It’s all change on Necromunda, as the denizens of Hive Primus exchange their steel skies for the sepia of the great outdoors. Yep, the Ash Wastes are coming to your tabletop – and with them, the thrill of the open road, the corrosive breeze through your respirator, and innumerable spots for that one perfect ambush. We’ve asked Lord Helmawr’s representative on Earth, Andy Hoare, to tell us more.
Andy Hoare: Well, the secret’s out. We’re leaving the (dubious) sanctuary of the underhive and breaking out into the vastness of the Ash Wastes of Necromunda! Over the next few weeks and months, we’ll be revealing much more about this setting, but for now, I want to give you some hints of where we’re going, and of course where we came from.
Necromunda: Underhive hit the streets back in 2017, with the action focusing on the “classic” setting – the tunnels and domes of the lower reaches of Necromunda’s miles-high hive cities. Two years later the biggest boxed game we’d ever done came along in the form of Necromunda: Dark Uprising, taking the action into the hellish guts of a cannibal rebellion – just another day in the underhive! These were both followed by the Necromunda: Hive War box just last year.
And now we head to the Ash Wastes – the biggest thing to happen to Necromunda since the 2017 relaunch.
This toxic, rad-scoured landscape is too expansive to fit into a single book. In fact, the wastes are so vast we’re introducing them with a massive new boxed set, which will be followed soon after by a whole series of books exploring the factions that battle across the wastes.
And then there are the gangs. The Ash Wastes are full of interesting (and murderous) denizens, only some of whom will be familiar to longtime inhabitants of the underhive. That means new factions to play.
Key to the setting is the terrain – games take place not in the twisted, cramped environs we’re used to, but in the vast openness of Necromunda’s irradiated surface, making them a unique new challenge. As such, you can expect new terrain and new vehicles, including the ones hinted at in the reveal trailer. Gangs aren't just scuffling in the Ash Wastes for no reason – they're protecting (or attacking) valuable convoys as they roll across the dunes. Rest assured, you'll be able to represent these situations faithfully in your games…
In the run-up to the release of Necromunda: Ash Wastes, we thought we’d show off some of the myriad locations in this incredible setting. Below is a small portion of the vast map we put together while we developed the setting. We’ll zoom in and describe some of these places in the future, but for now, here’s a look at the Palatine Cluster – the centre of which is, of course, Hive Primus.
This region is essentially what hive dwellers might be able to see from their apartment windows if they had apartments, or indeed windows. So say goodbye to this view, as we’ll soon be forging south into the Great Equatorial Wastes where all manner of opportunities to get rich await – alongside even more ways to die!
Thanks, Andy! That all sounds absolutely stunning. There’s much more to come from the Ash Wastes, and we’ll be featuring all of it right here on the Warhammer Community site ahead of the release later this year.