"Warhammer World" Loot 2018

"Warhammer World" - The main building complete with giant statue and "Warhammer 40K" game display

This past weekend saw the start of what will hopefully be a semi-regular pilgrimage to Lenton Lane, Nottingham, and the supposed "Mecca for collectors and gamers across the globe" known as Warhammer World. I haven't actually visited the global headquarters of the "Games Workshop" hobby since its early days, and was surprised by just how many different games, genres and miniatures the company currently produce. Certainly, I found my willpower simply to pick-up the odd little trinket wilting the moment I arrived and came face-to-face with the place's gigantic statue of a Space Marine and Rhino armoured troop carrier.

Having therefore found myself already considerably enthused with "Warhammer 40K" I set foot inside the Visitor Centre and promptly came face-to-face with a marvellous display of Ultramarines storming an incredibly detailed mining facility which had been unfortunate enough to fall prey to an infestation of Nurgle's chaotic disciples. Somewhat overshadowed by a formidably-sized statue of Lurtz from "The Lord Of The Rings", not to mention a second Space Marine (perhaps the original sculpt which stood outside?), this enclosed miniature display in some ways actually made me want to drive back home and start painting up the contents of my "Dark Imperium" boxed set straight away...

Warhammer 40,000 Rogue Trader - "Produced to celebrate the 30th Anniversary of Warhammer 40,000" 

Naturally there was still plenty more to see, and resultantly I spent some time moving around the various downstairs display cabinets before venturing up into the building's main store. Perhaps somewhat surprisingly for a manufacturer who is literally just about to release the second edition of their "Age Of Sigmar" rule-set though, it was not until I ventured up these steps that I started to notice its publicity; the vast majority of which came in the form of large cloth advertisement banners displaying some of the games more popular factions, such as the Stormcast and Daughters of Khaine.

However, as you can probably imagine, this momentarily banished all thoughts of their "dystopian science fantasy universe" from my mind and had me making a bee-line past the welcoming member of staff, and straight to their substantial "Age Of Sigmar" miniature exhibits. It was at this point though that I realised I really had ill-prepared myself for the sheer volume of plastic, metal and resin "Games Workshop" produce, and the presence of "Forge World" and their entire resin range didn't help matters either.

Errant-Questor WIP - The Stormcast Eternal has been assembled, based and primed

Luckily I was able to take a moments breather and libation at the wonderfully atmospheric Bugman's Bar, before returning to the store area and pressing on with my plan to view every single model on display. This refreshing respite momentarily allowed me to regain my wits and logically decide to only purchase from the centre's 'exclusive' range, rather than rampage through the fully-packed aisles of wares which I could doubtless purchase online (and at a significantly reduced cost).

To that end I was rather pleased to simply walk away with just a "special edition facsimile" of the original "Warhammer 40,000" rule-book, in order to replace my badly battered copy of "Rogue Trader", and the rather enigmatic-looking Errant-Questor multi-part plastic model for the Stormcast Eternals. Of course, paying £20 for a single average-sized miniature, even when it comes in a myriad of small fiddly pieces, is definitely not something I plan on doing everyday, especially when at one point I had been torn between purchasing either "the lone survivor of a retinue" or an entire "Blood Bowl" team for exactly the same price. But it was hopefully a one-off, and perhaps the start of another army for "Age Of Sigmar"...