"Seeking information about old GW sprues?" Topic

Hi, I'm seeking information about the Games Workshop ancient "Fantasy Warriors" sprue and the Orc and Goblin sprue made in 1992/1994(?)

I think the Fantasy Warriors sprue was the first fantasy sprue ever made by Games Workshop. Plastic sprues were, and still are, horribly expensive to make, and back in that day Games Workshop could only afford to make one. What they did was take one basic trooper from every race (orc, goblin dwarfs, skaven, wood elf, dark elf) and included it on the sprue. This ensured that ever race had cheap plastic infantry available, although it made in an utter nightmare to collect an army since you had to buy several boxes to get enough troopers to form even one unit. Most people gave up and traded with friends to get enough figures to form multiple units. Feel free to share stories – did the sprue make it more economical to collect an army, at a time when everything was metal? Did it help? Or was it more frustration than it was worth, what with all the different figures?

But the sprue is well-regarded as a classic and marked a watershed moment for Games Workshop history as a company.

When was the Fantasy Warriors sprue made, what WD was it featured in, and does anybody know anything of the "behind the scenes" aspect of it? The Rhino APC sprue supposedly almost bankrupted Games Workshop. Anyone else have any good stories?

How much did the Fantasy Warriors sprue/box cost?

The name "Fantasy Warriors" is so generic, searching for anything related to "Games Workshop Fantasy Warriors" on ebay turn up nothing.

The second sprue I'm seqarching for is the basic Orc Warrior sprue. Back then I think there was a sprue with an Orc Warrior and an Orc archer, and four shield designs. They included loads of them in the Warhammer Quest box set

They're these guys:

My question is when were they made, and what WD featured them as a release? How much did they cost? I remember them being like $12.50 USD but my memory is fuzzy. Was that their original price? How many were in the box and how much did they cost originally?

IT was made up of Skavens with hand weapons, Goblins (can't recall arms, I think archers), Orcs with hand weapons, Dark Elves with xbows, Wood Elves with bows, Dwarves with hand weapons. The hand weapons had different options.

They were made in the eighties if memory serves me right, others here may know the specifics.

Yeah, I've got an old catalog from 1992 right here, it has a wood elf with a bow, a goblin with a bow, a skaven warrior with sword and shield, a dark elf with crossbow, an orc warrior with sword and shield, and a dwarf with sword and shield.

I just need to know when they were made and what they cost?

Did you guys think they were worth it, back in the day? Were they well-received?

As a 13 year old I thought they were cool, but as a wargamer now it would be idiotic for me to buy a box of figs and I only needed one from every six.

The name "Fantasy Warriors" is so generic, searching for anything related to "Games Workshop Fantasy Warriors" on ebay turn up nothing.

Actually, it was never named that. The original name was Warhammer Fantasy Regiments, in 1993 they were re-boxed as Fantasy Fighters (with only 30 models per box) and then soon discontinued. Fantasy Warriors was a range of metal miniatures from Grenadier.

As for the release date of Fantasy Regiments, I do not have any specific information, but they feature heavily in the 3rd edition WHFB rulebook (1987).

As for the price, WD120 (December 1989) lists them at £9.99 GBP per box.

Regarding the plastic orcs, I would need to do some digging with old WDs. However, this picture of the sprue itself has year 1992 marked on it:

link

If I recall, these were original sold in small boxes of 10 figures, later reduced to 8 figures per box.

Those weren't the first plastics GW produced, before that they
did a couple blister of 3 sprues each with one figure.
One was a dwarf warrior, the other was an orc.
If i remember correctly the orcs were called 'psychostyrene'

Regards

Jim

You mean Psychostyrene Dwarves and Drastik Plastik Orks?

Thanks for the info Griefbringer.

And no, they're not the Psychostyrene Dwarves and Drastik Plastik Orks, they're the 0756 sprue. I thought they were called Fantasy Warriors, since that's what they were called in my catalog, but apparently not.

The orc that came in the multi-ethnic boxed set was different than the one shown above. It came with a choice of two heads (helmet or not helmet)as did the goblin archer in the set. In fact, since there were extra goblin heads, I converted the Skaven that were in the set to goblin spearmen, painted the elves and sold them to a friend, did the same with the dwarves and was only stuck with the dark elves.
Which are in a bits box somewhere in my garage.
It was a nice set and I really liked the goblin archers.
Good, solid figs that painted up well.

The Orcs first appeared in White Dwarf 160, dated April 1993. The box cost £4.99 GBP and contained 10 models, 5 Warriors and 5 Archers. I believe the number of models was later reduced to 8, along with the other plastic boxes of the time.

The box was unusual in that it contained two different models. The only other plastic boxes that did this were the High Elves and Goblins, which used the same models as the fourth edition Warhammer boxed set.

here are some pictures. I believe the box was called Fantasy Regiments. 60 figures for £10.00 GBP (back in the days when £10.00 GBP would buy you 3 rhinos or 2 land raiders)

I split a box with a friend and had the orcs, goblins and dark elves.

couldn't find a picture of the wood elf

Here's the sprue:

For clarification, my comment about Psychostyrene Dwarves and Drastik Plastik Orcs was purely in response to the comment made by fairoaks024, and not in regard to the Warhammer Fantasy Regiments boxed set.

OTOH I managed to find a picture of the cover art for Warhammer Fantasy Regiments box:

Nice pictures Olaf though that Skaven is a Heroquest figure that fantasy regiments skaven looked different

I remember buying 4 boxes with my friends somewhere in 88 or 89. This was the time of WFB 3rd edition ( orange hardback), so definitely was not later than 92, when 4th edition came out.

The sprues indeed had 6 figures, 1 of each race, and there were 10 of them in a box.

I had a Skaven army at the time, so I had 40 skaven available. Moreover, since there were multiple heads and weapons, one could do some simple conversions. I used the heads of skaven on top of goblin bowmen, so I also had a skaven archery regiment. In those days, there were no 'official' army lists, so skaven archers were perfectly acceptable :-)

The picture by Zephyr1 is the correct one. The orcs shown by the OP look like orcs from Warhammer Quest or Battlemasters – but might have been repackaged in other boxes as well.

I still have all those figures, although I quit playing warhammer when 4th edition came out. They still see the gaming table now and then, with my homegrown rules.

BTW for a simple conversion of a mutant skaven regiment (again, perfectly normal when Realm of Chaos was published in the late eighties), see this old blogpost of mine:
link

The box was unusual in that it contained two different models.

This caused me some annoyance back in the day, since I wanted more regular boyz than arrer boyz. I wonder what the logic behind it was?

I eventually solved the problem by buying a bunch of sword-boyz from a classmate.

Ah, the ice cream box minis. Cool. I would still like some of the alternate skaven hand weapons.