Alpharius.....or maybe Omegon? But probably just a regular marine. Very pic heavy

G'day all,

It's been awhile since my last post so I decided to do up my version of Alpharius and whack him into a series of WIP.

I'm reading the Legion novel at the moment(slowly) and love the idea that Alpharius could be any one of the marines, changing his name and identity at will.  So I decided to convert him as just that, a 'regular' marine armed like any one of his comrades.  I used the two following pictures as my main inspiration for the conversion.  A quick disclaimer, I'm using these pictures in good will, and with no ulterior motive.

The first pic has fairly standard power armour, but is clearly an important fella, and the second one I like because of the flowing cape around him something I tried to emulate.

So to start with the materials I used are:

- A FW AL torso
- A FW AL head
- A set of Tartaros termi legs
- A left and right arm from the termi set along with left and right hands to go with them
- A left and right arm from the mk3 power armour set
- A bolter (Phobos I think)
- Greenstuff
- Sculpting tools (clay shapers, scalpel, pin)
- a junior hacksaw
- a little bit of 2mm plasticard

We'll start off with the legs.  I sawed them off at the hip (as per my earlier tutorial on mk6 marines) and then pinned them back on reducing the cowboy like stance a little and adding about 2mm extra height to the upper thigh while I was at it.  I made sure the stance was how I wanted it and started to greenstuff.  The purpose of the greenstuff on this part of the leg was to heavily bulk out the thighs, which on humans are naturally a lot larger than the calves, something that's a little lost in translation on space marines (not the only anatomical anomaly).  The end result is quite a change from normal marine legs:

But it's grown on me and I like the bulkiness of them.  As you can see I also added a belt buckle and inserted a pin into the legs for the torso to attach to.

I then took a torso and cut it in half with the hacksaw, gluing a small 2mm spacer in between, making sure the front and back lined up before the glue dried:

I attached the torso like this to the pin on the legs and made sure to leave a few mils of space between the two:

I used a bit of greenstuff as gap filler, ensuring that it didn't protrude out past the body and let it dry to add a bit of structural support before I started the actual putty work.






Greenstuff was then used to add a bit more size to certain part of the armour that needed to enlrged to meet the new scale of the model.

The ribcage:

And the waist, a little bit of detail can be seen here, I didn't go overboard though, it'll all get covered up soon:

His arms are made from the upper section of mk3 and the forearm of tartaros joined at the elbow, a fairly easy changeover that allowed the 2 handed bolter hold utlising the angle of the mk3 arms:

As you can see the skinniness of the mk3 is covered up by the shoulder pads, making a nice natural pose:

His backpack is a combination of the mk3 chassis with mk4 vents, I love the mk3 backpack but wanted him to have newer equipment so went with the new vents.  The pack on the left is the finished product:

His cape would be covering his arms partially so I had to glue them in place before continuing.  I also attached the backpack.  I wanted the cape to be a ragged one like in the source pic above so wasn't worried about keeping the putty smooth and consistent.  I wet my fingers well (to stop the putty sticking to them) and took small balls of putty flattening them out between my fingers and pulling them into position on the mini.  The cloak is meant to look like its blowing in the wind so I pulled the sheets of greenstuff out to the right a little.  I also lapped the left hand side of the cloak around the front of him to create the wind effect.  At this stage the cloak looks a little rough on the back but I fix it up later.  After leaving it to dry for 20 minutes or so I took a pin and teased out a few edges on the cloak to make it look torn..

The next day after the putty has completely cured I added some waves in the cloak.  I took sausages of putty and using photos of how material flows I laid the sausages on and smoothed them into the cloak with the clay shapers.

It took a little bit of trial and error but I eventually got a look I was happy with.

Finally I added some brand new fingers holding the bolter and gap filled any spaces left behind at joints like the wrists and shoulders

And there we have it my interpretation of Alpharius, father of all marines, for we are everywhere.  I think he looks important while still maintaining that ambiguity of the XXth.

A scale shot:

And a little action shot:

Thanks for reading.

HYDRA DOMINATUS

-Ded

Alpha Legion Rite of War: The Coils of the Hydra

G'day guys, Macca here and today I am bringing you a look at the most complex and difficult to use Legion and Rite of War so far: The Alpha Legion and the Coils of the Hydra. The Alpha Legion is one of the few forces that aren't just a 'pick up and play' army. They require a deft touch and a sly general to get the most out of them... just like the real deal.

The Alpha Legion lacks a lot of the style that other Legions do. There are no specialist melee units, no Palantine Blades, no Gal Vorback and no Suzerin. The units they have are in fact an unorthodox combination of Recon Squads meet Veteran Tacticals on one hand, and Terminators meet Tactical Support Squads. Their units are nothing special, and in a one vs one fight they won't hold out for long, but...

Hydra Dominatus Brothers

G'day all Toby here again with the first few parts of my force to show you.

I've been playing a few games with Wadey and Keepy lately and been having a great time getting into the swing of a new game (despite my absolute tabling today ;)).

But I digress, back to the photos of my Alpha.

First up is my converted headhunter unit.  I've used secret weapon Oni masks superimposed onto mk6 helmets, more for the rule of cool rather than any solid fluffy reason but they turned out looking quite nice regardless.

 



The one on the left has transitioned from his rifle to knife and is about to hook into someone backhand style.  On the right is the units banestrike heavy bolter, the whole unit also has scales sculpted onto various parts of their armour, primarily their chests.

And three more, two standard and the Headhunter prime who's run out of ammunition and switched to his pistol.  He has a greenstuff symbol on his shin and his right shoulder is scaled up.  I use a very simple method of making scales that I'll do up a little tutorial for sometime soon.

 Up next is my obviously WIP contemptor, although what you see is done he just needs his arms finished up.  His eyes are done with watered down coats of vallejo fluros.  I reckon the Alpha Contemptor is by far the nicest in the range, chock full of nice little armour details.

Using parts from Autillon Skorr, Mk6 marines, Mk3 marines, EC Palatines and Anvil Industries is my Praetor, Tavi Psi.  He has neato minotaur transfers of the greek letter Psi adorning his armour.  I love how this guys pose has turned out, just a chilled out badarse.

So as you can see I'm slowly getting there one Legionnaire at a time, but I feel like my batch painting is getting better, something I don't normally do.

I'd love to hear any feedback you have on them.

FOR THE EMPEROR?

G'day

Hey all, Toby here 

I'm proud to say I've been inducted into AGIF, I’ve been a quiet follower of this blog for almost a year now so I’m honoured to be a part of it.  I’ve done a little hobby blogging in my past and found that it helps me stay focussed and motivated if I have a way to show others what I’ve been working on.

A quick bit of my hobby history.  I’ve been a fanatic closet hobbyist since the 90’s when I got my first miniature, a dwarven runepriest.  True I didn’t know what to do with it, not even that it needed to be painted, but I was hooked nonetheless.  Through the years I have in one way or another collected almost every WFB and 40k army out there, usually only until the next months releases come out and I realise I like them more.  I am first and foremost a hobbier over a gamer though, so my project indecisiveness has never really bothered me because at the end of the day it’s converting and painting that gets my rocks off.

However…..,

I genuinely feel like a 30k army might be my chance to finally build an army ready for the table and the xxth are going to help me get there.  Ever since the CSM 2^nd edition codex I’ve always loved the aesthetics and idea behind the Alpha Legion, their questionable allegiances and their constantly adapting tactics.  Being a keen converter as well I also like that their range is less than complete giving me plenty of opportunity to freely adapt the look of my army.  I plan on starting small with a 1000pt army then slowly building it up.

Take the following list with a grain of salt as I’ve never actually played a game, but the idea behind it is many small elite units backed up by some rapid moving support which I think is sticking with AL fluff.

Centurion, Consul Delegatus, Artificer Armour, Power Weapon                  100pts

7 x Vet Tactical Squad, Banestrike shells, Plasma gun                                  190pts

7 x Vet Tactical Squad, Banestrike shells, Plasma gun                                  190pts

Contemptor, Kheres Assault Cannon                                                             190pts

5x Headhunter, Prime, Banestrike shells, Heavy Bolter, Rhino                     240pts

Javelin Attack Speeder                                                                                   75pts

That comes to 985pts and seems like a pretty standard list.  However I’m open to suggestions on how to improve it.

I’ve got a few orders incoming so I should be starting on the bulk of the modelling in the coming weeks.  I have an order though Forgeworld (shoulder pads and rhino doors), faux Forgeworld (the bulk of the above list), Combat company (some Alpha Legion specific paints) and Anvil industry (pouches and weapon mods). 

Due to a generous donation however I do have several sets of Mk VI armour which I’ve started to modify a little to better suit my vision.

On that note my biggest gripe with space marines is their somewhat warped body proportions, for 7 foot super soldiers they are remarkably short.  So the first mod I’ll be doing is adding a little extra height and proportion to the legs, not too much, just enough to put the Alpha back in Alpha Legion.

Step 1:  Remove both legs from the hip carefully, cut inbetween the upper leg and the ribbed under-armour (there’s only one leg because at the time I couldn’t find the other one)

Step 2:  Sand/smooth down the top of the leg where you cut it, it’s important to get this as flat as possible so it sits flush with the plasticard in the next step.

Step 3:  Take some small squares of plasticard and glue them to the top of the leg, I used 2mm but 1mm would work just as well, 3mm might even be ok.

Step 4:  With the hip section, flatten out the top and put another bit of plasticard on top this extends the torso a little above the hips and adds that little bit more height.

Step 5:  This is where it gets fiddly.  Shave off the excess plasticard so it’s shaped with the contours of the leg and hip armour then sand and smooth it down so it’s nice and rounded.  If you sat the plasticard flush on top of the leg you will barely see the join between the two.  And even if you do it looks like another groove in the armour, so it’s ok.  The hip tops not quite as important to get smooth because it will be hidden in the torso.

Step 6:  You don’t have to but just to add a little more structural integrity I pinned the legs back onto the hips, it also gives a bit more freedom when posing the legs.

Step 7:  And lastly I took a little yellow grey putty and filled in some small gaps between the joins.  Every different putty type has its merits and yellow milliput is great for small gap filling, it has an interesting grainy consistency and smooths out really well with a bit of water.

As you can see the simple mod adds a little extra height and makes the upper leg a bit more realistically proportioned.  It’ll also help them to tower over the lesser legions out there.

Well that's all from me for now, back to chopping up little bits of resin.  I'll be back when my packages arrive.

Cheers,
Toby

Raven Guard vs Alpha Legion 30k battle report

G'day, Macca here with a quick battle report between the Alpha Legion and Raven Guard. This is an over 2000 point game, and was incredibly fun and funny. Be warned, it's a long one because it's full of pics. So, lets get on with is shall we?

The Forces:

 The Alpha Legion force is a veteran one, with a Praetor, Exodus, 3 squads of veterans in rhinos with havok launchers, a Legion Recon Squad in carapace, a Land Speeder squadron with havoks and multi-meltas, a Sicarian and a Sicarian Venator. To cap off the force, an Imperial Knight Paladin took to the field.

The Raven Guard force is a high-speed army. The force contained Strike Captain Alvarex Maun, a Praetor with jump pack and lighting claws backed by a command squad, Apothecary, a Tactical Squad, a Tactical Support Squad with Volkites in a drop pod, a Breacher squad with two graviton guns, a full Legion Destroyer squad with Rad missile launchers, a jetbike squad, lascannon devestator squad and a pair of Storm Eagles. Of course, an Errant Knight backs the powerful force.

The deployment was simple, the mission played was Legendary Mission: Deliverance from Book III. The mission revolves around the Raven Guard extraction from Istvaan V. The special rules involved victory points for killing named characters, bonus points for killing units in close combat, and killing primarchs. This rule was modified for Imperial Knights. For the traitors, any unit wiped out immediately goes into ongoing reserves! Yes, that's right, infinite traitors, or in this case, closet loyalists. From turn two, the Raven Guard roll a D6. on a roll equal to the turn number or less, the random length begins, and the opponent makes a secret D3 dice roll. This determines the remaining game turns, and keeps the loyalist on edge.

Cat deployed conservatively, with the Alpha Legion grouped together in case of my infiltrating shenanigans (Raven Guard lolz). For the Raven Guard, I chose to infiltrate very little, namely the breachers with Alvarex Maun. Keeping in mind my stealth rule on all my foot troops, I tried to use the large areas of cover to block line of sight where possible.

Turn 1:

The closet loyalist force moved forward, the sicarians providing a wall of mobile cover with their tough av13 hulls. Cat quickly used Exodus (the Alpha Legion special sniper) to wipe most of my lascannons (3 failed saves on 7 sniper shots ><) followed by firing the Rapid Fire Battle Cannon from his knight into my jetbikes. To add to the pain, the Sicarian Venator pummled the Errant Knight, half killing it with the first shot!

The Raven Guard response was simple, strike hard, rinse and repeat. I dropped my drop pod using it to block the armour from clear shots at my tac support squad, who opened up with thousands of volkite shots. When the smoke had cleared, Exodus was down two wounds and pissed off. My knight moved into the center, and working with the graviton guns of the breachers managed to kill a rhino and strip some hull points as well as shake the sicarians.

Turn 2:
Carnage. The Alpha Legion moved up, with the marines piling out of their rhinos and devestating the volkite squad. The knight then charged into Alvarex's squad, killing most of them, whilst the rest of the army moved for vantage points.

Conversely, the Raven Guard reinforcements arrived. Two storm eagles, the destroyers and the praetor and command squad came in. Thanks to Alvarex's special rules, I do not scatter deep strikers within 18" AND get to reroll failed reserves. The destroyers and Command squad landed bang on, and combined with the storm eagles managed to devastate armour and infantry alike. To finish my turn, the Errant Knight charged, and thanks to some very lucky rolls, saved Alvarex and co. from eing squashed as well as getting me a well needed VP.

As the turn ended, the Raven Guard were strong, however, with infinite reserves of manpower, the Alpha Legion would be no push over.

Turn 3:

The Alpha Legion turned the fight again, with charges from the veterans crippling the already depleted volkites. The destroyers also felt the combined wrath of the remaining speeder and the Alpha Legion Praetor (Alpha Legionaire No.7. Alpharius). Whilst the Raven Guard were dominant, the next turn would see a flood of reserves.

Keeping the momentum, the Raven Guard pushed further forward. At this point my strategy was simple: dominate the Alpha Legion deployment zone. By doing this, I was hopeful that I could easily deal with the reserves coming in. The Command squad cleaned up the veterans, saving the Apothecary who high tailed it out, and the storm eagles pushed forward.

Turn 4:

The Alpha Legion reinforcements hit hard. The Destroyers were exposed and riddled with fire, whilst the incoming Sicarian pumped a storm eagle, narrowly not killing it with the first salvo. The main reinforcements were just a wave away.

For the Raven Guard, the crippled storm eagle flew into ongoing reserves, and the other vectored for the sole surviving marine  from the veterans who had assaulted the volkites (easy kill point). The destroyers fired at and charged the veterans on the hill, however, the overwatch slew two of the 5 before the assault even commenced. The command squad targeted a rhino that drove on behind the church, easily smashing it. Importantly, I rolled a 2, so the game would soon end, based on Cat's super secret D3 roll.

Turn 5:

With a roar of engines, the Alpha Legion renewed the fight. Firstly, a rhino outflanked, firing and taking down a breacher. The Land Speeders flew in, throwing their firepower into the knight, who managed to make invulnerables  against both melta shots. The Venator added its fury into the unshielded side, but luckily for the knight, managed to only strip a hull point, leaving it on 1. The veterans on the hill wound up finishing off the destroyers for another VP.

This turn for the Raven Guard was all about threat elimination. The Command squad leaped over the church and assaulted into the Venator (killing it and losing one of their own in the explosion, the knight queefed against the marines on the hill, whilst the incoming half-dead storm eagle managed to pop the Alpha Legion Rhino. The unfortunate occupants were then riddled with fury of the Legion, killing all but two.


Then, it was all over. Cat informed me that he had rolled a 2 for his D3, meaning that the Raven Guard had been successfully saved. The final score was a mighty 21 VP's to the Raven Guard, and 6 to the closet loyalists. The outcome I can attribute to two things: my Knight killing his and surviving, and the always dominating performance of the storm eagles.

The game overall was fantastic, the mission is actually quite well designed, with just a few key rolls swinging it heavily toward the Raven Guard. The stratagem of dealing with Alpha Legion units on arrival aggressively rather then hanging back and allowing Cat to mass his forces probably helped me along. At the rate of attrition, I would have lasted to maybe turn 7 or 8, but in a potentially 9 turn game, if I lost all my models on the table, it would be game over.

 Power knife: stab stab hack hack stab stab

 Die closet loyalists!

So that's it, hope you enjoyed it, because we sure did!