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Hey there, Ive got a decent size 40k marine army and an ork one starting to grow. I've been looking around the warmachine site for a while and would love to start, I love some of the models.

I wondered what would be the best buy or core essentials to get me going, GW are great with the starter box sets not sure that WM do this sort of thing. Any pointers?

Yes, PP do a Starter box for most of the Warmachine and Hordes factions. Which are your favourite models from the Warmachine and Hordes ranges?

Once you know that I can give you some further pointers.

the battlegroup boxes are generally the best places to start with any given faction if for no other reasons than the value and quickstart rules.
getting the full prime or primal rulebook would be the best second purchase since you need it for the full terrain and unit rules. you don't need your faction book at all but it is nice for beginners to help decide what models have rules that suit your needs and playstyle.
each faction has a few things to help them stand apart from the crowd that are usually the first things people encourage you to get on your way to 15 or 25 points, cygnar's squire, protectorate's choir, the khador widowmakers, etc.

From what Ive seen I like the look of Khador models. Although I'm not sure of any of the army playing styles.

Do the models come as multi part and roughly how many part per model, is it as much as GWs. I've got a few secrets of the third riech models and they come in about five parts for a pretty big model.

The plastic Khador jacks are about 8 or so pieces: Two legs, hips, torso, head, two shoulders, and two arms, plus hands for one of the arms. Metal ones tend to have a few more, depending on which jack and whether the legs+hips are one piece or not. The warcasters in the starter boxes generally have two or three parts.

Khador's my main army, and (IMO) is a lot of fun: Extremely heavily armored jacks with extremely hard-hitting weaponry. On the downside, they're slow as molasses.

Their infantry, on the other hand, runs the gamut from the light-jack-replacing steam armored Man-o'-War, to insane convicts chained to cursed swords that let them hack their way through entire units of enemies (and the occasional nearby friendly), to decently trained conscripts with blunderbusses. The general theme is above-average infantry, which is a good thing as they generally get a low level of support from your Warcaster.

Khador is not slow. They have slow jacks, but troops are pretty fast (except MOW, but they are in essence light jacks...)

Some of the casters have spells that improve their movement, making them a bit faster then cygnar and on equal footing with Cryx (fastest jacks).

Khador is deceptively slow, as that's my current faction of choice.

Honestly, I'd recommend getting the rulebook first, and read that to see if it's something you like/dislike. It also has a basic intro to some of the faction models and backgrounds, to see if you like the 'feel' of them.

Devilsquid wrote:
Honestly, I'd recommend getting the rulebook first, and read that to see if it's something you like/dislike. It also has a basic intro to some of the faction models and backgrounds, to see if you like the 'feel' of them.

I'm going to have to disagree with you here. I would suggest hitting Battle College and checking the faction overviews to see if any of them pique your interest. From there try to find a local player that will demo the faction for you (fun fact: players who don't run demo games are probably dicks). If you like them, buy the battle box, some dice, the template set, card holders, and a wet erase marker. That give you everything you need to throw down in a Mangled Metal game.

Yes, but Battle College doesn't have the rules.

It makes no difference if you like the look of something if you don't like the rules of the game itself.

Barring that, you can find the quickstart rules on the PP site to get a general idea.

id sergest dl the quickstart from pp anyway, there good to look at how the basics work

the rulebook is a must. but i've seen people turn up and have no clue on how to play even with all the models or think its 40k mini

Devilsquid wrote:Yes, but Battle College doesn't have the rules.

It makes no difference if you like the look of something if you don't like the rules of the game itself.

Barring that, you can find the quickstart rules on the PP site to get a general idea.

The Battle Box comes with quickstart rules. It's enough to get going and start playing some games. Once you move into infantry, solos, scenarios, taking advantage of terrain, then yeah, you need the rule book. But for little Mangled Metal/Tooth and Claw matches the quickstart rules in the box sets should be enough to get going.

I think the rule book should be the first thing you buy when you get ready to move past battle box games.

the mk2 boxes are great , plastic figs and warcaster for about 30 pounds (ok i hate stryker hes lost me more games than any other warlock/ warcaster combined) and mk2 quickstart rules too boot

Gr3y wrote:The Battle Box comes with quickstart rules.

This would be my choice of first purchase, the Khador Battle Box.

Get a few games under your belt, then Prime MkII and enough models to flesh the army up to 15 points. What's a killer choice for four points for Khador?

George Spiggott wrote:

Gr3y wrote: What's a killer choice for four points for Khador?

I would say either two Manhunters or a Manhunter and another 2 point solo. Barring that, a War dog and a 3 pointer like Gudrun or Eiryss.

Widowmakers also make a good choice, in my opinion.

winter guard, or if you prefer a mortar , or even a greylord trinion