flashback friday: armored krumpany: support trukks

I recently found myself rummaging through pictures of several old and/or incomplete projects and thought it might be nice to try and put them all in one place. To this end, I'll try to dredge up an old project once a week to share with the world and reminisce. This week, we finish out the Armored Krumpany!

WHAT WAS IT THEN?
As detailed last week, the Armored Krumpany was my attempt at Orkifying the Imperial Guard's "Armored Company" rules. Tanks were the back-bone of the army, to be sure, but the supplemental rule-set also featured armored fighting vehicles in support roles. Most of these support vehicles were based on the stalwart, mutable Chimera chassis, which sees use as a troop transport, mobile artillery cannon, giant flame-thrower and missile launcher. To that end, I got to work kit-bashing the new (at the time) Trukk kit...

Belcha: final work-in-progress shot

First up was "The Belcha," an Ork equivalent to the IG Hellhound. Using multiple types of plasticard sheet, I-beams, rods and tube, along with various Ork bits and a smattering of non-GW kit, the intention was to make a relatively fast-moving, flame-spewing, death machine.

Belcha: painted

Belcha: details (clickable)

While I made the rules for the flame-throwing cannon particularly nasty, I tried to balance that by giving it a nice, Orky weakness:

BELCHA Capable of reducing whole squads of infantry to smoldering piles of ash and metal, Belchas are one of the most fearsome vehicles in an Armored Krumpany’s motor pool. Unfortunately, its light armor combined with its massive fuel cannister make it fearsome to the Orks as well.   Armor BS Front Side Rear Belcha 2 11 11 10 WARGEAR Belcha Cannon: Essentially skorchas on growth hormone, Belcha Cannons are capable of spewing large gouts of liquid fire over long distances. To fire, place the flamer template over an enemy unit so that the whole template is in range and LOS while over as many models as possible. Roll to hit once. If successful, all models touched by the template are hit. If unsuccessful, each model is hit on a 4+. SPECIAL RULES Bada-BOOM!: The massive fuel tank used to arm the Belcha Cannon makes the Belcha particularly susecptible to penetrating hits. When the Belcha is penetrated add +1 to the roll on the vehicle damage chart. This stacks with the +1 for being open-topped.

Building the Belcha just got me warmed up. With the back-story of the Armored Krumpany firmly rooted in a Big Mek lootin' his ideas off the battlefield, I figured he needed some way of draggin' back the big bits. I launched into the next support vehicle right away.

Wrecka: from above

Tanks and other armored fighting vehicles are at the forefront of any Armored Krumpany - both as fighting machines and as spoils of war. However, in it’s no easy task to recover conquered vehicles in the heat of battle. Without the Wrecka, damaged and disabled vehicles would be nothing more than battlefield debris. Born from a simple Trukk chassis, Wreckas have been retrofitted with hooks, chains, cranes, arms, magnets or other bits designed to transform debris into scrap, and bring it back as loot.

Wrecka: right and left

I gave it a super-sized "towin' engine" by keeping the engine halves separate and bulking out the space between. The headlights, one of my favorite single features on this build, are the searchlights from a Chaos Vehicle sprue sandwiched between two pieces of plastic tube. The towing apparatus in back was all from scratch, the chain coming from a dollar-store necklace.

Codex wise, a Wrecka was the dedicated transport for a Wreckin' Krew - a 12-strong Ork Boyz unit whose special rules (the ability to tow vehicles, including the enemies) was tied to the Wrecka.

Wrecka: details

WHAT DID I LEARN?
These were my first truly kit-bashed vehicles. They're where I started refining my plasticard skills and figuring out how to view model parts not so much as pieces of a puzzle, but as elements for a collage. With a sharp hobby knife, the right structural bits, and some glue, a given piece can become just about anything.

WHERE ARE THEY NOW?
Like may completed builds, they sit on a shelf in my hobby room. The Belcha on the shelf of painted and finished stuff. The Wrecka on the shelf of things I still need to paint. Looking at many of the pieces I have from defunct projects, I feel like many of them would make great test beds for honing various painting techniques. When I look at the Wrecka today, I see an opportunity to try out various weathering techniques - salt mask, oil washes, weathering powders - to approximate the look of a famous, dim-witted tow truck...