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.

Pretty much what it says, how do you pick what army you want to play? Is it fluff, models, in game effectiveness, uniqueness, commonness? Personally I go mostly off of fluff and models, how about you guys?

At the time i thought the old 3rd ed necron models looked the coolest.

I didn't look very closely.

Lol, Crys we all know you pick solely based off of most annoying to paint

Started with IG and stipp play them, I also purchased a rather substansial Ordo Hereticus arm some years ago. Both armies had the things I look for, Pluss that they are amongst the rarest army in my gaming area, its just me and one another IG player

I thought chaos was the coolest thing right after I got black reach. Before I started, I wanted to play dark eldar. Which was back then in the dark ages of dark eldar, where a new codex wasn't even on the horizon

Everything about CSM is awesome. I can't explain it. I just knew they fit.

Fluff / model range

Samus_aran115 wrote:I thought chaos was the coolest thing right after I got black reach. Before I started, I wanted to play dark eldar. Which was back then in the dark ages of dark eldar, where a new codex wasn't even on the horizon

Everything about CSM is awesome. I can't explain it. I just knew they fit.

CSM are in my top three favorites actually, can't say I love the models, but the fluff is really cool

Blood Ravens, by playing DoW games I got boned to them. Especially after Dark Crusade, Soulstorm and DoW II.

How the models look and how they play. Don't want to paint or play something you don't like

I like DE because they are unique in my local group and they put out a godly ammount of firepower against hordes of Nid's

Any game I play its either Necromancer/undead army or Paladin/holy warriors. Daemonhunters were purely metal and cost a feth ton, so I went Necrons. Went to Tyranids after that because I love Xenos... then Grey Knights since they fill my paladin-esque niche, now back to Necrons

Back in the mid 90s I played Space Wolves, which were probably the most despised army at the time. (Funny how history repeats itself.) When I got back into the game, I wanted to play a less popular army. Since I don't like to be the "bad guys" I went with Battle Sisters. I have no regrets.

Picked mine cause I like the daemonhunter/daemon idea. Its why I like diablo, paradise lost etc.. So I picked daemons and daemon hunters.. Eldar were fun too sinc they were fast.

I saw that Tau could use more "robot thingies" than Eldar.

I sorta regret saying that I also saw that the suits as "Gundam-esque", which also pulled me over; unfortunately proving the old and hated stereotype of Tau winning over anime lovers.

I bought AOBR gave the Marines to my son as there was no way I was going to play SM. That left Orks. But that was ok with me, used to collect orks when I was a kid so still had some old models.
I've started to collect DE because the models look good, and I didn't want another hoard army.

Nice, DE are good because of how you can run them as anything you want. CC, Shooty, Horde, Specialist, etc.

When I first started in the hobby I picked Imperial Guard as my army. I'd always entertained dreams of joining the Armed Forces, and as I was at that age of being obsessed with anything military (about 11-12), the Guard were the most logical step for me. Aliens/Xenos - never really appealled to me, nor did super-human Space Marines, but human soldiers were cool because I was going to be one when I was older!

Fast forward ten years to the release of the plastic Cadians. I'd not joined the army because of health complications, but the Imperial Guard still appealed only, as I was older, it was the background that started to grip me in it's massive fist. They're ordinary men & women dispatched to war against nasty things which would give any sane person nightmares, fighting with equipment which, whilst -very- effective against other humans has a tougher time against the xenos.
Just progressed from there. I dabbled in Grey Knights with the old Daemonhunters Codex, think that was during the Eye of Terror campaign, but I always went back to the Guard.

Now my Krieg army, which I am slowly building, is an extension of that love of the Guard. It might, however, be my last loyalist Imperial force, but at least it's the only 'standard' Imperial world/regiment that I truly love.

Nice, the guard are really cool

I always play elves or dwarfs, but there are no dwarfs in 40K. I also like things that make other stuff go boom, and I tend to be attracted to stuff that's not FOTM.

I bought Battle for Maccragge, and Nids had far more models.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Then I decided that I had the marine models, I might as well have them too.
The when I saw GK in the back of WD in march, I said..

" I have Rhinos, Stormraven, a Razorback, Land Raids all which will be usable, so...

Shiny. Gimme."


That was before I even seen the codex. I still don't have it and I have an 18pt army.

That's really cool. I wanted to do that with Orks and the AoBR box, getting two armies at once, Salamanders and Death Skulls, but then I saw Dark Eldar and that changed my whole plan

I started with Eldar, then moved to Orks, then to Dark Eldar. Eldar were my favorite of the first two armies i played, so i chose Dark Eldar as my next, and so far im having a blast. The fluff is what origionally grabbed me, then the models, and then the playstyle.

Dark Eldar are really fun. I don't know how you managed to switch from Orks to DE

I was watching Starship troopers wile riding in the car with my mother, we stumbled on GW and right then I watched a Tyranid vs IG. all i could thing about was humans figthing big bugs so I jumped on IG and got a few units. (Funny at the time I was 9 and my mother didnt think I would stay with 40K vary long...she was wrong)

ChiliPowderKeg wrote:I saw that Tau could use more "robot thingies" than Eldar.

I sorta regret saying that I also saw that the suits as "Gundam-esque", which also pulled me over; unfortunately proving the old and hated stereotype of Tau winning over anime lovers.

Most of the armies in 40K are heavily derivative and targeted at certain demographics. It's part of what made 40K so popular. The fact that so many things (like Starcraft) have been derived from 40K and later become famous has only helped. The only shame you have is admitting to liking anime, not that liking anime was the reason you were drawn to the Tau.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Amerikon wrote:Back in the mid 90s I played Space Wolves, which were probably the most despised army at the time. (Funny how history repeats itself.)

The problem the Space Wolves have always had is that Games Workshop can never seem to balance them with the rest of the Space Marine armies. If you look at Grey Hunters versus Tactical Marines, the Grey Hunters do nearly everything the same or better, and end up being somewhat cheaper. Though, to be honest, I think this is more if a facet of the Tactical Marines being underpowered, and not the Grey Hunters being overpowered. In 2nd Edition, all Marines had a Bolter, Bolt Pistol, and Close Combat weapon as their basic loadout in tactical squads. The imbalance of the 2nd Edition Wolves came in their amusingly cheesy army choices (Wolf Guard abuse was the worst, heh).


My first ever time playing was as Squats that belonged to a friend of a friend. When I finally got my own army, I chose Space Marines because they came in the 2nd Edition box which had just come out, and at the time, I didn't really understand the sheer awesomeness that is Ork. I filled out my Space Marines before deciding I liked Imperial Guard and Tyranids too which also became a Genestealer Cult army. Then I had Fantasy Orcs which I spent hours and hours customizing (oh the countless blisters of snotlings...) so I stayed away from 40K Orcs even though they had by then become one of my favorite armies. When I came back to 40K, my buddy already had a giant, beautiful Tyranid army, so for the interest of differing forces I decided to rebuild and enhance my Imperial Guard. Then I saw all the brilliant things people were doing with converting bigger Space Marines, so that became my new quest, the poor Imperial Guard being swiftly forgotten as anything more than comparisons for scale to make sure my Marines were tall enough (as seen in my avatar).

I know that I chose DE because i am very flaky when it comes to that stuff, but I always liked their models, so I looked at the fluff, I liked the fluff so I looked at the gameplay, I liked the gameplay so I picked up some warriors and an Archon. I have no regrets

I go with whatever has the models I like.

40k was easy. Tyranids are easily the best model range in the game. It helps that I dig their fluff as well.

Fantasy was harder. I look for a model range I like in its entirety, had HQ units that look great, and has some bigger centerpeice models I nearly went for Beastmen when I read about the Cygor and Gorgon, but they didn't have models, so I went with Vampire Counts. It was only missing a big centerpeice model that I liked. Then they released the Terrorgeist, and, well, I had my centerpeice model.

I never pick an army based on effectiveness. I can make a list that works for me from any codex, but I can't force myself to enjoy painting things I don't like the models of.

Started with eldar, however got tired of my gliding vehicles having more of a chance to explode and die from crashing.

I remembered though that I always loved the grotesque completely alien type things. (Zerg from starcraft) so nids was the only logical choice.

Fluff behind the Dark Angels and the aesthetic of the robes.

Well I chose Black Templars because they looked very appealing to a 12 year old kid that liked medieval and there religion sorta stuff back then, so I went with them. I grew up and got over them and I looked threw all the codexes and picked the models I liked so I picked Imperial guard, the catachan range, and then I picked up some cheap Cadians and have stuckw tih Cadians ever since and Because I only got 20 catachans I just forgot about them.