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So when thety say that units have different equipment, do I actually have to add that to the model? Or do I just say they have it? Like giving a Necron Lord a Ressurection Orb?

Some will insist that it has to be that way, some will not. You will have to declare any discrepancies beforehand. Its always better to have it visible on the figure. It makes the game easier to play for all involved.

40k for the most part is a "what you see is what you have game'.

So, if a model has a specific physical option for something, then yes, you should model it that way. Note; not all war gear has model options (sm digital weapons, tau disruption pods, necron weave armor, etc.) so thats fine - its mainly on models that have upgrades that have significant tactical impacts - a melta gun, or power fist, or ...a res orb.


Based upon your questions, I would suggest you first focus on learning 40k, and figuring out what army you would actually ENJOY BUILDING, PAINTING, and PLAYING.

The road to being a "competitive" player takes a long time - first focus on finding an army that suits your style either fluff wise (space marines are great heros of the imperium!), estethics (tau look like cool robots, if you like cool robots) or play style (orks have hordes of little guys running around in chaotic bands creating a lot of mayhem on the battlefield).

For example, I started tau because I thought the models look cool, I got into necrons because I read the stories of the ctan from the old 2nd ed codex, and thought an army of ancient machines was just cool.
(both armies were considered "bad" when I got into them....which ironically, made me a better player....).
My marines remind me of elite commandos or special forces that I can imagine going building to building in a ruined city in highly coordinated teams taking out bad guys (my marines are painted in modern military urban camo).
Pick what you are going to enjoy.

These factors GREATLY OUTWEIGH how "competitive" an army is.

An army's strength can change very quickly with rules updates or new armies stealing their thunder or formerly bad armies can change over night (eldar when from very hard to play well, to top of the heap in just their latest book).

Best of luck, and have fun.

 xxtwisted26xx wrote:
Hey guys, I want to get into WH40k as I love the lore of the game and love tabletop games! However, Im debating between Necrons and Space marines to play as a Beginner. Which ones do you suggest to start with? And of the choice, what units should an optimal army be made of? Im getting a bunch of different advice from the people at the LGS.

One guy said Necrons are good, and that you just need 2 squads of Necron Warriors, some Destroyers and a Necron Lord - and that the other HQs are more flavor and inferior to the normal Necron Lord.

Meanwhile, another guy told me that if you went Space Marine, its easier and cheaper because if someone has extra Space Wolves, you can side them in in your Space Marine army even though theyre from different armies. Is that true? Both guys were trying to sell my tyheir units to so... that's why Im kind of iffy on their advice haha.

On Necrons: Nemesor Zjandrek is just so good. I'm not saying to NOT take a Necron Lord obviously. But that Nemesor is a ball of awesome. He just is a force multiplier.

Space marines: True. You can have a Detachment of Marines right alongside the SpaceWolves. They are easier to find models for a lot cheaper price generally. LOTS of people own those armies and have extra. The army itself is very forgiving of mistakes by noobs.

As competition goes, given the ability to field whatever you wanted i nthe list, I'd be more a Space Marine advocate because there is no army they are ill equipped to handle in the broade sense. 40K is effectively scaled against Space Marines, so they are the gold standard against which the rest are judged. Reliable, tough and full of nasty tricks. Necrons are far more straightforward. You roll dice at the other guy more or less.

I absolutely would not recommend Eldar as the starting army for a new player, competitive or otherwise.

Don't buy into the hype. Eldar is an amazing codex, but you will get wrecked if you don't know how to play them. Eldar are not great because the codex itself is full of unkillable or super-killy units. Eldar is the strongest codex because their units are the best at exploiting the game's mission systems. If you're not familiar enough with the actual game and all its mechanics to make those exploits, what you'll find yourself doing is playing the army like you would any other army- by trying to beat the gak out of the other guy's army.

And that's a recipe for getting a beat down as an Eldar player, in a competitive environment.

I'd recommend Space Marines or Tau. My gut also says Necrons, but I don't actually know much about Necrons beyond the bakery and their Command Barge shenanigans.

 xxtwisted26xx wrote:
So when thety say that units have different equipment, do I actually have to add that to the model? Or do I just say they have it? Like giving a Necron Lord a Ressurection Orb?

With Necrons, there are a lot of instances, mainly with HQ's and Royal court members where you can't give their models their actual wargear, except the Rez Orbs, there are ways to have the models have one or the other, but most of the time just say that "This lord has a rez orb" and so on, as long as you can remember.

 BlaxicanX wrote:
I absolutely would not recommend Eldar as the starting army for a new player, competitive or otherwise.

Don't buy into the hype. Eldar is an amazing codex, but you will get wrecked if you don't know how to play them. Eldar are not great because the codex itself is full of unkillable or super-killy units. Eldar is the strongest codex because their units are the best at exploiting the game's mission systems. If you're not familiar enough with the actual game and all its mechanics to make those exploits, what you'll find yourself doing is playing the army like you would any other army- by trying to beat the gak out of the other guy's army.

And that's a recipe for getting a beat down as an Eldar player, in a competitive environment.

I'd recommend Space Marines or Tau. My gut also says Necrons, but I don't actually know much about Necrons beyond the bakery and their Command Barge shenanigans.

I would second this in another light - if you learn the game with a codex this strong - it will more than likely overshadow any opportunities for actually becoming a good player - you would be doing yourself a terrible disservice in the long run.

I dont know bout that.

 BlaxicanX wrote:
I absolutely would not recommend Eldar as the starting army for a new player, competitive or otherwise.

Don't buy into the hype. Eldar is an amazing codex, but you will get wrecked if you don't know how to play them. Eldar are not great because the codex itself is full of unkillable or super-killy units. Eldar is the strongest codex because their units are the best at exploiting the game's mission systems. If you're not familiar enough with the actual game and all its mechanics to make those exploits, what you'll find yourself doing is playing the army like you would any other army- by trying to beat the gak out of the other guy's army.

And that's a recipe for getting a beat down as an Eldar player, in a competitive environment.

I'd recommend Space Marines or Tau. My gut also says Necrons, but I don't actually know much about Necrons beyond the bakery and their Command Barge shenanigans.

so wouldn't that just make it an ideal army for learning the ins & outs?

There is a way that every army is the right answer here, being that his only specification was competitiveness, and Marines or Crons, the obvious answer is clearly Crons. Doesn't hurt that it's an army with no standout bad match ups, and easy to play just a matter of learning what to point where, in most situations.

Okay, so Im going to aim for 1500 point army as thats whats common in my area I guess.

So far I've got:

10 necron warriors
Anrakyr the Traveller
Necron Lord with Rez Orb
Trayzyn the infinite

Any other suggestions? Are Immortals worth taking over normal NW?

A friend of mine that has necrons usually only runs immortals, leaving a single group of warriors in the backfield for holding objectives since odds are they wont do anything anyway and are vastly cheaper. Immortals are a fair bit annoying to clean up in one go to prevent that reanimation protocol crap, warriors are a joke in comparison lol.

Err Mah Gerd I love Immortals. They're space marines, with specialized Heavy Bolters, or Tesla weapons, they're really cheap for what they are, and can take Night Scythes. My vote is yes on them.

Oh dang, so does nobody run necron warriors? ACK MY MONIES!!!!!

 xxtwisted26xx wrote:
Oh dang, so does nobody run necron warriors? ACK MY MONIES!!!!!

One of my favorite playstyles is AV13 wall. I always take a minimum of 2 Ghost Arks with warriors in them, and the Immortals I leave in Night Scythes for getting objectives/killing high priority targets. Both excellent choices, just depends on what you wanna do with them.

So when people say they put their units inside vehicles are they actually inside them? I was looking at the models and see necron warriors inside the arks.

 xxtwisted26xx wrote:
So when people say they put their units inside vehicles are they actually inside them? I was looking at the models and see necron warriors inside the arks.

No, you just keep them off to the side of table and remember or mark which vehicle they're in. Everything inside the ghost ark is just a part of the model itself, as a representation of there being guys inside.

The necrons inside the vehicle are basically the same thing as the droid deployer from starwars episode 1. Bunch of robots hooked into a carrying rack that are dumped out and activated lol.

First time i saw that i cringed....that thing has to be a nightmare to paint since it has what EIGHT warriors inside it? lol

Warriors can be good. Taken with a ghost ark and plopped on an objective they can do pretty well and can bring a surprising amount of fire to bear with rapid fire (ghost ark has it too.) The ark can bring back dead units so it gives them a bit more survivability and because they are guass they doesn't afraid a of any vehicles.

That being said, a 4+ save, while not really bad, isn't ideal when the sh1t hits the fan. That is where Immortals come in. 3+ save with the option to take an AP 4 rapid fire gauss weapon or tesla weapon with RP means more shooty and survivability but with a high points cost. I run two squads of ten warriors and two squads of nine immortals, one with a lord and orb and the other with a cryptek.

Being offerred:

3 annihilation barges
20 necron warriors
bunch of scarab swarms
3 destroyers
3 necron wraiths

Any of these useful to add to my army?

So far I have:

Necron Lord with Resurrection Orb
Trayzyn the infinite
Anrakyr the Traveller
10 Necron Warriors

annihilation Barges are excellent.

Swarm bases are sueful if you're willing to committo scarab farming but otherwise maybe not.

destroyers and Wraiths always useful

Warriors? you need em. so yeah.

 xxtwisted26xx wrote:
Thanks for the input guys! Hmm im debating on the Necrons now. Normally people play with 1,500 point armies right? So what would a typical Necron army be composed of? Like that guy said, I dont have the money to buy every single unit of Necrons :/. :(

"Competitive" in 40k is mostly resolved around list-building. And that's going to be expensive. Necron staples are Annihilation Barges or Sentry Pylons, Necron Warriors at minimum size to maximize the amount of Night Scythes you can bring, 1+ Catacomb Command Barge and 1+ unit of 6 Wraiths with 3 Whip Tails and a Destroyer Lord.

Trazyn is trash, Anrakyr can only be useful when your enemies has Lords of War. Else: use them as regular Lords. Destroyers are terrible, convert 1 of them to a Destroyer Lord and try to sell the two others.

The only list where a higher amount of Warriors is useful is a list with 2 Ghost Arks. I used to run 30-40 Necron Warriors with 2 Ghost Arks until I sold the GA.

Space Marines.

Space Marines have always been one of it not the easiest factions for a new player to learn. As of 7th edition, they also have a very competitive skill ceiling.

My recommendation:

Read the rulebook, read some Information about those armies youre interested in and watch some batreps on YouTube. Maybe make some Practise Games with youre friends models. I wouldnt pick an army cause the majority says its the best to begin with, cause 40k isnt the cheapest hobby out there. Pick the army that seems to be the most interesting to you. If youre planning to paint them all with more than 3 Colors and without skipping the details pick an army whose look you like most. You ll learn the game with every army, but its more fun if the army is what you really like, even if you loose (except if winning is what you like most. In that case you shoud pick the most powerful army ---> eldar atm ).

Personally I started with Space Marines cause I thought they look cool etc. But the way they work on the battlefield isnt too much fun for me. Except for some high competitive-lists they lack of focussed fire power which means it can be really frustrating to remove certain enemy units. So I got another army that works completly different (Dark Eldar) and now I am happy.

For the painting its neary the same. Marines maybe easy to paint, but in my opinion they are also absolutely boring to paint and except for the vehicles all you ll be painting is marines with less or more decoration on their armor. So you Need good endurance.

So if you ve got a tight budget dont hurry with picking your army.

If I had to pick between marines and Necrons I would take marines, cause they are more customizable with the different chapters. But that would be my personal choice. You can also buy and resell them on ebay nearly without any losses if you get bored of them.

If you choose necrons I recommand to get a silver base coating spray or an airbrush. Its unbelieveable how easy and fast you can paint a Necron army... but its also reaaaaaaaaaaaaally boring.

 tyrannosaurus wrote:
jy2s [a competitive, tournament player] list from his recent batrep. This is at 2000 points so you might have to drop some barges. I definitely recommend buying to a list - although GW love it, making random purchases based on looks will make it very expensive for you.

CAD #1:

Overlord - 2+/3++, Mindshackle Scarabs, Warscythe, Catacomb Command Barge, ResOrb
Overlord - 2+/3++, Mindshackle Scarabs, Warscythe, Catacomb Command Barge

5x Warriors - Night Scythe
5x Warriors - Night Scythe

Annihilation Barge
Annihilation Barge
Annihilation Barge

CAD #2:

Overlord - 2+/3++, Mindshackle Scarabs, Warscythe, Catacomb Command Barge

5x Warriors - Night Scythe
5x Warriors - Night Scythe

Annihilation Barge
Annihilation Barge
Annihilation Barge

What does CAD 1 and 2 mean? And that 2++ and 3+++?

Also, that army only runs 10 necron warriors?!

Eldar is the easiest army to win with now. Maybe that will change when more new codices are released but they should stay in the top for quite awhile still. Any army you start the game with will require a learning curve. Eldar is an easy army to play in my opinion... You just need a good list. Tau have fallen out of the top tier in my opinion and I don't see them climbing back up to the top any time soon... Sixth edition was when they shined.

Space Marines are another good army to start the hobby. Necrons are still good too but I would not start with them.

I just want a good starter list for 1k to 1.5k army to start with. I still dont even understand how the army points work...

Like it says:

Necron Deathmarks 95 points (may include 5 additional at 19 points each)

So I can only have 10 Deathmarks in an army? Or 20 max necron warriors?


Also what is eeryone using for transportation of their models?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Current list 1,000:

HQ:

Necron Lord: 35 points

Troops:

10 Necron Warriors: 130 points

10 Necron Warriors: 130 Points

10 Deathmarks: 190 points

10 immortals: 190

Support:

2 Annihilation barges: 180

Total: 855

With left over points for other stuff.

Also whats the scarab swarm build everyone keeps referencing but doesnt explian.

Yes I got the codex just finished reading it!

 xxtwisted26xx wrote:
I just want a good starter list for 1k to 1.5k army to start with. I still dont even understand how the army points work...

Like it says:

Necron Deathmarks 95 points (may include 5 additional at 19 points each)

So I can only have 10 Deathmarks in an army? Or 20 max necron warriors?


Also what is eeryone using for transportation of their models?

The points system can be a bit confusing. Basically, units have a base cost (in the case of deathmarks, that cost being 95 points for 5). This is the amount of points a default unit of this kind will cost you. You may add additional models (up to 5) and each model you add to the unit will cost 19 points. So if you add just one, that is 95+19, if you add two that is 95+19+19 and so on. This means that a unit of deathmarks will be between 5 to 10 models strong, as the default unit is 5 models and you can add a maximum of 5 to that. However, you may take multiples of the same unit in an army. With a basic Combined Arms Detachment (CAD) you must field 1 HQ unit and 2 Troops. You may also add another HQ (for 2 HQ altogether), 3 Elites, 4 more Troops (so a maximum of 6), 3 Fast Attack, 3 Heavy Support, 1 Fortification and 1 Lord of War. This means that if you wanted, your army could have up to 30 deathmarks in 3 units.

In 7th edition, armies can be made up of theoretically infinite detachments, as long as you field the mandatory portions of the detachment. In the case of a CAD, that's 1 HQ and 2 Troops. This means that if you really wanted to have ALL the deathmarks in the world, you could field a 'naked' necron lord and two minimum-sized necron warrior units to unlock another 3 Elite slots. I'm not familiar with the necron codex, but this could get you a whole lotta robot-skeleton sniper-men if you are into that sort of thing.

However, if you really just want to run a very specific unit and only have that in your army, Unbound may be a good idea. Detachments are how you organize your army if you are making it Battle-forged. Making a Battle-forged army is more difficult to do, as it has restrictions, but certain units in your army will receive benefits for your trouble. In the case of a CAD, your troops get a special rule, Objective Secured, which allows them to control objectives even if another enemy unit is contesting them, as long as the contesting unit doesn't have Objective Secured itself. Unbound lets you field anything as long as you pay the points for it, but you don't get any benefits. It's an easier way of organizing your army.

My advice:
Glad you picked Necrons, they are my favourite army and I feel I can hardly go wrong with buying models.

http://www.blacklibrary.com/faqs-and-errata.html
This site has the FAQ, they answer some rules questions and usually fix errors.

http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Warhammer_40,000/6th_Edition_Tactics/Necrons
I personally think this is an extremely helpful guide to Necrons, with a bit of humour attached to it.
Although not everything still works in 6th edition, but 99% of the time that won't matter for a starting player.
(The latest BRB is 7th edition, but they didn't that much)

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/forums/show/14.page
Here you can see armies that other created, with feedback from other users.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/596525.page
This is where we discuss the tactics of Necrons and talk about units and their use.

http://www.battlescribe.net/
This is a program that allows you to create army-lists on your computer or smartphone.

http://battlescribedata.appspot.com/repos/wh40k/index.bsi
You will need this 'data-link' to import the relevant files to your Battlescribe-program.
How to do this is explained in: http://www.battlescribe.net/help-gettingstarted-desktop.html

So I can only have 10 Deathmarks in an army? Or 20 max necron warriors?

You can pick three Elite units.
Deathmarks are Elites, so you can pick three units.
Each group needs 5 to 10 Death Marks.

Also what is eeryone using for transportation of their models?

Ghost Ark or Night Scythe.
It's a transport Skimmer and the other is a flyer, I would advice you to read the rules on those.

Also whats the scarab swarm build everyone keeps referencing but doesnt explian.

It's a combination of Scarabs and Spyders.
The Spyders can make more Scarabs, hence why they call it a 'farm'.

What does CAD 1 and 2 mean?

You should read the BRB and the section about creating an army.
You have an army that consists of CAD's, that's the only type of Detachment Necrons can use so far.
But you can have multiple Detachments in your army!

For now I would stick with a single Combined Arms Detachment until you learn more about the rules.
That means you need a minimum of 1 HQ and 2 Troops, the BRB has a useful image that should explain all.

And that 2++ and 3+++?

2+ is an abbreviation for a 2+ Armour Save.
3++ is the abbreviation for an Invulnerable Save.
For the difference I would advice you to read the BRB.
But in short: Some attacks can ignore armour, but usually cannot ignore invulnerable.
Because face it; even the strongest armour will not save you from a heavy lasercannon.


Last piece of advice for now:
http://www.games-workshop.com/en-US/Necron-Battleforce
http://www.games-workshop.com/en-US/Necron-Annihilation-Barge

Those two sets are - in my opinion - one of the best things you can get.
The Annihilation Barge is a cheap Heavy Support and it comes with an Overlord to combine them into a Catacomb Command Barge.
The Battleforce saves you some cash and you can use every single model out of it.

The Ghost Ark itself is a pain in the ass to build, but I love them!

WOOT! Awesome response Kang! Ya, I'm looking to get an Annihillation barge right now.

By transport I meant like whhat do you guys out your models in? Like is there a universal storage deice everyone uses? Like when I played Heroclix everyone used tackleboxes. But I feel these are mroe delicate models than that haha

Aah, like that! I bought an awesome suitcase for 10 dollar.
Other friends have cardboard boxes and some have the GW-Figure Cases.
http://www.games-workshop.com/en-US/Warhammer-40-000?N=102352+4294966567&Nu=product.repositoryId&qty=12&sorting=phl

I think they are quite expensive and I don't really need them.
Personally I just throw all my Warriors in a little box, the glue is strong enough to prevent them from breaking and the rest is just 'battle damage'.
Tackleboxes are actually quite more protective and durable than the stuff I have been using for years.

PS. I am not sure if another Annihilation Barge would be the best investment.
They are strong and competitive, but you already have two.

And you are welcome.
The best thing would be to take a look at those five links, if you have any questions I would gladly answer them.

One last link: http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/forums/show/15.page
This is the rules-forum of Dakkadakka, but since we are not allowed to quote rules we would always ask you to first check, double-check and then triple-check your books before asking.
As you can see people usually only ask about stuff that is really unclear or if rules are contradicting each other.