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Welcome to the Crypt of Blood, a brand new starter box for Warcry, the skirmish game system based in the Warhammer Age of Sigmar setting.

Our thanks to Games Workshop for sending us a copy to unbox and review.

This is the first, I would call proper, beginners/entry point box for Warcry. Previously we’ve big boxes crammed full of brand new scenery with two full size Warcry warbands. Of course, you also get all the core rules to play the games.

With that in mind, it’s time to unbox and review the Crypt of Blood, starting with the unboxing, which you can watch below:

With the unboxing out of the way…let’s get into detail about what’s in the box!

What is the Crypt of Blood Starter Set?

The Crypt of Blood is exactly what it says on the tin, a complete Starter Box for Warcry. Within the box you get:

• Two Warbands. Xandire’s Truthseekers and The Crimson Court (formally Warhammer Underworlds warbands)
• A rulebook 
• Instructions
• Dice
• Paper Warcry size mat
• New Scenery
• Ability and Character Cards for the included warbands
• Tokens

This box contains everything you need to learn to play Warcry, even if you’ve never ever played Age of Sigmar or rolled a dice at all when it comes to Warhammer, nevermind Warcry.

Which Warbands are Included?

Instead of giving you two ‘full-size’ Warcry warbands you instead get two smaller sets of minis, originally from Warhammer Underworlds. 

For the Stormcast Eternals we have Xandire’s Truthseekers, whilst for the Soulblight Gravelords we have The Crimson Court. Both warbands, combined with the scenery included, really work together and make a great set of adversaries. 

The sprues are identical to the original Underworlds releases, even down to the same colour sprues (as is commonplace in Underworlds). They are all push fit models and are straight forward to assemble.

The box also contains cards for easy access to rules and abilities, individual character cards for each fighters and a single faction card which states all the abilities and reactions. 

Can You Use the Warbands From This Box in Warcry Properly?

I guess we’ll quickly hit this point now. Yes, you don’t have enough models or points for a full size game of Warcry, but that isn’t to say you cannot use them.

In the included rulebook it explains how you can expand the included warbands in ‘proper’ games of Warcry. To do this you simply make use of the Bladeborn rules, which allows you to include other models from the respective factions (Stormcast for the Truthseekers, Soulblight for the Court).

This shows off the flexibility of Warcry, and further enforces the options available to get in to the game, especially if you have a ton of Age of Sigmar models already.

What’s In The Rulebook?

Let’s run through what you can expect when you opened the pages of the glossy, high quality, rulebook.

Remember, if you want a closer look at the inside of this box ensure you check out the unboxing video above, if you haven’t already!

The rulebook gives you plenty of background on the Mortal Realms, the Age of Sigmar and of course the narrative of this box. 

This book details how you go about assembling your miniatures (not to the depth of course of the included instructions, more so how to use your clippers, general advice) and how you go about painting them (again, not a painting tutorial, just advice and tips).

It also importantly includes a full rundown of everything included in the box. This book assumes you have never played Warcry before, which is absolutely what you want from this box. This isn’t aimed at the experienced Warcry players afterall.

The book moves on to 7 Battleplans, each one designed to introduce the player(s) to playing the game. Battleplan one for example, entitled ‘The Escape’ features just one model per player and takes you through the basics of movement. As you progress through the 7 plans, each time you learn or expand on the mechanics of the game until finally you pit your warbands against each other in a ‘full’ game. 

Whilst this gives the rulebook less mileage, it’s the best book I’ve read that introduces you to any of Game Workshop’s Warhammer games 

Again we move on to the next segment of the book, simply called Core Rules, and yes this is where we tackle the full Core Rules of the game. This is the natural progress once you have nailed the battleplans and learnt how to play the game. This is where the book gets mileage, as you’ll be able to take this book to your games of Warcry and look up any core rules that you need to clarify. 

Nothing is missed. Objectives, explaining the tokens and combat are all discussed in full.

The final section of the book is entitled Continuing the Quest. These pages help to point you in the direction of where to go next, which books to pick up and talks about the different monsters and allies you can take in future games. Finally the book talks about the hobby in general and building a bigger battlefield.

What Else Do You Get?

So we’ve covered the minis and the rulebook, but what else do you get?

You get a full size mat, made from high quality paper, to battle on. It is doublesided, one of which is snowy the other a little more grim and dark.

You get a bunch of dice and tokens (which are explained in the rulebook) and of course scenery, which we move on to next.

What Scenery is Included?

You get a number of scatter scenery pieces in this box, all new and draw inspiration from the Garden of Morr set that was released a few years ago. 

The wall and railing sections are new, albeit very similar to to the Gardens of Morr ones. You do however get two very unique pieces of terrain, a coffin, adored with bronzework and blood and a statue of the Mortarch Nefarata. These two pieces are really nice, and I looked to paint these first. Sadly I didn’t quite get to finish them, but you can see them in progress below. 

I didn’t realise until I was about to assemble them that they are all push fit, just like the two warbands included. This was a really nice surprise and again clearly shows that GW wants this box to be approachable as possible. 

Summary

And that really brings this review to a close.

Bearing in mind, I’m not reviewing Warcry or any of it’s mechanics, this article has purely been looking at the box as it’s titled, a Starter Box, which really leads to the ultimate question…is it a good starter box? Can newcomers get in to Warcry using this purchase?

The simple answer is yes. 

This is one of the best ‘introductory’ boxes I’ve had the pleasure of reviewing or picking up myself. The book goes to every effort to fully explain how the game plays. The Battleplans make the learning of the game seamless and it contains absolutely everything you need to play out the included plans.

By having smaller warbands allows for easier learning of the game, instead of giving you a possibly daunting number of different models and activations to contend with.

You can take the contents of the box and move on to ‘full’ games fairly easy, although if you do wish to proceed with one or both of the warbands you’ll need to pick up the Compendium at least.

The amount of scenery included is perfect for this box, but again if you wanted to expand into full games you would need more, especially some multi level ones. 

Whilst perfect for newcomers, this isn’t a box Veteran players may rush to pick up. The Crimson Court is a popular and sometimes difficult to obtain warband, so a few will pick this up for them alone. The included scenery makes fantastic scatter terrain and again I can see a number of players, both Warcry and Age of Sigmar, picking this up for those.

We believe the box is going to retail at around £65 which is on the top end of starter set pricing. £40-50 in my view would have been perfect, but I still believe you ultimately get value for money with this box.

If you want to get into Warcry then this is the perfect place to start.

Our thanks again to Games Workshop for sending us a copy to review.