Steel Legion Ogryns

 When I saw that Anvil Industry had created ogryn models with greatcoats and gas masks, I knew I had to add them to my steel legion army. The models are pretty big and are the same high quality as other Anvil products. My favourite part on the model is the Lewis gun inspired ogryn ripper gun equipped with an axe blade in the stock! Painting was the usual GunSchwarme colour scheme.

Guard model for scale purposes.

Stormtroopers and hopefully some vehicles are up next.

Thanks for visiting.

30k Health Care - Imperial Fist Apothecary

Free health care for the Siege of Terra! A VII Legion Apothecary is ready for service.

My delinquency in blogging continues...I am traveling for work, and while I still find time for painting and hobbying, I have lapsed on the blogging...and blogging just seems to be one of those momentum things, that when you stop it for a while, it is easy to stay stopped, especially in the summer. And there have been hobby happenings...musings over the "Siege of Cthonia" campaign book, and then...holy sh*t, they are actually bringing Epic back after all of these years!! Wow!! I could fill a month's worth of posts just praising and ranting about that!! But let's save that for later...for now, I just need to get back into the swing of things a bit. Let's start with this guy, an apothecary painted in the colours of the VII Legion Astartes, the Imperial Fists. This is a 28mm resin figure from Forge World.

Chainswords - helping to slay the enemy AND provide health care? Is there anything they can't do?

Horus Heresy players will have seen this sculpt many times by now - he is wearing Mark IV armour, carrying a bolt pistol, a chainsword and all of the implements of the medical trade for Space Marines in the year 30,000. It looks like health care for the Adeptus Astartes will be free, but seems to involve a lot of injections and saws...

All sorts of completely safe medical fluids hooked up and available to assist Dorn's lackeys...who of course will be easily wounded, as the Sons of Horus can hardly miss opponents bright yellow armour...

There are many different sorts of specialist flunkies and functionary Space Marines in a given Legion, part of what makes the setting so much fun! In that sense, the Apothecary is just one option among many...but for some reason, these models have always had something of an outsized impact when used in games, thanks to rules which either prevent damage to allied models, or, even better, bring allied models back to life! Certainly a way to drive your opponent crazy :)

The gloss varnish on the decals can still be seen...the humidity in Ontario is oppressive, and it will be a while before this fellow (and several other figures) will get their final matte varnish...

This guy joins my ever-so-slowly-yet-steadily-growing collection of Imperial Fists for Horus Heresy games. Loyalist reinforcements never seem to join my collection at the same rate or amount as those for the Warmaster's side, but I have been working away on a variety of Imperial Fists (in at least two scales), and just delinquent in my blogging...so I hope to share more pictures of the new figures soon. That's all for now - thanks for reading!

And holy sh*t - Epic is coming back!!!

Warhammer 40K Inquisition Rhino

Sick of Sisters of battle yet? I'm not, but here's something a little different, although Sisters-adjacent - an Inquisition Rhino transport.

This is another rehab project, as alluded to in a previous Sisters post... I picked up a bunch of metal Battle Sisters from a local dude, including the complete metal Immolator conversion set. The thing was, the Immolator parts (that were meant for a MKI Rhino) were stuck onto a MKIIB chassis. It looked terrible. So I removed the metal bits from the MKIIB, stripped them, and assembled a new MKI Rhino. Then, of course, I was left with the stripped and sad MKIIB...

No worries though, I dug into the bits box and replaced the parts that needed work, including the side doors, hatches and pintle weapon, fixed some of the worst damage, and primed the vehicle.

 

I actually had tried to sell it on a Facebook group and got a bite, but the dude backed out. So a thought occurred to me - why not paint it up as an Inquisition transport? It won't fit into the Sisters army per se since it's a MKIIB and the Sisters vehicles are all MKI Rhinos, but it makes sense that an Inquisitor (or even a Ministorum Confessor or the like) might have a fancier ride, right?

So away I went... the vehicle is panel-highlighted Vallejo Dark Rubber and edge highlighted Celestra Grey, just like the Sisters Rhinos, but I've added a pop of red (Khorne Red panel-highlighted Mephiston Red and edge-highlighted Evil Sunz Scarlet) for interest. The "I" on the hatch is hand-rendered and the decals are from the old Witch-Hunters transfer sheet that came with the Arco-flagellant box set.

 

Here it is with Uriah Jacobus and some VERY repentant sinners, looking to atone for their conduct by splattering the Emperor's enemies all over the battlefield. This should be a strong unit in the game, as described in the Saint Celestine post.

Of course for other narrative 40K gaming it can be a transport for an Inquisitor and his or her retinue, as shown. Yes I know that the Inquisitor is in Terminator armour and can't ride in a Rhino, but it looks cool in a group photo right?

I hope you enjoyed reading this, and have a great weekend. 

Saint Celestine and Geminae Superia

More additions to the Sisters of Battle army today... looking to add some character punch to the group in anticipation of the big battle against Mike's Imperial Guard. So I've painted the old metal Saint Celestine model and converted and painted two Geminae Superia as her bodyguard.

Here she is in her somewhat fuzzy glory... great model to paint but keeping that sword blade stuck on has been another matter entirely. It was broken when I got it and it really seems to have some sort of anti-superglue forcefield working on it. I even tried two-part epoxy to no avail... however it's stuck on now so we'll see how that goes.

I really like those two cute li'l cherubs holding her cloak... of course the fluff on St. Celestine is that she appears when most needed by the Sisters, does her thing (basically wrecks enemy sh!t) and disappears again. Just what you need in a 40K character. "Help us win this battle then f*** off. We don't need to hear you whining about our sh!tty rations or how cramped it is inside a Rhino... you have one job, do it and then just leave."

I really like the flower bouquet decorating the Ardent Blade. Pretty cool in-game as well, since it's both a power sword and a flamer... 

Some editions of the Sisters codex allow (or in some cases require) you to take one or two Geminae Superia along with St. Celestine. They're basically Seraphim with power swords that also act as ablative armour for the Saint.

I had a few extra metal Seraphim without jump packs, so I converted these into Geminae Superia by cutting off one hand and plugging in a current plastic Seraphim hand holding a power sword. I also used the current plastic jump pack. I think the conversion worked pretty well.

The old Seraphim are just soooo nice...

And those new jump packs look cool too don't they! Of course over 25 years the weedy supports attached to the feet of these models had long since departed, so it was simple matter to drill into the bottoms of the models with a pin vice and put in a brass rod/wire in their place. 

Anyway that's it for Celestine, nice to have her and her bodyguard done. Next up is an Inquisitorial Rhino I think. I've got a modern Rhino I rescued from the scrap heap, and was looking at the rules we're likely to use for the Sisters vs. Guard game. It turns out Arco-flagellants can ride in a transport... and the combo of those boys with Uriah Jacobus is not to be missed. As a sneak preview, the unit of six Arco-flagellants with Uriah would have 30 WS5 S4 attacks by themselves, re-rolling misses in the first round of assault, and benefitting from Feel No Pain... ouch! Look out Steel Legion!!

"Mea Maxima Culpa!" Arco-Flagellants

More Sisters production this week with another wacky bunch of sinners: Adeptus Ministorum Arco-Flagellants. These are original metal miniatures and came straight out of a sealed box from 2002. I got 'em on eBay of course.

Great models these; they came in a box of six with two different base sculpts. Cost? Well I don't exactly want to say - they were a bit more than a new plastic box of ten models - but they were well worth it to keep consistent with the old-school style of my army.

Lots of flesh to paint on these models - I layered Doombull Brown, Cadian Flesh, and Kislev Flesh, washed lightly with Reikland Flesh wash.

Metal bits were straight-up Leadbelcher washed with Nuln Oil.

These guys are really going for it aren't they!

Throw in a Ministorum Priest and you got a hard bunch for close combat action. I have to say that there's a really cool bit of fiction featuring some Arco-Flagellants in the Black Library "Book of Martyrs". Phil Kelly's novella in that book ("The Martyrdom of Sister Anarchia", a pretty good story about a Sister of Battle captured by T'au). Phil's description of the Arco-Flagellants was great:

"Human corpses, shas'vre."

"Are we sure they are not alive?"

"The waxy pallor indicates they are already dead, and their thermal life sign correlates with that of a cooling human corpse."

Sure enough, near-naked bodies were spread in awkward repose across the swamp, some missing limbs entirely...their lack of clothing was puzzling, disturbing even, but it paled next to the extent of their cybernetic augmentation. Their replacement limbs were as crude as they were horrific. One of the vilest aspects of humanity was its habit of repurposing its lost and unwanted as brutish tools of labour, each lobotomised and given but one task to slave away at, monotonously and without reprieve, for the rest of their foreshortened lives...

Most of the swamp-corpses were dotted with strange ports and sockets, their arms ending in sheaves of primitive electrical cabling...

[Then] the corpses in the marsh sat up as one... jerking as if electrocuted. In awful synchrony they rose to a crouch, then leapt forwards into a splashing, pell-mell run. There was an awful screaming sound, mechanical as well as biological, as their cybernetic limbs crackled with sickly green lightning. 
 

Good stuff eh?? I'd love to read some more BL fiction about the Adeptus Ministorum and Adepta Sororitas weirdos like Arco-Flagellants and Sisters Repentia. Maybe we can start a petition to get Dan Abnett to take that on!

Anyway I hope this is inspirational for your own projects. May the light of the Emperor shine down upon you!