The Horus Heresy March 25th 26th
Welcome to Throne of Skulls Welcome to Throne of Skulls: The Horus Heresy an entry level, non-competitive gaming event for anyone who wants to play fun games set during this age of darkness and treachery. This event features a relaxed atmosphere where players can focus less on winning games and more on rolling dice, killing Space Marines and enjoying themselves. All the awards are based on sportsmanship, painting, gentlemanly conduct and having a good old laugh with like minded people. If that sounds like something you would like to take part in, then read on. What s the Horus Heresy? The Horus Heresy is a story from the distant past of the Warhammer 40,000 universe - a galactic civil war that ended in the creation of the Imperium as we know it today. It was a time of legend, betrayal and strife and makes an ideal battleground for our games. At its most basic, this means we use a special series of supplements produced by Forge World designed to let you re-create these battles. Event Essentials Date: 25 th 26 th March System: Warhammer 40,000 - Horus Heresy - The Age of Darkness (more details on this below in the section titled Maelstrom of War in the Age of Darkness ) Points Value: 2,000-3,000 points (read more on this under the Army Size section!) Number of games: 5 Army Selection: Use the rules presented for your army in the appropriate Horus Heresy publication. See below under Army Size for further details. Scenarios in use: Maelstrom of War (randomly determined) See below under Maelstrom of War in the Age of Darkness for further details. Publications in use: All Horus Heresy publications from Forge World, including all campaign books, experimental rules and event programmes. A note on painting and basing: We will ask you during registration if you have any unpainted or unbased models left to finish. If you do, show us and we will tell you what needs to be done in order to make the models up to standard for the event. Then we will do our best to give you the time and space to get your models finished. Planning something outlandish? Many hobbyists take it upon themselves to create truly incredible models, through kit bashing, green stuff, and straight up weapon swaps. While most of these are awesome, there are some which are not suitable for use at our events. For example, any model that could be confused as another, or one which doesn t accurately represent the original model produced by Games Workshop. Examples of this would be Fire Raptors being used as counts as Storm Eagles, or Cataphractii Terminators being used as Tartaros Terminators. Though these might even seem commonplace in your local gaming club, at a Throne of Skulls part of your ticket is being provided opponent s who are using not only fully painted and based models, but the correct models as well. Using the right models adds massively to overall feel and quality of the event, and Horus Heresy events at Warhammer World have always had an exceptional quality which we are determined to maintain. Take a look at our handy chart below for our rules on proxies and conversions.
Are you planning to use converted models or prox- YES Contact us at whworldevents@gwplc.com or ring us 0115 900 4994 and check to make sure your conversion/proxy is appropriate for our events.** NO Carry on. Nothing to worry about except mould lines and getting it painted on time. *A proxy is when you use an unconverted model as a Warscroll/Datasheet entry different to the one it normally represents. Examples include Arachnarok Spiders as Stonehorns, Cadian Shock Troopers as Scion Tempestus s, Skeletons as Grave Guard and so on. **This is only for our gaming events, held at Warhammer Fest. This doesn t count for your local model shop, Games Workshop, Warhammer Shop, club or even a regular gaming evening at Warhammer World. Get in touch with them to see what their standards are. When you contact us, it would help a lot if you include pictures of the models in question. Also, don t panic. We are really nice and we LOVE cool hobby. Note: Fully assembled means just that fully assembled. Examples of models that are not fully assembled are cavalry without riders, artillery pieces without crew, one Mangler Squig on a base rather than two, half a skeleton representing a full one and so on. Please bear that in mind before deciding what to bring along!
If you aren t sure what you need to do, give us a call on 0115 900 4994 and we will happily talk you through what we look for. A polite but very friendly warning; we will have no choice but to disallow models which aren t suitable for the event, either by way of conversion/proxy or by being unpainted or unbased. We will do everything in our power to get your army battle ready, but we can t allow your potential opponents to feel hard done by after going to the effort of getting everything ready and having gone to the time and expense to get a full army ready for play, only to find the Grey Legions arrayed against them. You ve been warned don t risk it (Horus did, and look where it got him)! Registration Before the event gets under way we need to register you and your army. When you register we will need to know what Faction you wish to fight for (Loyalist or Rebel) and as well as that we need to know what Faction your army is, eg. Death Guard, Ultramarine etc. In order to prevent confusion, this is referred to as Army-Type throughout this event pack. Note: In order to qualify as a particular Army-Type, you must have that Army-Type as your Primary Detachment, and spend the majority of your points on it for every game. Also, you need to use that Faction in every game you play over the weekend. Once we have your details, we will ask if every model you will use over the weekend is fully painted and based, and then if the answer is yes then you are good to go. We d recommend getting in as soon and registering as the door is open, so you can get a famous Bugman s Breakfast in before your first game! The Schedule Saturday 9:00am Warhammer World main doors open, Registration begins. 9:55am Welcome and event briefing 10:00am- 12:30pm Game 1 12:30pm - 1:30pm Lunch and the Primarch, Hero and Artefact of Legend Painting Competitions 1:30pm - 4:00pm Game 2 4:00pm - 4:30pm Break 4:30pm - 7:00pm Game 3 7.00pm - 7.30pm - Entries taken for the Company of Legend Painting Competition 8:00pm Warhammer World closes Sunday 9:00am Doors open. 10:00am - 12:30pm Game 4 12:30pm - 1:30pm Lunch and voting for the Best Army Competition 1:30pm - 4:00pm Game 5 4:00pm - 4:45pm Break 4:45pm- 5:00pm Award Ceremony 5:00pm Event closes Army Size Throne of Skulls is one of Warhammer World s best entry-level events. If you aren t sure you are ready to duke it out with the best at a Grand Tournament, then Throne of Skulls allows you to come along and take part in an organised play event (note: Throne of Skulls is really really not a tournament!) without any pressure to win your games or squeeze the most out of every unit. Horus Heresy games tend to be played at bigger points values, but not everyone has 3,000 points ready to go, so we use a Flex system in order to make sure that everyone gets to play a decent sized game, while allowing anyone who wants to get into the Horus Heresy the opportunity to do so.
The Flex System: Unique Tactical Objectives Deck At this event, the minimum size army you should bring is 2,000 points, but, if you happen to have more than that, bring it along and if your opponents are up for it, you can play a larger game of up to 3,000 points. In general, you should expect to play 2,000 point games, and anything larger than that is a bonus. A good idea is to write a separate army list at 2,000, 2,500 and 3,000 points. That will allow you to easily flex your choices between games to suit your game. Also, there are lots of exciting extras like Relics, Force Organisation Charts, Fortifications and legendary characters available to players that are specific to the Horus Heresy. These are found across the various publications from Forge World and all of them are fine to use at our event! If you see something and you are not sure then just give us a call on 0115 900 4994 and ask - we are more than happy to help. Multiple army lists are allowed! Please be aware that we don t expect you to stick to the same army all weekend. You are more than welcome to bring a variety of armies and units and change between games. The only stipulation is that you stick to the points values set down in each game. Please bear in mind that if you wish to qualify for a Praetorian award, you will need to use the same Faction all weekend. Maelstrom of War in the Age of Darkness We will be using the Maelstrom of War scenarios from the main Warhammer 40,000 rulebook to play our games over the weekend. Additionally, we are going to use a modified set of Tactical Objectives to make the games feel like they are happening in the Horus Heresy. These cards will be made available to each player on the day. They will contain unique Tactical Objectives for the weekend, as well as some of the standard ones found in the rulebook. Age of Darkness vs the 41st Millenium Please be aware that gaming in the Age of Darkness has a few extra rules that you ought to be aware of. They are in pages 159-160 of the Horus Heresy Book 5 - Tempest book produced by Forge World. One of the biggest changes to bear in mind is that only Troops count as scoring units in Age of Darkness - and while the Tactical Objectives in the deck of Objectives that we will be giving you won t exclusively deal with capturing objectives at this event, there will be some and they may feature extra points for objectives that are completed by scoring units so bear that in mind! Secondary Objectives and Force Organisation Charts: The Age of Darkness supplements list a series of extra rules which are used in Horus Heresy games. For clarity s sake, overleaf is a complete list of the standard rules that you can expect to be used at this event. Please note: These rules are presented in all of the various Horus Heresy publications, and the best place to find them are the most recent Army List Books. If you need anything clarified, just ring us on 0115 900 4994 or email whworldevents@gwplc.com. We will randomly select missions from the list on page 148 to 153 of the Warhammer 40,000 rulebook for you to play in your games. Each mission will only be used once, if we roll it again, we simply re-roll it.
Age of Darkness Scoring Units Age of Darkness Denial Units Lords of War in Battles in Age of Darkness Games (Updated Rules) The Battles in the Age of Darkness Force Organisation Charts Battles in the Age of Darkness Alternative Force Organisation Charts* NO TITANS?! *Please note that this does not include the Leviathan Force Organisation Chart. We really like Titans, but in games of this size the addition of one of these behemoths means there isn t much else on the table! This often means games are typically over very, very quickly and tend to be quite one sided, one way or the other, as the Titan either annihilates everything, or miserably fails to get any Victory Points as its accompanying forces gets set upon by the other side. In our experience this tends to be less satisfying than a really close, two hour game of back and forth carnage, so for this event we don t allow their use. There will of course, be many other events during the year you can use your beloved Titans at, so if you are desperate to use your God-Engine, then just keep an eye out on our webpage! Note that the Secondary Objectives for Maelstrom of War are being replaced in favour of the ones printed in the Horus Heresy supplements as mentioned above. In other words, First Blood, Warlords and Linebreaker Secondary Objectives are not in use. Tactical Specialities Each Tactical Objective will be assigned to a different army from the Age of Darkness that specialises in that kind of warfare. If that army completes that Tactical Objective, they gain an extra Victory Point. The army that gains the extra Victory Point will be listed on the Tactical Objective cards. Factions Upon registration, you will need to declare your allegiance - will you fight for the Emperor of Man, or the rebellious Warmaster? Your Victory Points will go towards your faction in order to see which side wins. Each member of the winning faction will receive an award to celebrate their victory. In addition you will only fight members of the opposing faction at the weekend. Note: If you want to be able to choose your Faction, then make sure to turn up early! If you arrive later to the event, then we may have no choice but to assign (read as: conscript) your army to the Faction that needs more numbers in order to make the event work. Favourite Game votes Favourite Game Votes are simple - just pick the game you enjoyed the most that weekend. It s a great way to acknowledge a really fun game, an opponent with whom you had a great rapport, or maybe it was just that their army looked fantastic. Votes are taken at the end of the weekend with the results of your final game, so please show your appreciation of your favourite opponent. Finally, there are is list of errata and FaQ s on Forge World s website at the following link so check those out as well before the weekend! http://www.forgeworld.co.uk/en-gb/ Downloads?_requestid=5204873#horusheresy
The Praetorian Awards At Throne of Skulls, we also like to acknowledge the outstanding hobby and effort that goes into creating a perfectly themed and well rounded army for the Horus Heresy, as well as engaging with your opponent to make sure they have a good time. These awards will be given to the best players from each of the factions listed below under the Awards section. These awards are known as the Praetorian awards and are awarded as follows: You will be awarded a score based on your total Victory Points and Favourite Game Votes from the weekend. Your Victory Points and Favourite Game Votes are already recorded so all we need to know is what you think of your opponent s army in each of your games! After each game you will be asked to hand in a results slip from the game. This slip will detail what you thought of your opponent s army. All you will need to do is tick the following boxes: Army Theme: How was your opponent s army themed? Army Basing: How well was your opponent s army based? Army Painting: How well was your opponent s army painted? Additional Extras: Did your opponent go to any extra lengths to make their army look great or your experience enjoyable? Extra basing details, custom objective markers, themed giveaways or excellent conversions are all examples of this. Each of these is rated either Normal, Great or Outstanding. For every Great you receive, you get an additional 5 Praetor Points. For every Outstanding you get an additional 10! Your Victory Points will be translated directly into Praetor Points. Finally, for every Favourite Game Vote you get, you will also get an additional 5 Praetor Points. You will then need to write down what Faction their army was from. This is so we can make sure that the player in question is using the same Faction all weekend. We will then sort all the players by their Faction which is decided by which Primary Detachment you are using. You must also have spent the majority of your points on this detachment in order to qualify for that Faction. It would, after all, be very disheartening for a player to win using just a minority of a Legion, backed up by someone else! How to win the Throne of Skulls At the end of the weekend, we will call the player (or players, if there is a tie) who has earned the most Favourite Game votes to the stage. If there is a draw between these players, the one who has scored the most Victory Points will be awarded the legendary Throne of Skulls trophy. Only players who themselves handed in a Favourite Game vote are eligible.
Other activities during the event Legends painting competitions The Legends Painting competition gives you the chance to show off your skills with single models and units rather than with whole armies. Simply enter the relevant category when it s open (see the schedule for these times); once all the entries are in, we will ask all the players to vote for their favourites. The player that earns the most votes in each category will win the relevant prize. (please note: you may enter any Horus Heresy miniature from your collection in these competitions, not just ones from your armies). Hero of Legend: All types of Infantry, Cavalry, Bikes and Jetbikes Primarch of Legend: All of the Primarch models Artefact of Legend: Any unit not covered by either of the above categories Company of Legend: Any unit of 5 or less Infantry or cavalry on 40mm bases or smaller or 3 or less Cavalry, Bikes, Jetbikes or Infantry on 50mm bases or larger. The Best Army competition Every Legion had the utmost pride in its heraldry and history and would go to great lengths to ensure that their weapons and armour were worthy of their Primarch s honour. Players are no different and many armies at our events are truly spectacular. To celebrate this, the Events Team will nominate exceptionally well painted and/or converted armies from the event for you to vote on during the Sunday lunch break. The team who receives the most number of votes will earn the coveted Best Army award. Awards: The Throne of Skulls: This fabled award goes to the player with the most Favourite Game Votes from each faction as described above. In the case of a draw, we will use Victory Points as a second sorter. The Best Army: This award goes to the player who scores the most votes in the Best Army Competition. Primarch, Hero, Artefact and Company of Legends: These awards will to go the owners of the entries that had the highest number of votes from their respective categories. The Warmaster s Chosen: This is the player from the Rebel Faction that scores the highest Battle Points. We will determine your Battle Points by multiplying your total Favourite Game Votes times Victory Points. The Emperor s Champion: This is the player from the Loyalist Faction that scores the highest that scores the highest Battle Points. We will determine your Battle Points by multiplying your total Favourite Game Votes times Victory Points. Note: It s quite likely that the player who wins the Throne of Skulls will win either The Emperor s Champion or the Son of Horus award. If this is the case, then we will award the prizes to whoever is in second place from that Faction as well. Below are all the Praetorian Awards. The Knight of the Order for the Best Dark Angels player at the weekend. The Wolf of Fenris for the Best Space Wolf player at the weekend. The Master of the Hunt for the Best White Scars player at the weekend. The Worldbreaker for the Best Iron Warriors Player at the weekend.
The Ward of the Imperium for the Best Ultramarines Player at the weekend. The Tip of the Spear for the Best Sons of Horus Player at the weekend. The Butchers Nails for the Best World Eaters Player at the weekend. The Bearer of the Word for the Best Word Bearers Player at the weekend. The Blade of the Host for the Best Blood Angels Player at the weekend. The Prince of Crows for the Best Night Lords Player at the weekend. The Rage of the Gorgon for the Best Iron Hands Player at the weekend. The Exemplaris Legionis for the Best Emperor s Children Player at the weekend. The Paladin of Terra for the Best Imperial Fist Player at the weekend. The Scourge of Worlds for the best Death Guard player at the weekend. The Lord of the Scales for the Best Alpha Legion Player at the weekend.* The Anvil of the Imperium for the best Salamanders player at the weekend. The Shadow of Terra for the best Raven Guard player at the weekend. The Lord of Sorcery for the Best Thousand Sons Player at the weekend. The Master of Mankind for the best player of the Imperium (this award covers any army of the Imperium that is not a Legion specific force Custodes, Questoris Knights, Adeptus Mechanicus armies, militia and so on). The Champion of the Warp for the best player using none of the above. This award covers armies that may come out in the future that are not categorised above such as Daemonic Hordes and so forth. *Please note that only actual Alpha Legion players will be considered for this award. Armies bearing the heraldry, weapons and units of other Legions will not be counted, no matter how convincing their cover story, or how sneakily the Alpha Legion infiltrated them! Obviously. Contact Us If you want to ask us questions, discuss the models you wish to bring, or want to find out more about Throne of Skulls, please feel free to get in touch with us: Phone: 0115 900 4994 Email: whworldevents@gwplc.com Post: Warhammer World Events Team Games Workshop Willow Road Lenton Nottingham England NG7 2WS Find out all the latest Warhammer World news by signing up to our newsletter at: warhammerworld.games-workshop.com/ newsletter Find out about and get your tickets for upcoming Warhammer World events at: warhammerworld.ticketbud.com