"Old Fantasy Rules Worth Trying?" Topic

I've been on a retro-fantasy kick lately, 70s-80s era fantasy specifically, and wondering about old fantasy rules.
I've got a decent collection of old Ral Partha, Heritage and Grenadier figures… and wondering if there might be some wonderful baroque set of rules I've no knowledge of.
Slow playing, overly detailed, chock full of flavor… something with the flavor of Divine Right maybe?
Chaos Wars is already on my Must Play list, as soon as I track down a copy.

Anything else?

Chainmail.

Older rules I still enjoy playing…

Warhammer 1st edition (with a little 2nd mixed in for errata)

Reaper (Rick Priestley game before Warhammer)

Knights & Magick (PDF can be bought online now)

Fantasy Warriors (though that might be more 90s)

Necromancer's Bane (I think Irregular Miniatures sell this still)

Magic & Monsters (found in Martin Hackett's fantasy gaming/wargaming books. The author has a bit of an ego and is very rabid about gaming. But the actual game itself can be pretty fun.)

Fistfull of Miniatures (the original version, the 2nd edition lacks fantasy stuff.)

I still play most of these a couple times a year.

Heritage's Knights and Magick from 1980. Back in print:
link

Fantasy Warriors is 1990, so it was being created during the 1980s. ;-)

Steve Jackson's Melee and Wizard. Not baroque exactly but if you haven't played them they are well worth a look.

I still have my copy of Reaper. If a unit of 10 orcs each had 55% chance of a kill that was 550% so 5 of your opponents died with a 50% chance of a 6th if I recall. Quite a lot of maths but loved the whole do-it-your-self style.

Also played SELWG Middle Earth. Needed a LOT of gobbos to bring an attack home.

I also recently bought The Ringbearer Rules by Little Soldier. The whole of the LOTR on one tabletop.How's that for old school.

What rules were actually popular then-1970s- for table top games? Lidless eye was a WRG varient/army list if I recall.

Knights and Magic was fun.

Chainmail was a lot of fun--I gave away my copy years ago and still regret it.

Didn't Ral Partha have rules called Rules According to Ral, or something like that?

Steve Jackson's Melee/Wizard and Into the Labyrinth rules have held up very well. There are still some committed fans of these rules out there.

The first set I played back in '84 was an amazing entry to the hobby: swords of darkness / swords of light. If there is any interest I could scan these.

link

Daryl, you are correct. They are here:
link

Again a vote for Melee and Wizard. Simple, clean system.

I love Warlord by Maxx Carr. You can download them in a new format from Barony Miniatures.

Lots of great suggestions! Many of them completely unknown to me. Fun stuff to look into!
Bought a copy of Baron Wars (Warlord) right off, I'd looked at them once before when looking at HYW figs/rules.
I was able to pick up Fistfull of Miniatures and its supplement at Precis Intermedia link
I bought a copy of Knights and Magic as well.
Nice that so many of these are readily available.

Wizard and Melee are VERY familiar… two of the first chit-n-hex games I ever played (along with Ogre and Chitin:I).
I've got Fantasy Warriors around somewhere but never tried it.

Chainmail is an obvious one that didn't occur to me (not so obvious then!).
Rules by Ral is the non-fantasy precursor to Chaos Wars… which was later streamlined into Iron Winds of War (I think). CW is on my Want list but appears to be a bit of a collector's item… but at least I can read the original non-fantasy version.

@AronBC, probably not kosher to scan them… who made them originally? I did a search but turned up nada.

Give Fantasy Warlord a look. It is baroque, with two magic systems, loads of magic items and details, and a D100-based combat system. For all that, it also has a system for moving multiple units at once, in brigades, that was way ahead of its time. link

It comes up on eBay reasonably often, I picked up a mint copy from Noble Knight a couple months ago for not much. Finally, the production value was remarkably good for the time, and has held up reasonably well.

Give Fantasy Warlord a look.

Worth a look just for the Gary Chalk art. Amazon has used copies for dirt cheap, I just bought one for less than 10 bucks including shipping.

Ah original Chainmail. Still got my copy with the fantasy addons. Love that game.
Helped i got my current copy for 50 cents at a flea market a few years ago. :-)

Grimm

I still play Melee and Wizard a couple of times a year, too. Perfect for fantasy gladiatorial matches.

I still play The fantasy Trip's Advanced Melee and Wizard, awesome rules for a fast paced action orientated game. I love that it uses a hex board too

I'm actually rather fond of the old D&D Battlesystem (from the mid -80's).

WRG 4th had a fantasy appendix. We had some fun with it, but I only played with a referee who didn't let us get into the gritty details, so I don't know how good they were.

I.C.E Bladestorm. One of my old favorites. I can also second AD&D Battlesystems.Chaos Wars is fun also.

Swords & Spells by Gary Gygax is what I used to play in the early 80's.

Have completed my scan of the fantasy "Seords of Darkness / Seords of Light" set that fired my imagination in the 80s. PM me with your email address and I'll be happy to send you a copy.

I will likely post these to BGG with full a credit to their author Ed Kearney of Fresno, California. It would be a shame not to share these rules, being a valuable reference on how our hobby evolved.

Any chance of getting a PDF of that "swords of light" "swords of darkness" game? I've looked everywhere to buy a copy and can't find any leads! Any help much appreciated.

Just to clear things up, Chaos Wars was original ruleset by Ral Partha. Rules by Ral is a non-fantasy adaptation by Jackson Gamers. Iron Winds of War was a streamlined version available for a time when Ral Partha range was available via Ironwind company (iirc). Now Chaos Wars are available from Ral Partha again, and boy, are they oldschool.
Also, another vote for Fantasy Warriors.

I still have my copy of Reaper. If a unit of 10 orcs each had 55% chance of a kill that was 550% so 5 of your opponents died with a 50% chance of a 6th if I recall. Quite a lot of maths but loved the whole do-it-your-self style.

Just like Empire for Napoleonic's back in the 1980's.

A very doable system and really limits the dice rolling. Just need two different colored D10's.

Thing is the group that they are fighting is going to hit back.

Link to buying a PDF of ChainMail, for $4.99 USD. Cheers!