"Can afford Strike Force Ultra, buy something else instead." Topic

In this thread: TMP link I commented about a couple of the other things I could get for the price of the new Space Marine Strike Force Ultra box set. 21 Terminator figures, a tank, an aircraft, and a big stompy robot.

This got me thinking, what else in the way of wargaming stuff could one get for $325 USD or £190.00 GBP?

I would like to stress that this post is not a dig a people who enjoy WH40K. As Pictor and others pointed out in the topic above, they are just spending their disposable income on what they enjoy, I feel the same about GW's LoTR miniatures, no matter the price, I love them, while we can easily work out a cost per figure, the pleasure that comes from getting what you really want is far harder to price up.

That said, in spite of knowing full well that GW are expensive, I was truly staggered by the pricing of this set. So without further ado here are some more ideas for other ways to spend that money:

Literally everything you need to play Warpath.

Mantic's Warpath army sets are £50.00 GBP each so pick up their Marauder and Forge Father sets and you've got 80 figures and 4 vehicles. £27.00 GBP will buy you both of the matching paint sets (with brushes), another £25.00 GBP will get one of their smaller SF scenery sets. £20.00 GBP will get you a couple of pasting tables, that leaves you £18.00 GBP for dice, tape measure, and a pot of paint, or a piece of cloth, to cover the tables. Download the free rules and you're good to go.

A seriously awesome force from Khurasan.

$325 USD US will get you a tank, 3 APCs, an armoured car, 3 pieces of artillery, and a platoon's worth of figures (35+ 6 gun crew), and a couple of dollars change from Khurusan's rather lovely 28mm Federal Army range.

Painted forces (and unpainted hordes) from em4.

How about 75 pre painted sci fi miniatures with the Combat Zone starter set. If fantasy is your thing then you could get over a thousand unpainted plastic orcs and dwarves!

The Might of Rome.

2 of Warlord's Imperial Roman Starter Armies and 1 of their Scorpion batteries, together with a box of Wargames Factory's Early Imperial Roman cavalry would give you an impressive 248 infantry, 3 pieces of artillery, and a unit of 12 horseman. Nice.

The American Revolution in 54mm.

Back to the USA, All The Kings Men will sell you one of their Army in a Box sets together with their Queens Rangers set for exactly $325. USD That's 87 54mm metal figures, a cannon, scenery, and rules.

And Finally.

In fairness to GW, some of their starter sets are really good value, we all know why. The fact is though that 3 of the current Dark Vengeance starter sets would be cheaper than Strike Force Ultra, and give you 132 infantry, 9 bikes, and 3 big stompy robots. I've no doubt the starter set that will follow on with the new rules will be just as enticing.

So, if you've made this far without nodding off, what would you get if you had £190.00 GBP, or $325 USD, to spend on an army or several? I've limited myself to 28mm or larger above, but that kind of money would go a long way in smaller scales.

The 3 Dark Vengeance sets will even get you 15 Teminators of that 132 infantry if I remember correctly. If you go in with a friend you could get 6 of them for the same price and end up with 30 Terminators if he wanted the chaos stuff.

Interesting comparison – rather than the usual "over-priced" rant, here's what the options are.

I'm too lazy to look up exact prices but thinking of X-Wing. The two big ships are about $150 USD (total) so that leaves you $175 USD for the smaller ships. Starter set, say $30 USD, so still enough left over for 6 – 7 other ships.

Of course if you don't want the 'big' ships, the number of regular ships increases dramatically.

I'm doing up a Dirstide/Generic sci-fi force in 6mm. Now, you can't or shouldn't mock the gentleman I'm building and painting for, but he wants his stuff to be very clockwork steampunk style. So we go with Dystopian Wars to a large extent.

For $300 USD, he got 60 main battle tanks, about the size of a Battletech tank. He also got 40 artillery pieces and 40 APC's. For infantry, he went with a combination of Baccus WWI stuff and GZG 6mm. There are enough to fill all 40 APC's. The style is extremely steampunk, as you know, and the price was right. He's using Future Wars Commander for the rules. If he was so inclined, Dystopian Wars has a lot of flyers to add in. This force will take months to paint and will serve for huge and tiny games. He even has enough for a Red and a Blue force.

That's 3-4 complete 10mm armies. If you've got the Old Glory Army card (40% off), make that 4-5.

Having said that, Games Workshop produces the most affordable official Space Marines and Eldar available, and those models are generally very good.