Warhammer: The Old World — Muster a Warband with Battle March
Skirmish-sized, rank-and-flank action returns to the The Old World.
It’s shaping up to be a big summer for Warhammer: The Old World. A new starter box, updated core rules, and a refreshed Warriors of Chaos army are all coming soon but a little supplement is the item I’m most excited about: Battle March. Today, the studio team shared some thoughts on this newly updated format for the game.
Small Warbands, Big Stories
Battle March was a format first introduced in the 2026 supplement, Arcane Journal: The War of Settra’s Fury. Scaling down the epic sweep of clashing armies to a skirmish game was a challenging proposition for the designer but one that was so successful it’s being relaunched as a dedicated expansion supplement; Battle March General’s Companion.
Games of Battle March are played with much smaller army point values than a standard game of The Old World. In this format players build armies between 400-750 points as opposed to the 1,000 or 2,000 point forces standard to the game. The major changes in format previously came through list construction which allows you to build a warband around a single hero or leader. A handful of units and lesser officers accompany your leader, often with a single powerful unit or magic item that would usually be restricted at this lower points level. For example, the dwarf force I put together for the format last autumn see a Dwarf Engineer accompanied by a small band of miners and dwarf warriors with a single Bolt Thrower to give them a little extra punch.
This stuff is great fun and offers an opportunity to really go-all-in on writing some lore and kitbashing characters or specialized units. It brings me back to the experience of playing and building Chaos Warbands using the old Realm of Chaos: Slaves to Darkness rules set to kitbash outlandish warbands in something of a precursor to games like Necromunda and Mordheim.
Campaign Play
Now, the Battle March format is being further expanded with a robust set of campaign play rules. The supplement itself includes a series of six scenarios to recreate a specific conflict in the infamous Axe Bite Pass. However, the book is meant to function as a foundation for players to create their own narrative campaigns
The book will be a toolbox of new rules players can use to link their games of Battle March together. The scenario rules originally published in ntroduced in The War of Settra’s Fury have been expanded. Primary Objectives have been expanded and the scenario maps doubled. Excitingly, a set of three tables are now available to add some extra flavor to your battles. Choose between rolling on tables for Disruptive Weather, Wilderness Terrain, and the Chaos Of War.
Each offers a fun twist to ensure no two games feel alike, such as Fierce Gales that reduce the range of light missile weapons, bands of Wandering Mercenaries, or terrain features that may hold healing herbs or a surprise encounter with an Enraged Troll.Advertisement
I love this kind of stuff, it’s what makes a skirmish game really memorable. Almost a decade later and my gaming club still talks about the Battle of Bear Creek; a game of Muskets & Tomahawks in which a random event table resulted in a bear disrupting what had been a lethal ambush by a band of Iroquois skirmishers, driving them off and leading to a victory for the dastardly British.
New magic items are also being offered in the expansion, designed exclusively for use in the Battle March format. These cheaper items are meant to fill gaps in the format where some of the most useful magic items could easily cost a quarter of your entire points allowance.
The Journal closes out with suggestions for running narratively driven matched play events using and other tips for event organizer. Battle March looks like it’s going to be a great way to run a small weekend campaign or tournament and I can’t wait to get my hands on it.
Time to build those gyrocopters…
