Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

So there's a lot of talk about the best army with folks discussing points costs, but what armies does everyone think are the best to build with? that gives plenty of options for conversion, and lots of chances to do intreasting modeling. obviously every army does to some degree or another, but some more then others and I'm curious what people think on this.

I think Orks are proably the best, their racial lore just screams "KIT BASH" and some of the most amazing kitbashes I've seen have been Orks.

Outside of that obvious, I think Marines (loyalist and chaos both) offer some good oppertunities, with a fairly modualr set up, lots of little chapters each with their own independant culture etc so there's a lot of room to give a marine army some stylization.

Guard's fluff basicly allows you to use any on scale army minis as your guardsmen, even if the individual guard minis GW makes aren't partiuclarly kitbashable (in my opinon) this gives guard players some MASSIVE leeway for customization.


anyway thats just some of my thoughts, whats everyone else think?

orks.
maybe GSC.

Either Orks or Chaos.

Orks - yeah, sure, I get it why the vast majority of ork players all have identical looking stuff. You buy kit x & maybe add some bitz. But overall, same stuff.
In reality though? There's zero reason why any given ork piece should ever look the same as another. You could spend your life customizing each & every ork thing - right down to the shootas/sluggas/choppers.

Chaos - OK, the CSMs start with an Imperial base. And they do have the capabilities to produce standardized patterns of things. But given their exposure to the warp there's no reason you couldn't go wild.

Easy to kitbash:
Orks - You can you LITERALLY any vehicle, but you have to Orkify it. Orks themselves can be modified too, but you have to keep them Orky in order to not break the aesthetics. I saw Orks made as a parody to Cuban communists, with Viva Fidel painted on their vehicles.
Imperial Guard - You can use anything with army thematics, from ancient world far to the future. 3rd party companies offer hundreds of legs, torsos, heads and other bits to make your Guardsmen look unique.
GSC - Same as the Guard, but you can also use civilian stuff, but on the other hand you have to use some GSC bits.
Chaos cultists - Same as above, but more Chaotic
Inquisition - Same as above, but more Inquisitive

Not as easy to kitbash:
Marines of all kinds - You have a wide range of customization in the form of pauldrons and helmets, eventually armor types, but that is about it. Marines rarely use non-standard vehicles.
Dark Eldar - Offers some leeway to keep the theme.

Hard to kitbash:
Eldar - Any kitbashing would likely break their aesthetics. It can be done, but think twice, and then again before doing it. Lightly modifying the troops won't do much hard, though.
Tau - Same as above.
Tyranids - Too unique to work. There can be some silly kitbashes like Tyranid carnifex looted by orks, or controlled by the dark mechanicus, but I can't think of anything more.

I hope I didn't miss anything.

 Hawky wrote:

Hard to kitbash:

Tyranids - Too unique to work. There can be some silly kitbashes like Tyranid carnifex looted by orks, or controlled by the dark mechanicus, but I can't think of anything more.

Tyranid kits can actually be used for interesting Kitbash tyranid monsters. You'll need some creativity and a bit of greenstuff but you'll get interesting looking monsters. I've had a couple of questions about my models because people didn't recognise them and thought they were a new GW release .

Orks are of course you go-to if you want to build something unique. Want a Chinork warkopta? Take a trukk and a deffkopta. Want mek-guns...loot some chimera's etc.

Inquisition is pretty much almost entirely kitbash. You can use any imperial (or non imperial for those radicals) kit and kit bash to your hearts content. Got an armless imperial commisar left over and a meltagun and a thunder hammer laying around? Slap them on and you've got an inquisitor or acolyte.
Want a radical xenos inquisitor with a null rod? Give a Necrons staff and claim it has anti warp properties. (Referring of course to when null rods were actually usefull).

Seriously, inquisition is the imperial converters wet dream.

Orks- Easiest to kitbash AND scratch build. This is because Ork construction techniques are haphazard, which means you're free to make mistakes. Plasti-card and other supplies go a long way here.

Every other army demands a greater degree of finish- exact right angles, symmetry, etc. Which means more kitbash less scratch build.

Inquisition was a great suggestion; these guys are all about the Blanchitsu/ warband style, so they won't necessarily be a huge army in their own right- they're more like 1-3 Kill Teams SOUPing with other Imperial Forces. Great thing with these guys is that if you want inspiration, a google image search for blanchitsu should give you everything you need.


But for me, it's the genestealer cult. I love giving guardsmen genestealer bits. Trading bits even between acolytes, neophytes and metamorphs will give you huge variety. I also grow my cults through campaign play, so if a purestrain takes another model out of action, it becomes a brood brother in the next game. Lots of conversion opportunities.

Renegades and heretics probably also now known as servants of the abyss.
Have a big Arsenal.
Have the background to scratch build
Is Chaos so individualising is possible if not reccomended.
Has irregular and regular units.
Has mercs.


And you can daemonengify IG units, this is f.e. An basilik.

Might depend on what you want.

For example, I think DE have some fantastic models and some great opportunities for kitbashing:



However, if you want to actually use your creations then you'll quickly run into issues.

For example, I could maybe get away with using the middle model above as an Archon but there are no DE HQs with wings, nor anything that could even approximate such. Hell, there's barely even any variety amongst their HQs.

So if you're someone who doesn't mind using the same rules for your HQs, regardless of how you've modelled them, then DE could make for a lot of fun conversion opportunities.

But if you want to represent your creations as closely as possible . . . yeah, I'd probably go with a different army.