Category Archives: Games Workshop

Black Library, Book Reviews, Declan Waters, Games Workshop

Book Review – The Lost and the Damned

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Book 2 The Siege of Terra by Guy Hayley

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But this is only possible because of our wonderful Patreons. So, some articles over 1 year old will now display our Patreon request at the top of the article… like this one! Don’t worry, we are not adding ads – but if you can afford to donate to the site, we would definitely appreciate it. Membership is available from just £1/month (plus taxes!!)

Guy Hayley returns to the Horus Heresy in the second book from the Siege of Terra. This is the follow on series from Black Library and was made as a great ‘drop in’ point for those who lost track of the Horus Heresy series. I previously reviewed book 1, which can be found here.

From the book:

With the solar defences overcome through the devastating strength of the Traitor armada and the power of the warp, Horus launches his assault on the Throneworld in earnest. After withstanding a ferocious barrage of ordnance, an immense ground war commences outside the Palace with every inch gained paid for in the lives of billions.

On the thirteenth day of Secundus, the bombardment of Terra began… With the solar defences overcome through the devastating strength of the Traitor armada and the power of the warp, Horus launches his assault on the Throneworld in earnest. After withstanding a ferocious barrage of ordnance, an immense ground war commences outside the Palace with every inch gained paid for in the lives of billions. The front lines are beyond horrific and the very air is reduced to poison and blood. Bodies are thrown into the meatgrinder but the outer redoubts cannot possibly hold for long, even with the loyal primarchs to reinforce them. For Horus has his own generals to call upon… Between the plague weapons of Mortarion and the fury of Angron, the defenders face a losing battle. 

The Lost and the Damned includes the three Primarchs defending Terra from Horus and the attacks from Mortarion and Angron. Guy Hayley continues to tie together the threads of the battle, and as this book is based on Terra it is much easier to follow than Book 1 (which concentrated on the battle for the Sol system).

Sanguinius also makes his first appearance at the Siege, ignoring his brother Dorn’s instructions to stay behind the Wall, and going out to take the fight to the Heretics. His presence rallies the defenders and brings them hope that victory may be achieved… his appearance is great from a personal point of view, as I collect Blood Angels!

And similarly to much of the Horus Heresy series there are stories of ordinary defenders either from Astra Militarum regiments or from local PDFs.

A really good second book in the series – and definitely leaving me wanting to read the rest!

Rating: 4 out of 5.

We always encourage people to shop at local bricks and mortar stores, but if your friendly local book store doesn’t have this available, we have a UK Amazon affiliate link & a USA Amazon affiliate link for which Woehammer receives a small commission.

— Declan

Games Workshop, Hatchette Part Works, Peter Holland, Warhammer 40k

Warhammer 40,000: Imperium – Issue 5 Review

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I’ve managed to get some painting down this week, even if it is some base colours.

Primaris Lieutenant

The Primaris Lieutenant nears ever closer to being finished with just some detailing, his backpack and the base to go.

Necron Warriors

The Necron Warriors are also nearly finished with their weapons and bases to be finished.

Assault Intercessors

The Assault Intercessors are some way from being completed with only their white armour segments having been laid down so far.

Skorpekh Destroyers

The Skorpekh Destroyers have only had their base coat of Iron warriors metal completed.

Issue 5

So issue five is here with a shiny new Space Marine Captain who is unique to the Imperium series. I’m not a massive fan of the sculpt but I’ll paint it up and see how I feel about it when it’s done.

This issue sees the usual painting guides and construction guides for the captain as well as the now very loved (by me at least) fluff generator.

We also learn a little about the wargear of the Space Marines in the 41st millennium. There’s also a short story which introduces you to the Chaos Space Marines of Crimson Slaughter as they clash with a chapter of loyal primaris marines.

There’s another battle, this time the captain faces of against the three Skorpekh Destroyers from last issue.

Next week we have three Primaris Aggressors, which again is a full unit and excellent value for only £8. The week after there are no models but at two paints. That week should give me the opportunity to catch up on this ever growing back log at least…..

Solo Wargaming for your Favourite Games

I’m in the process of creating a series of Wargaming Aids which allow players to play their favourite games in a single player format against an AI controlled enemy army. To find out more on this click here.

For as little as £1 a month (the price of a chocolate bar) you can help support me in this endeavour and receive cool perks as a thank you, such as access to our Discord Server as well as downloadable copies of the gaming aids which you can print out and use at home.

Why not pop over to Patreon and sign up and help me in this project? Money raised will go towards making these as physical products.

Fantasy, Games Workshop, Peter Holland, Solo Wargaming, Warhammer 40k

The History of Wargaming – Part Two

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Part one

Following the developments of the three Johann’s wargames, wargaming attracted very little attention until 1870 when Prussia defeated France in the Franco-Prussian war.

This victory over France was claimed by many to do with Prussia and her wargaming tradition as Prussia had no tactical edge in weapons, numbers or the training of its troops. The only difference were the Prussians were the only army in the world to practice wargaming.

Following this the first Kreigsspiel manual was published in English for the British Army in 1872. While in America, Krieggspiel was introduced in 1882 and used on US Naval Colleges from 1894.

Little Wars (1913)

H.G. Wells developed the first set of rules to play miniature wargames in 1913. Known as Little Wars, these rules were intended to be basic and fun. They did not use dice or tables for attacks. Spring loaded cannons would fire pellets to physically knock over enemy models while models in hand to hand combat had a specific number of models removed depending on the sizes of the two forces in combat.

Little Wars never caught on, which was perhaps due to the World Wars and public sentiment towards those wars.

Jack Scruby (1955)

In 1955 a Californian named Jack Scruby began making inexpensive wargame miniatures out of type metal. However, his major contribution to the hobby was in creating a network of wargamers across the US and UK. At the time waragming was niche and wargamers struggled to find each other. Scruby organised the first wargaming convention which was attended by fourteen people. From 1957 to 1962, he self-published the world’s first wargaming magazine The War Game Digest through which gamers could publish their own rules and battle reports.

War Games (1962)

Meanwhile in the UK, Donald Featherstone had started writing a series of influential wargame rules which represented the first main stream publishing of the hobby since Little Wars in 1913. Titles such as War Games, Advanced Wargames and Solo Wargaming saw such an uplift in the popularity of the subject that many other authors were able to publish their own rules as well. This combined with emergence of popular miniature manufacturers such as Heroic & Ros meant that the UK hobbyists had a large collection of rules and miniatures to use.

In 1956, Tony Bath published what was the first ruleset for a miniature wargame set in the medieval period. These rules were a major inspiration for Gary Gygax’s Chainmail (1971), which in turn became the basis for the roleplaying game Dungeons and Dragons.

From 1983 to 2010, Games Workshop produced what was the first miniature wargame designed to be used with proprietary models: Warhammer Fantasy. Earlier miniature wargames were designed to be played using generic models that could be bought from any manufacturer, but Warhammer Fantasy’s setting featured original characters with distinctive visual designs, and their models were produced exclusively by Games Workshop.

Solo Wargaming for your Favourite Games

I’m in the process of creating a series of Wargaming Aids which allow players to play their favourite games in a single player format against an AI controlled enemy army. To find out more on this click here.

For as little as £1 a month (the price of a chocolate bar) you can help support me in this endeavour and receive cool perks as a thank you, such as access to our Discord Server as well as downloadable copies of the gaming aids which you can print out and use at home.

Why not pop over to Patreon and sign up and help me in this project? Money raised will go towards making these as physical products.

Age of Sigmar, Games Workshop, Peter Holland, Solo Wargaming

Solo Wargaming – Part 2

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Following on from my previous article, I wanted to share my progression to date and how I envision the whole system working once its up and running.

There will be a total of three different card decks used in any game.

Battleplan Deployment Deck

This deck comes with a cover card denoting how the deployment draw is carried out, what each objective number is and how to layout any scenery.

Battleplan Card

The deck also includes a number of other cards. A card is drawn for each Card Controlled unit in the army. This card then details how that unit will be deployed and in what order. The order of their deployment is determined by the number on the shield at the bottom of the card. This acts as an initiative order for deployment.

Battle Tactic Action Deck

There is an overall Battle Tactic card for each tactic in the game. At the beginning of the game you would take the overall cards for Monstrous Takeover, Ferocious Advance, Aggressive Expansion and Conquer and shuffle these together. One is then drawn at random which will be the Card Controlled army’s Battle Tactic that turn. The following turn the Broken Ranks battle card is added in and the one used in the previous turn discarded. In turn three the remaining battle tactic cards are added with used cards continually being discarded.

The Broken Ranks Battle Tactic Card

The Battle Tactic Deck which contains the actions for the units are then shuffled together with 1/5 of the deck of Battleplan Action Cards and one of these is drawn for each Card Controlled unit in the game that turn. These cards denote how and when these units move and shoot etc.

Broken Ranks Action Card

I have started a Patreon for anyone who is wishing to support me in this endeavour, and you can support from as little as £1 per month. Proceeds of Patreon will go towards making these into Physical products.

Solo Wargaming for your Favourite Games

I’m in the process of creating a series of Wargaming Aids which allow players to play their favourite games in a single player format against an AI controlled enemy army. To find out more on this click here.

For as little as £1 a month (the price of a chocolate bar) you can help support me in this endeavour and receive cool perks as a thank you, such as access to our Discord Server as well as downloadable copies of the gaming aids which you can print out and use at home.

Why not pop over to Patreon and sign up and help me in this project? Money raised will go towards making these as physical products.

A Life in Wargames, Black Powder, Bolt Action, Games Workshop, Mordheim, Peter Holland, Warhammer 40k, Warlord Games, Warmaster

Rick Priestley – A Life in Wargames

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Welcome to Woehammer – have you noticed the lovely feeling of no adverts (ads), no pop-ups and no auto-playing videos? Well, that’s the norm here at Woehammer.

But this is only possible because of our wonderful Patreons. So, some articles over 1 year old will now display our Patreon request at the top of the article… like this one! Don’t worry, we are not adding ads – but if you can afford to donate to the site, we would definitely appreciate it. Membership is available from just £1/month (plus taxes!!)

Rick Priestley alongside Jervis Johnson, Alessio Cavatore and Andy Chambers is perhaps one of the most well known game designers of our era.

Rick Priestley grew up in Lincoln and dtart d writing wargames as a teenager with his friend Richard Halliwell. In 1979 the pair wrote their first game Reaper while still in school. Tabletop Games (a small games publishing company with no sales output) printed their rules and they contacted Brian Ansell who worked for Asgard Miniatures at the time before his move to Citadel Miniatures. Brian Ansell put them in contact with Nottingham Toy Soldier Shop who agreed to sell the Reaper rules.

Halliwell & Preistley’s first game

With one rulebook for sale, Halliwell and Priestley collaborated on a second effort, a science fiction miniatures wargame titled Combat 3000, also published by Tabletop, that used 15mm/25mm “space marine” miniatures from Asgard. Around this time Brian Ansell left Asgard Miniatures, and with backing from Games Workshop set up Citadel Miniatures.

Priestley joined Games Workshop in 1982 as part of their subsidiary company Citadel Miniatures. At that time Citadel produced the miniatures for use in Dungeons and Dragons. Brian Ansell the manager of Citadel asked Richard Halliwell to develop Games Workshops’ first in-house game, Warhammer Fantasy Battles and Rick Priestley and Tony Ackland developed the product. Warhammer Fantasy contained many of the core mechanics or Priestley and Halliwell’s earlier game Reaper. Warhammer Fantasy was released in 1983 and was a huge success.

It allowed them a vehicle through which they could sell their own Citadel Miniatures. Earlier miniature wargames were designed to be played using generic models that could be bought from any manufacturer, but Warhammer Fantasy’s setting featured original characters with distinctive visual designs, and their models were produced exclusively by Games Workshop. This paved the way for Games Workshop to become the company it is today – all thanks to the three men who developed that first game.

Since before his time at Games Workshop Priestley had been working on a set of rules of Spaceship Combat called Rogue Trader which mixed Science fiction and fantasy elements. Priestley incorporated many aspects of this setting such as the lore and space travel into Warhammer 40,000 and dropped the ship combat element due to not having enough room in the book.

Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader

Games Workshop planned to sell conversion kits for their fantasy line to make them useable in Rogue Trader but eventually decided to instead dedicate an entire production line to the game and in 1987 Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader was born.

During his years with Games Workshop he was involved in the design of virtually all of their top games such as Necromunda, Mordheim, Warmaster, Lord of the Rings, Gorkamorka, Mighty Empires and Warhammer Ancient Battles (affectionately known as WAB by those in Historical gaming circles).

Warhammer Ancient Battles (WAB)

Rick Priestley left Games Workshop in 2009 stating that the corporate culture had grown too focused on sales and no longer cared about innovation in Games Design. He expanded on his view of Games Workshop in an article with Bell of Lost Souls in March 2015. In that, his thoughts on where Games Workshop was heading, was as a manufacturer of collectible miniatures and not games design.

After Games Workshop, Priestley co-founded Warlord Games which after Games Workshop is arguably the next biggest games and miniature manufacturer in Europe.

With Warlord Games, Rick Priestley has continued to develop fantastic wargame rulesets and being no longer held back by Games Workshop, these have included historical as well as Fantasy and Sci-Fi. The biggest games at Warlord such as Bolt Action, Black Powder, Gates of Antares, Hail Caesar, Pike and Shotte and Warlords or Erehwon have all been designed with Priestley’s input.

Bolt Action

In 2011 Rick Priestley was elected to the committee of the Society of Ancients. The Society of Ancients is a non-profit organisation that intends to promote interest in Ancient and Medieval history and wargaming.

This man is a true legend of Wargaming, is the father of Warhammer Fantasy and Warhammer 40,000 and has done a lot that Games Workshop fans and historical wargaming fans have to thank him for.

I have tried to give a flavour of the 115+ rules and add-on’s he’s developed below. But as with Jervis’ article, this really does not even scrape the surface as to the lore and depth of his many games. Rick, thank you! I can’t wait to see what you come up with next.

Sources

Board Game Geek

Wikipedia – Warhammer 40,000

Warlord Games

Bell of Lost Souls

Wikipedia – Wargame

Wikipedia – Rick Priestley

Wikipedia – Richard Halliwell

Solo Wargaming for your Favourite Games

I’m in the process of creating a series of Wargaming Aids which allow players to play their favourite games in a single player format against an AI controlled enemy army. To find out more on this click here.

For as little as £1 a month (the price of a chocolate bar) you can help support me in this endeavour and receive cool perks as a thank you, such as access to our Discord Server as well as downloadable copies of the gaming aids which you can print out and use at home.

Why not pop over to Patreon and sign up and help me in this project? Money raised will go towards making these as physical products.

The Woeful Brush Painting Competition Sponsored by SCN Hobby World

Closing date for entries 30th November. £1 entry, win your choice of a Start Collecting or Combat Patrol box set!

LINK

Age of Sigmar, Games Workshop, Peter Holland, Warhammer 40k

#Woehammer Roundup 17th October 2021

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Two submissions this week under the #Woehammer on Twitter. Both members of the team.

If you want to see your miniatures on the site remember to use the hashtag #woehammer either on Twitter or Instagram.

Dave has started a new 40k 9th Edition army, this time focusing on the Space Marine Chapter the Imperial Fists. The model below is his first Marine for the army, and I think you’ll agree its a stunner!

Dave’s Imperial Fist

Dave has gone for an awesome golden yellow armour tone and black trim denoting the 5th Company.

The detail on the base is great, and I especially love the coiled barbed wire and spent casings next to the dismembered head.

It’s little different this week for Declan’s submission, here we have an army shot of the force he took to Mancunian Carnage last weekend.

The blue armour really stands out along with the spots of Red. Declan has joked in the past that his Orcs have been called the Crimson Fists. It’s a great army and Declan finished the weekend 3-2!

And talking of Declan’s fantastic tournament performance, only yesterday he was interviewed by the AOS Coach on YouTube about the Gloomspite Gitz! I’ve included the video below for you to watch.

Remember to use the #woehammer for your painting. While you’re at it why don’t you check out our painting competition below where you could win a Start Collecting or Combat Patrol box of your choice all thanks to our sponsors SCN Hobby World. By signing up to their mailing list you receive 25% off all GW products or 15% for the web only products.

The Woeful Brush Painting Competition Sponsored by SCN Hobby World

Closing date for entries 30th November. £1 entry, win your choice of a Start Collecting or Combat Patrol box set!

LINK

Solo Wargaming for your Favourite Games

I’m in the process of creating a series of Wargaming Aids which allow players to play their favourite games in a single player format against an AI controlled enemy army. To find out more on this click here.

For as little as £1 a month (the price of a chocolate bar) you can help support me in this endeavour and receive cool perks as a thank you, such as access to our Discord Server as well as downloadable copies of the gaming aids which you can print out and use at home.

Why not pop over to Patreon and sign up and help me in this project? Money raised will go towards making these as physical products.

Fantasy, Games Workshop, Warlord Games

This Weekends Releases 16th October 2021

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This weekend Games Workshop releases their latest Warhammer Underworlds boxed set Harrow Deep.

This week’s GW releases

Warlord are releasing a massive amount of kits for Blood Red Skies, Hail Caesar and Black Powder.

Mordiphius have a number of new releases for their fall out miniatures game.

Reaper Miniatures have a massive amount of sets being released this month.

Solo Wargaming for your Favourite Games

I’m in the process of creating a series of Wargaming Aids which allow players to play their favourite games in a single player format against an AI controlled enemy army. To find out more on this click here.

For as little as £1 a month (the price of a chocolate bar) you can help support me in this endeavour and receive cool perks as a thank you, such as access to our Discord Server as well as downloadable copies of the gaming aids which you can print out and use at home.

Why not pop over to Patreon and sign up and help me in this project? Money raised will go towards making these as physical products.

The Woeful Brush Painting Competition Sponsored by SCN Hobby World

Closing date for entries 30th November. £1 entry, win your choice of a Start Collecting or Combat Patrol box set!

LINK

Book Reviews, Games Workshop

Book Review – Beast Arises Books 2-4

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Predator, Prey by Rob Sanders; The Emperor Expects by Gav Thorpe; The Last Wall by David Annandale

Welcome to Woehammer – have you noticed the lovely feeling of no adverts (ads), no pop-ups and no auto-playing videos? Well, that’s the norm here at Woehammer.

But this is only possible because of our wonderful Patreons. So, some articles over 1 year old will now display our Patreon request at the top of the article… like this one! Don’t worry, we are not adding ads – but if you can afford to donate to the site, we would definitely appreciate it. Membership is available from just £1/month (plus taxes!!)

As mentioned in my previous book review on I Am Slaughter by Dan Abnett, The Beast Arises series is now available in compilation E-books. The first of these – Beast Arises Volume 1 – contains the first four books. If you missed that review it can be found here…

There are some spoilers for later in the series included below… you have been warned!!

If you’re keen to hear my opinion on books 2 – 4 just read on:

Predator, Prey by Rob Sanders

This is a great fun, quick to read addition to the story. The Orks are starting to threaten the security and survivability of the Imperium and the Lords of Terra are starting to believe that this may be a threat they need to engage. It’s unashamedly pulp-fiction but it’s fun pulp!

The Emperor Expects by Gav Thorpe

The Beast Ork invasion is ongoing and threatening the Imperium whilst the High Lords of Terra are being taken over by the Navy… who really need to be killing Orks.

More characters are being introduced, and some expansion on the power, prestige, and inertia of the High Lords of Terra continues to add interesting twists to the story. This is still very much about the Imperium though, and whilst the Orks are the greatest threat since the Horus Heresy, there is little included about them.

A great, fast paced addition to the Beast / Ork Invasion series.

The Last Wall by David Annandale

An Ork moon sits over Terra and the Space Marines designated to guard Holy Terra are destroyed… what’s worse, the Black Templars and other successor chapters of the Imperial Fists are too far away to make it back in time.

The High Lords call on volunteers and the Astra Militarum (Imperial Guard) to assault the Ork Attack Moon. With the help of the Imperial Navy, and their transport vessels can they make it through and destroy the Moon?

The fourth in the series – another short novella lengths story – they continue to be interesting stories from the 31st Millenium, but do lack for any overarching peril in the story telling. Whilst people and ships can die, we know that the Imperium eventually overcomes the threat.

Some interesting ideas, and fun set pieces – the first four books are an fun light read.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

— Declan

Games Workshop, Hatchette Part Works, Warhammer 40k

Warhammer 40,000: Imperium – Issue 4

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Previous posts:

Issue 1
Issue 2
Issue 3

Unfortunately my work week has been extremely busy this week and I’ve not managed to get any painting time in yet. This means that my Imperium backlog is slowly mounting up, with the list now standing at:

  • Space Marine Lieutenant
  • 3 Assault Intercessors
  • 3 Necron Warriors
  • 3 Skorpekh Destroyers
  • 1 Plasmacyte

Still, with the paint scheme I’m going for on the Necrons, I know those at least will be fairly quick to do.

Issue 4

I mentioned at the end of the article last week what good value issue 4 is, and its worth repeating now. In this issue you receive a pot of Leadbelcher paint worth £2.75 plus three Skorpekh Destroyers and a Plasmacyte. As I also mentioned the equivalent kit on Games Workshop goes for £34.50 on the Games Workshop site:

For an issue worth £8 this is a bargain, with nearly £40 worth of goodies included. You’re also given a lovely thick battle matt to replace the smaller one given to you in issue 1.

The issue itself is the same as the others so far with lore, building and painting guides. The lore this week covers the creation of a Space Marine and their progression within a chapter. You’re given the obligatory battle record for the Skorpekh Destroyers and the more I see of these battle records the more I love them.

You’re also given the biggest battle to date where you can line up your Lieutenant and Assault Intercessors against the Skorpekh Destroyers and Plasmacyte. I will play through these scenarios once I have painted the models and post the results here to create my own little story of the war between the Void Dragons and Necrons.

Next weeks issue sees a Space Marine Captain enter the fray, and this model is one that is unique to the Imperium magazine series as it is currently unavailable through the Games Workshop website.

Solo Wargaming for your Favourite Games

I’m in the process of creating a series of Wargaming Aids which allow players to play their favourite games in a single player format against an AI controlled enemy army. To find out more on this click here.

For as little as £1 a month (the price of a chocolate bar) you can help support me in this endeavour and receive cool perks as a thank you, such as access to our Discord Server as well as downloadable copies of the gaming aids which you can print out and use at home.

Why not pop over to Patreon and sign up and help me in this project? Money raised will go towards making these as physical products.

The Woeful Brush Painting Competition Sponsored by SCN Hobby World

Closing date for entries 30th November. £1 entry, win your choice of a Start Collecting or Combat Patrol box set!

LINK

Age of Sigmar, Games Workshop, Solo Wargaming

Solo Wargaming in Age of Sigmar

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I’ve been toying with the idea for a while now on creating a solo wargaming experience for wargames, but primarily at this point focused on Age of Sigmar.

The idea behind the system is relatively simple, with a deck of cards for each battle tactic. The battle tactics will be decided some simple mechanics at the start of the turn, and depending on which is chosen that deck of cards would be used.

Each faction would be classed as either Aggressive, Neutral or Cautious. For example an army such as Orruk Warclans would be Aggressive, Cities of Sigmar Neutral and Kharadron Overlords would be Cautious. This categories would have purpose when units are interacting with objectives on the battlefield.

When an AI unit is near an objective, you would roll a D6 and refer to their aggression level:

Aggressive4+
Neutral5+
Cautious6+

If the score is equal to or higher than these scores then the AI unit will draw a card from the deck and carry out its instructions.

These would be on regular playing card size cards and a card would be drawn for each AI unit on the battlefield.

Below is an example card from the Broken Ranks deck that I’ve created for Age of Sigmar.

Based on the units keywords you would choose the relevant box for its instructions. For example Orruk Brutes may be classed as Melee, while Archeon could be classed as a Monster or as a Hero, however as the Monster box is above the Hero box on this card the Monster box takes priority.

I am developing these not only for AoS but for other major game systems as well. It’s early days by I’m hoping to have the first full deck ready to download from my Patreon page in the next couple of months.

If you’re interested in joining and supporting me on Patreon then please follow this link. You can become a supporter for as little as £1 per month.

The Woeful Brush Painting Competition Sponsored by SCN Hobby World

Closing date for entries 30th November. £1 entry, win your choice of a Start Collecting or Combat Patrol box set!

LINK