Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Im looking to make two units of Imperial Guard Storm Troopers (my own versions of) but cash is a slight issue and am looking for any ideas I might have missed / what other people have done.

So far I have come up with the following ideas/models:

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?catId=cat440248a&prodId=prod810031a
Old IG STs - very expensive when you take into account I'll need 4 packs of them. not the best aesthetic-wise.

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?catId=cat440248a&prodId=prod1070081
Kasrkins - absolutely love the models but again price is a big issue (€70 for 2 packs!).

http://www.forgeworld.co.uk/Warhammer-40000/Imperial_Guard/Cadian_Shock_Troops/CADIAN-INFANTRY-SQUAD-WITH-RESPIRATORS-UPGRADE-PACK.html + basic Cadians.
Ive seen a basic Cadian unit on Wayland for about 13 sterling but adding on the upgrade pack makes them about €31 which isnt much cheaper then above.

Buying a couple of basic Cadian packs from Wayland and just painting them differently / trying to add on extra bits I have around.

My friend has a really old unit of Storm Troopers (from 3rd? ed) - long coats, respirators, shotguns etc but I cant find them on ebay etc.

Any other ideas or suggestions?

What about trying to pick up some Van Saar necromunda gangers from eBay? They look tech enough, and you could swap out the headss for some Elyssian/Cadian respirator heads?

I made one of my vet squads stand out a bit. Maybe it could work for stormtroopers.

This requires plenty of extras from many infantry squads, but since this is guard, it shouldn't be a problem.
Grab a voxcaster and the helmeted head that comes with it. Alternatively, get some of the rebreathers from the Candian Command squad.
Trim down the voxcaster's antenna to make it look more like a backpack (I left small antennas on to suggest a short range squad comm system) (The giant speaker can be painted up as a light with minimal effort or cut off)
Use the voxcaster head or rebreathers (The rebreathers are very fiddly and don't fit if you have a lasgun across the chest. In that case, it might work to put the rebreather unit on the backpack and just put on the facemask)

That should get you a squad fairly similar to the forgeworld stuff for minimal price .The basic infantry squad boxes come with 2 voxcasters each, so you should have plenty laying around.

Unfortunately I dont have any spare vox casters and to make a squad of 10-20 STs I'd need a lot of casters!

Thanks though.

Response for the 1st comment. Done many times, nothing original.

If price is an issue Wargames Factory Greatcoats sounds about right.

I agree those Greatcoats are very guardy.

I raided my bits box for Tau legs to combine with Cadian everything else. A bit of GS helps hide the size difference. I also added Pig Iron heads, packs and Hasslefree weapons, but I think you could also use normal Cadian heads and modify standard lasguns easily enough.

Those tau legs work amazingly well.

For stormtroopers I:
1. filled in the eye area on vox helmets to look like a visor.
2. cut all the antennas and the bottom half off of the vox pack
3. connected backpack to gun with cable.

As you will note, the Kasrkin are actually just regular cadian shock troopers, except with more armor, and with a cooler gun. As such, the cheapest way, by far, to make stormies is to take regular cadian shock troops, and add more armor, and make them higher tech.

Flinty's are nice, if you're willing to buy extra stuff, as well as are lots of other conversions I've seen. Personally, I just used GS and the cadian shock troops box. They look like this:

I'd say A-man's and Flinty's are by far and away my favorite looking ST.
both have a very ST feel to them, but yet are themed well with the rest of the army.
now if i could just talk myself into using St....

Yeah dam nice Ail and Flinty, thanks for the ideas/help.

Irdiumstern wrote:I made one of my vet squads stand out a bit. Maybe it could work for stormtroopers.

This requires plenty of extras from many infantry squads, but since this is guard, it shouldn't be a problem.
Grab a voxcaster and the helmeted head that comes with it. Alternatively, get some of the rebreathers from the Candian Command squad.
Trim down the voxcaster's antenna to make it look more like a backpack (I left small antennas on to suggest a short range squad comm system) (The giant speaker can be painted up as a light with minimal effort or cut off)
Use the voxcaster head or rebreathers (The rebreathers are very fiddly and don't fit if you have a lasgun across the chest. In that case, it might work to put the rebreather unit on the backpack and just put on the facemask)

That should get you a squad fairly similar to the forgeworld stuff for minimal price .The basic infantry squad boxes come with 2 voxcasters each, so you should have plenty laying around.

When I got 20 vox backpacks and helmets in a bits bag (part of the swag for $20 which included a vindicare assassin AND a metal 2nd ed sentinel and a bunch of steel legion and other 2nd ed IG models) I had a similar idea for creating Inquisition Storm troopers.

I ended up giving the helmets to my SM scouts (metals) to make them look more like combat troops in training and less like Frat pledges and went with 20 Pig Iron heavy infantry helmets with the packs. Regular cadian bodies and lasguns supplied the rest. The one major change was cutting off the magazines from 20 lasguns and drilling a hole to fit guitar strings. A matching hole was drilled in the backpacks to allow for the "hellguns" power cables.

would it be a good idea to use SM backpacks to use with IG cadians and thus trying to crate a Stormtrooper look?
they should get a more steampunk look so i would use a cable to one exhaust of the pack and maybe turn the other one around to face upward like a stovepipe...

thanks vik

Where'd you get that bits bag? *drool*

One of the major conventions a few years ago (they have an upstairs room for "bring & buy" where people (attendees) can buy and sell their old stuff. It happens once a year and is the main reason I travel 3 hours to get to it.

I've scored everything from old RT guardsmen to Eldar WarWalkers (metal - with the weapons outfit I was after) to tanks and bits collections all for quite reasonable prices (under $20AUD for the most part).