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As I tend to do with the release of most new codex's I took a look at the Astra Militarum and got the urge to make up a small force of them, being an Imperial army its nice and easy to add into my current Marine builds as allied forces, and gives some great opportunities for converting. About the same time I was debating with a friend as to what theatre of war the Taurox might look a little less stupid in, to which I concluded a frost tundra might make the tracks a big more worth while (could be wrong here but it's my logic and I'm sticking to it). I've never been a massive fan of the Cadians head/helmets, I'm not sure why but they ruin alot of the cadian range for me, I did not however want to put bare chested Catachans in an arctic theme so I sought about kitbashing Tempestus and Cadian kits to create my own Regiment themes.

Starting with a test scheme I ended up here:



And for a Sergeant:



Being pretty happy with how these first two turned out I worked on a theme of Ice and Fire, aiming to work in a good degree of fire weaponry whilst maintaining a fun and atleast mildly competitive list. The plan thus far is for 10 Carapace Vets, 10 Camo Vets, Company Command, 2 Winter Sentinels and a taurox.

Progress on the Carapace vets have gone well so far, with a total of 4 painted and based, with 1 half painted:



I have now converted up 5 Camo Veterans:



And the company command squad needs some green stuff to fill gaps:



Stay tuned!

C&C Welcome as Always

Damn mate, you are off to one awesome start. Those scion heads look mint on the cadians! Looking forward to following progress.

Thanks!

A massively WIP Primaris Psyker who still needs a couple of mold lines removed and some green stuff trimming but really liking the way he's come together.

Very nice indeed. However I would paint the hands to look like they are gloved- would make sense if they have fully enclosed herons and cold-weather gear. Aside from that, brilliant

I second the glove idea. Bare hands get frostbit real quick.

Thanks guys, and yeah the glove thing is a good point, I'm so used to just doing the hands flesh tone by nature that I hadnt reasoned through the options on gloves. The finished models will probably stay fleshy but any from now on will be painted with gloves.

Cool stuff, that white is amazingly clean. Looking forward to this.

Not a huge fan of the rest of the kit (aside from maybe the legs with some conversion) but the Scion heads look really cool. And blend well with the regular Guardsmen.

Paradigm wrote:Cool stuff, that white is amazingly clean. Looking forward to this.

Thanks, its the first majorly white armour I've tried and despite having to do a good number of layers it seems to be coming out pretty smooth.

Veteran Sergeant wrote:Not a huge fan of the rest of the kit (aside from maybe the legs with some conversion) but the Scion heads look really cool. And blend well with the regular Guardsmen.

I got the kits mainly for the heads and backpacks, there's a good few accessories in the kit that I'm using to gear up my Veterans but the bodies and extras will likely end up being used for the Psykers, Priests and Commisars.

As part of an ongoing campaign at my local GW we're using wargear cards as bonus extras, so I took this as an opportunity to convert up my veteran sergeant for the camo cloak veterans:



And also worked on the Heavy Weapons team:

My attempt to make the most of my week off for modelling has hit a tad of a snag, I have gone through all of my white primer and the rest of my scion bits wont be available till wednesday. This gives me time to finish assembling and converting what I have in order to have a good starting point for my first campaign game on Thursday, but its left me without the ability to get much more painted.

Since money isnt overly abundant I was eager to make use of the part of the Scion kits I didnt need for my guard (everything barring the head and backpack really). Since they're still useful I sought about converting these into an Inquisitorial Warband as an extra detachment for when I need it. The acolyte is armed with a converted "Long Bolter" that I'm hoping people will accept for a Stormbolter though I expect will be classified as a bolt gun instead (not a huge loss). While the inquisitor is armed with the Hell rifle for same ranged potency.

So time for some pictures:

Warrior acoylte with long bolt


Malleus Inquisitor with Hell Rifle


Painted Sentinel Canopy

 Melcavuk wrote:
As I tend to do with the release of most new codex's I took a look at the Astra Militarum and got the urge to make up a small force of them, being an Imperial army its nice and easy to add into my current Marine builds as allied forces, and gives some great opportunities for converting. About the same time I was debating with a friend as to what theatre of war the Taurox might look a little less stupid in, to which I concluded a frost tundra might make the tracks a big more worth while (could be wrong here but it's my logic and I'm sticking to it). I've never been a massive fan of the Cadians head/helmets, I'm not sure why but they ruin alot of the cadian range for me, I did not however want to put bare chested Catachans in an arctic theme so I sought about kitbashing Tempestus and Cadian kits to create my own Regiment themes.

Starting with a test scheme I ended up here:



And for a Sergeant:



Being pretty happy with how these first two turned out I worked on a theme of Ice and Fire, aiming to work in a good degree of fire weaponry whilst maintaining a fun and atleast mildly competitive list. The plan thus far is for 10 Carapace Vets, 10 Camo Vets, Company Command, 2 Winter Sentinels and a taurox.

Progress on the Carapace vets have gone well so far, with a total of 4 painted and based, with 1 half painted:



I have now converted up 5 Camo Veterans:



And the company command squad needs some green stuff to fill gaps:



Stay tuned!

C&C Welcome as Always

Cadian + Scion = 1st edition Imperial Army! this regiment looks THAT way!

Looking very nice so far. What did you use for the camo cloaks?

Nice! I also made up some vets by kitbashing scion and regular ig kits, subbed!

Be careful about Star Wars IP
Nicely Done!

Damn that white! It looks great good job!

Brilliant colour scheme!
The sergeant with the Powerfist is great too.

Lone Cat wrote:Cadian + Scion = 1st edition Imperial Army! this regiment looks THAT way!

I had to google the old citadel imperial army for a second there, but definately see where you're coming from.

Jimmy_Sip wrote:Looking very nice so far. What did you use for the camo cloaks?

The coat is made up of some black fabric my wife had to hand that she used to make my Sons baby taggy, its a big coarse but does the job. It's soaked in PVA to solidify.

lipsdapips wrote:Nice! I also made up some vets by kitbashing scion and regular ig kits, subbed!

The kits are fantastic to kitbash, expensive but I really like the results\1

Jehan-reznor wrote:Be careful about Star Wars IP
Nicely Done!

Thanks!

ghostmaker wrote:Damn that white! It looks great good job!

Thanks, I was somewhat nervous about doing white since I tend to highlight upwards rather than wash down but it came together really well.

HoeJarris wrote:Brilliant colour scheme!
The sergeant with the Powerfist is great too.

Cheers, the odds of the fist doing anything are slim but he looks cool with it.

Whoa, awesome!

I'll be following this

 Lone Cat wrote:

Spoiler:

 Melcavuk wrote:
As I tend to do with the release of most new codex's I took a look at the Astra Militarum and got the urge to make up a small force of them, being an Imperial army its nice and easy to add into my current Marine builds as allied forces, and gives some great opportunities for converting. About the same time I was debating with a friend as to what theatre of war the Taurox might look a little less stupid in, to which I concluded a frost tundra might make the tracks a big more worth while (could be wrong here but it's my logic and I'm sticking to it). I've never been a massive fan of the Cadians head/helmets, I'm not sure why but they ruin alot of the cadian range for me, I did not however want to put bare chested Catachans in an arctic theme so I sought about kitbashing Tempestus and Cadian kits to create my own Regiment themes.

Starting with a test scheme I ended up here:



And for a Sergeant:



Being pretty happy with how these first two turned out I worked on a theme of Ice and Fire, aiming to work in a good degree of fire weaponry whilst maintaining a fun and atleast mildly competitive list. The plan thus far is for 10 Carapace Vets, 10 Camo Vets, Company Command, 2 Winter Sentinels and a taurox.

Progress on the Carapace vets have gone well so far, with a total of 4 painted and based, with 1 half painted:



I have now converted up 5 Camo Veterans:



And the company command squad needs some green stuff to fill gaps:



Stay tuned!

C&C Welcome as Always

Cadian + Scion = 1st edition Imperial Army! this regiment looks THAT way!

YES! That is exactly what this army is! It's what the Cadians should have looked like in the first place.

Great work Melcavuk, this army is outstanding so far, I'm excited to see how it comes along.

Thanks guys, I've finished off the sentinel who's been sat in the showcase, and now working on the Taurox. Its only half way done on the main body but its time to stop work for the evening, progress is slow coming on this one but it seems to be coming together.



And the sentinel from the showcase:

Looking excellent so far. I love how the white blends into the base so well. Makes for very convincing looking camouflage.

 Melcavuk wrote:
Thanks guys, I've finished off the sentinel who's been sat in the showcase, and now working on the Taurox. Its only half way done on the main body but its time to stop work for the evening, progress is slow coming on this one but it seems to be coming together.



And the sentinel from the showcase:

Oh! I see that how 'delicate' the new Taurox is! meow~

It's funny how the Taurox looks so much better with the back off. Great stuff.

These look great!

Had to put the back onto the taurox, now the amount of time spent painting the inside feels a little bit like a futile endevour. Still here is a finished and weathered taurox:


And the painted army so far:

Nice work dude. Still can't get over how awful the Taurox is but you've certainly done a fine job on it!

Those are some really quality conversions, and that white is to die for. The only thing I'd change whatsoever is I'd paint the hands like they're gloves. Bare hands really stand out against the enclosed helmets, and you figure they'd have gloves if they're fighting in the cold! Regardless, the painting and modeling work here is superb, and I look forward to seeing the guys with capes and berets coming up.

Elnibbus wrote:Nice work dude. Still can't get over how awful the Taurox is but you've certainly done a fine job on it!

Yeah, I'm still not 100% sold on the Taurox because it looks... off but I am happy with the paintjob.

Brother SRM wrote:Those are some really quality conversions, and that white is to die for. The only thing I'd change whatsoever is I'd paint the hands like they're gloves. Bare hands really stand out against the enclosed helmets, and you figure they'd have gloves if they're fighting in the cold! Regardless, the painting and modeling work here is superb, and I look forward to seeing the guys with capes and berets coming up.

Cheers, Im going to be doing all hands as gloved from here on out but really wasnt thinking on it when I started.

Now...

Since most of my time playing is in my local GW I've been told that my hoped 3rd party heads on my standard guardsmen wont fly. (Sad times). Since I'm more of a modeller than a gamer I'm not content to run standard looking cadians as my bog standard guardsmen but want to field atleast one full infantry platoon in my list.

Therefore I'm considering a variety of non-cadian heads that I could use, the basic theme of the army is an Arctic Promethium Refinery planet, most of the standing army are veterans (hence veteran squads) but the factory workers and pipeline engineers make up a well trained army in time of need. I'm looking for gruff, perhaps dischevelled looking heads/torsos for the factory militia guardsmen..

First up is the empire greatswords, pro is that they have good expressions but a somewhat goofy hat.

Then there's the flagellants though I feel their beards are perhaps a shot over what I am looking for.

Finally there is the forgeworld chaos renegade kit, which is nicely detailed head/torso combis. I can GS over the chaos icons and whilst the most expensive head kit on my list probably fits the best.

This is great stuff melcauk. This army is going to look smashing when you are done with it. You managed to even make the taurox look believable! Good Job!

BB

What about the pistoliers or the state troop heads?