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Hi,

Take into consideration army rules, army specific powers, alliances, rulebook, dataslates, FAQs, supplements etc, what army would you say is the simplest to play?

If some guy wanted to start 40k and asked you "What is the easiest army to play, where I can get stuck in and play more than read when on the tabletop?".

I dont mean assembly and painting wise, just pure rules.

This person is me BTW.

Deathwing.
Ignore morale, sweeping advances, deployment...

And you only have something like 3 special rules: Fearless, Deathwing Assault and you Deep Strike thingy.

Deathwing's good, but tau are better. With tau, you get to ignore all those rules about movement and shooting and psychic powers. You also get to basically ignore things like cover saves, or positioning MSM models carefully to avoid retaliation, and that's on top of all the wargear throwaways like night fighting and reserves.

If all you want is an army where you put models down on the table and roll dice, then tau is going to be the best.

Serpentspam eldar, deathwing, and non-henchmen GK buids are also pretty easy.

Serpent spam for sure. Point, click, move where ever you want whenever you want, win.

Space Marines.

Almost the entire army has the same statline and you don't have to stack special ablilities to make them useful.

Tacticals - Marines with 1 heavy and 1 special
Assault - Marines with 2 CCW
Devastators - Marines with 4 heavy weapons
Bikers - Marine with +1T and 12" move

Every choice has something to make it unique from the other choices, but they are simple rules,

Tau require combining unit actions and abilites to shine.
Orks require well thought out combinations and strategy to shine.
Tyranids are over the place in terms of styles of play, dataslates changing them up, special rules
Astra Militarum shines when you master using orders.

I think Ravenwing or Deathwing are the most straightforward. I won't say that I'd prsonally want to play Deathwing, having wiped them our as thoroughly as I typically do... But it isn't false that they are simple as pie. Ravenwing arent much more complicated and I like them a lot more. So if I was going to puh you towards another relatively simple one, and it happens that they both come from the same Codex, I'd probably go with Ravenwing. Plain old speed and thump.

Space Marine's are probably the easiest in terms of play style.
You have a relatively similar statline with everything and even with tactics I don't imagine it is overly hard seeing as squads seem to be versatile enough to deal with everything.
I will have to disagree about Tau though, I'd say they're pretty hard to get right (Not counting spam lists and the like) You have to make sure everything works well together and stuff like that. Plus lots of statlines and stuff.
Space Marine's seem the easiest army.
But honestly if you stay away from Dark Eldar and 'Nids you should be fine xD You get used the the rules after playing an army for a while, you remember the rules you have and what the stats are. I only need to check when I use either a new unit or something I've not used in a long time.
The important thing is to choose an army that you like the look of and one that fits the style you want to play!!!

I'm not sure 'nids occupy the same level of challange as DE. I'm starting an army, and other then synapse I'm not seeing too many "snag areas"

SM are the easiest to play. All the stat lines are the same, the only thing you have to worry about is what gun that guy is holding. There aren't really any deep or innovative special rules that require synergy with list building or thought to use.

Wave serpents are not point and click. If you go up against a competent opponent and shoot your shields every turn no matter what's going on in the battle, you will lose. The army takes more finesse than just "shoot my shields, pew pew, I win!"

I don't know, pointing markerlights at the thing you want to die seems a lot easier than correctly using versatility units like tac marines and tac terminators.

There may be a bit less to remember, but they're going to be a bit harder to play successfully.

BrianDavion wrote:
I'm not sure 'nids occupy the same level of challange as DE. I'm starting an army, and other then synapse I'm not seeing too many "snag areas"

It's in the point costs. Tyranids just aren't as good as other armies for the points. I used to rail against this kind of talk, but this bugs codex has finally brought me around: it's just not as powerful as other codexes out there, and that power difference becomes really pronounced in competitive play. Now the new releases might alter that balance a little bit, but as far as I know Nids are still just a sub par army.

Grey Knights and Deathwing are both very simple armies. So are Imperial Knights. Bottom line is that the more expensive your units, the fewer there are and the easier it is to play the army. (In general.)

Sisters of Battle! Sure, every unit has a unique special rule that requires a Leadership test to activate, but almost no one plays them, so when you get it wrong, your opponent won't notice.

Necrons, easily. Their special rules are fairly simple, not a ton of wargear options on lots of units to trick you into spending unnecessary points, solid statlines, and RP/EL, which will drive your opponent insane.

Necrons, honestly, feel like the pefect starter army, IMO

I suppose that, too. There's basically just two guns in the entire army.

The chariot rules can get a bit confusing, though.

SisterSydney wrote:Sisters of Battle! Sure, every unit has a unique special rule that requires a Leadership test to activate, but almost no one plays them, so when you get it wrong, your opponent won't notice.

LOL. So true

Current Necrons are the easiest by far!


Tau are complicated. SOOOO focused on unit cohesion.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Seriously... buy a bunch of warriors. Buy 2 Ghost Arks. Buy 1 Overlord... profit.

Thanks for your feedback guys.

Looks like its not really an army, but a build that answers the question.

I like Tyranids, but when I see a Lictor has like half a dozen rules, It puts me off.

As a guy who gets in a couple of (fantasy) games a month in, I suppose its not really about my own army, but all the others.

I mean, once Ive got the hang of my own army and the rules, its all the other (army) rules that makes me apprehensive.

Im ranting now, but cant help feel that 40k in general is becoming really inaccessible with so many rules, by which I mean, to be on a tactical par with everyone, I need to know all their rules too.

Pure Khorne Beserker list. No morale checks, no psychic shenanigans. Charge is your only option as well.

 adamsouza wrote:
Space Marines.

Almost the entire army has the same statline and you don't have to stack special ablilities to make them useful.

Tacticals - Marines with 1 heavy and 1 special
Assault - Marines with 2 CCW
Devastators - Marines with 4 heavy weapons
Bikers - Marine with +1T and 12" move

Every choice has something to make it unique from the other choices, but they are simple rules,

Tau require combining unit actions and abilites to shine.
Orks require well thought out combinations and strategy to shine.
Tyranids are over the place in terms of styles of play, dataslates changing them up, special rules
Astra Militarum shines when you master using orders.

This is the advice that I recommend 100%!

Actually, there is no army that plays easily.
Synergy is always key.
Deathwing has been mentioned.
But how to play DW against an army that heavily outnumbers it?

I think Space Marines are pretty easy to play and would be right up there with one of the easiest. Because each of their units has a pretty high point cost, and each unit has a very clear-cut purpose it takes a lot of guesswork out of list building.

And all their stats are the same so it makes it pretty simple to remember shooting and close combat.

I dont think Tau would be the easiest to start. While, yes, they do ignore alot of special rules, not EVERYTHING ignores those rules. So you have to keep track of which units ignore it, and you also have to ignore what the ramifications of each rule are. And then their suits can be equipped in so many different ways that you have to be pretty aware of how those suits interact.

And since Tau are so weak to close combat, it really requires some tactics in placing and avoiding that combat. Bubble wrapping and taking advantage of terrain are pretty much required.

Armies that don't have lots of options either cause the units are so effective they can be used in a point and click way or there are simply no other options avaliable.

Eldar serp spam, deathwing, IK.

C:SM. Fewest long complicated rules to remember, reliable/durable units. Very forgiving starting out.

 koooaei wrote:
Armies that don't have lots of options either cause the units are so effective they can be used in a point and click way or there are simply no other options avaliable.

Eldar serp spam, deathwing, IK.

DW can be easily outnumbered.
Then you need a battle plan which is usually not that simple.

Serpent spam needs tactics too.
Movement, positioning of Serpents to optimize shooting.
Keeping the enemy at arms length.
I tried to perfect this way of playing Eldar over the years.

IK is much different from how 40k normally plays.

 wuestenfux wrote:

Serpent spam needs tactics too.

Compare to footslogging eldar and you'll get what i mean.

 koooaei wrote:

 wuestenfux wrote:

Serpent spam needs tactics too.

Compare to footslogging eldar and you'll get what i mean.

Footslogging Eldar is not competitive.

 wuestenfux wrote:

 koooaei wrote:

 wuestenfux wrote:

Serpent spam needs tactics too.

Compare to footslogging eldar and you'll get what i mean.

Footslogging Eldar is not competitive.

How's that supposed to matter?

 koooaei wrote:

 wuestenfux wrote:

 koooaei wrote:

 wuestenfux wrote:

Serpent spam needs tactics too.

Compare to footslogging eldar and you'll get what i mean.

Footslogging Eldar is not competitive.

How's that supposed to matter?

Losing constantly is not an option.

 wuestenfux wrote:

 koooaei wrote:

 wuestenfux wrote:

 koooaei wrote:

 wuestenfux wrote:

Serpent spam needs tactics too.

Compare to footslogging eldar and you'll get what i mean.

Footslogging Eldar is not competitive.

How's that supposed to matter?

Losing constantly is not an option.

How's that supposed to matter in a discussion about simplicity of armies?

Serp spam's so common cause it's effective while being way easier to use than other options. As said before: 'point and click' build.

Knights are probably one of the most simplistic to use.

Just need to know where to point and where to not stand around.