Warhammer 40K - Basic Army Theory

 

When starting a table top miniature war game, your army is a big investment in time, money, and effort. To make things easier, here’s a few tips for new Warhammer 40k players to help you get started on the right foot.

Know Your Rules.

Get your codex of choice and the main book. Take time to read both of them thoroughly before you start building an army. Getting a decent starting force is much easier and simpler when you have a pretty clear idea of how it all is supposed to work.

Decide What You Like.

Though it sounds obvious, remember as you’re designing your army list, start with models you like. After all, if you don’t like the models, you won’t be as motivated to get them built and painted, and you probably won’t enjoy fielding them as much. Since the vast majority of units in 40K can be made useful, just pick out a few favorites you just gotta have, and go on from there.You need something that will deal with all the main types of enemy.

That would be heavy infantry (like Space Marine Terminators), horde infantry (like ork boyz), Psykers (like Chaos Marine Sorcerers), light tanks (like Eldar Vypers), and heavy tanks (like Necron Monoliths). Whether you decide to deal with them up close or at long range, just be sure you can kill it. Get at least one thing to do that, then find 1 or 2 more that can pull it off in a pinch, preferably one of your other existing units. You don't want 1 squad getting plastered to cripple your army.Cover the mission objectives.

Since by now you can kill most enemies, that covers 2 out of the 6 basic missions. Now you need to make sure you have a few units that can take and hold objectives. That alone will keep you covered for the other 4 basic missions.

Try Proxy first, then buy later.

Make yourself a list, try to proxy it with stuff you have handy before shelling out the dough. Give it a try by playing a couple games and make sure you like it. Give it a few tweaks. Then when you’re pretty sure you’ve got a decent start, make the plunge and start collecting that army. And who knows, maybe I’ll see you on the battlefield!