.
ReplyDeleteThe new bases are fine in principle – a lot of models used to overhang, with toes poking off and weapons jutting out of their vertical space in a unit. Ranking and flanking benefits from either very constrained models (like the sixth edition Chaos Warriors) or a base big enough to accommodate an exciting pose. The only "problem" is that I own nine thousand points of assorted undead and have no interest whatsoever in rebasing them – most of the kitbashes wouldn't survive.
It all falls down around the prices. After many years of cheeky buggers trying to pay the mortgage with their dead lead, the WFB community has become used to daylight robbery, but it does rankle somewhat that the exact same kits I couldn't afford ten or twenty years ago are still making me wallet shy now that I'm an adult with real money.
I'll play it, but probably only with other grumpy grogs who are blowing dust off their old figures and not getting too sweaty about bases.