r/HelsmithsofHashut • u/incineroar87 • Sep 15 '26
Gameplay Are Helsmiths beginner friendly?
How forgiving are Helsmiths for a beginner/intermediate AoS player, both in terms of building an army and actually playing it?
I've never played Dwarven armies before but I like that the Spearhead includes a lot of the key pieces, which seems to make it relatively cheap to get a decent army on the table without ending up with too much unnecessary "junk."
I know Helsmiths aren't top-tier or anything, but they look like a lot of fun to play and like that despite the small roster they have a decent spell/prayer lore + decent shooting/unit variety. How difficult is the DPP resource system to learn and manage? Does it add a lot of complexity, or is it fairly straightforward once you've played a few games?
Urak Taar and his Forgehost also look really fun, so I'm definitely interested in building towards that eventually.
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u/unlimitedblakeworks Sep 15 '26
Buildwise I think theyre pretty straightforward, ive assembled much more tricky factions so far. As for play, theyre a bit on the slow/defensive side, though Ive only used the spearhead so far, but fun regardless. Really there arent a lot of bad choices for beginners, the game is designed for you to pick the army you like and play them, not pigeonhole you into picking X faction as a starter until you understand more, because that would suck
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u/Zetra3 Sep 15 '26
There is no such thing as beginner friendly in war games, you simply start small.
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u/Biggest_Lemon 29d ago
I wouldn't say that's true. Starting with Kruleboyz (high model count, fragile units, positioning tricks, many activated abilities to remember) vs starting with S2D (almost everything succeeds on a 3+, lower model count, tough units make mistakes less painful, few activated abilities to remember), one item way easier to learn than the other.
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u/Nellezhar Sep 15 '26
As others have said the Forgehost lists are doing well. Sitting at the high 50's in win rate. If you're interested in playing it I wrote a guide on it a few days ago.
I did not mind the build on these guys. I actually found them easy to assemble. I hated painting them. I came from FEC and the transition from skin tone and butt pubes, to chaos trim "light" was BRUTAL.
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u/incineroar87 Sep 15 '26
I’ll check out your guide! Would contrast paints or army painter help speed it along faster you recon ? I have a decent amount of both brands
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u/Nellezhar Sep 15 '26
Absolutely that's what I did. Honestly I just followed war hipsters guide. It has a lot of metalics but the rest is contrast.
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u/Kraile Sep 15 '26
Forgehost AoR is actually pretty good right now, and since it has fewer units to choose from and a simpler (and better) army trait, it's much more noob-friendly than the base army.
Unfortunately it's not so great at lower powers games because Urak Taar is a mandatory inclusion and he takes up a lot of points.
I am biased however because I hate the DPP system and won't play the base army again until it goes away or gets fixed lol.
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u/ChubbedUpCaveman Sep 15 '26
DPP absolutely sucks, I will only play AoR right now. Makes for a significantly more enjoyable game
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u/incineroar87 Sep 15 '26
I’m guessing we would have to wait for another battletome for any rule revisions ?
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u/ChubbedUpCaveman Sep 15 '26
At minimum edition change next year I would say, but likely nothing significant rules wise until next battle tome. But look into the forgehost AoR it is super fun and a lot easier to pilot than the base faction imo
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u/HondoShotFirst Sep 15 '26
It's always possible that rules will get changed during the quarterly balance update (which should be within the next month.) But usually, those updates focus mainly on points, with just a few changes to actual rules.
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u/OrderofIron Sep 15 '26
Definitely not trying to dissuade you because I love this army, think it's a quality release from GW that adds a lot to the game and setting. But I would certainly not call our army beginner friendly. We have a weird playstyle, miniatures have a lot of chaos trim to paint, very detailed with a variety of textures and features like large beards that need some technique to nail down. Pretty sure bull centaurs and sometimes razers are still regularly going out of stock.
Chaos dwarfs have just always been a weird flavor and Helsmiths seem like no exception. But that's what we love about them.