Where Do I Start with Fallout Wasteland Warfare?

One of the most common questions I see with miniature wargames is: Where do I start or what should I buy first? This is a fair question as there are different ways to get started with Fallout depending on what your interests are. Since I focus on Fallout 4, that is what will be covered here. I don’t know the best way to get started on the Fallout New Vegas part of the game for example, because I don’t own any of it. So the characters and setting in Fallout 4 is appealing to you, then you should find this guide useful.

If you’re interested in Fallout Wasteland Warfare, then you or a friend should buy the Two Player Starter Set. The Starter Set isn’t expensive and contains a lot of things you need to start playing. For one, it has the rules, range rulers, cardboard tokens, and dice which are either essential or nice to have when playing the game. While you can technically get your hands on the rulebook and dice through Modiphius’s store and then buy third party range rulers on Etsy to circumvent needing to buy the box, it is much cheaper and easier to buy the Starter Set which is why I highly recommend it. I do recommend shopping around because the Starter Set is generally sold below the retail price in the United States anyway so make sure you’re getting a good price when you do buy it.

If you’re at all interested in trying out the AI system or narrative scenarios, the Starter Set also comes with a campaign handbook which contains a couple of campaigns and a number of one-off scenarios. I’ve had fun playing through scenarios from the campaign handbook and I think the tutorial campaign is a great way to get the rules figured out as well.

If that wasn’t enough, you also get Survivors and Super Mutants miniatures in the box. While these minis are PVC plastic that is lower quality than all of the other miniatures available for the game, you can use them to practice painting for the real thing, cut them up and use pieces for conversions, or ignore them and get resin miniatures instead. The Survivors and Super Mutants Core Box make pretty good replacements for what you get in the Starter Set. There are some differences between those two boxes and the Starter Set but it will get you close enough. Just make sure you don’t throw away the miniatures that are unique to the Starter Set like the Enslaved Tech as they are helpful in some of the tutorial scenarios.

The Starter Set is an excellent value, especially if you can live with the lower quality miniatures and use them in your first couple of games. A single copy is enough for two players to get what they need to start playing as well so if a friend wants it, you can share the contents and save a bit of money in the process.

After you or a friend get the Starter Set, your options are pretty open and its worth thinking about what you want to do with the game over the next year or two. If you’re the type of person who just wants to collect your favorite faction and play against friends using their favorite faction, then I highly recommend buying the Core Box for that faction. That is enough to get you started with them and you can pick up the remaining boxes to give you more variety in your squad. Just keep in mind that if you pick a more recent faction, you may need to buy the rules or card supplement to actually use them in-game. For example, the Children of Atom, Gunners, and Railroad all have their rules and cards in the Commonwealth expansion. For this reason, I’d say its worth doing a little research before you jump in and buy miniatures so you know what else you might need to play with your chosen faction.

If you’re interested in any of the narrative modes then it is a much different proposition. There are tons of units you can buy. Creatures like mole rats and radroaches are handy. There are plenty of robots that you may want to battle against in the wasteland like Protectrons and Assaultrons. Another faction besides the one you’re choosing to play will also help too. As you can probably already tell, there isn’t a wrong choice here and I would recommend buying whatever miniatures you like in Fallout 4 that you would like to see on your tabletop.

If the amount of choice is overwhelming, you might try picking out a scenario or two that you want to play and focusing on buying the miniatures that are required or that you think fit that scenario best. This is a totally valid way of playing and building out your collection as well. I’ve mostly followed this strategy as I’ve looked to expand beyond the Starter Set myself.

That gives you a few ideas on how to choose what miniatures to buy but you will need a few other things to get started. The big one is terrain. If you have some Fallout themed terrain already, then you may not need to spend a lot of time or money and can get to playing even quicker. Most new players will need to build and paint their own terrain however and the Starter Set does not come with any unfortunately. There is so much terrain out there that I can’t possibly tell you exactly what terrain you should buy. Everyone’s taste varies and the wasteland is a diverse place after all. What I would suggest is picking up some of the barriers and cars that Modiphius makes because you just need to paint it up and then you can use it. MDF kits are great and are an affordable way to make buildings but if you’re new to the hobby, you may find them challenging to put together and your time is better spent painting miniatures and mastering that skill first. You also can play without having many buildings to start with.

Finally, you will need the cards for the miniatures you want to play. The card system for Fallout Wasteland Warfare is a bit convoluted so I will try to keep this as simple as possible. The easiest and cheapest way to get new cards is to download the Fallout Wasteland Warfare app and purchase whatever cards you need. Most of the factions in Fallout were released in a wave and if you buy that, you’ll have a good chunk of your miniature collection covered. The physical cards are packed in a similar way and if you can find the cards for whatever wave your miniatures belong in, then you can pick that up and use those as well. Its worth noting that the Two Player Starter Set comes with cards for all of the miniatures in the box and the app has those cards for free as well. So you don’t have to buy cards for the Starter Set models right away and can start playing the game before you worry about what cards you need. When you start using miniatures beyond the Starter Set, you will need to venture out and get the appropriate cards however.

Getting started in Fallout Wasteland Warfare is thankfully not too complicated. The Two Player Starter Set is the perfect introduction and I highly recommend starting with it and having fun learning the game. This keeps your initial investment in the game low and when you’re ready to dive in, you can spend money with confidence. While you do not have to do this by any means, it is the most affordable, straightforward, and efficient way to get started on your Fallout journey.