The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread

[Condottiere]

Ha, maybe, would have been early 1990s, Warhammer came in a box with high elves and goblins. Dwarves could not cast spells, and wardancers were by far the most effective wood elf unit (though treemen had their moments too).

That's 4th Edition with the rulebooks looking like they were bound from photocopies. Spent over a year reading White Dwarf, when it had small font and plenty of text, before acquiring the 3rd Edition softcover, but by the time I convinced my parents to get me Warhammer Armies, it'd been removed and replaced with another edition. Considering the orgy of colors and photos in the 3rd Ed book, I was disappointed with what came out of the boxed set, but now I know the reason for the lower production standards.

Wardancers were super, but the prior edition's rules had more details and High Elves had access to Sea Elf Wardancers, though I don't recall any specific sculpts. I didn't mind the Runecasters, but it would've been nice to have the option for spellcasters, maybe hailing from the expat community in the Empire, as their stats were awful - I guess GW wanted to differentiate from D&D.     

[Lost Egg]

The head and sword arm look like they are from a different kit.

[Hobgoblin]

Might have been 2 or 3.

Definitely BS 3 for Orcs in both of those - were you robbed of untold arrow-based victories by dishonest opponents?!!

I quite like those Orcs and I think they're my favourite slotta-based ones - I think they're the first generation slottas. But my all time faves will always be the pre-slotta C-series guys.

Yes, those are the first slotta ones, though they share a lot of bodies and heads with the preslotta ones. The big difference, I think, is that the slotta-based ones got that consistent look with the underbite and upward-pointing tusks, whereas the earlier ones had that weird and wonderful variety of facial types - like that really hideous one with the long jaw that you've painted so well a couple of times.

Now I think about it, I wonder if that new uniformity was driven by the LotR range. Certainly, that first slotta-based range and their LotR peers are more physically coherent - more of a Middle Earth 'people' than the D&D-ish underworld monstrosities of the pres-slotta range, with their walrus tusks and huge fangs and elongated snouts.

[Cubs]

Definitely BS 3 for Orcs in both of those - were you robbed of untold arrow-based victories by dishonest opponents?!!

I'm a confused old man … stop hassling me.

Certainly, that first slotta-based range and their LotR peers are more physically coherent - more of a Middle Earth 'people' than the D&D-ish underworld monstrosities of the pres-slotta range, with their walrus tusks and huge fangs and elongated snouts.

Yeah, those early pre-slottas still seem very much like deformed humanoid stylie beastmen or sea demons or whatnot, before shaking out into the recognised ape-pig style things they later became.

[Charlie_]

Ha, maybe, would have been early 1990s, Warhammer came in a box with high elves and goblins. Dwarves could not cast spells, and wardancers were by far the most effective wood elf unit (though treemen had their moments too).

That's 4th edition.

My entrance into Warhammer was that box set, but mine was second hand and didn't have the rulebooks!!! It did have the quick reference playsheets though, which is how I learnt the basic rules. It had the plastic high elves and goblins, a couple of card buildings, bright green card movement trays, some cardboard cutouts of a bolt thrower, Eltharion the Grim, Grom the Paunch, an orc shaman on a wyvern and an orc stone thrower.... to use until you bought the models of course. And I think it had a few of the  magic item cards.... I remember Sword of Teclis. I also had a White Dwarf from the same era, which had among other things showcases of the metal High Elves that were released alongside the plastics in the box set (which I absolutely fell in love with), and a battle report with Dwarfs vs Bretonnians (the latter in their pre-Arthurian rendition, when they were basically just medieval French).

By the time I actually got a friend interested in collecting Warhammer with me, the 5th edition was out. (For all I know actually it might have already been out when I got my 2nd hand 4th edition stuff). He promptly got the 5th edition starter set, with plastic Bretonnians and Lizardmen... and RULEBOOKS! So I could actually learn how the rules worked in full. Borrowing his rulebooks of course, my pocket money didn't stretch that far. He also somehow got hold of a complete Lizardman army with all the new metal releases (i.e. his parents bought it all for him, and I think his dad painted it all..... I always suspected he'd never painted anything himself, as after this initial purchase and painting spree all his new things were fielded unpainted and often half-assembled!)
He also got the Magic supplement with the hundreds of cards for all the different spells and magic items....
Whilst i was still saving up my pocket money and adding to my beloved High Elf army one blister pack at a time! The 5th edition High Elf army book was read through over and over again.


Somewhere along the way we got hold of a MASSIVE haul of old White Dwarf issues from a carboot sale, all dating from the 3rd edition days (or earlier). I had hours of fun reading through them and was amazed at the Warhammer that was before we got into it. And it had ROLEPLAY scenarios, I hadn't a clue what they were about at first.... the statlines had extra stats like 'intelligence' and 'willpower'! I really loved the old-school look of the 3rd edition era I saw in these WD issues, and decided to order loads of the old Wood Elf sculpts - this was back when if you could find the codes online, you could call up mail order and order them one by one....

Somewhere around that time Mordheim came out, and we both got into that and probably played it more than WFB, got a few friends into it too. That was a seriously good game for its time.

The 6th edition of WFB came out shortly afterwards which I remember was VERY exciting, new plastic sets for all the armies, new rulebooks, new army books, certain armies getting complete overhauls! I liked the rule changes at the time, it did make for better, smoother games.

And then we actually got hold of the WFRP rulebook and pretty much switched just to Roleplay, with me as the Gamesmaster for a year or two... Before we outgrew it a bit, went our separate ways....




Just a trip down memory lane there.

[JamesValentine]

Iceman's the Ice Cream Man...

Who's that figure supposed to represent? The mail looks worse than what I've seen on 80s MM60 sculpts...

It's supposed to be Eowyn from Lord of the rings.
We also get a crippled horse and deformed hobbit

[Lost Egg]

   That horse posing is hilarious...it's almost a caption contest.

[Belligerentparrot]

I'm getting the impression that GW are directing their best sculpting talent to areas other than LoTR 

[Hobgoblin]

Always thought Orcs would go in for shooting though (all forms of killing would appeal to them), and could easily imagine them with guns actually. But that might be the early 90s Ork fluff (the louder the explosion the better) seeping into my fantasy tropes.

Might you have got it from The Hobbit?

It is not unlikely that they invented some of the machines that have since troubled the world, especially the ingenious devices for killing large numbers of people at once, for wheels and engines and explosions always delighted them, and also not working with their own hands more than they could help; but in those days and those wild parts they had not advanced (as it is called) so far.

[Cubs]

Sometimes you just have to wonder who rubber-stamped those designs through quality control, "Meh, it'll do!"

[Condottiere]

It's supposed to be Eowyn from Lord of the rings.
We also get a crippled horse and deformed hobbit

Eowyn?!?



Seriously, what was wrong with the older sculpts? Even redone in Finecast it looks better than this version...

[Belligerentparrot]

Just a trip down memory lane there.

A lovely trip! I have no fond memories of Warhammer 4th ed, because I chose to play Dark Elves. I painfully saved up over $100NZD for a 10-man unit of Cold One riders, which were then completely fucking useless (heavy cavalry with a 4+ save, I don't think so). Even the assassins sucked, as they couldn't beat heroes tooled up with magic items once the magic supplement came out.
I mean, it wasn't like we were playing that competitively or anything, but the DE army just didn't have anything fun. You set up your minis, they died without doing much, you wished you'd played 2nd ed. Space Marine instead.

[von Lucky]

Filled in the survey. Wasn't too bad, and I think shows GW willing to see where it should direct its efforts/resources.

And learnt something new, that Canadians need to answer a skill-testing question:
https://www.thebalanceeveryday.com/why-have-skill-testing-questions-for-sweepstakes-896839

(And that the Canadian province of Quebec has annexed Rhode Island without us knowing.)

[JamesValentine]

Eowyn?!?



Seriously, what was wrong with the older sculpts? Even redone in Finecast it looks better than this version...

It's odd how so much perry stuff they seem to want to replace. Gives me the impression they want no association with them.
But under the license the figures were supposed to be signed off by the actors...
Something tells me that's not the case or someone isn't bothering.

[Coenus Scaldingus]

More just very slowly phasing out metal (and finecast) products. As they've been doing for years.