As the old saying goes, "variety is the spice of life". It's just as true for the 40K portion of your life as well. But how do you go about getting it?
For me, I enjoy the idea, look, and different play styles of different armies and have collected a few (too many...) . I generally build an army to a particular points value, with little to no variation possible in the lists at the top point level. So I'll have a 2000pt loyalist IG army, a 2000pt traitor army, 1850 space marines, 1850 chaos marines, etc. When I want variety for a game, I bring a different army/codex.
Other folks find one army and are committed. They continually build up more for that one army, with some large eventual goal like a complete SM company/chapter, or having enough to fill every FOC with every possible combination. When these people want variety, they change their list up, swapping out terminators for more land speeders or whatever.
Some times I wish I could be the latter type, and have shelves full of something to keep swapping in and out. But I could never decide upon which army to do for it. GW's done a good job of marketing to me over the years - there are few armies I wouldn't want to collect if I had a chance!
Which way do you go? Are you committed to a particular race/faction? Do you hit the buffet? Do you have any particular long-term collecting/painting goals?
Both?
ReplyDeleteMost of my armies started out as completist: I've got some ridiculous amount of Tau in various stages of completion and I've got 6K+ painted points of Dark Angels (and still have hopes of painting up a full Battle Company and Deathwing). Don't even get me started on my Skaven.
But, more recently, I decided I was going to build a 2K list of Daemons. Although I've supplemented that list with a new unit here and there... that's pretty much what I've stuck with, and it's really not any less satisfying that the completist approach I've taken with my other forces. Does cost quite a bit less, though. :)
I knew someone would say both!
ReplyDeleteBack in the day I was leaning towards more completist with my CSM - I didn't get every thing possible but I did get more than would go into a typical list.
I think part of it back then was that I was actually getting a lot more games in leading to a good bit of list experimentation, and my group had a decent variety of armies that we would sometimes swap around, allowing us to play around with other armies without having to build them to do so. Nowadays I spend a lot more time building and painting than playing, and I guess it's easier for me to go "ooh, shiny" at a different army than a completed one that doesn't get much play.
I used to have 8 or 9 armies. By that I mean each was over a 2000 pts and was at least put together. Of course I was much younger 10 years ago, and wasnt married, didnt have a house, and had no kids.
ReplyDeleteNow, I am down to 3 armies.
One of which was built for me in exchange for designing his home. I wont keep building my blood angel army. It's sitting at about 3000 pts and fine.
I traded away my other armies, in order to really enhance my Imperial Guard army. It is a pretty dang huge army with over somewhere over 30 vehicles, couple hundred men, and a box of bits.
Now Dark Eldar will keep me busy. It is the only army I kept from before (besides guard). I will work on this army for the next year or so.
I try and only stay interested in one army at a time. It really allows me to specialize and narrow down my tactics. I play a list or two, and fine tune it for a long time, and then eventually retire it after a while. By then very few people will play against it.
I tend to test out alot of different models and sometimes new concepts for my lists, and this is how I get variety. A large army of a single codex, allows for alot of testing and variety. Especially with 5th edition codexs. I love em. (sorry for the long comment)
@Natfka - no worries on the comment length; that's exactly the sort of thing I was fishing for. I'm interested in how different people approach things.
ReplyDeleteI'm kind of a completist with Eldar (with a few exceptions... I never intend to buy support weapons, for example). They're my favorites, and they see the most tabletop time, so it makes sense for me to have lots of army list options.
ReplyDeleteWith my other armies (Blood Angels, Orks, and maybe Dark Eldar in the near future), I'm more of a "build 1500-2000 points and call it a day" kind of guy.
Considering that I can rarely manage to make two consecutive posts on a single one of my armies (much less stop from putting a painting project aside to start another, and another, etc.), I'm sure that you know which category I fall into...
ReplyDeleteSadly completist with Guard... so, so many models... But I'm hoping to string them out into Daemonhunters and Elysians, so at least I'll be able to use them in three different books and switch from Air Cav to Infantry to Mech at will.
ReplyDeleteMy Ogres are also "completist", which isn't really saying much as there are maybe 5 viable choices in the entire codex so it'll end up being 1 main list with a few small option at best. Though magnets help cut even that down quite a bit.
My next army will probably be a single list as then I can justify trying out a whole bunch of different styles, though the All-In-One Marine army also sounds good...
Good thing I have a job I guess!
I have three armies and each one of them evolves slowly over time. I've never played a list and thought, "Self, I'm so happy with this list and never wish to purchase other units for the army so let's just stop here!"
ReplyDeleteHell no!
I take my spice in that progressing evolution of an army, or armies I should say. There's just so many options to try, unit synergies to discover, etc, that I don't see an end to any of my armies.
I'm more of a "completist" myself, at least with GW stuff. I really like to have a little bit of everything in the codex(at least the ones I really like). And before wife, kids, house I actually painted a good bit. I try to collect mostly Imperial armies for the fluff side, just to have a little bit of everything on the table like in the stories. But then there's Chaos and I just can't get enough of them. Oh and dreams of an Eldar army. Currently thinning out my Fantasy armies, but only to expand more in PP Hordes and some specialists games stuff.
ReplyDelete@Josh - but the support weapons are so cool! The ONE+others approach is interesting. I may be halfway to that point with Chaos.
ReplyDelete@DMC - AADD (Army Attention Deficit Disorder) afflicts many, you are not alone my friend.
@Max - the multiple codexes that can use similar models is indeed a boon. With a little forethought and planning you can use your power armored dudes for at least half a dozen armies. I really liked the Inquisition induction aspect and LatD, provided some leverage and ways to try out some different things. Hopefully the GK/SoB revisions will keep that aspect at least to a degree.
@Thor - and if you do, they'll just come out with a newer version of the codex or rules and make you start all over again!
@ctreleheb - And so the cycle continues...I've parted with a number of armies over the years to make room/$ for new ones and may well do so again.
I really haven't started much yet (I have a post for tomorrow which I hope will get me going), but I don't WANT any other army right now. If I were forced to pick, I'd probably go Orks (and my husband would go crazy since I gave away 3K+ of them recently) just for funsies- and Orks give me a ton of options. (Maybe not other people, but me, I see lotta options.)
ReplyDeleteOh, Orks could definitely be an ever-expanding army. I could spend years just making vehicles and stuff for the fast attack section.
ReplyDelete