Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens: Eldar

Eldar

Pros:

• Sweet assault options
• Nasty artillery"
• Tough support units
• Wraithguard (nuff said)
• Howling Banshees (boobies!!(in armor, but boobies nonetheless))
• Some easy conversion possibilities swapping out Dark Eldar/FB-xElf parts

Cons:

• Plastic tigers (not quite as sucky as Dark Eldar and IG)
• Not much in the way of vehicles
• Not much "medium range" firepower
• Ki's already playing them

Summary: Eldar are probably my first love in 40k. Well, after GW actually came out with something besides space marines and orks and there were options to really fall in love with. I have to admit to a certain fondness for the culture, enjoy the aesthetics and they've got some interesting units. They're a little fragile, but you can work around that if you have to. They specialize a lot, but they have a lot of different types of specialists. Other than the lack of armor and hefty cost on their neater stuff, they're very little I don't like about the Eldar.

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens: Dark Eldar

Dark Eldar

Pros:

• Butt-kicking weapons
• Nasty special abilties
• Wyches (boobies!!(but only sometimes))
• Some easy conversion possibilities swapping out Eldar/FB-xElf parts

Cons:

• Paper tigers
• Sub par miniature quality overall (but see above)

Summary: Interesting in a BDSM meets wargaming sort of way. But once you get past the incubi and the wyches, they don't have much going for them. The mini's are crap for the most part, they have almost no vehicles and what they do have is like cruising around in a tank made of sugar-glass. I'm not sure all of the "neat toys" are worth the ass-raping you'll take after the first turn (assuming you can manage to stay mostly hidden for that first turn).

The race that cannot be named...

I'm not the only one with the squat conversion idea. Some ideas I've seen on forums:

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I've often thought of converting squats/demiurg. I'd need more experience with greenstuff to get the faces right but I can see how they'd work. I'd probablly use them as a space marine proxy army:
Commander - WarlordTechmarine - Guild EngineerChaplin - Ancestor PriestLibrarian - Rune PriestTactical squads - Demiurg ClansmenScouts - BeardlingsRhino/Predator - War WagonTerminators - Hearthguard in exo-armourLand Speeders - GyrocoptersDevastator Squads - Thunderer squadsBike Squads - Trike SquadsAttack bikes - Exo TrikesDreadnoughts - Battle Suit variantsTanks - Land Crawler variantsLand Raider - Heavy Land Crawler

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They could work for space marines becuase of the T4, but if you look at the original squat models they are better suited to Imperial Guard. I use mine for guard and the exo armoured ones make nice Grey Knight allies.

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Just some things to consider.

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens: Daemon/Witchhunters

Daemonhunters

Pros:

• Wargear list lets you really customize your army
• Officio Assassinorum (nuff said)
• Can ally or be allied with Witchhunters, SM or IG

Cons:

• Some of the stuff is very "vs. daemon"-specific
• Can't cross-ally (except with Witchhunters)
• Inquisitorial retinues are pretty weak. Paper tiger syndrome.

Witchhunters

Pros:

• Wargear list lets you really customize your army
• Officio Assassinorum (nuff said)
• Can ally or be allied with Daemonhunters, SM or IG
• Sisters of Battle (Space Marines with boobies!!)

Cons:

• Some of the stuff is very "vs. psyker"-specific
• Can't cross-ally (except with Daemonhunters)
• Inquisitorial retinues are pretty weak. Paper tiger syndrome.

Summary: As a standalone army, both of the Inquisitor armies are pretty beasty, but lack a lot of flavorful supporting units. Sisters of Battle, especially lack much in the way of anti-armor (unless they ally). Grey Knights are pretty much limited to advance-fire-charge, not a lot of "interesting" units, although theoretically they could ally with space marines to fill in some of the gaps. I think both army lists together might have some potential (especially with the right fluff), or possibly as allied units (perhaps doing some sort of "counts as" fluff) to an IG or SM army.

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens:Chaos

Chaos Daemons

Pros:

• Interesting special attacks
• Daemonettes (boobies!!)

Cons:

• Too many to list;

Chaos Space Marines

Pros:

• Chaos Space Marines (nuffsaid)
• Defilers
• Obliterators

Cons:

• Chaos Dreadnoughts (fire frenzy sucks)
• Generic units

Summary: Once upon a time, Chaos had these really interesting army lists. Lots of choices, mortal champions alongside summoned daemons, chaos "gifts" to really personalize your army and match your playing style. I can only assume that somewhere in that great big orgy of mutation, bolter rounds and warp lightning, too many players were using all of those yummy options to mini-max their armies. Now they've separated the Daemons from the Marines. Neither list has "cultists" in it anymore (no Traitor Guard for you, my pretty) and what Gifts are still available are only available to the Daemons, and even then only in very specific sets. No longer can a player create their own truly unique Champions and Princes. The only way to step outside the generic list is to take a pregenerated special character, and unless you're truly dedicated to a "fluffy" army, there's virtually no reason to take anyone but Abbadon. Finally, the only Traitor Legion I ever really identified with were the Iron Warriors, and without the ability to take allies, and no special wargear or vehicle sections for them, you're pretty much SOL (no more Basilisks for the "seige experts").

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens...

I think the first thing I'm going to try and do is list out each of the army types, and then make a pros/cons list for each one that I can add to as I go along. In theory, it should help steer me towards which my list I'll be using. Of course, it's entirely possible I'll just end up adding to the confusion and get nowhere.

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Thoughts and ideas this generated...

• Of all the Chaos fluff, I like the Iron Warriors the best.
• A "Fallen Sisters" chaos army devoted to Slaanesh could be interesting (this idea may just be hormones)
• I like the idea of combining multiple codexes (IG/WH/DH or SM/IG/DH) to create a sort of "fluffy-dex"
• Is there a way to possibly combine those elements to create something close to the Iron Warriors?
• IG as Ultramar PDF? Mix in DH/WH for extra oomph?
• Converting IG and/or SM minis to represent Sq**ts...(wonder if anything will become of the demiurge)

So many options, so little...

I guess the first issue I have is picking which army I want to play. In a perfect world, I'd have the time and money to indulge all of my ideas. But this, as we all know, is not a perfect world. So much to chose from, and almost all of the armiy lists appeal to me in one way or another. And that's before I start considering "counts as" and incorporated allies.

Part of me yearns for the freedom of the "old days", previous editions that allowed you to build your units precisely the way you wanted, or the ability to ally in just about anyone you wanted to. Sort of what Apocalypse started out being. At the same time, I understand how badly those older rules were abused. I distinctly remember having an entire Space Marine 2500pt army wiped out by one "commander" unit with a vortex grenade and eight (yes, I said eight) different saves ranging from armor to force fields to "dodging". So, really, I understand why the army lists have developed the way they have to some extent, and of course, GW has a vested interest in preserving its market share, so the lists are more likely to cater to the miniatures line than the "fluff".

Ultimately, it leaves me with a lot of small decisions to make: this unit vs. that unit on the battlefield, what will be most fun to model for, which miniatures are "coolest", how deep is my pocket, what's allowed in tournament play ('cause I'm considering it amd don't have the money to build a "legal" army just for that reason). I'll figure it out, I'm sure. Maybe ranting about it here will help influence my decision.

First posts: what are they good for?

The ubiquitous first post, wherein I state that nothing is here yet (except this post) and hopefully I will be updating soon.

My intention is to use this blog as a way to catalog and track my wargaming modeling/scratchbuilding "history". Hopefully this will help keep me on track and finishing projects (I am the poster child for ADHD-I). It will also be a way to keep track of where my ideas and skills go.

I'll probably post a few photos of some things I have already made, just to set a sort of "baseline". I know when I first started scratchbuilding, especially from some of the available templates, it was a lot of trial and error work. No instructions, poor or non-existent labeling, etc. I may eventually get around to providing tutorials/instructions for some of my projects, perhaps the template constructions as well to help out other folks.