Have You ever owned Codexes for Armies you don’t own?

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**Nightlord1987**

Most recently I bought the Thousand Sons codex, despite being a Nurgle Fan boy who thinks Magnus is overrated.

But it is one of the best looking codexes I've seen visually and design wise, and I love all the new art it had.

**HuskyWarhammer**

I've done this a few times...I have some friends who love the hobby, but aren't as financially stable, so I've picked up a few codices and some "models I thought looked cool" for the group to use.

**insaniak**

Up until 6th edition, I bought every codex - It makes it a lot easier to play the game if you know the rules.

The introduction of the ridiculously expensive hardcover codexes killed that off... I switched to just buying what I could find second-hand for a more reasonable price, and then gave up on that when 7th ed finished smothering my interest in actually playing the current version of the game.

**Talizvar**

insaniak wrote:
Up until 6th edition, I bought every codex - It makes it a lot easier to play the game if you know the rules.
The introduction of the ridiculously expensive hardcover codexes killed that off... I switched to just buying what I could find second-hand for a more reasonable price, and then gave up on that when 7th ed finished smothering my interest in actually playing the current version of the game.

I could not put my finger on it exactly but the game was dead to me then.
8th has kept my interest so-far so getting codex books is not so bad.
It can be rough when you see the same "lore" from 3rd edition in the 8th edition... but got to expose the stuff to the new folk too.

**Blackie**

No, never. I'm not even ok with paying for getting rules for my armies, let alone paying for books dealing with other armies

**Vector Strike**

Nope. They're already too expensive. If I want to check other codexes' rules... Tzeentch provides them

**Torga_DW**

Up until 6th, when they doubled the price (after raising prices on the softbacks), i had every codex. You had to, or someone would pull a double-veil necrons, even if it was accidental.

**Just Tony**

I owned every codex for 3rd and 4th, and half of them for 5th until I lost the passion for the game. Same for WFB from 6th through most of 7th.

**clively**

I’ve owned all of them since 5th ed - which is when I got into this game.

**kurhanik**

I only buy the codices for armies I plan to play. Now, I might buy a codex and not build the models for 6+ months, but it is still part of the plan.

I do occasionally pop onto amazon or ebay and see if older edition codices are cheap though...I only had Codex Daemonhunters when 4th was out and when the books are available preowned for 3-5$, why not?

**vipoid**

Archebius wrote:
Define "owned."

**TeAXIIIT13**

Every Codex from every edition except 8th, won’t touch that filth with an incinerator.

**Hatachi**

I don't mind buying codexes after they're past an old edition and sale dirt cheap.

**CragHack**

No. Waste of money and space.

**tneva82**

Stormonu wrote:
Back in the early days of 40K (mostly 5E and before), in my area it was not uncommon for players to not only own the codex of the armies they were playing, but the codexes of those they might face across the battlefield.

But, I have to wonder, was that particular to my area, and if not, is it still true today? Personally, I never did buy a codex for an army I didn’t have the models for - what about everyone else?

Back when they were much cheaper and there wasn't bazillion codexes yeah. This was on 3-4th editions. For one fluff, for second knowing the enemy, for third was always being tempted for new armies. And then they were more reasonably priced for that goal. And there wasn't quite the codex flood as there are now. Even with prices then the count is so many it might keep me from doing it now anyway!

**Sleep Spell**

Usually only buy the codex for forces I play, since most people at my FLGS will gladly let you browse their codex and chat about lore or point out the funniest/exciting sections in their codex.

That being said I (and probably anyone) who plays a flavor of space marines will buy the vanilla dex since its always one of the first to drop and then graduate to whatever their main branch of power armor is when that's released...

**DarkStarSabre**

Through 3rd edition, 4th edition and 5th edition I did. Then real life caught up and 6th ed onwards became prohibitively expensive - essentially forcing me to the YAR HARR approach.

Which is a shame. Codexes and the like are great reference materials for things like pen and paper roleplay or even general background fluff when trying to sort your own army out in your mind. Or even just for campaign fluff with your local group.

**NH Gunsmith**

I have never found the need to own any Codex except for the armies I played. If I wanted to know more about an army, I would just glance through one of my buddy's/opponent's books, or just talk to them.

Not owning the Codex for an opponent's army was a great conversation starter, and every Codex I didn't buy was more models for my army.