Hi, my son (who is 9) wants to get into Warhammer 40k, so I thought I'd get an idea of what its going to cost me!
I'll get him the basic set for xmas and give him a hand with doing the models etc. I rang up my local Games Workshop to book us into their modelling and painting courses but they're only for age 12+.
My martial arts instructor is also geting the Battle for Mcragge set for xmas so looks like we could be fighting each other out of our dojo as well!

It can get costly, but to start with you're doing the right thing, the starter set, with possibly a starter paint set as well. And I always remembered GW as being 12+ to leave your child unattended, not for them to attend if the parent stays, but perhaps that has changed. But I do recommend just going down to the store anyways and telling the staff your son is interested and if like GW boro, they'll go through all the stuff with him, to give him an idea before it costs you too much.

Can be costly, its best to speak to people on here about the direction your son wants to go! For example I spent alot of money on things I really didnt need.

My advice, take a look at various races armies online and see how there painted, found the army your son find easist to learn and ask here on what units / items to buy

I will thanks. Bought him the Battle for Mcragge set today so thats him set up for xmas.
The bloke at GW was a bit knowledgable shall we say and confused the heck out of me!
There's enough in the set to get him battling away and when he/I understand the rules he can start to build the armies etc.

Welcome Curly...

Yes, what army to buy and then what parts of that army to buy are the eternal questions we all are asking, even after playing for years.

I have a son also, he showed an interest in W40K at one point. He chose his army, we bought a few units and then he wanted a different army. So I ebayed what he'd had to date, bought the new one and we got it painted by a friend, which took almost a year unfortunately, by which time he had gone right off the game and was on his computer.

So what you have done so far is fine. Both the armies in that boxset were the armies my son had, so hopefully your son will land on one of those also. But I would resist the tempation to expand any of them soon. Unless of course, it isn't your son we are really talking about here There's no shame, don't worry, I'm 41 and the circle of players I have are all on here, they are all 30+ years, so your in good company.

If you can I would get holdof the big rulebook to read the short introduction to eash army. Afer looking at the pictures there also, and reading up on them all, I'm sure one of them will 'grab you'.

Any questions, just feel free to ask. I usually read the forum each evening and some mornings

LOL! I'm looking forward to making a game board and painting the figures thats for sure. The rules still seem complicated to me.

curly wrote:The rules still seem complicated to me.

Yes they did to me also, I recal. So I recommend; read the rules once. They hinge around the 3 phases of eash player's turn, Move, Shoot and Assault. Read them once, then not again, till you have played. Then re read them.

After that you should have a good enough understanding of the general rules to then look at an army codex or two and see what they can do within those general rules. That might even be enough to grab you and lead to taking a particular army.

The battle of Mcragge set is a good way to learn, it introduces the rules in a nice way. I am still teaching my 8 year old this way but through the boxed set he has learnt most of the basics. There is also a the "The Battle rages on" book which introduces most of the other elements into the game (you will have to buy additional models to play the extra scenarios) I like the way the game plays out in a story so it also introduces you to a little bit of the Warhammer 40k world history.
Me and my son still play through the first few scenarios over again and he hasn't gotten bored yet.

Chess with guns is how I see Warhammer!