How to Build a 2000 Point Warhammer 40k Army List - Beginner Guide

Two thousand points is the standard size for competitive Warhammer 40,000 — Strike Force — and it is the size almost every event, club night and pickup game is built around. It is also the point at which a list stops being "the models I own" and starts being a set of deliberate decisions.

This guide walks through building one from scratch in 11th Edition: the order to make decisions in, what a functioning list actually needs, and the checks that stop it being illegal.

Before you start: what 2,000 points gives you

At Strike Force you are working with:

Those numbers are the frame. Everything below fits inside them. The full set is in our army composition guide.

Step 1: Pick a faction you will actually play

The most common cause of a bad list is a faction chosen for the wrong reason. Three questions that matter more than tier lists:

Do you like the models? You are going to assemble and paint sixty of them. This is not a small consideration.

Does the playstyle match how you think? Some armies want to plan three turns ahead; others want to make aggressive decisions fast. A mismatch here makes the game less fun regardless of how strong the faction is.

Can you afford the list you want to build? Horde armies are more models; elite armies are fewer, pricier kits. Both add up.

If you are entirely new, our beginner faction guide covers which armies are forgiving to learn with. There is no wrong answer — every faction in 11th can win games.

Step 2: Choose detachments before units

This is the step that most separates 11th Edition list building from what came before, and the one beginners most often do backwards.

Your detachment decides:

That last point is why detachment comes first. You cannot know how many copies of a unit you are allowed until you know your detachment.

With 3 DP you can take one 3 DP detachment, a 2 DP plus a 1 DP, or three 1 DP detachments. For a first list, take one 3 DP detachment. Splitting is a real option, but it is a refinement — start with one clear army rule and learn what it does. Our Detachment Points guide covers when splitting is worth it.

Step 3: Build the scoring core first

Games are won by controlling objectives, not by killing things. Build the part that scores before the part that shoots.

Aim for at least four units whose job is to hold ground. Battleline units are usually the cheapest way to do this and they have the doubled duplicate limit, so you can take six of a single Battleline datasheet if you want to.

What "holds ground" means in practice:

A common beginner error is building a list of six excellent units and discovering you can only physically stand on two objectives at once. Four scoring units is the floor at 2,000 points; five or six is comfortable.

Step 4: Add two cheap, fast units

Separate from your scoring core, you want two units that are cheap, mobile and expendable. They:

These are the highest-value points in most lists and the thing experienced players notice missing immediately. Three of the five primary mission archetypes reward them directly — see the five kinds of primary mission.

Step 5: Cover the two damage jobs

You need to be able to kill two different things, and a unit that is good at one is usually bad at the other.

Anti-tank. High Strength, good AP, multi-damage. Enough of it to remove a serious vehicle or monster in one turn — spreading half-answers across the list means killing nothing.

Anti-infantry. Volume of shots or attacks, low AP is fine. This is what clears screens so your anti-tank can see its target.

A rough guide at 2,000 points: enough anti-tank to threaten two vehicles a turn, and enough anti-infantry to remove one twenty-model unit a turn. If you cannot do both, the gap will decide games.

Step 6: Characters and attachments

11th Edition gives every bodyguard unit two character slots — one Leader and one Support Character. Pick your Warlord, then decide which units are worth investing characters into.

The rule of thumb: attach characters to units that will survive long enough for the buff to matter. A powerful character on a fragile squad dies with the squad.

Two checks before you move on:

See leaders and Support Characters for the full attachment rules.

Step 7: Enhancements last

Four at Strike Force, one per Character, none on Epic Heroes, and the restriction on who can take each one is written into its description text. Do these last, once your Characters are locked. Do not feel obliged to take all four — if the third and fourth options are weak, the points are better spent elsewhere. Full Enhancement rules here.

Step 8: Plan your reserves

Up to half your points can start off the table, in one pool. Aircraft are exempt.

Half is almost never the right answer. Reserve units with a specific job — a unit that arrives to take an objective, or to punish an overextension — and keep enough on the board to hold your own half from turn one. Reserves and Deep Strike covers the details.

A worked shape for 2,000 points

Not a list — a distribution to sanity-check yours against:

Characters (250–400 pts)
  Warlord + 1–2 supporting Characters, attached to units that will survive

Scoring core (500–700 pts)
  4–6 units whose job is to hold objectives

Cheap and fast (120–250 pts)
  2 units for actions, late objectives and screening

Anti-tank (350–500 pts)
  Enough to threaten two serious targets per turn

Anti-infantry (250–400 pts)
  Enough to clear a large unit per turn

Flex (100–200 pts)
  Transports, a second character, or more bodies

If one of those buckets is empty, that is where your games will be lost.

Step 9: Play it before you refine it

Your first list will have problems you cannot see on paper. Play three games with it before changing anything — the temptation to rewrite after one loss is strong and usually wrong, because one game does not distinguish a bad list from a bad matchup.

The most common real problems, in order:

Building it in GrimSlate

You can create a 2,000-point list free — no account needed to start. The builder tracks points live, validates the DP budget, Enhancement cap, duplicate limits and Battleline grants as you go, and flags illegal combinations before you get to the table rather than after. It works offline once loaded, and lists sync across devices if you make an account.

The pre-game checklist