What was your first army?

Night Lords. I loved the winged helms, and the fact that their primarch was a twisted homicidal version of batman.

I started out with Craftworld Eldar at age 11. It was the summer of 1997 and I was living in England. A friend had come back from summer vacation in the Old Country (Sweden, in this case) and he called me over with a very excited tone of voice and urged me to come over to see the "coolest thing ever!". So I did and there he was with a 40k 2nd Ed starter set with fully painted Orks and sold off Space Marines.

I was thrilled, albeit sceptical to the fact that I'd have to paint the miniatures on my own. I chose the Eldar. I don't really remember why, but I can recall really liking the look of the Eldar Guardians with lasguns and got me a boxed set. I think it cost something like £5 and contained ten of them. I painted them up as various Craftworlds, depending on which look I liked more for the miniature in question, so there I was with Biel-tan and Saim Hann jetbikes, an Ulthwe Wraithlord (or Eldar dreadnought as they were called back then) and Iyanden Guardians (I remember liking them like that because they have the colours of the Swedish flag and I could loudly claim that they were the Caroleans of Charles XII ).

I played the Eldar for some time, until me and my friends lost interest for 40k and moved on to Gorkamorka and then, after a brief romance with WHFB's The Empire, I quit the hobby for a couple of years.

Around 2000 I was back in Sweden and my cousin had recently bought the 3rd Ed starter set and played Dark Eldar. So I awoke my Craftworlders from their slumber and played actively in tournaments and against my cousin for a while. I can recollect really being envious of his DE and their strength, since he curb stomped me in every game we played. It all stopped though when it was discovered that he cheated like crazy and faked his stat lines (we had this informal rule that you couldn't look in the other's Codex, since that would make it too easy to beat the other (we thought). I don't think we played much after that.

When puberty hit I quit the hobby once again. It wasn't cool to play 40k, you see. But now I'm old and have a reasonably well-paying job and don't give a damn about being cool, so last autumn me and a friend bought the Blood Island box and slowly made our way back into this utterly addictive hobby. After moving to Germany I met a lot of 40k players but very few fantasy players, so I decided to get back into 40k after almost exactly a decade. I was not even considering Eldar or their Dark Kin when I started the tedious process of deciding which army to go with; I feared their play style would be too much like my High Elves and I wanted some variation, but having seen the new DE and read their fluff, I knew I wanted them.

Last Sunday I played my first game of 40k, a small game against the Space Marines. I won and I am really excited about the tactical possibilities of the DE. They'll most definitely be my long term army (even if 6th Ed frak them over).

Technically I started with Black Template/Dark Eldar but I played with the Dark Eldar and let my friend play with the Black Templar.

I started with Raven Guard and moved onto Orks before finally settling on Night Lords for a while. Then the new Dark Eldar came out. I like the maniacal, sneaky, 'rip-your-face-off-before-you-notice-it is-missing' types of armies.

Nids. I believe I started about two years ago? It may have been three. I had been looking for an excuse to start 40k, especially since my LGS was almost all 40k players at that point, very few played Fantasy until 8th came out. So I hopped on the bandwagon and started Nids when their dex came out, which I later found out may have been a mistake, especially considering I never play them anymore.

Perhaps 6 months to a year later, I started DE (yes, with the old dex), jumping straight into a 1500 army after only a few Vassal games and lots of research. I felt they fit my play-style better than Tau, being much more maneuverable and glass cannon-like. Not long after, the new DE dex came out, and I started kicking myself because the old models looked so crappy and I had just bought 1500 points of them (plus some Elf models, for converting to be my Archon and Wyches). Even to this day, the only new models I possess are the Razorwing (gorgeous model, though a pain to build as a lot of parts don't fit together well, especially the turbines), and the Haemonculus.

tau.

i loved the fact that they could take missiles on just about everything, the ability to move during assault and the fact they have the railgun. I love railguns.

My first army was a 1500 point Black Templar list with two land raiders full of crusaders.

Original original....mmm that would be those that are not named (Squats) back in Rouge trader days.
after that i started building an Ork army but never really played it.
But my first Army i seriously played and enjoyed was Dark Eldar to which i now return.

My first would be the RT01 marines painted in the black dark angels colours - they sat alongside my Rt era harlies where 18 models was 4000 points!!!

Man, it was so long ago that it's a lil hazy as to what actually came first. I collected and painted random stuff for a while before playing Rogue Trader. I too had the RT01 marines and painted them black Dark Angels, along with random orks, and WFB skeletons.

But my first proper active army was craftworld eldar, painted Alaitoc just like the white dwarf showcase. I even had the tiny Avatar. My fave model was the Dark Reaper exarch with web of skulls and the very old Farseer.

Eldarz.

I was given the 2nd Ed Boxed game for my 12th b'day in '95 after ranting about this awesome magazine one of my friends had. it had a battle report with nid vs eldar/guard alliance. i was stuck for choice, nids the prime contenders after their pwnage in the battle report and the colours and pointy bits... but fell in love with jetbikes and the models as the owner of the local had a saim hann jetbike swarm... and then after looking throught the codex.

me and my dad built an ork army for my eldar to stomp along the way... many orks fell to the chainswords of the star performers in my amy at the time- 10 Scorpions

I dont think my dad ever won a battle.... ahh good times...

Space Marines. I thought they were the coolest thing in 40k...but then I did start in 2nd edition, where Eldar had stupid clown helmets.

Played Marines for 6 months. Got bored with them and tossed up between Eldar and Dark Eldar. Went with DE, and have never looked back since.

Orks

Spent the weekend at a friends house, watched him play an all-berzerker Khorne army against his brothers Space Marines. Needless to say, he was shot to pieces. i asked for advice on what to play and he recommended Orks. 20 Boyz for £15 later was my introduction to the hobby properly.

Then had a few years of flitting betwen every army i liked the look of.
Chaos (which i still collect on the side), Tau, Imperial Guard, Space Wolves, Daemonhunters and Witchunters. Now that I'm old enough to not snap fragile little Eldars when i pick them up my DE aspirations are finally being realised

Well my first army was Wood Elves and i still play them and love the models. I got into fantasy because my brother had an empire army and my dad had an ork army, yet they never played instore so i started playing orks i guess, but i wont tarnish my name with that so letts skip that to my first trip to the stroe. It was like a candy store, but BETTER! This was at the beggining of 7 ed of fantasy. My dad said i could start any army i wanted, he lead to me dwarves and there unwinnable gunlines, i said "too beardy", he lead me to chaos, i said "to armoured" and after a while he thought i wasnt going to buy one at all. BUT as we where walking out i saw the wood elves and they just had the new book and models and fell instantly in love. People said they where hard to win with, and i fell even further!

after a 2k WE army which i still play when i can i decided i have to start 40k, mainily because every1 plays 40k! Any way i was almost taken by CSM until the staff said they where a 'good' army and i wouldn't lose with them, i put them down immediatly. I asked which army takes the most skill, i was pointed to dark eldar, who also got there new book/models released, a SIGN!. i was advised against it, i didnt care and now im thriving with my elitest army and winning every game in my bracket.....of begginers/medium players.


I LOVE THE UNDER DOGS!!!!!!!

First "army" was back in 3rd edition. Had about 1000 pts eldar or so, was a big fan of banshees and scorpions (pew pew neck shot!). Had a very long break, came back around the end of 5th edition playing Space Wolves and now Dark Eldar.

What can i say i bought the starter set and played with the space marines

Started with Dark Eldar on December 2012... quite new to 40k

If I can recall correctly it was Khornate Chaos Space Marines back in 2nd edition.

IG 1999, the first models I bought were SM but my first army was IG

In Rogue Trader I played Eldar.

1st army was dark eldar, i played mostly fantasy ( dark elves) and the transition seemed appropriate.

god i miss those 100pt sniper squads and archon's on jet bikes with punisher's.

and i never have nor ever will lower my standards and get a SM army of any chapter

darthken239 wrote:

and i never have nor ever will lower my standards and get a SM army of any chapter

Welcome to the club!
Leave them for the pitiful mon-keigh!

Eldar for me, and then Eldar for me again. back in the day i when i was introduced to this game, it was the Harlequins that i fell in love with, but sadly the guy who introduced me wasn't interested in teaching, he was more into the ego trip of stomping a win out of someone. This put me off and i literally forgot about the game, until after year 2K, at which point it was a toss up between Tau and Eldar. Once again though, the Eldar won out due to the Harlequins and Howling Banshees. My Eldar currently sit somewhere around 20K pts.

next up is my Orks, they started out as nothing more than a small band of boyz, a nob, a mech, and a trukk, lost in the deserts of Gorkamorka. A warp portal opened up and pulled them in, spitting them out shortly thereafter on a major world somewhere in the imperium (i haven't built a back story for them yet), after which every time it gets dark (IE: i turn out the lights to go to bed) they breed and build more stuff for the waaaaugh, and currently sit at 7.5K pts worth of Bad Moonz.

3rd is the Tyranid of Hive Fleet Murder, these guys were actually my 2nd army, but were quickly surplanted by the Orks, and i have just under 2500 pts.

4th is Cycrons, or for those with a serious sense of humor, Nylons. Necron Models with GS'ed heads to make them look like the current BSG Cylons, also thinking of adding in a sqaud or two of Cybermen from Dr. Who. no back story for these guys yet either. they currently sit at 3K pts.

then there are the armies that are not yet ready to field, 5th up is the Dark Eldar, 6th is Sisters of Battle, and 7th are my Hydrissians.

"your what?" i hear you say. yes is said Hysdrissians, they look like this:


probably end up using the tau codex for these guys, not sure yet, but they are just too cool looking to not turn them into an army.
at any rate there you have it, how i got into 40K, what army hooked me, and the armies that have been started since then. maybe one day i will actually get them all painted and based. (gawd, i hate painting, love building and converting, hate painting.)

Tyranids were my first army in the form of a box of stealers, shame they kinda suck now.

2nd was my Daemon Hunters pure GK army

Then Guard that started off as allies for my grey knights and eventually evolved into an army in itself (about 5k points!)

4th was Salamanders

and Finally DE!

I've also inherited a CSM force and a small tau army from a friend who quit a while ago but haven't really had the time to do anything with either of them yet