Reviewing the actual cost of entry to wh40k, Space marine version

After living with the actual prices for a while I got thinking about the money needed to field your first army, on a budget I m not talking about a winning list here just a playable one, mostly because not all players think about that when they are new, my thinking goes more on the boxes or blisters needed when you don't have or don't like the introductory box set (]remember AOBR is going out, and no everyone will want the new one) For that you will need at least the codex, 1 HQ and troops.

1. The Codex will take from you: $41.25
2. HQ will take you anywhere from 16 to 21.50 depending on your choice, but lets use the higher choice since it will let you pick a better named character.
3. For the troops even if you can choose 2 scout units at $50 a more balanced choice, from my perspective, is to have one combat squad at 37.50 and one scout unit at 25 giving you a cost of $62.50.

So far the minimal army needs $125.25, a bit pricy and at that price someone would say that the battle force would take a quarter less, but then you would still need the codex and the HQ. That would mean another 62.75,that translate int a bill of 182.75.The extra money would mean an extra troop choice with transport and under 6th edition a valuable an assault choice, lets keep the battle-force like a possible choice. Meanwhile look at the boxes on others categories that are needed for a  playable army

1. We have reached the elite choice here the safest choice is a terminator unit so that adds $50 and it can be regular or assault terminators, but the better one is the assault ones.
2. The fast attack choice I believe that you can go with either the land speeder at $30 or the assault squad at $33 for cheapness sake I will go with the first at $30, but at just 3 dollars more and the new rules the second option is viable.
3. The last choice is Heavy support here you cant go wrong with the predator at $57.75 since we want economy of price and points is better than the $75 for a land-raider

All of that sums $263 Dollars, that is around 997 points  when you use the unit  options. That is pricey for a selection that is pretty standard and if you want to be competitive you will need more money, what I'm saying even if you don't and don't change anything you will need more money, since a new player wont have the paints and the tools needed that one will cost and it can be from a few dollars to some hundreds. just food for the brain.

Now we can get back to that battle force, would it be cheaper? First if you buy it, it sums $125 but detracts $30 from the fast attack choice and $62.75 from the troops choice  so we end up with $295.25 just $32.25 for a combat squad and a transport and that means  more points like 1250 points, both routes are enough to get someone hooked to the game system but at those prices is a hard proposition. wich takes me to the following

a good investment? perhaps, but it depends of how much you valuate your hobby time I do and believe that every dollar is a good cost, even if it pains me to pay for it since I need a good chunk of my pay for it. A new player might be put off by it or hopefully select a cheaper game system. What do you think it will.

The next post in the series will analyze the cost of entry for an Ork player and so on for every army.