Review:
Chaos in the Old World - The Board Game

Chaos in the Old World is the first board game produced by Fantasy Flight Games that is based on Games Workshop’s renowned Warhammer universe. The game is designed by Eric Lang, the man behind FFG’s Call of Cthulhu and A Game of Thrones card games.

The game requires three or four players to play, and each player takes on the role of one of the four Chaos gods of the Warhammer world. The aim of the game is to be the first to achieve dominance of the Old World, either by moving your ‘threat dial’ to maximum, or by scoring 50 victory points. Victory points are scored by taking control and ‘ruining’ the different regions of the board. Each player has different conditions for advancing his or her threat dial.

If you play the Chaos god Khorne, the lord of battle, then you advance your threat dial by killing the followers of the other gods (and also peasants). Your strategy comes in selecting the right things to kill, to ensure that your opponents do not get to advance their own threat dials.

If you play the Chaos god Slaanesh, the purveyor of pleasure, then you advance your threat dial by adding corruption to region that contain nobles. Your strategy comes from subtlety, as you control the fewest number of followers, and they are the weakest in combat.

If you play the Chaos god Nurgle, the master of pestilence, then you advance your threat dial by adding corruption to populous regions. Your strategy comes mainly from covering the board with as much corruption as possible – Nurgle is much more likely to win by ruining regions and accumulating victory points that by reaching the end of the dial.

If you play the Chaos god Tzeentch, the changer of the ways, then you advance your threat dial by adding corruption to regions that contain magic. Your strategy relies much on opportunism and misdirection, and the careful use of power cards.

Every god is given a deck of power cards, a selection of upgrade cards, a pool of corruption tokens (marked with the god’s symbol) and a set of detailed plastic miniatures representing his or her followers. The followers themselves are drawn from one of three categories – cultists (which can place corruption tokens), lesser daemons (which have minor attack abilities) and greater daemons (which have major attack abilities). Every god is also given a reference card which describes the game turn order, their threat dial advancement conditions, and which also tracks their power point usage.