"Warhammer 1-4th editions?" Topic

First edition was very basic, and had a fair chunk of RPG type stuff in it. So as you say, was more skirmish orientated.

It then got a supplement "Forces of Fantasy" which added much more to what we would recognise as army lists, and consolidated a lot of rules.

Second edition, was a proper mass combat system aimed at larger armies, units and the such.

I started WHFB just as first edition was being replaced by 2nd edition – I went to the Last Citadel Open Day and picked FoF for £1.00 GBP !

Third was where "Herohammer" started to kick in with Heroes/Wizards having five levels of prowess.

Fourth I never played as I was at university.

Wikipedia is helpful: link

Fourth saw the power level of heroes and wizards increase and that of units decrease. Cool, intelligence, and will power were removed from the game. Magic cards replaced spell points. Army books for each army were produced. Whereas 3rd edition retained RPG-like fluff, 4th edition was more streamlined. It was a fun game, but a big step away 3rd- IMO.

Do a web search for Oldhammer blogs and you will find a wealth of information. For example:

old-hammer.blogspot.com

link

oldhammeronabudget.blogspot.com

There's also the Oldhammer forum, which is a good place to start and probably has the info you seek:

oldhammergenerals.blogspot.com

Played from 2nd stopped playing around 5th edition.

3rd is my favourite incarnation especially when combined with the mighty empires campaign system.

Magic in 3rd could be devastating if a wizard had a high level spell and full magic points but they were a bit of a one shot weapon.

Hero's had a pretty limited range of magic items and practically no special rules that made them far less damaging than later editions when hero's started to become one man armies.

I only ever bought 1st ed so can't compare really

I started with 3rd edition playing Chaos Warbands which were definitely skirmish based- although I also had the siege book and we had some big siege games, but were kind of winging it with army lists (used it as a supplement to my D&D campaigns). I actually got out of it midway through 4th because it was all about God-like characters strutting around wiping out swathes of mortals. What was the point of a large, well-painted army if they were just Wizard fodder?

Got back into it in 5th (after a 2 year respite playing Warhammer Ancients). I think 6th was the best edition and that's where I ended up after they went to 8th. I found it to be the most balanced and not quite as complicated as 3rd edition.

I played from 2nd to whatever ed was about 5 years ago. IMHO 2nd or 3rd was best as you actually used an army, not a "Superdude with cheering section." We used to play games for 5-10 hours cause the melees lasted so long. You had to take 25% casualties before you even needed to check morale; none of this one orc dies in combat the other 29 die in the pursuit results. Yeah, I know that makes it a lot fast so everyone can get to the pub before closing time. But I've never liked it.

They actually moved a long way away from "Superdude with cheering section" over the last 2-3 editions, focusing instead on blocks of troops being the best way to field an army – characters are generally currently seen as somewhat ineffectual in 8th Ed, which is one of the things that apparently people didn't like so rumors are 9th will see a return to the superdude model (sigh).