Covers the general time and region of the Ottoman Turks. Covers the Punic Wars between Rome and Carthage in the 3rd-2nd centuries BC. Covers the Byzantine Empire from 6th-12th centuries. Based around a campaign following Spartacus' slave revolt. Designed to extend Warhammer Ancient Battles to a slightly later medieval period, this includes new rules as well as a set of summary army lists covering Europe in the 14th-16th centuries. The armies of Alexander the Great and his enemies. Covers the Spanish Reconquista in the 10th-13th centuries. Covers the British Isles, France and Scandinavia in the Dark Ages. Covers Roman and Barbarian armies of the 4th-5th centuries. Covers armies of the ancient civilisations in the Near East, and Trojan War. Many of the lists have been superseded by later supplements. Released soon after the rulebook, this was intended to help players get started, by providing a large number of basic summary army lists. A range of supplementary books has been released to provide more army lists, each focusing on a particular period and place. The core rulebook includes army lists for "Early Imperial Roman" and "Barbarian" armies. Hence, the influence of characters has been reduced. The first edition had had some elements that derived from its origin as a fantasy set and the revision aimed to remove them. Changes include allowing cavalry to make march rules despite infantry and capping bonus troops in melee for the number of ranks of the formation to 2. The revision aimed to encourage linear battle formations and to make flank attacks easier. Second edition Ī second edition ruleset was released in April 2010, written by Martin Gibbins. Standard bearers, musicians and officer figures are given specific advantages - seen by some as giving the rules more character. The rules are written for individually based figures and this approach was in marked contrast to the element based rulesets current amongst ancient historical wargames when the rules were first published. Warmaster Ancients - the application of the epic scale rules for Warhammer Fantasy to non-fantasy armies.įollowing the success of Warhammer Ancient Battles Warhammer Historical branched out into other areas: The WAB 2nd edition consciously took the rules even further from its fantasy origins. Modifications to the core rules have been included in some of the more recent supplements. The two games have developed in different directions since. The game rules were heavily based on the fifth edition of Warhammer, with magic dropped and more detail added for ancient weapons and formations. And, the designers had rejected the approach of contemporary rule sets as being too abstract. The rules, he said, were intended to be fun and informal, rather than dominated by requirements of super-detailed historical accuracy. To accusations that the rules were only a throwback to an earlier era of wargaming, Jervis Johnson pleaded guilty. Games Workshop eventually brought the project back in-house, with Rob Broom running the Warhammer Historical Wargames department that promoted an increasing number of books. It was published under the name "Warhammer Historical Wargames."īased as it was on Warhammer Fantasy, Warhammer Ancient Battles served as a bridge for fantasy wargamers to discover historical wargaming but also attracted wargamers who had never played the fantasy version. This led to the development of Warhammer Ancient Battles as a spare-time project. Several of Games Workshop's staff had begun experimenting with using Warhammer rules to play historical games before Warhammer Ancient Battles was written, and Wargames Illustrated magazine included some articles that had been written on the subject. Large numbers of dice are needed to resolve combat and shooting. The game is played on a table laid out with model scenery to look like a battlefield, on which the units of miniatures are maneuvered. Battles are fought between armies of miniatures. Games of Warhammer Ancient Battles model hypothetical battles between historical armies.