Take a look at the recent 2026 Richmond Open winning list for Warhammer: The Old World, and why it works.
The other weekend saw the 2026 Richmond Open take place. You can find it on BCP here. Held in Richmond VA it saw saw 56 players fight it out. At that size it’s one of the biggest events in the US. It had some significant and unique comp which you can find here (Todd the amazing organizer will tell you this is an evolving comp system) . When the dust had settled on five epic rounds of The Old World only 1 list could take the crown of best overall. With four wins and a draw Joshua Miller took Best Overall (and had the most battle points even before soft scores) with his Dwarven Expeditionary Force. So today lets take a look at the list and why it works.
Joshua’s Unbeatable List
85 – Burlok Damminson, General
78 – Dwarf Engineer Sappers, Handgun
79 – Runesmith, Full Plate Armour, Shield, Great Weapon, Rune of Passage
268 – Thane, Battle Standard Bearer, Master Rune of Grungni, Rune of Battle, Handgun, Shield, Master Rune of Bursting Flame, Rune of Rapid Fire, Rune of Accuracy
120 – 2 Scout Gyrocopters
120 – 2 Scout Gyrocopters
276 – 19 Thunderers, Shield, Great Weapon, Veteran, Handgun, Standard Bearer, Expeditionary Marksmen
120 – Cannon, Function Over Form, Rune of Reloading, Rune of Forging
130 – Cannon, Function Over Form, 2x Rune of Forging
115 – Cannon, Function Over Form, Rune of Forging
240 – 4 Gyrocopters, Steam Gun
240 – 4 Gyrocopters, Steam Gun
125 – Doomseeker, Master Rune of Alaric the Mad, Rune of the Hateful
How the Lists Works
Jousha’s list is a shooting heavy list that also does a lot of points denial. 4 units of Gyrocopters, 12 in total, give it a lot of mobility, certainly more than most Dwarf lists have. They also give it decent blocking and redirection options allowing for good screens. The Steamguns, while short ranged, are great for clearing out chaff units and skirmishers that are hard to hit with BS shooting. They also work wonders vs big units of infantry.
3 Cannons speak for themselves, and give the list some punch against bigger targets. The Doomseeker can give it some combat punch or protect the cannons as needed. Lastly pretty much everything else goes into the Thunderers for one big unit. This unit becomes a very strong shooting unit. Thanks to Expeditionary Marksmen and Burlok they don’t take penalties from moving and shooting or long range. With the Runesmith they are Armor Bane (3) and Burlok also lets them re-roll ones to hit. They can put out some real hurt.
Between Burlok and the Sapper the big unit is also almost always going to be Entrenched making them harder to shoot and very hard to beat in combat. The Thane gives them extra static and makes them hard to kill. Since most of the time you are going to be reduced to 1 attack fighting them (thanks to Entranced) and no Impact/Stomp attacks, it’s hard to do much damage to them in combat. They also have a very wicked Stand and Shoot with all the bonuses. This combines to mean that charging them for most armies is a bad idea as they will win combats on static res + Stand and Shoot. It’s a rough list.
Final List Thoughts
Comp and match up’s certainly favored Josh’s run here. He fought a pair of other Dwarves (including a Slayer army) 2 Orc armies and a draw vs Beastmen. Those are overall pretty good pairings for the list. Still it’s clear he brought a strong army and played it well. One of the hidden strengths of the list is how hard it is to score points off of it, with the Gyro’s being hard to pin down and finish off, and most of the rest of the points being in the one big block. Josh also scored high on the soft scores as well, so overall a strong performance to win at event with a lot of very good players.
Talking to people who went to the event it does sound like it was a blast. I know some people may look at the comp and be turned off, but the most important thing is that the people who went had fun! So big congrats to Todd for putting on an amazing event and Josh for winning it, and to everyone else who came out and played!
Let us know what you think of the event and list, down in the comments!
Don’t Miss:
Abe is that rare thing, an Austin local born and raised here. Though he keeps on moving around, DC, Japan, ETC., he always seems to find his way back eventually. Abe has decades of experience with a wide range of tabletop and RPG games, from historicals, to Star Wars to D&D and 40K. He has been contributing to BOLS since almost the start, back when he worked at and then owned a local gaming store. He used to be big into the competitive Warhammer tournament scene but age has mellowed him and he now appreciates a good casual match. He currently covers Warhammer: The Old World, as well as all things Star Wars, with occasional dabbling in other topics. Abe mourned over loss of WFB for its entire hiatus, but has been reborn like a gaming phoenix with Warhammer: The Old World.
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