Raven Guard Fire Raptor

It’s been a long time since we posted. We’ve had a big long break as real life has reared its head, but we are back.

Here’s a post with some images of my newest air support 🙂

Fire Raptor

Cheers,

Neil

Forging the Iron Hands Chapter

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Forging the Iron Hands Narrative

In this blog post I describe how I am going to create my 40k Iron Hands army along the lines of the 40k universe (or fluff). I intend to make this the first post of two.

This post will cover the chapter and squads, while the second will list known and living characters.

In later joint posts I will also cover my 30k Iron Hands Legion, units and characters.

Guilliman’s Codex Astartes

Firstly a review of how a Space Marine Chapter is formed post heresy. Every chapter is no greater than one thousand marines and split between ten companies, plus supporting divisions with their own heraldry, titles, symbols and history.

The first company is the elite soldiers and veterans of the chapter. The second to fifth are battle companies; the front line of the chapter. The sixth to ninth are the specialist reserve companies and the tenth are formed of scouts. Scout companies are posed of fresh recruits from the chapter home world who later go on to join other companies within the chapter.

The chapter also consists of an Armoury (tech marines, tanks and flyers), Reclusiam (chaplains), Apothecarion (Apothecaries), Librarius (Librarians), and Chapter Command.

 

The Iron Hands Chapter

Companies are referred to by the Iron Hands as Clans. Clans once represented the competing organisations on the Iron Hands home world of Medusa before the coming of the Great Crusade. Ferrus Manus, primarch of the Iron Hands, kept the formation of Clans in order to encourage their competitive nature historically formed when once fighting for scarce planetary resources.

Each Clan has its own history and character which marines emulate upon joining or being promoted (i.e going from a recruit of the 10th to a full battle-brother of the 3rd).

There is some contradiction around this as previous materials (codexes and novels) state that clans do their own recruitment. However the Clan Ruakaan Supplement differs. I personally think this makes sense given the first companies status as the veteran company.

This is how the Iron Hands Chapter looks under the codex composition:

• Armoury
• Chapter Command
• Reclusiam
• Apothecarion
• Librarius
• 1st Clan Avernii – Veteran Company
• 2nd Clan Garrsak – Battle Company
• 3rd Clan Raukaan – Battle Company
• 4th Clan Kaargul – Battle Company
• 5th Clan Haarmek – Battle Company
• 6th Clan Sorrgol – Reserve Tactical Company
• 7th Clan Borrgos – Reserve Tactical Company
• 8th Clan Morlaag – Reserve Assault Company
• 9th Clan Vurgaan – Reserve Devastator Company
• 10th Clan Company Dorrvok – Scout Company (recruits)

I will be basing my army primarily around Clan Raukaan, but also drawing from Squads in the 1st, 6th, and the 10th companies. This works well for me because it means I don’t waste most of my Forge World transfers 😉 and I can also use known characters and units from more than one clan.

Known Squads of the Clan Ruakaan

Just as companies are known as Clans, so too are squads known as Clave’s.
I’ve listed them here by Clave number, name, unit type, and any known characteristics in brackets.

• 1st Clave Taloch, Tactical
• 2nd Clave Riise, Tactical (bellicose, drop pod – assault specialists, excess choler and fury)
• 3rd Clave Arx, Tactical
• 4th Clave Nycter, Tactical
• 5th Clave Kalag, Tactical (methodical, efficient; don’t waste shots, heavy augmentation)
• 6th Clave Broesus, Assault
• 7th Clave Neim, Assault (expert support unit)
• 8th Clave Kebire, Devastator
• 9th Clave Selax, Devastator (nickname “Ferrus’ Vengeance”, record grievances and avenge them)
• 10th Clave Valan, Scouts

Other mentioned squads:

Unfortunately these squads have only been mentioned by number and not name, but I have put them in because their existence and unit type is known.

• Clan Garrsak, 6th Squad, Tactical.
• Clan Avernii, 3rd Squad, Terminator.
• Clan Haarmek, 10th Squad, Devastator.
• Clan Kaargul, 4th Squad, Tactical.

Clan and Squad Markings

Squad members marked with the icon of their chapter on the left shoulder pad, and their clan on their right. On their left knee pad is marked the number of their Clave and on the right shin is the unit type (tactical, assault, veteran etc.)

References:

1. Codex Adeptus Astartes Space Marine, Games Workshop, 2015-06.
2. Clan Ruakaan a Codex: Space Marines Supplement, Games Workshop, 2013.
3. Wrath of Iron by Chris Wraight, Black Library, 2012.

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7th Edition Warhammer 40,000

 

What we know….

What we know so far is that on May 24^th there will be an announcement regarding the 7^th Edition of Warhammer 40,000 and that it is more than a simple FAQ-Escalation-Stronghold Assault tie-in.

This is the real deal and comes less than two years after 6^th edition was released. There are plenty of websites showing shots of the pages in the next White Dwarf where Jes Bickham is discussing it, and he states that there is now a dedicated ‘Psychic Phase’ (like 2^nd edition, but playing like Warhammer Fantasy Battle’s magic phase) and that the Force Organisation Chart (FOC) is now optional.

You can use the FOC if you wish and indeed, it seems this will grant you certain – as yet unnamed – bonuses for your army. However, you can also field ‘Unbound’ lists which essentially means you can take whatever you like, subject to the unit size restrictions of course; you can’t have a squad of 48 Terminators or 14 Tau Crisis Suits whether you use the FOC or not!

The other noticeable change is that there are now many more mission and objective options. Indeed, objectives can even change in-game via the deck of 36 objective cards.

 

What we think we know….

We still expect the rules of Stronghold Assault and Escalation to be rolled into the main 7^th Edition rule set. There is a belief that flyers will be less effective against ground targets when they are zooming a full speed, and that stationary ground units will be more effective against flyers than they currently are.

We think that units that are charged will be allowed to overwatch as usual but will also have to option to pass a leadership test and run rather than fight…   however, the charging unit can take an iniative test and force a ‘sweeping advance’ manoeuvre against the running unit.

We also believe that sweeping advances out of combat and into another unit will be back.

 

Nerd-rage….

The internet is now full of raging gamers who are incensed at the release of an entirely new edition of Warhammer 40k – less than two years after 6^th editions’ release – and the presumably £45-£50 price tag for a new rulebook, and then the release of a new boxed game replacing Dark Vengeance.

The unbound lists have also caused outrage (and some delight) amongst the gaming community. Talk of fielding 10 Heldrakes has been mentioned….   or an entire army of Runepriests, boosting each other with psychic powers and so on. The possibilities are endless really.

The general vibe seems to be that people are unhappy to say the least.

 

My thoughts….

What do I think? Well… I think I’ll wait and actually see how it all works and ties-in together before I express any delight or rage.

I’m surprised that an entirely new edition has come along less than 2 years after the last.

Many codexes still require an update – Orks, Dark Eldar, Blood Angels, Grey Knights – and it remains to be seen how much this new edition will crap on (or buff) some older books, such as the Necron or Chaos Space Marine Codex.

I am generally supportive of Games Workshop fiercely protecting their IP and their model pricing policy but I am now a bit concerned about the pricing, and here’s why: Games Workshop’s model development and production is an expensive process and the designers, sculptors and mold makers are a very talented bunch who earn their wage. The cost of molds for unit’s like Wraithknights or Riptides and other big kits is extremely high.

This is fine.

Games Workshop (currently) limit, for example, Tau players to 3 Riptides in a normal game of 40k. This goes some way to justifying the £50 price tag. They know that your average Tau player can only field 3, so they can (very) vaguely estimate how many Riptides they are likely to sell over time and they will determine that in order to make a good return on investment that the Riptide needs to sell at £50.

This is fine. (at least, with me it is.)

What concerns me is that with the new ‘unbound’ lists, you can throw the FOC chart away and field 10 or 12 Riptides. Now they are the main stay of your force as you don’t *need* to field Tau troop choices.

They are still £50.

Something is wrong with this.

I don’t imagine there will be a price reduction but maybe they would consider more ‘bundles’ with actual savings rather than the ‘One-click’ bundles that are just there to save you the 14 seconds of your life adding items to your basket rather than actually saving you money.

Forge World provide good bundle offers and I’m surprised that Games Workshop – who are the same company after all -, don’t offer similar deals.

I’m off topic here a little now, but I do believe this is a genuine gripe that gets overlooked.

 

Anyway, roll on May 24^th so we can all see what’s going on.

 

Cheers,

Neil

Forge World Open Day

 

Good morning!

So it’s been almost a week since the annual Forge World open day and we thought it was about time we put up a few pictures and dished out some information.

The pictures in this post show the two Mechanicum Krios tanks that have been developed so far. One – the battle tank – was available on the day in limited numbers but the ‘Venator’ variant is still waiting in the wings.

I had long conversations with Matt Murphy-Kane, Simon Egan, Neil Wylie and Alan Bligh about various things they were working on, and got a very good walkthrough from Matt about how he created the Alpha Legion paint scheme. I will be trying this at some point!

Simon is working on a Primarch but he wouldn’t tell me which one! Apparently we are going to see him at the Horus Heresy weekender in May (which we at tykensrift are attending!) as well as a work-in-progress of the next Primarch. Everyone has had a guess at who this could be after hints here and there from Forge World but the best hint I got on the day was: “have a look at which legion has the most units and specific kits and still doesn’t have their Primarch… ”

Based on that, it can only be Mortarion. He is the only Primarch from Betrayal that’s yet to be released and the Death Guard have a lot of units available.

Alan Bligh spoke about the next trilogy of Horus Heresy books and said that book 4, ‘Prospero’ wouldn’t be out until next year at the earliest as it’s still in the planning phase and hasn’t yet gone into development. Books 5 (Calth) will be at least 6 months after Prospero and book 6 (Signus) will be at least 6 months after that.

As the Custodes are going to be in Book 4, I asked if Constantin Valdor will get rules as well, even though he wasn’t on Prospero and was told that they hadn’t decided yet but it’s possible.

Unfortunately there weren’t many other new Horus Heresy kits on show, when I asked Tony Cottrell about this, he said they were saving things for the HH Weekender and there would be ‘..loads of cool stuff on show there.’

 

 

The eagle eyed amongst you will have seen Forge World’s Knights. These are seriously coooool. I’m a teeny bit disappointed that they are a fair bit taller than the GW Knights because they are pretty mucy Warhound Titan sized and it kind of makes my Warhound look less impressive but that is literally the only gripe I have – and it’s a crap gripe at that!

My pal at Forge World tells me we will see one or both of these Knights released in several weeks as they’re in production now.

 

 

The Mechanicum trend continues with the Thanatar Siege-class Automata and I for one am pretty impressed. I expect I will get into creating a Dark Mechanicum army as soon as I’ve finished messing about with my Tau and Raven Guard, so it’s great to see so many nice looking models being developed. The Mechanicum are one of those armies that people have been crying out for and they’re finally here; it also gives FW a chance to flex their ‘cyber/steam-punk’ creative muscles!

 

I can confirm that Imperial Armour 13 is in progress and should be ready by Games Day 2014. This is a Chaos equivalent to the Imperial Armour 2 update that was released just before Christmas and gives Chaos rule updates for vehicles as well as Chaos rules to newer vehicles – Cerberus, Kharybdis Claws etc.

Last thing of note…  I bought a copy of Extermination and as a Raven Guard player I’m happy to confirm that Corax is an absolute MONSTER! I can’t wait to get the model… whenever that is! 🙂

 

Cheers,

Neil

 

What now for Imperial Knights?

Good morning,

 

So, the Imperial Knights are finally here; I like them.

I would have preferred a few more weapon or loadout options but this is a good place to start. I like that they are getting there own Codex and that they can be fielded as a primary detachment, but of course we won’t really understand the mechanics of that until we lay hands on the book.

They are super-heavy walkers, with a D-weapon chainsword and a thermal cannon or  (what I think is) a strange looking battle cannon.

So what’s next?

Luckily, the helpful folks at Forge World have been dropping hints like Hansel and Gretel breadcrumbs all over their Facebook page.

We can expect:

• Several new weapon options – to be revealed/discussed at the Forge World open day.
• A Chaos Knight variant
• Horus Heresy Rules – Knights will be included in HH Book 3: Extermination.
• Other Knight Variants: Lancers, Castellans etc  – This hasn’t been confirmed but seems a logical step

 

This may be the thing that tips me over the edge into starting a Heresy era Mechanicum army. I mean… what’s not to like about this? 🙂

 

Cheers,

Neil