30k Imperial Fist Command & Banner

Imperial Fist Command Squad - models from GW and Forge World.

Here we come with more loyalist reinforcements for GW's "Age of Darkness"! Here we have a command group painted in the colours of the VII Legion Astartes, the Imperial Fists. The figures are a mix of generations in terms of GW's 30k figure line - the commander and standard bearer are relatively old sculpts from Forge World, while the two body guard figures are plastic Marines from the new plastic Mark VI "beakie" range, with custom resin bits from Forge World.

Nice sword. Fancy armour. Bolt pistol. Tabard. This fellow is ready to defend terra!

Another view of the VII Legion officer, wearing Mark IV platre.

Anachronistic silliness like taking a big flag into battle is, for me, part of the "charm" for GW, and I like to have standard bearers painted for all of the Legions in my collection. Rogal Dorn's lads are exactly the sort, IMO, to want to have a banner to rally around while they stand up on whatever wall they have just built. 

BIG FLAG. A "must" for all 30k armies, in my opinion! Thank goodness for the Forge World decal sheet, which really came in handy for the banner.

Here we can get a bit of a look at the Marine peaking out from behind his great, big banner.

So. Much. Yelow. But here you can see more of the wonderful detail on the armour - and his lovely mace, ideal for bashing disloyal traitors!

This Forge World command set, designed specific for the VII Legion, has a nice look with custom Mark IV armour plate. You have a command figure (a Centurion, but really, can stand in as any one of a variety of different heroes or "consuls" available to Space Marines in the game) and a standard bearer, both sporting fancy armour with assorted patterns and legion symbols embossed on different spots.

A view of "The Chosen", the other base component of a Legion Astartes command squad. These are plastic Mark VI marines, with resin heads and shoulder pads from Forge World.

Again, my brush struggled to capture some of the details on the armour. Part of the issue is, well, still having room to improve when it comes to brush skills. But part of the challenge is also the fact that GW's newer "Agrax Earthshade" formulation is just awful, very hard to use for recess washes, with very uneven results (with a finish that is glossy as f*ck to boot). I want very much to find a replacement, but have yet to find one that works. Oh well. 

The Space Marine command squad also includes "chosen", functionally bodyguards. For these, I wanted to get back to the Mark VI plastics, thought they made good subjects for some of the custom Imperial Fist heads that Forge World released for the newer Mark VI kits. I still very much prefer the "beakie" helmet, but I do find these particular helmets appear "snooty" enough to imply some manner of extra status for their bearers. These are command squad flunkies acting as ablative armour battle-hardened bodyguards for the standard bearer and the officer, and the custom helmets match, roughly, the look of the Mark IV helmets on the officer and standard bearer.

The whole gang one more time...

My Imperial Fists now have a decent collection of command and/or command-adjacent flunkies - all worthy targets for the bolters of the Warmaster's finest! These fellows should look very nice - whether they are getting picked off from the top of one of Rogal Dorn's dumb walls or simply stomped under because they were caught out in an ambush en route to one of Rogal Dorn's dumb walls. That is all for this post - thanks for reading, and stay tuned for more yellow-armoured reinforcements in the near future!