Considering a second army

[DavionStar]

Hey there.

I'm thinking about making a second army to work on the side. I love my Kharadron and will be focusing on finishing them, but variety is nice too. I don't know all the details of every army so I was wondering if I could get help deciding.

I want two things for this army. 1) Magic. I'm not gonna get much or any magic playing Duardin so I'd like my second army to have good magic options. 2) Killyness. KO isn't always great at just wiping things off the board, which is fine, but I'd like my new army to be a bit better at straight up killing.

I'm not looking for a super competitive army, as if I do that I'm gonna stick with KO. I can always ally in Stormcasters (haha jokes) if I feel the need for spells.

Here's a list of armies I've been looking at.

Stormcast - Yeah I know. Something something Ground Marines. But I love the lightning aesthetic and they have really nice models.

Deepkin - Look at that, elves I actually like. And they have cool sea monsters to boot.

Sylvaneth - A little on the fence about these guys but I've seen some sick looking haunted forest color schemes for them.

Tzeentch - The go to Magic army from what I've read, and a lot of cool units to boot. I could have fun mixing bright colors.

Nurgle - My other fave Chaos God, though the putrid flesh might be hard to paint.

Nighthaunt - Spooky ghosts with scythes. They just look damn neat.

Soulblight - What can I say? I love bats. Not sure if they're a proper army or not though...the Death armies confuse me a bit.

Ironjaws - The only Destruction army I have interest in. And Ork/Orruk magic is hilarious.

[Skabnoze]

55 minutes ago, DavionStar said:

Ironjaws - The only Destruction army I have interest in. And Ork/Orruk magic is hilarious.

So as it currently stands you are not going to find much magic in an Ironjawz army.  They only have a single wizard, the Weirdnob, and their battletome is very old and was written before allegiance spell lores become a thing in AoS.  So the Weirdnob only has the spell that comes on his warscroll, generic endless spells, and the various generic spells.  His Foot of Gork spell is admittedly a whole lot of fun to use - but it has a high casting cost and most of the time it won't be a focal point of your strategy.

In fact, many Ironjawz armies look to allied Grot wizards (hello Fungoid Shaman!) instead.  Whenever GW rewrites their battletome they will probably get a full spell lore and make more use of magic, but we have no idea when that will happen.

But what Ironjawz do have is brute force aggression and the army certainly has "killyness" in spades.  Mawkrushers, Megabosses, Brutes, and Gore Gruntas are all quite effective at beating the snot out of things.  Ardboys are probably the least killy unit in the army and they still smash things pretty well.  Currently the majority of different Ironjawz army builds function around the playstyle of:  line up across from the enemy and then run straight at them and punch them in the face.  If that is something you are interested in then they are not a bad choice.  Just be aware of what you are getting into with these guys.

[Greyshadow]

Don't have to justify wanting Stormcast here. They are definitely on my list of armies too. Fists of Sigmarite Warrior Chamber infantry army is the way I am planning to go.

[Alcina]

if you want magic and killyness, just go for Tzeench: Daemons are heavy magic, but really heavy, (and you can play them also at 40K), not too strong otherwise, but mixed with the human part, kilyness is arising a lot. + you can add slaves to darkness units, which make a lot for the variety, both in term of playing and of painting. 40K side, you can then also quickly expand into 1k sons with also a lot of variety and a lot of models which all in all can be used in both systems.

when well used and the right combos, both in AOS and 40K quite competitive

[JPjr]

Tzeentch, just as I can’t imagine a more fun army to paint.

[TMS]

2 hours ago, DavionStar said:

Soulblight - What can I say? I love bats. Not sure if they're a proper army or not though...the Death armies confuse me a bit.

You can be safe in the knowledge that they're a proper army, indeed. Page 72 of the Legions of Nagash book has the allegiance abilities, traits and artefacts for soulblight armies. They're limited to only Blood Knights as battleline choices since all the ordinary ones for Legions of Nagash can only be taken as allies for soulblight. It's a very specialized elite army but the one I've found to be the most fun. Every character is a wizard and most units can do a load of damage, especially on the charge.

[DavionStar]

@Skabnoze Thanks for the insight. I'll avoid the orc boyz for now then. Nothing against the army, of course. I just want more spells.

@Greyshadow I'm so used to skirting the edges of this fandom that I just so often hear "Oh so you like Space Marines/Stormcast? What a basic b****" when it's discussed. But as I keep learning, it seems like everyone here is just super super cool. ❤️

@Alcina Ah that's right. Tzeentch does share a load of units between AoS and 40k. Considering my local (as in 5 minute drive) store seems to focus more on 40k, that makes running them all the more tempting. I'd love to make a Thousands Suns warband army if I went 40k.

@TMS Good to know! Looking at it yeah, the army is super expensive. Would probably make getting a 2k army a touch cheaper in cash though, heh. (I'd love to run a bunch of Vargeists and ally in a Terrorgeist for maximum bat if I can manage it)

Thanks so much folks~ I think what I'll do is come up with some 1k armies (2k for Soulblight) with the Warscroll Builder that look cool to me, throw them at the appropriate forums in the Grand Army area, and see what people say.

[calcysimon]

Nurgle guyz flesh is easy to paint since you can do it like you want (more colors more realistic), if u search for YouTube videos you will understand easily (rusty metals too). nurgle strategy and playstyle is the total opposite to ko

 

 

Idoneth fun to paint, fish are the bests

 

Nighthaunt are really a good army to paint but with 5-10 colors you can paint all of them

 

[bsharitt]

I guess for the ones I actually have:

Stormcasts: I really like the models that came out with the Sacrosanct release. Now they feel like superhuman heroes and warriors rather than the inhuman metal golems the 1.0 Stormcasts felt like. For game play, they're probably the best jack of all trades army, so if your play style preferences aren't set, you can do a lot of shifting around to have the army play completely different and you can build a pretty magical army if that's your aim.

Nurgle: Probably one of my favorite armies. I love Nurgle, the models are great across the board. Their core play style is basically outlast a battle of attrition with your opponent, which some people find boring but I really like. There's more offensive ways to play too though. There is some magic, and it can be pretty important to the army, magic isn't what I would consider a lynchpin to the army like Tzeentch.

Nighthaunt: Okay, this is probably tied with Nurgle as favorite. I liked all their models(minus the old Black Coach) before they even got their new release, but the new models(especially the new Black Coack) are fantastic. With their ignoring rend and deathless spirits, they can kind play the attrition game I like to do with my Nurgle, but can also be a fast killy army, especially if you roll those 10+ charges. I don't play them super magic heavy, but the potential is there.

[DavionStar]

Kinda super leaning towards Tzeentch or Nurgle now. Just cause of the 40k connection. If I base my army list with human/gor units supported by demons, then all I need to add to the 40k army is the choas marine units. I mean I could go pure demons too but eh...I like having the mortal element in there too.

I'll probably slowly grab some Nighthaunt ghosties, some vargulfs, maybe a Namtari unit just to have and to paint. And I'll probably get some Stormcast wizards so I could ally them into my KO army anyways as an option.

Thanks again for all the insight folks~ Love you guys. ❤️