I promised a #ThrowbackThursday of stuff I worked on every week until I forgot. Well, I forgot last week (week 2), so that was a good start. I'll make up for it with a humdinger. Who remembers Legends of the Old West (aka #LOTOW)?
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Love LotOW have all 4 of the books and played it a bunch lotr rules with the Mordhime experience system was gold, wrote rules to use it to run Deadlands games as well for less historical and more fantasy flavour
Lovely setup! I tell you what, I wish the laser-cut scenery boom had happened 20 years earlier. Then I wouldn't have had to spend every lunch break for 6 months making balsa wood buildings...
Absolutely. The MDF stuff is so perfect for an old west setting. The game is really immersive and tons of fun to play. We have a train, stage coach and cows too for those scenarios.
@markalatham.bsky.social the historical team at @goonhammer.bsky.social would love to chat with you about GW Historicals - can I email you or can you dm me if you're interested?
Thanks Henry! I still play from time to time. I unfortunately hold the dubious honour of writing the last ever WH book (Waterloo)... But that's a story for another day.
It would be. If you haven’t listened to my podcast before, there’s a list of episodes at https://battlegames.co.uk/battlechat-podcasts/ including a few names you might recognise…😁 You’ll see the format is more Parkinson than Paxman. Drop me a DM and we can make arrangements for a December or January recording.
This series was my first solo design credit (although it was of course heavily based on rick Priestley's LOTR Strategy Battle Game system). And it was all part of a vision by Warhammer Historical's Rob Broom to make a connected series of games using the same parent system.
At the time, I was working on the Battle Games in Middle-earth partwork (serialised gaming magazine), along with Pete Borlace, who would be the graphic designer on LOTOW. We pitched to Rob, and the project was born.
We were young (check out the photo!) and very enthusiastic, so we'd literally down tools on the magazine at 5:30, and work 4-5 hours on the cowboy game. Sometimes I'd crash at @rjmrgn.bsky.social's flat in Nottingham, but sometimes I'd make the 40-mile drive home. Then do it all again the next day.
The design of these books was next-level for GW at the time. Indirectly, they led to the production of full-colour books in the GW studio (our boss on the magazine became head of the studio, Pete later became art manager, and after White Dwarf I became studio editor).
We made four books in the end: the core rulebook, Frontier: Blood on the Plains, The Alamo: Victory or Death, and Showdown. All of them were unified by a smart design by Pete, and stonking artwork by @handiworkgames.bsky.social.
Because of our partworks experience, we were determined to introduce the hobby to a new generation of historical gamers. We had tutorials for prepping and painting minis, converting metal models, and step-by-step scenery guides. (Ray Dranfield even built us an Alamo in book 3!)
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Thank you for a great game 👍🏼
#LOTOW
#ThrowbackThursday