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Our club now has at least 2 of each armies being played( except the one SOB) and the chaos space Maine player was saying how minimal skilled required/op space marines and grey knights were and vise versa. So I came here. Which army does require the least skill to play
Let the arguing begin!

Forgot wolves and tyranids

minimal skill army is much different from an OP army, a minimal skill army is a space marine army, where as an OP army would be a tau or mechdar army.

Granted, I don't have an enormous amount of experience with the game, but everything points towards Space Marines, in my opinion. Now I wouldn't go as far to say that they're a 'noob no skill' army, but they are, IMO, the most forgiving and easiest to pick up for newer players. Several of the other armies require a lot of list-building 'finesse' and tactical insight to play well.

Frankly, it sounds like your buddy just wanted something to complain about. There are always going to be armies with a lower difficulty skill curve, and if he's pissed because he's playing against 'no-skill' armies than he just needs to work on his game. ..Especially because his codex gives him a fire-breathing flyer nightmare that is complained about quite a lot as being OP.

Cheers mate

This is always an interesting topic...

I went with Space Marines. They're durable, so you'll usually suffer less for your mistakes, and just about everything in the codex meshes at least adequately. They also make a good learner force, with relatively few models and special rules to keep track of.

I don't think any army is an auto-win button. Even "minimal" skill takes into account target selection, completing objectives and adapting to things going wrong (ie 5 Terminators rolling all ones for armour saves). So even a "noob army" has a lot to sort out before it gets effective.

As an aside, many would also reply to your CSM player by pointing at the Heldrake.

Don't forget the Tau.

Anyway, I think you're asking 2 different questions. Minimal skill and OP are different things.

Tau could possibly be considered OP. Throw nearly any list together and you'll have more firepower than many other armies. However, they are definitely not a minimal skill army. We're low leadership, relatively fragile (outside of Riptides), and obviously suck in assault. A poor Tau player can easily lose games due to mistakes.
Space Marines, on the other hand, are extremely forgiving due to ATSKNF. A lot of their units can perform similar roles, so they don't need to worry about positioning quite as much. They're definitely not OP.

Space marines are very forgiving to new players.

Tau are the best low-skill army because they let you avoid some basic newbie mistakes. One of the worst things you can do as a new player is throw a bunch of random units into a list without any coherent plan. You bring an assault unit, a shooting unit, a fast unit, a camping scoring unit, etc, and you get slaughtered by a focused list. And probably the second worst thing you can do is fail to evaluate power level effectively and bring really bad units or upgrades. Tau solve both of these problems. The entire army is dedicated to pure shooting, so even if you don't deliberately make a plan you're almost guaranteed to build an army where every unit has the same goal. And since it's a new army there aren't too many weak units to be trapped by, and none of them are the fluff/iconic units that a new player will inevitably be drawn to (crisis suits, riptides, etc). So a new player will usually have a reasonably effective list even if they don't know it, and having a good list is 90% of winning a game of 40k.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Siphen wrote:
We're low leadership, relatively fragile (outside of Riptides), and obviously suck in assault. A poor Tau player can easily lose games due to mistakes.

Tau also have easy LD fixes (Ethereals and transports), plenty of durability (seriously, T3/4+ gunlines behind an ADL and multi-wound MEQs are not fragile), and enough firepower and meatshield units to just deploy a gunline and laugh at many assault armies (and virtually all assault armies made by other newbies). A newbie Tau player who lines up a decent ADL gunline and shoots with anything approaching good target priority is going to win a lot more games than a newbie player with any other army, simply because their codex automatically builds an army to at least an adequate level of effectiveness.

For me, minimal skill means that I could give someone an army/deck/team/hero/whatever they have no experience with, teach them how to use it in half an hour or so, then have them destroy an opponent who's been playing for over a year. From what I've seen Tau fit that description in 40k.

Tau because they are the most forgiving army for new players in regards to tactics and rules. Any new player can sit behind an Aegis and blast away with Riptides and Fire Warriors which is a very solid and effective tactic.

Tau, put 2 or more riptides in there for unparalleled distraction and then have fire warriors kill everything...

I read the title in this thread, and I instantly knew this would turn into a Tau-bashing fest.

I agree that Tau, when played well, can be viciously OP, but I watched two games at my club this week that involved new(ish) players to Tau (one of them borrowing my army to see if he liked them) and the guy with more experience still made bad tactical choices and poor target prioritisation calls and lost a game he should have won and the guy I lent my stuff to is an experienced, albeit young, player who again, made poor choices and shot order/selection choices.

I, in no way, feel that the Tau is a noob army. It has a lower learning curve than some, but has nuances that can be tricky for a new player to pick up.

I would give my selection to Space Marines, for most of the above stated reasons. It is designed to be the starter army and can function well in the hands of a newer player, as it was meant to.

I wouldn't necessarily give a new player space marines. The amount of armies that can deal with 3+ armour is horrendous - Also everyone 'knows' space marines and their capabilities and new players really hate getting tabled. Feeling like you never had a chance to win can put people off.

I'd show them pictures of all the armies, let them choose because of how they look, then tell them the army strengths and weaknesses and the possible fighting stlyes and cool builds. And then mention the weaknesses again just so they know what they're getting into.

I gotta disagree with Tau being a good noob army. I've seen a kid pick up Tau from a friend to try them out, and he got slaughtered due to bad target prioritization, lack of Markerlights, and bad placement. Tau require all of these things to work in sync, or bad things are going to happen.

I voted D.Eldar. Not because you can always win with no skill, just becuase with a pre set venom build will take you a long way without much experience.

DjPyro3 wrote:
I gotta disagree with Tau being a good noob army. I've seen a kid pick up Tau from a friend to try them out, and he got slaughtered due to bad target prioritization, lack of Markerlights, and bad placement. Tau require all of these things to work in sync, or bad things are going to happen.

Those are really easy things to learn though, when I say Tau require minimal skill I mean that you only really need to master the basics to play them proficiently.

Siphen wrote:
Don't forget the Tau.

Anyway, I think you're asking 2 different questions. Minimal skill and OP are different things.

Tau could possibly be considered OP. Throw nearly any list together and you'll have more firepower than many other armies. However, they are definitely not a minimal skill army. We're low leadership, relatively fragile (outside of Riptides), and obviously suck in assault. A poor Tau player can easily lose games due to mistakes.
Space Marines, on the other hand, are extremely forgiving due to ATSKNF. A lot of their units can perform similar roles, so they don't need to worry about positioning quite as much. They're definitely not OP.

yes exactly.
Tau are op.
and require next to no skill to play.

i lost a tourney agaisnt a tau player, and his tactics were crap.

Considering Space Marines are the poster boys of 40k, I'd have thought most new players would be more inclined to collect them first. With respect to gameplay, they're also good all round and forgiving on a new player. They need relatively few models and so are perhaps cheaper, which is important to someone who's new to the game and may be less willing to invest in something they're not so familiar with.

Not sure what the most "noob" army would be, but I really wouldn't say Space Marines. Sure, ATSKNF is helpful, but you get relatively few models in a list and they still die very easily these days. I started with BT last year and aside from my very first match got slaughtered left and right because 3+ is the new -. Nor are SM vehicles all that fantastic. And even with the new Codex there are plenty of units and builds that are poor or outright bad. Sadly those often include the cool units, something that the new player is likely to fall for...

Who the hell thinks chaos daemons are the easiest army to play?

I voted SM, and really that applies to all SM armies to me. The reason is that SM of all kinds ignore a lot of rules. ATSKNF and assault grenades make it so you can ignore a lot of tactical decisions. Straight forward wargear means you don't have to remember a lot of profiles. Bolter/bolt pistol and CC weapon, they all have it base. Other armies have units set up for specific tasks. This unit is good at defence, that unit is good and durable, objective holding for him. Space Marines are all pretty good OK at everything.

 hiveof_chimera wrote:
Our club now has at least 2 of each armies being played( except the one SOB) and the chaos space Maine player was saying how minimal skilled required/op space marines and grey knights were and vise versa. So I came here. Which army does require the least skill to play
Let the arguing begin!

Forgot wolves and tyranids

You forgot Tau too. If they were on their the poll would have broke by now.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ninjafiredragon wrote:

yes exactly.
Tau are op.
and require next to no skill to play.

i lost a tourney agaisnt a tau player, and his tactics were crap.

And what does that say about your level of play if his tactics were "crap" and you couldn't exploit them to pull out a win?

Marines, of course. I always say "Marines" if someone ask me which army is the easiest to start with.

Two persons voted "Sisters of Battle". Wow. Because it is so easy to collect and to play the Sisters. Come on, they don´t even have a physical codex.

Space Marines have a lot of special rules, like ATSKNF.

I voted for IG, which can easily be run with quite rules, and even they get wiped off the table by the handful, it's a good start to 40k. Add some tough tanks, and work with bubble-wrapping, armour facings, and orders.
If the list is mostly Mechvet, there aren't that many rules to know.

They're a good army to swap with. If you're teaching how to play 40k, use IG against something else, and you take IG for the first game.

I selected sisters of battle because this thread is presented in a way that will generate meaningful discussion - the fact that the OP forgot some armies in the poll doesn't help.

Put a new player with a tournament net list up against a seasoned player using a semi-competitive list. The seasoned player's deployment, positioning and bluffing will destroy the "overpowered" list.

I would say space marines, but their options and complexity jumped up with the recent book release, and they can't handle everything.

Which leads me to say nercons are the new derp kids on the block. Guass kills tanks, otherwise kills stuff, they haz fliers, hacks rules and get back up. Space marines don't get back up.

In my local Meta it seems to be Necrons, everyone and their brother who is just learning is picking up Necrons.

GW has firmly made meqs no longer a "noob list".

Oh, and I like the quote "3+ is the new -" Because on a point for point basis, it is.

 Nem wrote:
I voted D.Eldar. Not because you can always win with no skill, just because with a pre set venom build will take you a long way without much experience.

This is crazy - the venom spam is not the only viable build in a DE army, and has a massive inherent weakness that can be exploited. DE are defo not a low skill army, or a new player friendly army, mistakes will be punished and harshly, you cannot, 'get away' with something in DE. Also the list building part of DE is pretty hard as the units have to have a good amount of synergy to work, and there are amny differant styles of play and combinations it takes a long while to figure what the optimum set-up is for your individual style of play.

I think Space Marines are a good starter army, they are generally unforgiving and allow the player to develop their sense of play, and from there can gravitate to an army that matches that style.

Yeah, once again, you're missing the correct answer: tau.

Need to learn how to move to get fire lanes to reduce the amount of cover your opponent gets? Nah. Markerlights. Need to bring different weapons to handle fliers and ground-based vehicles? Nah. Markerlights. Need to worry about force concentration so that you make sure you land enough hits on something? Nah. Markerlights.

Need to learn how to castle against deepstrikers or learn how to handle outflankers? Nah. penalty-free interceptor. Need to learn how to play the game differently those half of your games you get night fight? Nah. Virtually-free darksun filters. Need to learn the rules for close combat or how to defend against assaults? Lol, you're tau. Need to learn the rules for the movement phase works or how to best move to get your guns in range? Why are we even still having this conversation... you're TAU.

You don't need to learn the rules, because your army either breaks them all, or makes them irrelevant. The army you don't need to learn the rules to play is the easiest.

The easiest army is tau.

Followed by tautau, followed by taudar. Seriously, just play tau and bask in all your easy mode victories against players who have to actually learn the rules and try.

 Ailaros wrote:
Yeah, once again, you're missing the correct answer: tau.

Need to learn how to move to get fire lanes to reduce the amount of cover your opponent gets? Nah. Markerlights. Need to bring different weapons to handle fliers and ground-based vehicles? Nah. Markerlights. Need to worry about force concentration so that you make sure you land enough hits on something? Nah. Markerlights.

Need to learn how to castle against deepstrikers or learn how to handle outflankers? Nah. penalty-free interceptor. Need to learn how to play the game differently those half of your games you get night fight? Nah. Virtually-free darksun filters. Need to learn the rules for close combat or how to defend against assaults? Lol, you're tau. Need to learn the rules for the movement phase works or how to best move to get your guns in range? Why are we even still having this conversation... you're TAU.

You don't need to learn the rules, because your army either breaks them all, or makes them irrelevant. The army you don't need to learn the rules to play is the easiest.

The easiest army is tau.

Followed by tautau, followed by taudar. Seriously, just play tau and bask in all your easy mode victories against players who have to actually learn the rules and try.

too right! I was pretty pleased, last week I beat a (noob) tau player with my DE. He had 3 riptides and they didn't do sh*t the entire match.

Dang I want to change my vote.


Its definitely Necrons, they have 5 units and 5 flyers in a hyper competative list.


2 lords
2 wraith units
3 barges
5 scythes with 5 warriors


Easiest strategy in Warhammer 40k, rush wraiths/lords towards juicy target, shoot barges and scythes at juicy targets.

They have no hard counters in the entire game, destroy lords and wraiths can literally charge any unit in the game due to MSS and 3++ 2 wound models, str 7 ap 1 on lord and str 6 rending means there wont be any models you can't wound. Lords can pop av 14, and tesla spam owns anything else. Since snapfiring TL Tesla is almost as good as not they don't have to worry about weather not to jink the flyers if they are hit, and or move 6+ to get into range with barges.

Its basically the easiest army to play charge 2 units foward, shoot everything else, last turn drop warriors our of transports to win.


BTW the main reason they are easier than tau is because everything in that list is either, running foward straight towards to enemy to charge them, or has a str 7 machine gun, unless the warriors come out of the transports or the under guns of the barges get to shoot its all the same gun so you don't have to worry about what is shot at what, just what you want to shoot first until it is dead.