A Tale of literally some gamers - Getting started in Warhammer for all ages.

[Mr Mystery]

How do!

So, just posted up in the Mythbusting thread, and felt inspired to offer a practical example of how you might go about gathering up an army.

This is loosely based on the example set down in the really rather wonderful Sigmar's Blood, and it will require some volunteers!

Why based on Sigmar's Blood? Because it offers a different take on building up your army of either Vampire Counts (http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?catId=cat440005a&prodId=prod2340004a) or Empire (http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?catId=cat440005a&prodId=prod2340002a). I've cunningly linked to examples of the 'finished product' when listing the army names. Ain't I a clever one!

So if you've clicked on the link, you may be wondering 'but Mr Mystery, those armies are over £250 each, how in the name of Khorne's 27' of throbbing angry gristle is that easing us in?' Well, I'll tell you. The campaign book introduces those armies in bite sized chunks, starting with the armies respective Batallions.

The lesson here, and something I'm growing increasingly fond of is having an end product in sight, and otherwise not worrying about whether the army is 'game legal' as you progress toward the final brushstroke on the final model of the final unit. What's important is that by the end of the affair, the overall force does match up with the army listing restrictions.

Each scenario presents a battle scroll, adding additional units, and usually adding the previous scroll/scrolls to ensure progressively bigger games.

Now, outside of this book you'll need to do a little extrapolation, as those who opt to take part will need to work without carefully, cunningly written Battle Scrolls. Therefore, I propose that whilst I'm being lazy and taking on Vamps inline with Sigmar's Blood (already bought the Batallion, as I'm running through it with local manager), others come up with their own full army list, before breaking it down into a 4 month 'purchase 'n' paint plan', ideally keeping the monthly expenditure as even as possible.

This will lead to similar states, where no army is exactly game legal. But the important part is that you can still play with it, introducing new unit types and character classes each month, so you learn the system one element at a time, and get used to playing progressively larger games.

So, who else is up for joining me? Whilst you decide, I'm off to run around my back garden, which is in fact a Victorian Cemetery Garden, and then once done, use the inspiration of mildly bothering the departed to build those 20 skellingtons! And possibly the Corpse Cart.

[MMM]

...

[Mr Mystery]

To kick off, these are the 'chunks' I'll be using, lifted from the Battle Scrolls in Sigmar's Blood, in the same order.

Ghort's Nightstalkers.

Helman Ghorst - 225 points.
Lvl 2 Necromancer, Cursed Book, Corpse Cart

The Feasters in the Dusk - 210 points.
20 Crypt Ghouls, Crypt Ghast

The Direpack - 80 points.
10 Direwolves

The Konigstein Stalkers - 130 points.
20 Skeletons with hand weapons, light armour and shields. Full command

2nd Block

The Midnight Haul

Count Mannfred - 554 points.
Barded Nightmare

The Tithe - 100 points
30 Zombies, musician, standard bearer

The Devils of Swartzhafen - 148 points.
3 Vargheists, Vargoyle

3rd Block

Guardians of the Necropolis

Whispering Nell - 95 points.
Tomb Banshee

Vhostus of the Black Scythe - 60 points.
Cairn Wraith

The Chillgheists - 160 points.
5 Hexwraiths, Hellwraith

The Claw of Nagash - 240 points
Blasphemous Tome

4th Block - The Forgotten Legion

Verek the Blade - 104 points
Wight King with shield and sword of striking.

Verek's Reavers - 210 points
5 Black Knights, lances, barding, full command, banner of the barrows

The Sternsman - 155 points.
20 Skeletons, Spears, full command, screaming banner.


Comes in just under 2,500 and will cost around £300, or around £75 per month. Which is nice!

[Ben_S]

A group of us at a local store are doing a 300 points/month escalation league, similar to what's proposed here.

The point was to start a new army and build to 2,400 pts over 8 months. Since I was half way through building a WoC army, I decided I'd just plan out 2,400 more of reinforcements that I wanted to add to my army (this was purposefully character-heavy because I wanted more options there).

Here was my initial list:

Lords
Villitch - 380

Heroes
BSB on Daemonic Steed - c.250
Mounted Sorcerer - c.250
Wulfrik - 180

Core
15 Forsaken MoS - 315
15 Forsaken MoT - 300
2 Marked Chariots - 240
12 Hounds - 96
10 Marauder Cavalry - 190

Special
3 Ogres with great weapons - 123

Rare
Spawn - 60

Just over two months in now (i.e. Nov and Dec 2013) and I've done Wulfrik, Tzeentch BSB/Sorcerer on Daemonic Mount, Sorcerer/Exalted on Steed of Slaanesh, 2 Knights, 15 Forsaken, and a Slaanesh command group, so that's about 1000 points I reckon. (I own most of what I want, so the aim is to build and paint each month, rather than purchase.)

[Theblackprince]

I started my vampire army with one battalion box and a vampire lord. A great way to pick up all the models and with the savings ( at the time) I basically got a free corpse cart with the other units in the set.

[ACE01]

So, who else is up for joining me?

Mr Mystery, I shall join thee on thy quest!

I too am doing Vampire Counts in order to play Sigmar's Blood with my brother, who has an empire army.

I've got the battalion already, and have a few models which I'll be subbing in from my old VC force and TK collection respectively, as I'd like the force to be something not just for Sigmar's Blood.

To fit the Sigmars Blood Style, I've broken it down into 4 chunks, though I may split these, or add others as necessary.

Chunk 1 - VC Battleforce:

Corpse Cart
20 Ghouls
20 SW w/ HW&S
10 Dire Wolves

£75 - Purchased!

Chunk 2:

Count Mannfred - £23.50

30 TK SW w/ Spears - £0 from existing collection

3 Crypt Horrors - £29

£52.50

Chunk 3:

Vampire on Foot w/ Shield - £0 from existing collection
Necrarch Vampire on Foot - £0 from existing collection
5 Hexwraiths - £20
Black Coach - £0 from existing collection

£20

Chunk 4:

FW Wight King BSB - £14.50
5 Black Knights - £0 spares from Hexwraiths plug existing TK horses
20 extra SW w/ HW&S - £31

£45.50

Looking forward to getting started!

[Wildeybeast]

I already have a large Empire force, so sadly won't be joining you, but this is exactly the sort of thing we need to promote Warhammer, so good on you Mystery.

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

I have nearly 4k of Tomb Kings so I won't be joining either. Good luck though guys.

[Mr Mystery]

No worries chaps!

Right, having singularly failed to build the Skellingtons last night (I got distracted. Can't recall what by. But it was telly related) I will do those tonight, and hope for a break in the weather to get spraying!

I get paid on the 23rd Jan, 21st Feb and 21st March, so expect all to be painted some time in April!

[ACE01]

That's laying down a gauntlet!

Not sure I can match that, as have some work to do for others (boo!) but I'll do my best!

[Mr Mystery]

Ah it's just my general plan. And depends on my not being indolent.... Which is far from guaranteed! I'm not a totally terrible painter once it's underway, but I lack disciprine!

[ACE01]

I know the feeling. I find painting for other people is fine cause I have to get it done, and most often it's a special model that I can spend some time on.

With my own mini's, I end up not painting them because I want to paint them to a higher standard than I have time for! I just normally can't settle for a quick dollop of paint, but with this VC army, I'm seriously going to try to get it painted and ready before our first run through of each battle!

[Mr Mystery]

Looking forward to using BFTBG on the ghouls. Give them nice blood soaked hands and jaws!

[ACE01]

I got some for Christmas to see if it's worth the switch from the custom mix of gloss, medium, red paint and glue I'm currently using!

Oh, and I just went and ordered Chunk 2 from my local GW store to get me nice and motivated! Mannfred, Crypt Horrors and a Deathknell Watch to go with them!

[captjagged]

I was extremely lucky enough to get the models for both sides of Sigmar's Blood for Christmas. I've got a friend who's game to dip into WHFB along with me, we were just looking for a way to ease in a bit at a time. This kind of escalation is great, I'm just hoping they made enough to make it worth doing more of these with other pairs of armies. It's kinda like getting a new starter set (of sorts).

Anyway, progress! Over the past couple weeks I put together all of the VC units except the Mortis Engine, and thank god that's over. Those connection points are probably the most fiddly in the entire fantasy range, I already see myself gluing arms back on skeletons before each game. I've got some work to do on the Empire side and then it's time to paint and get the first game in. And yeah, I've got a new set of the technical paints, I'm thinking Agrellan Earth on all my VC models to represent the blasted land of Sylvania.

On the playing side, we're not invested emotionally in either army, so we're planning to play each battle twice, switching armies, so that we can taste each side of the field. Double the fun, right?

[ACE01]

Sounds like a great idea!

I was planning to get my phase one assembly under way tonight, however I'm sadly out of glue so no sticking for me :( I now have unboxed stuff littering my already cramped hobby room, baaaad!

[ACE01]

Well folks, I'm ready to get started! I've got my glue in hand, and am cracking open the box during my spare couple of hours tonight!

In prep, I've even started a project log so as not to hijack the thread! Anyone interested can find it here: http://www.lounge.belloflostsouls.net/showthread.php?40489-ACE01-s-Sigmar-s-Blood-Vampire-Counts-(and-a-bit-of-Empire)

[Cap'nSmurfs]

Hooray! So, I started my Dark Elves towards the end of last year. I've got a log thread lying around somewhere, so I'll update in that.

At the moment, though, mostly my host of evil elf *******s is in boxes lying next to me. Because of Birthday and Christmas presents it isn't exactly what I'd planned out in my list, but it should still come t about 2,400 points. I want to get it all assembled and painted as soon as possible (before the spring, certainly). Plenty of work to do!

[The_Gonk]

Looking forward to using BFTBG on the ghouls. Give them nice blood soaked hands and jaws!

I tried that out on one my Empire guys, it's awesome stuff!

I'm looking for a new army to start after Empire so I'll have a think about joining in with VC...... I'm off to window shop on the Gee-Dub store!