Warhammer Old World

Warhammer

Over on the Warhammer Community site they have announced how Warhammer Old World will be released.

They won’t be doing a huge launch boxed set, instead, in the first instance they will be releasing two army boxes, Tomb Kings of Khemri, and The Kingdom of Bretonnia. These each contain a 1250 point army.

It will be interesting to see how these are priced, considering each box contains nearly a hundred miniatures, and a huge army centrepiece. You also get the 352-page hardback Warhammer: The Old World rulebook.

As well as the boxed sets the rulebook will be available separately.

The rulebook will also be available separately. This weighty 352-page tome features over 70 pages of background on the World of Legend, plus Core and Advanced rules for the game, an explanation of the Winds of Magic and rules for casting spells, a gallery of armies painted by the ’Eavy Metal studio, and rules for building armies and setting up your battlefields.

I do like how the two army books are called Forces of Fantasy and Ravening Hordes.

Forces of Fantasy is a 192-page book covering five factions: the Dwarfen Mountain Holds, the Empire of Man, the Kingdom of Bretonnia, the Wood Elf Realms, and the High Elf Realms. Ravening Hordes contains all your Evil factions – it’s a 160-page  containing similar material for the Orc and Goblin Tribes, the Warriors of Chaos, the Beastmen Brayherds, and the Tomb Kings of Khemri.

Forces of Fantasy was the name of the first Warhammer (1st Edition) supplement. Whilst Ravening Hordes was the army list for second edition. I bought both of those back in the day!

I am tempted by the Tomb Kings of Khemri boxed set, as I always liked the idea of an undead skeleton army. I had some metal skeletons back in the day.

I am also thinking of rebooting my original Dwarf army as well. Then again I always liked Orcs and Goblins.

As for a release date, no idea.

The Bretonnian Joust

The Bretonnian Joust

I have always liked this jousting diorama, The Bretonnian Joust, by Dave Andrews which won the Open Competition in the 1996 Golden Demon awards. The level of detail is outstanding. There are hoof marks in the ground, created using clay. The manuscript on the back is handwritten.

More photographs of The Joust.

 

Louen Leoncoeur

Louen Leoncoeur, the Lionhearted, also known as the Lion of Bretonnia and the Golden Paladin, is the Duke of Couronne, one of the almighty Grail Knights and the penultimate warrior-King of Bretonnia. He is renowned as a noble and just ruler. Fairness in all matters is his watchword, never allowing the law as written to compromise its noble intent, never refusing anyone a hearing in his presence to air grievances of which must be judged.

Louen Leoncoeur charges into the fray atop his noble Hippogryph Beaquis
Louen Leoncoeur charges into the fray atop his noble Hippogryph Beaquis

Wearing the blessed Crown of Bretonnia, and wielding the legendary Sword of Couronne – forged from exquisite Bretonnian silverine – the fearsome Royarch comes to smite evil from his lands.

Bretonnia Miniatures Gallery

Duels

This lovely St George’esque Bretonnian Knight was one of many duel dioramas which were on display at Warhammer World. The knight is facing down a lovely red dragon (which I didn’t photograph).

I really like the scenic base, which is nice and rocky.

This is one half of an Elven duel, this was the High Elf, his opponent was a Dark Elf on a Cold One.

This is a Warhammer 40000 duel between a Space Marine Chaplin and an Exodite Eldar. The Chaplin is riding a bike.

The Exodite Eldar is on a lizard.

Exodite Eldar

The Exodites were a concept that had Eldar using giant lizards as mounts and large mounts for weapons (in a similar way to Elephants or Squiggoths). It was never taken further by Citadel, though some Epic concepts were sculptured and cast, but never went on sale. The concept proved popular with some and as a result there is an unofficial codex out on the tubes and some lovely models such as this one.

This was a Golden Demon winning Duel which I photographed on my most recent visit to Warhammer World in January 2020.

I first photographed the duel on a visit to Warhammer World back in 2007.

pace Marine Chaplin on a bike fighting an Eldar Exodite on a giant lizard

 

Classic Golden Demon: The Bretonnian Joust

Dave Andrews' Bretonnian Joust diorama 1996

I have always liked this jousting diorama, The Bretonnian Joust, by Dave Andrews which won the Open Competition in the 1996 Golden Demon awards. The level of detail is outstanding. There are hoof marks in the ground, created using clay. The manuscript on the back is handwritten.

Dave Andrews' Bretonnian Joust diorama 1996

Across the diorama are lots of figures adding to the story. The pavilion is made from foil, but is painted to look like cloth.

Dave Andrews' Bretonnian Joust diorama 1996

Some more photographs and details about the model can be found  here.

Bretonnian Miniatures from ten years ago…

These are the three-ups that were used to create the Citadel Bretonnians from ten years ago.

Things have improved since then, but I still think the quality back then was still pretty good. True though you had limited poses and therefore a lot of uniformity (something which works for WHFB but less so for WH40K).

Compared to the first plastics that Citadel did (a long time ago) these are fantastic.

With the new 3D scanning and laser technology Citadel are now using, it will be interesting to see where they go now!

Bretonnian Trebuchet

This Bretonnian Trebuchet from the talented hands of Martin Footitt was a Golden Demon Open Category Winner.

Of course I was taking photographs before the winners announce, and over the weekend I got my (UK edition of) White Dwarf which came with the free Golden Demon winners booklet. This was nice not only because they didn’t try and sell it like they did last year in WHSmith… but also I found many of the miniatures I had seen and liked enough to photograph had in fact been winners.