Fallout: Wasteland Warfare and Factions, How to Start

How to start Fallout on the tabletop: decide between Fallout: Wasteland Warfare and Fallout: Factions, then buy that game's starter set. Both are Modiphius miniatures games in 32mm scale, and many of the plastic core boxes work with either, so the real choice is how you want to play, not which models you can use. This guide lays out a sensible buying order for each.

Wasteland Warfare or Factions: which Fallout game should you play?

Fallout: Wasteland Warfare is the flexible one. Every game mode supports solo, co-op or player against player, so it suits someone who will often play alone. You build a crew from factions, allies and iconic characters, pick a Leader who gains Perks, give units V.A.T.S. bonuses, and grow a settlement whose buildings and resources shape your crew. It runs narrative campaigns as well as standard points based battles, and bottlecaps you recover in missions buy upgrades for the next encounter.

Fallout: Factions is a fast playing, high risk, high reward skirmish game for two players. You lead a crew through a campaign, and between games the Story Phase grows your crew, sometimes toward legend and sometimes into a footnote in another crew's story. If you would rather sit across the table from a friend and finish a game in an evening, start here.

What is the best Fallout starter set?

For Factions, the Battle for Boston Starter Set is everything you need in one box, enough to build two crews: a 106 page rulebook, 12 hard plastic Institute miniatures, 8 hard plastic Brotherhood of Steel miniatures, punch out terrain, a double sided 3 x 2 foot battle map, tokens, dice, crew rosters and a tape measure. The earlier Battle for Nuka-World Starter Set does the same with two Raider gangs, the Pack and the Operators.

For Wasteland Warfare, the Two Player Starter Set contains everything you need to play, for one or two players, with games averaging 40 to 120 minutes. Its miniatures come pre assembled in PVC, so you can play the day it arrives.

Which Fallout core box should you buy?

Once you have a game, a plastic core box is the cheapest way to build the faction you want, and the maker builds the plastic Raiders and Super Mutants boxes to be compatible with both Wasteland Warfare and Factions. The Wasteland Raiders Core Box is eight multi part hard plastic Raiders, two of them in power armor, on 30mm and 40mm bases. The Super Mutants Core Box is six Super Mutants and two Super Mutant Hounds. The Institute, Minutemen and Brotherhood of Steel core boxes cover other major factions.

Do you need the Fallout: Factions Core Rulebook?

If you start with a Factions starter set, its rulebook gets you playing. The Factions Core Rulebook is the full game: a 112 page full color hardcover with the core rules, the scenario system, the Story Phase, and faction lists for the Brotherhood of Steel, Super Mutants, Survivors and Raiders, plus weapons, perks and Legends of the Wasteland.

When your group is deep into a campaign, the Crew Folio expands it: refined Control and Reach campaigns, new subfactions, updated crew lists for groups like the Gunners, Children of Atom and Cult of the Mothman, a brand new all robotic crew led by the Mechanist, and rules for recruiting robot and creature companions.

What should you add after the starter?

A single crew is not a game on its own. If you started with Raiders, a second core box gives you a rival, and the Super Mutants Suiciders, three Super Mutants carrying mini nukes, make an explosive addition to a Super Mutant force. For a wasteland encounter in a solo Wasteland Warfare mission, few things say Fallout like a Deathclaw.

Later, a big monster changes the shape of a session. The Scorchbeast Queen is a large multi part resin miniature on a 100mm scenic base, and the Super Mutant Behemoth is a resin centerpiece of its own. None of these are needed for a first game.

What do you need to build Fallout miniatures?

Most kits come unassembled and unpainted, so plan on clippers, a hobby knife, glue and a primer. The plastic core boxes are multi part hard plastic with optional parts, so dry fit the pieces before gluing to decide each model's loadout. The monsters are resin, which wants a different glue from plastic. Our guide to miniature glues covers which bottle does which job, and painting your first army fast with Speedpaint gets a crew on the table quickly.

Pick a game, grab its starter, and start your run through the wasteland. Everything is in the Fallout collection.