Metadata
Description (>160 characters): Kill Team is an easy game to teach to new players if you know what you’re doing, but there are a few key things to keep in mind. Click here to learn more.
URL slug: /how-to-teach-kill-team
Keyword Research (SEMRush)
The Kill Team
14800 MV, 53 KD
Kill Team
4400 MV, 44 KD
Warhammer Kill Team
2400 MV, 28 KD
Kasrkin Kill Team
1300 MV, 10 KD
Kill Team Into The Dark
1300 MV, 21 KD
Kill Team Starter Set
1300 MV, 18 KD
How to play Kill Team
210 MV, 39 KD
Related Keywords (Google SERP)
What is needed to play Kill Team?
Is Kill Team easy to play?
How is Kill Team different than 40k?
What is Kill Team?
Is Kill Team a good game?
Are Kill Team rules free?
Backlinks
https://www.goonhammer.com/getting-started-kill-team-updated-may-2023/
https://www.goonhammer.com/kill-team-2-the-goonhammer-review/
H1: Kill Team: How to Teach New Players So They’ll Be Hungry For More
Teaching events are THE way to help grow your local community for Kill Team. Whether they’re full-tilt interested in starting to play or on the fence about it, giving players a time and place to gather and learn the basics goes a long way to fostering interest in the game, which means more people for you to play with.
H2: What is Kill Team?
Kill Team is a squad-based tactical tabletop battle game created by Games Workshop. Because it’s based on the “Warhammer 40,000” universe, many models and terrain pieces that can be used for 40K can often be used in Kill Team, and vice-versa.
The game has become quite popular since the launch of 2nd Edition in 2021. Those who don’t love the idea of putting hundreds of hours into assembling and painting a full army but are still interested in the lore, the miniatures, or playing games in the Warhammer 40,000 universe may find Kill Team a more accessible option.
H2: Is Kill Team Easy To Play?
Many aspects of Kill Team, like list construction, are much easier for new players to learn than 40K. Although the gameplay of Kill Team and 40K have some similarities, mechanically they are completely different games. While both include rules for shooting and melee combat, for example, the rules for both are totally different from each other.
H2: How Is Kill Team Different Than 40k?
Despite the mechanical differences, Kill Team can also serve as an onramp for getting people into 40K. People who are interested in the universe, the models, and the community might want to start with Kill Team before diving into learning 40K’s rules and painting a full army.
That way, they can get a sense of things like:
Which faction or factions appeal to them the most
How long it takes to paint a model
What their local community is like
How expensive the hobby is
…and other things to help them decide whether the hobby is “for them.”
H2: Explaining How to Play Kill Team to New Players
Once you’ve got your prospective Kill Team players assembled for your first teaching event, you’re going to need to teach them the basics.
Whatever you do, above all, remember to keep it simple. If your players show up to the event and immediately feel like they’re drinking out of a firehose, they’re probably going to lose interest. Remember that newer players—especially those who don’t typically play anything more complicated than Uno—can bounce off hard if they get overwhelmed by all the rules. Learning how to play something like Kill Team takes practice, which new players won’t get if they decide they’d have more fun staying home and playing “Baldur’s Gate 3” instead.
H3: Start Slow
Be honest, most of your first few games of anything probably included at least a few 5-15-minute instances of looking up the rules again and again. Don’t expect it to be different for new players.
Unless your players specifically request it, focus on teaching the core mechanics of an activation first, including how to read their team’s datacards—then help your players through their first Turning Point—this will ground them with context that will later help them understand things like Strategic Gambits, Firefight Ploys, Command Points, and the Scouting Step for after they’ve gotten a few games under their belt and feel more comfortable with the core mechanics.
Printing out datacards for a few Kill Teams ahead of time can be a great help to new players. Otherwise, Wahpedia is (currently, at time of writing) free for everyone, as are things like GW’s Balance Dataslate Updates. Lean on them and anything else you can to provide new players what they need.
As for mission type, sticking with the simplest, easiest, most basic missions in Kill Team will be fun enough that new players can play a single one multiple times while they learn enough to feel comfortable.
You don’t need to make sure that everyone has an absolutely 100% airtight grasp of the basic rules after one play session.
Some of your players might still get confused here and there, but once they get the basics down, you’ll be surprised how fast they’ll start flying through Turning Points without needing any support.
H2: What Is Needed To Play Kill Team?
You’ll need to provide the basic materials you need to play the game for everyone attending the event.
While the cost of entry is significantly lower in Kill Team than in 40K, there are a lot of materials besides dice that you absolutely need to play the game, and others that are nice to have but not completely necessary—especially for teaching games.
H3: What You Need To Play Kill Team
If you’re already a Kill Team player, you probably have things like order tokens and an assembled team of operatives handy. The thing is, you need to be able to provide the same things to everyone attending the event.
H4: Datacards (Essential)
You kind of need to know the rules for your little dudes if you want to play Kill Team, especially if you’re a new player and don’t have them memorized yet.
If you have the means, provide rulebooks if attendees don’t have them. Ideally, everyone should have access to their operatives’ datacards. Consider making printouts of the teams everyone plans on bringing ahead of time.
Alternatively, assuming your attendees have smartphones and a stable internet connection, show your new players how to look up the datacards for their operatives on third-party sites like Wahpedia.
H4: Cheat Sheets (Optional, but recommended)
Trust me, you’ll want to provide your players with a cheat sheet. It’ll save you and your players tons of time and headaches if they have a single source of truth with which to look up the answer to basic questions like “how many inches can I dash?” or, “what does ‘fusillade’ mean?”
You can find pre-made ones on the internet (like this one), or you can make your own.
If you don’t want to print them out for your attendees, consider texting them to everyone ahead of the event so they have them on their phones.
H4: Order tokens (Essential)
Order tokens are 100% essential for playing Kill Team, but having “official” order tokens is not.
The easiest and most cost-effective way to get order tokens—and most everything else you need to play—are through Kill Team Starter Sets like “Into the Dark” or “Octarius.” If you are running a teaching event for new players, it stands to reason that most of them will not bring their own tokens, so you will likely need to find a way to provide them to attendees.
Some options for solving this problem:
Ask existing players to provide some for the event
Ask your FLGS to provide some for the event
Make your own
Just use coins instead. It’s fine.
H4: Terrain (Essential)
It’s just not a killzone without things to hide, vault, and traverse over, around, across, and behind. Terrain is a big part of what makes Kill Team such a dynamic and interesting game, and you will absolutely need to make sure each player has terrain on their board.
If your personal collection is short on chest-high walls and ruined Mechanicus apparatus for the event, talk to your FLGS staff or members of your local community. See if they’re willing to lend some terrain out to create a few killzones for your new players.
If all else fails, you can always use soda cans, candy boxes, or whatever you have lying around to create your battlefield. It’s not as cool, but the silver lining is that it teaches your new players that they can still play Kill Team with regular household objects even if they don’t have access to real terrain yet.
H4: Mission briefings (Optional)
It’s extremely helpful to have printouts detailing the mission(s) each attendee will be playing. Be sure to provide one per board.
H4: Measuring tools (Essential)
Kill Team uses a unique, shapes-based measurement system. Kill Team starter sets often come with a vaguely triangular measuring tool designed specifically for the game.
While it’s nice to have, these are not absolutely necessary to play. At the very least, make sure that your players bring their own tape measurer, as well as a few dice.
H4: Game mats (Optional)
Kill Team is played on a 30” x 22” game mat, which is a plastic or padded mat designed to decorate the “ground” of your Killzone. While not absolutely essential for playing a game, they do make your boards look significantly more interesting and thematic, which is helpful if your goal is to sell new players on a game system that they’re unfamiliar with.
If you run your event at your friendly local gaming store (FLGS), talk to the staff beforehand. See if they have boards available for public use, and if you can set a few aside for the event.
H4: Kill Teams (Essential)
Obviously, you also need two Kill Teams to play Kill Team.
Don’t assume that attendees are 40K players who have a squad of Pathfinders or a Kasrkin Kill Team assembled and ready to go. Some of your newer players might be new to Warhammer altogether, and will need pieces to play with.
Talk to your attendees ahead of time if possible. Make sure everyone has a Kill Team so they can play at the event. If they don’t, see if other attendees are comfortable loaning their models out for the event. If you have the models, throw some teams together from your own collection.
H2: Running The Event
It’s absolutely crucial to keep this in mind while running a teaching event for Kill Team: let people make mistakes.
Be empathetic. Make yourself available for questions, but don't hover over people’s shoulders waiting for them to make a mistake. Nobody likes a hoverer, or to be incessantly corrected while they’re trying to learn a new complex task like playing an unfamiliar board game. It will make them not want to play the game again, which guarantees they’ll never learn.
If you must interject, try to pick your moments carefully. Don’t interrupt them while they’re trying to figure out how to play through an activation unless they’re doing something that gives them a blatantly unfair advantage over their opponent. Wait until they’re done, then gently let them know what they got wrong. Chances are, they’ll feel embarrassed that they made a mistake and not make it next time.
Remember, they’re not getting paid to do this. They decided to take time out of their week to try something new that seemed fun.
They don’t have to play again. Your goal is to make them want to.
H3: Think Like A Waiter
Don’t you hate when you’re at a restaurant and your waiter won’t leave you alone? Of course you do.
Most of the time, a good waiter will only come to the table a few times per party per evening. They don’t bug you every 5 minutes asking if you need anything, but they make themselves available if you have a question, want to order more drinks, or whatever.
It’s a fine line depending on the event, but once your players know the basics of what they have to do and have started rolling dice, try to have the mindset of a good waiter: check in with each game once or maybe twice, then leave them alone unless they ask you for help, and make yourself available if anybody needs help.
H2: What If Your Players Decide They Don’t Like Kill Team?
There’s always the possibility that you’ll do everything right and, despite your best efforts, your attendees decide that Kill Team isn’t for them.
Make it clear that that’s okay. Kill Team, like 40K, can be super fun, but it’s not for everyone.
For some, the rules might be too complex or unclear. For others, maybe tabletop skirmish games just aren’t their thing. Or maybe they are, but Kill Team isn’t what they’re looking for.
Consider encouraging them to look into games like Blood Bowl, Infinity, or Star Wars: Shatterpoint. There are a ton of great games out there that they might end up being really into.
Be kind and respectful of their decision, and let them know they’re welcome back if they change their mind down the road. Do that, and no matter what, you’ll have run a successful learning event of Kill Team.