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hi...as you might know (though i doubt it) ive been making an all gas mask wearing imperial guard army. at first i thought traitors. then i thought mercenaries. and then i thought good guys. so i have no idea what to do. im thinking, if evil, to incorporate my ton of cadian zombies into it and some forgeworld pyskers.

however : i cant think of a story to tie it all together.

if they were good guys, i had a theme for them, and i liked it, but i dunno. being good imperial guard somehow doesnt seem as fun....
so i made em kinda evil.
the basic theme is as follows:

oh i need some help naming the planet.....

it starts with a huge chunk of warpstone (or 40k equivalent) landing in a small planet/moons only water supply. this huge resevoir is miles deep and, the chunk of warpstone sinks to the bottom and goes undetected for many months. when the imperium realise about it, its too late as it has dissovled into the water. so, not wanting to pay for a planets worth of water, and maybe even get officials of the inquisition down upon them for not finding and acting upon the stone sooner, they do nothing.

it is forgotten about, and life returns to normal. the government release propaganda telling the population to drink less water, in a vague attempt to stop consumption of the substances within. all is forgotten. it is only a few weeks later, when the government collect data, and notice that their is a huge boom in child fatality rates, and the surviving babies tend to be mutents. unsure what to do, the government leave it, and think its just a spike in the otherwise perfrect graph.

2 months later, the next report comes in. the amount of child fatalities has dropped, but, EVERY baby being born is a hidious mutant. and, in a population where a baby is born ever 10 seconds, and where 2months of mutants have already been spawned, it has occured to the government, that something is terribly wrong. it then gets worse. adults start to mutate. thousands of mutated families flee from the hive cities, to escape the great culling that would be unleashed. those mutants that stay, do so because they have been driven mad from the water. the culling ensues and the guard forces act admirably, fighting, and clearing the bottom of the hive of mutants. the 'esteemed' governmentm, then declare that the tiny fraction of the mutants culled was the entire population that was infected, completely ignoring the millions of now frothing, insane, mutants in the country side around them.

however, after this occurance, and, after a particuly rich and powerful aristocrats daughter was found in her bed with another set of jaws and a finger exploding out of her eye, the government decide to act upon the water supply. they decide, that by using a huge turbo laser to heat up, and evaporate the water, they will be able to collect the water and leave the impure substance at the bottom of the resevoir. this was the worst mistake possible. when they fired the massive laser into the water, the steam expelled still contained the deadly warping agent. suddenly, the hive was being choked by a deady gas, that(as it was superheated) rose like heat. so, from the bottom of the hive, the gaseous substance rose, through every level to the top. only the military had ready access to gasmasks. the rest of the population, were choked to death by the fumes, or mutated into grotesque creatures.

meanwhile, the swarming infestations of mutants in the countryside saw, and felt the turbolasers shot into the water. driven by some animalistic urge, they swarmed BACK too the city, where they fell upon the beleagured guardsmen.

so thats the theme at the moment. mad, i know.
but i want them to be kinda evil (the guardsmen) so i need an idea how to link them defending their areas of the hive from millions of disfigured creatures too utalizing zombies and being gennerally a mercenary army

You should continue with this story, but you should have some of the normal guardsmen survive the mutant attack due to luck and gas masks. They should exile themselves to the planet's moon and live there for generations, each generation being recruited into an ever expanding army. When the time comes, this army attacks and eradicates the mutants on the planet. These "guardsmen", however, have , in the eyes of the Inquisition, been exposed to the taint of Chaos. The Inquisition seeks the new army out to eradicate them. the army becomes bitter, and now strikes back at the Inquistion. And they, remembering their homeworld, always wear gas masks.

cool thx, how would i add the zombies to the theme?
i dont want them too be chaos though
i find it kinda depressing that even a lowly traitor is guided by some force from above. takes the fun from meaning of their existance,.

The Zombies could be Penal troopers- repentant mutants that want to fight for the guardsmen.

How is this for some fluff?

Perhaps you could have the guardsmen as you ended your tale; locked into bunkers, fighting off the hordes of mutants, some still recognisably their former friends, guardsmen, families and superiors.

Cut off and alone, they hear each strong point of guardsmen fall silent as it is overrun. In desperation, they lead a breakout to the nearest shuttle port in order to evacuate off world.

What follows is a pitched battle as their garison fights its way to the shuttles through hordes of gibbering creatures. Some of the soldiers are exposed to the mutating steam when their rebreathers are ripped from their faces, or otherwise malfunction during the struggle.

After several days of fighting, the much reduced force manages to escape, taking with them as many of their casualties and gear as they can, knowing that they can never return.

Unfortunately the have been forever tainted, their very flesh etched with the warpstone vapour leading them to slowly change and mutate. Those who retain most of their humanity fight on with las and bolter, those whos minds have broken are herded into battle, heedless of shot and shell.

Hunted by the inquisition and unable to return home, they wander the stars, selling their services to whomever would hire them, waiting for the day that the last of them falls to the foul taint, but searching with deminishing hope for a cure that would allow them to save themselves and cure their broken world.

AMG LOVES IT! such an awsome themsesness! now, next problem i wanna make a pysker squad from the imperial cadian box and flaggelent box. i got a good idea howto make em, only problem is: i dont wanna put gasmasks on em >< and i dont want them to be mutents. mulls it over but i love that idea 4 the zombies. and also good idea with the penal legion thingy . if i ever bother to play this army in a game i could use them as that amg thx guys! totally awsomeness!


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ooh i could include something about mutants in my army aswell. i dont want obvious mutants in my army btw, something obviously mutated but discreet. anyone seen hills got eyes? cos the freaks in that dont have a giant arm of huge tentacle replacing their legs, and yet they still look scary beans.

any idea to use mutants? all feedback, no matter how silly is appretiated.

and WHY would the inquisition be out for my guys blood exactly?

ghosty wrote:AMG LOVES IT! such an awsome themsesness! now, next problem i wanna make a pysker squad from the imperial cadian box and flaggelent box. i got a good idea howto make em, only problem is: i dont wanna put gasmasks on em >< and i dont want them to be mutents. mulls it over but i love that idea 4 the zombies. and also good idea with the penal legion thingy . if i ever bother to play this army in a game i could use them as that amg thx guys! totally awsomeness!

You could always just give them nose tubes, so they inhale from an oxygen tank, rather than breathing from the air. Either that, or they could have just been picked up by your forces. Perhaps they raided a pick up ship for the Black Ships or something and "freed" the pyskers. Hence they don't have to wear masks.

any idea to use mutants? all feedback, no matter how silly is appretiated.

There is an apocalypse datasheet which features zombie type soldiers, I can't remember what it is called off the top of my head... "the lost and the damned" or something? I don't know... but it might help you field zombie/mutants. Have a look on the GW site... it is on there.

and WHY would the inquisition be out for my guys blood exactly?

See the attack on the Black Ship supply ship idea.

Or they could be after them to stop them mutating others... perhaps they also have to wear the gas masks to stop them from exhaling the warpstone stuff on other people? So the inquisition wants to make sure they don't destroy any more worlds by mutating their populations. Or perhaps the inquisition want to find out what wiped out a perfectly good planet and need some people who actually retain their minds to "question".

It looks great so far!

I've got it!
The guardsmen, having been culling thousands of imperial citizen for months, have become de-humanised and the ragged remants raid the stockpiles of gas masks. The whole surviving elements don the masks and proceed to fight of the mutants. Not willing to let the creatures escape back into the wild, the commander orders the the city gates to be shut. The result is thousand of mutant, as well as infected and unifected imperial civilians trapped inside the walls as the guard enact a total purge.

The guard brutally sluaghter all they find. Mutant or otherwise. Every man, women and child, rich or poor, is butchered by the guard. As the sluaghter ends the city is silent, the guardsmen the onyl ones still standing. What happens next is entirely up to you.

1) Fall prey to the dominions of chaos (or grow disillisuoned with the Imperium or just plain insane)

2) No future on the planet, so they offer themselves as mercenaries or even break off from the Imperium.

3) Mercilessly purge the whole planet in HIS name, then proceed to sieze control of what little planetary population is left. (still loyal to Imperium)

De-humanised by being butchering loonies? If that worked, then all Inquisitors would be mutants and the guy who presses the 'Exterminatus' button would be a Spawn.

I meant that they become less and less like people with emotions and more use to merciless sluaghter. (like Pertuabo and the Iron Warriors did during the Great Crusades)

ahh zis is veery good idea!

ok first up : NO CHAOS -.-....i dunno why but i dislike them! i wanna have an evil imperial guard army without chaos sticking its ugly mug into it

2nd, i like chaos but i dont want it for my guard

3rd i likes the pyskers thing. very cool idea. maybe they broke into a black ship and liberated them.

IDEA!


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" the planet (which i still have no clue to name) was silenced. the last hive had fallen to the mutant swarms. the last humans of the surface of the planet had slaughtered, and seen so much slaughter, that they seemed hardly human themselves. the general, who, in his prime was a great bear of a man, was now emaciated, the constant inhaling of the oxygen filtered from the atmosphere had wasted away his, and many others bodies. they had realised too late that the warpstone...wait gtta go

Cheese Elemental wrote:De-humanised by being butchering loonies? If that worked, then all Inquisitors would be mutants and the guy who presses the 'Exterminatus' button would be a Spawn.

I mean that they turn on thier own families, whether or not they have turned into mutants yet. It doesn't physically corrupt them (no warp-spawned tentacles ripping out) it just mentally distablises them. Makes them cold, emoitianally void from the heartless acts they have committed against both guilty and innocents.

For your mutant soldiers you could remove the noses from some of them, leave them with just a couple of holes instead. Maybe some of them have removed mutated body parts and replaced them with augmentations - just paint some of the hands metal coloured. Give some of them two different skin colours like a patchwork as though they've had to replace some of their skin.
Give some of them yellow skin or some other unusual colour and maybe spots or blotches on their skin.
If you can, position some of their heads to make them look hunchbacked and turn some of their feet in different directions to make them look deformed.

Mutants could act as penal legion troops enslaved by the "pure" IG.

right i think its time i clear up the image of my mutants.

the mutants have taken themes from the following films

* 28days later fiends: in other words, their bite is infectious, as is their blood. also, they differ from zombies because theyre alive. even though their flesh is stripped and gnawed. they ARE not zombies

* hills have eyes: i want them to be weird and mutants.

the idea for the mutants is that theyre the human population gone insane. so for a warhammer look, zombies, ghouls and maybe to an extent grotesques and humunculii of darkeldar. (humunculi will eventually be the planetary govener)

ok. so the respitory systems of the guardsmens gasmasks dont completely purify the air. though it purifys enough to prevent mutation, it doesnt completely clean it. therefore people exposed to it for long periods of time will suffer from radiation sickness, and their skin will wither. which is what happened to their officer (my first commander ive made so far)


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now back to basics. i have 24 40k zombies made. ill incorporate them as summit later...im thinking maybe dead citazins ressurected or animated by the psykers. either that or im not gonna use them in my army.

now ive thought of an interesting idea for the planet.

call and critasisms

basically, when the huge turbo laser was fired into the water silo, it penetrated the planets crust and struck the core. (the planet is tiny...one hive sized) . now, combined with the hole created evaporating the water, a huge amount of the irradiated liquid poured down this hole into the core. this rapidly cooled it, and caused a huge planetquake. the land burns as volcanic eruptiones explode all over the planet, and islands of rock are formed between rivers of lava. luckily, the hive itself is on one such island, and lava hasnt set the city on fire. however, the rock its based on is slowly melting away.

ok this sets the scene for them leaving the planet. or why anyways.

at theis firey point, the mutant swarms have pushed the guard forces to the top of the hive. the fighting here is intense as the hole hive has been adapted into a nightmare killing ground. every building is a bunker, everywindow a firing slit, every courtyard and garden a killing field. murderholes are positioned, and mines are laid. and through it all the mutants swarm.

ok need help for the theme again they cant readily fight their way out, so what should they do? and they do need to leave the planet

oh and im now thinking chaos might not be terrible idea. just i need to say that they arnt chaotic, but theyre guided by tzeentch. he is controlling their fates maybe? i dunno much about chaos. no chaos though in the army itself. meh persaude me otherwise if you want i love all the feedback

c and c

Stick with your original idea (because it's different) and keep chaos out of it. The galaxy is big enough for the people to have mutated by other means - either massive pollution or some alien species. Maybe the mutations and insanity are the result of an alien virus accidentally or deliberately introduced into the water by the Dark Eldar or some unknown alien race. Maybe the alien virus is aware and uses species like humans to spread but, huge possibilities without bringing chaos into it.

As for getting out, maybe they can release gas from industrial sites and factories into the levels below them and then set the gas alight. It wont stop the hordes but it removes enough of them to give the survivors time to organise an airlift before the horde recovers its strength.
Hives would be full of airfields and shuttle pads, the bulk lifters that carry the supplies and products to and from the hive would have to land somewhere.

PDF, Arbites and other armed units would have their own fortified bases with aircraft too, all your people have to do is get somewhere where they can be picked up from. I assume there are still ships in orbit, they can send down rescue craft as well and some of the bigger ships may even be able to fire on the lower levels to thin out the numbers of the horde racing towards the survivors.

cadbren wrote:Stick with your original idea (because it's different) and keep chaos out of it. The galaxy is big enough for the people to have mutated by other means - either massive pollution or some alien species. Maybe the mutations and insanity are the result of an alien virus accidentally or deliberately introduced into the water by the Dark Eldar or some unknown alien race. Maybe the alien virus is aware and uses species like humans to spread but, huge possibilities without bringing chaos into it.

Agreed in this case. How about giving them a nemesis? Maybe something that one of your friends plays. That way you can work out the background organically with one another.

Mabye, as the mutants slowly but surely push the guard back, the commander hears the the planetary governer is using his private battle cruiser (or sumfink to that effect) to escape and carry as many of his possesions with him.

The commander leads the remnants of the guard to the top of the spire, executes the governer and his aides, then comandeers the cruiser, making good thier escape.

Emperors Faithful wrote:The commander leads the remnants of the guard to the top of the spire, executes the governer and his aides, then comandeers the cruiser, making good thier escape.

Which would also handily demonstrate why the guys with -I- painted on their armour are looking for the soldiers. Killing the govornator is a bad thing

hehe thx for the comments. ok i agree, no chaos. my guys are just very unlucky.

hehe ^^ reminds me of my game style

wins: 0 lost: 3

ok back to the theme. well my m8s play orks, eldar, and chaos. i also have a tyranid army. and another imperial guard army. my ork friend also has tau. so lots of possibilities, but no races up there would really deliberately throw summit virulent onto a planet, would they? tyranids would do it a roundabout way with spore mines n' stuff. but i play as em so.....

hmm so were thinking planet governor should be attempting to leave planet with lotsa possessions?

and we're thinking blowing city sky high?

ok i was thinking that the planetary governer has mutated aswell, but nvm i like that idea more.
more c and c please. i need time to think. too early in the morning -.-





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ohh and would my force have a commissar?

as theyre feeling scorned and shunned by the imperium.

and that theyre now heartless killers

ghosty wrote:ohh and would my force have a commissar?

Pretty unlikely.

You could have your guys trying to join up wit hthe Tau as Gue'vesa and being rejected because they're too . . . aberrant. That would be a swift kick to the teeth for their already tender pride.

Commissar type may exist if he got mutated too but he wouldn't be a commissar anymore - one of his jobs is to shoot mutants and the like. You could just use a commissar as a regular officer and paint him with a mix of guard and commissar uniform to show his change of role.

Perhaps an insane commissar? One who is just a LITTLE too fond of executions?

lol i like the tau thing. hmm gimme a sec to think

and an insane commissar you say? hmmm....
what about before the planets apocalypse and descent into madness, they had a lord commissar who was the pride of the imperial guard? a firey general who terrified and inspired the guardsmen in equal measure? but, when the end of the planet began, he became reclusive and was rarely seen. however, when he took to the field he encouraged the men to do the horrorific things they did. he forwent wearing a gasmask, saying that he would rather fight the enemy face to face, which was his ultimate downfall. when the gases washed over the posistion they were at, and the true extent of the gases power was realised, he was rushed to hospital and had his lungs pumped clean. the dedicated medical staff fought to save his life, eventually giving him a futuristic version of an iron lung, enabling him to breathe without dying or mutating (lots of complex filters stuck down his throat ) however, after his first exposure to the gas, he was, changed. thus hes a bit crazy, and wont shy away from blowing someones face off for no reason.

i wanna commissar cos i love the lord commissar model!


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now the tau

maybe AFTER they leave the planet, pick up the pyskers and do some other random stuff that ive not thought of yet, they meet up with one of the tau expedition class ships.

the tau welcome them at first, and escort the mercenary guardsmen to one of the newely captured planets at the fringe of the tau empire. however it soon becomes apparent that the guardsmen are horribly scarred, in both mind, and body, and that the guardsmen would slaughter their oponents without extending the taus offer of alliance first. so the tau reject them. the now spiteful, twisted, pyscotic guardsmen assasinate the ethereal in charge and then escape the planet.

so what might happen before/after? im gonna have a battle with imperial guard today, lead by an inquisitor. so this battle will be after the murder of the governer.

so ill tellu what happens after words

Yeah! Great idea for the commissar, make sure he looks HORRIFICALLY scarred and such.

Also, perhaps a radical inquisitor could be on your side? One who shares thier bloody single-mindedness? Believing only the strong can survive or somesuch?

As for the Tau, perhaps a remote colony welcomes them, but the Guard storm the outpost without warning, sluaghter the inhabitants and flee before they suffer from retribution?

You could also treat ALL/SOME your guys as Penal Legion troops. (To get the psycotic effect)

hehe pyscotic affect ^^
im not completely sold on the rogue inquisitor idea yet, as these guys hate the imperium, especially the inquisition.

now quick thing. i painted up my first bloke yesterday, im gonna finish him off today. the fatigues are brown and the armours a very dark red. im thinking maybe the world they were on was maybe a heavy industrial world? do any other imperial factions wear dark red apart from adeptua mechanicus. also i have a adept to be painted with the army.

Vostroyans, but they have a strong link with the Adepta Mechanicus.
Also Praetorians, but they're poofters, and (almost) no one likes them.
I'm not even GONNA include Spaz Marinz 'cuase there is a lot of red there.

lol XD that made me cry XD

Also Praetorians, but they're poofters, and (almost) no one likes them

i just had a brainwave. see as much as i love the oozing with character lord commissar model, i realised that i probably do have to give him a pigiron head so he fits in.
which made me think, what head? now theres 2 choices. the first is a kolony head with a peak cap.
the other would have been the slightly different hat one next to him, but tbh now i look at it i dislike it.

so i thought about stormtroopers. i know theres rumours of plastic ones coming, but i really like the OLD ones. the ones befores kasrkin.
the helmets would really fit in with my army, so im intending to buy them. however, half come in masks the other half dont. so im planning on buying 2x all the sets that gameswork shop sells. so 2 normal 5 man boxes, 2 special weapons ones, and i think 2 leader packs. this way, hopefully ill get 2 identical squads in size, but one will have gasmasks and one wont. how is this to do with the theme? i hear you scream! or type. or think it but decide to be too polite to ask. well im also thinking aboot getting a valkyrie or two to ferry round these 2 stormtrooper squads. the gasmasked ones will be lead by the commissar. now. i think this is an evil idea but it seems summit the commissar might be prepared to do. when my force captures loyalists, they attatch explosive collars round their necks and kit them out in storm trooper armour. then give them a valkarie. now heres me hoping valkyries can deep strike or fly very fast.
basicallythe lord commissar and his storm troopers are feared by everyone. these were the men who inspired the rest of the guard to murder mercilessly. these guys arnt nice. so, they have a reputation of being horrific monsters who murder just because they can.
however, even though the commissar is now mad, hes lost none of his cunning. he sends in the captured loyal guardsmen in their place to trick them. hes always looking for a tactition who can equal his own brilliance. only one man has done that before, realising that these men couldnt be the ferocious warriors as they dont wear the masks from the planet. so most people shoot the captured loyalists dead unknowing that they arnt the people they believe. and then the other valkyrie with the real stormtroopers fly in and assault them hopefully oblitterating the opponents whilst theyre coming over the sudden shock.

fun eh ^^

I like the first helmet for the Commissar. (on the left)

Also, i have to ask, if the captured loyalist guard are a distraction of sorts, why kit them out in storm trooper armour? I would use penal legion troopers as them. (they actually HAVE a rule for explosive collars. The custodian could be a rouge guard to keep watch on them)

well the enemy are expecting the creme of my army to attack them, they wouldnt be penals would they? and i was thinking maybe that giving my oponents consent, id give the distraction storm troopers explosive collars. wouldnt that be fun ^^