So glad that somebody (you) finally gave due credit to the Blackstone Fortress Novels and Radio Plays. To me, its HALF of the experience. The most epic adventure I've ever been on next to Final Fantasy 6.
@@jamesv.7041 With the short stories and radio plays, every single character is featured at some point. The books are the reading bit and the on-the-table bit is like the grinding. The only thing missing is the epic soundtrack, but I think the building and painting filled in the gap for me there.
@@jamesv.7041 Cool, I'll try and remember that next time. Also, just FYI, I do think that just the base game alone is a great investment. (Being the expansions are basically all gone.)
Amazing conclusion to the series. I can't imagine the amount of research you must have done for this. Thanks for the content and can't wait for the next video!
Thanks for saying that! It was a fair amount, but I had a lot fun uncovering all the details - I really like when the modern designers are inspired by and homage to the past games.
Warhammer Quest is by far one of my favorite games. I started with Silver Tower and have almost everything since. This series was outstanding! Keep up the great work.
I've really enjoyed watching this series - congratulations on making it so clear and accessible to someone unfamiliar with these particular games. And an extra congrats for sneaking in a callback to ITV's Scavengers series, which I'd started to believe was a fever dream!
Thank you, that’s very kind of you to say! I’m glad that they were accessible and interesting enough to stick with! I’m also very glad that at least a couple of people remember Scavangers and I’m not a lonely aberration!
I was really looking forward to this part. I've come close to completing all the sets for Blackstone Fortress, and just recently picked up Silver Tower and Lost Relics. I find these sets, for me at least, are the easiest way into the Old World, AoS and 40k without the deep dive of the armies games. I've love the GW games going back to Space Hulk so it's nice they keep going til this day
I hope this part was worth the wait! I totally agree, I think they are really fun as discreet board game packages, but they also open the door to the wider GW worlds in really fun ways! Especially when they take inspiration from classic minis and lore. Funny you should mention Space Hulk…
@@jordansorcery the whole series has been fun. This and a couple of other videos made me pull the trigger on Silver Tower. It looks like fun world to explore. Space Hulk will be a fun deep dive. I spent the last few years obtaining it, Space Crusade and Advanced Space Crusade. Maybe one day I'll even play them!
Fantastic, I hope you enjoy it! I’ve had such fun with Silver Tower, like playing a blockbuster movie! I love Space Hulk, such a great game in every iteration. I hope you find a way to get it and Space Crusade (what a classic!) to the table again!
Excellent video. Blackstone Fortress was a great game. Cursed City had such great potential. I hope they do another WQ game, but it needs to have a good setting.
Thank you! I feel the same, Cursed City had good moments, but didn’t live up to all that potential for me. And I really hope there’s another Quest in our future!
@@jordansorcery 🤣🤣 great retrospective. I got stung by the Cursed City got a refund thankfully. Then when it got re-released I was thankful I didn't waste money on it - seeing reviews were not very forgiving lol. I still enjoy Mantic's Dungeon Saga and Star Saga games - had many epic adventures and cinematic moments. Some hated on Dungeon Saga but I never found these issues a problem, also heard there is a potential 2nd Ed of the game coming out at some point.
2:25 I'm Australian but we got Scavengers too, I LOVED it! I taped it and watched it over and over! Miss that kind of show... now I want Blackstone Fortress!
I love the lore and backdrop for the Blackstone Fortress. In fact they could make a great video game out of it. With a heavy emphasis on exploration and uncovering mysterious lore. The writers even created great heroes and characters for the game.
Fantastic stuff, Jordan. You mentioned that both Blackstone Fortress and Cursed City have a significant fan communities, and I'm aware that fan-made content exists. I've never seen a summary of the available fan content with any guidance about what's good, where to get it, and what needs more work (quality is usually the biggest concern when picking up fan-made content), and that would interest me.
Thanks so much! That's a really interesting idea, the Facebook groups for the games regularly share some amazing creations, and I followed the development of Peter Cooper's Cursed City work through his BoardGameGeek posts, but I'm not sure if there's a really comprehensive index anywhere. If I find one I'll post the link!
Thank you! It’s been really interesting doing the research, I thought I had a good handle on some of it already, but there’s some deeper cuts that have been fun to discover!
Thank you! I think that is a great shout! I'm hoping to spend some time with his Verminhollow campaign soonish, so I might try and put something together after that!
Wish I watched this before I got cursed city would have got blackstone was tossing up between the two just came down to cool minis in the end But Now I know I can make it fun cheers
Have enjoyed this mini series and I plan to try and get a copy of BSF sometime. Totally agree that the communications around the issues of the Cursed City launch were really badly handled. However I feel it's a salient point to have mentioned that the expansion characters were released as Soulblight models at a time when the cardstock issues were still at a peak. And the subsequent expansion didn't force you to rebuy these models if you already owned them and just had the unreleased tokens and rules. Cheers for compiling this archive of WHQ.
I've really enjoyed this series, you've gone into a great amount of detail and I can tell that you're speaking with loads of affection for the game. Warhammer Quest was the first GW boxed set that I ever had, for my 14th birthday present all those years ago. I can remember that my friends got really annoyed with me because I refused to play it with them until I had painted all the minis! I received a copy of Cursed City this Christmas and I've just finished putting all the models together. You better believe I'm gonna play it ASAP! Not gonna subject my mates to that again 😅💜
I'm glad you've enjoyed them, they've been fun to make and I'm surprised how many surprises Quest still had for me! That's classic, can totally understand wanting to wait until you've got things looking perfect; though I'm a fiend for just sticking unpainted plastic on the tabletop and playing ugly but tremendously fun games!
A tremendous series of videos, Jordan, thank you so much. Great games, I agree, and even where wieldy rules are lacking, the actual boxes contain the best sets of models GW has offered. Steve 🙂
4:00 Rogue Trader, 2nd ed 40K and the first couple of editions of WFB all used a variety of polyhedrals, which definitely included d12s for scatter templates and percentiles for some charts. I think some of the charts were d20 based although I might wrong, maybe the more varied ones were all on percentiles. Been a while and my old books are in storage. It's not like GW didn't understand the concept of poly dice, they'd been doing licensed D&D and Runequest stuff for years before they started on their own rule sets.
I've never played any Warhammer Quest but picked up a box of the cultists of the abyss a while ago, as (at the time) there weren't any options for chaos cultists. Always planned to build and convert them a bit to fit my Iron Warriors, but after watching this I think I'll keep them plain so I can get them into the game of Blackstone fortress you've now convinced me to play!
Also, would love to see a general w40k edition retrospective: e.g it's difficult to find all the weird old lore out, and I'd love to know how the game/lore has developed with each new edition
BSF is well worth a look if you’re interested in dungeon crawler/board game takes on 40k. I think it did a great job staying relatively simple, fast, and rewarding!
This was a great series! Really enjoyed learning the history of these games. I was lucky enough to get the OG Warhammer Quest game when it was released, and it was a mainstay favourite with me and my friends along with Necromunda and Fantasy Battle. It’s really making me want to print out some blank character sheets and get playing again, I’ll need to try out Blackstone Fortress as it sounds amazing! Thanks 🙏
That’s a great point! I think Ulfenkarn is such a great setting, hopefully C7 can really bring it to death with a richly detailed expansion! I’d definitely love to roleplay there at some point
I really feel like the BF gameplay structure is influenced by Advanced Space Crusade with the mix of combat events and other encounters. Brilliant video as always! (though "infested" is a really loaded term, I would prefer "newly liberated by the forces of the true gods")
Haha, language choice noted! That’s a great shout re Advanced Space Crusade being an influence, not least because Jervis Johnson helped design both! It’s just been so long since I’ve played it that I’ve forgotten how it works!
Great series, Warhammer Quest 95 holds a special place for me as it was the first warhammer game i played. Sadly I do not own the game and would love a reprint of it. Maybe with old worlds return we may get the opportunity to see it reprinted, well.... one can hope at least!
Stumbled upon your Warhammer Quest history trilogy and thoroughly enjoyed them. I have just purchased a painted copy of Blackstone Fortress for my lad and myself to play through for Christmas. It would have been good at the end for you to muse through what you think the future holds for the line. Subbed and liked, I will have a wander through your other content, hopefully it will be of the same standard as these 3 uploads. Great work and thanks
I very luckily squeaked in before prices got too wild, but there are so many lovely minis and components in the sets that it’s a real shame they’re so hard to get now
I definitely intend to look at blood bowl at some point! It will probably be later in the year, but it’s a fantastic game with a fun story so I’m looking forward to covering it!
Haha, I’d be lying if I said it hadn’t crossed my mind! There’s definitely some interesting stories there so they’re all on my project list! Thank you for supporting the series!
Am thrilled ...the missmanagement of CURSED CITY is beyond comprehension but hopefuly LOST RELICS could be expanded. Also I loved love to hear your thaughts on other GW board games
Ha! Loved the ending. Also, took me three whole WHQ videos to get the joke in the channel name. Very clever. ;-) I can't get enough WHQ on UA-cam, so feel free to keep going with the series whenever the mood strikes. :-D
I’m glad you enjoyed the video! And the channel name! I’ve got a few projects in the works looking at some other GW classics, but I’m keen to do some more WHQ related stuff as well! Out of interest, would you be interested in Quest play throughs or lore deep dives?
Thank you, much appreciated. I played the first edition reprint from a few years back a little, but truth be told it was so random and brutal at times that I struggled with it! That said, I always looked at the 3rd edition dragon tower expansion with envious eyes (and liked the look of the old FFG 40k reimplementation, Relic) so I don’t doubt I will try it again one day! Would you recommend giving it another look?
@@jordansorcery I was just thinking of it's history, really, it's been through a few incarnations, much like Warhammer Quest. Aye, it was pretty harsh hahahaha
Hey Jordan. How did you get on with those final expansions? I'm here mostly for the history of the miniatures, and that was fun to learn about. When do you think the next edition will come out? 40k in 2024 maybe?
Hey Jordan, they put the Ambull in the recent videogame Warhammer 40k Boltgun if you didn't know! Thought you might find it interesting. I played the game before I watched this video, so it's cool to know the background of it.
One question: Do you have review the SpaceQuest (or another coutries SpaceCrusagers) for the future? Beacuse its so fantastic game, and first incarnations the HeroQuest to make Games Workshop and Mattel too. Btw. It is good mini series and I like every minute was seen it. Keep it up next video!
Thank you! I’d really like to take a look at Space Crusade (as it was called for me) and HeroQuest in the future, they’re absolutely on my list of projects!
Describing Cursed City as "bump in the road" is mighty optimistic of you. I own the Sigmar Quest games and was expecting Cursed City to get at least half of what Blackstone got. Needless to say I'm not happy with two underproduced mini expansions. Base game is fun though, needs a few tweaks to avoid the grind. For my part I plan to be curious but skeptic of the 2023 Quest game, assuming they release one. I'm not saying a certain no, but GW has been burning goodwill when it comes to Quest series. I jumped head first into Cursed City. Next time they need to convince me.
I’m definitely taking it easy on GW despite the mess they made of it. I do think the pandemic played a major role, but they definitely did react appropriately, especially with the expansions. I think you’re right to be wary of what comes next, and to be disappointed that Cursed City didn’t get anything like the quality of BSF support, but I’m really hoping they get things back on track with any future Quest game. They’ve still got a winning record for me, but yeah, goodwill severely tinged!
They're usually called "dungeon _crawlers"._ Just FYI. If you don't know about it, you should look into Mutant Chronicles board game. It's like a sci-fi Hero Quest. I've never played Space Crusade (I wish!), but it's probably comparable.
Got my copy of Lost Relics. I wanted to delux the box with the miniatures for all the token enemies. UNFORTUNATELY, GW designed this game around some of the most out of print and hard to find Underworlds miniatures there are; The Zarbag's Gits and the Spiteclaw Swarm to name the biggest offenders. Luckily I have the Eyes of Nine but it'll cost me around $100 to get ahold of the Gits and another $70 to get Spiteclaw. I didn't even look into the orks. 😒 Great game otherwise. 😅 I'm looking forward to looking further into the unofficial Cursed City expansion works going around once my box is fully painted.
I went through exactly the same with Lost Relics - fortunately had some of the warbands, but still need a couple and they aren’t cheap! I’m hoping that they do similar to the recently announced Warcry warband rereleases and reissue them all for us! I’m really excited to play Verminhollow, it looks so good!
Unfortunately, the removal of these warbands was actually fairly recent. The removal was in late april. It's super sad that they're gone considering how nice of models they are. I do believe a few of them will be available in the upcoming Stormbringer Magazine, but I'm not quite sure which ones. I do recall seeing Zarbag's Gitz in the lineup that was previewed. But its still unclear if and when that's coming out. To me it seems like they pulled the models because they had to, not because they wanted to. I heard they were experiencing stocking issues at the time, and had to shrink their model lines. Bladeborn (out of production now) was released Dec 2021, and it too used minis from Underworlds as expansion models. Tome of Champions 2021 (Warcry Rules update) too which came out in Feb 2022, only two months before they pulled the models from the shop. It seemed like they were really planning to use these models in more games moving forward. Especially considering that Lost Relics came out AFTER they pulled them from the store. I am hopeful they'll bring them back eventually though. Maybe as a limited run, maybe for a different game, Warcry maybe.
Loved original WHQ. Played it to death a couple of years ago with my kids. I was Troll Slayer, son was Wizard and daughter was Elf. I think we got to like level 7 heroes? Great game, I doubt any of the later games are anywhere near as good. The only downside is you need extra miniatures to make it good. You can borrow your heroquest models of course! And any WH Fantasy Battle models you have spare.
I think there’s still some real magic and fun in the new games (especially Silver Tower and Blackstone Fortress), but it is definitely a change from the original. Sounds like an amazing campaign, I don’t think we ever got past the first 5 levels given the number of character fatalities! That additional flexibility from being drop in your entire monster collection was such a strength for us though
@@jordansorcery yeah, your model collection became a bit limiting though. Out of the box you didn’t really get solid fights for L7 teams unless you declared them champions or other stuff. Having said that the Giant was still capable of wiping out a high level party. So much so we never dated put him in the deck! I never owned any Greater Daemons, but I suspect any of those could wipe most parties out in no time.
So Jordan, I assume this is a bit too old to respond, but I really think you should give WHQCC another chance. While I do agree there's a bit of a pacing issue for levels 0-1, once you get into the later levels, the game picks up both in difficulty and pacing admirably, resulting in a tense, fairly difficult game. The person whose houserules you posted admitted he only played each scenario once and then wrote them, and while his changes would help with level 0-1 missions, they are very very unbalanced for much later missions where it's much more easy to die. Still, it's been nice to see all of the Cursed City content in White Dwarf. Maybe not enough to justify an Annual but I've got a friend who is planning to use his FEC's for a new campaign we're building while I'm thinking Callis and Toll myself. Anyway, if you read this, thank you and keep the content coming. As always, your dutiful servant, O.G.
I was excited for both Blackstone Fortress and Cursed City before their respective release. But I really didn't like how BF handled enemies, I knew I wouldn't have anyone to play it with, and it was prohibitively expensive to just get for myself, especially as due to Kill Team 2018 I was already buying multiple Citadel kits per month, and the expansion release schedule, while fine on its own, just exacerbated the issue. And Cursed City lost steam with me due to the bungled release. I actually seem to have interpreted correctly everything that went on and predicted accurately everything that was to come, but the complete lack of communication showed a complete lack of respect for the customers, which was a major turn-off in and of itself, and the poor reviews sealed the deal for me. I do have to say, though, that I found - and find - people complaining about the miniatures not being included in the expansions to be both baffling and irritating. It was pretty clear why the minis had come out first, and I actually found it - for lack of a better term - considerate of GW not to force people who'd already bought them to pay for them a second time.
Ok, say younwant to play a scifi-ish Warhammer quest. Would you use the mechanics of Blackstone? Or borrow Cursed City's mechanics for a scifi/Blackstone campaign?
I went back and forth on that as I agree, they are important to the game, but I settled on them being such interesting topics in their own right that they deserved a fuller exploration - I’ve got a few other videos planned first, but in the new year I’ll be giving them their due!
The worst part about Cursed City is that its fantastic and it sucks the narrative ended up the way it did with the expansions. Out of the box I have very little to complain about but sadly everything after is trash. I really hope a Space Hulk revival is next. I would also love to see them return to Mordheim but I doubt that's going to happen given old world Warhammer is going to be more of a Forge World side thing.
I’d love to see them bring Mordheim back with the level of amazing support we’ve had for modern Necromunda! I’m keeping my wyrdstone singed fingers firmly crossed!
@@jordansorcery Would you rather a straight up 100% reprint(difficult, molds might not be available) or a "Warhammer Quest: The Old World" which is a remake but a touch of modernization etc? I would probably like the second but i would hope we got orcs in the classic style with it
I’d love more people to be able to get a copy of the original, but I’d be happy with an updated take on questing in the Old World too! (As I have WHQ95 though, I’d take the new version if it was just about me!)
My biggest peeve with Games workshop over the last couple of decades has been (maybe in a huge over reaction to a previous over manufacture you mentioned from the early 90's) the habit of under producing nearly all of their boxed games? This not only creates a scramble between actual fans to get a copy, but also automatically makes them hugely profitable for scammers to buy up copies and sell them for double the price a year later? Grrrrrrrrrrrr If they were that scared of being left holding spare games, they should allow people to order them after the initial run was sold out and make the minimum manufacturing order levels for a new run to be visible to all? I beleive Games Workshop has lost loads of potential new players from (especially younger gamers) not having the cash or chance to buy immediate on release? maybe waiting for a birthday or Giftmas to be gifted a copy? While i may be happy to gift my nephew a £100 game off the shelf, I might look elsehere when I see that £100 game on ebay for £250 only a few months after release?
You made a very good summary, congratulations! Most of the games are also interesting and I would like to try them, but your series also reminded me of the worst, most evil company in the world. It is enough to think about which of the games and accessories listed in the three parts are currently available in stores at list price. GW, F UR-SELF.
Dang I still really need to pickup Blackstone Fortress. Cursed City was such a disappointment, but I think there will definitely be more in the series.
Great series! I think you undersell the misinformation and gaslighting GW put out about Cursed City. Initially they reassured us that the game would be a staple we could get at any time - no need to worry if you miss the pre-order. Then silence followed by them claiming they never intended for it to be anything other than a limited release. Then a run of curiously CC themed miniatures are released at silly prices Then, months later, once the scalpers have had a field day, they reverse on that. Great! Even those scalped are excited for what's to come next. Except, you know those silly priced miniatures, some of which aren't even available? Yeah, you're going to need those. "Tokens"? Never heard of tokens...
Thank you! Totally fair points, they weren’t upfront about what was happening, and whether the problems were the result of decisions or external factors better communication was needed. The expansions have been unusual choices too so I can only assume things didn’t work out as planned somewhere, it’s all a disappointing shame as the potential was all there.
7:25 I beg your pardon, what was that crack about 28mm? Over a decade of 6mm Epic games says otherwise quite decisively, and they've stuck their toe in 8mm with the new AT and Aeronautica as well - and that's not talking about the nebulous scale of Battlefleet Gothic. For that matter, GW refuses to stick to scale anyway. Their bloated figs haven't been 28mm scale in two decades, and they keep getting worse - and the only reason for the creep is a futile attempt to stay ahead of third party manufacturers who do a better job making the minis people actually want than they do. Thankfully that's due to end as they can't possibly compete with the ease of resizing STLs.
Haha, very true indeed! I actually think some of the best GW games have been in completely different scales (in fact, my next video is about one of their smallest scale boxed games!) You’re totally right about the ‘heroically’ scaled 28mm too, I tried to use some modern and older minis in a game recently and the size difference was wild!
A buddy bought Tyranid Attack when we started out in 2nd Ed 40k, just after its release.. He also bough an Ambull blister.. Not sure how we used him in 40k but he was in Tyranid Attack iirc? Maybe with a WD article or I am just wrong..
The original is such a classic! I’m glad they have found ways to bring something new to the concept though, to make the more recent games interesting and exciting in their own right
@@Predator8383 If everything good is only in the past, then everything will be only bad in the future. Should immediately lie down in the coffin, right?
@@Basil_Ghothickovitch not so, ise the blueprint of the past to make a better game not become corporate and make only money. Monopoly does this year I’m year out. Still time before I visit my coffin
Oh good question! For me personally, it’s Silver Tower. I don’t think it’s the most expansive story, but it’s just so themey and appropriately Tzeentchian! All the little adventure book events and things like the familiars just really speak to me! I do still love the two WHQ95 adventure pack settings/scenarios though (very pricey these days though!) And if fluff is the driver for you then don’t sleep on Shadows Over Hammerhal, if you’ve got a good GM it can be brilliant fun!
Loving this series, Warhammer Quest will always hold a special place in my heart! 😊
Thank you, I’m glad you’ve enjoyed it! It’s truly the game that sits right at the centre of my hobby heart, just so many wonderful memories!
So glad that somebody (you) finally gave due credit to the Blackstone Fortress Novels and Radio Plays. To me, its HALF of the experience. The most epic adventure I've ever been on next to Final Fantasy 6.
It’s a great fun story, I think they did really well with it!
Woah, next to FF6! That's high praise - and with Darktide out, I've never had more inspiration to paint up my copy of Blackstone Fortress x)
@@jamesv.7041 With the short stories and radio plays, every single character is featured at some point. The books are the reading bit and the on-the-table bit is like the grinding. The only thing missing is the epic soundtrack, but I think the building and painting filled in the gap for me there.
@@goodjessehobbies haha, Spotify has the Darktide soundtrack 🤓
@@jamesv.7041 Cool, I'll try and remember that next time. Also, just FYI, I do think that just the base game alone is a great investment. (Being the expansions are basically all gone.)
Amazing conclusion to the series. I can't imagine the amount of research you must have done for this. Thanks for the content and can't wait for the next video!
Thanks for saying that! It was a fair amount, but I had a lot fun uncovering all the details - I really like when the modern designers are inspired by and homage to the past games.
It's been a fun ride through the Warhammer Quest story.
I’m glad it’s been fun for others and not just me!
Warhammer Quest is by far one of my favorite games. I started with Silver Tower and have almost everything since. This series was outstanding! Keep up the great work.
Thank you! Silver Tower was a strong entry point, I'm really glad GW brought WHQ back and ST was a worthy successor that made it worthwhile
I've really enjoyed watching this series - congratulations on making it so clear and accessible to someone unfamiliar with these particular games. And an extra congrats for sneaking in a callback to ITV's Scavengers series, which I'd started to believe was a fever dream!
Thank you, that’s very kind of you to say! I’m glad that they were accessible and interesting enough to stick with! I’m also very glad that at least a couple of people remember Scavangers and I’m not a lonely aberration!
I was really looking forward to this part. I've come close to completing all the sets for Blackstone Fortress, and just recently picked up Silver Tower and Lost Relics. I find these sets, for me at least, are the easiest way into the Old World, AoS and 40k without the deep dive of the armies games. I've love the GW games going back to Space Hulk so it's nice they keep going til this day
I hope this part was worth the wait! I totally agree, I think they are really fun as discreet board game packages, but they also open the door to the wider GW worlds in really fun ways! Especially when they take inspiration from classic minis and lore.
Funny you should mention Space Hulk…
@@jordansorcery the whole series has been fun. This and a couple of other videos made me pull the trigger on Silver Tower. It looks like fun world to explore. Space Hulk will be a fun deep dive. I spent the last few years obtaining it, Space Crusade and Advanced Space Crusade. Maybe one day I'll even play them!
Fantastic, I hope you enjoy it! I’ve had such fun with Silver Tower, like playing a blockbuster movie!
I love Space Hulk, such a great game in every iteration. I hope you find a way to get it and Space Crusade (what a classic!) to the table again!
Great series to watch! Nothing better than a stroll down memory lane that ultimately has me diving into my garage to pull out boxes of fun :)
Excellent video. Blackstone Fortress was a great game. Cursed City had such great potential.
I hope they do another WQ game, but it needs to have a good setting.
Thank you! I feel the same, Cursed City had good moments, but didn’t live up to all that potential for me. And I really hope there’s another Quest in our future!
Blackstone Fortress should be called "WHQ Event Horizon" 🤣🤣🤣
It really could be!
@@jordansorcery 🤣🤣 great retrospective. I got stung by the Cursed City got a refund thankfully. Then when it got re-released I was thankful I didn't waste money on it - seeing reviews were not very forgiving lol. I still enjoy Mantic's Dungeon Saga and Star Saga games - had many epic adventures and cinematic moments. Some hated on Dungeon Saga but I never found these issues a problem, also heard there is a potential 2nd Ed of the game coming out at some point.
2:25 I'm Australian but we got Scavengers too, I LOVED it! I taped it and watched it over and over! Miss that kind of show... now I want Blackstone Fortress!
It’s such a time capsule of a certain era of Saturday night TV! Blackstone’s not really like it, but there’s a fun enough nostalgia similarity for me!
I love the lore and backdrop for the Blackstone Fortress. In fact they could make a great video game out of it. With a heavy emphasis on exploration and uncovering mysterious lore.
The writers even created great heroes and characters for the game.
Completely agree, it’s such a rich dungeon/world. I think they did a terrific job with that corner of the universe
Fantastic stuff, Jordan. You mentioned that both Blackstone Fortress and Cursed City have a significant fan communities, and I'm aware that fan-made content exists. I've never seen a summary of the available fan content with any guidance about what's good, where to get it, and what needs more work (quality is usually the biggest concern when picking up fan-made content), and that would interest me.
Thanks so much! That's a really interesting idea, the Facebook groups for the games regularly share some amazing creations, and I followed the development of Peter Cooper's Cursed City work through his BoardGameGeek posts, but I'm not sure if there's a really comprehensive index anywhere. If I find one I'll post the link!
well researched review of an often ignored aspect of warhammer gaming
Thank you! It’s been really interesting doing the research, I thought I had a good handle on some of it already, but there’s some deeper cuts that have been fun to discover!
Great series! How about an in depth review of Peter Cooper's rework of Cursed City?
Thank you! I think that is a great shout! I'm hoping to spend some time with his Verminhollow campaign soonish, so I might try and put something together after that!
Wish I watched this before I got cursed city would have got blackstone was tossing up between the two just came down to cool minis in the end
But Now I know I can make it fun cheers
Such amazing 40k miniatures for Blackstone Ambulls and Zoats!!
I never played this but would love to get my hands on some of those minis.
Thank you; I really enjoyed listening to the whole three-part series!
I’m glad, thank you for sticking with them and commenting!
Great series about these games. Thumbs up 👍
Thank you, glad you enjoyed them!
Have enjoyed this mini series and I plan to try and get a copy of BSF sometime. Totally agree that the communications around the issues of the Cursed City launch were really badly handled. However I feel it's a salient point to have mentioned that the expansion characters were released as Soulblight models at a time when the cardstock issues were still at a peak. And the subsequent expansion didn't force you to rebuy these models if you already owned them and just had the unreleased tokens and rules.
Cheers for compiling this archive of WHQ.
I've really enjoyed this series, you've gone into a great amount of detail and I can tell that you're speaking with loads of affection for the game. Warhammer Quest was the first GW boxed set that I ever had, for my 14th birthday present all those years ago. I can remember that my friends got really annoyed with me because I refused to play it with them until I had painted all the minis! I received a copy of Cursed City this Christmas and I've just finished putting all the models together. You better believe I'm gonna play it ASAP! Not gonna subject my mates to that again 😅💜
I'm glad you've enjoyed them, they've been fun to make and I'm surprised how many surprises Quest still had for me! That's classic, can totally understand wanting to wait until you've got things looking perfect; though I'm a fiend for just sticking unpainted plastic on the tabletop and playing ugly but tremendously fun games!
A tremendous series of videos, Jordan, thank you so much. Great games, I agree, and even where wieldy rules are lacking, the actual boxes contain the best sets of models GW has offered. Steve 🙂
Thanks Steve! I really love WHQ in all it’s forms, so it was fun to research and make these videos!
4:00 Rogue Trader, 2nd ed 40K and the first couple of editions of WFB all used a variety of polyhedrals, which definitely included d12s for scatter templates and percentiles for some charts. I think some of the charts were d20 based although I might wrong, maybe the more varied ones were all on percentiles. Been a while and my old books are in storage. It's not like GW didn't understand the concept of poly dice, they'd been doing licensed D&D and Runequest stuff for years before they started on their own rule sets.
Great series - thank you.
Thank you, I’m glad you’ve enjoyed it!
Again great stuff, I have cursed city and am think of getting black fortress.
I've never played any Warhammer Quest but picked up a box of the cultists of the abyss a while ago, as (at the time) there weren't any options for chaos cultists. Always planned to build and convert them a bit to fit my Iron Warriors, but after watching this I think I'll keep them plain so I can get them into the game of Blackstone fortress you've now convinced me to play!
Also, would love to see a general w40k edition retrospective: e.g it's difficult to find all the weird old lore out, and I'd love to know how the game/lore has developed with each new edition
BSF is well worth a look if you’re interested in dungeon crawler/board game takes on 40k. I think it did a great job staying relatively simple, fast, and rewarding!
You read my mind! I’m working on something in this space, but it’s a ways off still - the research is weighty on that one!
This was a great series! Really enjoyed learning the history of these games. I was lucky enough to get the OG Warhammer Quest game when it was released, and it was a mainstay favourite with me and my friends along with Necromunda and Fantasy Battle. It’s really making me want to print out some blank character sheets and get playing again, I’ll need to try out Blackstone Fortress as it sounds amazing! Thanks 🙏
Amazing series! Thank you for putting it together. I hope you keep up with more content like this in the future. Cheers!
Thank you for watching, and commenting! I’ve got a few ideas for more videos so there’s plenty more to look out for!
Cool ride, Jordan!
Thanks!
This series has been great, really enjoyed it. Looking forward to seeing what you cover next, keep up the good work!
Thank you for saying that, I’m glad you’ve enjoyed it!
Oh just to add some info; There was a group of Ambull’s in Caves of Ice (The Caiphas Cain Novel).
I didn't know that, that's ace!
Cubicle 7 are releasing Ulfenkarn: City at the Edge of Death, a rpg modual set in the cursed city.
That’s a great point! I think Ulfenkarn is such a great setting, hopefully C7 can really bring it to death with a richly detailed expansion! I’d definitely love to roleplay there at some point
I really feel like the BF gameplay structure is influenced by Advanced Space Crusade with the mix of combat events and other encounters. Brilliant video as always! (though "infested" is a really loaded term, I would prefer "newly liberated by the forces of the true gods")
Haha, language choice noted! That’s a great shout re Advanced Space Crusade being an influence, not least because Jervis Johnson helped design both! It’s just been so long since I’ve played it that I’ve forgotten how it works!
Great series, Warhammer Quest 95 holds a special place for me as it was the first warhammer game i played. Sadly I do not own the game and would love a reprint of it. Maybe with old worlds return we may get the opportunity to see it reprinted, well.... one can hope at least!
Stumbled upon your Warhammer Quest history trilogy and thoroughly enjoyed them. I have just purchased a painted copy of Blackstone Fortress for my lad and myself to play through for Christmas.
It would have been good at the end for you to muse through what you think the future holds for the line.
Subbed and liked, I will have a wander through your other content, hopefully it will be of the same standard as these 3 uploads. Great work and thanks
Loved watching this, thank you!
Very well done!!
Thanks so much!
I'm so sad that Blackstone Fortress was discontinued. Only got the basegame and the other stuff is really prohibitive to get now.
I very luckily squeaked in before prices got too wild, but there are so many lovely minis and components in the sets that it’s a real shame they’re so hard to get now
Would love you to do a Bloodbowl and Dungeonbowl video please?
I definitely intend to look at blood bowl at some point! It will probably be later in the year, but it’s a fantastic game with a fun story so I’m looking forward to covering it!
@@jordansorcery brilliant.
A deep dive into Skaven would be a fun watch too
Great videos. I'd love you to cover Space Crusade
Thank you! Love Space Crusade, it was a regular at my childhood gaming table! It’s absolutely something I want to spend some time on!
Glad I stumbled across this channel. The videos seem very well presented, I look forward to seeing more!
I’m glad you did too! Thank you for your comment, really appreciate it
Subscribed just for your video aesthetics and colour scheme. Loving the vids too.
Thank you!
Great stuff! So…. Are you doing a GW/MB’s HeroQuest/Battlemasters/Space Crusade video next?
Haha, I’d be lying if I said it hadn’t crossed my mind! There’s definitely some interesting stories there so they’re all on my project list! Thank you for supporting the series!
Great lecture as ever. Never played any of these games but I really enjoy hearing about them!
I’m glad! They’re worth a play if you get a chance, very fun stuff
Cursed City is such a grind.
Awesome video, glad I found your channel! Subbed!
Glad you found it too! Thanks for the lovely comment!
Am thrilled ...the missmanagement of CURSED CITY is beyond comprehension but hopefuly LOST RELICS could be expanded.
Also I loved love to hear your thaughts on other GW board games
I’m very glad, I’ve got plenty of thoughts to share in the coming months!
@@jordansorcery perfecto!
Ha! Loved the ending. Also, took me three whole WHQ videos to get the joke in the channel name. Very clever. ;-) I can't get enough WHQ on UA-cam, so feel free to keep going with the series whenever the mood strikes. :-D
I’m glad you enjoyed the video! And the channel name! I’ve got a few projects in the works looking at some other GW classics, but I’m keen to do some more WHQ related stuff as well! Out of interest, would you be interested in Quest play throughs or lore deep dives?
Excellent work, fella! Look forward to more videos! Did you ever play Talisman?
Thank you, much appreciated. I played the first edition reprint from a few years back a little, but truth be told it was so random and brutal at times that I struggled with it!
That said, I always looked at the 3rd edition dragon tower expansion with envious eyes (and liked the look of the old FFG 40k reimplementation, Relic) so I don’t doubt I will try it again one day! Would you recommend giving it another look?
@@jordansorcery I was just thinking of it's history, really, it's been through a few incarnations, much like Warhammer Quest. Aye, it was pretty harsh hahahaha
Hey Jordan. How did you get on with those final expansions? I'm here mostly for the history of the miniatures, and that was fun to learn about. When do you think the next edition will come out? 40k in 2024 maybe?
Hey Jordan, they put the Ambull in the recent videogame Warhammer 40k Boltgun if you didn't know! Thought you might find it interesting. I played the game before I watched this video, so it's cool to know the background of it.
I really enjoyed Boltgun; just haven’t had time to play much of it yet!
@jordansorcery Oops I'm sorry if I spoiled that part 😱 Thanks for responding to my comment
Not at all, it’s such a fun game I think it’s probably ‘unspoilable’!
Great series! Might have to pick up Lost Relics now ...
Thank you! It’s a fun little intro game, nice & quick to set up and play!
One question: Do you have review the SpaceQuest (or another coutries SpaceCrusagers) for the future? Beacuse its so fantastic game, and first incarnations the HeroQuest to make Games Workshop and Mattel too.
Btw. It is good mini series and I like every minute was seen it. Keep it up next video!
Thank you! I’d really like to take a look at Space Crusade (as it was called for me) and HeroQuest in the future, they’re absolutely on my list of projects!
Love you videos man, keep up the great work.
Thank you, I will do my best! There's a couple of ideas I'm working on that I think will be really fun!
Great stuff! you should definitely do a deep dive on Mordheim next
I’m glad you liked it! That’s a great shout, I bet there’s a lot of interesting stuff to uncover there!
Describing Cursed City as "bump in the road" is mighty optimistic of you. I own the Sigmar Quest games and was expecting Cursed City to get at least half of what Blackstone got. Needless to say I'm not happy with two underproduced mini expansions.
Base game is fun though, needs a few tweaks to avoid the grind.
For my part I plan to be curious but skeptic of the 2023 Quest game, assuming they release one. I'm not saying a certain no, but GW has been burning goodwill when it comes to Quest series. I jumped head first into Cursed City. Next time they need to convince me.
I’m definitely taking it easy on GW despite the mess they made of it. I do think the pandemic played a major role, but they definitely did react appropriately, especially with the expansions.
I think you’re right to be wary of what comes next, and to be disappointed that Cursed City didn’t get anything like the quality of BSF support, but I’m really hoping they get things back on track with any future Quest game. They’ve still got a winning record for me, but yeah, goodwill severely tinged!
They're usually called "dungeon _crawlers"._ Just FYI.
If you don't know about it, you should look into Mutant Chronicles board game. It's like a sci-fi Hero Quest. I've never played Space Crusade (I wish!), but it's probably comparable.
I’m eager to get a copy of Siege of the Citadel, it looks like a lot of fun!
Never read a more Dunning Kruger comment in my life. Just FYI.
Nobody was supposed to know!
"Unusual smells" of a multi storey carpark - do you mean air freshener in the lifts.......?!!!!
Absolutely! Unusual only in that they smell so fresh, clean, and welcoming!
I'm sure I had a D20 with my 2nd Ed 40K... but i might be misremembering things over the aeons!
Got my copy of Lost Relics. I wanted to delux the box with the miniatures for all the token enemies. UNFORTUNATELY, GW designed this game around some of the most out of print and hard to find Underworlds miniatures there are; The Zarbag's Gits and the Spiteclaw Swarm to name the biggest offenders. Luckily I have the Eyes of Nine but it'll cost me around $100 to get ahold of the Gits and another $70 to get Spiteclaw. I didn't even look into the orks. 😒 Great game otherwise. 😅 I'm looking forward to looking further into the unofficial Cursed City expansion works going around once my box is fully painted.
I went through exactly the same with Lost Relics - fortunately had some of the warbands, but still need a couple and they aren’t cheap! I’m hoping that they do similar to the recently announced Warcry warband rereleases and reissue them all for us!
I’m really excited to play Verminhollow, it looks so good!
Unfortunately, the removal of these warbands was actually fairly recent. The removal was in late april. It's super sad that they're gone considering how nice of models they are.
I do believe a few of them will be available in the upcoming Stormbringer Magazine, but I'm not quite sure which ones. I do recall seeing Zarbag's Gitz in the lineup that was previewed. But its still unclear if and when that's coming out.
To me it seems like they pulled the models because they had to, not because they wanted to. I heard they were experiencing stocking issues at the time, and had to shrink their model lines.
Bladeborn (out of production now) was released Dec 2021, and it too used minis from Underworlds as expansion models. Tome of Champions 2021 (Warcry Rules update) too which came out in Feb 2022, only two months before they pulled the models from the shop. It seemed like they were really planning to use these models in more games moving forward. Especially considering that Lost Relics came out AFTER they pulled them from the store.
I am hopeful they'll bring them back eventually though. Maybe as a limited run, maybe for a different game, Warcry maybe.
Loved original WHQ. Played it to death a couple of years ago with my kids. I was Troll Slayer, son was Wizard and daughter was Elf. I think we got to like level 7 heroes? Great game, I doubt any of the later games are anywhere near as good. The only downside is you need extra miniatures to make it good. You can borrow your heroquest models of course! And any WH Fantasy Battle models you have spare.
I think there’s still some real magic and fun in the new games (especially Silver Tower and Blackstone Fortress), but it is definitely a change from the original.
Sounds like an amazing campaign, I don’t think we ever got past the first 5 levels given the number of character fatalities! That additional flexibility from being drop in your entire monster collection was such a strength for us though
@@jordansorcery yeah, your model collection became a bit limiting though. Out of the box you didn’t really get solid fights for L7 teams unless you declared them champions or other stuff. Having said that the Giant was still capable of wiping out a high level party. So much so we never dated put him in the deck! I never owned any Greater Daemons, but I suspect any of those could wipe most parties out in no time.
So Jordan, I assume this is a bit too old to respond, but I really think you should give WHQCC another chance. While I do agree there's a bit of a pacing issue for levels 0-1, once you get into the later levels, the game picks up both in difficulty and pacing admirably, resulting in a tense, fairly difficult game. The person whose houserules you posted admitted he only played each scenario once and then wrote them, and while his changes would help with level 0-1 missions, they are very very unbalanced for much later missions where it's much more easy to die.
Still, it's been nice to see all of the Cursed City content in White Dwarf. Maybe not enough to justify an Annual but I've got a friend who is planning to use his FEC's for a new campaign we're building while I'm thinking Callis and Toll myself. Anyway, if you read this, thank you and keep the content coming.
As always, your dutiful servant,
O.G.
I was excited for both Blackstone Fortress and Cursed City before their respective release. But I really didn't like how BF handled enemies, I knew I wouldn't have anyone to play it with, and it was prohibitively expensive to just get for myself, especially as due to Kill Team 2018 I was already buying multiple Citadel kits per month, and the expansion release schedule, while fine on its own, just exacerbated the issue. And Cursed City lost steam with me due to the bungled release. I actually seem to have interpreted correctly everything that went on and predicted accurately everything that was to come, but the complete lack of communication showed a complete lack of respect for the customers, which was a major turn-off in and of itself, and the poor reviews sealed the deal for me. I do have to say, though, that I found - and find - people complaining about the miniatures not being included in the expansions to be both baffling and irritating. It was pretty clear why the minis had come out first, and I actually found it - for lack of a better term - considerate of GW not to force people who'd already bought them to pay for them a second time.
Do one on Blood Bowl please
Blood Bowl is definitely on the list!
Ok, say younwant to play a scifi-ish Warhammer quest. Would you use the mechanics of Blackstone? Or borrow Cursed City's mechanics for a scifi/Blackstone campaign?
Amazing series of videos! Hoping to get a new Warhammer Quest game in the future that comes in spanish and well that it gets to my country 🤣
I’m glad you enjoyed them!
Holy balls… Scavengers…
Gone, but not forgotten!
5:20 Mala beads?
Not formally, but they do ground and calm me. Don’t leave home without them!
Very enjoyable series really enjoyed this. Shame you didn’t delve a bit more into HQ and AHQ, seeing as they were the original WQ in all but name.
I went back and forth on that as I agree, they are important to the game, but I settled on them being such interesting topics in their own right that they deserved a fuller exploration - I’ve got a few other videos planned first, but in the new year I’ll be giving them their due!
20:55
The worst part about Cursed City is that its fantastic and it sucks the narrative ended up the way it did with the expansions. Out of the box I have very little to complain about but sadly everything after is trash.
I really hope a Space Hulk revival is next. I would also love to see them return to Mordheim but I doubt that's going to happen given old world Warhammer is going to be more of a Forge World side thing.
I’d love to see them bring Mordheim back with the level of amazing support we’ve had for modern Necromunda! I’m keeping my wyrdstone singed fingers firmly crossed!
Someone obviously never had to make S8+ close combat armour penetration rolls in second ed 40K...
Those memories are locked deep in the mind vault. All I recall now is forever damaging the tank tracks, you may not move next turn
This is gonna sound dumb but honestly with the release of the Old World, putting out a Warhammer Quest classic seems almost too obvious too me
Not dumb at all, I’d love to see it happen!
@@jordansorcery Would you rather a straight up 100% reprint(difficult, molds might not be available) or a "Warhammer Quest: The Old World" which is a remake but a touch of modernization etc? I would probably like the second but i would hope we got orcs in the classic style with it
I’d love more people to be able to get a copy of the original, but I’d be happy with an updated take on questing in the Old World too!
(As I have WHQ95 though, I’d take the new version if it was just about me!)
My biggest peeve with Games workshop over the last couple of decades has been (maybe in a huge over reaction to a previous over manufacture you mentioned from the early 90's) the habit of under producing nearly all of their boxed games? This not only creates a scramble between actual fans to get a copy, but also automatically makes them hugely profitable for scammers to buy up copies and sell them for double the price a year later? Grrrrrrrrrrrr If they were that scared of being left holding spare games, they should allow people to order them after the initial run was sold out and make the minimum manufacturing order levels for a new run to be visible to all? I beleive Games Workshop has lost loads of potential new players from (especially younger gamers) not having the cash or chance to buy immediate on release? maybe waiting for a birthday or Giftmas to be gifted a copy? While i may be happy to gift my nephew a £100 game off the shelf, I might look elsehere when I see that £100 game on ebay for £250 only a few months after release?
Interesting, never heard about Cursed city being controversial
Where's the dogs
I keep trying to record it, but the cats’ got my tongue!
You made a very good summary, congratulations! Most of the games are also interesting and I would like to try them, but your series also reminded me of the worst, most evil company in the world. It is enough to think about which of the games and accessories listed in the three parts are currently available in stores at list price. GW, F UR-SELF.
When do we get Space Hulk?
It's still gonna be a blip or two!
Dang I still really need to pickup Blackstone Fortress. Cursed City was such a disappointment, but I think there will definitely be more in the series.
BSF is a great ride, though an expensive one to complete these days, sadly! The base game is still ace though
Great series! I think you undersell the misinformation and gaslighting GW put out about Cursed City.
Initially they reassured us that the game would be a staple we could get at any time - no need to worry if you miss the pre-order.
Then silence followed by them claiming they never intended for it to be anything other than a limited release.
Then a run of curiously CC themed miniatures are released at silly prices
Then, months later, once the scalpers have had a field day, they reverse on that. Great! Even those scalped are excited for what's to come next.
Except, you know those silly priced miniatures, some of which aren't even available? Yeah, you're going to need those. "Tokens"? Never heard of tokens...
Thank you! Totally fair points, they weren’t upfront about what was happening, and whether the problems were the result of decisions or external factors better communication was needed. The expansions have been unusual choices too so I can only assume things didn’t work out as planned somewhere, it’s all a disappointing shame as the potential was all there.
:~D
Cursed city theme and presentation is amazing, the gameplay is not that good though
I think I’d agree
7:25 I beg your pardon, what was that crack about 28mm? Over a decade of 6mm Epic games says otherwise quite decisively, and they've stuck their toe in 8mm with the new AT and Aeronautica as well - and that's not talking about the nebulous scale of Battlefleet Gothic.
For that matter, GW refuses to stick to scale anyway. Their bloated figs haven't been 28mm scale in two decades, and they keep getting worse - and the only reason for the creep is a futile attempt to stay ahead of third party manufacturers who do a better job making the minis people actually want than they do. Thankfully that's due to end as they can't possibly compete with the ease of resizing STLs.
Haha, very true indeed! I actually think some of the best GW games have been in completely different scales (in fact, my next video is about one of their smallest scale boxed games!)
You’re totally right about the ‘heroically’ scaled 28mm too, I tried to use some modern and older minis in a game recently and the size difference was wild!
A buddy bought Tyranid Attack when we started out in 2nd Ed 40k, just after its release.. He also bough an Ambull blister.. Not sure how we used him in 40k but he was in Tyranid Attack iirc? Maybe with a WD article or I am just wrong..
Nothing compared to the original
The original is such a classic! I’m glad they have found ways to bring something new to the concept though, to make the more recent games interesting and exciting in their own right
@@jordansorcery they do not have that dungeon crawl feel like hero quest or warhammer quest. Those days GW were a class act
@@Predator8383 If everything good is only in the past, then everything will be only bad in the future. Should immediately lie down in the coffin, right?
@@Basil_Ghothickovitch Non-sequitur. Just keep playing & enjoying what you have & know you like.
@@Basil_Ghothickovitch not so, ise the blueprint of the past to make a better game not become corporate and make only money. Monopoly does this year I’m year out. Still time before I visit my coffin
So which WHQ would you recommend if you care about story/fluff. WHQ1995, Silver Tower or Cursed City?
Oh good question! For me personally, it’s Silver Tower. I don’t think it’s the most expansive story, but it’s just so themey and appropriately Tzeentchian! All the little adventure book events and things like the familiars just really speak to me!
I do still love the two WHQ95 adventure pack settings/scenarios though (very pricey these days though!) And if fluff is the driver for you then don’t sleep on Shadows Over Hammerhal, if you’ve got a good GM it can be brilliant fun!