for your first plane, unless you have an extensive background in building models, you want something like an arf because there are things that you want to learn about how they are built first. you want a kit second. here's how i see it: "you would me spending months building a plane to be flown by a beginner that doesn't quite have a hold on flying yet." remember,m you are most likely to crash when you are new not only because of pilot error, but you are new to linkages, choice of servos, and properly hooking things up. instructions usually have something really misleading in them such as hard mounting your tank to the firewall. every plane i have had tells you to do that.