Warhammer Oldworld Update, Was I Right?
Back in November 2019 I made three speculations as to what to expect from the secret Warhammer Oldworld project when it is finally launched.
Just today, at the time of writing, an update on the progress of the upcoming Warhammer Oldworld has popped up on the Warhammer Community site.
Square Bases and Kislev Ascendant – See Your Questions About Warhammer: The Old World Answered
In it all three of my speculations have been answered. Which, if any, did I get right?
Speculation One: Darklands
My first speculation was that the Warhammer Oldworld would open up new territory in the Darklands to the east of the Empire. This is based on the expected two to three year development time resulting in a release coinciding with Total War Warhammer III which likewise seemed likely to do something with the Darklands.
Well from the update we received today it seems that Kislev in Warhammer Oldworld will be larger and extend further east. I am going to say I was a bit right there.
A nice bonus is that Kislev seems likely to get a full faction treatment. It seems Kislev may even be the core human faction given that they are saying that Kislev was a mighty empire at this time. Kislev may be for Warhammer Oldworld what the Empire was for Warhammer Fantasy Battles.
Speculation Two: Epic Scale
My second speculation was that Warhammer Oldworld could see a scale change from 28mm to something like 10mm or 15mm. Well here I was completely wrong, sadly. The update from on Warhammer Community confirms that Warhammer Oldworld will be on the same scale as Warhammer Fantasy Battles.
Speculation Three: Period Change to the First Age of Sigmar
My third speculation was that Warhammer Oldworld would see a period change from Warhammer Fantasy Battles. Specifically I thought they might go back to what we might retrospectively call the First Age of Sigmar. This was the time when Sigmar became the first emperor of mankind before later becoming a god.
Well the update today says that there will indeed be a period change but they will be going back to a different more recent time.
Keen-eyed observers will have gleaned by now that Warhammer: The Old World is going to be set several hundred years before the End Times, so there’s plenty of space to explore the history of the setting. Especially knowledgeable students may also note this puts us just before another calamitous Chaos invasion, and one which, while central to the story of the Empire and the entire Old World, was barely touched on in previous iterations…
– Warhammer Community
I just checked a copy of The Empire Army Book for the fourth edition of Warhammer Fantasy Battles and I believe this will be the year 2302-2304 on the Empire’s calendar. At this time Magnus the Pious is the Emperor of the Empire and there is a great war between a chaos incursion and an alliance between Kislev and the Empire.
This time is only two centuries before the reign of Karl Franz which was the current time for Warhammer Fantasy Battles.
I am going to give myself half a point here since I was at least right about the change of period even if I did not get the right period.
Score?
So what was the score for how many of my speculations were correct?
First: 1 point. Second: 0 points. Third: 1/2 point. One and half points out of three. Could have been worse (shrug).
New Speculations!
Since the time period will only be slightly earlier than that of the End Times it may be that most factions will be very similar to how they were in Warhammer Fantasy Battles. Perhaps the Empire will have less gunpowder weapons and perhaps no steam tanks.
Bretonnia likely will be same as before. Kislev too, although I think we can expect a much larger range of models for them. Seemingly Kislev is the great empire of this time.
Box Set
Very likely the opening release will be a box set like Isle of Blood or Battle for Skull Pass. The protagonists for this box would most likely be Kislev and a Chaos faction, perhaps Chaos Dwarfs or Norsca. That is my guess.
True Scale?
I have already noted that Games Workshop’s new models seem to be moving away from the warped proportions of heroic scale. Becoming true scale so to speak. I certainly hope that new releases for Warhammer Oldworld will too. Perhaps my planned project True Scale Warhammer Fantasy Battles will simply be Project Warhammer Oldworld in the end. Nice.
Other Revelations
The update mentions that the rules will be pulling from all the editions of Warhammer Fantasy Battles from 3rd to 8th edition. I suppose that is just fine. In terms of the rules it seems that Warhammer Oldworld be essentially just the 9th edition of Warhammer Fantasy Battles.
Do you think you will take up The Old World when it comes out?
Share this article to my twitter @SolarCrossGames or my reddit community r/SolarCrossGames and let’s chat about it.
