40K For the Masses: How To Build An Army For Fun – Part 2 List Time
Join Abe as he continues on his quest to build a fun – and effective army.
Last week in part one I started on a quest to build a fun yet still somewhat competitive army. An “OK” army meant more for casual play. I’m doing this to help show how one can build these kind of fun armies without going overboard. Again this is my process, but hopefully, people may find it instructive, or at least entertaining. Now in Part One, we went over the basic idea of the army, today lets get down to the gritty details, the army list.
Recap: Goals
Let’s start with a real quick recap. Last week we discussed that I want to build a fun 2,000 pts Astra Militarum army based on the new Escher models. We talked about how basing the list off those models meant the list was going to feature lots of flamers and close combat options, and as such would be using the Catachan Regimental Doctrine. We also decided we were going to limit the infantry a bit. So with those basics under our belt lets start looking at how we can build and point out an army.
The Core
Every army has to have a core, a kernel to start with. This is the basic force that we are going to be building the army around. For an AM army the cheap basic, yet powerful, Battalion of 2 company commanders and three infantry squads is a good place to start. This will let me show off the Escher models, give me a lot of good CPs and let us build up the army. If I were building purely for efficacy I’d take these units with no upgrades, but we’ve already talked about the models we want to use, so here is our core:
1x Company Commander w/ Plasma Pistol and Power Sword 39
1x Company commander w/ Plasma Pistol and Power Fist-45
10x Infantry Squad w/ 1x Flamer, 1x bolter, 1x power weapon-52
10x Infantry Squad w/ 1x Flamer, 1x power weapon -51
10x Infantry Squad w/ 1x Flamer, 1x bolter, 1x power fist-58
The Wish List
At this point in building an army, I like to come up with kind of a wish list of units to include. It’s also important to be that each unit has a reason for being in the army. Let’s take a look things I want to try and fit in and why.
- 100% the first unit that jumps out at me as HAVING to be in this list is a Bane Wolf. Now, this isn’t a unit I like, but it fits the theme sooo well because its armed with a Chem Cannon. Escher is all about chem weapons, and I cannot pass up including this.
- Valkyries are another just OK unit I’d like to include. This is pretty much solely because I think painting the Escher gang symbol on the wings will look rad. It’ll also give the force some mobility.
- As ganger as this army is no doubt well versed in city fighting and sieges. That to me is an excellent excuse to add in my favorite Imperial tank, the Leman Russ Demolisher, for some heavy weapon firepower.
- I’m really tempted to take a regular Taurox in the list. I think converting a Goliath Truck to act as a Taurox (they carry similar weapons) would help make the army distinctive.
- Priests are a must have, they greatly increase the damage output of my infantry. The Redemptionist Cult started on Necromunda and modeling some of them to be the priests would make a lot of sense.
- Straken- Like the Priest Straken is an excellent force multiplayer for my Catachans. I think we can make a pretty cool looking counts as model.
- More infantry- I do want to show off the models.
- A Command Squad- I love flags. This is how you get a flag.
Building out the List
So based on our core and wish list, here is the list I’ve put together:
Astra Militarum Battalion – Catachan
- 1x Company Commander w/ Plasma Pistol and Power Sword 39 – Kurov’s Aquila
- 1x Company commander w/ Plasma Pistol and Power Fist-45 – Grand Strategist
- 4x Command Squad w/ Regimental Standard – 29 pts
- 1x Ministorium Priest W/ Chainsword – 35
- 10x Infantry Squad w/ 1x Flamer, 1x bolter, 1x power weapon-52
- 10x Infantry Squad w/ 1x Flamer, 1x power weapon -51
- 10x Infantry Squad w/ 1x Flamer, 1x bolter, 1x power fist-58
- 1x Valkyrie w/ multilaser, 2x rocket pods and 2x heavy bolters – 158
Astra Militarum Battalion – Catachan
- 1x Straken – 75
- 1x Tank Commander w/ Demolisher Cannon, Lascannon, 2x Heavy Bolter and Heavy Stubber- 247
- 1x Ministorium Priest W/ Chainsword and autogun- 35
- 10x Infantry Squad W/ 1x bolter and 1x Power sword- 45
- 10x Infantry Squad w/ 1x Flamer, 1x Power Fist -57
- 10x Infantry Squad w/ 1x Flamer 1x Plasma Pistol and 1x Power Weapon- 56
- 1x Bane Wolf w/ Heavy Flamer and Heavy Stubber – 109
- 1x Leman Russ Battle Tank w/ Demolisher Cannon, 3x Heavy Bolter and Heavy Stubber – 190
- 1x Taurox W/ Heavy Stubber- 74
Astra Militarum Battalion – Catachan
- 1x Company commander w/ bolter and Power Fist-41
- 1x Primaris Pysker – 40
- 1x Platoon Commander w/ Power Sword- 24
- 1x Ministorium Priest W/ and autogun- 35
- 1x Bane Wolf w/ Heavy Bolter and Heavy Stubber – 98
- 10x Infantry Squad w/ 1x Plasma Gun 1x Plasma Pistol and 1x Power Weapon- 56
- 10x Infantry Squad 1x Power Sword – 44
- 10x Infantry Squad w/ 1x Flamer 1x Plasma Pistol and 1x Power Fist- 62
- 1x Taurox w/ Storm bolter – 74
- 1x Leman Russ Battle Tank w/ Demolisher Cannon, 1x heavy bolter – 170
1999 pts 18 CPs
Thoughts
So that is the list I’m going off of right now. Counting Characters its 103 Infantry (just above the 100 I wanted) and eight vehicles. I wanted each unit to feel unique, so every unit in the army is equipped differently, no copy and paste here. In addition, I think every unit has a reason to be in the list. I hope you can see how from our starting point were we able to build out this list to make sense and be decent. And I think it could be pretty good. This is going to be a much more ‘in your face’ army than people might expect, but that also fits the Escher way.
The Bad News
So here is the bad news folks. This is most likely as far as the army goes for the meantime. I did this pair of articles to show part of my army building process and give some ideas for how people can build towards more casual lists. While this is an army I would LOVE to build, and have even bought one Escher gang box, realistically I wasn’t planning to build it anytime soon. Since I get to use the BoLS studio armies I haven’t actually built a 40K army of my own in close to 10 years, and while I love to convert, I’m not a painter. At the end of the da,y I doubt I have the time to really build this army in any reasonable time frame. That being said if people are really interested in the project let me know down in the comments. If there is interest I may be able to slowly work up the army and post about it on occasion. Let me know if you’d like that. Also if you have any advice on the list, let me know down below.
Let us know what fun list you are working on, down in the comments!
