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I've been looking through the forums for weeks, finding useful information, and finally decided to join in. I was a casual 40k player years back and have suddenly found the urge to get back into things, this time broadening my horizons and looking to WHFB as well as 40k. The first army I plan to put together I plan to be either orcs or vampire counts. Which one would be friendlier to a new user? Also, if you would be so kind, propose to me a good starting point to get either, or even both armies off the ground. Just to let you know, I enjoy large armies (I'm thinking hordes of zombies for VC).

Vampire Counts are probably easier to play since they're a little on the overpowered side. Orc / Goblin armies are prone to psychology problems which can be very daunting as a new WHFB player. Both armies are a lot of fun, don't get me wrong -- I just think that VC will be more forgiving for someone just getting started with WHFB.

You can always snag a VC spearhead on ebay (I paid $125 for mine although I've seen'em cheaper lately) and it gets you a nice starting point for an army.

If you decide to go Orcs, the Battle of Skull Pass set is actually pretty darn economical if you like goblins.

Just some quick thoughts.

As Selestine said, Orcs and Goblins have some quirky rules that can be daunting to new players. Not to mention that O&G do struggle against Fear / Terror enemies with their standard leadership of 6 - 8. Though, the Choppa (standard orc weapon) is brutally effective for core troops.

But... to me at least, Vampire Counts aren't any easier for a new-new player. VC rely on the magic phase a lot , and the Magic Phase of WHFB is a lot different than the Psycher phase of 40K. Not to mention that there is the whole summoning-horde learning curve. Not only do you have to be able to know what to summon, but where, and when.

I would have to say that, overall, O&G are a bit easier to start with, as they aren't as magic dependant, and do tend to stick with the rules in the BRT better than VC do. They are more suseptable to Psychology, but they'll give you some solid experience on the rules in the BRT. Then you can expand over to the VC.

As for where to get your armies, eBay (and its clones) is usually pretty good. BFSP is also a good way to start (if you like a lot of goblins).

VC are one of the best beginning armies to me. They don't have to deal with psychology and their units are very resilient. I agree with LtCraggs that they are magic dependent but mastering the magic phase to me wasn't as hard as other aspects of the gamer imo. O&G being rather underpowered and random at times requires a bit more player skill to work effectively. If you were to start VC I would get a mounted vampire lord and a couple mounted/foot vampires and get some black knights, wolves, fell bats, zombies, and some grave guard. Remember that in VC, the most important thing is your characters and you will often spend a good deal of your points on them but they help a lot.

Speaking as someone who plays Orcs and Goblins and someone whose wife (Selestine) plays Vampire Counts, I suppose I'll offer an opinion.

As background, I've been playing WHFB for about 10 years now. I started back in 5th Edition, used to be a tournament player, etc etc. Selestine just started WHFB about six months ago. Even considering that, her Vampire Counts are nigh-unbeatable for me. She does run a very magic heavy list, but to say VC is durable is an extreme understatement.

Orcs are great, and have the potential to be enormously powerful if one is lucky, but playing the army well takes a lot of fine balancing both in army composition and in play style. It used to be the case that you could compete magically with other armies, but O&G have just plain been left behind when facing off against Chaos Daemons and Vampire Counts in particular. A melee-heavy Orc army will have about seven dispel dice. A melee heavy Vampire Counts army can still have seven dice in addition to 13 or so casting dice, two Varghulfs, 60 or so ghouls, and four characters that are just brutal in close combat despite the fact that they're all Wizards.

This sets aside the fact that VC completely ignore psychology, and that Ghouls are almost certainly the best core infantry in the game. Two poisoned attacks, cause fear, T4, can be resurrected if they die for the bargain cost of 8 points? Yes, please. Not to mention that if you squeeze in Ghoulkin on a character your Ghouls can basically be halfway across the table before the game even starts.

This is beatable with O&G, but I'll give an example from my last game just to demonstrate the power of the Vampire Counts army. I wiped out two units of Ghouls with combined charges (thanks, Waagh!), and Selestine was down to one unit of Grave Guard, one Varghulf, and a 25 strong unit of Ghouls. The Ghouls were all by their lonesome, and set up for a combined charge. My turn came, so I declared charges with Savage Orcs (flank charge), Spider Riders (rear charge), and Black Orcs (frontal charge) on that unit of Ghouls. The Spider Riders and Black Orcs both failed their fear tests, which is not totally unexpected for Orcs and Goblins, and so didn't get to charge.

So I ended up with a unit of Savage Orcs, with a Black Orc Big Boss, on the flank of those Ghouls. I killed seven Ghouls. So combat resolution was 7 + 1 (flank charge) + 1 (standard bearer) + 3 (ranks) + 1 (outnumbering). 20 Ghouls died that turn. On Selestine's turn, with 9 power dice remaining, she threw seven dice at Summon Undead Horde and resurrected all of the Ghouls that I'd killed, plus some! In that close combat phase, the Ghouls struck first (better Initiative than Orcs) and killed 5 Savage Orcs. I lost combat, lost Frenzy, was outnumbered, automatically broke, and was run down.

Any single other army that I can think of (bar Tomb Kings, who have terrible infantry anyway), if I had killed 7 models, that unit would have broken. But the Vampire Counts were just able to absorb that damage, mitigate the tactical mistake that allowed me to set up combined charges like that, and kill my unit. Which, mind you, was far more expensive than that Ghoul unit in points.

I don't want this to come off like O&G are a terrible army, because they are certainly not. But mistakes hurt with them because of their average leadership, susceptibility to psychology and, to be frank, weakness in the magic phase. Especially for a new WHFB player, Vampire Counts are just a lot more forgiving. And if you decide you want to play Orcs and Goblins later (and really, most people have two armies just for variety), they're cheap as chips thanks to the Battle for Skull Pass and an excellent battalion box.

I believe this settles it. VC it is, with of course some orcs or dwarves on the backburner. Now comes the next part: building a force. As per Selestine's suggestion, I did investigate the spearhead boxed set, and while it does appear to be a formidable army, there just doesn't seem to be enough meat in it. Unthinking, shambling, rotting meat that is. I'll have to fix that, but I think the set a worthy investment. Anyway, would you happen to have an approximate points number for that spearhead? Giving a little 'wiggle' room for character loadouts of course. Also, I have recently come into posession of the 7th edition army book for VC, how useful/viable is it today with the current edition?

Basically you need the most recent codex, and that should be 7th o.o So that should be the one that you're looking for.

<--- there's a picture of the cover of the current codex.

With the models in the spearhead you get about 1000 points using only basic upgrades (champions, standard bearers, etc) and without any upgrades at all to the two vampires that come in the box. If you play the Vlad model as Vlad you're at like 1300 points without upgrading the vampire chick at all. If you twink out the characters you're at 1350ish points, and if you add in magic banners you're getting close to 1500 points from the spearhead.

I understand your wanting hordes of zombies, but I would urge you not to use them to fill your core requirements. They're pretty crappy, honestly, and you can raise them like CRAZY with magic. IMO you're better off having ghouls or skeletons (although I prefer ghouls) and raising zombies from whole cloth. The ghouls have some true hitting power, whereas the zombies honestly can't really harm a fly. A great use of zombies is to raise them BEHIND a unit that you've charged so that when your ghouls / grave guard / whatever defeat them in combat, the unit flees into the zombies and you get an awesome crossfire effect (to use the 40k term, which I'm sure you're familiar with).

The Spearhead gives you a pretty solid starting force. You get a Vampire Lord with a unit of Grave Guard to protect him. Toss some great weapons on them and they're a really nice hitty unit. You also get a corpse cart and you can use the miasma spell to make your Grave Guard strike first with their great weapons. You get 10 ghouls and 10 skeletons, either of which unit can contain the second vampire that comes in the box. You also get a Varghulf and 10 dire wolves to support him. Combined those two can be nice to run up on your enemies' flanks. The Varghulf counts as a Vampire so he is able to run up with the dire wolves and keep them able to march. You can also use them to block him from having to charge something (because of hatred) that you don't want him to charge. It really is a very solid core.

Do you have Army Builder? You might want to mess around with lists in there before you make up your mind what to buy.

Edit: Bah -- I'm forgetting that you can't take a lord in a 1500pt game, so that adjusts you down a little bit so far as points goes. With twinked out characters and standards / musicians / champs the list is between like 1000-1300 depending on if you make one of the vamps a battle standard bearer with a magic banner or not, and whether or not you give the Grave Guard and Skeletons magic banners.

I would take selestine's advice on zombies, they're best used for holding table quarters and extra deployment and for zombie tricks e.g. raising a neew units to block charges or march block stuff. i wouldn't go ghoul heavy unless youre gonna go heavy infantry with grave guard and corpse carts and the like.. Ghouls should be used in support of gg. I'd also give them hw ans s for extra durability as they already having killing blow. Also, another tip, don't think you can use your magic to raise your units over their start. While this is possible you also have to remember that youre screwed if you go up against good magic def and you built a list consisting of small units of ghouls and skelies, take normal sized units.

That is definately not the codex I have, I have been misled yet again! I wish they'd show what edition a book is inside it somewhere, if they do and I haven't found it, well, I'm a fool. This one has the date 2001 on it. I have just started with army builder, and the ruddy demo version only allows so much it seems. A handy tool though by the looks of it. I think my course of action may be to purchase the spearhead online, get the newest codex from the local store and do some reading/planning while I await the package. Maybe a regiment of zombies to pass the time if it takes a while, hehe. I won't deny that zombies are generally garbage, but they sound to be decent screens and vices if positioned correctly. Oh and the corpse cart, I take it that is what raises them? Also, I thank you for steering me away from what would have been a poor army (the zombie-laden idea).

Firstly: If you buy a spearhead it will come with a copy of the newest codex.

Your vampires (or necromancers, if you take them) cast spells to raise zombies / skeletons / ghouls / etc. You have to take a special vampiric power to raise units above their starting strength (except for zombies, you can always raise them above their starting strength). Just to be clear, since you're new to the game that means: If you have a unit of 15 ghouls and 3 are killed, any caster can cast Invocation of Nehek and bring 3 back to life. If a vampire with the "summon ghouls" vampiric power casts Invocation of Nehek and rolls to raise say.. 5.. then your unit is now numbered at 17 since he can raise ghouls above starting strength.

The corpse cart doesn't actually raise any models. It can charge into combat and do wounds, and it has a bound spell that allows any of your units within 6" to Always Strike First. For 25 points you can upgrade it to either have an Unholy Lodestone or Balefire. The Unholy Lodestone works as such: When you cast Invocation of Nehek on a unit within 6" of the corpse cart, the unit gains an additional wound back (basically as if you had rolled one higher on the die). If you upgrade for Balefire instead (and you can only choose one upgrade for each corpse cart): Any enemy casters within 24" take a -1 to casting rolls.

As far as raising zombies: There is a spell "Raise Dead" that creates zombies from nothing, and another spell with a higher casting (Summon Undead Horde) value that can create 5d6 zombies from nothing. You can also Invocation of Nehek a unit of zombies to make it bigger and, as stated before, anyone casting Invocation of Nehek can make a zombie unit bigger than it started out.

Like Pistol said, it's best not to RELY on being able to summon your units above starting strength, but it sure is nice when you can. My 2250 list has 14 power dice so I can usually force a fair amount of spells through, but obviously anyone's magic phase can be shut down, and you can always get unlucky rolls ^_^ I actually do tend to run infantry heavy lists, so I'm probably more than a little biased that way. I use three 20-man units of ghouls and a block of 20 grave guard.

You'll probably want to play with your grave guard (if you take them, of course, but they're really a wonderful unit and make nice protection for your general) to see if you prefer great weapons or hand weapon and shield. My GG unit is actually pretty beefed up -- it contains my general and my battle standard bearer in most cases, so my GG have a 4+ regen from a ridiculously expensive banner QQ so I like to have great weapons on'em since they really don't need the save from shields. Really, it comes down to a personal preference. Once you've played a few games you'll be able to decide if you want them more hitty or more resilient.