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Before anyone yells at me, I've tried searching! It seems like something that'd come up fairly often but I must be using the wrong things to search.. Is there a way to search only for thread titles?

Anyhow, what I was wondering was how the different Battleforces available rank up in terms of value? Not just straight $ value (ie: you save X$ compared to buying the models individually), but in terms of playability (ie a hypothetical Eldar Battleforce made up of swooping hawks, shining spears and warp spiders might not be the hottest thing in the world).

Just for reference, here's what I believe to be the current Battlforces (and a few old ones, since I'm using a swedish online store for reference, and they have some left in stock):
(All are 60€, except the Old Ork, which is 65€)
Dark Eldar:
20 Dark Eldar Warriors, 1 Raider, 5 Reaver Jetbikes, 1 Jungle trees sprue

Ork (Old):
16 Ork Boyz, 5 Ork Warbikes, 1 Ork Warbuggy, 1 Ork Wartrukk, 1 Battlefield Accessories

Ork (Current):
20 Ork Boyz with weapon options, 3 Ork warbikes & 1 Trukk

Necron:
20 Necron Warriors, 5 Scarab Swarms, 4 Necron Destroyers

Catachan (marked as Old, unsure if there's a newer V or just not made anymore tho):
'20 Catachan jungle fighters, 2 Catachan Sentinels, 1 Leman Russ Battle Tank.

Tyranids:
3 Tyranid Warriors, 8 Hormagaunts, 1 Tyranid Carnifex, 8 Termagants, 8 Genestealers.

Tau:
12 Fire Warriors 1 Devilfish 12 Kroot Carnivores 3 XV25 Stealth Armour 1 XV8 Battlesuit Extra Gun Drones

Space Marines:
10 man tactical squad with a Rhino transport, a 5 man combat squad, 5 Space Marine Scouts and a 5 man Assault Squad.

Eldar:
8 Eldar Guardians, 5 Dire Avengers, 1 Wave Serpent, 1 War Walker and a Guardian Heavy Weapons Platform with two crew.

Dark Angels Ravenwing:
6 Ravenwing Bikes, 1 Ravenwing Attack Bike and 1 Ravenwing Land Speeder.

Chaos Space Marines:
8 Khorne Berserkers, 15 Chaos Space Marines, 5 Possessed Space Marines and a Chaos Rhino.

Of course, I can go through all these myself and see what kind of savings you get compared to buying things piece meal, but if someone has already done that, I'd rather not + I couldn't actually rate how useful the boxes are.. Anyway, this is mostly out of curiosity as I'm not looking to buy any of these right now, but perhaps it will be helpful to someone.

I feel like the DE, chaos, and catachan are all pretty bad. The necron, new ork, and ravenwing are all good.
The tau, space marine, eldar, and tyranid are alright.

The only 2 battleforces I see that are playable from the begining are the Tau, and Nids.

The rest are decent add-ons and starters if you get a HQ as a seperate purchase.

Rough guess most battleforces (no math done here) will save you a minimum of $20 US. Of course that depends on the army for instance the Tau box is amazing while the raven wing cost wise is not so great (however its the only way to get RW attack Bikes and Speader).

The Tyranid one is awful. When are you ever going to run 8 hormies/termies?

Cheese Elemental wrote:The Tyranid one is awful. When are you ever going to run 8 hormies/termies?

WoN meatsheild for a Tyrant/Fex in a non killpoint game?

Its still a nice boost for the price though.

Chaos are pretty bad, just because they include possessed, which came in 2nd iirc in the dakka "vote for the worst unit" thread.

Tyranid one is great. Used three of them to kick-start my 'Nid army when I was bulking it up and making it into a proper force. The Tau one also has a decent amount of stuff in it.

And the Ork one is good for beginners as it is the best ways to get Boyz and Trukks (buy two and you are essentially getting the second Trukk for free).

The rest are pretty terrible. The Chaos one is 'ok', the Eldar one is pathetic, and the new Guard ones are a waste of time.

Space wolves is a great one for any marines-> rhino, 20 marines and 3 bikes = GOLD!

Bat Manuel wrote:Space wolves is a great one for any marines-> rhino, 20 marines and 3 bikes = GOLD!

QFT

Orks, SM, Ravenwing, and Tau are great starter forces.

The Marine one is good, except the Scouts and Combat squad should be a 2nd Tactical squad.

The coming IG one is pretty weak. GW should have included a Chimera Transport.

JohnHwangDD wrote:The Marine one is good, except the Scouts and Combat squad should be a 2nd Tactical squad.

'Should' is a matter of interpretation John. I think GW sees these boxes as a way to give a variety of units, not to give efficient choices. To them, the idea of getting three different squads is better than two squads that are the same, no matter how much more sense getting two Tac Squads makes to you and I.

Fiendcrackar! wrote:Chaos are pretty bad, just because they include possessed, which came in 2nd iirc in the dakka "vote for the worst unit" thread.

The battleforce comes with loads of bits to convert the possessed into aspiring champions, lords, sorcerers, chosen etc

It is pretty reasonable to stretch the battleforce to:
2x10 marines w/ass champs,
6 berzerkers (or raptors with some harpy wings £5),
2x winged sorcerers/ lords w/possessed wings,
and a rhino.

Not a bad little starting force.

EDIT: Also possible to make more plasmaguns from spare bolters/plasma pistols or order 5 meltaguns for £5 along with the wings.

The Eldar battleforce is just this side of worthless. 5 Dire Avengers is not a useful unit, 1 warwalker is not a useful unit, guardian defenders are not a useful unit period.

JohnHwangDD wrote:GW should have included a Chimera Transport.

That's not going to help them sell nice new expensive Valks though is it?

I think they should be viewed as a slightly cheaper way
of building up your forces.I've never seen anyone use
a battleforce straight out of the box.

-

Slipstream wrote:I think they should be viewed as a slightly cheaper way
of building up your forces.I've never seen anyone use
a battleforce straight out of the box.

That's basically what I meant by playability - how well do they fit into various competitive (or at least, playable) armies.