WARHAMMER QUEST: SHADOWS OVER HAMMERHAL

Dungeons And Dragoons

The original Warhammer Quest was one of the highlights of Games Workshop’s ’90s heyday. Effectively a tabletop “dungeon crawler” where players guided a cast of stock fantasy characters in search of treasure, it was self-contained enough for players to get to grips with quickly, while remaining flexible enough to allow as much expansion and storytelling potential as you desired.

Last year’s Silver Tower was a solid relaunch, if lacking in some of the depth of the original. Shadows Over Hammerhal – a standalone boxed game that also acts as a companion to Tower – reintroduces a Gamesmaster to the proceedings, meaning that one of the players must forego adventuring in favour of springing traps and unleashing ambushes on the foolhardy explorers.

That might not sound as much fun as getting in the thick of the action, but it’s actually very entertaining for the GM, allowing them to slowly tell a story while the other players are searching for treasure. And while Hammerhal may be less easy to pick up and play than its predecessor, there’s more room for expansion here – you can customise and grow your characters between games, and what happens to them off the board in the district of Cinderfall is often as intriguing as the adventures themselves.

Plus it’s a fine-looking set, with atmospheric dungeon tiles, lots of lovely miniatures and reams of background material. Will Salmon

There are no exclusive new miniatures. However, Chaos players will find Kairic Acolytes, Bloodreavers and a Sorcerer.