A visit to Warhammer World

A recent family holiday offered an opportunity to stop off in Nottingham on the way and visit Warhammer World for the first time.

While it seems that Warhammer World first opened towards the tail-end of my first run with the hobby in the late 90s, I had never visited. Now nearly a year getting back into things after a 25 year gap, I jumped on a chance to spend a couple of hours at Warhammer World as we drove south recently.

There’s a shop (of course), bar (pretty decent) and gaming hall — all of which are generally free entry. The main reason for our visit though was the exhibition space, which is reasonably priced at £8.50 per adult and £5.50 per child.

While the majority of the exhibition space is held over for cabinets and dioramas using the current models, there’s also a nice bit of a run through memory lane with classic models too. Finding the mini diorama of the Emperor and Horus by Mike McVey was a proper blast from the past!

Tomb Kings surprise

The first display area is based around Age of Sigmar, with a little Old World stuff at the start too. First time round, I had next to zero interest in the Fantasy Battle side of Warhammer: even then, it felt a bit too old fashioned and stuffy to me.

So colour me shocked to find that seeing the Tomb Kings of Khemri miniatures in their cabinets for real, I really liked them! 

In fact I enjoyed them so much I’ve been kicking myself ever since that I didn’t take any photographs of the display miniatures in the cabinet. The paint scheme worked so well in person and I kind of want to go back quite soon just to get more time looking at the details.

I did get a couple of wide photos of the impressive Old World/Fantasy Battle diorama that sits nearby, which was also very cool. My son and I particularly liked the scorpions burrowing up from under the sand on the inside of the castle walls.

Different in person

The Tomb Kings were perhaps the strongest example but seeing some of these miniatures in person compared to (often) the same exact miniatures in print or online, it was fascinating to see how different my reaction could be to the same objects.

I came away with a few strong inspirations on colour schemes and enthused for a couple of factions I previously hadn’t been so bothered about. For some time I’ve wanted to paint up my Sylvaneth in an autumnal silver birch theme but haven’t got around to it. A small display of some light-coloured Sylvaneth was great to see, even if they’re not quite the scheme I’ll be attempting.

Bjarni í Dali and the Howling Griffons

Right at the end of the last exhibition space was a display case showing off a number of miniatures and small dioramas from a non-Games Workshop painter, Bjarni í Dali. I absolutely loved his Howling Griffons diorama and quite want to try painting up a marine or two in this colour scheme now. Which is quite the feat, as it’s a scheme I’ve never liked the look of, even back in the 90s.

Good for kids?

My youngest, at 5, enjoyed things to start but understandably didn’t have the staying power to look in detail at hundreds, if not thousands, of miniatures in turn so my wife did eventually take him outside for a distraction while my eldest and I spent a bit more time with the exhibits.

That said, Warhammer World is a very kid-friendly place. The staff are all lovely and this is a generally pretty welcoming hobby community anyway. Much like the stores, there’s a tutorial area in the shop where you can paint a free miniature and my kids enjoyed that. I have to say though, it had clearly seen heavy traffic and the brushes were all in an awful state, while most of the paint pots were empty. GW could surely do a better job keeping materials available in their own HQ shop.

Exclusive miniatures

Before visiting, I had heard about some of the Warhammer World-exclusive miniatures and was especially on the lookout for the Orlock Champion and Gangers exclusive set. So I have to say a big thank you to the staff member at the till, who kindly checked I’d picked up the right thing when she spotted I didn’t have the exclusive version!

Saved from some serious frustration.

Back again?

As this first visit was more a passing-through affair on a family holiday, I’d certainly like to go back and spend more time with a little less pressure time-wise. There were a few small groups who were clearly long-time fans for whom it was a great nostalgia trip and it would be cool to go back with one or two of the friends I played with first time round.