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Over the years, I've picked up a few model sets from Warhammer here and there. I have the Island of Blood starter set, and am set as Skaven for one army, with a few other models from that line that we also have. I have painted a few skaven, but never got around to playing the actual game. Flash forward to present day...A small Games Workshop store opened up nearby, and my 14yr old daughter and I stopped in to have a look. The main faction that caught our eye was the Daemons of Chaos, a close second place would be the Warriors of Chaos.

We are not really looking to play out on a serious level, but just for fun between us at home. My main concern is that from what I have read, Daemons can be quite complicated to play, so then I start to lean towards WoC, but at the same time we just love some of the Daemon models...If we are both new to the game, will it be too complicated to play Skaven vs Daemons ; or is it safer to have to go with Skaven vs WoC?

Thanks for any opinions or advice, as it is very appreciated.

If you are just playing for fun amongst yourselves you could use the models you like from one as units from the other.

Ie. Plaguebearers as Nurgle marked Warriors.
Bloodcrushers as Skullcrushers.
Seekers of Slaanesh as Slaanesh marked knights etc.

Shouldn't be very hard to keep track of who is who and will give the army a retro combined horde look the way it used to function.

You can just ignore all the special rules when you are starting. As you get more comfortable with the rules then start trying out your special rules. It's not like your betting her college fund on your games right? ( right?)

If you really prefer the look of the Daemons, then go Daemons... besides, you can also look at Daemons as a way to potentially break into 40k later on since the models are exactly the same between the two systems! (personally I prefer using the round bases, but squares work well enough in 40k as long as you avoid hard-core tournaments)

As for the difficulties in getting to grips with the army;
a. either forget entirely about the Reign of (comedic) Chaos table to begin with, or else just roll for it in the shooting phase since DoC don't actually have a real shooting phase worth mentioning.

b. Gifts luckily are generally a waste of pts on your Heralds, unless there's a specific Magic Weapon from the BRB that you fancy.
Most of the time your Greater Daemon/Prince will again take either a Magic Weapon and/or a Hellforged Artifact as most of the results are well, rather poo outside of a couple specifics.


Those two basically are what leads to a lot of the mainstream headaches that DoC can cause due to all the added rolling involved.
The rest of the DoC problems simply stem from god-awful internal balancing of the various units. (ie: Plaguebearers are amazing, Bloodletters are polished turds) There's still ways to make things work, but it will become quite clear that some units are just painful to try and make them work. (looking at you Flamers of Tzeentch!)

Skaven are a pretty good draw though for the current DoC however, since they're an army of overall poor to average fighters who rely on numbers & their wonder weapons to even the odds. So while those Bloodletters for example are still heinously over-costed for what you get, vs. a bunch of rats they get to still strut their stuff, unlike vs. the likes of Warriors or Elves or Ogres who tend to simply curbstomp them.

Skaven and DoC are both way up there in complicated. WoC isn't much better. But as stated, you can find ways to dumb down the game if you choose, though dumb is the wrong word. Just use house rules. But at 14 I was playing all kinds of complicated games.

Thanks for all the advice so far. Another question I have is if I were to make an initial investment in say a Daemon army, what would be the best way to start with about $150 or so as a beginning. Would a Battalion box be a good way to start, or another idea?

Unless you really like the models I would probably avoid the battalion box. If you want the army to be easier to win with nurgle is the way to go right now. You will probably want to decide what route you will go for gods, theme, competitiveness level, and aesthetic. I personally love nurgle models so have a bucket load of plaguebearers, nurglings, a GUO, and epidemius. As it so happens this list became really good in the new army book. However if you like khorne and hate nurgle models this won't be a great way for you to go.

The cheapest way is always ebay or a 20% discount retailer (frontline gaming/warstore/etc.). If you order epidemius, 1 box of 3 nurglings, and 4 boxes of 10 plaguebearers this should come out at 150 usd before S&H from frontline gaming/thewarstore/etc.

The current Battalion box sucks as it's way too much of 'tiny bits of everything!' If you can find the old one that was 20x B.letters + 10 Pinkies + 10 Daemonettes + 5 Seekers than grab it up as it's a pretty decent buy.
Otherwise, as mentioned look for a discount retailer if you're looking to really stretch your funds as far as possible.

You're always best to choose a Core unit + matching Herald to join them, and then pick-up a support unit or two. Depending on what Core unit you choose will determine how many of those 10-man boxes you buy initially;
a. Bloodletters = 30 to start with + Herald. Eventually you'll want to make the unit 40 strong because they die really fast and have trouble grinding it out in prolonged combats.
b. Horrors = 20 to start with + Herald. You'll likely only start with 10, but the others are there for adding to the unit through your Lore of Tzeentch attribute. (hope for Gateway/Firestorm on them!)
c. Plaguebears = 20 to start with + Herald. Again, you'll eventually add another 10 to bring the unit to a proper size for 2k+ games, but 20 to start with a solid anvil - especially when the herald gives them Regeneration.
d. Daemonettes = 15 strong + Herald. These girls aren't designed to fight things head-on (ever!), and thus should always be using their superior movement to hit flanks. Eventually you'll likely want 2-3 units of 15 if you take them as your main Core units.

After that, your support units can come down to what you like the look of mostly, though I'd seriously avoid Flamers because well, they're pretty much the outright worst unit in the entire game! (there is no saving those turds)

Good Special units include Beasts of Nurgle, Seekers in units of 10-12 or so, 5-strong Furies for getting the way of nasty things and/or Flesh Hounds for ambushing behind your opponent's lines, while Screamers, Fiends and even the Seeker Chariot in the right list can be made to work. (hint: Seeker Chariots are decent if there little enemy shooting and if you have a heavy-hitter like 2-3 Beasts/Plaguedrones who can cover most of the enemy's frontage and thus allow the chariot to simply 'clip' the unit and thus deny a lot of return attacks... they might even make Bloodcrushers almost viable!)

Good Rares are the obviously undercosted as hell Skull Cannon, or a pair of Burning Chariots, Soul Grinder and/or Plaguedrones. The rest is really, really sub-par to overcosted crap.

Again, this information is so very much appreciated. I'm sure I would have made the mistake of picking up a battalion box as a 'starter' so to say. It looks like I will most probably take the advice and pick up 2 or 3 particular core boxes and take it from there.