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With exception to the Rune Priest in Terminator Armor, most Librarians within in the models and pictures depict Librarians without wearing helmets and is there a piece of fluff that explains this? I like having most of my Space Marines and Grey Knights depicted with their helmets on usually because in a battle, I think it is foolish to not be wearing your helmet and I just don't like painting faces. I go to the point of using a GK Terminator to make my GK Librarian because the model actually looks like a GK (The SM Librarian in Terminator armor just does not speak GK to me, even when it is painted silver) and because I can give him a helmet and it kind of still looks like the GK Terminator is wearing a Psychic Hood. A lot of the models are hard to modify except maybe the new SM Librarian that came from the release of the new codex that came with them.

Because they're space marine leaders and space marine leaders don't believe in head shots.

It looks cooler. (To GW at least)

To visually separate them from the rank and file. IIRC there is no in-game reason. The lack of helmets lets the HQs stand out better on the tabletop, and gives the sculptors more of a canvas to work with.

Oh, "the rule of cool" sometimes grinds against my personal aesthetic preferences.

 Envihon wrote:
Oh, "the rule of cool" sometimes grinds against my personal aesthetic preferences.

So slap some helmets on. Nothing says they have to be bare-headed. And head swaps are probably the easiest conversion there is. Keeps the libbi’s brains from splattering all over his squad mates when he perils as well.

So that his battle brothers can swoon over his rugged good looks.

No fluff that I'm aware of. The last batch of metal librarians came out in 4th edition and there was no new fluff, prior to that the range consisted of two librarians for each rank, one bare headed and one with helmet. Just a creative decision by the sculptors I would guess.

Hm, if you want helmets, then use helmets. If you want to, equip bolters on your HQs, then they would be more or less indistinguishable to your opponents. You could even explain it away, in one of two ways. 1. Helmets can have HUDs, to identify friendlies as well as targets. 2. Work with a group of people long enough, and you will be able to tell who is who without any distinguishing marks or uniforms (I can do it after about a week. Lore suggests Space Marines have worked together quite a bit longer than that.). Just don't forget who is who on the tabletop.

Well, the Librarian is always distinguished from his brothers because he wears blue armor...well, as long as you aren't Ultramarines and I play Imperial Fists so my Librarian definitely looks different. The only thing is that I purchased the SM Librarian that has the book and a staff so that conversion is a little difficult but I have been thinking about buying the new one and converting him.

 Envihon wrote:
Oh, "the rule of cool" sometimes grinds against my personal aesthetic preferences.

The nice thing about the GK plastics is you could pick up a torso back that had a psychic hood pretty cheap on the bits market.

A few of the older Librarian metal models had helmets. No idea if you can still get them though. EBay would be a good source.

http://img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20120524010927/warhammer40k/images/d/d1/Librarians_Appearance.jpg
http://i.ebayimg.com/00/s/MTYwMFgxMjAw/z/I1gAAOxycgVTi9-L/$_35.JPG

It's because their Psychic Hoods blew off in the breeze.

i hated Tigirius' face. hideous monstrosity. i drilled it out and cut the back of a SM helm and fit it in

Oh wow, that is basically what I want to do as well. I think I will do it actually. It looks so much better with a helmet!

I prefer helmets over bare heads. Of course, I prefer the fancy helmets for characters. Grey knights have excellent ones for the occasion (for my taste). of course, I have a studded skull chaos helmet I'm dying to convert onto a custom chaplain. need to get my hands on a few more for different versions...biker chaplain, jump pack chaplain.....

 EVIL INC wrote:
I prefer helmets over bare heads. Of course, I prefer the fancy helmets for characters. Grey knights have excellent ones for the occasion (for my taste). of course, I have a studded skull chaos helmet I'm dying to convert onto a custom chaplain. need to get my hands on a few more for different versions...biker chaplain, jump pack chaplain.....

Haha, this is what I was exactly thinking. I have a lot of Paladin heads left over from all my GK Terminators that I have made and I was going to use one of those to put onto my Imperial Fist Librarian especially since Imperial Fists are known for wearing the knight-styled helmets.

You can still get a few Librarians with helmets. It's all I buy actually and I need three Librarians... I hate unhelmeted models and unless there is a distinct need for it, as in I take a grunt warrior and convert him to something higher rank, I won't have it. My Inquisitor wears Mk VII Power Armor complete with helmet, my Librarian is the old Power Axe and helmet model. But I still haven't found the right type of model for a Jump Pack Librarian conversion with a decent weapon...

I found going into the fantasy models can help with weapons. They might not have the lil wires going up the blades but in terms of coolness and fancy looks, many of the fantasy weapons make excellent power weapons. Just a thought. My one inqusitor model is hefting a space wolf rune sword as his force sword.

I hadn't thought of Fantasy bits for weapons. That helps me out a bunch actually.

the original wore a helmet and an agis hood

 SharkoutofWata wrote:
I hadn't thought of Fantasy bits for weapons. That helps me out a bunch actually.

No problem. I'm climbing off the floor in shock of someone saying something nice to me. Glad It helps.
Before I gave away my chaos marine army, I armed my bikers exclusively with the bulky hand weapons from the old hunchbacked chaos warriers. I just put the entire right arms on and got a lot of compliments.

of course, there are a few bare heads I like. The "old man" heads from the space wolves (NOT the topknots and other bloodclaw heads) look pretty cool for characters who are too grizzled and mean to wear helmets. The normal "clean cut" heads just dont cut it for me but THESE bad boys look mean enough to not care. lol

One of the projects on my bench is to make a jump pack librarian. Most of the bits I plan on using are going to come from the vanguard vet or GK strike squad box. The GK torso backs have the psychic hood bit on them, need to see if it conflicts with the jump pack.

But he probably won’t have a helmet on. Very few of my HQs do.

The reason is simple:

Psychic abilities

With the exception of the Furiso dreadnought (which I believe has veeeeery thin armour around the face) Librarians find that the layers and layers of ceramite just make it hard to project psychic abilities, for example:

Some IG psykers have tattoos that throw out flames, if hidden, they don't work.

The hoods apparently work better when the helmet is not on as well.

 Dannyrulx wrote:
With the exception of the Furiso dreadnought (which I believe has veeeeery thin armour around the face)

You mean the AV13, which if I recall correctly is equivilent to T9? not even Mephy was that tough.

 carldooley wrote:

 Dannyrulx wrote:
With the exception of the Furiso dreadnought (which I believe has veeeeery thin armour around the face)

You mean the AV13, which if I recall correctly is equivilent to T9? not even Mephy was that tough.

Just did a little editing

Would totally mess up their hairdos.

 ChazSexington wrote:
Would totally mess up their hairdos.

You should know, after all, you're a pilot

 Dannyrulx wrote:

 ChazSexington wrote:
Would totally mess up their hairdos.

You should know, after all, you're a pilot

Any girl that wants to chain herself to my railings and suffer a jet movement gets my vote! Woof woof!

2nd Ed Rune Priest ... ignore the shoddy paint job it was a long time ... and I've only marginally improved.

Or pay Forgeworld lots of $$$ for Sevrin Loth