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Hello Dakka Gang... and Happy Thanksgiving!

Anyhow, I've completed painting my first Rough Rider conversion and I have three assembled. However, I'm having troubles settling on an idea for the two that will have special weapons (melta guns, etc...) I'm not sure if I should do a sidecar, use a 'turret' or sponson-like mounting on the side... or something else. I want to use magnets to swap out the weapons... but I'm not fully sold on which way to go. Thought I'd throw it out for Dakka comments and see if I can get some inspiration.

As you can see from the below pic... I've modified the Space Marine Scout Bike to give it a less chunkier look... and I don't think using the Space Marine attack bike is that viable of an option... but maybe.

That is very good! The only other one I've seen is the infamous 'dirt bike' Cadian Rough Rider...



Any chance of some other angles so I can see it better, cause you've done a good job on that. Sorry I can't actually help you out though, just wanted to congratulate you on a great conversion.

Thanks for the comments!

I have a WIP Gallery for them... but here are a few more views.

I too have seen dirt bike conversions for the rough riders. I always had issue with cavalry attacking tanks. It didn't work in real life (WW1 and WW2) but then again, we are talking about a game in a sci-fi universe!

Side cars may make it a bit too bag... too large of a footprint to get shot at, charged, or hit with template weapons.

Maxstreel wrote:I too have seen dirt bike conversions for the rough riders. I always had issue with cavalry attacking tanks. It didn't work in real life (WW1 and WW2) but then again, we are talking about a game in a sci-fi universe!

Indeed, it's sci-fi! If anything I think it works well. An enemy tank is hardly going to bother with cavalry when there's bigger fish to fry, but unlike WW1/2 horses these ones have massive lances that can tear through your vehicles when the explosives go off! Bit of a sneaky tactic if you ask me.

Why does that lance have a gunstock. Is that actually just a huge barrel and the charge on the end a rifle grenade? :p

Anyway yeah, very nice conversion work, cutting the scout bike down must have been time-consuming. For the special weapons, can you keep the weapon mount on the bike and just swap the weapon?

The stock was for two reasons...

1.) To do something about the arm that was part of the bit for the lance (Mongolian Rough Rider arm).
2.) I figured a pistol grip would be easier to handle in the far future.

I did snip off the trigger guard to have it be just a handgrip.

I thought about using the basic weapon mount. Another though I've had is to rig something up that attaches to the back and sticks out some from the side.

That is an awesome looking and well-painted conversion!

You could mount the specials between/in front of the handlebars. Look at this model from Maxmini for an example of what I mean:



Looking at your model, it seems like there might room for a melta below the headlight, on the front fender/mudgard.

I think it looks awesome, but the lance seems to be in an awkward position to hold. A massive lance held by the end just seems to heavy to lift like that.

Doesn't seem to be much room left on the bike...Maybe you could just have it slung over the rider's back?

In any case: excellent conversion, excellent paintjob.

Thats a really nice model. Well done!

Regarding special weapons... head tracking mini-turrets!

Kudos on an awesome looking Rough Rider man he looks freaking sweet.

My thought would be to cut out the headlight and attach the special weapon in between the handlebars. a meltagun would probably fit quite snuggly inbetween the handlebars and plamsagun wouldnt need much work.
Or as Whigwam said, sling it over his back. Conversion wise that would probably be easiest.

@OP:
I would just put the weapons on the rider's hands and either make them shorter or make the handler look like he's having a bit of trouble aiming. Another alternative would be to just stuck the weapon into some side compartment and either make some average pose or make it look as if he's reaching out to grab it (makes it harder for opponents to forget he has a special weapon).

Oppl wrote:

Maxstreel wrote:I too have seen dirt bike conversions for the rough riders. I always had issue with cavalry attacking tanks. It didn't work in real life (WW1 and WW2) but then again, we are talking about a game in a sci-fi universe!

Indeed, it's sci-fi! If anything I think it works well. An enemy tank is hardly going to bother with cavalry when there's bigger fish to fry, but unlike WW1/2 horses these ones have massive lances that can tear through your vehicles when the explosives go off! Bit of a sneaky tactic if you ask me.

There are several advantages in fielding horses, even nowadays. The most notable being logistics - not all planets and regiments have endless supplies of fuel. Not to mention roads and maybe the soil is so bad even tracked vehicles have trouble moving. During WW2, germany and russia used horses to move infantry around a lot faster (contrary to popular belief, there weren't enough trucks to carry around every single soldier). Cavalry is very useful for scouting: they make hardly any sound and can "refuel" nearly anywhere. Tough to be honest, drone tech is making them redundant nowadays, then again, 40k decided to skip the whole drone thing.

Also there are some reports of cossacks successfully moving and ambushing tanks. I can't find any concrete evidence right now, but I remember one story where a bunch of cossack irregulars (i.e. not soldiers) nearly wiped out an Italian tank group using molotovs or something. It makes sense that between all of that and the general high-tech oddness of the 40k universe, cavalry would find it's place.

Just in case anyone else is thinking of getting rough riders, I've been thinking of getting some bikes from Ramshackle Games. Have some examples:





Be aware some of them are a bit large.

Those bikes are amazing! Thanks for linking! ^