My Life As A Gamer: No, You Don't Need The Minis To Play

Let's take this misconception out back and put a bullet in its head.

No, getting into 40K is easy. You need the rules, you need your Army List, and you need tokens sufficient for your Army List. All of that is pennies-on-the-dollar or cheaper, with the sole exception being the rules governing your specific army; this is because Games Workshop and its shills--you know who you are--push this pernicious lie that you have buy the miniatures and paint them to play the game.

Take it from a Car Wars and BattleTech veteran: Bullshit.

What the lie regarding the game is consists of the conflation of two separate, but related, hobbies: playing the game, and collecting/painting the miniatures.

The reason this lie is pushed is because Games Workshop, to this day, is about pushing physical product--the minis and paints--first and foremost and making a good game a distant second. (The game wouldn't need to be in a 9th Edition if the game designers weren't incompetent. If you don't believe me, go pick up a new rulebook for Car Wars vs one from 1986 or so; they are identical.)

The most you need is to possess play tokens of the proper shape and size, and mark them appropriately with direction and unit signifiers. (Your opponent needs direction for Facing reasons, and Unit ID to know what items keywords to screw you with.) Blank bases with arrows for facing and a taped-on unit ID will do, and those bases can be cut out of paper or cardboard.

Will the paint puffers cry? Yes. Will you be allowed into tournament play? Hell no. (Very strict rules on using on-brand product with What You See Is What You Get rules.) Does this physically prevent you from fielding a 5000 point army of otherwise prohibitively expensive mode? Not on your life. There's no reason at all to believe that you have to blow hundreds or thousands of dollars on miniatures and paints, blow almost as many hours assembling and painting them while figuring out how to store and transport them, and still not actually be playing the game--y'know, the reason you're doing this at all--but instead doing bitchwork.

No, fuck that. Draw up your Army List(s), cut your counters, and get on with actually gaming. Let the paint pushers and the shills cry. Consooming is not gaming. Gaming is gaming, and despite Games Workshop believing (wrongly) otherwise, 40K is a game first and foremost. Don't let anyone get between you and wrecking fools on the battlefield.

And, for the record, you don't need them for Fantasy or any other wargame either. Counters are fine. Always. (So is Tabletop Simulator.)