Here's an advertisement for the Warhammer scenario pack, McDeath, described as follows:

The evil, sadistic and thoroughly unpleasant McDeath has murdered the rightful King Dunco and usurped his throne. But, in the spirit of great tragedy, the forces of justice are gathered to do battle against McDeath and his depraved minions. Orcs, Men, Dwarfs and Treemen fight it out in a titanic struggle for power, money and alcohol.

The more I learn about stuff like this, the more I realize that I missed out by paying more attention to the early days of Warhammer. Sounds like it was a lot of fun!

Issue #76 of White Dwarf (April 1986) features a cover by Peter Andrew Jones, whose art has appeared on the cover of the magazine several times in the past, the most recent being a year before, with issue #64. Like his previous work, this cover is quite striking, depicting a hippogriff – a mythological creature not often shown in fantasy gaming illustrations, so it definitely wins points in my book for its uniqueness (though its inclusion here is in reference to the issue's AD&D adventure).

Ian Marsh's editorial notes that the "unannounced demise" of many long-running columns in WD, such as "Starbase" for Traveller, "Heroes & Villains" for superhero gaming, "Crawling Chaos" for Call of Cthulhu, "Rune Rites" for RuneQuest, and, most significantly, "Fiend Factory," a staple of the magazine practically since its inception. Marsh claims that, "with the greater variety of popular games on the market, having a department for each is impractical, and indeed restricts the content of the magazine." Future issues would include articles according to different metrics, such as themes. Issue #76 is the first example of this, focusing as it does on thieves. 

The issue begins with a longer than usual "Open Box" that devotes three pages to its many reviews. The first is ICE's Riddle of the Ring boardgame, which received only 6 out of 10. Better reviewed is another ICE product, Ereech and The Paths of the Dead for MERP (9 out of 10). Chaosium's solo Call of Cthulhu adventure, Alone Against the Wendigo, receives 8 out of 10, while the Paranoia scenario, Send in the Clones, is judged slightly more harshly (7 out of 10). TSR's Lankhmar – City of Advenure, meanwhile, gets a rare perfect score (10 out of 10), which is slightly generous in my opinion, but I can't deny that the product is a good one nonetheless. Two adventures for FASA's Dr. Who RPG, The Iytean Menace and Lords of Destiny, are reviewed positively and, oddly, receive a joint rating of 8 out of 10. Finally, there's Hero Games's Fantasy Hero (8 out of 10). That's quite a large number of products for a single issue – and not a single GW product among them!

Dave Langford's "Critical Mass" does its usual thing and I do my usual thing of mostly not caring. More interesting to me is the first of this issue's thief-themed articles, "How to Make Crime Pay," by John Smithers. It's written as if it were a lecture given by a guildmaster to apprentice thieves and it's all the better for it. Smithers presents lots of practical advice on how to handle a wide variety of larcenous activities within a fantasy RPG. What makes the article stand out is that its framing device makes it such that the article is useful to both players and referees without having to shift perspectives or divided itself into different sections. Articles of this sort are hard to pull off, so I'm all the more impressed that Smithers succeeded.

"You're Booked" by Marcus L. Rowland is an expansion of Games Workshop's Judge Dredd RPG, introducing the "misunderstood" Accounts Division of Mega-City One's Justice Department. The article lays out the purpose of Acc-Div, as it is known, and how it could be used within a campaign, with several scenario outlines presented as examples. The division is not suitable for Player Judges, but its inclusion in an adventure or campaign could help to flesh out the Justice Department and add a note of levity, as Judges deal with paperwork and expense accounts. 

"Glen Woe" is a Warhammer miniatures scenario by Richard Halliwell. It's intended to expand upon the material provided in McDeath – a Shakespeare-inspired scenario pack released around this time. Not being a Warhammer player, I can't to much about the quality of the material presented here, only my amusement at knowing there was ever a miniatures scenario based around MacBeth. "Banditry Inc" by Olivier Legrand looks at thieves guilds within the context of AD&D from the referee's point of view. While hardly revolutionary, it nevertheless raises some useful questions about the organization and operation of the guild that any referee should consider if thieves and thieves guilds become important in his campaign.

"Caped Crusaders" by Peter Tamlyn is a three-page article on "running Golden Heroes campaigns," though most of its advice is equally applicable to superhero campaigns using another RPG system. Tamlyn covers a variety of topics and the quality of his advice will depend, I imagine, on how familiar one is with both refereeing and the superhero genre. I judge it pretty positively myself, though I imagine others might find it old hat. "Thrud the Barbarian," "Gobbledigook," and "The Travellers" are all here, among a handful of only a few remaining connections to the eatly days of White Dwarf. Since I was not a reader of the magazine at this time, I can't help but wonder how much longer they will continue to grace its pages.

"Castle in the Wind" by Venetia Lee, with Paul Stamforth, is a lengthy AD&D scenario aimed at characters of 5th–8th levels. As its title suggests, the adventure concerns the sudden appearance of a "sky castle" above a desert in the campaign area. There are several things that make "Castle in the Wind" stand out aside from its length. First, there's its vaguely Persian setting, a culture that doesn't get much play in fantasy games in my experience. Second, there's the clever design of the sky castle itself (including its hippogriff nests). Finally, there's the open-ended nature of the adventure itself, which spends most of its text presenting a locale rather fleshing out a traditional "plot" for the player characters to follow. 

"How Do You Spell That?" presents a collection of six new AD&D spells culled from reader submissions. The article is listed as being part of the "Treasure Chest" column, which surprised me, since so many other standbys of White Dwarf were axed this issue. Part two of Joe Dever's look at oil painting closes out the issue. In addition to the usual color photographs that always accompany it, the article also includes a mixing guide for how best to achieve certain results when using oil paints.

I must admit, I found this issue a bit of a slog. I don't know that it was objectively any worse than most issues. Indeed, I suspect it was probably better than many I'd read in the past. Nevertheless, I can't shake the feeling that the magazine has changed and that change has started to sap my enthusiasm for reading it. Of course, I might simply be tired of this series. Slightly more than three-quarters of the way to 100 issues, I hope I can be forgiven a little White Dwarf fatigue. Still, I will attempt to soldier on for a little while longer.

Issue #75 of White Dwarf (March 1986) sports a horror – or I should I say Call of Cthulhu? – themed cover by Lee Gibbons, whose work appeared several times in the past few months, most notably issue #72. This issue marks a changing of the guard at the magazine, with Ian Marsh taking over its reins from Ian Livingstone. In his inaugural editorial, Marsh admits to "an element of trepidation" about his new job, especially at a time when WD is "mutating slowly into a different beastie." He elaborates on this, explaining that there is a "shift away from the usual formulaic style" of the magazine, by which I think he means an end to the regular, monthly columns and other features that have defined its content since the beginning. Regardless, the times, they are a'-changin' at the Dwarf.

"Open Box," for example, consists almost entirely of reviews of Games Workshop products, starting with the Supervisors Kit for Golden Heroes (8 out of 10) and Terror of the Lichemaster (9 out of 10) for use with Warhammer. There's also a review of Judgment Day (9 out of 10), an adventure for Judge Dredd – The Role-Playing Game. Rounding out the GW products covered this issue is its edition of the venerable science fiction boardgame Cosmic Encounter (also 9 out of 10 – I'm sensing a theme here). Finally, there's a look at Chaosium's second Call of Cthulhu companion, Fragments of Fear, which earns 7 out of 10. While it's inevitable that a periodical published by a company involved in the industry it's covering will include reviews of products it also publishes – TSR's Dragon certainly did – I nevertheless can't help but feel a line was crossed this issue, given the preponderance of Games Workshop releases reviewed. Perhaps next issue will be better?

I feel like a bad person for only enjoying Dave Langford's "Critical Mass" when he snarks about books about books and authors I, too, dislike. This month he brings the hammer down on the Darkover novel, Hawkmistress:

There will no doubt be hordes more 'Darkover' tales from Marion Zimmer Bradley: publishers love issuing books very similar to previous ones. Hawkmistress ... despite its veneer of science-fantasy, seems hauntngly familiar. Heroine Romilly wears breeches and gets on well with animals, but Daddy wants her to don girlish clothes and marry. One knows instantly that the chap Romilly finds most loathsome is Daddy's intended bridegroom: and so it proves. With hawk and horse our heroine to find her way in the world.

The interesting thing about Langford's critique of the novel is not that he thinks it's bad – he calls its "a readable yarn" – but that it is essentially a romance novel in very thin science fantasy dress, which I think is a fair criticism of her oeuvre (and that of Anne McCaffrey, come to think of it).

"Getting the Fright Right" is this month's installment of Colin Greenland's "2020 Vision" column. It's a collection of reviews of then-current horror movies, broadly defined, ranging from The Return of the Living Dead to Fright Night to Teen Wolf. Greenland's reviews of these films is interesting, because, as the article's title suggests, he takes some time to talk about the proper balance of thematic elements within a horror movie to make it enjoyable for him. I like this approach to reviews, since, even when I disagree with them, I at least understand where the reviewer is coming from and that's quite useful.

"Thrud Gets a Social Conscience" is this issue's installment of "Thrud the Barbarian," humorously addressing the claim that the comic (and, by extension, the entire genre of sword-and-sorcery) is sexist. This leads to an amusing exchange between Thrud and his occasional female guest star, Lymara the She-Wildebeest, about how her attire reinforces negative sexual stereotypes.

Issue #68 of White Dwarf (August 1985) features a cover by Brian Williams, who's probably best known for his work on the Lone Wolf series (though he also produced covers for both Games Workshop and TSR UK). For me, the issue marks the first one in several years when I was not a subscriber. I still picked up copies from time to time, but I was inconsistent in doing so. Consequently, many of the issues that I'll look at in the coming weeks are ones I didn't see at the time of their original publication or that, in some cases, I never read at all.

In his editorial, Ian Livingstone theorizes, based on reader feedback, that the readership of White Dwarf is in the vicinity of 100,000. That seems implausibly high to me, especially for mid-1985, but I must confess I've never had a good sense of the actual size of the hobby. Livingstone states that "our hobby is growing fast" and I can only presume he had better information on this than I ever have. Regardless, I always find it fascinating to ponder the size and growth of the hobby over the decades and this is yet another data point to consider.

"The Artificer" by David Marsh is a new character class for use with AD&D. As its name suggests, the class focuses on the construction and use of mechanisms of various sorts. Unfortunately, as presented, the class is simply a spellcaster with a unique (and very focused) spell list and some thief abilities thrown in. While I can understand why this approach was taken, it's disappointing to me. I've long wanted an artificer (and alchemist) class that was genuinely different in its presentation and not simply a magic-user or cleric with some unusual spells. Oh well.

"Open Box" very favorably reviews Blood Bath at Orcs Drift (9 out of 10), a scenario for use with Warhammer Fantasy Battle. Also reviewed are Dragon Roar (5 out of 10), the computer game Chaos (7 out of 10), Legacy of Eagles (7 out of 10), an adventure for Golden Heroes; and The Worlds of Boris Vallejo boardgame (3 out of 10). From my perspective, though, the most notable review is Marcus Rowland's harsh one of Twilight: 2000 (5 out of 10). Rowland's many criticisms are not for the rules themselves but for the game's basic set-up and "moral stance and attitudes," which he calls "fairly loathsome." By and large, he seems to find the idea of the aftermath of a limited-nuclear World War III an unfit subject for a roleplaying game, "one written for and by Americans, with little or no understanding of European attitudes or desires." 

Dave Langford's "Critical Mass" continues to do what it always does: briefly – and snarkily – review science fiction and fantasy novels from the '80s that I either never read or don't remember, with a handful of exceptions here and there. He also continues to take potshots at L. Ron Hubbard's Battlefield Earth, which I can't really criticize but neither can I applaud it, since it's a bit like shooting fish in a barrel. Meanwhile, "Free the Spirit" presents two new additions for use with Call of Cthulhu, both of which are add-ons to the excellent "Haunters of the Dark" article from last issue: the clergyman profession and the hypnotism skill. Sadly, neither of these expansions are as good (or useful) as the original article.

"Beneath the Waves" by Peter Blanchard is the promising start of a series dedicated to aquatic adventures in AD&D. Blanchard begins by looking at the nature of the underwater environment, including how it affects one's movement and senses, as well as the need for some means of breathing. I give the article bonus points for referencing the 1960s anime, Marine Boy, which I strangely loved as a young child. I definitely look forward to future installments in the series, since underwater adventures have long held my imagination, even though (because?) I've largely never managed to make them work as well as I would have liked.

"Solo Series" by Simon Burley looks at the ins and outs solo adventuring in a superhero RPG. It's a very good overview of this topic, one made all the better in my opinion due to the prevalence of lone heroes in the superhero genre. "Lone Dragon" by Phil Masters is a lengthy but well-done scenario for Traveller that makes use of both Mercenary and Striker. The characters are hired by a mysterious "nobleman" from a nearby world that has fallen into political and civil unrest for what he presents as a quick smash-and-grab mission in search of wealth. Naturally, things are quite as simple as that. 

Speaking of Traveller, "The Travellers" comic begins a series of presenting its characters in game terms, starting with Captain Horatio Flinn and his sometime love interest Syrena Medussa. I'm a sucker for things like this, especially when, as in this case, the author understands the RPG system in question and uses it to humorous effect. The issue also includes further installments of "Thrud the Barbarian" and "Gobbledigook." In the former, writer/artist Carl Critchlow once again appears, this time as the narrator delivering useful exposition. 

I mentioned above how disappointed I was with the artificer class, right? Interestingly, the issue includes a very clever adventure by the same author, intended to highlight the utility of the class and its role in AD&D. Entitled "Star of Darkness" the scenario tackles the old trope of technology vs magic but does so in an intriguing and flavorful setting, complete with lots of maps, NPCs, and challenges. I did not expect to like this as much as I did, but it's an imaginative and fun little adventure for characters of levels 3–4.

"Words of Wonder" is a collection of new AD&D spells of varying utility, which is the usual pattern with articles of this type. "The Magic Frame" by Joe Dever continues to explore the question of photographing miniatures, with lots of thoughts on approaches and techniques. Dever's columns in White Dwarf continue to be my favorites, in spite of my own relative inexperience with miniatures. He clearly has a passion for the subject, not to mention remarkable skills, and he manages to convey both through his words and photos. As ever, I find myself wishing I'd devoted myself to this aspect of the hobby when I was younger and in a better position to acquire some skills of my own.

Issue #66 of White Dwarf (June 1985) is once again graced by a Chris Achilleos cover illustration. I've always been very fond of his artwork and this piece is no exception. This issue also marks another step, albeit a small one, down the road toward Games Workshop's transformation into an all-Warhammer-all-the-time company. Ian Livingstone's editorial opines that "there is obviously a resurgence of interest in wargaming," with the growing popularity of Warhammer Fantasy Battle being offered as evidence of this. I suspect his prognostication would ultimately prove correct. Warhammer's success was real and lasting; it played a huge role in revitalizing the field of miniatures wargaming, a segment of the larger hobby that continues to be very successful (and profitable) today. 

Speaking of miniatures wargaming, this issue's "Open Box" kicks off with a positive (7 out of 10) review of FASA's Battledroids, the earliest iteration of the Battletech line of games. Slightly more glowing (8 out of 10) is its review of the second edition of Warhammer Fantasy Battle Rules. There's also a review of the 48K Spectrum version of Talisman (7 out of 10). Rounding out the reviews are The Halls of the Dwarven Kings (8 out of 10) and not one but two Fighting Fantasy gamebooks: House of Hell and talisman of Death (both 9 out of 10). I owned and enjoyed House of Hell, which has a modern day haunted house setting. It also included a Fear score that increases as the reader's character deals with more frights within the titular locale. Once the score reaches a high enough number, the character is "scared to death." The mechanic introduces an interesting dynamic, as the reader tries to avoid encounters, since each one contributes to the Fear score and its inevitable consequences.

Dave Langford's "Critical Mass" laments the "fantasy explosion" in publishing with words I could almost have written: "SF is my true love ... Fie on fantasy: for me the highest literary values consist of megalmaniac computers, hyperspatial leaps and colliding black holes." He then goes on to review multiple fantasy books he considers "consistently better than the SF." Interestingly – or perhaps simply indicative of my own cramped tastes – the only one of these great fantasies he mentions that I recognize is Piers Anthony's On a Pale Horse, the first of his "Incarnations of Immortality" series – and I don't count myself a fan. Langford nevertheless does review a few SF books, including E.C. Tubb's twenty-second Dumarest of Terra novel, The Terra Data. In his review, he notes that "beyond rotten sentences [it] has a plot resembling the previous ones: hero Dumarest tepidly pursued by omniscient yet inept Cybers, fights through unconquerable barriers of padding to obtain secret whereabouts of lost Earth, only to suffer his 22nd failure. Soporific." Cruel but accurate (and I say this as a fan of Tubb).

"The Road Goes Ever On" by Graham Staplehurst is a very nice overview/review of Iron Crown Enterprise's Middle-earth Role Playing and some of its supplements. Reading it again almost made me want to dust off my copy of MERP and give it a whirl again. Part Four of the "Thrud the Destroyer" saga continues, as the evil necromancer To-Me Ku-Pa employs dark sorcery to summon "the essence of evil throughout time." Behold!

Issue #55 of White Dwarf (July 1984), with its cover by Les Edwards, is one I remember quite well, in part because it was published during the time when Games Workshop USA was located in Columbia, Maryland. Maryland being my home at the time, this situation made it much easier for me to find issues of WD, both current and back issues. The fact that the cover was science fictional in nature probably also plays a part in my memory of it.

In his editorial, Ian Livingstone mentions that TSR "had to sack about 150 employees during the last year and several other companies have ceased trading." 1984 was definitely a significant year for the history of both TSR and the wider hobby, though of course I didn't realize it at the time. Livingstone goes on to say that "this is not the end; it merely signals change." He suggests that "adventure gaming," as he calls it, is still growing in popularity and that book companies and computer games companies will benefit from the "changing desires" of the buying public. He was probably more correct in his prognostications than he imagined.

The final installment in Marcus L. Rowland's "The Name of the Game" focuses on RPGs other than fantasy and science fiction. He puts particular emphasis on superhero and espionage games, though games like Call of Cthulhu, Gamma World, and Car Wars also get nods. The main benefit of articles like this is historical; they're a good snapshot of the time in which they were published. Speaking of history, "Spiderbite" by Oliver Johnson is an introductory scenario for both D&D and AD&D whose premise involves historical research. The characters are approached by a cleric of scholarly bent who wishes to learn more about an ancient tomb complex located in the jungles of the south. Though short and relatively straightforward, the tomb is a well-done little dungeon seemingly inspired by the adventures of Indiana Jones and other pulp treasure seekers.

"Open Box" reviews a number of notable products, starting with Forces of Fantasy, the first supplement for Warhammer, which scores 7 out of 10. Four (A)D&D modules are also reviewed: Temple of Death (10 out of 10), The Assassin's Knot (7 out of 10), Tomb of Martek (9 out of 10), and Ravenloft (8 out of 10). I find it fascinating that the reviewer, Dave Morris, gave Temple of Death a perfect score, his only complaint being that it was written for Expert rather than Advanced D&D. Equally fascinating is his complaint that Ravenloft is the module's "series of tedious puns" – a fair criticism but far from the worst aspect of this highly influential scenario. Sherlock Holmes, Consulting Detective is viewed with great favor (9 out of 10), as are three volumes Commander's SSD Books for use with Starfleet Battles (all scoring 9 out of 10). 

I suppose it's a reflection of how poorly read I am compared to Dave Langford that only one of the books he reviews in this month's "Critical Mass" – Stephen R. Donaldson's Daughter of Regals – has ever graced my shelves. Actually, that's not true: he also mentions Moorcock's The Weird of the White Wolf and Bane of the Black Sword, though he says nothing much about them. Much more intriguing is "The Unquiet Grave" by Phil Holmes, in which he takes a look at the undead as portrayed in myth and literature, with an eye toward their use in fantasy RPGs. "Punks in 2034" is a short and self-explanatory Car Wars article by Steve Jackson (the USA one, not the UK one). It wouldn't be the '80s without some punks, after all ...

"Man and Beast" by Tom Parry and Jerry Vaughn is a treatment of zoolatry – animal worship – as the basis for cults in AD&D. The article provides information on initiation and advancement within the cults, as well as animal talismans, which are magic items that grant various powers related to the cult's animal patron. Interestingly, advancement within a cult isn't tied to a character's experience level, but is something independent of it. I rather suspect that the idea behind this is derived from the cults of RuneQuest – not that I mind, since cults are one of the most compelling ideas in RQ.

Part 4 of Dave Morris and Yve Newnham's "The Castle of Lost Souls" solo adventure appears in this issue and is as enjoyable as the previous parts. Normally, I skip over the letters page; I will make an exception this issue, because of the following "letter," which I found amusing:

As usual, we get more "Thrud the Barbarian," "Gobbledigook," and "The Travellers." There's also "Flying the Flag" by Joe Dever and Gary Chalk, which talks at some length about the trials and tribulations of creating flags and standards for use with miniature figures. It's a surprisingly interesting article and I say that as someone who's never been much of a miniatures guy. "Mystic Triptych," as its name suggests, is a collection of three small articles for use with RuneQuest, my favorite being Oliver Johnson's stats for the night shriekers from Dougal Dixon's After Man. 

"The Gods of the Shapelings" by Fred Lee Cain is a follow-up of sorts to last month's "Fiend Factory," which introduce the naturally invisible shapeling race. Their gods are written up Deities & Demigods-style and are vaguely interesting (which is more than can be said of the shapelings themselves). "Arch Enemies in FRP" by J.H. Dickson is about what you'd expect: a bit of advice to the referee about making memorable enemies. Finally, there's "The Edge of Infinity" by Marcus L. Rowland, an excellent Ttraveller piece that considers alternate approaches to sector design, including curved and folded space, in addition to wormholes and parallel dimensions. Good stuff!

Though this issue is one I remember well, it's not one of my favorites. That's no knock against it, mind you. Rather, it's (yet more) recognition that it's difficult to put together a consistently excellent periodical, since it's so dependent on its submissions. With luck, next issue will be one of the greats.

Memory is a strange thing. Though I owned many of the issues of White Dwarf about which I've been writing in this series, some of them stand out more than others. Issue #54 (June 1984) is one of those I remember very well, in large part because of its striking cover by Peter Andrew Jones. In my opinion, the covers of Dragon were consistently good, while the covers of White Dwarf were more hit or miss. However, very few of the covers of Dragon stick in my head the way that White Dwarf's covers do. I suspect it's because the WD covers were generally wilder and more varied. They were rarely "safe" in the way that Dragon's were. That's not to say all of White Dwarf's covers were brilliant – they were not – only that many more captured my youthful imagination than did their counterparts on the front of Dragon.

Issue #54 is also memorable for its editorial by Ian Livingstone, which touches on the issue of the Satanic Panic. I reproduce his words here in their entirety:

And then there was this photo from the back of the issue. Yes, it's real.

Issue #53 of White Dwarf (May 1984) boasts a cover by Angus Fieldhouse depicting wgar appear to be orcs in the service of Saruman from The Lord of the Rings – notice the sigil of the white hand on their shields and battle standard. If so, it's an odd choice, since the issue contains a scenario for use with Warhammer based on the Battle of Pelennor Fields in which Saruman's forces did not participate, having already been defeated at Helm's Deep a couple of weeks prior. Even so, I like the illustration quite a bit; it nicely encapsulates many of the features I strongly associate with the Games Workshop "house style" for artwork.

Issue #45 of White Dwarf (September 1983), featuring a very weird cover by Gary Ward, is an important one in the history of the magazine, at least for me. First, this issue marks the premier of two new comic strips, both of which are very dear to me. Ian Livingstone would seem to agree, since he uses his editorial to announce this fact and urges readers to give the new comics "a chance to settle in." I gather from his comments that not all readers like comics in their gaming magazines, which is understandable, as gaming comics tend to be very hit or miss (mostly the latter, in my experience). Second, this issue also marks the appearance of the very first battle scenario for Warhammer in the pages of White Dwarf. It is an omen for things to come.

The issue kicks off with "Open Box," which reviews Avalon Hill's Wizards. This is a game I regularly saw in game stores but never owned or played. The reviewer, Alan E. Paull, found its presentation somewhat frustration, but liked its gameplay enough to give it 7 out of 10. Meanwhile, Oliver Dickinson gives Pavis 9 out of 10, which is, I think, a little stingy. The older I get, the more I have come to appreciate the output of Chaosium in the late '70s and early '80s, with Pavis and Big Rubble among its masterpieces. Also reviewed are three modules for AD&D and one for D&D: Tomb of the Lizard King (9 out of 10), Pharaoh (10 out of 10), Oasis of the White Palm (10 out of 10), and Blizzard Pass (6 out of 10) respectively. With the exception of Blizzard Pass, I think these ratings are a bit generous, but tastes differ, of course, and I recall thinking much better of the "Desert of Desolation" series at the time than I do now.

Dave Langford's "Critical Mass" spends most of its space on a lengthy review of C.J. Cherryh's Downbelow Station, which was the winner of the previous year's Hugo Award for best novel (for what it's worth). Langford seems genuinely well disposed toward Cherryh as a writer, but doesn't think this is her best effort. He also does quick reviews of three other books, including Italo Calvino's If On a Winter's Night a Traveler, which is an admittedly strange book to review in White Dwarf, though "Critical Mass" frequently devoted itself to books other than those that could easily be called fantasy or science fiction. 

Part 2 of Dave Morris's "Dealing with Demons" focuses on lesser demons, describing them and their abilities for use with RuneQuest. The article's main attraction, in my opinion, is that these demons are (mostly) original rather than drawing on real world myths and legends. It's a clever approach to the topic, I think, though they're a good fit for RQ's Glorantha setting is another matter (assuming that was the intention, since the article is silent on the matter). "Gateway to Adventure" by Bob McWilliams is a "cameo" adventure, which is a coinage of McWilliams for "small scenes or themes that could be fitted into an ongoing campaign." In this case, the cameo is about researching an interplanetary transport device – the titular Gateway – that leads somewhere else. McWilliams doesn't provide any information on what's beyond the gate, leaving that to the referee to decide, which is admittedly a little unsatisfying. On the other hand, the set-up is fairly good and it's an unusual one for Traveller, which is a plus.

"Stop, Thief!!" by Marcus L. Rowland is a short article detailing the contents, along with individual weight and costs, of the items in a typical thieves' kit. I personally don't care for this level of detail, but I can appreciate its utility in certain circumstances. Part 4 of Daniel Collerton's "Irilian" is as good as its predecessors. In addition to the usual mix of local businesses, this installment describes the town's guards, bureaucracy, and ruling council. It's packed with the kind of detail that a referee needs if he intends to use a town as regular locale for his campaign. There's also an adventure set in the town relating to religious corruption and false relics – good stuff!

As I mentioned earlier, this issue marks the debuts of two new comic strips. The first is Thrud the Barbarian by Carl Critchlow. Thrud is a delightful parody of Conan and his mighty-thewed knock-offs. Most of Thrud's adventures involve random mayhem and destruction as a result of his penchant for attacking first and then thinking later, if at all. I'm especially fond of his encounter with an Elric clone, but most of his stories are great. Also premiering in this issue is Mark Harrison's The Travellers, which is a similarly broad parody of science fiction, filtered through the lens of GDW's Traveller. If anything, it's even more delightful than Thrud and I simply adored it back in the day (and still do).

"Divinations" by Oliver Dickinson is largely a collection of errata and clarifications to RuneQuest and RQ products. As such, it's only of interest to diehard fans. "Thistlewood" is a Warhammer Fantasy Battles scenario intended for two, four, or six players, plus an umpire. The scenario is a fairly typical "defend a sleepy little village against invaders" kind of thing, but it's filled with lots of charming details and information from the early days of Warhammer, before it became the behemoth of later years, so I find it strangely compelling nonetheless. Of particular note is the fact that the scenario is written by Joe Dever, best known for his work on the Lone Wolf series of gamebooks.

"Fiend Factory" offers up four new elemental monsters for use with D&D and AD&D. The somewhat misnamed "Elemental Items" by Daniel Hooke is actually a collection of eight new magic items that pertain to the para-elemental planes. Finally, "Super Mole" is a gossip column about the RPG industry, written by an anonymous author, after the fashion of Gigi D'Arne of Different Worlds but without the bitchiness. Most of the gossip is ephemeral stuff that has little lasting value, but I did find the section relating to Chaosium and its licensing of RuneQuest to Avalon Hill fascinating. According to Super Mole, Greg Stafford stated that the Chaosium crew simply wanted to design games and had no interest in "printing, selling, credit control," and the more tedious, business-related aspects of producing RPG materials. This is something I've long suspected to be the case (and indeed may have read somewhere else), but it's fascinating to see it stated here so baldly.

Issue #45 is another solid one. White Dwarf has really hit its stride in my opinion, though I am undoubtedly biased, since I'm now well into the run of issues with which I am most familiar. We're not quite yet at the point when I was a regular subscriber, though that will come soon and I'm rather excited to revisit those particular issues. In the meantime, though, I continue to enjoy these revisits to one of the truly great magazine's of our hobby.

With issue #43 of White Dwarf (July 1983), we are well within the range of issues I remember strongly from my youth. This is the period before I'd actually subscribed to the magazine – that would come a little while later – but after I'd made it a point to pick up a new issue each month. Consequently, I still have a vivid recollection of this Jim Burns cover. Strangely, I also recall Ian Livingstone's editorial in which he suggests that computer games can never replace tabletop RPGs (or even boardgames) for the satisfaction they provide in playing them with (or against) human beings. Nearly forty years later, I find it hard to disagree.

Part 2 of Marcus L. Rowland's "Cthulhu Now!" presents two mini-scenarios and one campaign outline for use in a Call of Cthulhu campaign set in the 1980s. One of these, entitled "Trail of the Loathsome Slime," would become the basis for a licensed CoC adventure published by Games Workshop at a later date. Since I never owned that particular book, I can't say how closely it hews to Rowland's original idea. I really enjoyed this article back in 1983 and it encouraged me to try my hand at modern day Call of Cthulhu.

"Open Box" reviews Warhammer in its initial release, earning 8 out of 10. I've mentioned before that I've never had the chance to look at this version of the game and now I wish I had. It's a pity that it's nigh impossible to find a copy at a reasonable price. Oliver Dickinson gives Questworld, Chaosium's alternate setting for RuneQuest, a mere 6 out of 10, which surprises me, as my (admittedly hazy) recollection is that it was more interesting than that. I shall have to re-read it sometime soon to see if I agree with Dickinson's assessment. Finally, there's a review of the play-by-mail game, The Tribes of Crane, which garners a 9 out of 10 – high praise indeed! I never got into play-by-mail games, but I'm fascinated by them, so such a positive review only piques my interest further.

Dave Langford's "Critical Mass" looks at a number of books, starting with a couple casting skeptical eyes on psychic and related phenomena. He follows it up with reviews of Alfred Bester's The Deceivers and The Insider by Christopher Evan. I've read the former, but I've never even heard of the latter. Go figure. "Hanufa's Little Sister" is Oliver Dickinson's final short story of Griselda. The tale includes a note that information on her further exploits can be found in Chaosium's Pavis. This is true: the boxed set released the same year as this issue includes another short story of Griselda, also written by Dickinson (though her game stats appear in Big Rubble, along with those of her associates).

"Magimart" by Lewis Pulsipher briefly discusses the ups and downs allowing the buying and selling of magic items in a D&D campaign. As with so many of Pulsipher's articles, he offers sound advice, though it's difficult, from the vantage point of the present, to appreciate it fully, since so much of what he has to say has since passed into the collective wisdom of the hobby. "Vehicle Combat" by Andy Slack, meanwhile, remains of lasting interest. It's a nice, simple system for adjudicating vehicle combat in Traveller without recourse to Striker (though it does make use of Mercenary). I had a lot of fun, thanks to this article, so it remains a favorite of mine to this day.

The centerpiece of the issue is Part 2 of Daniel Collerton's "Irilian." As with last issue, Collerton describes a single section of the city, along with an adventure set in that part of Irilian. This part focuses attention on an abbey and an inn, both of which are given complete maps and both of which figure prominently in the scenario. The remainder of the article describes on living in Irilian, with an emphasis placed on what houses look like, family arrangements, coinage, and similarly mundane but nevertheless useful features. It's another great installment in a terrific series; it remains one of the highlights of White Dwarf during the period when I was reading it.

"Happy Landings!" by Thomas M. Price is a very good three-page article for Traveller. Price looks at starport design, an overlooked aspect of Traveller in my opinion (and not just because I worked on a book concerning this topic). What makes the article especially good are the half dozen or so sample maps included with it. Traveller characters spend an awful lot of time in starports; having more examples of possible layouts is this extremely helpful to the harried referee. This was another favorite of mine. "Arms Talk" by Oliver Dickinson is a discussion of damage absorption in RuneQuest. It's a fairly dense little essay, filled with plenty of musings about RQ's combat system. At the time, I wasn't playing the game, so I paid little heed to it. Nowadays, I wouldn't give it much attention either, since the complexities of the combat system are my least favorite aspects of RuneQuest.

"And Some Came Riding" is a fun installment of "Fiend Factory," describing several new D&D monsters that make use of mounts of one type or another. I especially like the Bug Riders, insect men who make use of a variety of arthropods as riding beasts. "Bujutsu" by Graeme Davis details Japanese weapons for use by AD&D monks, which was a well worn genre of article in the gaming magazines of the '80s. Finally, there's the first appearance of the comic Gobbledigook by Bil (who, I believe, is Bill Sedgwick, who did art for Games Workshop). I loved many of White Dwarf's comics, including Gobbledigook, so it was great seeing his debut in this issue.

Issue #42 of White Dwarf is an excellent one, perhaps one of the best I ever owned. The mix of D&D, Call of Cthulhu, and Traveller material was welcome, since they were my three main RPGs back in the days of my youth. Even now, they remain among my favorites. It's a real pleasure to revisit issues like this one and I look forward to those that follow it, as I recall that many of them are just as superb as this one.

Though I was (eventually) an avid reader of White Dwarf, my direct experience with most of Games Workshop's other products was quite limited. I largely missed out on games like Warhammer Fantasy Role-Play until many years after the fact and even then my experience of it was cursory. That said, I do remember quite vividly the original marketing campaign for the very first edition of Warhammer, featuring the advertisement below.

Issue #4 of White Dwarf (December 1977/January 1978) features a cover by the incomparable John Blanche, who would later go on to become of the signature artists of Warhammer, in both its miniatures battles and RPG versions. Its opening editorial, by Ian Livingstone, bemoans the state of the British gaming industry, pointing out that, as of the time of publication, there was only one UK wargames company and none devoted to RPGs. I find this interesting, in light of the fact that Games Workshop would eventually become one of the juggernauts of the hobby and, while it no longer publishes its own RPGs, GW nevertheless remains a force to be reckoned with even in the 21st century.

"Alice in Dungeonland" by Don Turnbull is truly fascinating article in which the author describes eleven "features" of the "Alice level" of "the Greenlands Dungeon," which I can only assume was the "tent pole dungeon" of his home campaign. Equally fascinating is that, unlike Gary Gygax's Dungeonland, which directly translates people and places from Lewis Carroll's famous book into AD&D, the features of the "Alice level" are (mostly) inspired by things described in the Alice stories rather than directly imported. 

Lewis Pulsipher continues his series on "D&D Campaigns," this time discussing "some practical aspects of constructing dungeons and setting up a campaign." He notes that, more so than other articles in this series, it's intended for neophytes and "may not be of much use to veteran referees." Pulsipher is indeed correct in this assessment, as his advice, while completely sound, includes the sorts of things that most of us have reader dozens of times in many places. In fairness, some of this advice might have been genuinely new in 1977 (and, of course, it's always new to those who've never before served as a referee). 

The article entitled "Hyboria" is written by Tony Bath and provides an overview of his famed Hyboria miniatures wargames campaign. Though short, it's a terrific article for anyone interested in the process that led Bath to create his campaign setting. In some ways, it's better than Pulsipher's preceding article, even though it's far less detailed. I was also struck by his conclusions.

What are the lessons of Hyboria? Well, firstly, what you get out of a game is in relation to the amount of effort you put into it. Secondly, a well constructed fantasy soon takes on its own life, and from that point needs only minimal guidance. Finally, if you want to test the limits of your imagination and still keep the whole thing within a logical framework, there is no better medium than creating a fantasy world. Besides, it's fun!

I doubt anyone could disagree with anything he says here.

"Open Box" reviews Nomad Gods by Chaosium, Star Empires and Dungeon! by TSR, and Melee from Metagaming. Of the four games reviewed, Melee – the first part of The Fantasy Trip – is the one that receives the harshest criticism, mostly on the grounds that "there are no really original ideas in this game." The reviewer, Martin Easterbrook, seems to have felt that "anyone who has already adapted rules" would have no need of Melee, which is probably a fair point. It's a reminder, I suppose, that, in 1977, kit bashing of one degree or another was widely assumed; playing a game straight out of the box with no modifications was perhaps unusual, let alone the expectation that would could do so, hence reviews like this.

Don Turnbull returns with "Monsters Mild and Malign," where he talks about the process of creating new and unusual monsters with which to challenge players. He offers three of his own, in addition to citing examples he likes from other sources. More interesting to me was his principle of MERIT – "make empty rooms interesting too." According to this principle, the referee should set up

an array of magical effects, interesting traps, intriguing though valueless pieces of furniture, curious artifacts, new magical items or whatever strikes your fancy and which will present something of a challenge to intruders.

The question of empty rooms and the "best" way to present them remains a much debated matter. I confess that I continue to struggle with it myself, having come to no firm conclusions about it. It's a topic that's been on mind lately as I dive into the design of the main Vaults beneath the city of Inba-Iro in my upcoming sha-Arthan setting. I'll likely have more to say on this matter once I've begun play.

Brian Asbury presents a Barbarian character class that bears many similarities to the one that Gary Gygax would one day include in Unearthed Arcana, as well as many differences. This version of the barbarian is much less physically robust, having only six-sided hit dice (though it does appear to have been written for OD&D rather than AD&D), but, in exchange, it gets a variety of wilderness-related abilities, as well as fearlessness, ferocity, and the ability to catch missiles. I'm not sure I'd ever use the class myself, but I can't deny that it has a distinct flavor that differentiates it from fighting men or rangers. Meanwhile, Andy Holt's "The Loremaster of Avallon" presents an absurdly complex system for dealing with parried and unparried blows that I simply glossed over. I appreciate the value of detail in many areas, but combat is not one that matters much time, hence my preference for keeping it simple. Consequently, articles like this do nothing for me.

"Competitive D&D" by Fred Hemmings continues with the details of several more rooms from his competition dungeon, this time from its fifth level. Several of them are cleverly done and I was glad Hemmings shared them. However, I feel as if they'd have made more sense if they'd been given more overall context, even if it had made the article longer. Still, I remain fascinated by the kinds of dungeons referees designed in the early days of the hobby; articles like this give me a little more insight into the matter.

All in all, issue #4 was a good read. I particularly enjoyed the content that was clearly derived from play and spoke to the though referees put into the design of their dungeons and campaign settings. I hope that we'll continue to see this sort of thing in future issues, perhaps in lengthier and more detailed forms.

Sad news.

Richard Halliwell is no longer with us. One of #Warhammer's creators, plus #SpaceHulk, #DarkFuture, and more.
To say Hal was a personality is an understatement. I think of him as the British games industry's very own Crazy Diamond. Shine on, Hal.https://t.co/AaIscU2k3Q

— Graeme Davis (@GraemeJDavis) May 3, 2021

Last month, I presented Part I of my interview of Rick Priestley, co-creator of Warhammer Fantasy Battle and originator of Warhammer 40,000. What follows is the second and final part of this interview, in which Mr Priestley once again provides lengthy and insightful answers that illuminate the early days of Games Workshop and the games he created and developed while he worked there. 

4. How long after all of this did Ansell go on to found Citadel Miniatures? How long after that did you join the company and what were your initial responsibilities there?

I wasn’t involved with the founding of Citadel so all I can tell you is what I believe to be common knowledge, namely that Citadel was founded in 1979 by Bryan in conjunction with Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone of Games Workshop. I was at university in Lancaster from 1978 to 1981 studying archaeology, and was otherwise occupied, so to speak.

I joined Citadel, then based at Victoria Street, Newark, in late 1982 and my initial role was to "do the mail order." There was just me dealing with all the mail order at that time. Previously

the mail order had been done by Richard Halliwell, Duncan MacFarlane or by Bryan himself, and I’d also helped out occasionally on a casual basis. I would go on to build the mail order team and pass the role on fairly quickly. After that Tony Ackland and I went on to found the first studio, which was at Mill Gate in Newark, and produce the first Warhammer, catalogues, journals and so on.

It was a very small team when I joined and we all did a bit of everything really. As well as booking in mail orders, sorting out the cheques and postal orders for banking, collating/dispatching the orders and dealing with mail shots, Tony and I would put together

all the catalogues, pamphlets, inserts and other advertising as well as any packaging that was required. I also learned how to cast - often necessary to complete orders – and had a go at making moulds. Often we’d all pitch in to fulfil big trade orders or to help out with deliveries (all by hand – you couldn’t get a palette truck through the narrow doorway – the arrival of the monthly metal order was always greeted with some trepidation). You have to remember it was a tiny operation really – nothing like what it would become.

5. When did the idea for the game that would become Warhammer first appear and who was responsible for it? I have a recollection that it was originally intended as a promotional product to help sell miniatures. Is that correct?

The idea for a set of rules to allow folks to play something like a battle was something that Bryan Ansell came up with when he was running Citadel. It was something we all talked about when I joined, so it was "in the air," so to speak. There had been fantasy games of this kind before, so the idea wasn’t new in itself, there were a number of rulesets already out there although they tended to be a little over-complex and most were crudely produced. However, it was definitely Bryan who called the shots on such things - he was the boss after all! There was talk of a "free" set of rules that would be given away with the mail order. At the time, we produced an A3 mail order flyer every month that was basically a catalogue supplement with deals and a bit of a write-up for the new models. The notion was that the "rules" would be something like an A3 sheet. Bryan was keen on selling figures in "regiments" rather than just the odd one or two that folks were ordering for playing Dungeons & Dragons and other role-playing games. In that sense, the game was initially conceived as a promotional venture – but Warhammer has always existed to "sell" the models, as it continues to do to this day. The story of Warhammer starting out as "free" rules is just one of those press anecdotes – yes it’s sort of true – but it never happened like that. We did later on publish rules and stats for new models on the mail order sheets, and even on the backs of the boxes of some models, but by that time the Warhammer game already existed. 

The idea of a "free giveaway" never reached fruition because as soon as we started to think about what was involved it was obvious we were talking about a book (three booklets in fact). Richard Halliwell and myself had written and published rules together before, and Bryan had published his own rules too. One of the reasons Bryan recruited me was to produce these kinds of publications. Bryan came up with a basic brief for what he wanted – stressing that it had to be a game youngsters could play using ordinary dice, that it had to have rules for everything we made, and it had to have a token "role-playing" element because at that time role-playing was extremely hot. Richard Halliwell was given a commission to develop and write it – Richard (Hal) wasn’t working for Citadel at the time but freelancing as a mould maker. That meant he had spare time to devote to developing the game.

So we started playing – all out of house and in our own time – there was no way anyone was going to pay you to sit around designing games in those days! Hal worked out the basic mechanics and produced a type-script. I collaborated on the design, and there were a number of Hal’s friends and Citadel employees who pitched in with playing. Hal handed the type-script over to me at the newly founded studio (basically me and Tony Ackland) and between us Tony and I edited, expanded and to some degree completed the work that would become the first Warhammer. Bryan didn’t do any hands-on work at that point - he was busy running the place – but he contributed ideas to the rules and provided a much-needed steer and plenty of encouragement. Bryan was very keen that the rules should be accessible to younger players in a way that the Featherstone and Grant rules were when we were novice players ourselves. It was Bryan’s insistence that the rules use only ordinary dice that led to Hal adopting that "roll to hit," "roll to kill," and "roll to save" system that was a modification of the percentage "roll to hit/roll to kill" system we’d developed for our Reaper game. You needed a three stage roll to get the breadth of stats for a fantasy game with everything from Gnomes (yes really) to Dragons.

6. Your name is listed second in the credits for "game design and development" for 1986's Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay. What specifically were your contributions to the game?

Well it was a long time ago for a start so exactly what I did I can’t rightly recall, but if I remember correctly the project was something we started with just me writing in-house and Richard Halliwell contributing out of house. At the time Tony Ackland was our sole in-house artist and he did all of the initial artwork. Tony and I would have bounced stuff between us as we always did on those early projects. I remember working out the world background – it was really when the Warhammer World gelled - and I researched medieval settlements, roads and such like in quite a bit of detail. I pretty much wrote the first draft - but the idea for careers was something Hal came up with – I remember that because he couldn’t get it to work and abandoned it. I thought it was worth persevering with, so I took the idea and expanded it massively, and I wrote up all the careers and worked out the career paths. We pretty much had a finished manuscript when the studio was still at Eastwood. By the time that Jim Bambra, Mike Brunton and Phil Gallagher joined us (all ex-TSR UK writers with a lot of experience with role-playing games) the game was essentially there – but I’m sure it benefited from their experience at in terms of further play-testing and editing. I remember in particular that when we played as a group the more experienced role-players thought the combat system was too dangerous, which is why we came up with the idea of "fate points" to add some "ballast" into player survivability.

The scenario was written by Hal – "The Oldenhaller Contract" – and I seem to recall he wrote that as a freelancer. During the writing and production of WFRPG the studio transitioned from being just me, Tony, John and Joanne, our sole-production assistant, to a big team that included the ex-TSR designers as well as Graeme Davis, Ken Rolston, Stephan Hand and a great many middle managers and even more production folks. White Dwarf moved up from London together with some of the staff, and so what had been a very tight team suddenly became something different. That TSR team and Graeme would go on to produce all the role-playing supplement for WFRP including the Death on the Reik series and everything that made the game such a success. So – although the book itself was almost all my own work, all the subsequent role-playing material was handled by others.

7. Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader was released in 1987 and you're credited as the sole designer. When did you first get the idea for a science fiction version of Warhammer and what were your primary inspirations in doing so?

Well I had a game called "Rogue Trader" that I brought to Citadel when I joined – but that game was basically a spaceship combat style game for which I’d designed the models. I joined Citadel on the understanding that I’d "get to do" Rogue Trader one day – and we got as far as advertising it in one of the early Citadel Journals if I remember correctly. Once Warhammer took off we started to put science-fiction elements in right away – you can see it in some of the Journal and Compendium articles, especially in the scenarios set in Lustria where the Amazons are often armed with alien weapons of mysterious kind.

So, the idea was always there, and I was always pushing to "do Rogue Trader" but didn’t get a chance until the TSR crew joined up. After that we were awash with designers, and at the time there was an assumption that the "big money" was in role-playing games and board games – so we started to produce those in some quantity. We also employed Nigel Stillman to take on some of the Warhammer work specifically, and Hal re-joined the studio at about the same time. So, whilst everyone else was distracted I finally got to "do Rogue Trader," although when I started no one expected it to amount to much. The word at the time was that "science-fiction doesn’t sell," this was so axiomatic that I was to understand we wouldn’t make many new models, but people would be encouraged to convert their fantasy models into science-fiction equivalents, to which end we would make conversion packs of weapons. That’s why the Rogue Trader/40K alien races are basically Orcs, Elves, Dwarves, etc "in space" – although to be fair that was also the premise of my original spaceship rules. Those spaceship rules were supposed to be printed in the back of the Rogue Trader book – but alas by the time I’d written everything else there wasn’t room!

As with the original Warhammer, Rogue Trader was an out-of-house commission, and I wrote the draft text in my own time rather than at work, although I subsequently did a lot of development work as my day job. I think by that time it was obvious the game was going to do well – despite the indisputable fact that science fiction doesn’t sell – and resources started to be put into it. That included the first plastics as well as lots of metal models and artwork. Of course it sold very well indeed and has continued to do so ever since in its various iterations right up to the present day.

I don’t know about inspirations. I’d been playing science-fiction wargames in various forms for years together with Richard Halliwell. A lot of our Reaper games were a mix of fantasy and science-fiction. I think it was that at the time I thought a lot of the science-fiction games that already existed were a bit old-fashioned – often based on or inspired by Heinlein’s Starship Troopers. Star Wars was still quite a big thing and that idea of squeaky clean heroes – of good guys and bad guys – was typical of how folks approached science-fiction at the time. Well as you know, 40K isn’t like that – it’s a universe sustained by its own madness, where ignorance really is strength, and where archaic institutions battle for power within a feudal universe that’s almost medieval in character. That’s what appealed to me about the project – a chance to describe a universe that really was grim and dark albeit in the context of a game of toy soldiers! The reason for that was obviously to set up a background for a game of warfare, and one that could be sustained practically forever too. It seems to have worked reasonably well.

8. Among the elements that have always made 40K compelling were its dark sense of humor, playful irony, and its nuanced, occasionally philosophical, approach to some of the questions raised by its setting. Do you agree and do you think that the game as it currently exists still retains those elements?

The original book certainly combined a dystopic and violent universe with humour – perhaps the irony was rather heavy handed and maybe the humour verges on the silly in places – but I was writing a book about wargames for wargamers and not aiming for literary credibility. And just as well, you might reasonably say! My approach has always tended to combine high and low styles together. Sometimes that was to evoke a deliberate clash intended to remind us that this is all pretend and we should not take it too seriously. I probably couldn’t resist the gag. I did cheerfully plunder some quite serious literary references. If I read or saw something that "would work well in 40K" I used to just jot it down and it would be re-worked into the text.

I think that approach did colour the way other authors at GW presented the universe; especially in the hands of Mike Brunton and Graeme Davis because we shared a sense of humour (and often the odd pint or two at the Salutation after work). It was fun coming up with all the imperial mantras and nonsense sayings, and I think we were quite competitive about it, trying to make each other laugh whilst riffing on different ideas. We were quite an educated bunch. At a time when most people didn’t go to college we were all graduates – Phil Gallagher studied Russian at Cambridge – and both me and Graeme (and Nigel Stillman for that matter) had studied archaeology so we brought a lot of broad cultural and historical references into our worlds.

As 40K evolved, and other writers took over the job, it did get increasingly po-faced, which I always thought missed the point a bit – but what can you do? I didn’t have much to do with the development of 40K in my last years at GW. I haven’t so much as looked at it since I left in 2010, so I can’t comment on what it’s like now as I’ve no idea. During my last few years the company was going very much in the direction of producing bigger models for everything – because those are far more profitable than regular "troops" – so the game (and this goes for all the games not just 40K) was being re-imagined around the big models rather than trying to reflect the background or any recognisable representation of warfare. Not my thing really but I’m sure it has its appeal on its own terms. Whatever the current game/back story is like, it certainly continues to be popular judging by the Games Workshop financial results (I write at the end of 2020), and good luck to them I say.

9. As you mentioned, you left Games Workshop in 2010. What have you been doing since then? Do you have any current projects you'd like to highlight or promote?

I’ve done a few things with some of my ex-Games Workshop comrades – people I worked with for years such as John Stallard, Alessio Cavatore and Paul Sawyer. I’m retired now and don’t intend to undertake any big projects, though there’s a few odds and ends that still need sorting out. I wrote a game together with the Lucid Eye team of Steve and Joe Salah – The Red Book of The Elf King – which was envisaged as three books of which we’ve completed the first two (the second is Troll Wars). We were going to do the third one (provisionally Hell Saga) this year but because of the Covid-19 epidemic things have been put on hold. We hope to get back to that next year (2021) assuming things calm down a bit.

I wrote a couple of sets of historical game rules for Warlord Games – Black Powder and Hail Caesar – and helped out with the World War Two game Bolt Action (Alessio Cavatore was lead designer for that one). Those have been successful in terms of historical wargames and Warlord Games has grown from a couple of guys in a dingy office to a proper grown up company operating out of a sizeable and very smart industrial unit just round the corner from Games Workshop HQ. It’s been fun working with so many of my friends from my days at GW – it’s amazing how many of those who own and work for the local wargames companies have passed through the doors of GW.

I also produced a science fiction game based on the Bolt Action game system – Beyond the Gates of Antares – and a fantasy warband game called Warlords of Erehwon (that’s nowhere backwards in case you missed it!). There’s a second edition of Antares already written but put on hold because of the epidemic – so I don’t know when that’ll be out. Whilst waiting for it I wrote a fantasy game that uses the same basic engine, and I’m having a lot of fun with that. It’s another slightly tongue-in-cheek take on fantasy, a bit like early Warhammer, although there’s no overall background and players are encouraged to "do their own thing." I’ve created a website which has all the updated army lists, including many new ones, as well as errata and various play aids – it’s called This Gaming Life and you can find it under thisgaminglife.uk or rickpriestley.com.