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So I'm wanting to "buy in to" 40k.

I'm up to date on all the fluff because I'm an addict like that and spend hours pouring over the RPG sourcebooks, novels and wikis
I'm pretty much set on collecting xenos: Eldar, Deldar, Tau, Orks, Necrons or nids, with a Chaos force being much more acceptable to their loyalist counterpart

I've played the game a couple times before in 5th ed, but have no models of my own.
I have a couple friends that want to play with me, but again, have no models
And I have one, maybe two friends that have their own forces that they can field between 500 and 1500 points

So my question is: Should I pick up the Dark Vengeance set? The Dark Angels will almost always go to my opponent, with me fielding the renegade Chaos units
My only problem is from what I've read in tacticas, the Chaos units (Lord, Chosen, Cultists and Helbrute) kind of suck in regular gameplay
The biggest attraction is obviously having two forces at my disposal right out of the box (whether they suck or not) and allowing me to build from there
and the mini rulebook which is worth more than it's weight in gold (The BRB is 75 dollars stock from GW, is heavy and unwieldy and has a lot of fluff and modeling advice I don't need)

I could try to pick up the minirules from somewhere (eBay?) and put the 60 dollars toward my xenos force... That seems horribly inefficient though
Just not sure if the value is still there. Help?

Yes get the Dark Vengeance box set. You will want that mini book to carry around.

Since you might want to start Chaos Force the DA can also be painted up as Chaos for you to give you more Chaos minis.

I would honestly suggest doing a few proxy games. Go through the xenos armies (and chaos) and decide which one you like the best. One of the most important parts of this game...you should love the way your army looks.

If you have any questions on how the various armies play (strategies, good/bad units, etc), feel free to ask. We're always happy to help a new player.

Once you've made a decision, play a few small games. If you have fun, you've found your army. The Dark Vengeance set is a good buy, but only if you actually want to play either of the armies.

Davor wrote:Yes get the Dark Vengeance box set. You will want that mini book to carry around.

Since you might want to start Chaos Force the DA can also be painted up as Chaos for you to give you more Chaos minis.

Siphen wrote:I would honestly suggest doing a few proxy games. Go through the xenos armies (and chaos) and decide which one you like the best. One of the most important parts of this game...you should love the way your army looks.

@Davor The minibook is one of the things that's selling it for me. That and getting $300+ of minis for 99.00. The only problem I have with painting up the DA as Chaos terminators and Nurgle bikes and a Sorc and CSM and such is that I could kind of use the box as a demo kit to get my friends to play, but only if I keep them as two separate forces :/

@Siphen Proxy games are a good idea. Buying codices for all of those armies would be a pain though. As for loving the way my army looks: the soft organic curves of the Eldar, the sleek predatory bladed look of the Dark Eldar and Tyranids and the angular dynamic look of the Tau all appeal to me. I would have no problem fielding any of them. If I had thousands of dollars to sink into this, I would field them all.

I could kind of use the box as a demo kit to get my friends to play, but only if I keep them as two separate forces :/

You could always paint them as Chaos, maybe even use some greenstuff and spare bits to grunge them up a bit, and then let your friends proxy them as a separate force. If it's your army and your models I'm sure they won't mind. And if they like the game you could always go 50/50 on a second box and boost your army even more. Finally, you can always add to your Chaos forces quite easily with a little skill with greenstuff and some extra bits and pieces of sprue. I've seen some epic looking Demon Princes and Chaos Engines built from scratch. To me that's a lot more fun to build and at a fraction of the cost.

As for the Xeno armies, I'm a fan of the Eldar and Necrons but Eldar are almost exclusively metal and finecast models so they're a bit expensive (although that might be changing with rumors of an Eldar update.)

I hope you choose wisely and end up with a great looking army.

Tau or Necrons are most likely your best bet at the moment. The Necron codex is fairly recent and overall very decent and competitive with most units having a use. Tau are the ones most up to date and as for the rules, well, they are too early to tell and the internal balance is hard to judge.

Eldar are soon. Their aesthetic will likely remain but the internal balance will shift and the models themselves will get more refined as they are brought into the 21st century.

Orks is never a bad choice, but their internal balance which once was really good has now been eschewed to lean heavily towards shoota boys and lootas. Functionally, there are also a few external balance issues I've been told.

Tyranids can be made to work. It'll be a Tervigon slugfest with some variations thrown in and it is a true horde army. Internally the balance is fairly bad and several builds suffer from horrible external balance. They are especially weak against Eldar allies or Space Wolves since they rely on psychic powers a lot.

And start with buying something from a Forum or eBay not something new from a retailer or GW direct.

start with buying something from a Forum or eBay

I'd agree with this if you're going to go with xenos but if you're going Chaos go with DV. If you do decide to go Xeno you can look for past starter boxes online. They can sometimes be just as good and get you an army closer to the one you want.

Hmmm, Dark Vengeance... I got it when my LGS was letting us double up on 1 force so i got 2x Chaos because I really liked the models. The problem is that now I don't really know what I want to do with them. The equipment that the Chosen have isn't all that and costs a lot in points, I don't rate Helbrutes (dreads in general). The cultists and the rulebook are the best part of the set imho.
If you want xenos then I would suggest nids, they haven't had much love lately and the only reason i really started them was because they have big mean looking aliens, but man they are fun to play.
Otherwise Eldar, I don't like them becasue they always seem to batter me.

Frankly, you can almost definately grab a mini rulebook on ebay. Don't force yourself in to getting Chaos because of that. The most important thing really is to have fun so chose an army that you like the look of, find out how they play and if you like that play style then go with it.


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One last thing, I know a guy who buys Dark Vengeance sets and sells everything from it that he doesn't want. He essentially got a free 2000pt Deathwing army, so if you did get it you could sell the DA and invest what you get back in to more goodies

Thanks for all the feedback on this guys

It's looking like what I'm going to do is buy the Dark Vengeance set and play them they way they come,
probably leave off on modeling/converting, painting, heck even gluing them can wait.

Until the new Eldar update comes out. When that drops, I'll pick it up and have a good hard look.
Once I've decided on Xenos to collect, I'll convert all the marines to Chaos (probably a Death Guard force at that, with Typhus and zombies and nurgle bikes and such)

This way I'll have a painted up CSM force and a xenos force of my choice that I can field and do demos with.
Even though I'm still not into buying 2x Helldrakes just to make my Marines viable

I'm still not into buying 2x Helldrakes just to make my Marines viable

I don't blame you, but make sure you're not taking scratch building lightly. Buying some Chaos bits and pieces on Ebay, a dragon's head here and building a pair might be a lot of fun. If you're not sure how that will work you can always Google search for custom and scratch built Helldrakes for inspiration. Some of the ones I've seen are pretty awesome and it only needs to be 50% games workshop bits to be tournament legal (if you care about that).

Hooray! A new player wanting to collect Xenos and specifically NOT wanting to collect Marines!

As for picking up the Dark Vengeance set, it's perhaps not the best idea, unless you don't mind using the Chaos. If you'd prefer to play Eldar, for example, there's no point you buying an army you don't want. That said, the mini rulebook is very useful. However, you can get them on eBay and, despite being hotly contested, you can get them fairly cheap too. If bidding's not your thing, the BuyItNow things do them for around £24. However, you could probably get Dark Vengeance off an independent retailer and sell the models you don't want on eBay and you'll still come out not much out of pocket.

Just so you are aware, the Dark Vengence set is not balanced between the 2 forces. And neither side even has a legal army.

The only bad units are the Tactical Squad and the Chosen really. If you are playing DAs you are most likely playing them for the Ravenwing or the Deathwing, which can be troops with the correct HQ. Running Tactical Marines is for the Vanilla codex.

The chosen are bad only because of the weapon options you get.


Its not a bad start to either army, but if you are just bying it for the rulebook don't do it. There are online retailers selling the mini rulebook for $15-20, much better use of money.

Dark Vengeance is the way to go. Rulebook, dice, templates, and two armies for a little more then the price of a rulebook.

You can keep them separate armies and keep an eye out for sales and trades to add new units in. I picked up chaos stuff from a Hobbytown that was 80% off, and am trying to trade the DA side for more chaos.

Welp, I finally caved. Ordered my Dark Vengeance. Should be here next week.

Awesome. Welcome to the game.