MK III Iron armour Combi-Weapon Conversions

Hi All,

Just a quick post about the Combi-Weapons I'm converting for a 10 man Sternguard Squad of FW MK III Iron Armour Marines.

I wanted to keep the look of the models right, by using the Phobos pattern Bolter with a special weapon attachment. I found a seller on eBay who sold just the special weapon, which was designed to fit on pre-made bolters- they also fit quite nicely on to the bolters after a little cutting back. Here are the results..

I opted for 5 plasma, and 5 Grav gun combi weapons- a lethal combination for taking out both tanks and heavily armoured units- My plan with these, as with previous squads is to have 2, 5 man squads, each with the same type of weaponry- the plasma combi weapon squad can deal with tanks up to AV13 if needed, with 2 shots each with rapid fire. Likewise the 2 shot Grav weapons are great for taking out 2+/3+ armoured units..

I'll post again when the squad is finished.

Thanks for looking

Alternative Heavy Weapons Battery? New UK Plastics Company - PDC Gaming

I recently backed a successful Kickstarter campaign and the plastics company are based just up the road from me, so when I saw that they were doing 'combi-weapon' style plastic weapons, I was sold and backed - who wants to pay ebay prices for a combi-weapon?!

They were also doing a tracked weapon as pictured above, too small for a Thunderfire but ideal for maybe Imperial Guard heavy weapon teams or as an alternative to Forgeworld Rapier Batteries. I have three FW Heavy Bolter Rapiers and love them, I love the snub nose lethality of them and wouldn't change them, however if I want some Laser Batteries, then maybe these will make a great cheap alternative!

Not as detailed as FW resin, but good enough for the table top. This is the weapon carriage sprue, no flash, good moulds and plastic slightly more brittle than GW plastics. Slightly tougher to file but good stuff.

This is a 28mm miniature portable Heavy Weapon Sprue, makes a variety of weapons like FW Legion Heavy Weapon Squads, again not as detailed but good for table top.

The combi-style weapons, plenty of them too!

And finally, the company themselves, good luck to them. Plastic toys indeed for my plastic weemen. Nice additions.

Pretty Cool Kickstarter for your Wee-dudes

Just thought I would throw this out there quickly:

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1474140048/toys-for-your-toys-science-fiction-wargaming-acces

It is a Kickstarter making wargaming accessories or more aptly "Toys for your Toys". I've starting getting into Kickstarter recently (specifically the Zombicide 2 and Jonathan Coulton graphic novel) and it's a bit addictive.

This one in particular jumped out at me because its from the UK, has quite a lot of stuff for your money on the Pledges and its something I can actually use.

I suggest you take a peek - the mobile weapon platforms look pretty cool and I love me some modular weapons.

Iron Warriors - pre-Heresy Havoc squad

Hi again all – another out-of sequence Iron Warriors army update (despite working on my core CSMs squads for what seems about 3 months now...they still aren’t finished). Today’s bad-ass goodness is my new Havoc squad.

 

If you have read Storm of Iron/Iron Warriors Omnibus, you will know that the Iron Warriors are an original founding legion and were instrumental on the Siege of Terra. As such, a number of their forces are the original (10,000 year old) marines that stood on Terra as the walls were being torn down. They later managed to steal imperial gene-seed for Abaddon and one of his crazy crusades...and are able replenish their own ranks with new CSMs. That means that it is possible for an Iron Warriors army to contain a mixture of both pre and post heresy tech.

 

This have given me a great opportunity to use some of the Heresy era goodies from Forgeworld and one of the main things I have had my eyes on are the MKIII Iron Armour marines. Other than the name, this armour is perfect for Iron Warriors; it is old, the helmets are similar to the Iron Warrior skull markings and perfectly fits aesthetically (they look like evil marines – rather than spiky/chaosy marines) – they are pretty similar to how they would have been pre-Heresy. The Heavy Weapon squads are also built to take the Legion Heavy Weapons – which I went and bought seeing as CSM Missile Launcher and Autocannon bits are really expensive to pick up online and the GW Havoc kit only has one of each weapon (which look crap anyway). And check out how the Legion Autocannon looks... pure awesome.

So drawing back on the Iron Warrior fluff, I think that any veterans of the Heresy are going to be taking pride of place in the army – most likely with the big guns; so the plan is to mix pre-Heresy marines into prime places in the army; heavy weapons, Champions, special weapons, Chosen etc. This does mean I will need to buy some more to mix into my existing CSM squads (yet another reason why they wont be finished any time soon...).  

I am happy with everything apart from the Champion...I was in a hurry and wanted to give him a combi-weapon which a) I bodged together in 2 mins and looks crap (especially after I realised Siph posted a tutorial on making great looking combi weapons *stupid*) and b) why the hell would a Champion sitting in the backfield with Missile Launchers and Autocannons need a combi-plasma??? Needless to say, this model will be swapped out for something more appropriate when the army gets larger.

BTW – I managed to get my first 900pts test game with the army and the Havocs were amazing! As someone who has only ever played Nids, you cannot understand how awesome cheap S7/8 weapons with an AP are...and they all have an armour save!!! These guys got into position on a tower overlooking the entire battlefield and shot anything off the board that dared show their face (and then I forgot they were there for the last two turns...).

Relictors Sternguard #3 Re-Armed w/ Combi-Melta

Well, since I bought the FW Limited Edition Boarding MKIII Marine, I've been wondering who should get his spare Combi-Melta? Then looking at the rules for Sternguard and what the metal marines are armed with, only one has a Combi-Melta whilst the others all have Special Issue Ammunition Bolters. So...

A quick snip here and a snap apart there of one of my home built Sternguard Bolters and I've re-armed the robed marine #3 I made earlier (here) to hold the Combi-Melta, now at least two of the squad when painted will have Combi-Melta's. Watch out tanks!

Simple Combi-Melta Conversion

I was checking out the competition for the UK BlogWars 2011, when I noticed in the back catalogue of Andy-bG's Iron Wolves Blog a simple and effective Combi-Melta Conversion tutorial found here.
I was having trouble bidding on e-bay for some Combi-Melta's for my Sergeants, lord knows why someone would pay over £3+pp for just one, however, I needed some to arm up some of my Sternguard and Scout Sergeant and Tactical Sergeants to give Pornstarjedi's Landraider Spam list, which rolled me over a few weeks back, a little more to think about - until I paint up my Devastator's I need a little more mobile anti AV14 tank firepower!
I have used the spare bolt pistols that came in the ForgeWorld Space Marine Character Upgrade pack (the one with the Bionic goodies) and some Chaos Bolt Pistols, 'cos the Relictors like that spikey stuff (and as Andy bG says, the common bolt pistol is too small). Just follow the link to the tutorial, a simple shaving off detail and cuts and done.

This should save me a few quid and give me some mobile anti-armour in my Troops sections. Cheers Andy-bG!

See also my Simple Sternguard Bolter or Vehicle Storm Bolter conversions.