Thunderhawk and Rapier Battery for Legions Imperialis

Legions Imperialis reinforcements!

Hey, look at this! A second post within one month! Efforts to get back into the regular posting routine continue here with some kit for GW's "Legions Imperialis" game (a.k.a Epic 30k), the small-scale tabletop game rules for the Horus Heresy. We have a battery of Rapier support weapons for the XV Legion Astartes, the Thousand Sons, and, the real star of the show, a Thunderhawk gunship in the colours of the XVI Legion Astartes, the Warmaster's own Sons of Horus!

Rapier Support Battery

"Quad launchers" - the current version of the old "Thudd Guns" - great for knocking enemy infantry around.

"Rapier" support carriers go WAY back into the Rogue Trader times. Take some kind of scary weapon, mount in on a tracked carrier and give up a couple of support crew, and you had a Rapier. They were available back in the day both as 28mm metal kits, and were also among the first metal support options for the early "Space Marine" game - you could get tiny little batteries of these guns to support your 6mm sized Space Marines in the earliest version of the "Epic" game.

The designs have changed over the years, but the concept of the weapon is still the same - some scary weapon on a tracked platform, accompanied by a pair of minders/crew. In the scale of Epic 30k, where super-heavy tanks and Titans stalk the battlefield, these weapons are not large, but they can pack a surprising punch.

Rapiers - anti-tank fire support that will come in handy for the sons of Magnus!

These are great little kits - the only real downside is that they are part of a larger sprue, sharing space with heavy dreadnoughts and other support bits - and so it is not really easy to acquire a decent-sized batter of the guns without accumulating a bunch of other stuff you don't necessarily need. But even the small battery is useful - two laser destroyers designed to pack an anti-tank punch, while the quad launchers take out rival infantry. They don't move very fast, but they do move, and so are good to support an infantry detachment. 

Thunderhawk Gunship

Let's fly the friendly skies of 30k!

On to the star of this post! Here we have a classic Space Marine vehicle, the Thunderhawk gunship. I have been painting Thousand Sons for Legions Imperialis, but there was no way the Warmaster was going to miss out on this bird, so it got the green for the Sons of Horus! 

The original! Who remembers these little metal guys zooming over games of "Epic"?

Remember the original Thunderhawk from the days of "Epic"? The modelling has come a long way!

The Thunderhawk is the all-around, go-to gunship for the Space Marines. While not as large as the venerable Stormbirds, the vehicle fills a similar role, meant as much for action in the void as it is for ground support (hence the main weapon mounted on the top) while it carries Space Marines in for combat landings. It has quite a few weapons to provide fire support for them after they have been dropped off! 

This is a model that GW originally released for their excellent 2nd edition of "Aeronautica Imperialis", the 40k-setting air combat game. The company leaned into the dark humour of its fanbase by touting that a plastic Thunderhawk model was here at long last! I think most of us appreciated the humour :)

Anyway, this thing just looks cool. Here are more photos. 

View from the top.

Side/rear view.

View of the bottom detail.

The model is easy to detach from its flying base, so you can represent it on the ground during the game if the need arises.

There are a lot of parts to this kit...you need to pay attention, because the components are small! But wow, is it ever a wonderful little kit. I painted it sub-assemblies...not a whole lot of them, but I did the tiny heavy bolter currents and missiles separately, as well as the secondary wing assemblies (the smaller "wings" over the top of the engine). I glued those secondary wings into place, but if you wish you can build it so they move! I loved painting all of the details on this model (to the extent I could manage it). I can't wait to use it in a game of Epic 30k at some point. 

That's all for today, but stay tuned for another post, hopefully soon!

"Saturnine" Dreadnought for 30k Thousand Sons

"Saturnine" Dreadnought for the Thousand Sons. Big guns on a big dreadnought.

Well, at long last...a blog post! I have been utterly delinquent when it comes to posting on the Blog. I actually have been painting a fair bit through the summer, and have been meaning to share some photos, because that is fun! But...I just keep getting delayed on the whole "take photos and post" part of the process. Oh well. Let's try to get one post going, and we'll see if we can build on it...and for said post here we will highlight a new addition to the ranks of my XV Legion Astartes - a great big "Saturnine" Dreadnought. This is a 28mm multi-part plastic kit from GW's "Age of Darkness" range.

Big sucker...

"Saturnine"-type kit is the new "latest thing" for the Horus Heresy, central to the box set of the 3.0 edition of the rules released in the summer of 2025. Considering that the Black Library had 50 or 60 so novels covering the story of the Horus Heresy, as well as a 10-book series on the Siege of Terra itself, and that "Saturnine" kit is not mentioned the whole time, this amounted to quite the ret-con, even by GW standards! 

Low emissions...I think? 

The Saturnine-equipped chaps are pretty large. The Saturnine terminators are essentially "they're terminators, but bigger!", and the same thinking lies behind the Saturnine dreadnought - "it's a dreadnought, but bigger!". This thing is mounted on a 100mm round base and is much larger than the Contemptor and Leviathan dreadnought models found in the Space Marine Legion collections. 

"Heavy Plasma Bombard" on one arm.

It is still not as big as the Imperial Knight kits, but in terms assembling and painting, there are a lot of similarities to the approach. There is a significant amount of metal/machine, covered with armoured plates, and the best way to tackle the painting is via a sub-assembly process. This allows you to get a base of metal colours down on the interior components, get those washed and dry-brushed, before focusing on the external armoured covers. 

"Disintegrator cannon" - surely this is totally safe to use...

This is particularly important with the giant, turtle-style armour plates which dominate the top assembly on the model - they cover MOST of what is underneath, but NOT all, so it's worth taking some time to paint the plates separately. It's also a lot easier to apply the transfers to them before they are affixed to the main body.

Secondary weapons, mounted on the chest of the dreadnought. The pair at the top are "concussive resonators", while there are a pair of "photonic incinerators" on the bottom. These are designed to accommodate magnets, which is great.

The designers of this kit anticipated small magnets, which is great, and so magnetizing the weapons was easy. The kit comes with two different options for the (relatively) smaller short-range weapons mounted on the torso, and those are easily magnetized so you can swap them out. The main weapons on the "arms" can also have magnets fitted to them, allowing them to be changed out should I even acquire some of the other weapon options which have been released in the months following the introduction of these new kits.

Close up the the "sarcophagus" on the Saturnine dreadnought...

I've played very little of the 3.0 Horus Heresy rules, so I can't tell you how this thing performs in games. But I have come up against Saturnine Terminators, and find they are just broken, so I expect this thing would deliver similar results. I cannot remember what the main weapons are called, but they seem pretty devastating to infantry and to vehicles, while this version of the dreadnought armour is likely to be unbelievably resilient. These are among the game's newest models, after all, and as the "40k style" is sadly continuing to creep into 30k gaming, it's not shocking that these new kits would be powerful in the game. 

It's hard to spot, but you can see the alternate weapons mounted on the torso.

But I should be fair - these things are not solely a power gaming exercise. First, this is a very nice model kit, something GW can still do very well. And whatever I think of "Saturnine" stuff, it sure seems popular with gamers, and in a genuine way. Many players seem to have a soft spot for those distant images of the original goofy-looking "Saturnine" armour of the Rogue Trader times, and are pleased to have the chance to bring the updated kits to their 30k collections.

No doubt the Thousand Sons of my own collection are surely pleased to be enjoying the boost. They have the "Axehole 2.0" to lead them in battle. They have a Saturnine Terminator squad to bring further support. They also have a new Spartan APC to carry the troops into battle!  Watch for further reinforcements to come to this legion through the fall...anyway, that is all for now, hopefully I'll be back with another post before too long!

How to Make Some Simple Hills

I feel like you guys already would know all this stuff but I am so pleased with the new hills I made for the Little Bighorn game that I wanted to post a short tutorial. It is really easier than it seems.

Materials:

• 2x8 sheet of 1" styrofoam, Home Depot/Rona, cost ~$10
• Sharpie. You have one of these already
• USB Hot Wire Foam Cutter. I use the FloraCraft CleanKut. Got it at Michael's, $30
• Sand
• Paint. If you can, grab a pint pot of mistinted paint at the paint counter. Otherwise, have some latex paint mixed up in a ground colour. Don't use craft or model paint, you will need too much of it
• Sanding sponges - medium texture. ~$8 for three. Get washable/reusable ones. You will be doing a lot of sanding
• White school glue

First, draw out the shapes of your hills on the styrofoam with your Sharpie. Next, cut out the shapes with your hot wire foam cutter - but angle the wire outwards from your lines as much as you can manage, like 45 degrees. This will give you a start to the "slope" on the hillsides. Cut slowly and let the cutter do the work while you inhale the fragrant fumes of atomized styrofoam. If you're using a USB cutter and it's not working well, try a different plugin adapter as some are more powerful than others.

Once you've got the shape cut out it's time to start sanding. You want to round off the edge contour between the hillside and hilltop to make it natural-looking, and smooth out the hillside itself. When the sponge starts to get less effective, switch to a new one. The styrofoam dust will clog up the sponges but you can wash them.

When you have the hill contoured in a pleasing way it's time to start painting. On mine I laid down a basecoat of the latex ground-coloured paint. Then I brushed over white glue thinned with water and lightly sprinkled the sand over top. After the glue has dried (it can take a long time if it's thinned) put another coat of thinned glue over top. Then paint again, or not, and drybrush, or not, and apply flock or static grass, or not, all according to your taste.

Lastly, have a game with your fantastic new hills!

Here are the hills cut out of styrofoam and shaped.

Hills after basecoat of paint with sand applied over thinned white glue.

More thinned white glue gets put over top to seal down the sand.

Hills laid out on the Little Bighorn terrain.

Hills after painting over the sand, with flock and static grass applied.

Finished hill.

Ready for the last stand on Custer Hill.

Hills laid out on the finalized terrain.

The battle is on Sunday - hoka hey!

All Done. Teepees and Dead Horses

OK so this is the end of the Little Bighorn project (for now)... some set dressing for the game. Above we have some teepees for the village. The pattern is a free download from firstpalette. They are big though, but I discovered that printing them two to a page (on 8 1/2" x 11" letter paper) makes a perfect size teepee for 28mm gaming. The "poles" are coffee stirsticks cut in half, then in half lengthwise, and taped to the inside of the teepee walls. A good project for an evening. They didn't need to be super-detailed since they will be placed on the very edge of the battlefield anyway.

The other thing the battle had a lot of was dead horses, survivors of the Reno fight talk about piling up dead horses as breastworks and the people who saw the Custer battlefield afterwards mention dead horses (and later, piles of horse bones) everywhere. So I thought I would get some horses 3D printed (thanks Byron!) and paint them, just as some cover for the troopers.

Here's what I imagine they'll look like on the battlefield, more or less.

So that's about it for painting before we have the Big Game. Don't get me wrong - I still have lots of unpainted models for this project, likely more than I will ever get painted. But this will be enough to do the battle I've planned for my birthday, and to commemorate the 150th anniversary of one of history's most famous "last stands". 

Next up - battle report. Hoka hey!

Nearly there! More Plains Warriors and Crow Scouts

Last night I finished off nine more Plains warriors and three Crow scouts for the other team. The warriors are from Foundry and the scouts are the very nice Brigade Games models sculpted by friend of the Conscripts Paul Hicks.

 

Here is Crazy Horse his own self, flanked by two warriors, Fish Arrow and Holds Fire. I have a mounted Crazy Horse too.

Lean Wolf, Bear Licks With Tongue, Lazy Boy.

Little Crow, Running Rabbit, One Shirt.

Crow scouts with trapdoor Springfields. Really nice models, these.

Here are all the models I've painted for the game so far, approximately fifty foot and mounted on each side, which is about what I'd set as a goal. This should make a pretty good game of Legends of the Old West even if not all of the 7th Cavalry get put on the table - there are several specific "characters" including Reno, Benteen and deRudio who I've painted, but who won't appear in the Last Stand game. The model painting is almost done now, I just have to paint some dead horses (depressing, I know, but they were everywhere on the battlefield and will be useful cover for dismounted troopers). I also will be making a few teepees for the village on the nearside of the river, at the edge of the table.

Hoka hey!

Nearing the End! Mounted Seventh Cavalry Troopers and More Plains Warriors

OK! So we're about a month away from The Big Birthday Game and the models are progressing nicely. The latest I've gotten done are eight mounted Seventh Cavalry troopers and eight more Plains warriors. First the cavalry - they are Wargames Foundry models (naturally) and are pretty great in every way. The horses are noticeably larger than the Plains ponies ridden by the warriors, which necessitated slightly bigger bases, but that's the way they were in real life and it's fine by me.

   

Custer organized the Seventh in a particular way - each company was mounted on the same colour horses, except for one company, and the buglers who were on greys. Company A had coal black mounts, Company E had greys, Companies B, D, F, I and L had bays, H had blood bays, G and K had sorrels, and C had light sorrels. Company M had mixed colour horses. These were all identified with brands. The excellent Foundry horses have a "US" incised brand on the front upper leg and I put company brands on the rear left "thighs". The pattern was company letter over "7 C" for the Seventh Cavalry. I did these with a black technical pen.

  

The castings are good - horse is one piece and the trooper, saddle and gear cast together as a separate piece. This makes for easy painting although there is a lot of gear. You can see the light blue overcoat rolled in front of the trooper here. There's also a nosebag, feed sack, saddlebag, pistol holster, lariat, and canteen.

I've painted the greys as E Company of course, the bays (reddish brown with black points - mane, tail and socks) as C Company, and the sorrels (reddish brown with light coloured points) as C Company.

Bugler here on a grey.

Trooper of Company C in his red fireman's shirt.

With the mounted troopers out of the way I also got some more dismounted Plains warriors done. These are the Foundry Dog Soldiers.

Goes Through the Camp, Touch the Sky (he is a big fella), Voice Like Thunder.

Yellow Thunder, Walking Rain.

Three Fingers, Pawnee Killer, Plenty Coups. All painted in the traditional style, although I did punch up the blue with another highlight of Hoeth Blue and the red with some Evil Sunz Scarlet.

Here are the forces as of this update. I have nine more Plains warriors to go and maybe three more Crow scouts if there's time. I also want to make some teepees for background colour on the battlefield. 

So till then... hoka hey!