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Warhammer fans around the world have been eagerly anticipating the return of the Old World, a beloved setting that has been absent from the Warhammer tabletop gaming scene for many years. For those unfamiliar, the Old World was the setting for Warhammer Fantasy Battles, a tabletop game that was first released in 1983 and ended its run in 2015.

However, in 2019, Games Workshop announced that they would be bringing back the Old World, much to the delight of fans. 

Much to the dismay of the fans, on the other hand, has been the very slow trickle of information that has come from the Games Workshop team. Admittedly, they said in that initial announcement that they were going to be moving slow. 

“You get the idea – this is a long way off. Years. More than two. Like three or more. Definitely not soon.” 

Now, that announcement was in 2019, and it has been years. More than two. More than three. So, while it was definitely not going to be coming soon then, it’s about time for us to be getting more information. 

And… information about Warhammer: The Old World has been annoyingly slow in coming. We get dribs and drabs, and they’re mostly just art and maps, and that’s not what people want. 

But is 2023 the year for Warhammer: The Old World? Predictions are running rampant, not the least of which is that this is going to be the 40th anniversary of Warhammer Fantasy, which seems like it ought to be a fairly obvious choice for releasing this big return to classic wargaming. 

Warhammer: The Old World–Everything We Know

What Happened to Warhammer: Fantasy Anyway?

A lot of things happened to Warhammer Fantasy, which I outlined in this article, but the general gist of it is a business decision: Warhammer Fantasy wasn’t selling well. Lots of people point to a lot of different reasons it wasn’t selling, but here are some highlights:

It Was Hard to Trademark

This might seem like a business sidenote, but according to Peachy on the Painting Phase podcast, the ability to trademark Warhammer Fantasy was a major issue. Any company could make orcs and dwarves and elves. But not every company could make Lumineth Realm-lords and Sylvaneth and Kharadron Overlords. The ability to trademark and therefore protect their intellectual property was a major factor in deciding what to do with Warhammer Fantasy. 

It Wasn’t Bringing in New Players

There were a lot of barriers to entry to get into Warhammer Fantasy, the two biggest being that it cost a lot of money and that it had a really thick tome of rules. New players to Warhammer were being drawn to easier-to-enter games, like Warhammer 40k, and they were ignoring Warhammer Fantasy. 

If the Warhammer Community is going to thrive, it needs new blood. And if Games Workshop is going to support a game, then it needs to bring in new players and sell more models. These things weren’t happening.

The Model Selection was Getting Boring

The rule that a big portion of your army had to come from core units meant that most games were very heavy on boring infantry units and the big cool units that you love and want to show off never got to play the game. 

One of the most egregious examples of this is that if you’re playing a 2000 point game, you were literally unable to bring Archaon at all. You could only spend 25% of your points on your HQ, and he was more than that, so you either needed to play massive games (2500 or 3000) or he was sidelined. 

And nobody wanted to play that many spearmen and swordsmen when the whole point of fantasy is dragons and giants and other monsters. 

The rules were THICK 

Now I have heard people say that the rules of Warhammer Fantasy at its end were no worse than the current rules bloat of Warhammer 40k, but if anything that’s a condemnation of Warhammer 40k, not an excuse for Warhammer Fantasy. The rule book–the core book, not the army books–was more than 500 pages. It wasn’t a book, it was a tome. 

Gameplay was… Boring

Now, this is a condemnation of a lot of rank and flank games, but a lot of them get away with it better because they’re smaller scale. The fact is that you can’t play a rank and flank 28mm wargame with a lot of terrain. So a Warhammer Fantasy board would be a blank table with two or three token pieces of obstructing terrain, and all the games felt very samey. 

In other words, Warhammer Fantasy was a stagnant game that, while it had (and still has) its ardent supporters, it wasn’t welcoming to new gamers who wanted exciting new units, easy-to-understand rules, and dynamic gameplay.

When is Warhammer: The Old World going to be released?

Like I said above, this has been teased since 2019, so it’s hard to nail anything down, especially since there has been a significant lack of anything in the way of model previews, rule previews, or even leaks–and everything at Games Workshop leaks. 

But if I were a betting man, I’d say that we’re going to see the major teaser trailer for Warhammer: The Old World at Warhammer Fest later this year. Of all the major reveal shows that Games Workshop does, this seems like the best option for the release. It won’t be Adepticon, and it won’t be GenCon, and it won’t be in the latter part of the year. 

This is going to be the first big in-person Warhammer Fest again for several years and my Warhammer prediction is that they’re going to make it a big deal. 

When Will Warhammer: The Old World Take Place?

We have confirmation that it’s going to be taking place in the past of the Old World, about 200 years before the End Times, during an era known as the Age of Three Emperors. This is interesting for reasons we’ll talk about in a minute, but this is an era of civil war in the Empire. Humans fighting against humans. 

Yes, there are other things going on, and the long-living Elves and Demons are all around during this time. So while we won’t see Emperor Karl Franz, we will still be seeing people like Teclis. 

And it’s not purely human vs human. There’s a big storyline of wars with the Orcs, and there’s another with the Vampire Counts. Those are going to certainly play a big part in the setting. But it’s interesting that they chose to put it here. 

From a storytelling point of view I would suppose that it’s done so that they can have the freedom they want to tell a variety of stories that do not interact with established canon of the End Times. This is a relatively blank slate with just a few big set pieces (like Gorbad’s Invasion) sprinkled in. 

What Factions Are Going to Be in Warhammer: The Old World?

Although not everything has been revealed in detail, we do know for almost 100% certainty that the following factions will be included in Warhammer: The Old World.

• The Empire
• Kislev
• Bretonnia
• Orcs
• High Elves
• Wood Elves
• Grand Cathay
• Tomb Kings

It’s probably safe to say that Chaos is also going to be involved, even if they haven’t been mentioned yet, as well as Skaven. And the reason for this is that Chaos and Skaven (and Seraphon) are among the current Age of Sigmar factions that have existed in both Age of Sigmar and Warhammer Fantasy. 

So, while not every Age of Sigmar player is going to have an army that hearkens back to Warhammer Fantasy days, many Age of Sigmar players will be able to translate their current armies into Warhammer: The Old World armies–if The Old World keeps these factions. 

Will Warhammer: The Old World Replace Warhammer Age of Sigmar?

The answer to this is a resounding no. Think of the revival of the Old World similar to the revival of The Horus Heresy. It’s probably going to get a lot of fanfare up front, and there will be a lot of big neat releases for it and a very tempting starter box, but The Horus Heresy is not coming close to touching Warhammer 40k, and The Old World will not come close to touching Age of Sigmar. 

And the reason for that is three fold:

Not a Lot of Models

The Old World once had a ton of models being produced for it and there’s no doubt that Games Workshop still has all of the molds in storage, but Games Workshop is not going to suddenly start churning out enough models to support an entire game, with all of its many armies, from the get. 

And, arguably more importantly, they’re not going to be releasing NEW models for all of these ranges. The Horus Heresy hasn’t really produced all that many new models either–just made some old Forge World kits into plastic and added some interesting unit upgrades. 

And that’s almost entirely been focused on Space Marines which are, like, 98% of Horus Heresy so far. To imagine that The Old World is suddenly going to be supporting SO MANY new armies as fully as they support Age of Sigmar or Warhammer 40k factions is logistically impossible. 

Doesn’t Have the Fanbase

Again, taking a page from The Horus Heresy, my prediction for The Old World is that they’re going to be catering to some of the diehard Games Workshop fans who buy everything, and then they’re going to be catering to the diehard Fantasy fans who have been holding a candle for Warhammer Fantasy all this time. 

Love it or hate it, Age of Sigmar *at the moment* has more fans than The Old World. While it could be argued that if a full redo of The Old World could be just as popular as Age of Sigmar, that would be extremely expensive for Games Workshop to invest in, and I don’t see it happening. 

Maybe, if The Old World does really well, there could be years of prolonged investment and expansion and new releases, but it’s not going to happen all at once. 

Personal Opinion: I Don’t Think Rank and Flank is the Face of Modern Wargaming

I recognize that this is my most subjective opinion here, but I don’t think that rank-and-flank games are really going to be making the same splash with Games Workshop’s core audience as they once did. I personally think that rank-and-flank is diminishing in popularity–in the fantasy space. Almost all historical games use rank-and-flank and people seem to love it but… those games don’t have the same fanbase size as a Games Workshop. 

And while games like Kings of War and Conquest: The Last Argument of Kings are rank-and-flank I think they’re outliers. I honestly don’t see people who have been introduced to Warhammer 40k and Age of Sigmar suddenly switch to rank-and-flank.

Warhammer: The Old World Predictions

So we’ve talked a lot about what we know about Warhammer: The Old World. Now let’s talk about what we think we can expect from Warhammer: The Old World and, if we give ourselves a little leeway, what we can predict about the upcoming release. There’s nothing more fun than Warhammer predictions!

#1. It’s Going to Be Trademarkable

I don’t know how they’re going to go about this, but since this was one of the major reasons that Warhammer Fantasy got the ax, we have to assure that it’s going to be fixed for The Old World. I think there’s a reason why Kislev and Cathay have taken such a prominent position in the lore, at least in Warhammer Total War, and I can only assume it’s going to continue in the future. 

What does that mean for the other factions? I think we’re going to get a lot more unique names, and not just for characters. We’ll see creatures that may look a lot like the Warhammer Fantasy models–and may even use the same models–but be named something different. I don’t think there will be griffons and dragons, but creatures that look similar with unique names. 

Because if the game isn’t trademarkable, and it’s just a rank-and-flank generic fantasy game, then why don’t we just play Kings of War? There has to be motivation for people to buy Games Workshop miniatures, not proxies, not 3D prints. It’s going to be an uphill battle, and I don’t know how successful it will be, but I think Games Workshop is going to make it a top priority. 

#2. We’re Going to See Square Bases–But With a Twist

When Warhammer Fantasy died and Age of Sigmar started, the Fantasy players (who did not set fire to their armies) painstakingly transferred their square-based miniatures to round bases. And that’s an undertaking, even if you spend a moderate amount of time working on your bases. For an army of a hundred minis, that’s a big task.

So what I expect to see–because Games Workshop has confirmed that Warhammer: The Old World is going to have square bases–is we’re going to see square bases that can hold round bases: think of a square base with a hole in the center that your round base can fit into. This way anyone who has committed to Age of Sigmar, and anyone who wants to play both Age of Sigmar and Warhammer: The Old World with their same armies, can do so without needing to rebase the miniatures. 

#3. We Might See… Mordheim?

Stay with me and try not to get too excited (because I’m excited). The period of time that the Old World is set to take place, approximately 200 years before the End Times, was the time when Mordheim is said to take place. And, if we’re dipping our toe into The Old World, at the right time, then is there any reason at all not to reinvest in the most popular and beloved game Games Workshop has made in the last twenty five years? A lot of people still play Warhammer Fantasy using their old rules, and a lot of people still played Horus Heresy with the old rules, but a ton of people still play Mordheim using the old rules, make new rules–even some of the original rules writers contribute to the fan community. 

#4. The Starter Box Is Going to Be THE Major Investment Into New Sculpts. Therefore, It’ll Be the Most Popular Armies

I have heard people say that the Old World Starter Set is going to take a page from The Horus Heresy and have humans against humans, so that you can either keep the entire box for yourself or split it up with a friend. 

But I don’t think that people want the Empire as their new introduction to the Old World, and I don’t think that Games Workshop would be taking all of this time if they could just break out some old Empire model molds and churn out archers and greatswords. 

I think the starter box will be two of the following factions: Tomb Kings, knights of Bretonnia, Kislev, or Grand Cathay. If I had to put money on it I would say that it would be Tomb Kings and Bretonnia, as those seem to be the models that get the highest prices on eBay and are sought after by collectors. But Kislev and Grand Cathay are also big deals–and we know that in one of their teases they showed off Kislev art. 

#5. The Game is Going to Be Released With Indexes

This is not a release that can allow people to wait for their codex to come out. When the game drops, people are going to want to play with their army, the ones that they’ve had in a box since 2015 (or rebased to play Age of Sigmar). The release of Warhammer: The Old World is going to come with Indexes, like the start of Warhammer 40k 8th Edition, where all of the army lists for every faction are laid out. 

This seems like a no-brainer. Just like the Liber Astartes and Liber Hereticus books for the Horus Heresy, that laid out every unit–including a ton of units that are only available on Forge World and some that aren’t even available. 

#6. This is Still Going to Be A Specialist Game

I don’t think we should go into this with the illusion that it’s going to ever be as supported as Warhammer 40k or Age of Sigmar. Even if you think of The Horus Heresy, the obvious analogue, they have the benefit of most of the forces being Space Marines and can therefore all  be the same kits. 

Consequently, while I think there are going to be a lot of new kits for things like Kislev and Cathay, I think a lot of stuff is going to be available through Forge World as resin. Which will make this game expensive. Sure, you can probably convert your Age of Sigmar army Skaven into The Old World Skaven, and the same with Daemons, but most models are going to be coming in small batches making them cost a lot. 

Takeaways

My predictions for Warhammer: The Old World are that it is going to be a great game but that it is going to have a LOT of constraints. This is probably why it’s taking so long for it to come out. The Warhammer studios are probably weighing a lot of factors in making sure they hit all the right notes while still figuring out manufacturing and trademarking and still trying to make everyone happy. It’s going to have to walk a fine line between keeping the longsuffering Warhammer Fantasy fans happy while simultaneously bringing in new fans who are new to the setting. 

It’s going to be a tough road. I can see why it’s taking so long to get it right.