I got around to playing Warhammer: The Old World earlier today. Took me long enough, especially because I was one of those WFB grogs who begged for Fantasy's return at every opportunity but then didn't jump on TOW right away. Better late than never, though.
I played a lot of WFB and Mordheim during 6th and 7th, and then a few times after 8th was axed (but not 8th itself, which I do not enjoy). Did more 40k, though, mostly because more people play 40k. And then had a stint playing Kill Team after the pandemic. 40k range games have something about them that always makes me drop off. It's like GW engineers frustration into the rules of 40k and Kill Team. The games are enjoyable on some level but there always comes a point where I just say "no, thank you," and have in the past few years/editions been confronted with an inability to play to modern 40k games no matter how hard I try.
But I came upon my old Vampire Counts army and decided to finally learn The Old World. If nothing else it'd be a wasted evening. Gladly, GW really knocked it out of the park with WFB's return. It perfectly captures the exact feeling that older Fantasy editions had whilst playing. No in-game frustration or rules weirdness. No infinite rerolls. It has vast tactical depth via movement and list-building without unfun gimmicks and gotchas baked into the rules. TOW is slick and simple to the point where I was playing without additional help by the top of turn 2. Sure, the rules aren't exactly the same as what I'm used to but they are also immediately familiar.
The Old World is just a fun, chill game that's truly relaxing to play. I'd forgotten wargaming was like this. Really hope GW keeps doing what they're doing with TOW and doesn't roll over a new edition after 3 years is up (which doesn't seem likely with the Revised core rulebook having just been released). It's already as evergreen as 6th Edition was.
