Warhammer is Back, Baby!

I have finally finished reading the rulebook, and had my first game of Warhammer: The Old World!

 

I know Age of Sigmar 4th Edition is all the rage now, but because of its slow roll-out, restock issues, and my glacial pace, I'm just getting rolling with The Old World. But that's what I like about miniatures games– the slow pace.

Crafting a beautifully painted army is an investment of time, and the game should reflect that. Age of Sigmar's constant refresh rate always felt antithetical to collecting toy soldiers. You don't have to paint as many models (which, I thought was the entire point of collecting and painting toy soldiers), and if you try to, the game format or edition changes and invalidates your hard work. (To say nothing of the people who re-based their Warhammer armies onto round bases, only to have them dropped from the game altogether!)

So here's The Old World– One core rulebook, and one "army book." That's it. And, the rulebook has –get this– all of the rules and scenarios you need to actually set up and play the game. Neat! This is also likely to be the only rulebook for several years.

 

 

And I have to say, it feels just like the good old days of Warhammer Fantasy. I was concerned about the new way units are organized into their formations (Close Order, Open Order, and such), but it's not as involved as I thought it would be. I like the new combat resolution results (Give Ground, Fall Back in Good Order, and Break). They are a nice compromise to previous editions where combat was an all-or-nothing result where units were either wiped out or didn't move at all. Even the Unbreakable undead will be pushed back two inches when they lose combat.

Magic is the only thing that feels radically different, but I definitely prefer this to the 8th Edition "Winds of Magic" dice roll, which usually resulted in either nothing, or a 6-dice irresistible force casting of a unit-deletion spell. Now, every wizard gets the opportunity to cast all of the spells they know, and because there's no power or dispel dice generation, it can scale up with larger sized games.

Last week, I got together with my friend Jason. (Long-time readers might remember him and his orcs from the map campaign we played in 2014.) We put together simple 1000-point lists to try out the rules and see how everything worked. In addition to this being the first game of The Old World, I think this might also be the first miniatures game I've played with another person since 2020!

Jay's Orc & Goblin Tribes list was pretty straightforward, and included a little bit of everything– Boar Boys, a Rock Lobba, Arrer Boys, Stone Trolls, Lots of Orc Boyz and a small unit of Black Orcs. Leading it was a Black Orc Boss, and an Orc Shaman. 

 

 

I fielded my Vampire Counts– Two units of 20 Skeletons, 5 Blood Knights, 12 Ghouls, 6 Dire Wolves, and a Master Necromancer general, with a Wight Lord battle standard bearer and a Banshee.

 

Neither of us bothered with rebasing our models, as this was just a test game to feel everything out (although Jay has a few newly-painted models on the new base sizes). While I was down in South Jersey, I stopped by the hobby shop to pick up some styrene strips to build "spacer" movement trays. I'm pretty fortunate that most of the army stayed on the original base sizes– All of the 40mm models and monsters, and the dire wolves stayed the same. It's really just the basic infantry and cavalry that got bumped up. And I'm a little torn– I have so many models (specifically my grave guard) based on 4-man wide regimental strips which I can't just plunk into a spacer tray. It seems silly to rebase them onto 20mm bases only to space them out, so maybe I'll just put them on 25mms and be done with it. My black knights are all "loose" so I'll leave their bases alone and give them a spacer tray. (And man, they need that extra room!)

The game went pretty smoothly and was a lot of fun. I took the first turn and moved my battle line forward. I forgot to make the Vanguard Move for the wolves, and then forgot to use the Reserve Move to move the wolves and ghouls in the shooting phase. I'll have to get used to that– The Reserve Move rule for those units has sort of replaced being able to march while within 12 inches of the general from previous editions, and not every unit can do it.

 

 

My blood knights, however, can march on their own, and in the second turn, they were close enough to charge the unit with Jay's general in it, thanks to Swiftstride giving them +D6 inches to their charge range. They broke the unit, and it fled through the black orcs behind them and off the table! Jay also had bad luck with those stone trolls, failing their Stupidity test every turn. They never got out from behind that building.

 

 

In the early turns, Jay managed to score two hits on my skeletons, but I was able to resurrect most of them back. (Good old undead!) The Invocation of Nehek is now an ability, rather than a spell, that only necromancers have, which is a significant change. I gave my necromancer the Sceptre of De Noirot, which allowed him to use it twice. The range is limited, though, so I'll need to include a few necromancers if I want to spread the ability across the army.

The boar boyz charged my skeletons...

 

 

...And the arrer boyz charged the flank of my blood knights. They couldn't wheel to align, however, so it was a disordered charge, meaning they didn't get any Initiative bonus for charging. (That's another nice middle ground between previous editions where either the charging units always went first, or everything happened in in Initiative order. Now, fighting happens in Initiative order, but the charging unit gets a bonus to their Initiative, meaning they're more likely to strike first, but it's not a guarantee.)

 

 

The skeletons took a severe beating, and lost a lot of models to combat resolution and the Unstable rule, but managed to hang on.

 

 

In the following turn, the ghouls charged into their flank. The necromancer cast Spirit Leech, which dropped the Leadership of the boar boyz by -2. Then the banshee wailed at them, requiring them to take a Leadership test at a total of -4. (That's Ld 7 down to Ld 3!) Jay rolled higher than an 8, so the unit was wiped out.

 

 

On the other side of the battlefield, the blood knights, having survived the charge of the arrer boys, were finally wiped out in my turn, and Jay claimed my banner as a trophy. One of the issues we had to look up was whether the orc standard standard still counted as captured since the unit that claimed it was wiped out. 6th Edition had been very clear that banners were captured by the units that defeated the enemy, and could be reclaimed if that unit was subsequently wiped out. Unfortunately, there's nothing like that in The Old World– The banner is simply "a trophy" claimed by the winning side, and not necessarily assigned to any particular unit. And there is no way to reclaim the banner, so once it's captured, it just stays captured and counts as extra victory points at the end of the game.

 

 

Jay's orc mob charged my ghouls, but failed to do any damage to them. In my next turn, I charged with my other skeleton unit, and wailed again with the banshee. I see now why people are concerned about "screamer" lists. The Wailing Dirge, combined with Spirit Leech is devastating! Fortunately, you can only have one banshee per 1000 points, but the terrorgheists have it too... Yeesh.

 

 

After remembering that the dire wolves could move twice, they crossed the board quickly, and took out the rock lobba, carrying on into the arrer boys. That basically sealed the game. 

 

 

Jay and I had a great time. We didn't have to look up too many rules, and I wrote down some questions that I researched in more detail afterward and found concrete solutions to. I really like this edition of Warhammer; it's a nice blend of classic Fantasy, with some rules ported over from Warhammer Ancients. Magic has been dialed back to about where it was in 6th Edition– enhancing the game, rather than being the unit-deleting, game-winning phase that it was in 8th Edition. I'm happy that Skirmishers are "blobs" again, rather than ranked up like they were in 8th, although they can't be strung out too far, or the unit risks losing models if they can't reach the fighting rank when charged. Skirmishing archers also need to be careful with positioning, because models in their own unit now block line of sight.

I'm definitely looking forward to playing more, and can't wait to get my Tomb Kings up and running.

'Til next time!