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JMAvariant wrote:
The Start Collecting Blood Angels Box is a bad box.

10 man Tactical Squad is mediocre. Nobody takes Tacticals. You could however, paint them as Sternguard Veterans.

1 Terminator Captain with Storm Bolter and Thunderhammer. Not really usefull now that BA players take the Angel Wing + TH + Storm Shield captain.

Baal Predator is an iffy choice. 24 " inch range on 12 Shot Twin Linked Assault cannon, + 36 inch bolter sponsons or 8 inch flamers on main and sponsons. you could go on ebay and try to get the predator autocanon/lascannon or try to turn the Predator into a razorback.

it's a good box for the money. Can't say I necessarily disagree with the Captain but the Tactical squad are one of the few kits that come with a Heavy Flamer, which BA can take instead of other heavy weapons. Maybe not great in a Tac squad sitting at the back of a field but a nice deterrent to charges if you're closer in for rapid fire. Worst case scenario they're nice blinged out bodies for other BA units.

As to the Predator... Unless I'm missing something, you'd actually have to do less work to turn it into a Razorback than to build a Predator. I don't see where "try to turn it he Predator into a razorback" comes into it.

I'm definitely going to pick up a box at some point. I've got a spare banner from the BA Assault Terminator squad that might look good on the Captain model too...

 Scott-S6 wrote:
Wow, how many people don't know that a commander in a regular crisis suit has its own datasheet?

You'd think it would be the other way around. What? You mean there are non-Commanders in Crisis Suits?

The Ork one would be fantastic if Deff Dreads are worth a damn in the next codex. Would be nice to get a warboss or big mek instead of the painboy though since hes not an HQ (though maybe its pointing to him being on in the codex?)

craggy wrote:

JMAvariant wrote:
The Start Collecting Blood Angels Box is a bad box.

10 man Tactical Squad is mediocre. Nobody takes Tacticals. You could however, paint them as Sternguard Veterans.

1 Terminator Captain with Storm Bolter and Thunderhammer. Not really usefull now that BA players take the Angel Wing + TH + Storm Shield captain.

Baal Predator is an iffy choice. 24 " inch range on 12 Shot Twin Linked Assault cannon, + 36 inch bolter sponsons or 8 inch flamers on main and sponsons. you could go on ebay and try to get the predator autocanon/lascannon or try to turn the Predator into a razorback.

it's a good box for the money. Can't say I necessarily disagree with the Captain but the Tactical squad are one of the few kits that come with a Heavy Flamer, which BA can take instead of other heavy weapons. Maybe not great in a Tac squad sitting at the back of a field but a nice deterrent to charges if you're closer in for rapid fire. Worst case scenario they're nice blinged out bodies for other BA units.

As to the Predator... Unless I'm missing something, you'd actually have to do less work to turn it into a Razorback than to build a Predator. I don't see where "try to turn it he Predator into a razorback" comes into it.

I'm definitely going to pick up a box at some point. I've got a spare banner from the BA Assault Terminator squad that might look good on the Captain model too...

for $72, you are getting a $50 box of Predator lite, + $38.95 of a 10 man tactical squad, + a $25 dollar terminator. So around a 115$ value for $72. For that 72$, a 10 man squad is 130 points + a Baal Predator at 166 points with a Terminator Captain to top it at around 500 points.

Now the question is do you really want to use that Terminator Captain.

On the other hand, you could buy 1 x 5 Hellblasters ($20)+ random HQ (anywhere from 7 to $11)+ Primaris Ancient ($11) + 10 man Squad of tactical (variable price) from ebay for less and have a good starter for an BA Gunline with the Standard of Sacrifice artifact.

I think the best SC box is Necrons.

You are going to use everything in that box, until you swap out the Necron vehicle.

Stux wrote:
I've been thinking about starting Nids recently actually, but the Start Collecting is putting me off a bit...

It's an example of one of those that is great value on paper, but actually kind of awkward and not the best starting point unless you want to go down a very specific kind of list build.

Trygons are cool sure, but the guy makes up the bulk of the value of the kit and is not really that important to a new Tyranid player. Likewise, the Broodlord and Genestealers seem to be good units sure, but Stealers aren't really core Nids in my opinion. They are sort of the Tempestus Scions to Imperial Guard as it were.

Just a weird selection of units in my opinion!

A perfect box to start out for me would probably be:

Hive Tyrant
Gaunts (1 of either Horma or Terma)
Hive/Tyrant Guard

Or maybe

Hive Tyrant
Carnofex
Termagants
Hormagaunts

The box is.....ok. The Trygon is a good centerpiece model, and there are reasonably competitive ways to use it. Genestealers show up in a lot of builds, the Broodlord has his place, and they can be used as allied 'stealer Cult units.

So all of the models have a place in a Nid collection. The box is a good value and all the parts of it will see play.

The issue is that the box isn't close to enough to actually start playing. The box is 390 points. Upgrading the Trygon could push it to 400. A beginning player would want to add a bunch of stealers and some Venomthropes to try to play the box, and wont get a lot of value buying a second box.

orks sc was decent in dollar amount wise, but terrible in points wise. idea being close to a starting army (500ish range) orks were no where close

JMAvariant wrote:

craggy wrote:

JMAvariant wrote:
The Start Collecting Blood Angels Box is a bad box.

10 man Tactical Squad is mediocre. Nobody takes Tacticals. You could however, paint them as Sternguard Veterans.

1 Terminator Captain with Storm Bolter and Thunderhammer. Not really usefull now that BA players take the Angel Wing + TH + Storm Shield captain.

Baal Predator is an iffy choice. 24 " inch range on 12 Shot Twin Linked Assault cannon, + 36 inch bolter sponsons or 8 inch flamers on main and sponsons. you could go on ebay and try to get the predator autocanon/lascannon or try to turn the Predator into a razorback.

it's a good box for the money. Can't say I necessarily disagree with the Captain but the Tactical squad are one of the few kits that come with a Heavy Flamer, which BA can take instead of other heavy weapons. Maybe not great in a Tac squad sitting at the back of a field but a nice deterrent to charges if you're closer in for rapid fire. Worst case scenario they're nice blinged out bodies for other BA units.

As to the Predator... Unless I'm missing something, you'd actually have to do less work to turn it into a Razorback than to build a Predator. I don't see where "try to turn it he Predator into a razorback" comes into it.

I'm definitely going to pick up a box at some point. I've got a spare banner from the BA Assault Terminator squad that might look good on the Captain model too...

for $72, you are getting a $50 box of Predator lite, + $38.95 of a 10 man tactical squad, + a $25 dollar terminator. So around a 115$ value for $72. For that 72$, a 10 man squad is 130 points + a Baal Predator at 166 points with a Terminator Captain to top it at around 500 points.

Now the question is do you really want to use that Terminator Captain.

On the other hand, you could buy 1 x 5 Hellblasters ($20)+ random HQ (anywhere from 7 to $11)+ Primaris Ancient ($11) + 10 man Squad of tactical (variable price) from ebay for less and have a good starter for an BA Gunline with the Standard of Sacrifice artifact.

I think the best SC box is Necrons.

You are going to use everything in that box, until you swap out the Necron vehicle.

being able to buy used for cheaper is a damn silly argument. It's unwanted used minis of course it's cheaper! not really fair to discuss the value of a package deal of new stuff vs what you can get on ebay

now a BETTER arguement would be to note that the most dollar effective purchase for marines of just about any stripe is Betrayal at Calith, 150 bucks (USD) nets you 3 ten man tac squads (and each squad comes with a heavy bolter and missile launcher ) 1 cataphracti terminator squad, a terminator captain and a "dude with a mace and power armor" (said to be a chaplain but can also work nicely as a reasonably cheap Lt) and a contemptor dreadnought.

Thats over 800 points. pretty good deal all told I'd say

The absolute state of posters on dakka, the thread.

Not everyone wants to play ultra competitive, but WAAC style matches that must squeeze out every % of effectiveness out of its points.
Some people play the game to have fun. Yeah, fun. They don't care if another choice is is better, even marginally - if what they got is cool, they'll play it.

Wanting to have a winning army is not wanting fun? That is odd, the only way for your random type of buying&having fun with it method works would be, if you were 100% sure that all the people playing against you will be buying their models the same way. If only 10% go for optimised build, it stops being a valid method of buying because each time you play vs people with normal lists you will lose and have 0 fun. This accumulates and will make others optimise their lists too, so if your stubborn you may end up as the only guy with a bad list, with even less chance of having fun.

Karol wrote:
Wanting to have a winning army is not wanting fun? That is odd, the only way for your random type of buying&having fun with it method works would be, if you were 100% sure that all the people playing against you will be buying their models the same way. If only 10% go for optimised build, it stops being a valid method of buying because each time you play vs people with normal lists you will lose and have 0 fun. This accumulates and will make others optimise their lists too, so if your stubborn you may end up as the only guy with a bad list, with even less chance of having fun.

worrying obsessivly about Mathhammer can get unhealthy. sometimes it's fun to just lunk whatever down and go "pew pew"

 Dr. Mills wrote:
The absolute state of posters on dakka, the thread.

Not everyone wants to play ultra competitive, but WAAC style matches that must squeeze out every % of effectiveness out of its points.
Some people play the game to have fun. Yeah, fun. They don't care if another choice is is better, even marginally - if what they got is cool, they'll play it.

I see what you're saying and agree to an extent, but there 'fun' will run out if they are losing all the time. Having start collecting boxes be competitively useful and well rounded hurts no one and helps new player especially. Also playing competitively can be a lot of fun. Fun is subjective. A well balanced rule set alongside well balanced start collecting boxes is a great thing. It also helps sales of models if their rules are good.

BrianDavion wrote:

Karol wrote:
Wanting to have a winning army is not wanting fun? That is odd, the only way for your random type of buying&having fun with it method works would be, if you were 100% sure that all the people playing against you will be buying their models the same way. If only 10% go for optimised build, it stops being a valid method of buying because each time you play vs people with normal lists you will lose and have 0 fun. This accumulates and will make others optimise their lists too, so if your stubborn you may end up as the only guy with a bad list, with even less chance of having fun.

worrying obsessivly about Mathhammer can get unhealthy. sometimes it's fun to just lunk whatever down and go "pew pew"

Tried that after 30 games, no one wants to play with me, because it is "not fun to play agaist my army". It has nothing to do with math hammer, I didn't expect my army to be the best in the world, but I would at least like to have most of my army at the end of turn 4.

But they are just supposed to be an affordable way to buy miniatures.
You're not gonna get a start collecting box with 4 lascannon Predators.

ValentineGames wrote:
But they are just supposed to be an affordable way to buy miniatures.
You're not gonna get a start collecting box with 4 lascannon Predators.

Agreed, and it seems that the consensus is that most of the boxes provide good value $ wise, which is what a new player is going to care about. Per usual dakka discussion, it has since devolved into balance and competition whine

An old volkswagon beetle is good value $wise, unless you're competing in a competitive nascar/formula1 event. In which case, you're probably going to feel taken by the salesman.

Katherine had the right idea, the IG defence force is a good starting point for IG players. Otherwise, if 2 people choose a start collecting box to play against each other, and one person choose the IG box, they're probably not going to have a good day. Assuming they're 'casual' garage gamers that don't care about the codexes and are just playing with what they've bought for the same amount.

A volkswagon is never a good buy, because it either it is post flood, damaged engine etc or it is good, and then people will steal it soon.

Agreed, and it seems that the consensus is that most of the boxes provide good value $ wise, which is what a new player is going to care about. Per usual dakka discussion, it has since devolved into balance and competition whine

See this is something I do not get. If you are starting you want an optimal list of what ever the local people play, you don't want any units that take you away from the goal. Who cares if a starting box gives you a "free" HQ in terminator armor, when you will never use the model. The model is free, but it is also has a netto worth of 0$. So as long as the non free units are ok, you are buying stuff in bulk without discount. An IG player is going to use dudes and he is going to use a Russ. But then there are boxs like the BAs. No BA list runs tactical, they all run scouts, termintor HQ are never used and baal preds are horrible, I don't even know if they come with normal pred parts. So a new BA players is foolish, buy what is advertised to him as start collecting set, plays 2-3 games and starts asking himself what the hell did he just spend his money on. And while his friends who got lucky with their starter sets are buying extra stuff and moving in to 1000pts, he is starting from scratch. And this means he will be late for the time when they hit 1500 and 2000pts, unless he has a lot more money then them. It maybe good for GW, because this would sell them more stuff, and glue the player to their product because few people would quit after spending 100-150$ on an army, but it is not a fun expiriance for the player.

 Billagio wrote:

ValentineGames wrote:
But they are just supposed to be an affordable way to buy miniatures.
You're not gonna get a start collecting box with 4 lascannon Predators.

Agreed, and it seems that the consensus is that most of the boxes provide good value $ wise, which is what a new player is going to care about. Per usual dakka discussion, it has since devolved into balance and competition whine

But thing is it's not good value for $ if they aren't actually useful.

tneva82 wrote:

 Billagio wrote:

ValentineGames wrote:
But they are just supposed to be an affordable way to buy miniatures.
You're not gonna get a start collecting box with 4 lascannon Predators.

Agreed, and it seems that the consensus is that most of the boxes provide good value $ wise, which is what a new player is going to care about. Per usual dakka discussion, it has since devolved into balance and competition whine

But thing is it's not good value for $ if they aren't actually useful.

Most new players dont' care about what's useful. They care about what looks cool as they learn to play.

Ok, it feels as if were are talking about two different games here. The only situation when people could not care about what units were good or not, would be if w40k was cheap like vodka. And GW is many things, but cheap is not one of those things. It is in fact very expensive, which means aside for a super small minortiy of super rich people, the cost of what you buy matters. People aren't starting the armies they like, because they don't have the money to buy them. Main reason why so many people play marines too, because they are cheaper then something like eldar, IG or tyranids.

The game is not actually that expensive. People make it expensive for themselves by buying things in bulk rather than piecemeal. But no, main reason people buy marines is because they're pushed the hardest. The stars of the show usually with the most varied kits. Nobody who starts new is going to knowledgeable enough about 2nd hand prices unless they were shown it by someone else or been into the hobby long enough to learn about it themselves.

dude what are you talking about a basic army is around 700$, and some cost twice as much. GW seems to be nerfing some armies on a half a year basis, so if you want to play you have to buy it in the first month post a CA or codex faq. But lets say I decided to not buy any food at school, no movies, stoped using my phone and lie to my parents I bought my monthly tram pass. 30$ per month means I could buy a unit or HQ every two months. If I picked marines, pirated the book, did not paint anything and used friends glue etc. I would take 2 and a half years to buy an army, lets say I also spend all my christmas money on w40k, and that I am pre comfirmation and this in the end gives me 60$ per box per year. It is 1 year of buying stuff, and the army will be unplayable till month 6-8 of collecting. And in the mean time GW may nerf kill the army, rise the basic game cost higher, add obligatory center pice models to the army I picked etc.

With all respect, that's down to individual circumstance. If you build steadily, say 500pts at a time, finish that then move onto the next 500, you'll find it much more manageable. No you can't have big battles yet, but that's half the satisfaction of the hobby, building to a goal. If it takes a while so be it.

tneva82 wrote:

Process wrote:

tneva82 wrote:
It's really customer friendly eh to sell them stuff that they soon realize they don't want to field. Wasted money. Good customer service selling them useless junk.

If i collected guard or Tau i would field both Leman Russ and crisis suits. How is anything in a SC useless junk?

If you played tau you would soon learn to avoid crisis suit like plague. Those are newbie traps. Total crap unit that's seriously overpriced.

Oh and commissar from IG box might just as well be thrown to garbage bin for use it has. Even with change in FAQ it's still bad option.

But there's the error you and the other waacists make.... I don't just play Tau, I COLLECT tau.

They are "start COLLECTING" boxes, not "start netlisting, mathhammering, game breaking, rules lawyering, fun killing" boxes.

People like you are poison in this hobby.

I started playing about 18 months ago with a friend (7th ed), we both collected tau (funnily enough we both started with a SC box, what fething noobs). I loved the infantry, i loved the crisis suits but disliked the bigger models like the riptide and stormsurge even said to him "id like an all infantry, all crisis suit army". Played our fist games against each other, learned the game, added models here and there, he went down the bigger suit route, i didn't, still had pretty good games, even with our terrible rule of cool loadouts.
Now here's where a guy like you pops up, local FLGS TG telling me i "need" a riptide for the upcoming tourney we had entered, telling me my crisis suits arent "optimal" so might aswell drop them despite the fact id spent weeks painting them to a good standard, telling me i "cant run just one" riptide, "you need to drop the fire warriors and take a drone net"
So i bought and i built all of these units and fielded my grey tide abomination and guess what? i still lost every game, but worst, i didn't have fun pushing my unpainted ugly models round the table no matter how effective they were.

It eventually turned me off Tau and i switched to marines, deciding id only build what i liked and only play what i painted; Ive never looked twice at an assback (ugliest most bland model ever), Girlyman, or a pot of macragge blue and im having more fun and success in this hobby than ever.

TLDR; Stop ruining this awesome multifaceted hobby with your constant WAAC diatribe. The start collecting boxes are legit. Period.

Karol wrote:
dude what are you talking about a basic army is around 700$, and some cost twice as much. GW seems to be nerfing some armies on a half a year basis, so if you want to play you have to buy it in the first month post a CA or codex faq. But lets say I decided to not buy any food at school, no movies, stoped using my phone and lie to my parents I bought my monthly tram pass. 30$ per month means I could buy a unit or HQ every two months. If I picked marines, pirated the book, did not paint anything and used friends glue etc. I would take 2 and a half years to buy an army, lets say I also spend all my christmas money on w40k, and that I am pre comfirmation and this in the end gives me 60$ per box per year. It is 1 year of buying stuff, and the army will be unplayable till month 6-8 of collecting. And in the mean time GW may nerf kill the army, rise the basic game cost higher, add obligatory center pice models to the army I picked etc.

From your last few posts, it sounds like:
- you are young and on limited funds
- you are in a country where GW models are comparatively expensive
- you play in a *very* competitive environment

This is not everyone's experience of the hobby.

tneva82 wrote:

 Billagio wrote:

ValentineGames wrote:
But they are just supposed to be an affordable way to buy miniatures.
You're not gonna get a start collecting box with 4 lascannon Predators.

Agreed, and it seems that the consensus is that most of the boxes provide good value $ wise, which is what a new player is going to care about. Per usual dakka discussion, it has since devolved into balance and competition whine

But thing is it's not good value for $ if they aren't actually useful.

Not useful to who?
The predator spammers who demand you spend equal money to earn the right to play?

Process wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

Process wrote:

tneva82 wrote:
It's really customer friendly eh to sell them stuff that they soon realize they don't want to field. Wasted money. Good customer service selling them useless junk.

If i collected guard or Tau i would field both Leman Russ and crisis suits. How is anything in a SC useless junk?

If you played tau you would soon learn to avoid crisis suit like plague. Those are newbie traps. Total crap unit that's seriously overpriced.

Oh and commissar from IG box might just as well be thrown to garbage bin for use it has. Even with change in FAQ it's still bad option.

But there's the error you and the other waacists make.... I don't just play Tau, I COLLECT tau.

They are "start COLLECTING" boxes, not "start netlisting, mathhammering, game breaking, rules lawyering, fun killing" boxes.

People like you are poison in this hobby.

So true. So very very true.

tneva82 wrote:

 Billagio wrote:

ValentineGames wrote:
But they are just supposed to be an affordable way to buy miniatures.
You're not gonna get a start collecting box with 4 lascannon Predators.

Agreed, and it seems that the consensus is that most of the boxes provide good value $ wise, which is what a new player is going to care about. Per usual dakka discussion, it has since devolved into balance and competition whine

But thing is it's not good value for $ if they aren't actually useful.

Ok but a new player (the target these boxes are made for btw, not players looking to spam them to build out their already 3000+ point collection) are going to at first care about whats cool looking for their army and gets them good value. Once they use these models then they can look into buying 4 las preds if they want to be competitive. The point is to draw new players into the hobby with a good deal, not make it so you can buy 3 of them and have a tournament ready list.

Otherwise, if youre a new player and walk into GW with your buddy who also hasnt played before, how do you know where to start? You start looking at models, see whats neat with no clue how they perform. At this point you can pick up the SC boxes, or the GW guy will recommend some to you. Do you want to trust his judgement? Hes probably not going to recommend the best stuff to you either. Not every new player wants to be a tournament player, they want to build and play with cool models with their friends. Id wager that most players (myself included) dont play at stores anyway

Karol wrote:
A volkswagon is never a good buy, because it either it is post flood, damaged engine etc or it is good, and then people will steal it soon.

Agreed, and it seems that the consensus is that most of the boxes provide good value $ wise, which is what a new player is going to care about. Per usual dakka discussion, it has since devolved into balance and competition whine

See this is something I do not get. If you are starting you want an optimal list of what ever the local people play, you don't want any units that take you away from the goal. Who cares if a starting box gives you a "free" HQ in terminator armor, when you will never use the model. The model is free, but it is also has a netto worth of 0$. So as long as the non free units are ok, you are buying stuff in bulk without discount. An IG player is going to use dudes and he is going to use a Russ. But then there are boxs like the BAs. No BA list runs tactical, they all run scouts, termintor HQ are never used and baal preds are horrible, I don't even know if they come with normal pred parts. So a new BA players is foolish, buy what is advertised to him as start collecting set, plays 2-3 games and starts asking himself what the hell did he just spend his money on. And while his friends who got lucky with their starter sets are buying extra stuff and moving in to 1000pts, he is starting from scratch. And this means he will be late for the time when they hit 1500 and 2000pts, unless he has a lot more money then them. It maybe good for GW, because this would sell them more stuff, and glue the player to their product because few people would quit after spending 100-150$ on an army, but it is not a fun expiriance for the player.

This attitude is the reason I stay far away from any sort of 40K tournament and most other players at my local FLGS. I love the SC boxes as they are (well, the Eldar SC annoys me slightly because it doesn’t have Guardians or Dire Avengers instead of wraithguard, but eh), especially the Tau set. In fact, if it hadn’t been for the AdMech SC, I wouldn’t have started that army. And *I* bought the BA set for the Baal Predator, specifically.

Do you want to trust his judgement

No, the basic rule is that you do not trust anyone outside of family, and even that changes when your older. Can't trust your brother or sister, when your both 40 and/or have your own kids, because then you care more about your own family then your own siblings, and are willing to screw them over no matter what.

For the IG, I've just told new players to paint and use the commissar as an officer.

Look, all the SC offer a discount on the contents compared to buying them separately. If you just want to collect and paint, or play casual, they're ALL FINE.

Some of them are far better from a competitive perspective, under the current meta. We all know the meta can and will change over time. Judging them solely on the current meta isn't a good way to go about it. Crisis Suits were far more useful when SC Tau first came out. Nearly all of SC boxes run into hard limits in terms of competitive play (from rule of 3 if nothing else), so they're almost all poor for comp players in the long run. Some are bad for WAAC comp play regardless, but they're still only a portion of market segment. They might be the 'whales' of the hobby (the folks who individually spend the most), but they probably don't comprise the majority of sales.

Let's go back to the OP. What's the 'best' SC box? I can think of 5 criteria for judgement:

1.) Money saved vs individual purchase
2.) Points gained for growing that army
3.) Unit effectiveness
4.) Coolness of models
5.) Potential for repeat purchase to capitalize on points 1-3.

Based on those criteria, I'd say SC Tempestus Scions is the best SC box.

1.) Large cost savings - Scions are expensive troop units in terms of money and the bundle of 2 Scions boxes + Taurox is big savings even ignoring the Commissar.
2.) Can be built as a range of points from 250-ish to near 500 fully kitted out
3.) Scions and Tauroxes might not be the best AM units, but they're good and bring lots of accurate plasma and heavy weapons.
4.) Scions look great and Tauroxes are different from the AM aesthetic (some hate, some love)
5.) If you want a pure Scions army, this box is all you need because of 1-3, and even a regular AM army won't hurt buying 3 of these.