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Purpose:
I have the greatest admiration for the DakkaDakka community and know that even if this project does not impress anyone I'll get invaluable advice and feedback. I was picking up some miniatures for an upcoming d20/Stargrunt campaign and looking at my collection realized that I could field a 40K army without a lot of extra effort. I love GW's miniatures, but when I play there isn't a lot of variety in how armies look. I want to create a distinctive army that falls within the acceptable spririt of repping. The gamers in my area are becoming very accomplished at presenting compelling armies both thematically and in terms of craftsmanship. I'd like to play with the "vision" of what space marines look like and go back to some of the concepts in the old "Rouge Trader" game which GW has dropped. I'd also like to use the same miniatures in other sci-fi games like d20, Stargrunt, and GURPs. Critisism is welcome.



What is a Rogue Trader Army?
Squats are not the only thing that's been dropped from 40K. 40K has become a wargame between standardized forces, but one of the coolest original army concepts was that of the Rogue Trader irregular list.

[From Rouge Trader, p 166]
"Rouge Traders are individuals who have reached a position of power within the Imperium hierarchy. They come from the ranks of the Adeptus Terra, the Inquisition, army or fleet - a few are influential civilians, amongst whom the navigator families are the most famous. Politics sometimes obliges this course, for free of Imperium command the Rouge Trader is also conveniently out of the way, beyond the center of real power. Rogue Traders have a reputation as outcasts, many are people whom the priesthood deems better kept at a safe distance; vociferous Space Marine leaders, influential Navigators, liberal-minded Inquisitors, and rebellious Imperial Commanders."

It is in the spirit of the old school "Rogue Trader" that I created Rogue Trader Roberts and his skilled band of both alien and human mercenaries. Rogue Trader Roberts works outside the rules of the Imperium and is hunted as both a heretic and traitor. Everyone wants a peice of him! He hires himself to colonial worlds and specializes in neutralizing small scale alien threats. He also freelances as a privateer and smuggler when not otherwise engaged.

His technology is comparable, but different from the imperium. The armor, weapons, and equipment his troops use are either of alien origin or crafted in colonial space by Squats. Yes there is a warm place in Robert's heart for the little guys.

Getting Started
I plan on updating this blog as I complete the various components/units. I started out seeking advice on exactly what the units should be. I posted an army list in the "40K Army Lists" forum. http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/211938.page

That's the outline of this project. Right now I'm finalizing the list and buying what I need to complete the project. I enjoy scratchbuilding, but I'm no expert and like to buy as much as I can before I get out the dremel and greenstuff. Please offer any critism or comment you wish. The whole point of me Blogging about this is getting much needed help.

My next update will center on the creation of the Rouge Trader Roberts mini and getting the space marines looking right. Until then, here are some pictures of the materials I've collected so far.



I'd like to use the miniatures from this project in various sci-fi games. Here are some of the rules I'll be targeting. The second picture has a box of the marines I will be using in this army (Albeit painted in much brighter colors than I intend on using.)


Closeup of the miniature box. Note the price ($10). That's for 5 troopers with weapon swaps and one commander. Someone on Dakka a long time ago posted some pictures of these guys painted up and I really liked them.


A marine sprue and weapon swaps. I put in some GW weapons for comparison.


A closeup of a marine off his sprue. The arms are problematic for converting poses, but I think I can work with them....also parts of a GW marine for size comparison.


This pile of bits will become the Rouge Trader Roberts miniature. It will look cool, but I'm already worried about the size of the baseing I'd like to use.


This will be my speeder model. I'd like to keep the flying base as it's very cool and will be handy for the other games I'd like to use this model. It's a Ghost in the Shell attack drone.


I have a 28mm grav tank and want to make a Predator Annihilator out of it. This picture is not the chassis I have (its the wrong scale too. Its a 15mm Stargrunt mini), but I did not get a chance to take any pics of the tank kit I own. My tank matches the speeders I will be using a lot better than this one too. I do like the grav plates under the tank (why I posted the pic) and may have to build those into my model.


I want to have fun with my scout units. I want them to be aliens and well suited to the role. Pictured are some old Grenedier minis I painted up a long time ago. I'd love to use units of these guys but don't have enough and don't want to chop the mnis up for weapon swaps. Hmmmmm, maybe spiders?

Thank you for reading this first post. I hope to have an update soon.

y'know I just saw some of those old plastic Space Rangers at a shop here in Beijing, can't wait to see what you do with them.

Digging this project already, some weird and wonderful ideas you've got cooking. The sniper squids (?) are pretty sweet models, pity you don't have enough to really have a go with them. In a pinch I'm sure you could strap automated sniper weapons to spiders, call it awesome and be done with your scouts

I'll be watching, great ideas here.

- Salvage

I'll keep an eye on this. Looking forward to the alien mercs.

Yah. Keeping an eye on this one. I love the idea and I absolutely love the GURPS rules. GURPS is the only RPG I think I enjoyed as much as miniatures, at least in theory. It is hard to find people who play with it around here though.

Thanks for the replies . I appreciate the feedback.

Kid_Kyoto, as you write, the original Atlantic Star Rangers have been around for a while. They’re obvious 40K derivatives. I’ve seen a box here and there at hobby shops, but this is the first time I’ve seen 4 boxes and I grabbed them all. The spider-alien-scouts should be fun, and I want to try to make legitimate aliens out of them and not just sniper-rifles-glued-on-a-spider. But a giant spider with a gun is, by definition, awesome.

Here’s my update. I like to work on everything at once.

HQ


This Warmachine Kommander will become Rogue Trader Roberts. This is the before shot.


The pile of bits is coming together. The marine bits are now a nice heap of dead marines Robert's will trod upon. The spikes have been filed off. I've started to reform the shoulders. I want the armor to look more like the troopers. Some more work on the armor and give him some weapons.

Also:
* Put together the standard bearer
* The Sergeant will be a commanding Spider Alien. Presumably a larger female spider who will keep the ranks of the scout units well populated. Got some spider bits and wondering how I can get this thing in power armor.

Troops


The marines (Atlantic Space Rangers) won't be very difficult to put together. The paint job needs to be good. I painted up one marine to test a color scheme. I will try one a bit darker. The basing is junk (done fast), but I wanted to see how a larger base works.

Dread


(...Yes I know it's a mech!...) I'm adding more armor to the legs and body and working on the weapon arms (Shooter and melee). Still more work to do. I'm pleased that the overall shape of the mech matches the Star Ranger armor (Gotta lose the big shoulder spikes though). I want the assault arm to be like a Swiss-army-knife of nasty weapons. The mech was already painted.

Scouts


Got the spider models. I chopped off the head and front arms and this is a test for the new gait. I'll scupt the upper body to fit the new posture. The front legs will be replaced by 4 arms (Gaunt arms) Two slasher appendages and two with fingers to hold weapons. Big update to come.

Tank


This will be the main body. It's a StarGrunt 25mm resin. I mail ordered a Predator and will mold the turret and weapons from that.

Whirlwind



This is almost done. The launcher came from my bits (The USMC use it on their LAVs). It's crewed by Squats. I want to add more gear on it and work up an auto loader in the rear area with a few hand loads for emergencies.

Thank you again for reading.

Rouge Traders should probably have Sisters of Battle,
Howling Banshees, Wyches, Blood Angels, and Space
Marines in dresses.

Your Rogue Trader idea seems great. Once you're done it
would be fantastic to keep things on record in the Dakka
Articles system. I'll help you out if you're not sure where
to start.

Thanks Malfred. That's a very kind offer.

It's been another week and Rogue Trader Roberts is getting his boys together bit by bit. I need to have the GURPs Traveller force together by August, the 40K army will follow along as its a lot bigger.

I like to work on everything at once....


HQ


Not a very clear shot, but there was a lot of work on Robert's back (Also toothpick for pin). Always-subtle-Robert's pile of marines is ready to trod upon. I play against a couple of smurf armies in 40K, and they're going to love this base.


I really like how Roberts turned out. Very 40K and very (in my opinion) Rogue Trader.

TROOPS


I've been painting and basing to figure out what the color scheme is going to be. So far Jaeger commo, Shadow Grey and squat-khaki. As an irregular strike force, there is a lot of latitude in dress. I did a bit of work on the Star Ranger assault rifles to make them look like alt-bolters.


The spider-scouts-alien. This spider-guy still needs a lot of finishing, but I like it a lot. In GURPs and d20, these aliens will be VERY effective commandos. It was important that the alien be man-sized when finished, as it needs to interact with humans, fit in human vehicles/spaceships, etc...


Spider-alien backside... I want to fit him up with equipment, belts, etc...


The evolution of a spider miniature from (before/after)

DREAD


The spider aliens have a bit of fluff now. The commando/scouts are human sized males. This is an alien female spider. She hatches her minions who serve her as soldiers to prove themself for breeding rights. For my 40K army I was going to have the female alien attached to my HQ squad, but she's so big she'll rep my 40K dread. I'm in the process of putting her in power armor. More to come.

PREDATOR (TANK)


Work in progress. I love scratch building futuristic human vehicles. Why should ork players get all the fun?

WHIRLWIND


Construction is done. If I don't step away from this one I'm sure more crazy cr*p will be added.

SPEEDER


I really, really, REALLY, love this Ghost in the Shell model. I won't scratch build anything with this one. The straight model is perfect. All it needs is a wargame base and it's ready to terrorize the table. This shot gives a good sense of scale of the parts which still need to be put together (x2)


NO LONGER DREAD


I need this guy for GURPs/d20, but he's not right for 40K. I won't show any more work-in-progress shots of him until he's done. The female alien spider is now my 40K dread.



Thank you again for reading!

Woah, awesome stuff dude. Spider Scouts are a great idea. And it's always great to have the fitting miniatures in a roleplaying campaing.

The tanks are cool and I just love that Roude Trader Butcher.

I've learned a lot about taking very blurry pictures of very small miniatures. I know my camera has plenty of megapixels and macro focus. The problem, I think, is lighting. With good light you can take good pictures, but I digress....

This update has a little of everything. I finished my first tactical squad and tried it out in a Stargrunt-40K game and now my goal is not only to finish the 40K army, but fill in what I need for a Stargrunt/d20 army. I have to admit, I like playing Stargrunt a lot better than 40K, but I again digress...


TROOP UPDATE:


!st Platoon's Third Squad. I rushed these guys to get them into a Stargrunt-40K game, but I'm happy with the way they turned out. I'm doing a lot more conversion work on the other squads. They make a fine 3rd squad. In Stargrunt they are meant to have "jump packs." That is why some of them are vertical. (As an aside: One thing I love about Stargrunt-40K is that space marines (or in this case their equivalent) fight as they're supposed to. This squad (in a Stargrunt-40K scenario) was dropped behind ork lines to secure a crash site for evacuation. The one squad fended off a force of 50 orks taking only wounding casualties (The orks mixed it up close and lost 15 wounded, 25 killed, the rest ran away). It was a great game, a nail-biter to the end, and good to see marines be the tough guys they're supposed to be. I can't wait to try them out in 40K! )


This shows that you can make the old Star Ranger models very poseable. I use a dremmel and lots of epoxy to get the pose I want. This guy will be part of 1st platoon/2nd squad.


This is a comparison of a GW bolter to the bolter alts in my army. The top is the weapon that comes with the model, the middle one is converted, the bottom is a GW bolter. In Stargrunt this is an ACR (Advanced combat Rifle). Some have RAMs under to muzzle. Some have bayonets.


I’m still working on the Spider aliens, but I’ve become distracted by squats. There used to be an alt-armies line of miniatures that included squats and going through my bit box, I saw I had 20. Rogue Trader Roberts likes squats in his army. This lineup has some of the alt-armies line plus an old GW squat and current marine.


Every Squat unit needs a proper tunneller. This will be a tunneller bursting out of the ground to disembark squats or whoever else can cram inside there.



HEAVY


The whirlwind, more or less finished. In Stargrunt fire support is all off-table. This is an Air Defense vehicle in that game.


The name on the side is "Dolph's Devil" (That must be Dolph)


ELITE


(Finished!) This is back to being my dread. It's too big, but it fits in well with the theme of my army. I scratchbuilt (See previous pics) the assault arm from an old Estese rocket and plastic-card. It has a ripper, a shocker, 2 buzz-saws, and a cutter. It could double as a deforestation mech. (I call it my mech-swiss-army-knife-of-doom)


The mech's backside. It's a lot grittier than your normal streamlined mechs. Some of that is due to the natural design of the model with a big assist from my bits collection. In StarGrunt the mech is dropped with the power-armored troops to provide point-fire-support. Next weekend I'm going to get to try it out in Stargrunt-40K against some Tau Crisis suits. Should be fun!

EXTRA


This is an ECM (Electronic Countermeasures) vehicle needed for Stargrunt. The main vehicle is from Ground-Zero-Games. It's a nice design.


Thanks again for viewing this blog. It's almost finished. When it's done I promise to get some good pictures.

Thanks!

are you going to call the dreadnought "fezzik"?

take care

tesseract wrote:

Is that a deodorant tank?

'sing good man!

WHOA lost track of this log, looks like you've had some great progress! Great stuff going on here, props most on the spider conversion and the mech paintjob

- Salvage

cool. Where's the GITS Jigabachi from? Love that show!

Thank you for the replies.

Fezzik is the perfect name for the mech! Props to Andre the Giant and albinoork. I'll get that name on the mech someplace, I love it!

I've gotten some eMail asking for more detail on this StarGrunt-40K thing I've mentioned. Please do not take this as an anti-GW statement. With 5th edition on the horizon (and based on what I hear on the "Generation D6 broadcast") there is a lot of excitement out there for the new rules and I will definitely be playing them. The reason I'm building this particular army the way I am is to cover as many gaming systems as I can with the same miniatures. I want to play 40K, but I also want to play GURPs, D20, and Stargrunt.

Concerning Stargrunt-40K specifically...

Many wargamers are taking these now free rules (which are meant to be generic) and discovering how much fun it is to use them with GW miniatures/armies in the 40K universe (setting). Here is some of that buzz:
http://theminiaturespage.com/rules/scf/stargrunt.html

The rules are free. If you have some GW miniatures and can download the following rules, you can start playing now...
http://www.groundzerogames.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=97&Itemid=50
You will need some counters to play. The counters are nothing special and you can make your own very easily, but you can download and print the ones that came with the game (If you like the game, pick up a printed copy with counters off of eBay. )
http://www.groundzerogames.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=100&Itemid=50
http://www.groundzerogames.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=101&Itemid=50

There are many good resources on the net for "Grunting" 40K. None of them are perfect, but the best aspect of the game is you can pretty much take it anywhere you want. It's meant to be generic and good wargamers do very good things with it:
http://www.digitalkingdom.org/~rlpowell/stargrunt.html

(EDIT: Ugh, I reread that link and it's not as good as I thought. My group didn't pull any one source when grunting 40K. The process was more collaborative like this (It even looks like the linked thread is referring to the other link I provided): http://forum.rpg.net/archive/index.php/t-91067.html . You can do whatever floats your boat...which I know will sadly scare away a lot of 40K players from trying this. Oh well. )

You can also take the system in other directions than 40K (Different armies, backgrounds, scenarios). There are many good web resources out there and it would be great to see even more.
http://www.stargrunt.ca/
http://www.warbard.ca/sg2.html
http://www.groundzerogames.net/index.php?option=com_frontpage&Itemid=1

Anyway, enough propaganda!

GW is great, Stargrunt is fun, happy wargaming!



Edit: covenant84, the Jigabachi is hard to find in the US (in stores), but is readily avaialble on eBay for 25-35(US).
http://cgi.ebay.com/GHOST-IN-THE-SHELL-SAC-2ND-GIG-JIGABACHI_W0QQitemZ280138125079QQihZ018QQcategoryZ348QQrdZ1QQssPageNameZWD1VQQcmdZViewItemQQ_trksidZp1638Q2em118Q2el1247

There are other models coming out from Kotobukiya including some of the battle suits. I'm a HUGE Ghost in the Shell fan myself. I put the 2 I got for this army together and they are fantastic models. The flying stands are amazing and will be perfect for all types of wargames.

thank you

Star Grunt is a hell of a game! I really like your Hodge-Podge Rogue Trader retunue. Like the guy has been travelling through space and has collected a myriad of fellows who have banded together for a common goal. very nice.

I'll have an update soon of my Rogue Trader army. I'm still trying to work out how to take pictures...

Anyway, this blog has veered a bit into alternative rules (40K/Stargrunt/d20/GURPs) and alternative miniatures.

A friend of mine found a line he wants to build a (40K Guard/Stargrunt/d20/GURPs) battle force with. I think they're great. If they've been posted before on DakkaDakka forgive the indiscretion. They're at least blogworthy enough for another look.

Here's the manufacturer's website...
SHADOWFORGE MINIATURES
http://www.shadowforge.com.au/

40K seems to have segregated armies. The 40K Guard unit would be a sort of a "Daughters of the Emperor" type thing. I think they'll be outstanding as a stand-alone force, but you could integrate them with other male guard models to make mixed units.







Nice full squad pictures (Off vendor website)



GW Guard-vehicles are all to "cartoony" for the people I wargame with. This would be the Chimmera alt for this army. It's an Old Crow Glaive Medium APC... You can get it in grav and hover drive suspensions as well.



Thank you for reading!

I'd like to finish up this thread with some pictures of more ATLANTIC Star Ranger to Marine reps. I have finished all my troop squads, but I've been distracted by Warmachine the last few weeks and getting models ready for that. Thankfully Khador are easy to paint up. I'll try and do some more pics this weekend when I've got the models out.

Last weekend I was over at a friends house who showed me some minis he picked up online. Everyone, I think, remembers the discontinued VOID game. I didn't realize ScotiaGrendel still made those models and have continued the line. He has some Viridians for StarGrunt/d20/Gurps that would make great IG alts (He has no intention of that.). A lot of people like "Pig Iron" bits (especially the gas-mask heads). Viridians have that look AND a lot of cool new models. Here's a link for those who want to look for themselves...


http://www.scotiagrendel.com/

EDIT: Better link for those who hate searching sites:
http://www.scotiagrendel.com/viridiansp1.html

VIRIDIANS







Same website. The futuristic-samurai Triad. These might make some cool Eldar alts. I'm going to order some minis and check size. Lots more pics on the website (Under Triad). I love samurai models and some of these are real keepers...

EDIT: Quick link to product
http://www.scotiagrendel.com/triadsp1.html






More Rouge Trader Roberts soon. I promise. I just have one more Khador Behemoth and some Iron Fang to finish painting.

I'm playing some Warhammer 5th edition this weekend and even MORE next. I'll get to see how Roberts does.

Thanks again for looking.

if I was wearing panties they would be wet right now.

I would greatly appreciate scale shots on the Triad dudes when you get 'em, I've long contemplated grabbing some of them for nefarious IG purposes.

- Salvage

Nice blog - I think the end result army lacks visual coherence, but who cares, you are having fun and producing interesting stuff and I applaud!

migsula wrote:Nice blog - I think the end result army lacks visual coherence, but who cares, you are having fun and producing interesting stuff and I applaud!

Tacobake....

Boss_Salvage, ordering from ScotiaGrendel is not the easiest thing to do from the US, but I got an order in and will post about scale. Dang, their sculpts are not cheap.

Migsula, you made my day responding to my blog. I've been a long time fan of your amazing modeling skills. You had me at, "Nice blog."

I agree that coherence is important when you put together sci-fi armies from various sources. Companies like GW go to the bother of ensuring scale and visual context is consistent across a wide range of models. When you start mixing and matching between different vendors, you have to make sure it pulls together in the end. I had my army on the table this weekend, and I'm pleased with how it's turning out. It would be so much easier, for me at least, if I had mad-Migsula-skills and could sculpt a chewed up piece of gum into a completely unique powered armored warrior, with meson weapon (That’s obviously a meson gun there!) and kilt. Sadly…

I'm an old school wargamer who likes to be surprised by the composition and creativity of the armies I face. The guys I game with are of the same school and produce very interesting and cool looking armies. Back before you could buy everything you wanted from companies like GW, you had to search and craft the playing pieces you wanted.

You can still find well designed player driven content on the web, but if you’re a GW or Privateer Press customer, you’re probably not looking.

Personally, I love sci-fi armies. Player created content can be well ahead of the curve produced by corporations.
Examples:
http://www.warbard.ca/sg2kravak.html
http://www.hyperbear.com/sg2/sg2-bds.html

I love it when someone finds a new line of minis like this:


And crafts an entire force with a coherent look and doctrine, like so:


To me, that is coolness in wargaming! The above, found on the net here (More free sci fi rules called “Beam Strike”. Never played them, but they look a lot like Stargrunt (with tables instead of shifting dice)):
http://www.neilandannettec.myby.co.uk/eliminator_downloads/Aliens%20supplement%201.2%20rules,%20v1.2.pdf


Sorry for the tangent post, but Migsula got me thinking.

Thanks for reading!

awesome

I really like this blog and the older or alt models. I'm currently building a 1000 point IG army using Wargames Factory greatcoat troopers and Old Crow vehicals.