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I'm in the process of planning a space marine army after having been away from the hobby for a while and would like some input on some suggestions of bits for the marines. I'm going to be plundering the various marine chapter box sets for bits, and possibly some of the WHFB Empire sets too (although I haven't properly looked through those yet), but wondered if there are any other particular bits that you could suggest that might be of interest to me from other miniatures? Having been away from the hobby for a while, I am not as familiar with the many many kits as I used to be!

Thank you in advance.

Sternguard kits will provide you with a plethora of fancy torsos, combi weapons, special weapons, heavy bolter, heavy flamers, a tonne of unique heads etc.

Vanguard Veteran Kit similarly is a treasure trove of close combat weapons for things like thunder hammers and storm shields etc, aswell as pistol.

Thanks for the suggestions. I will have a close look at those then. Any thoughts on things outside of space marines?

Depends a lot on what you want to do. What look are you going for? Once you head down the road of kitbashing, the sky is the limit.

It's hard to say really. I am thinking of creating my own chapter and am looking for some inspiration! I still want them to be human, so using body parts from other species is probably out, but other than that, I am open to suggestions.

Sternguard kit, already mentioned but the bits are amazing, all combined weapons of various types, pads, bits, scrolls.

Vanguard kit has some great power weapons, 2 swords + one double headed axe, claws, ha!mmers and sheilds. Good pads etc too but not quite sternguard on them. Lots of helmet options, and good crusader one .

Both those kits are ideal for upgrading entire armies worth.

I'm in process of planning to cpnvery a vangaursd and assult marine kit into a Chaplin with jumpack. Those kits contain nearly all I need.

My suggestions:

Dark Angels veterans/upgrade kit - provides lots of great robed bodies and fancy iconography, weapons, etc

Black Templars upgrade kit - fancy torsos and heads, some weapons chained to the arms

Really all just depends on what you're going for, as said.

Check out Anvil Industry if you're not planning on playing at a GW store:
http://www.anvilindustry.co.uk/Exo-Lords

Tons of cool guns, weapons, accessories and armour parts.

Well, if you want them to have awesome shoulderpads, buy a Terminator box and use theirs.

If you want to custom make a chaplain head, a skull from the tomb kings set would work pretty good. Someone here did a Legion of the Damned conversion using space marine helmets cut with part of the skull and combined them.

Dax415 wrote:
If you want to custom make a chaplain head, a skull from the tomb kings set would work pretty good. Someone here did a Legion of the Damned conversion using space marine helmets cut with part of the skull and combined them.

Thankyou, I may have to try that.
I was otherwise hunting down a head off bitz or going with a bone white crusader helm, or a chomand sqaud head. Has a great knight klike helm.

Looks really good, I want to make a custom Chaplin as well as I just finished a custom librarian and I think it would be a good addition to any space marine army.

The Fantasy range is the same scale, for instance I use the Flagellants with my Mechanicus army, but not sure how that'd work with the more heavily armoured marines. I have also used Necron arms and legs to show bionic enhancements, which I think look pretty effective. As already mentioned, the Sternguard and Vanguard kits are so versatile, well worth getting just to supplement your marines and make each one individual. Again, as previously mentioned, robes from DA upgrade are great, even some of the Sanguinary Guard torsos only require minimum shaving to remove the iconography, and instantly show a character or sergeant. If you want to go non-GW, then there are plenty of sites to use, most of which are in the sticky at the top of the Painting and Modelling section. Good luck!

I must echo the stern and van guard kits, but don't also be afraid to look to others space marine types. I found great legs for a kit bash in the Sanguinary guard kit and the from those traitorous chaos guys. Just remove all the blasphemous iconography and the blood drops and you're good to go!

FM Argos

Thank you for all of the suggestions. Now I just need to spend a few hours designing the marines!

A box of necrons and skitarii would provide enough parts when combined with a couple of space marine squads too make some sweet ad mech kit bashes.

Part of my Chapter's lore is that they are on the Mechanicus' feth list so they have to scavenge old battlefields for replacement parts. No two Marines look alike but they all look similar. All have pouches, grenades, and pistols but those bits come from the entire range and from every chapter's bits. Adding in bits from the CSM range, I've even got my assault squads set up where no two marines have the same jump pack. But that's a LOT of bits collected over many years to do this.

Other theme armies are to use Beastmen or other alien heads with Marine bodies. I've seen Deathwatch Marines kitted out with xenos weapons. The current fad is to take Alter of Storm guys and stick backpacks and bolters on them.

 Paradigm wrote:
Check out Anvil Industry if you're not planning on playing at a GW store:
http://www.anvilindustry.co.uk/Exo-Lords

Tons of cool guns, weapons, accessories and armour parts.

epic. just made an order. thanks for the heads up.