Games Workshop - Role-playing Games

Role-playing Games

Several of the miniatures games (e.g. Inquisitor) involve a role-playing element, however Games Workshop has in the past published role-playing games set within the Warhammer universe. Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay was first published in 1986; a second edition appeared in 2005 published by Black Industries, part of GW's fiction imprint BL Publishing.

Warhammer 40,000: Dark Heresy, the first of three proposed role-playing games set in the Warhammer 40,000 universe was released in late January 2008 and sold out almost immediately.

Immediately following the release of Dark Heresy, Black Industries announced that they would cease producing role-playing supplements in September 2008, in order to focus on the more profitable Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000 novels. A later announcement indicated that the game would continue to be produced, however; production had simply been turned over to a third-party publisher, Fantasy Flight Games, instead.

As well as republishing and expanding the Dark Heresy game, Fantasy Flight Games have subsequently published two other roleplaying games, Rogue Trader and Deathwatch, set in the same Warhammer 40,000 universe and employing different systems. Fantasy Flight have also released a new edition of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, along with a number expansions to that game also.