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When starting a new army, how far do you plan it? 250 points at a time? 1000? 500 point segments? Everything on the whim?

A full 1850pt list, then work down to what I would be okay with at 1250 (casual points I play with friends) and try to use as many units from the 1850 in that goal. It never really works out because each points level needs specific units the larger ones don't. Space Marine Scouts for instance. They never have reason to be in my 1850 lists but are often in my 750pt.

I plan and pretty much buy everything at once. I take into account metashifting stuff like Flyers, Imperial Knights and the like when designing my initial army list, and go for a TAC -approach 90% of the time.

Depends what I can find on ebay.

Honestly, I feel 40k is far too expensive right now to start from scratch. So, if I want to start or expand an army, I see what ebay has to offer.

With my IG (which I started in summer), I started with an army I bought off ebay (a Chimera, a Leman Russ, 2 Sentinels, 3 Heavy Weapons Teams, 10 Storm Troopers and about 80 Guardsmen). My friends and I generally play 1500pt games (which I could just about manage with the above), so I played around with what I had and decided what I wanted to expand and what I wanted to drop.

I recently acquired a number of Chimeras, HWTs and Guardsmen on ebay - giving me the option of fielding either a 1500pt mechanised army or a 1500pt infantry army.

The only things that were bought new were a CCS (because I wanted to do a conversion for my leader), and a Leman Russ (which one of my friends kindly bought me for my birthday/Christmas).


As it stands, the only time I'll buy something new from GW is if I either need the sprue as well (for whatever reason), or if it's an important character (I don't like using a character someone else has built as my Warlord, though more minor characters like Primaris Psykers are fine second-hand).


In terms of planning my armies, I usually have a general idea what I want to focus on, though it might change over time.

I enjoy making different and varied/thematic army-lists, so I usually buy waaaay too many models.
Then when I come up with an obscure list that I don't actually have the models for, I buy more models.
I then buy any models I don't already own because I am a completionist (is that a word?).

....I don't, I buy what I think that looks cool and want to paint

Tend to buy the models that attracted me to the army on a whim then work out what else i need and how to win with them.

 TheDraconicLord wrote:
....I don't, I buy what I think it looks cool and want to paint

Always been my way too

Whenever I start a new army, I first of all pick a theme for it. Then I write out a 'Master List' of all the units I want that fit my theme and the mental image of how I envision the finish army will look.

I don't care about overall pts, just looks & fitting my theme!
The small'ish Black Legion warband for example I've got written up is horribly inefficient for example, as I love the idea that the emissaries Abaddon sends out to demand fealty from the lesser warbands of the Eye are made up of hardened veterans. Thus, I've got plenty of kitted-out Chosen, with 2 squads of them each totalling just over 300pts each! And because I want the warband to be Tzeentchian themed, it also includes for example some Rubric Marines, as well as being led by the Sorcerer Zaraphiston. (who naturally has the Last Memory of the Yuranthos as the codex mentions that him specifically as controlling that relic)
Plus some other squads linked to the backstory, such as a large'ish squad of Berserkers with a Blood Angel feel to them, as this unit was created from the stolen gene-seed on Mackan, and a unit of Alpha Legionaires sworn to the Warmaster and who act as recon & infiltrators for the warband.

I find such armies to be much more fun & enjoyable for both players, as well as being more challenging to play with. I'll leave the netlists for those who link the size of their ego to their 'professional 40k' & generally take winning at toy soldiers way too seriously.

I make an entire army based on my own fluff dervied from what makes sense.

Then i look at what models i really want to paint.

then i compose the same army based on units made for the game that fulfill my fluff list.

I always make an entire army first though which would consist or at least 10 possible list variations. I never play the exact same list twice in a row ever.

Not in steps.
I can play a few competitive lists with variations atm and don't plan to start a new one.
I'd look for some competitive lists at the 1850 pt level and explore from there.

I just make a 2000 pts list, and scale down from there.
To limit myself, I decide not to buy anything until everyhting else on that list that I already have is painted: although this slows me down (a lot) when I get to something annoying to paint (like a Valkyrie), it keeps me to the plan and keeps it fun!

I make sure the list is downscalable without buying anything new. This lets me play it during the (very) long time it takes me to build up, even if it means that it often isn't very competitive.

I do more planning than playing sadly. Since the move I don't have anywhere with a real active 40k community.

But it does keep me interested and it is fun to think of all the scenarios I could run into and how to counter them.

Also I live vicariously though others on this forum.

 luky7dayz wrote:
When starting a new army, how far do you plan it? 250 points at a time? 1000? 500 point segments? Everything on the whim?

When I first got into wargaming, I always started with a core of 2 Troops, 1 HQ. Then I would make a list of units that I liked, then I'd buy those and slowly build a gigantic army with no points limit in mind. Now, I tend to build with my budget in mind. So, I wait for bargains and package deals to build an army. My Dark Angels army started with going halfsies with a buddy on Dark Vengeance. I've picked up more bikers and termies from my FLGS's bitz bin, and I got a great Black Friday deal on the Dark Angels Dark Vengeance expansion boxed set. I bought a Land Speeder Storm I can convert into a Darkshroud ($30 rather than $65), and I recycled a couple metal HQs from my bitz box.

At this point, I've got about 2,000 points, and it probably cost me less than $250.

I usually make a 1000pt and 1500 pt build. I buy what I need for 1000 pts and play it, then I usually modify the 1500 pt list based on my experience and buy from there.

I trade for whole armies, then I add whatever I feel like the army needs for my playstyle.

I plan for either 2.5k or 3k as standard and go from there choosing units I like more than anything else. I have a very different philosophy from my main gaming group. They go for all the powerful toys and uber HQs, while I am a troop and theme guy and wouldn't even bring an HQ if I could get away with it. It makes for interesting games since they play each other far more than I do them so they are never ready for my armies when I visit.

As for building the army, I come up with the list and build it as fast as I can with minimum three colors just to get them on the field. Later I go on and do details one unit at a time. It really frustrated me this last weekend that I couldn't field the army I wanted and planned to use because I got screwed over by a dude selling 10 Cataphractii on ebay who took the money and never sent them for two months. (I got a refund from ebay). I guess I am a completest when it comes to armies, I want them done and built not half-assed.

I take a combined arms approach to building my armies. I like taking a little bit of everything. I also like fielding fully fleshed out units. In this regards, if The max size of a unit is 20 modelts, then, I like having 20 models for it.

With this being said, I am a bargain buff when it actually comes down to purchasing the models in question. Whether it is buying a Chimera at a local book store for $6, buying one of the selected bargain boxes through the GW website, or individual items on E-bay/Amazon. I like to keep my eyes peeled for the deal of the week.

I am by far a better purchaser than a hobbyist. Most of my models are only primed, but at least everything is assembled. I guess that I am lazy with the paint brush. In time, it will all get painted.

I plan my armies to about 1850 when starting one, to give me an Idea of where I want to go.

 nwns wrote:

 TheDraconicLord wrote:
....I don't, I buy what I think it looks cool and want to paint

Always been my way too

+1

Well, without wanting to sound too pretentious, it is generally a more conceptual thing than that.

For instance - back in 5th "Raven Guard are cool, but the standard C:SM book doesn't really work for how I want to run them. I know, BA Codex! Then proceed to find modelling and fluff solutions to make some of the less appropriate units work within the concept. "

Daemons in 6th - "I really love all these awesome third party models I own/would like to buy, but need some gaming justification to make the purchases" - my how many non-GW models can I fit in a 40K army project

CSM in 7th. "I miss shooting, how can I add shooting to my daemons while not breaking fluff? Ooh, CSMs!" Quickly followed by "damn, these CSM models is fugly" which leads me to model a Scouring Era Emperors Children force, using FW and loyalist kits in conjunction with the CSM to make them less 'ooh, we has spikes, we is evil" Also I like purple, white and gold!

So, I guess my army plans boil down to "ooh, shiny!"

1850 points, standard format we play.

I buy stuff that looks like it's fun to play from there on and swap units around.

I've built a 10k Dark Eldar army(well currently building, my stack of boxes is extraordinarily high) and I've planned everything right from the beggining, the apoc list, the formations, all the way down to unit equipment, tactics and build schedules. I should do a blog.

nwns wrote:

 TheDraconicLord wrote:
....I don't, I buy what I think it looks cool and want to paint

Always been my way too

Hubris wrote:Tend to buy the models that attracted me to the army on a whim then work out what else i need and how to win with them.

TheDraconicLord wrote:....I don't, I buy what I think that looks cool and want to paint

Pretty much all of the above

I usually build my collection first, then begin assembling and building cool stuff. At some point, I think, gee this is almost an army! And then go and buy some ridiculously overpriced HQ model.

 Azreal13 wrote:

+1

Well, without wanting to sound too pretentious, it is generally a more conceptual thing than that.

Mine is similar, I pick a theme or strategy and try to build around that. With my Alpha Legion I'm trying to create an incredibly flexible force that can be used with SM (FW Raptor tactics) and IG, Lost and the Damned, CSM, and 30K lists.

I've set a general point limit (1000, 1500, 2000), then I start buying. I've currently got

3 squads of Fallen Angel Chosen with either melta guns, plasmaguns or power swords to go with Cypher

Helcult formation consisting of 70 Cultists and a vanilla Helbrute

Huron, to potentially go with power sword-wielding Cultists

5 Havocs with autocannons

1 lascannoned-out Predator

10 CSMs with 2 plasmaguns

What I'm gonna probably add is

3 FW Dreadnoughts to Deep Strike

1 Contemptor Dreadnought

1 Dreadclaw

1 squad of FW Lernean Terminators, whenever they arrive

30x FW MKIV SMs

IG and a converted Lias Issodon

So I guess I plan the first 1000 points as a balanced unit, then start adapting tactics and strategies.

The closest thing to planning is sometimes making "blueprints" for my next conversion/scratch build. Beyond that its mental notes of X model could be used for parts or X hull of this tank model would work well for it and so on.
The most common kind is just daydreaming about the next potential design for the next weapon system or war machine.

Generally out to the next few hundred points. I start out with a basic ideas (Guardsmen in Chimeras backed up by Leman Russ tanks was that for my Guard army) and expand from there.

I plan quite a bit.

I make a list at 1500 - 1850 and just adjust it til it seems right. Then I grab mits of dice and roll it out over and over (generally while doing stuff on the computer) once I get a good feeling about the odds I move on to proxying the army.
After that If I can beat my gaming buddies with it consistently then its good to go for painting. For there out its just tweaking and practice.

When i started my space wolves this summer, i simply got the codex and supplement. I read through, looked at what i thought was cool then bought as many thunderwolf cavalry as i could. I figured out how to kit them out while i was building them. Very happy with how i did it also.

so i guess a bit of planning, but not much in the sense that i went more of the rule of cool.

When buying a new army, I find a couple lists I like that share some common units, the buy a large used army that will allow me to build what I'm looking for. Then I add units to taste as I go.