Tuesday, June 30, 2009
I'm starting over.
I don't want to do Orks. They paint up great but I don't like them. Their just not me. I should have listened to the the 40k rulebook guideline to picking an army... pick one you like. If I had to paint Blood Angels into a collection I would go sick. Dang I picked two armies I didn't really want to do. Got to file them under the was a good idea at a time file and offer em up on ebay.
I don't like to have unfinished stuff around. Just reminders that I didn't finish what I had started, a mirror that shows me I am a fickle gamer. 40k is a bit of a mystery to me. As I mentioned before each and every army attracts me and repulses me at the same time but there are none that really "grab" me.
In a way I feel like I'm dating this game. Playing the fields of war until "the one" comes along. If it's anything like my actual marriage "the one" will come when I'm not looking for it but alas this is a game and it forces you to make a choice and it's not dating either. It's more like having a bunch of mediocre women standing in front of you all in a line. You only want one of them (to court them all would be a one way ticket to loony ville). Only you know nothing about any of them, just how they look.
And I don't know which one to pick
Test driving this game is expensive and making a wrong choice is expensive ergo just like in real life playing the field hurts your wallet and can burn you out (not that I would know "in real life" of course...*wink*).
So I'm selling my stuff, raising a financial pool until I figure out just what The 25mm Warrior really wants.
If anyone wants a go at my Blood Angels army it's at
http://cgi.ebay.com/Pro-Painted-Warhammer-40K-Space-Marines-Blood-Angels_W0QQitemZ110409137214QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLH_DefaultDomain_0?hash=item19b4e5bc3e&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=65%3A1|66%3A2|39%3A1|240%3A1318|301%3A0|293%3A1|294%3A50
My wife put the "Pro-Painted" part in there. She says tag lines like that help it to sell. When I think of "pro" I think of guys like Ron not pro TAP dippers like myself.
So good luck and any advice on armies would be most welcome:)
11 comments:
Any chance of borrowing armies to just try playing with them? I find there's usually 2 main reasons someone plays an army. 1) They love how they play in terms of mechanics or 2) They love the mini's.
If you can base your army choice on one of those I think you can pull it off.
As I sip on my morning coffee I shall try to help you unravel this conundrum. The armies you started had something about them that appealed to you, but didn't hold your interest, what was it?
If you like the Blood Angels list, but hate painting all that red, make up your own chapter color scheme and just use their list (or paint up a successor chapter).
If I could do anything differently about my gaming habits, it'd be to sell EVERYTHING I didn't see through to the end. It frees up space, you don't have junk laying around you'll never use, and it can generate more money for something you'll actually use in the future. Keep ebaying!
Hey, email me! I have a couple questions about your Blood Angels.
unfortunately, things like your wife adding "pro-painted" to auctions has rendered that phrase almost meaningless on eBay now.
Good luck on finding an army you like. That, or pick a different game.
Mik made a good point. Find rules you like, then work on the minis from there. buying on looks without talking to people and figuring out how an army plays can work out, but you're usually better at figuring out what fluff, models, and play style all mesh up together with you the best.
I agree with Mik and AoM. Read up on the fluff, go to a few big tourneys to look at people's armies.
There's sure to be a range of models that grabs your imagination, and a line of fluff to go with it.
I as always put off by 'Ultragood-guys', spiky marines might have been ok... but still common. Space Elves might have worked for me, but I wanted something different than them. Space undead held little for me. Giant bugs were the same as undead.
then I found what I would fall in love with.. INQUISITION. woo-hoo! Nuns with Guns was too cool. I liked the Grey Knights too. The tragic hero theme appealed to me, allong with the paranoia, and fanaticism.
read around, pick up codexes, take your time.
use your marines for 'counts as' for a while. maybe even try out Vassal. it's a cheap way to try out an army.
Persoanlly I've settled on inquisition because it affords me some great modelling opportunities, plus in any given game I can play radical and use chaosy figs, puritan and use GK, ally in guard or marines, use SoB whatever I fancy, and I can use my modelling skills to try and make my army unique.
at the end of the day, you dont have to run a last as it first appears, lets say you like orcs playstyle but really dont like the minis; well hell, knock up another species entirely, and if you want tos tay tourney legal, how about space beastment? or skinks as gretchen?
at the end of the day make the army you want, and worry about the rales later, theresnothing that cant be sorted with a "counts as" as long as you dont mix and match incompatible codexes.
It seems like painting is an issue for you. You can't stand to paint the same thing a million times over.
So in that case you can try Red Corsairs SM. Either use CSM or SM rules. If you are clever, you can build an army that uses either so you essentially get two armies in one.
Every guy is an individual looking model, each painted with a different paint scheme all tied together with the red markings x-ing out their chapter markings.
Funny, I find myself going through a very similar thing. I would say that the problem lies in figuring out what 40K is to you: a Hobby Game or a Game that can be a Hobby. If it's the former, then you're likely to choose armies that have appealing models, fluff or represent an army that you'd like to create. If it's the latter, you'll want to do as suggested and playtest armies using proxy models to see if they play the way you want them to.
I consider myself more hobbyist than gamer. The trap I fall into is being exposed to an army through fluff or video games and then saying "that's it, I wanna make an army like that." Problem is, I pull the trigger before I play a single game with them, and then I usually find out later that I don't like their playstyle. My first army was Space Wolves, and I love their playstyle. But I also have 1000 pts in Sisters of Battle, still in the shipping box, because I thought they were like Guard in power armour (they're nothing like it). And I just bought about 500 pts of Guard purely because I want to try out a Gears of War themed army. And now the more I play Dawn of War 2, the more I want to make a Blood Ravens chapter. Yep, it's a trap!
"Only you know nothing about any of them, just how they look."
This is part of the problem. Borrow armies if you can. If not, (dare I say it) proxy with what you have.
As for the whole painting thing. It sounds like you need to chose your own scheme or find a way to do things quicker.
We all want armies that are 'Eavy Metal grade, but more often than not, time or ability just doesn't permit. I personally have found my middle ground by rationalizing that I'm not trying to win a Golden Demon and using a painting method that's quick and easy. It helps keep me from burning out and I'm satisfied enough with the quality that it doesn't leave me wanting more.
Dude, I hate when that happens. I've gone through Eldar (weak puny xeno scum - hate 'em) and Space Marines (everyone has frakkin SMs).
I finally got caught on Deamonhunters and Guard because I can build two armies and interchange them in the same list or run them individually.
At least - that's the "logical" side. The real reason is because I've read the Eisenhorn and Ravenor Inquisitor series, all the Grey Knight books, most of the Gaunt series and every Ciaphas Cain book there is.
Read the fluff and fiction and you'll be hooked on an army.
I feel your pain. My first contact with 4k was in the late nineties. Buddy of mine started to paint some UM for a friend, whose younger brother got the orks from the starterbox.
My first idea was to start eldar, but those guys said "magic doesn't fit a SciFi scenario" and my love back then wasn't strong enough to play those pointy guys without any farseer and warlock support.
So I switched to SW (being a metal-head back then wolves sounded cool to me), which I converted into CSM after the chaos dex was launched and I figured that a 4 person playgroup with 3 loyal armies (UM, SW, IG) doesn't sound like fun. Just before I got the CSM projec roling those guys split up.
I stayed away from 40k until my new RPG group wanted to try out the 3ed,bought ~30 CSM with TS shoulderpads from ebay, and sold my old SW and those SM from the Space Crusade game to one of my buddies from the RPG group and started CSM. Then GW wrecked the TS with the 3.5 dex and launched tau. Being a gundam-fan I stuffed my CSM in a box (and sold those shoulder pads) and started tau. Played them for ~a year against SM, DE and nids, but got bored fast. The only good thing was that it opened my eyes. I liked the high-tech look, I liked the mobile playstyle and the somehow specialised troops. But I really missed the lack of any proper CC units.
So I got back to the army I loved when I started with 40k in the nineties. Eldar... fast, specialised and high-tech wielding elves. Started collecting them in ed4, put them on hold when the new dex was anounced (got enough experience with GWs codex policy from my TS-army). A lack of funds and the will to create a more personal force drew the project right into ed5, but now I'm the proud owner of a 5k strong eldar force, which needs some serious painting work.
Why did I ended with a eldar corsair force?
- I love the gamestyle and most of their fluff
- I use models from the WHF DE range to create a more rare army compared to your typical CW eldar army
- doing that helped me to keep some costs low and stay away from models I don't like (chopper-style jetbikes for example)
- Building a raider force allowed me to have a good reason to skip the typical eldar circus color schemes, which I never liked.
Sure, as a rather competitive driven player I could have took some easier to play and cheaper to collect army like orcs, but they just don't fit my style and while I don't like loosing 5 games in a row at a tournament, I also don't want to see that "oh, another ork player...nob bikers?"look on my opponents faces each time I tell them which race I play. ^^
So my advice would be to look for a force which caters towards your taste in terms of models and playstyle as close as possible, replace those few model you don't like with some great conversions and use a personal color scheme. This isn't a history TTG after all so most people won't mind playing against a pink colored eldar force or a BA army, with a scheme which totaly breaks with any codex astartes heraldy rules.
Post a Comment