A friend of mine bought the new starter set of Aleph... I do not know which (new?) sectorial is it, but I know that he pre-ordered it some weeks ago. It could be "Beyond coldfront" but I am not sure... I would like to make him a gift and buy some miniatures to integrate this first group. Or at least, miniatures, which find for sure a place in any reasonable Aleph combat group... Could you please advice for some good purchase ?
The very first thing you need to know if it's Steel Phalanx (the greeks) or Aleph/OSS (either the vanilla starter, which is compatible with OSS, or the Beyond coldfront). Because it will totally change what you need to take with it. As a quick guide for ever useful miniatures: Steel Phalanx: myrmidon box, Machaon, Phoenix, myrmidon officer Vanilla/OS: Aleph starter (if he took Beyond), Posthumans box (either 1G or 2G, no need to take both for a starter, proxy the others), Aleph support pack, nagas
It seems like he either picked a big box with a lot of models (Coldfront) or a small box with some models (Beyond Coldfront), both have models for two different factions (so he probably got it to split with a friend). Always right buy: Rebots box (works for both the greeks and the vedics) and (shudder) Andromeda (useless profile, good enough model, very meh concept for the model compared to what we were left to believe it was going to be). For the greeks: I doubt it is the case, since he would not have preordered, but it could be the 300pts newly retired army box. If there is a girl with a motorbike, then it's the case, and I suggest Machaon's blister, or the Thorakitai box. For the Vedics (Coldfront/Beyond Coldfront): the 2 Nagas blister (1 girl with long gun at the back, one guy with a mine in the hand), the Danavas hacker blister, the Support box (one girl, 2 small robots, three antennas), the Devas box (2 robots, 1 guy, 1 girl). And of course the Posthumans box, but that one I would thread lightly, since some people like to get the 2 boxes, while others prefer full male (thus needing to find compatible models for Box1) or full female (so they need to find compatible models for Box2).
As someone who just recently started Steel Phalanx, a good starter if you can find it is the 300pts box. To expand the 300pt Box I did as @xagroth suggested; buy Machaon - he does an unbelieveable amount of work in entomarchos fireteams and as a LT. To expand the army beyond this look into: Thrasymedes (Dire Foes 2 Box) / Thorakitai Box, for a cheap amount of specialists. Steel Phalanx Starter - gives you Eudoros, Myrm Hacker and a few thorakitai. Achilles :)
By the way, we are suggesting Machaon for Steel Phalanx, but he also does wonders in vanilla Aleph - he just can't be used in OS (and if we could, we would, he is just THAT good). So if you're aiming for Vanilla Aleph, or you want to play the both sectorials later, Machaon is a good choice. And the mini is good :)
Achilles and Patroclus work great in vanilla - and probably okay in Phalanx. And the Marut is a great gal.
I was shocked when I found out I'm one of the few members of my gang of players that absolutely hates the looks of the Marut. I think she is horrendous, way too skinny to be a tag, but everyone else thinks she is great and really beautiful. Anyway, I'm digressing, all the sugestions are great for both Aleph vanilla and Steel Phalanx =D
