An eclectic mix of everything that fits nowhere else including miniatures, terrain, house rules, comics, lyrics and anything that doesn’t have a home elsewhere.

So after seeing the latest White Dwarf and having a couple of chats with friends we are thinking of allowing the Stormraven into our games using all the rules and points cost given in any space marine army. The discussion has been over if it should be a limited choice, like one or two maximum or if it should just be run as per the Blood Angels codex.

As an additional fast attack choice I can see my plan for a reserve force of marines and a dreadnought would make for a flexible option in reinforcing the normal gun line of tactical marines or counter attacking enemy units as they advance, or sweeping around to contest enemy held objectives or simply disrupt enemy artillery and heavy weapon units.

The problem is that I am just not that happy with the model, it looks like a slim land raider with wings bolted on and an intake slapped on the roof behind the turret. Swapping the turret for the razorback one (or landraider one) would reduce the height so I could lower the height of the intake above it.

The ability to deploy dreads like this with a supporting unit of infantry and the ability to soften up targets and knockout enemy tanks could make for a particularly useful (annoying for opponents) tactic. Having it priced in the low 200s can mean that once it has delivered the ground forces, any enemy forces it destroys helps offset it’s point cost.

I had planned on a cheap tactical squad being mounted in it with a dread, but now I am tempted to go down the assault squad path (with jump packs) as it would mean that both the dread and assault unit deepstrike together in the stormraven and the jump packs would allow the assault squad to redeploy or attack further enemy forces more easily. Upgrading the dread to be kitted for assault as well would make for a hard to beat force. But I know most forces I have played against keep their heavy artillery and heavy weapons squads near their deployment zones, so they are not the most efficient close combat troops and I can run a fairly normally armed dread with a heavy weapon and a dread close combat weapon which should be more than enough to take on anyone but the most specialised of assault units or characters.

This may seem like a crazy waste of points to some when I could just go for three vindicators with upgrades to pound enemy forces to dust. I have considered that method, but it just isn’t fun nor do I feel it is in theme for my marines. I’d go for iron warriors if I wanted to do that to be honest.

The previous reserve group I normally ran in big games was a mix of tactical and combat squads in rhinos and razorbacks, held back behind my advancing gun line of marines. Until there is a need or opportunity to push them up to engage enemy break throughs or to capitalise on openings in the enemy forces to push the reserves up to take enemy objectives or to cut off and destroy important enemy units. The plan was to drop in additional predators to roll up with the rhinos using them as cover to give a multitude of varying targets to distract the opponent from other greater threats such as a quietly manoeuvring vindicator trying to get a new firing line onto enemy units or characters.

Of course with fliers now the next flavour of the month (summer of fliers is coming up) you will see a greater need for anti aircraft solutions so it may be better to look at a couple of landspeeders than heavy artillery options. With the Imperial Guard being the only one with a dedicated anti-aircraft solution in the Hydra, here’s hoping we see the model released to aid the IG against the influx of fast moving aircraft. (I would be tempted to get one to get the weapons to use on a Mortis pattern dreadnought conversion that I have been thinking about.)

Anyone have any specific plans for changes to their current army to cope with the new additions to their opponents armies? Or do you have a plan to add in some cool new stuff to your own armies?

The plan is to run an evil sunz army with a speed freak focus. Which will require wazdakka gutzmeg on his bike (as the speed freak character I can’t leave him out of the list) and mad doc grotsnik (to give units the cybork upgrade which I will use to count as a ‘jink’ save).

The plan is for the force to be lead by a big mek on bike, a second mek will be included with a shokk attack gun in a truck or similar. I may switch this for a mek with a kustom field. Mounting the second mek in a vehicle would mean the kustom field would be exactly where it needed to be to give added protection to the troops.

Supporting these characters will be my lead unit made of nob bikers who take the lead in the charge and hold the centre of my battleline. I may add a second unit if points allow later on. (and deploy them next to one another only to split them after breaking the enemy line.

Fast attack is always going to be deff koptas to help consolidate victories and to give a rude shock to enemy players who feel safe behind impassable terrain features.

Add in some trakks, buggies and skorcha units and the troop heavy weapon support is sorted.

Troops are always going to be ork bike units and as many as I can field!

There will be one or two gretchin units left up the back to do the protecting of flanks and hold/contest objectives. (but might be dropped as they don’t fit the speed freak theme too well)

Then comes the fun big guns. Although I would be happy to keep a unit of artillery in the list I just feel it doesn’t fit the theme. Which leaves me with battlewagons and plenty of other nice big options from apocalypse. Upgrading a few wagons to proper gun carriers might be fun (expensive, but fun). Especially if I go for some of the crazier weapons.

Alternate options are a mekboy unit in a trukk to zoom up close and use their nice kustom weapons in support of the bikes, a few trukk boyz units to capture and hold objectives and some dredd and kan units to follow up behind the bikes and destroy any pockets of resistance encountered. I have thought about adding mobs to battlewagons but I just don’t see the value in it. The only other unit I am keen to get is a looted Imperial Guard vehicle partly for the rules but more for the conversion work. The new hellhound looks good and fits within a fast moving army like the one I am building.

The other factor in the army is that I plan to ‘ape-up’ the units so instead of being orks and gretchin they are all primates. Gorillas and chimps would allow me a much greater flexibility in style of the army, I had intended to do it in a Somali warlord style with semi uniformed models on slapped together vehicles with their icons also including bananas. A little silly but a well thought out conversion style could make for easy building of the units. I swear the chimps with bananas would look hilarious in the back of a battlewagon or adding bananas in crates on vehicles.

This leads to other ideas like converting the battlewagon to be a catering truck. Change it so it has a little kitchen built in with price boards and a few steps to get to the ordering window. Kebabs and bananas! Banana milkshakes and banana liquer shots.

It would almost be worth sculpting up an ammo pouch stuffed with bananas to cast up and add to random models.

Red berets would be an easy way to tie the army together along with a consistant camoflague scheme (a bright red, yellow and orange one could work with black berets).

It would be time consuming but would turn out quite nicely! Future apocalypse units could be added with the same theme.

The downside would be the response to a large mob of nob bikers, in a tournament it could mean a reduction in the points awarded for army selection, but in my opinion what other choice do I have? I can’t take a standard nob unit without transport or a meganob unit without a battlewagon. I just don’t see the speed freaks wanting to be used as foot infantry when they could be going so much faster on a bike.

Any feedback on the ideas outlined above would be great! I am still trying to decide if it is worth my investment of time to start building the whole themed army or if it would be better to hold off till the buggy/trakk/skorcha kit comes out and put together a strong list and build the army all at once.

With the new spearhead expansion rules just hitting, the idea of bringing a stompa to the table is just SO tempting. I would of course have to remodel it so it was a mek-stompa with a ramp up to a refuelling platform so the boyz could still be on a moving vehicle even as they refuel or work on their bikes! Crazy stompa conversion aside, there are plenty of imperial vehicles like the baneblade that would supplement a speed freak army quite nicely. Anyone have a favourite that they are bringing to spearhead games?

The idea of using transformer style robots as tyranids is an interesting one.

Running a simple pallette along with various sized cheap plastic models for troops could be a real winner.

Building up a stockpile of cheap robot toys could be a way to get the best option for each unit AND if all else fails the toys could be cast up to fill units in larger mobs for apocalypse scale battles.

It would also allow for necron models being used for parts (like weapons and heads) plus it could be used as a counts as force to stand in for necrons.

Additionally they could be used to stand in for the genestealers in Space Hulk to give it a different feel for a couple of games.

All this talk of new plastic daemon goodness has got me digging through my thousands sons stuff and adding in some new plastics to the summoned units is going to give me a larger choice of units. Yes, the thousand sons legion is quite a limited army in that you get very few options and the troops are not that quick to adapt to the changing battlefield (and are seriously undergunned compared to other chaos forces). When your only heavy/special weapon option is a psychic attack by your aspiring champion/sorceror you have to be that little bit more careful when and how you want to attack. Psychic hoods are NOT your friend.

But with a greater daemon and lesser daemon units I can see the flamers of tzeentch really making their points back versus horde armies, but against the now common Imperial Guard “leafblower” and “alpha strike” lists they are going to struggle. The best bet is dropping sorcerors into the IG rear and hopefully get some psychic strikes against the tanks along with any powerfists I can bring along. The IG sanctioned psyker squad is going to upset the applecart but knocking them off early will hopefully open up the psychic phase to a building torrent of psychic attacks. Fortunatly foot IG are soft against large flamer units, the daemons just have to get close enough without getting shot to pieces.

Honestly running a few rubric units should give me an unbreakable core of infantry and elites easily able to defend positions. Attacking would be best left to other units and any “cunning plan” I can come up with would be a bonus. From memory, a unit standard dedicated to tzeentch gives the unit an invulnerable save or increases the one they already have. Which could make for some tough rubric terminators! Having a fifty – fifty chance of saving hits is just awesome when facing Tau or IG heavy weapons.

It would be tough in a tournament due to the repeat spam of the troops choice (to get good army selection points). Full rubric tactical squad with sorceror aspiring champion in a rhino. There are no weapon options to choose from so anyone not used to them is going to be surprised how limited they are. Yes I know I can run normal chaos units dedicated to tzeentch, but they are not part of the legion as such.

Two daemon engines would probably give me the range and strike power I need in big games, but the thrill of building some silver towers may keep me busy long enough that an alternative unit comes out!

A vindicator would be low profile enough to advance with the troops and give them enough support to allow them to have some success in close range firefights and soften up targets prior to assaulting them. The vehicle upgrades could make for some interesting conversions. (the old flames of tzeentch one I have seen done amazingly well).

The special character for the thousands sons is not only a nice miniature it is pretty good on the table too. I might try and find the rules for Ahriman’s Council the unit of thousand sons sorcerors that was in a chapter approved article a while back. Have to pick a good selection of psychic powers to hopefully cover anti-vehicle and anti-infantry needs throughout games.

I primarily planned only a small force to use as an opponent in kill team themed games, but with the inclusion of some heavier daemon and vehicle units they may be a nice change to my Imperial Marines, Genestealer Coven and Orks.

There is also the option to build my daemons and try running a mono deity daemon list. I certainly have enough greater daemons for that!

Lesser daemon cavalry would be a sight to behold for tzeentch, although the horrors are meant to be riding discs, I can see various modes of transport being used from crazy cavalry mounts to a spawn with hundreds of legs.

Spare spawn and horror models are required for the psychic attack conversions. Possibly have imperial helmets or clothing modelled onto them. Even a couple of converted tyranid models would work well as they have great fanged maws and chitin body armour that could be replicated to make the spawn have a strong style along with some visual cue to where the original spawn was created from.

A recent devolpment is the leaked images of the new horrors. They have moved away from the more recent ones back to the bigger slightly comical versions. I have plenty of ideas for conversions so it might be worth getting a couple of boxes to convert up for fun. Of course all the crazy conversions will need to be matched in the other units or at least have the units with conversions as crazy. It would then be down to doing something different for the greater daemon to fit it within that style of army.

One of my tzeentch greater daemons is painted to look like a vulture but a second one I have could be converted to be more like a shaolin monk or similar.

Since there is a theme of flames with tzeentch I am tempted to work on a flame covered daemon prince. A burning skeleton in a robe would suit the style of the army especially if I spread flaming unit champions through the army. Adding extra flames onto the tzeentch flamer units could give them a better look alongside the burning prince.

Back in Realms Of Chaos days I had a chaos warband which was hilarious fun, especially when your champion was just as likely to be given gifts as mutations. Lots of gifts allowed you to ascend to daemonhood whilst mutations lead to becoming a chaos spawn. You had to laugh at the luck of some of my champions getting so close to their goal only to them be given half a dozen mutations leaving them nothing more than a spawn. Then there was the blasted standard which caused a toughness check which killed you if you failed or gifted you with d6 mutations. My genestealer cult faced one at one point a whole stealer squad was cut down apart from two, so I rolled up their mutations and ended up with two truly brilliant models to convert up. (this is just something I remembered whilst writing about flaming characters) one had a flaming skull, gave off a smoke cloud and had extra limbs, the second had an additional head, brightly coloured feathers, had extra long legs and both caused terror. Not a bad set of upgrades for them in our campaign, and makes me want to find the old conversions I did and do new better looking ones.

So one of my plans years ago was to do a ‘tale of four gamers’ style article called ‘a tale of one tragic gamer’ but the addition of children has pushed all other stuff to the backburner. So instead I am planning on reorganising some of my older armies to work better under the current rules and new codex options. Because let’s face it, I have used miniatures that are older than some of my opponents and having to remind them that yes, RTB01 marines are still a valid choice. (although with a return to true line of sight the smaller beaky marines are at a bit of an advantage)

So where do I start? I have a huge genestealer cult invasion force needing some refining to be allowed to be taken again. There are several hybrid units that will need to be taken as ‘counts as’ troops along with deciding on the best HQ to use to lead them. But with the addition of some inquisitor scale genestealers to count as carnifex units I think it is pretty sorted.

The marines are a problem for me as several units have weapons that are no longer valid in the rules. Over the evolution of the game they have gained and lost some pretty great weapons and gear. Tactical squads with shuriken catapults and all manner of other weapon options. Auxiliary grenade launchers were a big loss and a nice return. I don’t miss graviton guns or conversion beamers but when you have devastator squads kitted out with weapons no longer an option it is time for some conversion work or some quick counts as games to help pick the best options for weapon selection.

The armies I have are mostly on foot, primarily because our games were fought over a very terrain heavy battlefield. There was always ruined buildings and the addition of necromunda terrain to help block lines of sight and deny the use of simple charges across open ground. Vehicles always found themselves flanked and destroyed all too easily in this type of terrain. Due to a desire to put together an army for games in stores and tournaments I need to upgrade to have a mechanised component to be able to have some chance in the sparsely used terrain of some tournaments.

So instead of just relying on my old standard army list I am going to start looking at my options and hope to have some adaptability when facing newer armies (or armies that have had a new codex and have evolved further than my list was designed to cope with)

So, my standard force has a Marine Captain and a Chaplain. These days it seems the requirement for a librarian outweighs the usefulness of a Captain. Now I have taken a marine officer pretty much in all my lists over the years knowing a high leadership lightly equipped commander could stay with the bulk of my troops and keep them in the battle for much longer with the higher leadership and made for a handy boost in close combat to tip the results in my favour.

The chaplain I built quite a few years back has a jump pack, plasma pistol and a two headed power axe that counts as his normal power weapon. This was the pinnacle of what I could achieve using just plastic components that were lying around in my bits box. He used to have the terminator honours and all the rest (including grenades and a master crafted plasma pistol) making him come in at a huge points cost. As a deterrent on his own he has helped clear enemy flanking and sniping units on his own. Attached to an assault squad he certainly boosts them to a much higher level.

I do have several librarian models but until the latest tyranid book, I wasn’t overly fussed by taking one. The need to nullify powers with a psychic hood has now made me want to include one to replace the battlefield role of my normal officer. In that he will stay with the troops and boost their potential and hopefully help protect them. Especially against the Blood Angels who seem to have rather powerful powers in their list.

Elites are an easy pick of a dreadnought (with close combat weapon and assault cannon) and a terminator squad. I used to run a veteran tactical squad but these days a teleporting terminator squad can really ruin an opponents day and gain a foothold in their deployment zone.

You will see a heavy push in my forces for bolters, storm bolters, heavy bolters and assault cannon simply as they are the best build for the terrain we used to game over. There will be a smattering of other weapons like flamers, melta guns and plasma guns and pistols but the close range firefights were won by the bolter choices as they had long range when required down streets and lanes. Being able to pepper an independant character at range if they strayed into a fire corridor made for some hilarious sniping incidents. Hell, I lost an Eldar warwalker to a turn of massed bolter fire when it accidentally ended up in the view of an advancing marine force.

I may sort out my deathwatch unit so I can use them as just a veteran squad. It’s one of those characterful units that people have and without valid rules get left in the display case. I like the look of them too much to let them simply sit around doing nothing. Debate with my friends has us trying to decide if I should stick to the heavy bolters I currently have or switch to heavy flamers. Need to get some games in to see which works better.

Standard troops choices are always going to be a full tactical squad along with a sniper scout squad. I normally split my tax squad into two and have a unit holding the deployment zone and the other half advancing on the enemy to consolidate any advances the other units make. They are also there to hold objectives so specialist units can continue their work. The scouts hold back and snipe targets of opportunity and act as a deterrent for opponents. I used to run them with a veteran sarge who had an auspex which meant some pre-game shooting which could on occasion leave an enemy pinned on their first turn. They have served me well over the years and are a very cheap unit to field.

So, now to the specialists. I normally take a small assault squad to attack alongside my chaplain, normally clearing buildings and the like for the rest of the force to follow up on. Occasionally I will run the chaplain and the assault unit on different flanks and keep them back for counter charging advancing enemy units that get too close. Sometimes it doesn’t pay to be too aggressive with them. (bezerker armies I am looking at you here). The only other fast attack unit is a lone Landspeeder tornado. This has served me well as a surprise unit to support my assault elements, support terminators or even clear out small units held back by my opponent to hold objectives. I have had mixed success against light vehicles with it as normally they carry weapons quite capable of knocking it out of the sky.

Which leaves my heavy choice. It is a predator. A run of the mill autocannon and heavy bolter predator. This one unit has put more hurt on my opponents at range than any other unit on it’s own in any of my games. It is a reasonably cheap addition to an army but brings a lot of firepower. After facing plenty of horde armies and marine armies this has been well worth taking as a distraction unit for my other units.

Normally I run a simple pincers or hammer and anvil battleplan. These are probably the most adaptable plans I can run based on the normal battlefields I have had games on. It boils down to having two distinct flanking units coming around to encircle the enemy or destroy their support units in their rear before rolling up on the other units. The hammer and anvil was based on broken units being wiped out if they had to retreat into an enemy unit. This isn’t the case anymore, but it is still quite a viable tactic where you have a static heavy unit holding a position and you use advancing or deep striking units to drive them onto it. An example of this would be a devastator unit or predator holding a terrain piece and using terminators to force enemy units into the path of the units guns. In large battles I have been known to hold jump pack equipped assault squads in close reserve behind devastators, waiting for enemy forces to advance on them and either use the assault unit to preempt the enemy charge, or wait until the enemy is about to close and try and drop behind them. This was against an enemy dread so I don’t think you could pull it off against an enemy horde.

We have also used space hulk sets to build massive building complexes to fight over. Games in close cramped quarters like that let you know just what works and why terminators excel in this type of combat, just don’t let your squads get caught at the end of a long corridor by enemy heavy weapons. The best part of these games is the board tiles themselves let you know exactly how far everyone can move and fire. (pretty much every weapon ends up being able to fire further than the length they can see) of course you can’t take IG infantry forces in games like this as you just won’t be able to bring the amount of fire you have against your enemies negating your greatest strength which is big numbers of infantry.

Possible future inclusions are things like rhino transports and razorbacks to allow rapid deployment and a few heavy support units like a vindicator, land raider or two whirlwinds. (yes, I still see the artillery options of the whirlwind as being a great bang for your buck on the table) you may think I am thinking too much about mech choices but having several squads of terminators and a full third company of infantry to draw upon (once I sort out their weapon options) means I am looking at the additional units I need to purchase rather than what I currently have. I am tempted to try running a bike unit with attack bike as one of my flanking units. I don’t normally see them in games so it might be a nice change.

Allies. Okay for normal games I consider these a bit of a no-no. It detracts from your core force, but for really big games or for apocalypse games I don’t mind having a few specialists added in for some extra flavour. I have a very old vindicare assassin (bought on its month of initial release in fact) which I feel suits the feel of my army (sniper scouts and so on) and a very old inquisitor which I built in power armour and in terminator armour. The terminator one was built out of a librarian plastic terminator from the space hulk expansion and the head of a squat. (yes I did have a squat army back in the day) the inquisitor has served for years alongside my forces and I am tempted to give him a strong retinue to make him viable again.

Anyone have good tips for strong units in the marine list I should look at taking?

I am tempted by the tech marine options but I am not convinced they are more useful than a chaplain would be for my force. Building a couple of card drop pods might give me some options to try out.

Special characters.
Now this is where I probably stand apart from most people. I want a special character to allow me to have added theme to my army. Most characters just don’t cut it for my chapter. The only one that I have found that comes close is the ultramarine chaplain who is a veteran of the tyrannic wars. Mostly because my army has faced off against the genestealers in space hulks so often that he is the only one that brings anything to that theme for my force. I see the scout character as handy but i could spend the same points on other things, as the sniper unit has a pretty good chance to hit already. Yes I know about Vulkan and his awesome rules but I don’t take a lot of weapons that would benefit from his rules. So I won’t waste points on a character I don’t feel adds to my armies theme. Not that it leaves me as the weaker sibling of the armies that do take them, I think it gives a better opportunity to diversify my army whilst I work on tactics to stop those characters. (assault cannon, auto cannon and las cannon have all worked well for me in the past).

Having a quick look through some of the units that could be switched over easily are some of my old assault units with their twin bolt pistols (the units with power shields will need some conversion) but without jump packs I need to find them better transport options.

Other miniatures are standard bearers, officers of all three ranks tech marines, librarians, old attack bikes and the old assorted characterful metal marine miniatures.

So, all things considered do you have any list additions that may work or that I should try out? It would really help me out!