When Lenoon messaged me to review a kit from Wargames Atlantic I thought for a few minutes that he was finally tricking me into Historical Wargaming. Instead, and much to my relief, he asked if I’d review their skeleton chariots and cavalry kit. I’ve recently started a Tomb Kings army for the new Old World; an army that 14-year-old me wanted but wasn’t able to collect. Before I go too far into this I do need to be honest: I wasn’t actually very excited by this kit. I was definitely curious about it but there’s something in me that just really likes the Games Workshop aesthetic and wasn’t sure how these would look alongside “real” Tomb Kings. These are of course not meant to be Tomb Kings, they’re just skeletons on horses and with chariots. They’re not meant to be a 1:1 copy!

That said, I was very excited by the prospect of more chariots!

A big thank you to Wargames Atlantic for sending us this set for review! This article contains a labelled affiliate link

The Kit

Sitting down with this kit was slightly daunting at first. I’m not a historical wargamer; my kits come with build instructions (whether I look at/follow them is another thing) and the chariots themselves looked confusing to me on the sprue. Clipping all the parts off to look at them all didn’t exactly help much, either. It took me about 5 minutes of dry fitting and fiddling with all the bits, staring expectantly at the company’s images of built ones, before figuring the first one out. Then I felt kind of stupid because it suddenly made a lot of sense.

Now the awkward part: You don’t get to build everything. You get five of this large sprue and then two separate chariot sprues. I later found out from the historicals crew you can get individual sprues of them from a third party. Which is exactly what I did. On that sprue you get:

• 2 skeleton horses
• 3 skeleton riders (1armoured body, 2 unarmoured)
• 2 skeletons on foot (which you use in the backs of the chariot)
• a large array of weapons from bows to spears and even a horn

I got really excited so please pretend that there’s two horses still on that sprue. They’re in two parts each and very simple, and are the only thing missing from this frame!

For anyone that’s not familiar with this kind of kit: bases are not included, at all! You’ll need to pick up some plastic or MDF bases (I like plastic) if you want to use them for Warhammer like me. These are all on “correct” base sizes for Old World, too.

Mixing and Comparing Kits

The best part of the kit, really, is just how good the skeleton horses are. They size up perfectly with Games Workshop kits for Tomb Kings; I’ve even used a pair of them to pull my King’s chariot because they look so much better! Steeds fit for a (tomb) king. That little round base you get under them just helps so much in keeping them on the base, no need to cut out little grooves or try and glue tiny hoofs down with enough plastic cement that you’re not sure where base ends and model starts.

If I could buy just these horses I’d replace all of my Tomb King ones with them in an instant. I might just use these for horse riders anyways. They’re just great. Look at those teeth!

Very important to me though was just how well they would mix with Games Workshop bits to make them look a little more like Tomb Kings. I dry-fit some arms and decided that the GW bits were ever so slightly too large to really work; however, the heads don’t look too out of place! They just don’t work super well if you’re giving the skeleton a bow and arrow, gets in the way.

Why Get It?

If it’s not already clear these are just outstanding skeletal steeds, riders, and chariots. I’ll be making good use of them mixed in to my Tomb King army from now on; these chariots will be “normal” ones while the gaudier GW ones will be my Tomb Guard chariots.

Really though if you’re looking at a few of these sets to add both chariots and skeleton riders to your army then it’s very good value. Instead if you’re looking at just chariots then picking up one box at £30 then adding three more chariot sprues (if in stock/available) from Sprue Shop brings you to £42 total spend giving you five chariots quickly – think of it as two free chariots compared to the GW kit!

Obviously if you’re wanting skeleton riders and/or chariots for anything else these are simply wonderful models! They go together quickly and easily (once you figure out the chariot, maybe you’re smarter than me) and paint up nice and quick too.

If you’d like to pick up either of these Wargames Atlantic kits and support Goonhammer while you’re at it, get them through our affiliate link

Would you use these for something other than Warhammer? Are there other games that have skeleton chariots? Genuinely, I’m very curious and want to know where else these would be used, please leave a comment below. Any questions or concerns etc you have then email in to contact@goonhammer.com.