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BlaxicanX wrote:You're describing almost every faction in the game here, bar some exceptions

Exactly. That's what makes the difficult armies that much more difficult - they don't have access to all the basics.

BlaxicanX wrote:The difference being Space Marines without a transport are still T4 3+ sv wearing badasses, while an MSU warrior-squad without a transport is up gak-creek.

But it's structurally the same - a bunch of damaging transports holding small, squishy squads.

And still, as I said, it's the same, but you give up some durability for killing power. You gain open-topped and lower T and Sv, but you gain lance, twice as many shots, and poisoned.

BlaxicanX wrote:What I said is that MSU for Dark Eldar is harder than MSU for Guard

Ah. Yes, guard can certainly spam more infantry, but are they actually spamming more UNITS? You can't forget all those raiders and venoms, they're units too. Easy to kill, of course, but so is a PCS.

MasterOfGaunts wrote:DE need good target priority and movement. If youve got that, DE are fine and not THAT hard to play. If you dont (like most beginners) you will loose every game.

Well, that's true of most armies, though. I don't think DE are even necessarily the worst for this compared to demons, or really any army that's short ranged like most GK lists, or orks, or necron.

Scions are the hardest as are knights. They are a very limited army in terms of move set and units. Your going to need to work very hard to win games and the knights are also very expensive.

 ionusx wrote:
Scions are the hardest as are knights. They are a very limited army in terms of move set and units. Your going to need to work very hard to win games and the knights are also very expensive.

C:MT is difficult for beginners? Sure.

But Codex Imperial Knights is so simplistic and plain in its strategy that a mentally deficient toddler could operate an army of Knights effectively, that suggestion has nothing approaching validity. You have two models to choose from, you move max distance, soak up fire, shoot and kill things, you charge and kill practically anything. Half your opponent's weaponry is useless and the other half struggles to put each Knight down regardless.

I would go as far as saying C:IK is the single easiest army to start with, even in terms of real money the whole army is barely more or less expensive than most other armies.

 Ailaros wrote:

BlaxicanX wrote:You're describing almost every faction in the game here, bar some exceptions

Exactly. That's what makes the difficult armies that much more difficult - they don't have access to all the basics.

BlaxicanX wrote:The difference being Space Marines without a transport are still T4 3+ sv wearing badasses, while an MSU warrior-squad without a transport is up gak-creek.

But it's structurally the same - a bunch of damaging transports holding small, squishy squads.

And still, as I said, it's the same, but you give up some durability for killing power. You gain open-topped and lower T and Sv, but you gain lance, twice as many shots, and poisoned.

BlaxicanX wrote:What I said is that MSU for Dark Eldar is harder than MSU for Guard

Ah. Yes, guard can certainly spam more infantry, but are they actually spamming more UNITS? You can't forget all those raiders and venoms, they're units too. Easy to kill, of course, but so is a PCS.

MasterOfGaunts wrote:DE need good target priority and movement. If youve got that, DE are fine and not THAT hard to play. If you dont (like most beginners) you will loose every game.

Well, that's true of most armies, though. I don't think DE are even necessarily the worst for this compared to demons, or really any army that's short ranged like most GK lists, or orks, or necron.

We're going in circles now, Ailaros.

 BlaxicanX wrote:

 Mr.Omega wrote:
Your main argument falls apart when you forget that we're talking about beginners here. At most, they're going to have about 40 something Guardsmen, probably about 10 of which are going to be forming Command Squads. I started playing IG with roughly 40, 20 of which went to a platoon, 10 to a Veteran Squad and the rest forming a CCS and a PCS.

A beginner neither has the models nor the will to pull a 30/40/50 man fearless blob with a Priest they haven't even considered yet probably out of their posterior.

The models have absolutely nothing to do with the topic of which armies' pmechanics are the most difficult for new players to master, which is the topic I'm discussing.

So, no. Model complications doesn't effect my argument anymore than it effects your argument regarding Dark Angels and CSM, unless you're of the belief that making a DA/CSM army is harder than making any of the horde armies?

If I'm not mistaken "that doesn't count!" was the sort of answer to criticism I gave when I was <10. In the overall topic, model count is a requisite of talking over beginners experiences with armies, they may or usually do not have a lot of them due to confusion, indecision or lack of funds and experience. This thread concerns what armies are hard to get started with, not the core mechanics that drive each Codex and why they're better or worse

Talking about MSU or horde armies is pointless because by the time they get together the models for those sorts of armies they've already probably had a considerable number of games under their belt and a fair amount of time talking, discussing and learning, being out of the beginner stage as a result. It is very unlikely that a new player will have a clear idea of the strategy they're going to take (e.g MSU/horde) until they've played a fair bit and learnt.

And yes, DA/CSM armies are harder to make than horde armies. A horde army generally works on the principle of generally throwing men at the enemy or keeping them on an objective. They're simple, often effective when they reach the enemy without having reached critical levels of damage and don't require complex thought about movement, deployment and strategy.

Meanwhile, DA and CSM have garbage basic troops. The only way to honestly make Tactical Squads and Chaos Marines truly effective is to know how to move them and get them into an optimum circumstance with as few caveats as possible, and this is very difficult to master because their most common transport is a weaponless Rhino that explodes when AT stares at it too long. As I said before, most beginners won't even mech their Tacs/Chaos Marines because they don't understand the benefits, so the learning curve is even more difficult.

The Dark Eldar are more simple than people say. The Kabalite Warrior has one role - to put firepower down range. They're dead in CC and dead if they face up against shooting generally. But they're simple to use. It is far, far easier to understand the need for a Raider or Venom when they are armed with guns and effective firepower, as well as splinter racks on the former. So the beginners DE instinct is easy- move forward quickly, fire guns, cause wounds, kill tanks. Its an effective tactic even against relatively experienced players.

DE are difficult but definitely not the hardest army for a newbie to go with. I have played 6-8~ games with DE at points 1500-2000 over Vassal in the past, and with lists of Kabalite Raider gunboats, Ravagers and the odd Razorwing, Trueborn Venoms and Reavers, I never lost a game, beating, amongst other things, a Draigostar army, a DKOK armoured brigade, and the new Tau 'Dex twice. This was in a period where I was consistently having difficulty getting anything out of SM Mech, due to them being to complicated and difficult to operate effectively by the time they got to the enemy. DE mech is way easier to understand than SM/CSM mech.

With CSM/Tacticals, their bolters are useless against MC's and they lack specials, they have no lance weapons or easy//convenient AT if a tank pops up 24''~ away or more. They also can't fire out of their transport with everyone, so they have to disembark.

Tyranids are pretty hard for new players.
- The suggested starter box has no Synapse Creatures and the worst HQ in the Codex.
- Hobby-wise, they're going to have a lot of models to buy, assemble and paint
- Tyranids are pretty fragile and are generally either slow and/or have very short range
- Tyranids aren't as forgiving as other armies, mistakes in unit positioning are punished severely.
- The army has plenty of obvious weaknesses opponents can easily exploit.

 PrinceRaven wrote:

- The army has plenty of obvious weaknesses opponents can easily exploit is liable to eat itself

Honestly, Dark Eldar (Yes, I'm saying it too) are one of the harder armies to play, since they are very fragile and require you to think tactically and use the terrain to your advantage.

However, another contender, which is also a pain to get started with as far as cost of models alone, is Tyranids. They require army-wide synergy and plenty of Synapse to actually work, and you have to rely heavily on cover as well. They have been nerfed hard with their new codex, and even harder with 7th edition, but you can still make them work. It's just much harder. And, if you lose your synapse, well GG sir.