Depending on how much scrounging and building you are able to do there are some great ways to get armies for cheap.
Firstly, order from
frontline gaming if possible. If you call, they might be willing to give you the best discount of 25% off. That stretches your $300-$400 to $500 MSRP -- which gives more wiggle room.
Tetrad
As someone mentioned, this is a very good way to make a teir 1.5 army. My cost shows this army as running $350.25
I suggest the 'start collecting' kits as they give a lot of flexability. Indeed the 'Start Collecting Nurgle' is probably one of the best value kits out there for collecting. This gives you five unique daemon princes, 6 plague drones, 20 horrors, 20 plaguebearers, 6 stands of nurglings, a VSG/Bastion, and 2 heralds of nurgle.
$20 -
Slaanesh Prince. I have this kit and it's beautiful.
$30 -
Nurgle Prince. The kit says with wings, though they are not pictured. I would check to ensure it has wings.
$41 - Daemon Prince
$41 - Daemon Prince
$37 - Be'lakor
$85 - Start Collecting Nurgle
$85 - Start Collecting Nurgle
$40 -
ITC Shield Generator - For use as a bastion or VSG
$29 - Horrors
$29 - Horrors
Tzeentch Host
To build this you will need your own bases, as this takes advantage of the 'flaming chariot' kit. This kit, with a little putty work and bases, makes 2 screamers, 2 horrors, 1 exalted flamer, and 1 herald (on or off disk). It's a great value, if it takes a little work. The only real critique I have is that the horrors that come out of it are rather small. It comes out at $386.25
$40 ea - 4 flaming chariot boxed sets
$29 ea - 5 boxes of flamers
$29 ea - 7 boxes of screamers
This nets you 58 horrors, 4 heralds (2 on disc, 2 on foot), 4 exalted flamers, and 29 screamers. 8 of the screamers will need flying stands and you will need 8 bases for horrors. This makes a strong 1500 point list (and it's what I'm bringing to a
RTT this weekend). If you can get fateweaver for another $57 retail, that's a 1850 list.
Cabal w/KDK and Daemons
This list takes advantage of the puppets of war flesh hounds. These are really great models, and will catch eyes from across the table.
Take 3 of the bikes and make them into chaos sorcerers from bits. This lets them be taken as the cabal, which is an
extremely strong combo
The horrors and fatey provide support to the dogstar. You take 2 horror squads and some heralds. You also have 6 screamers you can build from the flaming chaiot kit.
$67.88 (60 euro) -
15 Flesh Hounds
$67.88 (60 euro) -
15 Flesh Hounds
$40 ea - 3 Boxes of Chaos Space Marine Bikes
$29 ea - 2 Boxes of Horrors
$57 - Fateweaver
$40 ea - 3 boxes of Exalted Flamer Chariot
Wave of Mutilation
Ok, so this is not the most competitive list, but it's really cool. If you are going to 'wow' someone, I think this is the way to do it. I'm currently building this as my 'thematic' list. The total cost to you would be $390
Again, this takes advantage of the awesomeness that is the 'collecting nurgle' boxed set. That boxed set gives $139 of models for $85. It's an incredible deal.
It has a host of nurgle rotting across the table, with 40 plague bearers, 12 nurglings, 21 plague drones and 4 healds of nurgle. It's 1850 points.
$85 ea - 4 boxes of Collecting Nurgle
$60 ea - 3 boxes of Plague Drones
