To Empire or not to Empire?

So I'm going to beauty school at Gene Juarez starting July 14. I've bought some Daemons to paint up (aka dry brush and wash) before I start. But I want to start working on another army for *while* I'm at beauty school. Though I've been flirting with the idea of doing Wood Elves, my other idea is Empire.

It seems to me that with the Empire list you can build just about any kind of army you want. Want to go big-regiment infantry, supported by detachments? Done. Want a gunline? No problem. Want artillery? You can have it. Magic. It's in there. Heck, you can even go uber-cheese and drop in a couple plastic S.Tanks and a War Altar.

Personally the detachment system appeals to me most (perhaps supported by handguns). It offers me the opportunity to do the kind of tactical manuevering that I envisioned with my Orcs & Goblins before I was rudely awoken by the truth of animosity.

The latest White Dwarf has a tactica article waxing about the glories of the detachment system. However it ultimately totes the gunline as the way to win with Empire. Now don't get me wrong. Shooting has it's place in Warhammer. But having been obliterated by gunline armies, I can attest to how boring they can be. Not only that, gunlines reminds me of blue-coated American soldiers gunning down Native Americans in movies like "Dances With Wolves" and "Little Big Man."

On the other hand a "pike and shot"-like system of spearmen supporting musketeers seems like an ideal solution. Lots of close combat nastiness. But lots of fun in the shooting phase as well. I'm not sure if the Fantasy rules would allow such a setup to be effective (Warhammer Historical English Civil Wars has rules for it, however...)

Overall, I'd say the raw versatility of the Empire list appeals to me most. I don't mind it being a "horde" army. I don't even mind that it's a challenge to paint (I plan on painting this army over the 13 months I will be in school).

Mostly, I want my next Fantasy army to be the "last" Fantasy army that I build. That doesn't mean that I will *never* build another Fantasy army again (heaven forbid). It just means that I will want to focus on this army and build and tune it over the next year. Originally I intended to buy the bulk of it before I start school and work on it on my days off (there's no homework in beauty school). Maybe start off spending $300 to $400? Or even just a Battalion box and move from there? Realistically, I could see myself pouring waaaay more than $400 into the army over the year. But that's the whole thing: I only want to put my money into one (Fantasy) army. So I'm thinking it should be an army I can do *anything* with.

So those are my thoughts. Though I'm tempted by the call of Athel Loren, Empire still appeals to me for it's versatility and breadth of scale.