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Ok, so now that my exodites are done, I am looking for a new project.

I have always wanted a chaos warband with some Alpha Legion as the commander(s). Are there any depictions/descriptions/ideas for having a chaos themed warband that is not made of spikes, demons, and skulls? I would like a professional looking cultist army (if such a thing is possible) overseen by the Alpha Legion. Back in some older edition, it stated that the Alpha Legion used cultists extensively, and since the Alpha Legion generally doesn't generally seem too into the tentacles and spikes, I would like an army with that sort of feel.

Also, anyone got an idea on how to get that sweet metallic teal sheen with paintbrushes?

Thanks in advance.

-STS

A fair number of AL armies are built from loyalist models. The right kind of subtle iconography and a few bits swaps (bolters, backpacks) can go a long way. 'Cultists' can be guardsmen with some adjustments, and again, iconography.

Basically no one has the full list of regiments or even chapters, so posing as a legitimate relief force to deal with orcs/GSC/whatever can be amazingly effective inroads into a planet.

Also keep in mind that while people are limited by the bog-standard-Cadian-Guard kit, fluff records Guard regiments in all sorts of outlandish uniforms. Glass armor, furs (or less- some regiments are recruited from feral worlds and drilled in modern weapons), gangers from various hive worlds. We've sort of been left with the boring options even though in universe official regiments are amazingly varied.


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The sheen is pretty easy these days. Contrast paint over metal base coat. A bit of experimenting with how light or dark you want the metallic and which green, blue or mix of greens/blues work best, but its definitely achievable without too much effort.

Painting Alpha Legion is dead easy: undercoat with a gunmetal paint of your choice, then apply a slightly watered-down coat of Akhelian Green contrast paint. It looks great on infantry, and with a little practice even the wide, flat surfaces of vehicles look good.

I'm afraid I'm not much use on the lore side of things. The Night Lords trilogy features some fairly non-spiky, non-corrupted marines. In that warband most of the marines appeared to be fairly standard issue (although they do have some spikes and skulls being Night Lords), while those members who had fallen into cults (the Raptors, specifically) were more corrupt in their appearance.

If you can get your hands on Mark 4 and Mark 3 armor- that's your best bet for the marines. No spikes, a lack of skulls (some, but not many), and a 'clean' look.

Now, to Hellbrutes- just use Dreadnoughts.

Obliterators could be made from Ambots (Necromunda).

Probably will be spending a little money at Forge World to get little things that aren't specifically 'Loyalist' or 'Chaos' in appearance.

The only thing you might have a challenge working around will be the daemon engines, provided that you'll want them in your army at all.

Don't be afraid to chop up Primaris Marines and file down aquilas. Also, shapeways is your friend.

As far as cultists go? Well, you could always use guardsmen, no one's going to scream that your lasguns aren't autoguns (they are pretty much the same, it only matters if you're playing Guard and using Orders). Or, you could look into the Necromunda kits- the Delaque have a 'spooky' look to them like spies, and the Van Saar could pass for some badass hi-tech operatives, and even Orlocks can just be 'pretty normal dudes'. Genestealer Cults are also a good choice, sort of like a "labor force insurrection" theme- just might have to cut off a few of those icons here and there. They look REALLY cool if you can find some hooded heads to go on them.

As for your paint: Hit them with leadbelcher. Do a drybrush of Necron Compound. Slap some R. Kelly Green on it. Bam, done. It actually looks really nice.

My Emperor's Children army, while currently on indefinite hiatus due to not really being into 40K just now, is conceptually similar. I've not completely avoided spikes etc, but I've tried to make them feel less "imperial unit with spikes" and more organically part of the model. I've also probably used more Imperial components than Chaos ones where there is cross compatibility.

My head canon is that they're a remnant of the Legion immediately post Terra, that thanks to timey wimey warp shenanigans has found itself in the 40k era, and while they've firmly fallen, haven't had millennia to become corrupted in their entirety. So I have a range from Daemon engines built as is complete with all that entails to vehicles that barely differ from their imperial counterparts aside from some sigils and a paint job representative of being part of a bunch of hedonists that ain't got time for proper vehicular maintenance.

Here's my Fellblade as an example,

Al, as a legion, well Al unlike the other legions has dropped their Shooktroops terror tactics, therefore, they only pull out the spikes when they want to scare people.
Atleast that's how i allways imagined it, hiding they do by just putting the spikes away and repainting their armor, which they do regularly.

Probably the most prolific painters in all of 40k

As said about, AL are a great pick for going without spikes and skulls, and contrast paint over Leadbelcher is a super easy method!

I also don’t put the spikes and skulls on my EC. I consider it a BL thing.

Point is the more time CSM spend in the eye of terror the more they become warped and disfigured and prone to wearing spikes.

It’s perfectly reasonable for a faction of AL to have never really been near the eye of terror. So do as you please. It’s also cannon worthy to assume that AL marines could have stolen modern power armour etc and look like a new chapter, pre primaris of course.

The new Primaris Assault Marines could work well as berzerkers, especially if you replaced their pistols with chainaxes.

That sounds like a good idea. I never really liked a lot of the chaos-y models anyway.

A squad of very individualized "berzerkers" could work well as a command squad...with a bunch of PDF "cultists"

Thanks for the idea.

To everyone who told me about the technique for painting, thank you as well.

-STS

That's a really great idea. Why not combine them with Primaris conversions for the Alpha Legion marines as well, so you get the scale difference between marine and standard human?

Might be worth checking out Victoria Miniatures - they have a real range of different Imperial army types and you can mix and match them.
A few I think give quite a good non-standard vibe without being overblown on spikes and skulls - couple of examples below

https://victoriaminiatures.com/

Anvil would allow you to even more customize your PDF units.

Agree on the primaris though for size difference.