Adeptus Mechanicus - Sagittarii Painted

Chugging along with the painting - I wanted to get a few things done 'for me' before I dive into the more mercenary 'paint to sell' work that I have planned on the horizon. There's a mess of half-done projects and leftovers from prior armies that I just need to paint up and free up the space - Orks, Eldar and Chaos all will make their appearance over the next few months. However today it's the forces of Mars once again!

The Sagittarii are the heavy weapons teams of the Skitarii legions. usually incorporating some form of mobile weapons platform that bears the bizarre and arcane weaponry of the Adeptus Mechanicus. I went with a arachnid themed carrier to tie them in with the rest of the insectile models that seem to be proliferating throughout the army.

Whether this will progress into full-blown tech-heresy remains to be seen, but as I have a model representing Urtzi Malevolus, Despoiler of Mars it's probably a fair bet that there may be some dabbling in the Soul Forges in the future somewhere...

With these out of the way, I'm getting stuck in on a unit of Eldar Pirates I'd kitbashed almost six years ago and that have been sitting on the painting shelf for all that time. Time to break out the weird colors for a bit! Purple and Teal and Orange and Green! It's gonna be glorious! ...Or is that hideous? Guess we'll find out!

Adeptus Mechanicus - Telepathica Emancipator Painted

Continuing on the path of clearing out the to-be-painted shelves, I'm often surprised how many half-completed projects I've gathered over the years. There's plenty to keep me occupied! I grabbed a few models off the Ad-Mech shelf, and I have to say it was nice to work on the Scions of Mars once again!

This go-around brought the Telepathica Emancipator to the painting desk. This is the Mechanicum's answer to the need for Psychic offense and defense, and consists of a Psi-Emancipator Carriage containing a shackled psyker, and a Telepathica Tech Priest who carries a Null Rod in case the shackled psyker's powers prove dangerous or recalcitrant.

Per the Tempus Fugitives Codex: Cult Mechanicus listing: "The Emancipator Carriage has a Psyker Mastery level of 1 and may generate powers from any of the following disciplines: Pyromancy; Telekinesis or Telepathy. Furthermore, the design of the Emancipator Carriage can tap the Psyker contained within for further power. Before the battle additional Mastery Levels can be gained. Each level gained in this way reduces the Emancipator’s Leadership value by 1. When using Psychic Powers, any Blessings that target the Psyker must instead be conferred to another friendly model within 12”." Though I have yet to field this model in an actual game, I'm definitely looking forward to seeing how it works out!

I also got started blocking in the colors on the Sagittarii - the heavy weapons teams of the Ad-Mech. They are described numerous ways in the various editions of the Ad-Mech codexes I've seen, but I decided to go with a controller and spider-bot theme, as that matches the aesthetic of the Arch Magos and the Myrmidae Centurius I've built for the army thus far. Looking forward to getting these guys finished up - then it's either on to painting up a mess of Skitarii, or perhaps something totally different! There's units from half a dozen different armies to work on, which means I can change gears entirely and paint whatever happens to catch my interest at the time. That should help keep me churning out the models!

Adeptus Mechanicus - Sagittarii built

A little breather while I wait for more parts for the Leviathan to arrive allowed some time to work on the Adeptus Mechanicus. The Skitarii march to war with a number of bizarre and esoteric weapon systems not commonly found within the armies of the Imperium, and amongst these are the Sagittarii who bear a bewildering array of heavy support weapons in support of the Hypaspist maniples.

The Sagittarii are describes as consisting of a Ballisterai controller and a quadrupedal servitor/robot that carries the heavy weapon. In keeping with the general spider-y aesthetic the army has thus far, I'd ordered up some of the spiderbots from Blight Wheel Miniatures to act as the weapon carrier. Six legs are better than four, right? The weapon is the heavy tesla cannon from MaxMini, and will act as a Photon Thruster in game (72", S6, AP D6, Blast). The Ballisterai are built similar to the Hypaspists I'd shown earlier, with their controller device fashioned from a bit off the space marine hunter killer missile, and the aerial that was trimmed of the voxcaster that makes up their backpack. Easy peasy!