WHITE DWARF · JUNE 2018
The Soul Wars begin, Imperial Knight design, Glazer’s Creek revisited and a guide to Armageddon.
COVER TO COVER
In printed page order
Nagash’s great working sends deathly omens across the Mortal Realms. Short accounts of Aqshy, Ghyran, Ghur, Chamon and Shyish show how their inhabitants interpret the rising dead, from desperate defence and magical suspicion to the orruks’ enthusiastic search for a final battle.
The Soul Wars launch introduces the Sacrosanct Chamber, Nighthaunt processions and a new edition of Age of Sigmar. Malign Sorcery and fresh Knight engines expand the month’s possibilities, alongside Forge World releases, licensed games and fiction that connect the new miniatures with their wider settings.
Five recommended stories provide different routes into the Mortal Realms, from the first Stormcast battles to urban intrigue and skyborne adventure. Fyreslayer culture, Kharadron expeditions and a quest for legendary weapons demonstrate how varied the setting’s fiction has become.
Readers share personal hobby experiences, converted models and requests for more rules. The replies connect those interests with current projects and the magazine’s history, giving a conversational view of how collectors use White Dwarf alongside their own armies and campaigns.
Simon Grant’s Sacrosanct host meets Matt Hutson’s Nighthaunts while souls fall into the Realm of Death. New command abilities and returning undead shape a hard-fought contest, but an overlooked Gryph-hound secures a decisive objective and gives the Stormcast a narrow victory.
A scarred Saurus guards the entrance to an ancient ruin and the relic within. Reused Seraphon details turn the small base into a recognisable temple entrance, while severed tentacles, a cracked shield and bloodied equipment imply the battles that have already taken place.
Alarielle’s gesture appears to lift a Wrathmonger into the air through grasping vines. Matching the vines’ direction to her extended arm gives the action a clear cause, while wire-wrapped creepers help make components designed for scenery support the demanding composition.
A Plaguebearer emerges from an enormous shell to seize a startled Greatsword. A small Nurgling steals the victim’s dropped weapon, giving the disturbing natural form a second, darkly comic story and making each figure’s position matter to the scene.
The designer of the Sepulchral Guard arranges his own miniatures into a first small diorama. Scenery components and sculpted texture establish a coherent graveyard without sand, showing how repeated materials can unify a base assembled from several unrelated kits.
Weathered metal and spotted skin give an armoured orruk the accumulated wear of a veteran fighter. Simple metallic foundations support varied staining and surface damage, with the skin’s dotted texture repeating the model’s rough character rather than leaving its organic areas too pristine.
A Lord-Castellant’s lantern drives back daemons in a deliberately theatrical display. Highlights and cast shadows follow the imagined light source across figures and ground, making the lantern’s protective power legible through painting rather than relying only on the chosen miniatures.
A forest spirit and a fallen intruder suggest a story that the painter deliberately leaves open to interpretation. The terrain begins to consume the body, while carefully painted details on the warrior and sword invite the viewer to imagine what happened before this frozen moment.
A menacing Varanguard combines cool armour with warmer contrasting details. Subtle choices in the sword and scenic base hint at Nurgle’s influence, allowing a follower of the Everchosen to express a particular allegiance without discarding the broader identity of the miniature.
Jes Goodwin, Tom Walton and Dale Stringer trace the Knight family from practical settler machinery to the specialised Armiger and Dominus classes. Cockpits, service ladders, recognisable weapons and shared mechanisms make the imagined engineering convincing while preserving distinct silhouettes and battlefield functions.
Andy Clark explains the hidden dependence of Armiger pilots on the senior Knights controlling their Helm Mechanicum links. The defensive and assault roles of Dominus machines contrast with the flexible Questoris suits, which remain the preferred steeds of the houses’ ruling nobles.
Nagash prepares a vast pyramid to draw the magic of Shyish toward his own dominion while enemies gather around his works. Skaven interference corrupts the design at its critical moment, unleashing catastrophic necromantic power as the Great Necromancer refuses to admit that lesser creatures have spoiled his triumph.
Saul Painter’s wasteland warband combines familiar components into unfamiliar travellers, mutants and machines. A zenithal foundation followed by drybrushing and many washes gives the figures their shared worn appearance, while altered limbs and unexpected heads preserve distinctive stories within the group.
Kristian Simonsen builds each scavenger around an individual history, from escaped pit fighters to mysterious armoured leaders. Extensive kitbashing and selective sculpting support those identities, while quick main colours and a heavy wash keep the collection visually tied to its harsh wasteland home.
Studio artists explain how Warhammer illustrations evoke fear, curiosity, disgust and recognition. Their examples range from unsettling human figures to monstrous silhouettes, culminating in Alex Boyd’s Gutter Runners, whose perspective makes the viewer feel present in the scene rather than safely outside it.
Chris Peach’s Ventrillian Dragoons defend Glazer’s farm against Dan Harden’s repeated Ork attacks in a recreation of the classic magazine battle. Four assaults reduce the defenders to desperate survivors, but their line holds; named casualties and an improvised hospital give the victory a lasting human cost.
A beleaguered Imperial force faces a secretly chosen number of escalating Ork assaults. Randomly generated attackers, hospital recovery and persistent casualties turn the game into a test of endurance, with damaged buildings and limited defenders carrying the consequences of one attack into the next.
The industrial world’s poisoned environment and military traditions set the scene for its repeated invasions. Angron’s secret war, Ghazghkull’s return and the vast forces of the Third War lead into continuing conflict, with the Great Rift bringing daemonic threats to a planet already exhausted by fighting.
The four growing armies add magical support and begin testing their collections against one another. The games reveal both new combinations and unfinished ambitions, giving the next painting choices a practical purpose alongside the collectors’ enthusiasm for impressive centrepieces.
Nick adds a Huskard on Thundertusk and reimagines a Firebelly as an ice-channeling wizard. Repeated banners and familiar army colours connect the unusual newcomer to the force, while the contrast between fire and frost becomes a deliberate part of the conversion’s appeal.
More Sisters of Slaughter restore attention to Khaine while another allied magical model stretches the army’s theme. Andy adapts his existing aelf colours to the addition, treating visual consistency and the army’s bloodthirsty story as tools for integrating a unit from beyond its usual roster.
Jes completes a third Great Unclean One, continuing to build an army rich in daemonic centrepieces. Painting advice and discussion of magical equipment show how he combines an achievable familiar finish with an increasing range of options for games in both major Warhammer settings.
A Mortarch, another Necromancer and a Ghoul King expand Anthony’s magical leadership well beyond the minimum challenge. Battlefield experience prompts new combinations, while the Ghoul King offers both an allied unit now and a possible starting point for an additional undead collection.
The new edition provides an entry point for choosing an army, discovering its background and preparing a first force. Staff approaches range from reading battletomes to building lists around preferred miniatures, with open, narrative and matched play offering different ways to begin.
Issue 222 returns through memories of Glazer’s Creek, Ork projects and the Bommerz over da Sulphur River minigame. The retrospective explains the lasting appeal of a dramatic scenario driven by character and survival, connecting the original report to this issue’s new recreation.
Jay Clare describes house rules that keep Battle Companies campaigns responsive to their players’ stories. Bribes, captured heroes, extraordinary creatures and multiplayer balancing show how a group can agree exceptions while retaining challenging games and meaningful consequences.
A company follows its enemy to camp to free a captured leader. The prisoner begins bound and unarmed, so the attackers must reach and release their ally while managing the surrounding fight, turning a campaign setback into a focused narrative rescue mission.
Gorkanauts and Dominus-class Knights enter the engine-duelling game with new weapon and damage rules. Separate sheets for Gork’s Maul, Adamant Wrath and Pride of Kolossi identify the consequences of each ruined location, preserving the importance of choosing targets rather than merely counting wounds.
A broad gallery includes Space Marine forces, Nurgle figures, Middle-earth wizards and Underworlds fighters. The varied submissions show how individual display pieces and gaming units can share the same pages, with practical photography advice encouraging clear records of readers’ finished work.
Mateusz Sztraf builds crisp red armour through an airbrushed dark foundation and increasingly bright layers placed toward the light. Controlled edge highlights sharpen the result, while helmet stripes inspired by Paul Norton add a recognisable studio influence to the finished Blood Angel.
Studio hobbyists test the new Age of Sigmar rules and reflect on their favourite parts of the launch. A thirty-minute painting challenge, finished Ork reinforcements and wounded Guardsmen for Glazer’s Creek show how small regular sessions and a looming game can bring unfinished projects to completion.
Dan Harden gives the farm’s industrial scenery a dusty neutral grey so it remains bright without competing with the armies. Spray foundations, washes and drybrushing handle the buildings and containers efficiently, with thin orange pigment accumulating in recesses to suggest years of rust.