Return to a grim and perilous “Old World” of adventure, coming soon from Cubicle 7 and Games Workshop.

That’s right friends, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay is getting a new edition later this year! There’s scarcely any information out about it at the moment–other than it’s coming out of a partnership with Games Workshop and Cubicle 7. If that name sounds familiar, that’s because they’re the ones responsible for the Dr. Who RPG, as well as Kuro (Japanese future horror), Rocket Age (Retro Sci-Fi and Planetary Romance), and World War Cthulhu (just to name a few). Much of their previous systems are d6 heavy–but I’m not sure that’s necessarily an indicator of what 4th Edition WHFRP will look like because 4th Edition, “takes its direction from the 1st and 2nd editions of the game.”

That sentence is pretty exciting, because if you’ve played WHFRP ever, then you know that the early systems are bananas–with their bizarre career-based improvement tree where your hero could come from any walk of life, and would most likely end up getting their throat slit by chaos cultists in the night, seemingly at random, but always out of spite. Seriously, 1st Edition WHFRP is fantastic.

Starting characters could be just about anything. Sure you had the standard classes you’d expect in a Roleplaying Game set in the Old World: thieves, mercenaries, wizard’s apprentices…even a few more “exotic” careers like Protagonist or Noble or Hunter. But then there was also the option of picking up a class like the Rat Catcher. Or the Student. Or the Pedlar. It’s that detailed–want to play as a civil servant? Roll up an Exciseman and start collecting taxes that comes with a 50% chance to pick up knowledge of the law (opening the way to become a Lawyer–one of the game’s Advanced Classes) or run the risk of the 20% chance of picking up Embezzling and becoming a thief. But not just ANY random thief. No, specifically a Clipper or an Embezzler.

And from there the world is basically your oyster. Become a Merchant! Become a Judicial Champion or a Raconteur. Employ all manner of random skills like Numismatics or Begging to take your character through harrowing adventures in the Old World. Having said this, I now want to see how that party of heroes that begin life as a Student, a Rat Catcher, an Exciseman, and a Grave Robber end up. I mean, yes, obviously their throats will be slit by Chaos Cultists in the night, but BEFORE that happens, what kind of heroes will they be?

And getting back on topic, what kind of heroes will Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay – 4th Edition let you be? 2nd Edition was a little more dialed in to classic fantasy tropes–and I imagine we’ll see more of that structure and less of the sprawl–but a big part of what I love about WHFRP in general is its ability to let you play as just “a person.” With a job. Who has to put up with adventures. It’s absolutely perfect, and I’m hoping that the spirit of “well here’s a random civilian who is having adventure thrust unwillingly upon them” that 1st Edition captures so well is maintained in the latest edition of the game.

I mean, sure, I guess we can have some of this too…but I want to count coins of differing denominations and nationality.

Failing that, I hope the crazy reagents for spells stick around–because players just don’t harvest things for parts often enough any more. And if your wizard doesn’t need to rip off the withered hand of a lich, or pull out a fresh heart from a nearby “volunteer” then it’s not really casting a spell, is it?

This is a legendary artifact in your system? I use ’em for spell components.

As we’ve said, details are scarce for now. You can see the entirety of Cubicle 7’s press release below. But! GenCon is around the corner, and hopefully between now and then we’ll have some more solid news about what the game will play like. In the meantime, stay tuned for more news as it develops.

via Cubicle 7

A new edition of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay will be launched by Cubicle 7 Entertainment later this year. The new edition will return players to Warhammer’s grim world of perilous adventure, and takes its direction from the first and second editions of the game. Cubicle 7 CEO Dominic McDowall said, “Like so many gamers I grew up on Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay. It’s an iconic setting and I’m thrilled to be working on this new edition of the game. Our team have a huge breadth of experience with Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, and I’m excited to be able to bring the Cubicle 7 approach to the Old World. We’ll be revealing more of our plans in the coming months, so subscribe to our newsletter and keep an eye on our website!”

Time to go roll up a Tollkeeper. What’s your favorite class/experience from WHFRP?