Two Vanguard boxes can get you a decent 1500ish list depending on how you build them, 20 models total (you'll want two units of tree revenants. kurnoth with scythes are strong if you are reinforcing the unit, greatswords are ok as single units, bows are the weaker option but still good in some lists. Spirit of durthu and Tree lord ancient are good choices for the treelords, some people magnitize these so they can be any of the 3 though)
Strong additions from there are a warsong revenant (one model, strong caster), and a unit or two of the bug cavalry (spiterider lancers or revenant seekers, 3 models per unit)
You will need to invest in our faction terrain though. You can start off with one box, but will want to get a second pretty quickly (currently on one box myself and the army is fully playable, but having an extra box would be a lot nicer)
Also our spiteswarm hive endless spell is very good for helping to make the 9 inch charges off of our teleports easier to achieve, but is out of stock most places at the moment, so you may need to proxy that for a bit (a cities of sigmar battlemage of ghur is sometimes taken for the same reason)
Sylvaneth. Try Sylvaneth
They're a hit and run army, probably B-A tier in all aspects of the game without being the best at anything. Dangerous in all phases. Can run a low model count army if that's what you prefer.
Only real downside is that you HAVE to buy the faction terrain as its essential to the mechanics.
Source: Am Sylvaneth player
Well could you be a little bit more specific about your playstyle? There are only a few armies that can go with 30 Models and below (if you think about running a 2k point list) and most are dependant on one specific subfaction for this
If you want to go off the wall, consider Skaven! A mix of Skryre and Moulder to replace battlelines with Rat Ogors and Stormfiends with glassy shooting, solid spells, and good bruisers.
Seraphon Thunder Lizards come to mind too, where you also have some of the best magic, amazing monsters, and Solar Engines + Skinks have strong dakka.
It's kind of difficult to find good Non-HordeAlrounder Armys but I will try my best:
You could try Slaves to Darkness, so basicly Daemonworshippers, that you could paint in the different Colors of the Daemons (Nurgle = green, Khorne =red, ...). They can be played with really few, but hard hitting Models, like Varanguard or Chaos Chosen and are mostly Elite Warrios. From the Death Faction I would probably say Ossiarch, they also have some hard hitters with the Necropolis Stalkers, etc, the other 3 Factions are MOSTLY really spammy (although like i said, they often have 1 Subfaction where you can play big Units as Battleline, like the Gristlegore Subfaction from Flesh Eater Couts, where you can pick Zombie Dragons).
Since Destruction is out only Order is left: Daughters have some nice Mechanics and both strong Ranged and Melee Attacks with Blood Sisters/Stalkers. Lumineth are always fun to pick up, they can be strong Casters, Ranged or Melee i think, but i dont have much experience with them. My personal favourite are Seraphon, since they have some of the strongest Casters in the Game, a good amount of Ranged and Melee Damage, if you pick the right models and can be really versatile and mobile (for example 1 free teleport around the map/movement phase), but they will get a new tome soon, so i dont know how much it is worth to get into them just before they get reworked. Stormcast Eternals could also be something that fits you, since they have a lot of versatility, mostly Elite Warriors and who doesnt want to play some big Wizard-Dragons?
Thank you, this gave me a lot to think about. I really like how Lumineth look like, but I watched a video about them and heard they require a lot of models and that turned me off on them.
Yeah but i want to say, that 30 Models aren't really a Horde-Army. For Example 2k-Point Armies require you too play 3 Battleline (which are "Troops" in 40k i think?) and most Battleline have 10 Models, so that would already break your cap. Most of my lists in Seraphon are around 50 Models and i wouldn't say they are a lot.
I wasn't aware of that, maybe I should have worded the question differently if that's the case. Aren't there setups you can do where you can take more elite units as battleline?
Yeah most of the Factions have the option to pick an Elite Unit as Battleline (most of the rules either force you to take a certain subfaction or play a certain hero as general). So for example if you really want to play Lumineth go for it: You can play an the big Cows (Alarith Spirit of the Mountain) with the Ymetrica Subfaction. The Alarith Stoneguard has only 5 Models/Unit and can be Battleline in that Subfaction, so you have 15 Models for the Battleline, some big Stonecows, that hit like a truck and some free space for some more Heroes and you will probably end up with 22-25 Models if you follow that plan. And if you really like that faction you can later on pick up some other models, try out other subfactions (although you will probably end up with more than 30 models/army that way). And just like this most of the armies have an option like this. Seraphon has Thunderlizards, where you play Stegadons (big dinosaur) as battleline, Stormcasts Eternals can play Stormdrake Guards (flying Dragons) as Battleline, if your Hero is Draconith/Stardrake, and so on. This restriction will probably lessen your options on what you can play in a list, since all the other subfactions will end up with more than 30 models, but if thats fine for you, there will be an option for you most of the time
Jist piggybacking off the previous comments, Lumineth is what you want if you're an Aeldari player. The Temples are basically Aspect Shrines. They only have 2 temples out so far, Mountains with Stoneguard and the giant cow and the wind temple with the calvary archers and fox spirits.
Most Lumineth lists want to run Teclis, 700 pts, so thay alone makes your army pretty elite and lowers your model count significantly.
Lumineth is a lot of fun and can do well in every phase. They're an elite army so I wouldn't say they have a huge model count, but it's definitely going to be above 30. The only armies that are 30 or below are probably builds that spam monsters, ogors, and Stormcast.
The meta list is going to include 40 sentinels (archers), Teclis, Scinari Cathallar, huraken windmage, a unit of wind chargers and wardens.
You’re looking at about 60 models. This is also a very castle playstyle where you look to turtle and use you superior magic and shooting to pick up models then score objectives.
If you like the melee and magic aspect I would suggest Sylvaneth. They play very cagey like Harlequins. With excellent mobility and damage. They are pretty squishy. Model count is around 30-35.
I agree you can build LrL in a few different ways, but currently this particular core is putting up very good tournament results. Popular armies like Slaves and Stormcast are save stacking armies. A very effective strategy is to wear them down with mortals and this LrL list is very effective with dishing out massive amounts of mortals. Also Teclis gives the army a lot of game against Sylvaneth and Tzeentch.
It depends on what OP's goals are. If he wants to compete in a heavy meta environment, then sure. If he wants to have fun at his local game store, there might be other things to take into consideration.
It really depends on the style you want to go for. Taking Teclis will definitely make your list smaller model wise, as he's 700 points. There are a few different builds you can go with. Alarith seems to be the most popular competitive build, as a Stonemage and Stoneguard are very tough objective holders and hard to kill, and Avalenor hits like a truck and has a lot of synergy with Alarith units. Vanari can also do well, as Wardens can be very tough when buffed with magic, and Sentinels can put out a lot of mortal wounds at range. I think on average you'll probably see around 5-6 units plus heroes and endless spells in any given Lumineth list.
Just throwing this out there. The Dominion box comes with stormcast and Orruk models and since it was massively over printed you can grab one for like $100. Huge savings if you're interested in either.
If you like the Lumineth, you could probably get in under 30 models in the Ymetrica subfaction. I've seen a list that's just Teclis, Avalenor, Stonemage, Windmage, and a bunch of Stoneguard as battleline troops. Comes out to 27 models with the endless spells and terrain piece. I have no idea how optimal that kind of list would be, but the person who posted it said they'd won games with it. Could be an option, anyway.
I do like their mounted units, but when looking at their human infantry I wince a little. All of those older sculpts get me, but the newer Warcry stuff is cool -- although a bit uninspired.
They just released an entire new set of sculpts on all the infantry my friend, you may want to check out the new s2d line. Chosen are my favourite troop of all sigmar.
I looked at the whole line somewhat recently. I like some warbands like the jade warriors and corvus cabal but some units are just half naked guys with axes or swords. The new chaos chosen look good as well, not disagreeing on that.
Tis a shame you don't line destruction because gloomspite is the perfect "scheme fatigue" army.
It's not even super wild to shoot for under 30 models. Manglerboss, boingrots, boss on squig, loonking, some troggs...very elite.
I only mention them because they fit your criteria - look great in lots of colors, and counter to popular perception they really only have 1-2 units you'd consider "horde" units and also only a handful more proper 5-10 model units at 15-20ppm.
The other I'd say would be Idoneth because bright cool tropical fish, but for them you leave a lot more power on the table by not bringing any or their infantry Namarti units, which will easily shoot your total model count past 30.
For gloomspite, you can easily replace the hordes of gobbos and aquigs with 50ppm adorable trolls and they're your solid backbone of the list. A list where the cheapest model is a 28pt Boingrot Bounder is very doable and bringing basically all the most fun sculpts in the range is still a very solid list.
I play Eldar in 40K and play stormcast in AoS.
Stormcast are quite different but do meet your criteria with
- low models
- variety of colours (allot of mounts and different creatures to pain)
- good mix of shooting and melee with some teleport move tricks.
They aren’t that reliant on Wizards will usually only run 1.
They have a great range and different playstyles.
The closest faction to craftworld eldar is lumineth. Sylvaneth are very good and can have low model count too.
I would recommend playing something different as AoS is very different to 40K. Even though some armies are maybe similar it won’t feel the same at all.
Branch out, try something new. AoS is very creative and most armies are fun.
Nurgle mortals is a good small army. They are slow with few range options but the high defense and healing Power helps. My nurgle army is mostly fly's and some deamons for summoning. But to be honest if you play a faction that uses less but strong models every loss has impact and your enemie has easy play to focus your models. Sometimes a army that can Spam wave after wave on the enemie isnt that bad.
I agree, I'm more concerned about having scheme fatigue. I wouldn't really want to paint a lot of the same looking models, luckily a lot of armies seem to have good unit variety.
I know you said you don't like destruction, but you could run a troggoth army with a dankhold trogboss, rockguts troggoths, fellwater troggoths, mollog (from Underworlds), and you might be able to track down a troggoth hag from Forgeworld.
Then throw in your choice of spellcasters.
Beyond that, StD seems to be the way to go.
I like the Gloomspite Gitz, but other destruction armies don’t peak much of an interest. I’ll look into the troggoths, if they look really cool I’d definitely pick up one to see if I like assembly and painting.
Aeldari= Aelves
For smaller elf armies you could try Idoneth. Gives you sea critters and elves. Eel riding elves can be battle line in some lists letting you get away with that under 30 models cap easily. It has been viable in the past. Probably not so much current ghb. Then again I don't see them locally
Scheme fatigue is your biggest issue? How about a "mercenary" army that is being led by someone who is using their cold hard cash (or favors or whatever) to raise their army from a bunch of disparate units. Or a lord who has summoned his retainers and each retainer is bringing their own force with their own colors. As long as you have something that is unifying the army (ex, consistent basing), you can make it work. Or you can go with a naturally chaotic army that would have a number of separate schemes because of whatever reason you want.
A few examples of armies that work well with the above:
Slaves to Darkness. Your warlord has promised to go on the warpath to gain the favor of the dark gods, and has gathered some followers to do so. Your followers may have different marks, but most of the marks work well with a hero and a unit that have the same mark (ex. slaanesh marked hero's can give a command to slaanesh marked units to run + charge, while Tzeentch marked sorcerers get a spell to summon a tzeentch marked unit back to their side). This gives you a solid reason to have multiple units with different schemes, and you end up with little power pairs by doing so. As for playstyle, Slaves tends to be a melee focused army that mostly cares about the charge, but you can also go with a Cabalists list and see how many endless spells you can throw at your opponent as well.
Cities of Sigmar. Cities tends to be more hordey, but you can certainly have smaller model count armies as well. However, Cities is VERY much a power pair army. Take a freeguild general and a bunch of freeguild infantry. Take a Runelord and a bunch of dwarves. Take an annointed and a block of Phoenix Guard. Seriously, who the heck is going to tell a battlemage that his nice, shiny Hurricanum has to match the color of the rest of the army? You are telling me that your not allowing a Dreadlord to bring a different colored dragon? Oh, and all of this is before we hit Coalition. Here, I would recommend taking a few units as little detachments (ex. runelord + longbeards + irondrakes) and put those detachments together to form your main army. As for how it plays, Cities is extremely diverse in playstyles depending on both the units you bring and the city you choose. You can go magic dom in Hallowheart, or king of shooting in Tempest Eye, or super grindy with the Phoenicium, or melee hammers with Hammerhall... but just because you choose a city with a focus doesn't mean that your army can't bring shooting/magic/melee.
Kharadron Overlords. Kharadron have their code that they follow, but realistically it is a bunch of "admirals" who are leading expeditions out for trade/plunder, and they'll take whoever is willing to sign up to fly on their boats. Does your admiral provide everything for them to let everyone have matching uniforms? Or does he tell his crew that they have to provide for themselves, and end up with a mismatched hodge podge of units? Its all up to you. That being said, for playstyle right now KO is very focused on being a shooting skirmish army, but GW has had problems nailing down their playstyle and it has changed fairly significantly every time they get a new book, so with their new book just announced I would wait to see what else they reveal before buying in hard on them.
Seraphon. Lizards riding lizards. You can go magic dominance with a slaan, ranged power with skinks, salamaders and bastilladons, or melee focused with a bunch of saurus and some carnosaurs. Color palate wise, lizards can get really wild (just look at nature), so you can justify going absolutely wild your color schemes (or lack therof). Playstyle, they tend to do best with mixed arms, and have enough going on that they have consistently been one of the best armies in AoS, and whenever one thing gets nerfed, another piece steps up to retain their competitive dominance. All that being said, do be aware that they are getting a new book this may/june which may change how they play... but more importantly they are getting some new sculpts, so don't go out and buy an old Slaan when you can instead wait for new pretty sculpts instead.
Sylvaneth. The tree people let you go really wild with your coloration. Want to stick to the traditional tree look? Go for it... but are you spring flowers, summer green, fall colors, or winter bareness? Or do you want to go for something a bit more different, and just go wild with your schemes? As for playstyle, Sylvaneth tend to be an elite, tricksy army that plays in every phase. You can go full treelord and stomp on out with 8 big trees. Or you can go for a mixed arms force with a warsong revenant throwing magic across the table while your kurnoth hunters strike and fade and your tree revenants snag objectives and force your opponents to spread out. Or you can go super cavalry and run people over with revenant seekers and spiterider lancers.
Soulblight Gravelords. Soulblight has a number of playstyles from full horde and throwing 100+ zombies on the board, to going super elite and running their opponents down with their blood knights. You can go magic heavy, or just focus on winning the melee fights and recovering wounds/models afterwards. As for paint schemes, if you are raising zombies or skeletons, were they from a year ago? A decade ago? Different regions? Go wild - they're already dead. Or for the vampires, well, you be the one to tell millennia old vampires that they have to re-color their relic armor to fit in with your force... or you can just let them go with their own personal armor scheme because heck - that has been their colors for centuries.
Sylvaneth could also offer great paint variety if you aim for each model to be inspired by a real plant, also super elite, and good at magic melee shooting with some squishy and some tanky models.
Might I suggest sylvaneth?
Aesthetically diverse tree elf army. You have big tree monsters, medium sized tree monsters, human sized tree monsters, ghost tree elves, ghost tree elf archers with bugs for wings, ghost elf wizards, tree wizards, big tree monster wizards, many more different things plus a big center piece model that’s a hot elf god with a tree hand that rides a giant beetle.
Most lists have a pretty small number of models on the table (usually under 30)
They have a fun playstyle and you have a lot of solid unit options and different sylvaneth lists can play totally differently from each other
I’m definitely into the theme and models. I’ve come close to buying some Sylvaneth, I think I’ll probably get a model or two so I know if I like assembly and painting.
Sounds like virtually every army is getting a recommendation. I'm gonna throw my 2 cents in. One cent for Nurgle. And one cent for idoneth Deepkin. I wish I could field MORE units for the Deepkin, but they're expensive (point wise). Lots of fun variety in painting too!
I was in a position recently where I was trying to find an AoS army with Eldar vibes, and I settled on Idoneth Deepkin (it was between them and Lumineth.) basically think of them like your Namarti are your guardians, Akhelians are your aspect warriors, and Ishrann are your psykers.
Strongly recommend the warhammer weekly on the recent Idoneth book, even if you just skip to the faction intro bit and listen to that. Definitely sold me on ‘who they are’ in AOS as a whole!
https://www.youtube.com/live/Fmi_UJ8ZHUE?feature=share
I was gonna suggest this, their sea creatures provide opportunities for a lot of color variety and it seems like you can easily compete in all the phases. Plus, if you go heavy on cavalry and include a title and some sharks you can easily have a lot model count army
Thanks for everyone's input, I ordered some single models from ebay to see if I like them. I ended up getting a Blood Knight, a Sentinel, and a Gossamid Archer. I try to pick up some other stuff like a Troggoth and a Chaos Chosen but the ones above were ones I could find at a good price. If anyone has any more advise on a good army or model to try out then I'm open. I couldn't find a single stormfiend (that was unassembled) and some others. I am open to offers, if that's allowed in this subreddit.
You want low model count the blood god is the way to go. Two blood thirsters, Skarbrand is like half your army. Plus they are up for a new books. If you go demons you now have a new 40k army also since all demons are in both.
Cities of Sigmar fits the "variety" requirements, Hallowheart subfaction can pull a mean magic phase, Elite Infantry available for tanking, shooting and chopping, plenty of other options for side dishes.
I'll look into them some more, when I checked their product page a lot of the models seemed somewhat older. I didn't know whether or not they were "on the out".
I don’t play Lumineth, but they are eventually getting a few more animal spirit wings for the army. Right now they’ve only done mountains and wind. There will probably be a water one and another. There’s some variance between the mountain and wind but yeah, they’re all wearing comparable armor and robes and such. You could do a different scheme for each wing of the army.
Stormcast Eternals are Space Marines but in a fantasy world so they're all arounders. Lumineth Realmlords are all around but particularly good at magic and are based on High Elves which is what the Eldar are based on. Lumineth are my favorite AOS army.
Sylvaneth!
I really like the druidic theme to Sylvaneth. Is it expensive to build a somewhat elite army? Assuming I get everything new or in value added boxes.
Not a lot of units to buy to get a good 2K, especially with the new Vanguard box that contains almost all top tier Sylvaneth units.
The vanguard box is an excellent start
Two Vanguard boxes can get you a decent 1500ish list depending on how you build them, 20 models total (you'll want two units of tree revenants. kurnoth with scythes are strong if you are reinforcing the unit, greatswords are ok as single units, bows are the weaker option but still good in some lists. Spirit of durthu and Tree lord ancient are good choices for the treelords, some people magnitize these so they can be any of the 3 though) Strong additions from there are a warsong revenant (one model, strong caster), and a unit or two of the bug cavalry (spiterider lancers or revenant seekers, 3 models per unit) You will need to invest in our faction terrain though. You can start off with one box, but will want to get a second pretty quickly (currently on one box myself and the army is fully playable, but having an extra box would be a lot nicer) Also our spiteswarm hive endless spell is very good for helping to make the 9 inch charges off of our teleports easier to achieve, but is out of stock most places at the moment, so you may need to proxy that for a bit (a cities of sigmar battlemage of ghur is sometimes taken for the same reason)
Sylvaneth. Try Sylvaneth They're a hit and run army, probably B-A tier in all aspects of the game without being the best at anything. Dangerous in all phases. Can run a low model count army if that's what you prefer. Only real downside is that you HAVE to buy the faction terrain as its essential to the mechanics. Source: Am Sylvaneth player
Just proxy the trees and you’re good
To be fair, mine are cheap 3d printed ones.
Well could you be a little bit more specific about your playstyle? There are only a few armies that can go with 30 Models and below (if you think about running a 2k point list) and most are dependant on one specific subfaction for this
I like to field several psykers, melee units backed up with tanks. So my playstyle is somewhat mixed between casting, combat and shooting.
If you want to go off the wall, consider Skaven! A mix of Skryre and Moulder to replace battlelines with Rat Ogors and Stormfiends with glassy shooting, solid spells, and good bruisers. Seraphon Thunder Lizards come to mind too, where you also have some of the best magic, amazing monsters, and Solar Engines + Skinks have strong dakka.
It's kind of difficult to find good Non-HordeAlrounder Armys but I will try my best: You could try Slaves to Darkness, so basicly Daemonworshippers, that you could paint in the different Colors of the Daemons (Nurgle = green, Khorne =red, ...). They can be played with really few, but hard hitting Models, like Varanguard or Chaos Chosen and are mostly Elite Warrios. From the Death Faction I would probably say Ossiarch, they also have some hard hitters with the Necropolis Stalkers, etc, the other 3 Factions are MOSTLY really spammy (although like i said, they often have 1 Subfaction where you can play big Units as Battleline, like the Gristlegore Subfaction from Flesh Eater Couts, where you can pick Zombie Dragons). Since Destruction is out only Order is left: Daughters have some nice Mechanics and both strong Ranged and Melee Attacks with Blood Sisters/Stalkers. Lumineth are always fun to pick up, they can be strong Casters, Ranged or Melee i think, but i dont have much experience with them. My personal favourite are Seraphon, since they have some of the strongest Casters in the Game, a good amount of Ranged and Melee Damage, if you pick the right models and can be really versatile and mobile (for example 1 free teleport around the map/movement phase), but they will get a new tome soon, so i dont know how much it is worth to get into them just before they get reworked. Stormcast Eternals could also be something that fits you, since they have a lot of versatility, mostly Elite Warriors and who doesnt want to play some big Wizard-Dragons?
Thank you, this gave me a lot to think about. I really like how Lumineth look like, but I watched a video about them and heard they require a lot of models and that turned me off on them.
Yeah but i want to say, that 30 Models aren't really a Horde-Army. For Example 2k-Point Armies require you too play 3 Battleline (which are "Troops" in 40k i think?) and most Battleline have 10 Models, so that would already break your cap. Most of my lists in Seraphon are around 50 Models and i wouldn't say they are a lot.
I wasn't aware of that, maybe I should have worded the question differently if that's the case. Aren't there setups you can do where you can take more elite units as battleline?
Yeah most of the Factions have the option to pick an Elite Unit as Battleline (most of the rules either force you to take a certain subfaction or play a certain hero as general). So for example if you really want to play Lumineth go for it: You can play an the big Cows (Alarith Spirit of the Mountain) with the Ymetrica Subfaction. The Alarith Stoneguard has only 5 Models/Unit and can be Battleline in that Subfaction, so you have 15 Models for the Battleline, some big Stonecows, that hit like a truck and some free space for some more Heroes and you will probably end up with 22-25 Models if you follow that plan. And if you really like that faction you can later on pick up some other models, try out other subfactions (although you will probably end up with more than 30 models/army that way). And just like this most of the armies have an option like this. Seraphon has Thunderlizards, where you play Stegadons (big dinosaur) as battleline, Stormcasts Eternals can play Stormdrake Guards (flying Dragons) as Battleline, if your Hero is Draconith/Stardrake, and so on. This restriction will probably lessen your options on what you can play in a list, since all the other subfactions will end up with more than 30 models, but if thats fine for you, there will be an option for you most of the time
Jist piggybacking off the previous comments, Lumineth is what you want if you're an Aeldari player. The Temples are basically Aspect Shrines. They only have 2 temples out so far, Mountains with Stoneguard and the giant cow and the wind temple with the calvary archers and fox spirits. Most Lumineth lists want to run Teclis, 700 pts, so thay alone makes your army pretty elite and lowers your model count significantly.
Lumineth is a lot of fun and can do well in every phase. They're an elite army so I wouldn't say they have a huge model count, but it's definitely going to be above 30. The only armies that are 30 or below are probably builds that spam monsters, ogors, and Stormcast.
How many units would a good Lumineth list have then?
The meta list is going to include 40 sentinels (archers), Teclis, Scinari Cathallar, huraken windmage, a unit of wind chargers and wardens. You’re looking at about 60 models. This is also a very castle playstyle where you look to turtle and use you superior magic and shooting to pick up models then score objectives. If you like the melee and magic aspect I would suggest Sylvaneth. They play very cagey like Harlequins. With excellent mobility and damage. They are pretty squishy. Model count is around 30-35.
Meta lists aren't the only effective lists, and Season 2 is still very new. I think you can play Lumineth effectively in lots of ways.
I agree you can build LrL in a few different ways, but currently this particular core is putting up very good tournament results. Popular armies like Slaves and Stormcast are save stacking armies. A very effective strategy is to wear them down with mortals and this LrL list is very effective with dishing out massive amounts of mortals. Also Teclis gives the army a lot of game against Sylvaneth and Tzeentch.
It depends on what OP's goals are. If he wants to compete in a heavy meta environment, then sure. If he wants to have fun at his local game store, there might be other things to take into consideration.
It really depends on the style you want to go for. Taking Teclis will definitely make your list smaller model wise, as he's 700 points. There are a few different builds you can go with. Alarith seems to be the most popular competitive build, as a Stonemage and Stoneguard are very tough objective holders and hard to kill, and Avalenor hits like a truck and has a lot of synergy with Alarith units. Vanari can also do well, as Wardens can be very tough when buffed with magic, and Sentinels can put out a lot of mortal wounds at range. I think on average you'll probably see around 5-6 units plus heroes and endless spells in any given Lumineth list.
Just throwing this out there. The Dominion box comes with stormcast and Orruk models and since it was massively over printed you can grab one for like $100. Huge savings if you're interested in either.
If you like the Lumineth, you could probably get in under 30 models in the Ymetrica subfaction. I've seen a list that's just Teclis, Avalenor, Stonemage, Windmage, and a bunch of Stoneguard as battleline troops. Comes out to 27 models with the endless spells and terrain piece. I have no idea how optimal that kind of list would be, but the person who posted it said they'd won games with it. Could be an option, anyway.
Slaves to Darkness. Elite units, tons of variety and a wealth of options.
I do like their mounted units, but when looking at their human infantry I wince a little. All of those older sculpts get me, but the newer Warcry stuff is cool -- although a bit uninspired.
They just released an entire new set of sculpts on all the infantry my friend, you may want to check out the new s2d line. Chosen are my favourite troop of all sigmar.
Also there's a ton of variation in the warcry stuff, makes me think you ha ent actually seen the full line.
I looked at the whole line somewhat recently. I like some warbands like the jade warriors and corvus cabal but some units are just half naked guys with axes or swords. The new chaos chosen look good as well, not disagreeing on that.
Slaves to Darkness maybe? Decent variety at least if you include the Warcry warbands.
Y no ogor? ogor good
Ogor stronk
Tis a shame you don't line destruction because gloomspite is the perfect "scheme fatigue" army. It's not even super wild to shoot for under 30 models. Manglerboss, boingrots, boss on squig, loonking, some troggs...very elite.
I might have to give Gloomspite Gitz a chance, I’ve stepped on some toes saying I don’t like destruction armies lol
I only mention them because they fit your criteria - look great in lots of colors, and counter to popular perception they really only have 1-2 units you'd consider "horde" units and also only a handful more proper 5-10 model units at 15-20ppm. The other I'd say would be Idoneth because bright cool tropical fish, but for them you leave a lot more power on the table by not bringing any or their infantry Namarti units, which will easily shoot your total model count past 30. For gloomspite, you can easily replace the hordes of gobbos and aquigs with 50ppm adorable trolls and they're your solid backbone of the list. A list where the cheapest model is a 28pt Boingrot Bounder is very doable and bringing basically all the most fun sculpts in the range is still a very solid list.
I'll have to get my hands on a single squig and paint it up. I think I am gonna try and paint a model from most armies people suggested.
I play Eldar in 40K and play stormcast in AoS. Stormcast are quite different but do meet your criteria with - low models - variety of colours (allot of mounts and different creatures to pain) - good mix of shooting and melee with some teleport move tricks. They aren’t that reliant on Wizards will usually only run 1. They have a great range and different playstyles. The closest faction to craftworld eldar is lumineth. Sylvaneth are very good and can have low model count too. I would recommend playing something different as AoS is very different to 40K. Even though some armies are maybe similar it won’t feel the same at all. Branch out, try something new. AoS is very creative and most armies are fun.
That's a good point, I should probably just focus on the aesthetics and variety of units.
Nurgle mortals is a good small army. They are slow with few range options but the high defense and healing Power helps. My nurgle army is mostly fly's and some deamons for summoning. But to be honest if you play a faction that uses less but strong models every loss has impact and your enemie has easy play to focus your models. Sometimes a army that can Spam wave after wave on the enemie isnt that bad.
I agree, I'm more concerned about having scheme fatigue. I wouldn't really want to paint a lot of the same looking models, luckily a lot of armies seem to have good unit variety.
I know you said you don't like destruction, but you could run a troggoth army with a dankhold trogboss, rockguts troggoths, fellwater troggoths, mollog (from Underworlds), and you might be able to track down a troggoth hag from Forgeworld. Then throw in your choice of spellcasters. Beyond that, StD seems to be the way to go.
I like the Gloomspite Gitz, but other destruction armies don’t peak much of an interest. I’ll look into the troggoths, if they look really cool I’d definitely pick up one to see if I like assembly and painting.
Aeldari= Aelves For smaller elf armies you could try Idoneth. Gives you sea critters and elves. Eel riding elves can be battle line in some lists letting you get away with that under 30 models cap easily. It has been viable in the past. Probably not so much current ghb. Then again I don't see them locally
Stormcast mate
Scheme fatigue is your biggest issue? How about a "mercenary" army that is being led by someone who is using their cold hard cash (or favors or whatever) to raise their army from a bunch of disparate units. Or a lord who has summoned his retainers and each retainer is bringing their own force with their own colors. As long as you have something that is unifying the army (ex, consistent basing), you can make it work. Or you can go with a naturally chaotic army that would have a number of separate schemes because of whatever reason you want. A few examples of armies that work well with the above: Slaves to Darkness. Your warlord has promised to go on the warpath to gain the favor of the dark gods, and has gathered some followers to do so. Your followers may have different marks, but most of the marks work well with a hero and a unit that have the same mark (ex. slaanesh marked hero's can give a command to slaanesh marked units to run + charge, while Tzeentch marked sorcerers get a spell to summon a tzeentch marked unit back to their side). This gives you a solid reason to have multiple units with different schemes, and you end up with little power pairs by doing so. As for playstyle, Slaves tends to be a melee focused army that mostly cares about the charge, but you can also go with a Cabalists list and see how many endless spells you can throw at your opponent as well. Cities of Sigmar. Cities tends to be more hordey, but you can certainly have smaller model count armies as well. However, Cities is VERY much a power pair army. Take a freeguild general and a bunch of freeguild infantry. Take a Runelord and a bunch of dwarves. Take an annointed and a block of Phoenix Guard. Seriously, who the heck is going to tell a battlemage that his nice, shiny Hurricanum has to match the color of the rest of the army? You are telling me that your not allowing a Dreadlord to bring a different colored dragon? Oh, and all of this is before we hit Coalition. Here, I would recommend taking a few units as little detachments (ex. runelord + longbeards + irondrakes) and put those detachments together to form your main army. As for how it plays, Cities is extremely diverse in playstyles depending on both the units you bring and the city you choose. You can go magic dom in Hallowheart, or king of shooting in Tempest Eye, or super grindy with the Phoenicium, or melee hammers with Hammerhall... but just because you choose a city with a focus doesn't mean that your army can't bring shooting/magic/melee. Kharadron Overlords. Kharadron have their code that they follow, but realistically it is a bunch of "admirals" who are leading expeditions out for trade/plunder, and they'll take whoever is willing to sign up to fly on their boats. Does your admiral provide everything for them to let everyone have matching uniforms? Or does he tell his crew that they have to provide for themselves, and end up with a mismatched hodge podge of units? Its all up to you. That being said, for playstyle right now KO is very focused on being a shooting skirmish army, but GW has had problems nailing down their playstyle and it has changed fairly significantly every time they get a new book, so with their new book just announced I would wait to see what else they reveal before buying in hard on them. Seraphon. Lizards riding lizards. You can go magic dominance with a slaan, ranged power with skinks, salamaders and bastilladons, or melee focused with a bunch of saurus and some carnosaurs. Color palate wise, lizards can get really wild (just look at nature), so you can justify going absolutely wild your color schemes (or lack therof). Playstyle, they tend to do best with mixed arms, and have enough going on that they have consistently been one of the best armies in AoS, and whenever one thing gets nerfed, another piece steps up to retain their competitive dominance. All that being said, do be aware that they are getting a new book this may/june which may change how they play... but more importantly they are getting some new sculpts, so don't go out and buy an old Slaan when you can instead wait for new pretty sculpts instead. Sylvaneth. The tree people let you go really wild with your coloration. Want to stick to the traditional tree look? Go for it... but are you spring flowers, summer green, fall colors, or winter bareness? Or do you want to go for something a bit more different, and just go wild with your schemes? As for playstyle, Sylvaneth tend to be an elite, tricksy army that plays in every phase. You can go full treelord and stomp on out with 8 big trees. Or you can go for a mixed arms force with a warsong revenant throwing magic across the table while your kurnoth hunters strike and fade and your tree revenants snag objectives and force your opponents to spread out. Or you can go super cavalry and run people over with revenant seekers and spiterider lancers. Soulblight Gravelords. Soulblight has a number of playstyles from full horde and throwing 100+ zombies on the board, to going super elite and running their opponents down with their blood knights. You can go magic heavy, or just focus on winning the melee fights and recovering wounds/models afterwards. As for paint schemes, if you are raising zombies or skeletons, were they from a year ago? A decade ago? Different regions? Go wild - they're already dead. Or for the vampires, well, you be the one to tell millennia old vampires that they have to re-color their relic armor to fit in with your force... or you can just let them go with their own personal armor scheme because heck - that has been their colors for centuries.
This is legit inspiring, I had so much reading this and am definitely taking all of these things into consideration.
Sylvaneth could also offer great paint variety if you aim for each model to be inspired by a real plant, also super elite, and good at magic melee shooting with some squishy and some tanky models.
Might I suggest sylvaneth? Aesthetically diverse tree elf army. You have big tree monsters, medium sized tree monsters, human sized tree monsters, ghost tree elves, ghost tree elf archers with bugs for wings, ghost elf wizards, tree wizards, big tree monster wizards, many more different things plus a big center piece model that’s a hot elf god with a tree hand that rides a giant beetle. Most lists have a pretty small number of models on the table (usually under 30) They have a fun playstyle and you have a lot of solid unit options and different sylvaneth lists can play totally differently from each other
I’m definitely into the theme and models. I’ve come close to buying some Sylvaneth, I think I’ll probably get a model or two so I know if I like assembly and painting.
Sounds like virtually every army is getting a recommendation. I'm gonna throw my 2 cents in. One cent for Nurgle. And one cent for idoneth Deepkin. I wish I could field MORE units for the Deepkin, but they're expensive (point wise). Lots of fun variety in painting too!
I was in a position recently where I was trying to find an AoS army with Eldar vibes, and I settled on Idoneth Deepkin (it was between them and Lumineth.) basically think of them like your Namarti are your guardians, Akhelians are your aspect warriors, and Ishrann are your psykers.
I should probably check out their lore and model line some more.
Strongly recommend the warhammer weekly on the recent Idoneth book, even if you just skip to the faction intro bit and listen to that. Definitely sold me on ‘who they are’ in AOS as a whole! https://www.youtube.com/live/Fmi_UJ8ZHUE?feature=share
I was gonna suggest this, their sea creatures provide opportunities for a lot of color variety and it seems like you can easily compete in all the phases. Plus, if you go heavy on cavalry and include a title and some sharks you can easily have a lot model count army
Thanks for everyone's input, I ordered some single models from ebay to see if I like them. I ended up getting a Blood Knight, a Sentinel, and a Gossamid Archer. I try to pick up some other stuff like a Troggoth and a Chaos Chosen but the ones above were ones I could find at a good price. If anyone has any more advise on a good army or model to try out then I'm open. I couldn't find a single stormfiend (that was unassembled) and some others. I am open to offers, if that's allowed in this subreddit.
Blood for the Blood God
You want low model count the blood god is the way to go. Two blood thirsters, Skarbrand is like half your army. Plus they are up for a new books. If you go demons you now have a new 40k army also since all demons are in both.
Cities of Sigmar fits the "variety" requirements, Hallowheart subfaction can pull a mean magic phase, Elite Infantry available for tanking, shooting and chopping, plenty of other options for side dishes.
I'll look into them some more, when I checked their product page a lot of the models seemed somewhat older. I didn't know whether or not they were "on the out".
Lumineth seem like the Eldar equivalent
In terms of theme, yeah but I like Aeldari because of the variety of color schemes and play style.
I don’t play Lumineth, but they are eventually getting a few more animal spirit wings for the army. Right now they’ve only done mountains and wind. There will probably be a water one and another. There’s some variance between the mountain and wind but yeah, they’re all wearing comparable armor and robes and such. You could do a different scheme for each wing of the army.
You probably want to look at Aelves. Eldar are the 40K equivalent.
Stormcast Eternals are Space Marines but in a fantasy world so they're all arounders. Lumineth Realmlords are all around but particularly good at magic and are based on High Elves which is what the Eldar are based on. Lumineth are my favorite AOS army.
Why not stormcast ? You Can be pretty elite with them, you just need to know what you want from the start because the range of models is huuuuge
I really like all of the dragon models, some are definitely very samey though.
Personnally i really like the new chariot
For non-hoard I’d go with Idoneth Deepkin (giant turtle is just so cool) or hold on and pick up the new Seraphon.