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Hello there!

I've been thinking about starting Warhammer 40k for a couple of years. I love miniature games: I played WHFB several years ago and recently I've played avidly Confrontation from the defunct Rackham. WH40K has always been in the spotlight, and for about a month, the feeling has grown intense.

I've scrutinzied forums, read background from the armies that caught my first attention, look at miniatures, army lists... I think I might have an information overdose right now, and I still can't make up my mind about which army to start with. I've nailed it down to two armies: Blood Angels or Tyranids. I like both of their background, armies, playing styles and customization options (both in terms of army list and miniature painting&customization).

My idea is to start simple. WH40k is not precisely a cheap hobby. That's probably why I have been looking at so much info before even buying the manual. I would like to start with a 1.000, maybe 1.500 points army for a long term army of no more than 2.000. I want to fully paint to a pro level and customize my units, so I would not like to spend 30 hours painting a squad that I won't normally play, at least when I'm starting.

On one hand, I like Blood Angels because of their background as Space Marines, their whole iconography in banners, armors, etc and their playing style with retros, quick deployments, fast action combat.
PROS:
- Armies are comprised on a lower number of miniatures (higher costs per unit), therefore less money (theoretically) and less paint work.
- Polyvalent army. Being a chapter of the Space Marines, you have access to anything.
- They have termis! (probably my coolest unit in the whole WH40K).
CONS:
- It is a very common army.
- Space Marines are the flat entrance to the hobby (or at least it seems to me). They offer a bit of everything, they are easy to play. To me, this is actually a con, because I see a long term feeling of -"I need something else than this. Something more unique".

On the other hand, Tyranids also look very, very cool. At the beginning they didn't caught my attention at all as I thought they will be very like Zergs in Starcraft. Go mindless to melee combat and destroy everything. Looking more deeply into it, I have seen that they are truly a polivalent army (actually, to a neophyte like me they look the most polyvalent of all), their unit are *very* cool, specially the HQs and Heavies (I've seen that you can even make an army made almost exclusively with these).
PROS:
- They offer what it seems to me unique gameplay in the battlefield (if not the most).
- Great miniature customization. They are aliens, you can do anything to them.
- The big creatures look absolutely stunning.
CONS:
- Too steep learning curve? Kinda feels like an army an experience player will consider.
- Big swarms. A lot of money, a lot of painting.
- Are they really a polyvalent army?

What I hope to get from you, experienced and well-versed players, is to bring some light above the statements that I wrote above. I fear to start doing one army or another just to find out in some weeks or months time that I don't like it, or that I thought that army was capable of doing this or that, but it doesn't.

To start, 1.000 points is my target. In a couple of months, 1.500 maybe 2.000 points, in where I'll stop (at least for short-term).

Any help will be more than welcome. Thanks everyone for your time!

If I were you, I'd start lower than 1000 pts to begin with. Maybe even just start with a battleforce box. As for Blood Angels and Tyranids :

Blood Angels aren't your regular type of marines (if they we're, they'd be in the SM codex ). They have the Red Thirst, which can turn some of your units at the start of the game in fearless killing machine, they can take assault (jump packed) units as troops, their vehicules are extra fast, their psykers powers make their CC better, an their dreadnought can become psykers and tend to be CC oriented. Overall, they are SM that focus more on CC than shooting. Depending if you go mechanized or infantry heavy, this will affect how much you spend. Infantry heavy that focus on jump units will require you to buy more models, while mechanized will require you to buy fewer models, but that cost more.

Tyranids will cost you defenitively more, since if you go horde you will have to buy alot more of model (even more if you play with a Tervigon that as the ability to spawn nids). If you go Nidzilla (monstrous creature heavy), it will cost you an arm in my opinion, and it ain't that competitive (bigger models = bigger target). Also, Tyranids are harder to play since they have some special rules that make some of their units dependant of other (Synapse creature) to stop them from being mindless animals, and most of them have pretty low armor save.

Since you want to begin, I'd suggest you BA over Nids because it will be more easy to begin with, you'll still have some decent special rules, you'll have fewer models to pay for, and it will be a more forgiving army. However, that's just my personnal opinion, feel free to start Nids anytime. If you go BA, I suggest you start at 800 pts and maybe buy the Battleforce box.

You've already spent a great amount of time in the planning of each army. You're on a great head start and you've probably saved more money in the long-run by making these decisions with pragmatism.

Choose what you love the most, with all considerations involved.

Rafalas wrote:I've been thinking about starting Warhammer 40k for a couple of years. I love miniature games: I played WHFB several years ago and recently I've played avidly Confrontation from the defunct Rackham. WH40K has always been in the spotlight, and for about a month, the feeling has grown intense.

I would strongly suggest starting with the Marines for the following reasons.

* They are a more forgiving army. Mistakes you make while learning are not going to cost you games as often as nids
* BA is a much better codex. You don't start playing golf with a handicap, why would you do the same in 40k?
* As a marine player, you can switch between BA, SW, C:SM, BT, and DA codex's pretty easily. This lets you change your style of play to find what you like.
* Marines are cheaper due to the starting box sets. You can get going for less $$$

That being said. If you have the money and the time, why not collect both armies at once? Get a small marine force so you can play a few games, then start buying and painting some nids. I often paint models Ill never use in a game because I love painting them.

BA and 'Nids are my two main armies but I'd say that BA would be easiest to start with.

For that reason alone I'd suggest Tyranids as long as you don't mind losing more than winning to begin with.

When giving advice on these sorts of things, I normally try and eliminate the "how hard is said army to play" bit. It might be easyer to win with sm but if you want to take a xenos army in perticular, you should go for it. I started with tau and they are sometimes considered to be the hardrst army to play and I never got down about not winning the odd game. Really after the first few games you should be playing fine and have figured out the cool little tactics that each force brings to the table.

Whats even better is if you are starting with friends. If you all suck, well... you wont have to be a tactical mastermind to have fun and win the odd game.

Anyway good luck with whatever you want to choose.

I could not, in good conscience, bring another BA player into the world. I hate playing against blood angels. They are OP. If all you want to do is win, go BA.
If you value having fun, and not just you yourself having fun, but also your opponent, so they'd want to play you again, then go non-BA, so in your case tyranids. I've played as tyranids a few times, and they are really fun. If you want to play in tournaments, and dont care if your opponents enjoy playing against you, then play blood angels.
Personally, I only play against blood angels when I have to, like a FLGS tournament or something like that. I'd never play against them by choice.

Also, 'nids aren't bad. They arent super- , but it is definitely possible to win with them.

hey there welcome to 40k!

i think with how expensive 40k is you should deffently invest time into deciding what army you want to collect you cant afford to change half way through anymore

i think that tyranids would be a more exciting army for a veteran player of other games space marines do not have very many special rules or exciting units except for terminators. i played space marines a few years ago and they are really boring my turn would always be the same thing haha but thats just my opinion.. a good army to collect is grey knights if you want space marines.. they are coller looking.. will be even less models to paint and they are like 2-3 x stronger than a space marine and they get better special rules.. at the moment they are the best race to play competitivley to

painting a swarm army is crap.. i started a imperial guard army and boy do i regret it. ive got 150 minis to paint ive done 15 in 2 weeks... you do that math

good luck!

Your first mistake was thinking the Tyranids would be like the Zerg, when the Zerg are a straight rip off of the Tyranids.

However, I have to echo the sentiment that Marines pose a more gradual learning curve. However, Tyranids are awesome, both in models and in style. I played both armies, so I can't give you a favorite. I'd say if you aren't terribly concerned with having the "better" army, go with the ones whose models you like. If you play bugs, you will definitely not be fighting your mirror image every time, lol.

Tyranids are much more forgiving army than Marines, and in my opinion are a bit easier to paint. With greater numbers comes less reliance on any one guy, so it makes it easier to bounce back after a bad tactical decision. (And as a new player, you will make them, lemme tell ya.) The Marines, on the other hand, will be played by more people, and so you will find more help from other players/the internets. Now with the objective information out of the way: I can't stand 'Nids myself, I despise their background and wish they weren't in the game, so if you're asking me I will have to encourage you to play Marines.

Given what you've said, I think I'd go with marines here. You are correct in your assumptions that there are a lot fewer army builds for nids at the moment, and there are more units that are useless eye candy. Of course, that will change whenever they wind up with a new codex, but BA is certainly better for "polyvalence" now.

Also, as the commander of a horde army myself, I can say with certainty that it's going to take you a long time to get your army up and running, especially if you want to do a lot with painting, and ESPECIALLY if you're going to want to do a lot with converting. If you want to actually play the game sometime before the end of the year, then it would be better to start 40k with a low-model-count army like marines while having your horde army in constant simmer in the background over a long period of time.

Something else I'd seriously recommend here for you is regular marines, rather than blood angels. Codex marines have the same advantages of a low-model-count army filled with versatile units, and can also take termies, while at the same time they're arguably LESS popular than blood angels, and they certainly require more finesse to play than BA. BA is an army full of fast vehicles, FNP-rending-chainswording-thunderhammer monsters that can assault straight out of deepstrike, dreadnoughts with a hypothetically infinite number of attacks, deepstriking land raiders, etc. etc. Way easier to play than codex marines are at the moment, which have to rely much more on applying the right killing power at the right place at the right time, rather than just waving your hand and shouting "death company!" at whatever happens to be in front of you and assaulting it regardless of what it is.

It draws a lot my attention the common argument that BA is an OP army. If you want to win, play BA !, if you want to have fun (but don't really expect to win), play 'nids (or another not so common army). This deeply worries me, as I definitely will like to play in tournaments, and I would like to stay competitive.

This issue tells me that WH40K is actually unbalanced, that everyone knows about it, and depending on what you are playing, you'll switch armies. Does this mean that if I play 'nids, I can forget about competitive tournaments? I've been checking tournament stats in several sites (www.rankinshq.com for instance), and what a surprise:

USA Rankings:
1 - Grey Knights
2 - Orcs
3 - Space Wolves
4 - Blood Angels
5 - Imperial Guard
6 - Space Marines

UK Rankings
1 - Grey Knights
2 - Blood Angels
3 - Necrons
4 - Space Wolves
5 - Imperial Guard
6 - Dark Eldar

AUS Rankings
1 - Grey Knights
2 - Space Wolves
3 - Dark Eldar
4 - Orcs
5 - Imperial Guard
6 - Space Marines

As well, very interesting stats for Grey Knights army, Tyranids, Space Marines and Blood Angels.

Tyranids have almost half as much pressence in tournaments as GN, BA or SM do, and SM are among those four, the army that scores the less points.

Analizing these stats, one can only think that armies like GN or BA are clearly OP over the rest now, how do players feels when they get to a tournament with a competitive (but not tier) army, and they are paired with any of these two armies? isn't kind of unfair? I would have guessed that a serious, tactical game like WH will be balanced enough to avoid one army being 1st in almost any country. I'm sure I won't be happy when I manage to win another player after having played tactically, but the reason being that I'm playing the "strong army". As well, if I start playing and I do realize that one army is way OP over mine, how am I supossed to have fun playing against it knowing I have very few chances?

Great feedback so far from you guys. Thanks a lot!

G'day Rafalas, I see what points your making, but honestly, after a year or so I've being on Dakka I've realised that just about every army is considered OP by someone. There are lots of compelling arguments about why from every other person so the best advice I've seen and given in most of these threads is go for the army you like looking at the most. So many of the comparative reasons for why this army sucks over that one come down to people knowing what both lists will be at the start. This is not how the game usually pans out, usually you will have no clue what is coming.

Sometimes you get spanked, sometimes you're the spanker!
That's the nature of the game so in the end, if you love your army and paint it well and learn the game, you will have fun!

If you get too caught up in the mathhammer then you'll go nuts, and if you are really into the painting side and get good at it, then even if you totally lose a lot, your opponenent will still be looking at your army with a bit of jealousy, so make that sensation the win instead!

Personally, I think I am pretty good at the game, I think I am definitely better than my best mate, but he constantly spams the hardest units in his lists and kicks my butt more than he should. That being said, when he sets up his undercoated, half painted half varnished guard opposite my lovingly crafted Ultramarines I just don't care...much...

Anyway, just enjoy the game and don't focus too much on the weakness of whatever army you choose, its supposed to be fun right?

Good luck!

Oh, and you should go vanilla marines to start with I reckon!