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.

I'm planning on making a 40k chess set out of minis and was wondering what peoples opinions are on which 2 armies to use. Feel free to be specific with models for each piece or whatever.

For the pawns, troops, and king and queen, HQs (duh!), and use SM for white, and Chaos for black.

I'm not really a big fan of marines but they would probably make a pretty good set

Imperium and chaos.
Imperium
king - Chapter master
queen - canoness
pawns - gaurdsmen
knights - regular space marine
rooks - techmarine
bishop - chaplain

Chaos
king - deamon prine/chaos lord
queen - sorceror
pawns - chaos marines
knights- beserkers
rooks - plague marines
bishop - noise marine

I like all but the chaos side of that. It just seems odd with the noise marines and plague marines. Could end up looking really cool though.
.

i kinda agree with you it's just that chaos doesn't have any direct equilavent to those that i picked for the imperium side.

Orks maybe? but keeping them all on the same size bases might be difficult.

Orks and Marines would work, especially since you can get them so cheap from AoBR.

King: Space Marine Captain/Warboss
Queen: Space Marine Librarian/Weirdboy
Bishop: Space Marine Chaplain/Big Mek
Knight: Assault Marine/Stormboy
Rook: Devastator/Loota
Pawn: Tactical Marine/Ork Boy

Commisar Wolfie wrote:Imperium and chaos.
Imperium
king - Chapter master
queen - canoness
pawns - gaurdsmen
knights - regular space marine
rooks - techmarine
bishop - chaplain

Chaos
king - deamon prine/chaos lord
queen - sorceror
pawns - chaos marines
knights- beserkers
rooks - plague marines
bishop - noise marine

I really like the canoness as queen. Thats awesome.

Thank you.
You could always do the same for the chaos side as the imperium side but just do conversion work to make them properly chaosy and spikey.

It could work with Eldar but it'd be a bit more expensive.

Guardians as pawns, Dark Reapers or one of their Weapon Platforms as Towers, Swooping Hawks or Warp Spiders as Knights (Or even Shining Spears, if your wallet's feeling heavy). The bishops could be warlocks, and the king would be a Farseer, and the Queen would be the Avatar.

In the Space Marine one, I'd put an Emperor's Champion as Queen. Why? The actual titles in Chess were given in the middle ages (if I am to believe the research I did some years ago), and before that, the title was male (he was a counsillor, a Vizhir) and people tend to forget that he's the most powerful/threatning piece on the board.

And I don't like the Star Wars chess because someone put the Emperor as Queen and Vader as King. Pah!

Hey this is fun.

Took Wolfie's list and modified it slightly, exchanging a few of the CSM types for a more diverse setup and giving the Canoness a few warriors of her own. Given how the Bishop is played, I thought jump infantry would fit. Also, made Chaos pawns into Cultists (or do you think Blood Pact would fit better?).

Imperium
King: Chapter Master
Queen: Canoness
Bishops: Celestian
Knights: Tactical Space Marine
Rooks: Dreadnought
Pawns: Guardsmen

Chaos
King: Daemon Prince
Queen: Sorceror
Bishops: Fury
Knights: Chaos Space Marine
Rooks: Defiler
Pawns: Cultist

(the Dreadnought and Daemon Machine would obviously be too large per se, but perhaps something could be done by using Epic-scale minis? I just thought they'd fit best - though Terminators and Chaos Terminators would be another obvious option, or perhaps Epic-scale tanks, would also give the IG a 2nd figure on the board)

As dreads/defilers are too big, and epic can be hard to find (or so I've been led to believe) have the rooks as Devastators/Obliterators. otherwise I'd say I like Lynata's best so far.

Thanks! 8)

I just noticed that, given how the Queen and the Bishops can both do long jumps, the Canoness totally needs a jump pack. Sorcerer could just use his psychic skillz and teleport across the board I guess.

Devastator/Obliterator are a good idea! Or how about Assault Marines and Chaos Raptors? Rooks move somewhat similar to Bishops, just in a "straight line" instead of crossways ... so I just noticed they could just as well all be jump infantry, with the rooks just looking a bit heavier.

And yeah, Epic is really hard to come by these days. FW still offers some on their website, but for most models you'd have to hope for ebay etc... it's a shame, Epic40k is a cool game idea.

I gotta agree with those saying Orks, I maybe biased though.

I can relate - Orks = Waaagh = screams 40k!

Personally, I've simply favored Imperium vs Chaos because chess is Black vs White, all using similar figures. The "mirror army" situation was just something I couldn't pass up on.

If not for that, Orks would definitively be my next choice as well.

I'm also open to suggestions on how to make the board too. I was planning on something like a wood boarder like a normal chess board but having the actual board be dirt/grass squares .

Trying to stay away from things like the ork warboss, wierdboy, and dreads. I'd prefer the whole set to be on the same size bases.

Sounds cool, maybe you could paint the white like marble and the black like rock.

Eldar vs Dark Eldar.
King= Farseer/Archon
Queen = Autaurch (sp)/Haemonculi
Rooks = Dark Reapers/ (not sure - Warriors with lances?)
Knights = Swooping Hawks/Scourges
Bishops = Warlocks/ something associated with the Haemonculi
Pawns = Guardians or a mixture of Scorpions, Banshees and Avengers/Warriors and Wyches

Tau:

King: Aun'va or just a regular Ethereal
Queen: Shadowsun
Bishops: Crisis-Suit
Knights: Stealth-Suit/Vespid
Rooks: Broadside
Pawns: Drones/Firewarrior/Kroot


Of, if you wanna stick with identical bases

King: Ethereal
Queen: Shadowsun
Bishop: Firewarrior
Knight: Vespid
Rook: Sniper
Pawns: Drones

Revised Dark Eldar

King = Archon
Queen = Leilith - really have to
Rooks = Incubi
Knights = Scourges
Bishops = Haemonculi
Pawns = Warriors and Wyches - 1/2 and 1/2

The King shouldn't be a HQ. HQ units do stuff, the king should be a planet, or one of those campaign tiles.

Imperium:
King: Terra
Queen: Chapter Master
Rook: Armoured company
Bishop: Thunderhawk
Knight: Space Marine
Pawn: Guardsmen

Chaos:
King: Eye of terror
Queen: Daemon Prince
Rook: Evil armoured company?
Bishop: Helblade fighters
Knight: Chaos Space Marine
Pawn: Cultists

It would be fairly easy to make identical stands for all of them to create some unity, then epic and aeronautica models for representation.

Or make Horus Heresy set:

Loyalists:
King: Emperor
Queen: Sanguinius
Bishop: Russ & Guilliman
Knight: Corax & Khan
Rooks: Dorn & Ferrus
Pawn: regular Space Marines (or Epic Titans or whatever)


Traitors:
King: Horus
Queen: Fulgrim
Bishop: Magnus & Lorgar
Knight: Curze & Alpharius
Rooks: Perturabo & Mortarion
Pawn: regular (Chaos) Space Marines or stuff

Zweischneid wrote:Or make Horus Heresy set:

Loyalists:
King: Emperor
Queen: Sanguinius
Bishop: Russ & Guilliman
Knight: Corax & Khan
Rooks: Dorn & Ferrus
Pawn: regular Space Marines (or Epic Titans or whatever)


Traitors:
King: Horus
Queen: Fulgrim
Bishop: Magnus & Lorgar
Knight: Curze & Alpharius
Rooks: Perturabo & Mortarion
Pawn: regular (Chaos) Space Marines or stuff

That would be cool, but having different models for the same pieces on each side would be very confusing.

Maybe do it on an Epic scale. Have the kings like the hq bases/ hive city/ something equally important.

Queen: Warlord Titan
Rook: Reaver Titan
Knight: knight Titans
Bishop: Warhound Titan
Pawns: Epic tanks/infantry etc

Nidian wrote:I'm also open to suggestions on how to make the board too. I was planning on something like a wood boarder like a normal chess board but having the actual board be dirt/grass squares .

Aye, that sounds good. Maybe a bit like the Blood Bowl Boards - could even include a few ruins on the edges.

for tyranids
KING:hive tyrant

QUEEN:tervigon

BISHOP:hive guard

KNIGHTS:genestealers

ROOK:carnifex

PAWN:termagunts

Cultists/IG for the pawns. I think it gives a little more variety.

Brother SRM wrote:
King: Space Marine Captain/Warboss
Queen: Space Marine Librarian/Weirdboy
Bishop: Space Marine Chaplain/Big Mek
Knight: Assault Marine/Stormboy
Rook: Devastator/Loota
Pawn: Tactical Marine/Ork Boy

^^ This is the best imho.

Zweischneid wrote:Or make Horus Heresy set:

Loyalists:
King: Emperor
Queen: Sanguinius
Bishop: Russ & Guilliman
Knight: Corax & Khan
Rooks: Dorn & Ferrus
Pawn: regular Space Marines (or Epic Titans or whatever)


Traitors:
King: Horus
Queen: Fulgrim
Bishop: Magnus & Lorgar
Knight: Curze & Alpharius
Rooks: Perturabo & Mortarion
Pawn: regular (Chaos) Space Marines or stuff

Saguinius a wife! Zog off

Lets make jokes about humour, not and Germans instead!

Eldar dark eldar necrons tyranid

king farseer/archon/ ctan/hivemind(not sure how to represent it)
Queen autarch/lelith/lord/tyrant
bishop warlock/ incubi/pariah/zoanthropes
Rook reapers/grotesques/immortals/broodlord or hive guard
knights hawks-scourges/wraiths/warriors or raveners
pawns avengers or guardians / kabalite/ necron warriors/ genestealers size wise or gaunts for accuracy

hope this helped sorry for spelling or grammar as im on my phone.