40K for the Poor Man

I would not be overexaggerating to say that Warhammer is an extremely expensive hobby.  When a single model for an army costs as much as $60-$70, the bottom of one's hobby budget comes quickly.  So, here are five ideas for those who are modeling/hobbying/gaming on a budget and how to get the most bang for your buck.

1) Plan- This is fairly self-explanatory.  It is easy to become enamored with models that look pretty and that might even look great on paper.  Do your research first.  Check out the forums, read the rules, proxy and test out your ideas first. This saves a lot of unneeded spending because as many of you ebayers know, once it's open and painted, it isn't worth nearly as much as when it is still in the box.  Avoid this and plan out your armies first.

2) Magnets, magnets, magnets! In a game that centers on highly customizeable squads of troops, it is nice to be able to have a single model that can have it's equipment switched out when needed.  All of my terminators have magnetized arms so that I can run them as regular terminators with powerfist/storm bolter setups or as assault terminators.  This means that I have a total of 10-12 terminators in my collection that can fulfill the roles of about 20-25 terminator models when needed.  This brings me flexibility without adding to my model count.

3) Fluff is great, but it is just fluff.  This is especially important to Marine players.  When there are about 6 codexes for various marine armies, sometimes you have to let fluff slide and just play the game.  I currently have a Black Templar army that is painted in a half black/half red paint scheme.  I also play them as Space wolves.  I can also play them as Codex Marines.  Fluff hounds will cry heresy, but as long as you are playing with WYSIWYG standards, who cares what color your models are.  Also, if you are a fluff hound, you generally don't mind spending extra money to make the army look just like it's fluffy counterpart.  If you are strapped for cash, you don't care.

4) Compact can be good.  It is possible to play an army that is fairly small an compact.  Ron over at From the Warp and John at Santa Cruz Warhammer have both put together armies (Dark Angels no less) that contain fewer than 20 models total including vehicles.  The Blood Angel Sanguinary Guard list and Eldar Jetbike Seer Council lists have very small model counts as well.  If you don't want a ton of models and have very little money, try putting together a low model count army.

5) Buy for cheap.  Buy used.  By going to ebay or bartertown, a player can get models for fairly cheap.  In many cases you will get models around 50-60% off of retail.  That translates into big savings when you are buying a full army.  Remember that you may need to be patient though.  You won't always find what you want, but then again, with the money you save, you might be able to fit in the odd retail cost model as well. 

So, they are 5 ideas for making the dollars stretch in Warhammer 40k.  If anyone wants to share an additional idea, post a comment.  Thanks.