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A while ago i made a thread about picking an army based off of what would be the nost fun to paint, yall were super helpful and i narrowed down my choices a lot! I have still been trying to pick, and i realized one thing I have been neglecting in picking an army is looking at the mechanics.

I don't plan on playing 40k often, maybe a couple of times a year. I want an army that I could show up to a game store, and as long as I have a general concept of wargaming strategy, I only need to give the codexes a quick read through to remember the gist and have a good time. I don't want to need to remember like 10 million army-specific rules that don't work like anything in any other wargame. Or, to put that another way, I want a simple army with room to play tactically but not too many fiddly rules to remember.

Also since this would mostly be a social thing, I want to avoid the armies that make people go "oh no I don't want to fight THAT", I don't know if 40k has any of those, but most games have at least one lol

Lastly, I would prefer to not have to paint up an entirly new army every time a codex is released. So an army that stays fairly consistent with stuff like what individual model weapon lodouts are allowed would be nice.

Any suggestions? Any armies I should avoid?

Edit: the main armies I were considering where: big monster tyranid list, any eldar list, an ork list with either vehicles or mechs, an imperial knight list. A chaos knight list, a big mecha focused tau list. I could also be convinced to go for custodes or some space marines (minotaur, malevolent, or blood angel successors)

If it's for casual play a few times a year don't worry about super strong armies, this changes often.

I'd give two suggestions, either, rule of cool. Pick what looks good and go with them. Or pick a small elite army so you have less rules to learn/remeber.

Rule of cool is a personal thing so go with whatever you like.

For small elite armies you're looking at Knights, Custodes and maybe something like Harliquins or Tyranids big monsters.

Space marines are classically middle of the road and fairly forgiving.

Also since this would mostly be a social thing, I want to avoid the armies that make people go "oh no I don't want to fight THAT", I don't know if 40k has any of those, but most games have at least one lol

40k has several
Currently Custodes and Tau..

Knights can wobble in there with their skew lists, but can also fall into 'can't deal with objectives or terrain, so fail horribly' depending on the edition rules/scenarios.

Lastly, I would prefer to not have to paint up an entirly new army every time a codex is released. So an army that stays fairly consistent with stuff like what individual model weapon lodouts are allowed would be nice.

Tyranids tend to fail at that, their weapons (and what's good/whats not) varies wildly.


Pure Craftworlds tend to be stable (their units are largely mono-tasked and gear mostly fixed), but have a bit of past reputation as the Cheese Faction.

Space Marines are, as stated, middle of the road. But have a lot of rules overhead currently.

Necrons aren't the worst choice. Consistent weapons, not oppressive, though a little weak and their 'army purity rule' is naff.

Thank you all for the suggestions! A small elite army would be great! Shame about tyranid weapons, but good to know!

Just updated the original post with the armies I thought seemed fun from a painting and fluff perspective!

One thing to consider, which helps with both compatibility/longevity and avoiding being TFG with an army is to avoid skew lists.

Build a take all comers list with a little bit of everything. Don’t double down on any one aspect, but spread things around. This helps insulate you against nerfs, and even if you have a broken unit in your list, you are not spamming them, so people shouldn’t complain.

Also collect an army that fits well to the theme of your faction. This is not 100%, but helps future proof your collection. Sometimes certain lists are powerful, but get adjusted out of the rules (despite being a fluffy part of the factions, like White Scars or Eldar jetbike lists) What was once a valid list is now something you would have a much harder time getting to the table. But GW normally does a decent job making sure the mainline core of the faction is at least workable.

For an elite eldar list maybe trying to make an army using a lot of the wraith constructs? It would be nice and fluffy, be fairly elite and look cool?

I honestly wouldn't worry about being "that guy" unless you learn every rule and use spam tactics even if you take a powerful army you're very unlikely to make an accidentally overpowered list.

I don't know enough about enough armies to tell you which is best for you, but any elite army should make it cheaper and easier to remember the rules needed.

Tau.

 Nevelon wrote:
One thing to consider, which helps with both compatibility/longevity and avoiding being TFG with an army is to avoid skew lists.

Build a take all comers list with a little bit of everything. Don’t double down on any one aspect, but spread things around. This helps insulate you against nerfs, and even if you have a broken unit in your list, you are not spamming them, so people shouldn’t complain.

Also collect an army that fits well to the theme of your faction. This is not 100%, but helps future proof your collection. Sometimes certain lists are powerful, but get adjusted out of the rules (despite being a fluffy part of the factions, like White Scars or Eldar jetbike lists) What was once a valid list is now something you would have a much harder time getting to the table. But GW normally does a decent job making sure the mainline core of the faction is at least workable.

I really like both of those tips! A generalist army and a army that fits the normal theme bolth seem good.

Here were the lists I thought seemed the most fun for each army:

Tyranids: As I said in the post, I was picturing mostly the big monsters, any monsters will do I just like the big ones. I was thinking that getting the combat patrol which would get me a bunch of smaller units, but I am not tied to that.
Eldar: The main appeal to me was that I could take a bunch of diffrent sub factions, so a group of space pirates, a group of grim reaper cosplayers, some robots, etc all in one army.
Orks: I don't want to paint 100 boys, I want to focus on their bigger units. In particular I love all the vehicles, all the mecha, and Ghazghkull Thraka. So either a speed waagh or some sort of list with Ghazghkull Thraka and a Stompa.
Knights and chaos knights: I am pretty sure most knight armies are pretty similar to each other? 3 big knights and 3 small armigers. I would probably magnetize knights so the weapon thing is less of a deal.
Tau: Big robots are rad, take as many as possible.
Custodes: i'm up for whatever, I like painting metal and these have a bunch of that.
Space marines: I'd want a dreadnaught and a Chaplin but other than that I am up for whatever. I like the ones that have more religious symbolism.

Do any of those not fit the theme of the army or aren't particularly generalist in mechanical terms?

With regards to dipping in and out, space marines have recently been getting updated more often than other armies (they have had 3 codices over 2 editions so far). That not only increases the cost in the form of codices, but also increases the chance that the stuff you have becomes crazy op (which can result in people not wanting to play against it), becoming underpowered and frustrating to play, or allowed loadouts changing which means your models now have unplayable loadouts.

Just something to consider.

Rfkannen wrote:



Tyranids: As I said in the post, I was picturing mostly the big monsters, any monsters will do I just like the big ones. I was thinking that getting the combat patrol which would get me a bunch of smaller units, but I am not tied to that.
Eldar: The main appeal to me was that I could take a bunch of diffrent sub factions, so a group of space pirates, a group of grim reaper cosplayers, some robots, etc all in one army.
Orks: I don't want to paint 100 boys, I want to focus on their bigger units. In particular I love all the vehicles, all the mecha, and Ghazghkull Thraka. So either a speed waagh or some sort of list with Ghazghkull Thraka and a Stompa.
Knights and chaos knights: I am pretty sure most knight armies are pretty similar to each other? 3 big knights and 3 small armigers. I would probably magnetize knights so the weapon thing is less of a deal.
Tau: Big robots are rad, take as many as possible.
Custodes: i'm up for whatever, I like painting metal and these have a bunch of that.
Space marines: I'd want a dreadnaught and a Chaplin but other than that I am up for whatever. I like the ones that have more religious symbolism.

From these I'd say go either knights or tyranids. It also depends on the size of game, if they're small 500pts games knights would be no good, if larger 2k games then either is fair. Tau gundam lists look awesome but I don't know how "all in" you can go on that and I don't know how much of a general list you can make.

Let us know what decide whatever way you decide tho.

Tau gundam lists can work. Crisis suits are particularly strong at the moment, as are broadsides.

With custom sept tenets you can also mitigate the low model counts when it comes to controlling objectives with battlesuit models.

Based on everything you have said, I would suggest either Space Marines, Death Guard or Necrons.

Space Marines:
Jack of all trades
You can buy the models cheap (ebay, the Imperium magazine series + whatever series they run after)
No particularly crazy rules
Quite easy to paint quickly
If you paint them in your own colours, then you can use a variety of rules options if you chose too - or go with one of the classics such as Blood Angels.
Everyone accepts the fact they will play against Space Marines

Death Guard:
Not as easy to paint but generally a lower model count
Also still quite cheap to buy - especially some of the daemon engines which are a real go-to unit
Surprisingly fewer rules than you may expect.
People don't have an issue playing against them
Unlike Space Marines - no constant stream of releases to buy and paint up (as per your criteria)

Necrons:
They are silver robots. The single easiest army to paint and you can then add as much colour or complexity as you want!
Again, super cheap due to the Starter boxes and Imperium magazines
People don't mind playing against them and again, accept that they will face Necrons given they are in the starter boxes
They just had a whole load of new models but as for painting - spray black and drybrush silver for a basic but effective paint job. I also suggest getting a gray and white for he glowy bits before using something like a flourescent green paint over it - looks awesome.
The vehicles are harder to paint depending how much detail you want to add (did I mention the spray and drybrush?)
They may get some new models during the refresh, but generally expect them to get nothing new for the next 10 to 15 years.

Armies I wouldn't get based on what your criteria is:
Tau - you would be "that guy" along with the others.
Knights - you become "that guy's really annoying friend that people don't even want to make eye contact with and generally pretend he doesn't exist"
Tyranids - Special rules galore these days.
Custodes - Super-easy to paint and build an army with. People actually don't mind playing against them BUT they don't really have any strategic elements to their name due to the lack of diversity in the army.
Drukhari - Lots of units, lots of special rules. Really vulnerable to the power swing of 40k. In the blink of an eye, your army could become trash and GW wouldn't care at all.
Craftworlds - As above
Harlequins - See Custodes, just squishier and faster.
Chaos - Not easy to paint and as much as they are the primary enemy in the galaxy, GW doesn't really care much for them.
Chaos Daemons - I actually recommend this army all the time to new players, just not this time due to your criteria. No they are not powerful but you can use your army across 3 gaming systems (40k, Heresy and AOS). This is why I recommend them to newbies as if they don't like one game, try the other without buying new models. Quick to paint, can have more time added to look great etc etc.

The fewer the models the easier to play, because less things to learn and remember. Now quality of something like knights right now, is not that great, but if GW fixs them in their new books playing them could be fun. They do have a problem, a few other armies suffer from, which is a small model pool.

Custodes or some sort of eldar seem to be a safer pick.

Rfkannen wrote:


Edit: the main armies I were considering where: big monster tyranid list, any eldar list, an ork list with either vehicles or mechs, an imperial knight list. A chaos knight list, a big mecha focused tau list. I could also be convinced to go for custodes or some space marines (minotaur, malevolent, or blood angel successors)

Most of the armies you listed are extremely dependant on the moment, sometimes they do suck sometimes they're OP. Some of them (monster bash, vehicles spam, mecha spam) can even become illegal at some point. Typically none of them is easy to play as well. Eldar maybe could do.

But I'd suggest something like SM (any of them), Deathguard or Necrons. Easiest armies to play, all solid mid tiers especially for casual games and among the easiest/fastest to paint. Eldar, assuming you get a bit of everything instead of focussing on skew (some players say themed) lists, should be ok as well.

If both necons and space marines are a good pick, it sounds like the imperium subscription that would get me both is a good get! Do y'all recommend it? Neither space marines or necrons were my fist choice, but it looks like a good deal, I would get two armies at the end, and I do enjoy subscription boxes lol.


I didn't realize that you could run space marines as whatever if you didn't use an official color scheme! So I could paint them... Idk something like black metal with silver highlights and run them as a different chapter each game?

Okay so a side question for this, if I get imperium should I build the my space marines as ultramarines or a custom chapter?

On one hand I really like being able to run with any set of rules, on the other hand it would feel like a shame to not use guilliman or the paints provided.

For casual play, I'd consider Necrons.
Its a medium tier army.
No need for a bad conscience when you bring your army to play. The opponent will gladly battle you.
Necrons are easy to paint and fun to play.