build: work-in-progress: iron warriors, pt. 4

I think I'm done with the breaching squad's Rhino. I've enjoyed the challenge of fleshing it out, but I'm not looking forward to making another when I expand the list beyond Combat Patrol levels. Though it may not be so bad. I spent more time on plasticard work that ended up discarded for new ideas than I did on the stuff that stuck. As has become the norm, pics are clickable for larger versions.

Breaching Rhino: daemonic possession, dozer blade, extra twin-linked bolter

Breaching Rhino: detail close-ups

Breaching Rhino: without dozer blade

Still have a little green-stuff work to do on the marine's respirator attachment, but for all intents and purposes it's done. Now I need to figure out what the regular CSM's Rhino will look like. I've got some IG dozer blades lyin' 'round here somewhere...

build: work-in-progress: iron warriors, pt. 3

Again, it's been a rough week for making progress. Kicking around Space Marine multiplayer in my Iron Warriors skin seems to have sparked my imagination on the Rhino though, and I was able to get a little more headway. (once again, all images are clickable for larger version)

The dozer blade is magnetized. Still need to trick out the doors, shave the IW logo down a bit, add the IW stickin' out the top, and then get down to detail work. I've got some spikes and barbed wire lying around that I'd like to use if I can make it look good...

build: work-in-progress: iron warriors, pt. 2

Did some work this weekend, a good chunk of which was fruitless. Got a set of these tracks off eBay thinking they'd look pretty cool on an IW Rhino. After a couple hours cleaning up the considerable flash and another couple hours trying to get 'em to fit, I scrapped the idea. I got 'em to fit, mostly, but not well enough to look manufactured. Add in that the track system of a Rhino is mostly covered, keeping visual impact of the new treads to a minimum, and it quickly ceases to be worth the 4-5 hours effort needed to fiddle the tracks into working order. Particularly when my expanded list looks to have at least 6 Rhino chassis. At this moment, I'm very glad to have had the foresight to purchase only one test set.

The Breaching Squad's Rhino is nowhere near complete, but it's on its way. Here's a teaser...

All I'll say is this: the front plate takes queues from the IW Rhino Doors kit and I have a rapidly growing knowledge-base concerning InstantMold...

I also pulled out some Blue-Tac and fit the squad together partially to test the fit, and partially to get some better shots of what the squad will look like. All of the following pics are clickable to a double-sized version.

Breaching Squad 01: aspiring champion

Breaching Squad 01: plasma team

Breaching Squad 01: fire team

Breaching Squad 01: mop-up

Mk.III Pauldron: (l) stock, (c) legion, (r) miscellaneous

I mentioned in the first post that I had to modify the Mk. III shoulder pads quite a bit, so I went ahead and got some pics of that too. With three horned-helm exceptions, two of which were necessary due to positioning, the "Legion" pad above goes on a Marine's right shoulder. Two figures have FW pads on both shoulders. I'm mixing and matching as I go, trying to steer clear of any 8-pointed stars. These guys aren't intended to be pre-Heresy, but I want them to be Iron Warriors first, Chaos Space Marines second.

As always, questions, comments, criticism both welcomed and encouraged.

build: work-in-progress: iron warriors, pt. 1

And so it begins. The first of my hopefully two 400 point Combat Patrol entries for Adepticon 2012. The list I'm working from is pretty straightforward...
 

Iron Warriors Combat Patrol: 400 points BREACHING SQUAD Havocs x6: flamer x2, plasmagun x1 Aspiring Champ x1: Combi-Melta, Power Weapon Rhino x1: daemonic possession, dozer blade, TL bolter 2nd WAVE CSM x6: meltagun, icon of chaos glory Rhino x1: dozer blade, havoc launcher

And, after a few days intermittent work, here's where I'm at with 'em...

Breach Squad: close support and flamers

Breach Squad: plasma, ranged support, aspiring champ

I was a little gunshy about mixing the FW and GW parts, as neither are cheap and if it looks ass I've only myself to blame. Test fits looked promising so I went ahead with it. There are problems, though. The plastic heads fit low in the FW bodies, and, somehow, the FW heads fit low in the plastic bodies. A little grey-stuff spacer fixed the problem in both cases. There's also compatibility issues between the resin torsos and plastic legs - not enough contact area for glue to adhere. Once again, this is easily fixed with a little grey-stuff.

The Mk.III arms are all identical, and, IMO, are the most awkward arm pose from any Space Marine box - the downward tilt. All the SM/CSM Troop boxes have at least one set of those arms. The Mk.III greaves have the additional problem that their ornamentation can make it hard to find a good pose, even on the Mk.III torsos they come with. You can work around it, but I suggest gluing the "fist arm" flush into position with your weapon held at the angle you want, let it dry, then glue the "grip arm" with your weapon in place so you get a nice fit. If you glue both arms completely flush to the torso, the fist and grip will likely be too close to look right.

The Mk.III shoulder pads fit like regular shoulder pads, but have a few problems integrating with the CSM kits. There are a couple arm position/head combos that make it impossible to fit the tall, ornate Mk.III pads underneath a horned helm without alteration. Likewise, they flat out cannot fit on the bent pistol arm without modification. When I cut them down to fit the pistol arm, I liked the look so much I went ahead and altered all of them to match, even though they fit as-is on all the bolter/special weapon marines. I'll try to get some close-up pics of the alteration(s) later.

Considering how easy it is to kit out Chosen and Havocs with special weapons, the CSM box is woefully lacking. Trying to stay thrifty, I've Chaos-ified some "borrowed" from loyalist sources. Don't think they look too bad, considering.

Those that have seen the list may wonder why there's 10 dudes above. I figured I'd go ahead and make/paint both squads at full-strength, just in case I fall in love with the Iron Warriors and have to flesh it out further. I've Army Buildered the list out to 2300ish just grabbing what I think are fluffy Codex options. And I've still got two Troop and all the FA to fill! With that in mind, I've also begun work on a model that I can't even use in Combat Patrol...

Chaos Lord: daemon weapon, combi-melta

The sword's being held in place, as it's being held by the wrong hand. I've also got to a little grey-stuff work to add flexible joint armour and smooth out some of the nastier exacto cuts it took to trim this guy down to something useable. Also need to prop and angle the head a bit - in the pic it's being held by gravity.

Anyway, that's the start of the force. I've got a Rhino on sprue sitting next to me that needs some attention. As always, questions, comments, and criticism both welcome and encouraged.