Hello everybody, and welcome to another episode of The Crown of Command. Today. I just wanted to give a explanation what's to what this is. It's called my first White Dwarf, and it's been a series that I've been running on the YouTube channel for a number of years now. It's one of my favorite videos to make with people because they bring their story of where they found their first white dwarf. It may have been through a friend or cousin or brother. It could been through their father.
It could been through their local game store newsagent. We'll all have our own tale to tell about where we discovered our very first white dwarf. And of course, it took us down this massive rabbit hole into Games Workshop products, most namely one Third Edition, 4th edition, 140 K Second Edition, and all those games that were released during the early 90s during that, what we'd like to call the golden period of Games Workshop. So this is a series we've been
running for quite a while. As I said, you can find all the videos for that in a playlist on my YouTube channel at Chronic Command Games. So just go to YouTube, put in the search engine, Crown of Command Games to find my my channel, and you can listen to all of those episodes there, which are really entertaining. They're basically a visual podcast. And during the process of that podcast, they might go for about 40 minutes, if not less or more.
And I tend to edit them down to about 20 minutes. But all the other footage in audio is it tends to be lost and I delete it or what have you. But I thought that's quite a shame because a lot of the things that people are talking about related to the articles and everything like that would
be just nice to hear for people. So I thought I'd bring it to the podcast so you can expect more of those in the future as kind of fillers in between interviews, in between deep dives or what other content we're doing later in the year. Speaking of which, it's now the 4th of December.
So I just can't believe how fast this year is this sort of flown by. So I hope you have reached your hobby goals if you have or if there's something you've achieved over the last 12 months, maybe you want to call into a bedroom of battlefields. Not literally. There's a little placement ad I put into the into the episodes. Now, you may have heard those before where Matthew talks about like a question of the month. And yeah, this one for December.
I've sort of missed those last couple ones, which are a real shame because I did have a couple of things I wanted to talk about. I think. Let's see, October was about your favorite game store, local local friendly game store. And for us here, it's in Chiba called the Miniature Forest, run by a little guy, lovely Japanese guy called Mori. And he has a store there that has many tables where people game in tabletop role play, board games, there's painting tables there.
And it's it's not so far from the station. And that's where we congregate to have our Wahama Renaissance days there. And whatever other gaming related days that we all get together and have a fun social, social time. So it's a real shame I couldn't get that on the on the bedroom battlefields podcast for that question of the month And November was about painting and what it means to you. And it's a real shame.
I, I, I tried to get my audio clip through to, to Matthew there, but for some reason the site wasn't, was down or something like that and then it wouldn't accept my microphone or something like that. So I had a few issues there. But to wrap up that very quickly is that it's a pretty much an integral part of my hobby, but it's not my complete hobby. It's I paint to play and some people paint to display, but I'm very much a painter play. I love playing.
Gaming is a big part. If not, it's not the biggest part. I think it shares with painting 5050 with me. So, but everything I paint, there's a purpose to it being eventually put on the tabletop to game with. I want to, you know, physically move that model around, roll dice and you know, be an active part of the gameplay experience, whether it be on a on a board game or on the tabletop. So painting for me is very much a, an essential part of the visual aspects, the aesthetical
pleasing aspects of gaming. And if you play with unpainted miniatures, which you know, is up to you, I think you're just losing a massive part of what the gaming experience is all about. So, so there you go, Matthew. I've answered those questions for you mate. So just not on your podcast, mate, Sorry. I did try. I will, I will definitely get the one in for December talking about, you know, what you've achieved in the last 12 months and your hobby goals.
Now Mark the person that's featured in our first White Dwarf article today is a big part of the bedroom battlefields community there on Discord. And I think we met through there. He he's he was a participant of my painting tutorials and I think that's how he first contacted me about that. So if you don't know, I'd, I run one-on-one classes for people at very reasonable prices through my Patreon and they're about 40 minutes long.
I record them, I edit a video and I send it back to them so that they got like a permanent record of all the things they wanted to learn during that lesson. So Mark's been a part of that. So thanks again, Mark, for all those lessons, mate. I think that was like a Christmas present last year from his wife. So, and we did, we covered lots of things, like really difficult technical stuff that I haven't even tackled, like Translucent white gowns covering these ladies bodies.
And you have to, you know, show the show their skin colour through the sort of the veiled very thin fabrics that they're wearing and that sort of stuff. He's got very specific, had very specific needs for mini miniatures he was painting for his games and stuff he was playing.
So yeah, it presents really good challenges for me, and I try to do my best to bring a very practical way of giving you the essential knowledge you need in order to get that, you know, get your painting skills to the level where it's achievable. So that's How I Met Mark and Mark's, yeah, like I said, he's a big part of the Bedroom Battlefields Discord he runs. And I'm going to forget what it's called. The Royal Orc, I think it's called.
And that's like a group of people getting together during the hours of the evening and painting and chatting and there's like questions and stuff he does. So if you're, if you're interested, I'll leave a Discord link for the Bedroom Battlefields here in today's episode and you can go and check it out. You can also check out our Discord. Our Discord also has a load of channels related to lots of games in the 90s. It also has historical games.
It has things like I think battle tech, even though I don't play battle tech, I think a few other guys are interested in that. So we try to cover most things about gaming and see what, what's hits, what's, what's a hit, what's a miss kind of thing. But they've got a great play locator channel so people can find other people that they that's in their area.
So we had a gentleman today from Germany and he was asking through our YouTube channel, you know, he's looking for people to play second edition 40K with in Berlin. I think it is. And yeah, so immediately he contacted a few people in our Discord channel about that. So that's great. I'm really happy that we're making connections that way and getting people together to play games and meet up and and enjoy their hobby together. So that's the main aim, isn't it?
So now in other news, the big one is that from our last interview, you would have heard Scott from Black Arrow Minis in our interview together in our chat. And Scott emailed me later or messaged me later to say he went to my Patreon and he saw that we had I had put up there some sponsor sponsor tears. If you want to become a sponsor of the channel as I really wanted someone that was, you know, affiliated with gaming or in our sort of, you know, our
Nisha the hobby, so to speak. So he proposed and offered that if he was the right match, you know, would, would I would be, would I be interested? And I said, yeah, that's, that sounds fine. Scott's a really nice guy and we've had a quite a few sort of paint chat sessions through the week. And yeah, I'm really happy and very glad that Scott approached me about that. I'm glad to make this association in collaboration with him. And he runs a great little site.
I've actually ordered some stuff this week from him because I just noticed that he had a lot of epic Space Marine stuff that were quite rare. And I've been thinking maybe I'll never get these models. And then I saw them on there. I thought, I've got to get them so desperately, you know, reached out to Scott. Put those aside. I'll pay you straight away, mate.
You know, So yeah, he's, he's, he's got quite a large collection of rare and collectible miniatures that I think would be a great service to you guys, especially now if you're in the US, you're in the great, in a great place because that's where he's located. But if you're overseas, well, if you spend $199, it's international shipping free, which I think is a really good deal. So, but anything just just going to have a look, just going to
check out what he's got. He's got, you know, one of the fantasy ranges covering all the different races and factions, 40K the same mod, some, you know, more modern to really old stuff. It's sort of, you know, this layers of different ranges covering different years, different eras, different editions. And but most of it, most of it's all LED and and, and it's all LED as well. You know, think of ranges like Grenadier, for instance. That's on there as well.
Like I said, ton of epic stuff on there and he's uploading stuff all the time. So it's going to be continual kind of progress of just getting things photographed, catalogued and then uploaded into the the website. So he's got stuff like Battlefield Gothic, he's got, let's see what else. He's got historical ranges on there as well, not so much, but he's got some there. So he tries to cater, caters and you know, tries to tries to cover all aspects of war gaming for miniatures and that's his
passion. So, but if you can't find something and you think, well, maybe Scott's got it sitting in a tub, you know, or on a list of in his catalogue there, then you can always contact him. I'll leave an e-mail down, e-mail address down for him as well. You can you can e-mail him to ask him. I know he's got a slew of dwarves, a whole pile of those, a lot of Marauder stuff on there as well, but he's going to
slowly put up there. He's got a tonne of beautiful Perry Empire models there as well, which is very tempting. So yeah, so it's really nice to see a lot of that stuff on there. And it's cheaper than eBay, so that's another incentive. So that's Black Arrow Minis. So www.blackarrowminis.com and I'll leave a link in the show
notes. You can go down there and you can find Scott's e-mail address if you want to e-mail him about something, a query or maybe a deal of, you know, if you get so much stuff, maybe he can give you a discount or something like that, whatever. But I'm very, very happy that Scott's jumped on. He's a great guy and I'm really happy that he's associated with the Crown of Command. So that's, that's one of the news topics I wanted to share
with you today. Apart from that, I'm doing a let's see every day I'm uploading something to my Patreon. It's it's totally free. Everybody can access it. It's audio video content. It could be me doing a splatter natter. A splatter natter is basically me painting and talking rubbish or whatever. I don't know, talking about something hobby related or just socially related, whatever, and
just painting miniatures. I came to a point where I just wasn't satisfied doing painting tutorials for videos. I just just didn't find them fun. I just didn't find find something that I just didn't find those things. Something that was really engage with doing. I think there are a load of other people's there's, there's hundreds, if not thousands of people doing that online already on YouTube.
And I think they do a great job. So shout out to Deetz at Anvil of Doom, Ozzy mate down in in Cairns. I think he was in, in Australia. He does fantastic work in terms of if you want like 90s miniatures painted very, very well. Deetz does a fantastic job entertaining, engaging videos and I think you know those him and, and there are others as well and I'm sure you know them better than I do. I don't personally watch a lot
of painting videos. I, I tend to watch gaming related stuff where people are playing games and that kind of thing. That's my kind of entertainment nation. That's where what I do on my YouTube channel, I, I make battle reports. That's my, that's my cup of tea. That's my Forte really. And and I also do these White Dwarf magazines and and that kind of stuff that's I found my niche of where I should be.
So the splatter natters and painting tutorials will cover all of the other painting stuff needs that people want specifically or just generally. So that's again that you can go down to the link in the show notes. Check that out. Again, it's all free, nothing behind the pay wall. So don't worry, you can go in there, watch and most of it's for free anyway. Most of the stuff I post up there for free. So anybody can watch it and anybody can engage with it.
So I sort of wanted to keep that like an open platform because yeah, it's a great place to be. There's no ads, you know, there's, there's no, no bollocks like that. So it's, it's, it's just the creator making something that they want to do and share with their their patrons and followers. So if you haven't seen that or go and be entertained for 25 days until Christmas. And I hope there's something there that you will enjoy. But for that, I think we're just going to leave it there for now.
And thank you so much again for tuning in to so many of the Crown of Command podcast this year. There is some great stuff on the way. There's some more deep dives. I know they're very popular. I really enjoy listening to them. I always learn something from them. So there's going to be a couple of maybe two, maybe 3 that'll drop probably 3 this month leading up to the to Christmas anyway before we go on a bit of a break. But guys, enjoy it while you can.
Take care, enjoy your hobby. Until then, take care. So, Mark, thanks very much mate for offering to come on to the Chronic Command Games channel and talk all about this wonderful issue 153 of White Dwarf. Yeah, thanks for having me on, Josh. It's this was the first White Dwarf that I ever bought myself. It wasn't the first one I read because friends of mine were buying it before me for about a year or so before me and some of their older brothers had got copies back copies.
So I'd seen plenty. But this was the first issue that I think I bought myself, and the main reason for it is because this is the issue that was launching the 4th edition box for Warhammer. So friends of mine had got the third edition rules and I was kind of getting interested in collecting things and I hadn't really bought anything at this stage. It was all sort of just ideas simmering around in my mind. And then when this issue
launched. So this is a September 1992 issue, so I would have bought this probably in the August. They normally release me a couple of weeks before the month that they're named after. I would have bought this in the summer holidays after I finished the first year of secondary school, around about my 12th birthday in August. So I will have bought this in WH Smith's in town, I would have thought, and brought it back home.
And the great thing with this issue is in some ways it's not necessarily a brilliant White Dwarf issue because it's quite focused. But it really opened the door to me to what this new Warhammer was going to be because I'd played a couple of games, a third edition, you know, probably not by the full rules with my friend and his older
brother. But just seeing that there's going to be this new boxed version that, you know, looked to me like Hero Quest. It looked like one of the things that as a 12 year old, I could get my head around and understand. And I knew that there was going to be miniatures with the box set. This was kind of everything that I wanted to know. So it was, it was more than just a magazine. It felt like a catalogue that was going to kind of transport
me into the Warhammer hobby. All right, that's wonderful mate. Let's let's journey on through the magazine page. And then obviously you've got that absolute fantastic front cover, which is that brilliant Jeff Taylor drawing that we see on the 4th edition box. And you know that. And what I loved about it is it looks great on the magazine, but looks even better in that big landscape on the box when you see it and what what you see.
I remember this very vividly, the night goblins picture at the top left corner on the inner inner left there, because it's just something so iconic about the way that the night Goblins looked. And it's almost like that image kind of burnt into my mind for years afterwards, although I never bought any night goblin has never had any. But it was just something about how they looked in that that big, that big block with the three fanatics coming out.
It's it's just that kind of captures that Hero Hammer era for me perfectly. The aesthetic anyway, with the red Spears and the and the and the black cloaks. It it just and brilliantly painted as well.
Yeah, absolutely. I think I remembered having this particular issue on the bus in high school and looking over all the wonderful models as I just got into one of the 4th edition and this this was just like you say, a wonderful catalogue of looking looking at all the models that will be available
coming soon. Yeah, so I mean, if you look at the contents page here, you see how much of the stuff is going to be about High Elves, the Silver Helms, there's Mike Mcveigh's Warhammer Regiments thing, There's things on there about goblins. There's a, there's a, there's a battle report, which is kind of a little bit weird because I can only presume it's sort of a third edition, 4th edition kind
of hybrid battle report really. But it's when they're testing out the Warhammer magic rules, which is quite cool actually, because it doesn't go into too much of the detail about how the
game's actually working. It's more about what possibilities there are for the magic system, which as we know when it came out was really quite a major part of what made 4th edition so brilliant is having this magic system that's just so. Kind of comprehensive and works in its own right, and this is them playing around with it. There's some really good content in here.
I think on the next page where it's got the news, there's a really cool thing that I just noticed when I was looking back through this, and it's just a very subtle, very casual Systelle miniature news column. There's about 50 words. It just says they've been very busy. Jess Goodwin's been sculpting a whole series of elves. The model shown here is a high elf wizard. That's all it says one of the best models ever made, just very casually. Oh, here's a wizard and you'll
be able to buy that soon. And here's some mighty empires things as well. Below that, it's just like they snuck in probably the best model release in just the most casual, understated way, whereas now there'd be like a grand unveiling on the stage. And it's just, it's just crazy to think that that that Techlist model that is I, in my view, probably the best fantasy miniature ever made. It was just sort of subtly kind of just put out there as just a
generic wizard. Yeah, I think him and Tyrion were two of my favourite models ever. Yeah, they're just stunning, aren't they? I really hope that they do do the made to order and put those out to us because I haven't got either of mine and I'd love to pick up a new copy of them at a better price than you can pay on eBay, certainly. Yeah, mate, yeah, for sure, absolutely. I hope so for you anyway mate.
It'd be lovely to see that. So it's, it's just cool, you've got the all the little things in there. Oh, it's sort of strange how you get like the vouchers in there, like Toronto store 10% off and 15% off. And there's a there's an advert for a store in Madrid and you just think they weren't at this point doing any kind of
regionalisation. So, you know, you're picking up the magazine in Australia, I'm picking it up in the UK thinking we're never going to go to Madrid or Toronto, but nice to know that there's something there for you if you if you were, if you were living in those parts. Yep, absolutely lucky buggers got a nice discount. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, they they stopped doing that for, for, well, I don't know how long, but you know, in the 90s I can remember them doing discounts or buy, buy 2,
get one free. But yeah, today's are long gone now. Yeah, I think that, you know, it's just something like those little tokens and just taking them in it. I don't remember actually ever doing it, but some of them were quite good. Whereas if you bought like two big boxes, you get like a whole third box for free, you know, involves shelling out quite a bit of cash, but you can get a big old saving.
Yeah, definitely very cool. And. Then kind of go into this 40K World Eaters article and I remember at the time looking at this and being completely confused what this might be. So I played hero quest. I'd had a hero quest. I had I'd played Warhammer at my friend's house. And all I knew is that there was a sort of science fiction version of Warhammer called
Warhammer 40,000. And then looking at this, it just, it just, it just seemed completely different to anything that you might have seen on TV, whether that's, you know, Star Trek or or Star Wars or Blake 7 or something like that. This was like a sci-fi world to a 12 year old. That was just like, what the hell is this? This is absolutely crazy, especially when you kind of go to the next page and they've got their the blood slaughter, a
demonic robot of corn. And it's a guy who's got kind of a it almost looks like a old fashioned cannon with a robot on the top. And it's just really crazy stuff. And I remember just looking at it as a kid and just completely and utterly confused as to what was going on, but amazed by it as well at the same time, entranced by it. But I had no idea whatsoever what all this really meant. And all the rules seemed so complicated compared to what I'd really seen up to that point.
Because I think even when I played a couple of games, the 3rd edition, it was with my friend's brother who was very much guiding us through it all, really. And we, oh, roll, roll 4 dice. Oh, OK. And then, oh, how many fives did you get? Oh, I got that many. And so you didn't really understand the rules. He was kind of games mastering it. And he really enjoyed that because he was a few years older. But yeah, this, this whole stuff, it's great looking back
at it now. But I just remember looking and thinking, right, this is cool, but I've no idea what any of this means. It was like looking at a chemistry book. I bet there's a Bloodstone that. That that template there as well is fantastic. It's just, it's just the kind of thing that's it looks totally like it's out of a really dry historical war gaming set of rules for like a, you know, the tank in 1940 or something. And it's just got this crazy thing on it.
So it's kind of this really weird combination of this really detailed approach, but with something absolutely mad going on, which is kind of cool. And then we've got these squat war machines again. I don't think I even knew that Epic existed at this point, or maybe I did. But I remember looking at these, I'm thinking they were
absolutely brilliant. But I remember distinctly at first looking at this and thinking that maybe this was in 28 mil scale and that the figures, the squats on the picture below were were, you know, full size. And then realising, oh, they can't be. But I was thinking how cool it be for that squat colossus to actually exist as a, as a full scale model. It would be absolutely enormous, especially if it was made of
metal. Yeah, they're brilliant as well, and beautiful colours and just so great that that just totally honestly you, you know, that there's this, this complete alignment of the 40K in the fantasy world. It's like, you just can look at these and go, yeah, that's dwarves. That's exactly what dwarves look like. It doesn't it?
It just feels really. I know that they probably have needed to define 40K as being quite different to fantasy, but I think I really enjoyed the period of time where there was a hell of a lot crossover and things really looked like they were from the same world in a sense. And I think that's why, you know, some of the Hero Hammer stuff is brilliant. Now this is a place that you'll know. So this is the grand reopening of your old gaffe. My old gaffe, yeah.
Oxford. Street, Yeah. Plaza, Yeah. So I, I, I went to that shop once and I don't know when it would have been. It would have been about 1994 or 1995, something like that, because we were down in London for the day, just doing whatever. I can't remember a bit of sightseeing or something. And I remember going into there, but I don't remember particularly much of it. And it's kind of blurred into one. But was it upstairs in in the Plaza? Yeah, right. OK.
And because it was like a smallish sort of modern shopping centre off Oxford Street, I don't think it's even there at all anymore. The Plaza at all. From what? I I have no idea, mate. Yeah, yeah. But it was the only, it was the only central London 1 though, wasn't it? Because all the others were like, you know, Hammersmith or Hammersmith. Was the other one I went to and that's as far as I know. I don't remember any other ones apart from that. No, and there weren't very.
I mean, there's an advert a bit later on in the magazine back which where the branches are, but I remember going to this one and thinking it was going to maybe I thought it was going to be like 20 times bigger than the one that I've been to before in Birmingham. But of course it wasn't. It was relatively similar, but it still was a really great branch and really, really busy on the day I went in.
I just remember it being absolutely packed full of people my age, sort of 1314 year olds, just tons of us. You know, there was to the point where you couldn't really get to look at stuff. You had to kind of wait for people to shuffle out the way and look at things.
You know, I haven't, I've only been into one branch relatively recently and it was, it was absolutely silent in there, very different, you know, and you know, they're friendly people, but it was, it just didn't have that kind of crowded buzz that you get used to. That's right. Yeah. And that's what I feel about too. But the modern to the old, it just doesn't have the same feeling, the same culture, nothing about it. No, it's very different.
I think even even the the the sort of the fact that they were very much explicitly hobby shops where you went in and you could get advice and you could do things and be shown how to do stuff. It was kind of, it very much felt part of it all. Whereas whereas now it feels like they're just a shop and you go into and if you're not buying, then you really just, you know, you might as well head out. And it's not that they're not welcoming, but it just operates like a very ordinary shop now.
Whereas I felt like they were really operate as a, as a space that, you know, for people who are interested and not just people who are into it. They were really good at taking people in, going, oh, you know, you've walked past the door, you saw the bright colours. Let me tell you all about it.
They were really good at introducing people to the whole concept of war gaming and miniatures, which maybe they're just sort of lack that a bit now and they they they're just maintaining that High Street presence. Well, the next page is the is the Warhammer gaming fantasy battles advert and then we go into the the advert for it all, which looks fantastic, some brilliantly painted models.
Interestingly, like, I mean, they've got loads of empire stuff out there, but and and just elves, those generic elves that like, you know, very kind of third editiony. But what's interesting is they've they've lined all the pictures up and everything's kind of more in not quite a skirmish formation, but sort of offset and all raggedy blocks, which looks really cool, But it's not something that you're used to seeing really in White Dwarf as a sort of photography
style. They generally used to try and show it looking as good as possible but still set up for actual play, whereas this is a little bit of a different approach. But still. I remember looking at it and just thinking, Oh my God, if this is if this is what you can do if you buy this box, then I'm in. It just looks absolutely gorgeous and I mean the paint jobs on these are just stunning
as well. I can see why they chose so many empire models to go in. I mean, I presume they had a lot of them, but also just just the colours are just absolutely stunning. And this is kind of, you know, this is only just the launch of 4th edition, but this is very 4th edition in colour and in tone and in style.
And it kind of shows, doesn't it, that even towards the end of third, you know, the steam tank was coming out, the war wagon was coming out, things in the Empire range were becoming that more bright balls spectacular kind of look and feel and it and it's just really cool how they've done it. But yeah, that's really nice. And if you go to the next page, then you you get the the box content and, and really sort of crossed my mind, but 104 plastic miniatures, you know, that's a
lot of miniatures. And I remember this box set was 30 lbs when it came out. And that's what I paid for it. What what was paid for it? I had it for Christmas that year and it was 30 lbs. And you know, even in today's money with inflation adjusted, that's still a really brilliant price. I've sort of gone back and
looked at other things. At the time, if you wanted to buy a copy of Monopoly or Risk or Pluto or something like that, you know, you would have paid 20 or 15 then this was not significantly more money than a couple of Reg.
There was a price of two very ordinary board games and the kind of board games that now would set you back £20 each or something, you know, and yet a starter set with 104 plastic miniatures, if you were to get such a thing, you know, Games Workshop would probably charge you £250 or something nowadays.
And it just means that the whole group of teenagers and who are buying this, who are getting it for Christmas, just wouldn't have done so because you would have gone, oh, it looks quite good, but Oh no, it's too much money, move on. I think they really got that entry point right. You know, the amount of stuff you got in that box as well, all the cards or the rules or the templates. It was just jam packed and just everything looks spectacular.
I, I don't imagine they made a huge amount of money on each unit they sold. They will have made their money further down the line when when people actually wanted to buy more stuff to go alongside with what they had, I'm sure. But yeah, no, they've done a really good job on it. One thing that's really interesting is in the bottom left corner there you've got the future Warhammer releases. I mean, they've been quite bold saying what?
What's coming out? So Warhammer magic was like the first thing to come out, but then they're saying Warhammer army books, everything you need to know. They include full army lists, background histories. The first book is about the armies of the Empire, released in the fall of 1992, which is strange because there's an
autumn in the paragraph above. More army lists will follow, with the following books planned for release before the summer of 93. The orcs rather than orcs and goblins, Britannia, the high Elves, and there's orcs. And of course, we never got the Britannia book in 4th edition, so they evidently were planning on Britannia being an important race that they were going their support, but it never came until
the 5th edition. I don't quite know why, but you know, they obviously just felt that there was just other things to move onto. And how those decisions happened at the time, I don't know. But maybe they just sold so much Empire stuff, they were pretty happy with that and they just wanted to kind of crack on with other things or who knows why.
But yeah, there's certainly, it's it's certainly not the first time that what that Games Workshop have been very explicit in saying exactly what they're going to release. I mean, the Realm of Chaos books is the classic 1, isn't it, where they were saying they were going to release it and it took about seven years or something like that and and Rogue Trader
and all these kind of things. So, but I don't imagine they would ever do that in a million years now promised what they were exactly going to do unless they knew for definitely it was going to happen. But yeah, there may have been some disappointed Brutonian players from 3rd edition who were getting very excited that their book was going to be the the third one coming and it never appeared. Yeah, that's interesting, isn't it? I just noticed that myself, actually, Mark.
Yeah, I just read that and thought, oh, York's Brutonium. So yeah, it's interesting. Maybe the models they just didn't have time or schedule in for them to be reproduced in. Yeah. Because they were pretty much historical models anyway when you look at them, and they're pretty ordinary in most cases. Yeah. So. The, the Empire and the Britannian stuff just rarely felt very similar in 1st to 3rd edition, I think. And I think that that idea of
oh, well, what's it going to be? And maybe it was just a case of there's still very much at the time when you're like, OK, who's who? Who does elves, right? Get Jessica when he's going to do the elves. Kev Adams, he's doing the orcs, the Peris, they can do the Empire. You know, it would have been that kind of real sense of rather than just the design studio needs to get all this stuff done.
There will have been a sense of, well, if the Peris aren't yet ready to come up with an idea for what Britannia is going to look like and sculpt all those models, then maybe you don't do it yet. And perhaps as well, they recognise as they were making the Empire so, so kind of exaggerating and different to his historical counterpart that they really needed to do a kind of spectacular version for Brit Britannia. Britannia needed to look like it
did when it came out. This kind of over the top nights thing, you know, that they really kind of lent into a very sort of bright and interesting aesthetic, but they kind of needed to get that ready. I don't know, but it's be fascinating to see if someone who was there at the time knows that history of why things like that got dropped. But I'm sure that a lot of it just disappears into into
forgotten memories. Then we've got an advert on the right for the the Wraith album, Danger Calling, with those pretty cool looking guys there, their bare chests and their leather. Yeah, very much Spinal Tap inspired. Yeah, and I love the fact that there's just an absolutely massive picture of the Chaos Space Marine and then just a little picture of them. It's just they must have opened it up going, oh, we're going to be in the magazine. And it was like, oh, there's our
picture. This is the bottom left corner. They've shoved the stand there. But they look pretty cool, those guys. I think that that that crossover between like metal and and Games Workshop was always really noticeable. It was something I'm never into metal, but I but like whenever you went into a game for a shop shop or you went to something and there's people there, there's always been a lot of a lot of metalheads wherever you went and there really is that crossover.
I think Brian was probably pretty instrumental in deciding that because of his love of that kind of all things spiky and chaotic. Then we've got dwarf rune weapons by Nigel Stillman. So this is kind of rune rules in great detail for the next, you know, number of pages, but it's presumably kind of legacy 3rd edition dwarf ring rules. I haven't really read it in detail. I don't really fully and know all the the 4th edition green rules and where what what's similar and what's different.
But yeah, I can only presume that there's an element of things that were carried across and brought into the 4th edition book because that will have come out not very long after this. But it's pretty comprehensive and all sorts of things on there. But as to exactly how whether it all works fully in 4th edition and or not, or whether you have to do a bit of adjustment, I'm not really sure. But classic sort of Nigel Stillman, very detailed kind of
approach to something. But I remember if, if anything, just thinking it was really cool that things like this could exist. Just I think that's one of the things that's great with Warhammer. And I know it's a complicated game and I know that there can be a lot of rules and you can get bogged down in a lot of special rules, but it really does add to a lot of the flavour. And I think that that role-playing background to the design really comes out with
something like this. But yeah, if you were trying to do this with hundreds of units and every unit had got a different set of combination of rooms, you'd get very complicated very quickly, I'm sure. But cool stuff, though, that question of the month for you in December is tell us about your 2024 Hobby Highlights. Maybe you finally got that miniature you've wanted since 1991. Maybe you leveled up your painting or finally finished that army.
Or perhaps it was something on the game in front that stood out to you most. No matter what your 2024 Hobby highlights were, we'd love to hear them head on over to bedroombattlefields.com/voicemail to submit. And I need them in by Monday the 30th of December. That's bedroom battlefields.com/voicemail. And now back to the show. Just really nice looking.
And then if we go on through that, then you get to a nice heavy metal section, which is very much focused on the on the Spearman and the arches from the box set. Remember being a tiny bit bit disappointed that they showed the command models, because I think I thought that you'd get those in the box because I remember I remember the regimental champion with the sword and the antler things and thinking, Oh, that's really cool.
Really want to get that model. But of course, I think that they would presumably a blister Packers with the Archer command to go alongside with what you got in the box set. But either way, you still got them. I mean, the plastics still hold up fantastically well, don't they? They monopos, Archers and Spearman. I think because they're elves and they're you imagine that they would stand neatly in the
line and be all disciplined. Then they look even better than the goblins in my opinion, because I think they just, it, it feels right that they all look the same. And just seeing these, you know, just classic gobbling green bases, the blue sky backgrounds. And but I mean, the paint jobs on them are still absolutely wonderful. And I love the fact that you got the you got the banners that you
could cut out as well, remember? But I remember not cutting them out because I don't want to ruin my magazine, which I'm sure a lot of people did as well. They didn't. They're probably like, oh, it's great that you get them, but I don't actually want to cut anything out of my magazine. So, but yeah, brilliant, brilliant models just. I think they still hold up today. I think that they look absolutely fantastic. They're 30 years old, but but 32 years old, they don't look it at all. Yep.
Not at all mate. I still love them, I think they're still beautiful and glad to have painted them now. And if you consider at the time in 1992 when these came out, models that were 32 years old then would have come out in 1960. I can only imagine what miniatures like were like in 1960. The few that existed, they would have been very rough around the edges. I mean, these are, it is a top drawer and it just shows that how ahead of their time, yes,
the studio was operating. Very much so, mate. Yeah, absolutely. And over the page, you've got some real detail about how to I used to really like articles like this with a sort of long form, you know, Mike, where they sat down and written, you know, a good 1000 words or so on on this. It's it's not just it's not just quick. I'll here's some captions. Here's some stuff. Shove it in a magazine.
It was you could sit and read this magazine, you could sit and read White Dwarf like a book and I always really enjoyed that. I felt like it was good value as a magazine as a result. And then and then the next page after that was the first unit that I bought after buying the the box that I remember got a
bit of Christmas money. So I got the box set for Christmas. I had a bit of Christmas money and I went into Birmingham probably a couple of days after Christmas. I bought the silver Helms box and I never did paint them absolutely fully. I don't really know why. I was think I was too intimidated and this picture is partly to blame.
So for as wonderful as these heavy metal pages are, there is something when you're 12, when you look at it, you can just feel a little bit like like, I don't know if I can if I can do it that well. And I remember that being being a bit caught in that paralysis of being overwhelmed by what someone else could do. And because I didn't have any friends who were collecting high holes. Whereas if I had have done and I'd seen theirs and gone, Oh yeah, they're cool, they're good.
I would have been able to aspire to maybe that level rather than Mike's level, which was a little bit overwhelming. This is the Orkin squat Warlords supplement for space Marine. Like I said before, I wasn't really quite that sure what Space Marine was. Interestingly, they, they use the phrase epic in a sort of way to describe the scale.
Still at this point they're describing, they're calling the game Space Marine and they've just got that little thing down in the bottom corner that epic battles.
You know, it's just, it's just like, oh, this is just a type of gaming or a, or an approach with a different scale, which I think is cool, but it's strange because I think that a lot of people would use the word epic now, but if you said Space Marine to them, maybe they wouldn't necessarily know that you meant that second edition epic and so on.
But either way, it was something that I always kind of never bought anything for it, but I always thought it always looked at it from afar as being something very cool. I think it's because none of my friends were particularly playing any of it. It was all very much fantasy battles that we were all playing for that time that was in the hobby, which was probably, you know, certainly from Warhammer, it would feel like 92 to about 94, So not very long.
But yeah, that it was. It was just that high off army that I had really this night goblin article, though, it's over the next few pages. This is this tempted me. I this was this was very much what I was thinking. You know what night goblins that if I buy the box set, I could have a night goblin army using the goblins from it as well as a high off army. But funds as a as a person with only a paper round just didn't allow for it.
And I think I was conscious as well of the huge volume of bottles that you needed to collect. I mean, if you go on to the next page and you just see a kind of, you know, there's a Spearman unit there. I don't know how many are in that 40 or something. You know, it's a pretty big units and you know, there's
plastics in there. But if you were looking at the night goblins, you'd be looking at metals at the time, which I don't know how much money they would have been, but it still would have tottered up to a good old amount of cash. But it was something about the night goblins. They definitely looked. I mean, I like the I like the the the goblins Spearman, but I think the night goblins, I'm sure you'd agree as a night goblin and aficionado, there's
just they're just a cut above. There's just something about them that's even more definitively Warhammery. They're just really beautiful models. They're full of character. I like how they look funny and evil at the same time. They're just they're just the exact right balance. And then we've got some rules in there for for night goblins and how they work.
I don't know if this is the first point that Night Goblins were sort of officially introduced as a as a thing, because I don't think 3rd edition's got Night Goblins as such as far as I'm aware. But yeah, they certainly have stuck around and they've become a real fan favorite, haven't they? Night Goblins over the years. Absolutely. Yeah, I think they, I think they were in 3rd edition actually. OK.
They are sort of a, a more what I like about, I think the stuff that works best in Warhammer is the stuff where it's not so much generic fantasy. It's something that they've come up with themselves where there's an element of, oh, OK, that's a really cool thing. Whether that's dwarf slayers or whether it's the Empire looking the way they do and having all the kind of unusual things or it's the Scaven, whatever it might be, it's those things are always really iconic, I think.
So we can go into, there's a page with the with the stores there. There's not many stores at this point, but I imagine there's there's not many more nowadays days actually, to be honest. I imagine they've contracted back to having not very many, but yeah, just a sort of a handful really. But, you know, they were all spaced out and there's one that you can get to wherever you live
really. That was, they were very strategic about it. Then you've got this brilliant battle report from Nigel Stillman. It's just unusual. They're testing out the magic. They've got these. They've got quite cool scenario. They're using Brutonians, which has, we know, you know, weren't really a 4th edition thing, but there's there's still featuring them heavily here, which suggests that they really were thinking that they were going to be coming out soon and some
beautiful dwarves there. But there's also like a, a Kislev scout as a single character and there's a wood elf scout in with the Britonians. That's quite a cool little thing. They've got this interesting scenario where there's a, there's like a tomb and there's undead that come out the tomb and they've got to protect different things. It, it feels, it feels very much like the kind of game that I like to play these days where there's a really good story to be told rather than just a pitch
battle. And it feels like it's, even though 4th edition probably was the start of things being more simplified, straightforward, able to kind of turn up and play. Don't need the games master, don't need this. You know, the beginning of what became the sort of tournament scene perhaps for for Warhammer. I know that probably kicked off most around 6th edition perhaps. But either way, 4th edition probably was the point where it became a more straightforward product and less complex.
But they're still leaning into the oh, the best way to play, and this is probably Nigel Stillman all over, really. But the best way to play is to to tell an interesting story. I remember looking at this, reading through it several times and, and it just being really exciting at how it's told as a really cool story rather than kind of going through the individual dice rolls. It wasn't really a rules based battle report. It's very much a narrative 1.
And you know, and the maps as well really appeal to me. We still do. It's just something about maps in fantasy books in, in things and whatever it is, if there's a map in it, I'm always interested and drawn to it. And it just looks fantastic. The backdrops, the trees, the hills, just everything looks absolutely perfect. You know, this is this, this really sums up the kind of experience of Warhammer that I, I want to have.
You know, it just feels like all of the fun and all of the enjoyment that you can get from it, but none of the none of the kind of balance issues or who's got the better side or, or is that fair or isn't it fair? It's kind of a lot more based around a storytelling experiences. It's really cool. I like as well how it goes on for about 10 or 12 pages. You know, it's a it's it's really is the kind of flagship article in this magazine.
And that's how it should be. I think that battle reports should be the main thing that you get in a white door, something that you can really understand what went on and really read it back multiple times. And yeah, stacks up as a really cool short story as well. It's it's great. It's really well done. It's just from every picture, every everything is just it just ticks all the boxes. It really looks great. And we've got a a game stay thing here.
We've got ticket hotline at the top, which is they've put the phone number on a lot of times so you're not going to forget how to get tickets for that. It's funny that you have to ring someone to buy tickets, but and you know, they've, they've shown you all the stuff that's going on. It looks absolutely frantic. There's that photo on the right hand page where they're up on the sort of raised stall bending
over. People are grabbing miniatures and they're trying to do things and take payments. You can only imagine if you work there for the day, you would be absolutely exhausted. It looks like they're in, you know, in a nightclub in Ibiza or something. It's just absolutely mental and I can only imagine how exhausting it was to go. Now, I never went to games today, which is really stupid because it's about 15 miles from my house and I think it was 5 lbs to go.
But I never went and I kind of ruined the fact that I never experienced it because I could have gone for a couple of years, definitely, and I just didn't. But yeah, it looks like the kind of thing that we will never see again, unfortunately. Yeah, unfortunately. And if you actually look, I mean, basically everyone, pretty much everyone there is a teenager there. There's a few adults, but it's it's very much a kind of a youth oriented activity.
And I think if you went to an event nowadays, you'd see people who are, you know, adults. And that's a shame in a way, because, you know, you might not feel like a greying hobby if you go, Oh no, everyone's, you know, under under 50 or whatever. But well, they might be, but they won't be always. And, you know, we need that new blood coming through. And I'm just not sure if we are getting it. We will see over the page they've got a bit more information to try and get you there.
I really like this. They've got a little rail map of how to get to the NEC. And this is just like classic Games Workshop where they're like, there is absolutely no excuse to get there. They've got a train in the bottom left that goes to Penzance, which is the bottom tip of the country. And then they've got the train that goes all the way up to Inverness in the north of Scotland. So they're covering about about 700 miles worth of railway there.
And they're like, you know, there is, there's no excuse not to get it, even if it means having an 8 hour train journey each way that you're still coming. So yeah, they're, they're really banging on about it. And it, it's just, it also, it speaks of the, the pre Internet stuff here where you've got to ring the number to get the ticket. They've got a really, really complicated detailed map with all the car parks and all the arrows exactly describing how you get in the building.
It's the kind of thing that no one would do nowadays. You're just like, yeah, that's where I'm going. Stick it in your phone and turn up there. But yeah, when you used to go to things in these days, you had to, I had to be super prepared because you were, you were, it was a big old expedition. But yeah, it's, it's really cool. I really like the fact they've really gone to town on that. Running this event must have been a massive investment of time and effort for them.
And, you know, I don't know how much money they made on it, but it's more about perpetuating the hobby. It will have just created so much positive energy that it will have paid back in dividends. I'm sure it's a cool event, but I don't think we're going to see it again. Always something on that level. And then we conclude with a really nice Part 2 of the story. And this was the only slightly disappointing part of this issue when I bought it, is that I hadn't read the Part 1.
But it's still it's a Bill King story and as you'd expect, really nicely written, really flavourful, really kind of evocative of of what scavener like and and, you know, just has it's got that real Warhammer fantasy role play feel to it, I imagine. But, you know, at the time, I remember it was, you know, it's a Got trick and Felix story or a Got trick story and Scaven. And it was very cool. Yeah. Really, really just kind of made you go, oh, OK, this is the world.
And following that battle report as well. It just makes you kind of feel that you're very much the hobby. It's not just a set of rules or a set of products. It's a it's a whole experience, really. And then very unusually for the magazine, you go on to some relatively generic Space Marine and battle manual stuff for 40K. You know, the only 40K stuff we've seen at the start was the
was the chaos stuff. And then this is the, this is the only picture of a normal Space Marine I think that you see in the whole magazine, other than maybe the catalogue, which is crazy really. And then we're back on to more pages of of the Gotrek and Felix story. That is very odd, isn't it? Yeah, it feels like they needed to break it up with an advert for it to get the advert in. But yeah, it's just strange really just chucking in that
devastate a Squad advert there. But yeah, it's just an unusual layout decision to do that because then when you finish the Gotrek and Felix story, you then go into some adverts, which I didn't really, but then, Oh no, it goes back to the story again. So it's kind of, it's almost like they're kind of oh, it's
like an advertisement break. So you're busily happily reading that and then subconsciously you suddenly find yourself ordering some devastated Space Marines, a subscription to White Dwarf and an Imperial steam tank before you know it. Now this subscription offer that. I remember taking this out 25 lbs for a year and you got the two, the blue and the red catalogues, which were absolutely brilliant. And I had those and they used to pour over those who were fantastic.
Again, very old school, fill in the thing, write your card number on there, put it in the post, hope it doesn't get intercepted and you get defrauded. But you just used to send money off to random people in those days and stuff came back through the post. So that's what it was like. And then the steam tank, I remember looking at this and just being like, Oh my God, this is amazing. And that exploded diagram as well, showing how it all goes together. Just really cool, Really, really cool.
And just hilariously, I remember it saying diagram not to scale. So you just so you don't think that the steam tank is about an inch wide or something like that. But yeah, but it's just, it's ace, isn't it? And and also that that little thing that you still get written on stuff, but requires a degree of modelling skill. We do not recommend this kit for young or inexperienced modellers. So I think you'd feel really grown up if you bought 1 and you were young. You blah. I I can do this.
I can take on the challenge of the steam tank. And then 3 bottles of stupid glue and four hours in A&E later here, there, you realize the error of your ways. And then we go back onto the story. So it's really quite a long story actually. Silver helm advert then concluding and then into the mail order section that you always got. Now my paper copy here has got the mail order pages cut out, which obviously whoever had it will have done so.
But you know when you get into the prices there, you realise how good value some of the things were. Something's quite expensive though. I mean, one thing I noticed that was fascinating is that like the, you know, the, the box set for Warhammer, like I say, was 30 lbs, but I think it's £20 was steam tank or something. I don't know where I've, I can't find that now, you know, 20 for a war wagon. So actually it was 20 for a war wagon, but 30 for the whole box set.
So I think that it was very much priced to kind of wow you, whereas 20 for the war wagon back in 1992, that was a lot of cash. Yeah. You know, so I, I think when I got my paper round, I was earning, you know, something like 5 lbs a week or something. You know, so you're talking about four week, a month's worth of paper round to buy a war wagon. So, you know, they, they, they did sell expensive stuff.
So when people say, oh, it used to be cheaper, it's like, well, something's worth, but something's worth a lot of money and they just work. But I think they just have a different pricing model where it's more about hooking you in with those kind of cheap prices. And then the very final sort of inner Backpage that I've got is the Battle for Armageddon advert for the Jervis Johnson game, which was something I never
bought. I don't know whether it's you can track down copies of this, but it looks interesting. I've never played it. Have you played any of these games, Josh? I've played, I've played Armageddon, Yeah, Battle Armageddon when it first came out in 19. Two or so when it first came out, yeah. Yeah, Yeah, I presume they're kind of more like the sort of Avalon Hill traditional type war games, more like that style. Yeah, chit encounter. Yeah. Bent cards you can play as well.
So I'd actually like to revisit that at some point and play it again. I know that Ed did on a mini Sods and it got me fired up to play it again. I would like to do it, yeah. It's kind of thing. You could even make your own like print and play version, couldn't you? Theoretically if you get the scans and print out a few sheets and make a a little board and back some tokens it. Having some possible my good friend Davide in Italy, he sent me the files to print everything
out. You can print it all out. Oh wow, well I just haven't done something. Around doing it so yeah, but it is. A print for. Sure mate. Fantastic. And then we conclude with a stunning picture. This is not a lot more than you get in the box set. And that I think is testament to A, how good the box set is, B, how good you can make it look. But also it, yes, the paint job's brilliant. Yes, the terrain's fantastic. But I remember looking at her and thinking, OK, I can paint up my box set.
I can, I can get something like this and, and this, this what a brilliant way of having something super aspirational, incredibly beautiful to look at, but possible. And that terrain is, is just absolutely wonderful. Those buildings. I I don't know how they made those buildings with those unusual cone like angles, you know, out of card or paper or whatever they're using.
They they, they're very complex compared to like the medieval kind of half timbered buildings or, you know, Inns and things that you've seen on other pages. You know that they're really, really nicely done, blended into the bases. Just stunning work. I don't know who made those buildings originally, do you know? Would have been Adrian Wilde mate. Right, OK, they're fantastic, aren't they? And they just, they're just perfectly go with the Jess
Goodwin high elf aesthetic. It's just spot on. I know that Doctor Spork has been looking at recreating these, hasn't he? He has. He's recreated that those two towers in the bridge and it looks stunning. So yes, it's it's something you can get in order from his website at 3D. Is it Cult 3D? Is that Yeah. So if you search for Doctor Spork on Cult 3, DI think you'll find them. But he's done. He's done those. I know that he's he he mentioned he was looking at doing the obelisk as well.
So you know, stuff like that, which would be. Because I love scratch built homemade terrain, but I don't really know how you'd begin to do that, to be honest, with paper and cardboard and you know, ordinary materials. So that 3D printed option is definitely probably the most viable for getting something that looks like that on the table. And you 2 could have this amazing picture in front of you. It's just brilliant.
It just looks just, it's just sums up that era of Warhammer perfectly for me. No, there's a there's a guy in Scotland making a lot of these iconic buildings. I can't recall his name offhand, but he's making them exactly like those original ones and they're incredibles. Oh wow. Yeah, someone with a lot of skill and who really loves making terrain. So it is possible, but in the in the right hands I think mate. Yeah, Richard, it's not mine, I'm afraid.
But yeah, no, these, these are, this is just great. And, you know, so that's, that's the, that's the magazine from start to finish. And it's very much got that theme of, you know, it's all about it's the Warhammer 4th edition launch issue and what a great place to jump into the hobby. It is made, it's a it's a classic issue and it's the start and catalyst for many of us who got into Games Workshop and discovered Warhammer and discovered the the bright, beautiful colours of Hirahama.
So thank you so much again, Mark, for sharing that with us here at the Crown of Command. And mate, if we've got anything else we can share in the future, I'll get you get you back on again. Wonderful. Thank you very much for giving me the time, Josh, to reminisce and go through this. That's great. Take care.