War is raging on London’s Holloway Road. Spindly tree spirits known as the Sylvaneth are clashing with hulking giants from the Sons of Behemat; swarms of flying insectoid cavalry have launched an attack from behind a rocky outcrop; in retaliation, a Mancrusher Gargant, a brute of a warrior, is charging a grove of magical trees.
The belligerents are less scary than they sound. They are painstakingly painted plastic Warhammer Age of Sigmar figurines, at a dainty scale of around 1:56. The players, TV director Colm McCarthy and software engineer George Seymour, are manoeuvring them over carefully placed pints in the newly opened north London outpost of tabletop games venue Bad Moon Cafe. The pair are usually teammates but have opted to fight one-on-one so that McCarthy, best known for his work on Peaky Blinders, can test out strategies with his giants. “This is a new army for me and I’m playing it a wee bit skew-whiff,” he chuckles, as his attack on Seymour’s trees fails due to bad dice rolls.
Bad Moon Cafe co-owner Wilym St John plays a game of Warhammer 40,000 © Peter Flude
Boxes along the wall display copies of the games spawned by the Warhammer franchise, its name originally inspired by the weapons in English sci-fi and fantasy writer Michael Moorcock’s books, written in the 1960s and ’70s. But its popularity extends far beyond the tabletop. It now spans hundreds of books, several dozen video games, an official magazine and, currently in the works, a collaboration with Amazon Studios to produce live-action films and TV shows, starring and produced by Superman actor Henry Cavill.
