Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

So I was sat here bored with nothing better to do and started wondering why people choose the armies they play.

I chose dark eldar cos of the asthetic and their speed in game.

And chaos and Sob solely due to asthetics

So why did you choose your armies?

Space Marines, because of AoBR.

Dark Eldar. I read the fluff, loved it. Saw the models, loved them. Read the rules, loved it. Made a list, loved it. Now I'm saving up for buying the first 1000 points of it. ^^

Well, sit yourself down and let me weave you a tale...

When I was younger I didn't like the models of most of the armies. I didn't like the look of the aliens, nor did I enjoy the Astartes models. When the SoB came out I was tempted by them, as the models are nice and still look as good now as they did back in 1997 or so. However the one army I did like the look of was Guard. Mordians, Valhallans, Tallarn, old Cadians, the Holy Grail that was the Praetorian box set, the old plastic Stormtroopers. The imagery of the Guard appealed to my young mind, especially as I starting off down the road towards my intended future career of being a soldier*, so I had an affinity with human soldiers because I wanted to be one.

Wasn't until I was about 18 that I understood truly why I loved the Guard so much, and the Imperium for that matter. It was because they're gripping on to what they have by their fingertips. They are holding on desperately, fearful of enemies both outside and within, hateful of the mutant & the alien, disgusted by the heretic. That, tied up with blind faith in a 'being' most of humanity would only know as a depiction, whether a stained glass window in a chapel or imagery on propaganda, clinched it for me. That 'backwards' thinking, by our standards, is what holds the Imperium together and keeps it going. Best of all the Imperium is not depicted as the good guys. It would have been so easy for GW to make them look like the good guys but instead they threw in a hell of a lot of 'evil' stuff - the Inquisition ordering Exterminatus on planets, psykers being sacrificed to sustain the throne upon which their 'corpse God' sits, the readiness with which Imperial citizens will 'dob in' people as heretics, how the soldiers of the Guard are sacrificed to hold the enemies of the Imperium back, Commissars executing those who run away - there is so much depth to the Imperium that I can't help but love it.

I collect Imperial Guard more for the background than the actual tabletop game. Also because I love the models & enjoy painting them. Tyranids, Necrons, Tau, Dark Eldar, Eldar, Orks, Astartes, Chaos Marines etc - none of these appeal at all compared to my beloved Imperium, even if my views have gone from the Amalathian faction more towards the Xanthite faction.


*Allergies scuppered that career plan.

Death Guard-Great Models, awesome fluff, tactics

Eldar-Everything!

Space Marines - AoBR

Tyranids - Aliens who just want to eat everything, that's damn cool!!

Necrons - My friend gave me a whole bunch of them

Necrons- Soulless machines coming to get ya always appealed to me, plus i love the models

Necrons. Looked at them in the beginning and thought nah, not for me. Then I tried my self with a host of other armies and none seemed to suit what I wanted. In the end I tried Necrons 2 years ago. And loved them. I could even win about 40% of my games. Then the new codex came out and I still love them.

Trying to decide on orks or nids for a second army. I want a horde army and love MC, but I cant look past the stompa, even though I dont play apocalypse. So one of those two for the reason of Horde and MC/Stompa.

CSM was my first choice mostly for the dark evil look they had at the time.

I got my Necrons off my brother, and they've become a strong favorite for their style of play.

I chose Eldar purely because they are a top tier and highly competitive list... LOL JKS!
Eldar all the way because I wanted an army that lent itself to being able to go to town with a paint brush. Bright colours, a high focus on aesthetics and smoothness is a OCD perfectionist's dream

Looking at starting up a Grey Knights army as I've always adored the terminators and general 'nobility' of it all. And with the new codex, their competitiveness has given me extra reason to fall in love

~Ghost

Tau. Killing people at a distance always seemed better than letting half-genetic, half-man, half-Mattel super humans run up and pummel me with a Chainsword.

That and I like the half-diplomacy, half-soviet-negotions; the Water Caste wanting to be your friend with the Fire Caste shouting in the background; "Or we will bury you!"


I also like Guard for the fact that their ordinary men fighting the most haneous creatures in the Galaxy, but with their Reliable las gun and a payer on their lips they willing get slaughtered by the thousands.

Hilarity.

Or the fact that standard infantryman look super awsome when they kill things with said laser pointer. Or the stirring sight of a gunline with broods of hormagaunts 7" away because they failed their fleet.

Super Hilarity.

The Imperial Guard: 12 years ago, because they are not genetically enhanced super freaks or alien doom.

Normal guy + Rifle + Flak jacket = Me.

and who needs flying doohickeys that zoom around the place when I can have a proper battle tank?

SPESSH MEHREENS and Orkz thanks to AoBR.

I want to get a Dark Eldar army started fairly soon, though.

Tyranids due to nostalgia for the army I always wanted in 3rd/4th edition.

Pity I can't have that army anymore...

orks. because they are hilarious for such a serious 40k backdrop.

Plague Marines, because I saw a converted Nurgle Rhino and thought 'wow I want to make one of those', so I bought the Chaos codex and some Chaos Marines and greenstuff.

Back in 3rd I bought the starter SM Vs DE box set and I liked the space marines a lot, but then I went to my store and just about everyone played imperal guard, space marines, or eldar. So I said to myself, "I want to play space marines but I want to be different." Then someone handed me the *new chaos space marines codex and showed me the daemon prince model. I had found my answer. I built beserkers with a prince and a bloodthirster, and loved it. Cc is my favorite aspect and I played them for a couple of years to my first victory at a RT tournament. I put them down and just decided to play again, and this time I'm gonna build space wolves, and play them as a thirteenth company, (using SW rules, but diff paint scheme), because now marines aren't as popular and the wolves are competetive which is what I want.

Eldar because of fluff and awsome falcon model!

Tyranids - I got a great deal on the '05 army box, and grabbed a good number of units for almost nothing on Ebay.

I've since come to the realization that they're buckets of fun to play (horde of bodies anyone?) and even more fun to paint.

Dark Eldar


Because boobs.


Good chance I'll be doing SoB if they ever get updated.

If that's serious then I'm saddened.

Biel-Tan Eldar. Because of the fluff.

Just about the only Craftworld that enjoys fighting, and does not give a damn how the enemy dies, so long as they do. Plus it gives me a fluffy reason to take all the cool Aspect Warrior models

My next army might be Orks just because I love them so much, and it would be a nice break from Eldar

Brother SRM wrote:If that's serious then I'm saddened.

I concur.

Blood Angels because the fellow I introduced to WHFB and minis gaming in general gave me a fair amount of surplus SM stuff he had a few years later. Blood Angels since a CC specialist army was different from the WHFB ranged attack armies I was running at the time.

Otherwise, I would have built IG, Praetorians if I could have gotten more troops. (GW had a sale on Praetorian HWs just prior to cancelling the line and I bought heavily, only to discover I'd traded a cow for "magic beans"). Valhallans were still in production, and I liked the WWII Soviet Red Army look, so that was 2nd choice.

The Dark Eldar, because of their dont take gak attitude. Their models were the origional hook though.

Imperial guard, mostly because of tanks and the whole "men against monsters" thing

I've always loved wolves and vikings. So Space Wolves were the choice for me.

Orks = Fun... had to have an army of them
UM = Romans in space (much more the paladins of IoM than those cruel heartless GK)... plus low expectations
Tau = well I camp and snipe in FPS, so why not 40k

I liked the "humanity VS every horror imaginable" bit the Guard had going for it. I already like humans fighting for their lives against monsters much stronger than they; but 40k turned it up to 11. Then kept going and going and going.

I chose Imperial Guard because they were the race I played in dawn of war....

Then I chose Daemonhunters because I could use them in my Guard Army.

Having a taste for marines, I decided I liked them, and got a marine army. I then sold my guard army, and mothballed my daemonhunters (though I should really bring them out... I have like 20 metal GK Terminators that would work really well in the new edition).