It's okay to like the things you liked

From the back side of the 1996 Citadel Miniatures Catalog. High Elves vs. Undead. The style of Warhammer in the 90's.

It was already a while ago that I discovered that "Oldhammer" trend. A community(?) of people who play and collect older Citadel minis and play older versions of Warhammer. It is or was a kind of trend. Just search "Oldhammer" on Facebook and you will find groups with more than 10k subscribers.

Are people not happy with never versions of Warhammer or the new miniatures? Or did they become aware of the fact that constantly running after the hot new stuff, constantly changing everything and blowing everything up out of proportion does not make them happier? That it never made gaming better? 

So how about liking things again that we already liked before? These miniatures from the 90's - or choose an era by yourself - weren't bad. I really liked the style of the Citadel like shown above, I loved the design or let's say "look" of the whole thing. Clearly a point for the design department. And I am not the only one, in fact I heard that Games Workshop is re-releasing a lot of them. 

We can dismiss that as nostalgia. But is it bad? Maybe it is only the realization that the old is often just as good as the new and meets the requirements. An high elf from 1994 is still one in 2025. Prove me wrong.

Random vs. Random = more Randomness?

Original D&D dice from the red box. (probably 1983). Special dice are available for ages now, for longer than anyone would believe. They are not special any longer. 

Let that sink in: If you throw a dice to get a result in a fight, the result is completely random. So why should an opponent answer with another dice as a safe throw and produce another random result? The result of the first dice was already completely random anyway. Randomness can’t be enhanced. The first random result is 100% random. You can’t get more randomness, exactly like you can’t get more emptyness if something is already empty. There isn’t something like „a little bit dead“.  It’s absolute. True or False. Thats's it.

The only thing you can do is deduct from or add values to the result to pay respect to different situations, different enemies and other factors, changing the barrier for success. And if a 6-sided dice has range of numbers that is too small, use dice with larger numbers like D8, D10, D12, D20 or D100.  Or a combination.

But rolling random vs. random is complete nonsense. It only makes people roll dice more often and slows down games.

It may sound a bit heretical or daring, but sometimes I have the impression, that authors of wargame rules try to keep players busy to let it look like they are doing something. Or is it to give the safe throwing player the feeling that he/she is not helpless? Or is it simply the - to me - strange "fun" that some people have when they use dice? I read that from time to time and always wonder how this very simple thing tickles peoples brains.

By the way : Did you also notice that wargamers always look for faster and simpler rules, but always land in another elaborated mess of dice & tables?

Painting progress in Jan/Feb 2025

 Impressions from the workbench.