Jyshite Initial Concept

I've had this idea buzzing around in my head for a while now so I thought I'd stick it down on "paper" and try and give it some shape. The astute, or just generally curious, among you may have noticed that I have a second blog with absolutely nothing on it, named "The Lay of Jysh". It was created a bit prematurely, mainly to test out new blogger templated for NYD, but has been staring at me for a while now, begging for something to be done about it.

The whole point is to create a campaign setting - in a similar vein to Forge World's IA books, mainly for my friends and I, but also anyone interested in the milieu. I want the battlezone to evolve as we play games/campaigns in this context so that, in the end, we have a massive narrative that has occured as a direct consequence of our actions.

So, Jysh is an orc-infested system that caught the tail end of a Waagh about 400 years before Terran forces first came across the system (this setting is during the Great Crusade). The Waagh was broken, but so were the Jyshites, their population greatly reduced, their cities mostly destroyed and mines ransacked. Since then, the orks and the Jyshites have been competing with each other and amongst themselves for resources. Reduced to a hunter-gatherer/scavenger existence, the Jyshites are a pale shadow of their former state.

The models I'll be using for these guys will come primarily from their Feral range (I'll be stripping my Penal Legion squad as the basis for the first hunting group), but also from their Rebel range to represent them scavenging Hellebronian equipment after skirmishes and battles.

Regardless of body, they'll all be using one of the Feral heads:

The force will be using the Imperial Guard codex, so I should be able to integrate them seemlessly into my army for bigger battles. It will of course be a more feral (sorry about the pun...) interpretation of the army list. Penal Legion for individual Kin Bands, Enginseers for Tech-Shamans, etc...

I want to include some desert-style rough riders in there, and the Tallarn Mukaali seem quite fitting - either as rough riders OR ogryns, maybe. I was wondering if anyone owns these models or has had a look at them in the flesh. If you could let me know what parts come separately on these kits, I would be very grateful.

So that's a rough outline so far. Any comments or suggestions?

Helghast Planning: Storm Troopers

It's been a while since I had a look at my Helghast-based guys - mainly due to the fact that my collection has been stuck round my mate's for the past few months...

This is just a quick one really. I had originally intended for the Storm Troopers to be based on Pig Iron's heavy infantry models with the Inner Guard heads. But now they've brought out a new boxset:

They're perfect for the look - I'm going to test out a "chipped" black armour highlighting method that Rev from Warseer has used to great effect. These will kind of be test minis for my final Iron Hands colour scheme, strange as that sounds.

However, I'm not sure whether to keep the standard heads or switch them for Inner Guard heads:

 

I'm thinking I'll hold off on adding the heads until then end of the month and order some inner guard heads anyway just to see what they're like. Any opinions on which I should use?

Pre-Heresy Bits Guide

I thought I'd go through the plastic box sets available at this time and list a few bits from each that are useful to the Pre-Heresy modeller.

First though, the big ones to avoid:

Unless you are doing Emperor's Children, this torso should be avoided due to the Aquila. If you have no other suitable torsos, you can always file this one down - the abdominal cables aren't truly indicative of any specific mark.

These are all Mark 7 helmets. There are other variations such as the one in the Commander box set as well as quite a few in the Chaos range as well. The identifying feature is the mouth grill. If you smooth down/putty over that, you can make the head usable.

SM Tactical Squad

These two torsos have a winged skull emblem on them. They're perfectly acceptable pre-heresy (though the one on the left has cable protection that was only introduced in MkVIII Errant armour), but do even better theme-wise for a Siege of Terra/Scouring-period armies as the winged skull was the loyalist symbol used.

This one is, again, perfectly usable for pre-heresy and very useful for boltgun-armed marines. I personally like to remove the skull symbol.

This is just about the closest you'll get to a plastic MkV that doesn't need conversion.

Theoretically, this is supposed to be a MkVIII chest, but they forgot the abdominal shielding for the cables when they sculpted it, so it's really a Mk.VII with MkVIII-style collar added. I tend to use this one for the collar alone, trim off the wings, vox and skulls and sculpt any details needed.

These two heads can be used for MkV conversions when you add studs to the skull cap.

A very popular piece for those looking to convert MkV and MkVI armours.

Assault Squad

The only piece of specific use to pre-heresy modelling in this box is the chestplate. This chest can be converted to either MkIV or MkV depending on what you replace the details with.

Command Squad

The apothecary torso is another that would be perfect for Siege of Terra or Scouring. If you'd like it to be more clearly earlier in the timeline, just file it down, or take the belt-mounted vials and pouches and stick them to another, more appropriate torso.

Though I don't like the wooden plank of a tabard on this chest, the armour itself is a great shape. As with the errant chest from the Tac Squad, I would tend to remove the wings, purity seals and skull and sculpt more appropriate details.

The champion's head is very good for use as a MkIII helmet.

I've seen the champion's shoulderpads used, along with standard pads, to bulk out the legs on terminators.

SM Commander Box

Another winged skull chesplate. Would make a good Scouring commander or standard bearer chest.

This piece is perfect for use on Cataphractii terminators.

Vehicles

Dreadnought shin plates are probably the most commonly seen bits when it comes to Cataphractii shoulder plates.

The first one is from the Land Raider Crusader and the second is in the generic vehicle accessory sprue. Both would be suitable for Techmarines (though a little plain) or Iron Hands and, as with the skulled one in the tac squad, can easily be converted.

As mentioned in the previous article, this shoulderpad is perfect for Iron Hands clan symbols.

Black Templars Upgrade Kit

This is the only plastic example of a MkIV chest. Hopefully, you either collect Black Templars or have a friend who does and is willing to part with them.

I would use this one, again, mostly for the collar.

All the Black Templar torsos could be used for the Imperial Fists Legion's First Company. Variously called Huscarls or Templars.

The three suitable heads that come in this set.

Dark Angels Company Veterans

These two torsos could literally be used for anything, ranging from a Word Bearers marine to a Thousand Son sorcerer (or of course, a Dark Angel).

These are more likely to be useful to only Dark Angel players, but are still perfectly acceptable as pre-heresy.

Another Siege of Terra/Scouring chest.

A good head for a Librarian of any Legion.

Another studded shoulderpad, though the chapter icon will need covering up if you're making a different Legion.

Ravenwing

Another couple of suitable chests.

A suitable chest if you're doing a Dark Angels army from the Order of the Ravenwing.

Two more helms. The right one would be especially good for Techmarines/Iron Hands.

Old Space Wolf Bits

All four of these would be suitable torsos to be used - with a bit of trimming if you're not a Space Wolf player.

This is the only true MkVI chest in the current plastic range. It's a shame the tooth necklace precludes its use for most other Legions. Would suit Space Wolves (of course), White Scars, World Eaters(?) and maybe even Luna Wolves. You would probably need to cover up the Fenrisian rune for any of the other Legions though.

SW Pack

All of these would work quite well, though the bottom-right one does have a MkVIII gut plate.

Chaos Space Marines Set

All of these would be suitable once skulls have been removed and spiked filed down/squared off. The bottom-centre one may well make a good basis for a MkII chest due to the ridged pipe going down the centre of the chest.

I've seen this head used for MkV before.

Though they all have horns, any of these heads would be suitable once they've had them removed and new earpieces have been converted for them and putty used to go over the more overtly chaos elements. The first four would be suited to MkIII armour. The bottom-centre could work well as the helmet for a recon marine or devastator squad. The last would, of course, be suitable for Thousand Sons, though any trooper could get away with it too.

With a bit of putty for the jaw - and removal/squaring off the arrow, this helmet would be fine. The jaw could be left unmodified for a chaplain.

Bezerkers

Once the Khorne symbols have been easily removed, none of these chests would require any more modification.

One of the most popular heads for pre-heresy modellers as it matches the helmets from some of the book covers perfectly (once you remove the bunny ears).

While it may have a mouth-grille, this helmet matches the World Eaters art in the Collected Visions artbook really well.

A very cool, archaic-looking plasma pistol.

CSM Vehicles

Same as the rest, though you may wish to cover the skull with a vox-grille or somesuch.

Another helmet ripe for MkV usage.

The two heads from the Defiler kit would be good for a pre-heresy dreadnought, though I'm personally not too sure if they work in terms of size. The right-hand one would be especially good for Iron Warriors.

As you may have gathered, while you can go the whole hog with armour mark accuracy, you don't have to. The vast majority of the torsos I've shown you have been MkVIIs, but they're different enough to give the right "feel" to a force. Personally, I would go without the winged skull torsos unless I was doing something in the late Heresy period. While they are canonically fine, they are too reminiscent of the Aquila torsos in my opinion. But then, you can always file them down and change them as you see fit.

Hopefully this will help anyone going for a pre-heresy theme to locate bits that might be useful to them.

All images supplied by Bitz Box

Mini Pre-Heresy Guide

I received an e-mail yesterday (someone used the button! :D) from a certain Levi, asking for various bits of advice, so I thought I'd stick some of it down in a blog post for future reference. So here's a small guide to starting out with a pre-heresy army - particularly Iron Hands.

So, let's start with the basics, then move through the armour marks.

The Iron Hands Tactical Squad box set is a good place to start. While it isn't the steal it used to be, it's still not bad at 25 squids. You actually get almost enough pieces for 12 models (you need two extra backplates) and some very nice bionic-y metal parts. Remember though, that pre-Heresy, only the Emperor's Children were accorded the right to wear an aquila (two-headed eagle) on their breastplate, so you'll either have to file off or bulk out the chests with that detail on.

Of course, you don't have to use that box set. If you're feeling adventurous, you can make the bionics yourself by cutting off sections of limbs and replacing them with various bits, ranging from electronics from an old remote, to bits of wire and plasticard (styrene) rods/tubes. Using the standard box sets, you can achieve some very good results. Here's a decent tutorial.

And here are a couple of projects I've been tracking for inspiration:

G-Relk's Iron Hands
Kikkala's Iron Hands

Get lots of these. Shaving down the skull will give you a perfect cog and a nice flat surface for your clan marking, although you could leave the skull and have that as such.

These power cables are also VERY useful - both for bionics and adding random detail to just about anything. The bag comes with a series of different-sized wires, ranging from vehicle-sized to ones more suited to infantry.

For pre-heresy armour marks, I'll go through each one with a few comments.

Mk.I: Thunder Armour

This is the original power armour used by the barbarian tribes of earth. It only enhances upper body strength - the legs and pelvis are adorned in the 30-something-k equivalent of plate mail. This type of armour was only really used during the Unification Wars, as it's lack of respiratory equipment - as well as a sealed environment - make it practically useless in space. Elements of the design can however be ported over to different marks for variety, such as the layered shoulderpads and the thunder/lightning ornamentation - the Emperor's own heraldry.

Here's a great tutorial from Horn over at My Wargame on converting MkI Armour:

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Mk.II: Crusade Armour

This armour came into use universally at the start of the Great Crusade. The outer planets of the solar system were taken using this armour. It provides a sealed environment and full auto-senses. Some models seem to have had a fixed helmet.

Converting this type of armour would be quite a challenge - the amount of layered plates all over the armour and the distinct breastplate mean you're probably going to have to break out the modelling putty. You could always use the Armour Through The Ages box set, but metal is a pig to convert with, and you'll definitely want some different poses - the original has an unnatural "leaning forward" pose that just doesn't look right. It might be worth picking up that box set for reference as you work on different armour marks though.

Oh yes, High Marshal Helbrecht is wearing either an ornamented MkI suit, or a later design artificed to look like Crusade Armour.

Mk.III: Iron Armour

Iron Armour could be considered prototype Terminator Armour. It's basically a MkII suit with extra armour plates added on the frontal parts over the chesplate and legs and a new(ish) helmet. You can find a few examples of iron armour in GW's current range:

Master of the Arsenal - very ornate example, perfect for a Pre-Heresy Captain, and there seems to be enough flexibility in the model to be able to perform weapon swaps relativeley easily.

Sergeant Chronus - This pack is a pretty good deal - you get a full suit of MkIII with a variant type of helmet and a MkIII torso in the same blister. The ultramarine symbols are a pain to remove without scuffing the rivet detail.

Iron Warriors Warsmith - This guy just looks awesome - and is perfect for Iron Hands, especially. Though not true MkIII (he has a MkVII "boot" on), he's customised himself enough for it to not really matter.

Iron Warriors Conversion Pack - Though the chestplates are definitely useful (you could probably use them as a basis for MkII armour types), the best thing about this pack, in relation to Iron armour is the helmets which are some of the most appropriate bits you could get.

My Wargame also has an excellent tutorial for MkIII armour which Horn has just finished:

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Mk.IV: Maximus Armour

This armour was supposed to be the final Mark to be produced - the epitome of armour engineering (at least until the Legions were completely re-equipped with Terminator Armour). Though it became available late in the Crusade, a few of the Legions were well along in switching to this new Mark. It's features are much closer to the current types of armour, so make it one of the easier armour types to convert. It's main differences are the snout on the helmet, the breastplate, groin guard and kneepads.

As with MkIII, there are several models/bits in the current GW range which can help us here:

Red Scorpion Upgrade Kit - this pack has been the bread and butter of pre-Heresy modellers ever since it came out. You get 11 MkIV heads and torsos, as well as a powersword-armed bionic arm and a pair of shoulderpads that My Wargame thinks suit the MkIII armour very well.

Red Scorpion Vanguard Veterans - This pack is less useful to the pre-heresy enthusiast. Though it does give you 5 MkIV torsos and heads, they are so covered in religious ornaments as to make them almost not worth it. The thing of greatest note would be Sergeant Culln's legs - they are true MkIV legs. Buying a pack per marine is not really feasible, but you could get hold of one for reference though.

Black Templar Upgrade Kit - This kit contains, by virtue of having two of the same sprue inside, two MkIV helmets and torsos. The detail isn't as crisp on these as it is on the Red Scorpions, but it is serviceable and the two don't look completely weird next to each other. It might be an advantage to start a Black Templar army and just save those torsos from the packs you buy...

Black Templar Sword Brethren - This would again be for reference - one of the Brethren has MkIV knee pads (bottom-right on the link). Apart from maybe Imperial Fist Huscarls or Word Bearers, the model itself is a bit useless for our intentions.

Mk.V: Heresy Armour

As the Heresy broke out, MkIV armour was found to be lacking due to the exotic materials that were needed to construct it. MkV was brought out as a stop-gap and could conceivably be patched up with any old armour the Techmarines had lying around. The helmet itself is a prototype for the Terminator project and due to the inferior materials used in it's production, molecular bonding studs had to be used on the areas most likely to be facing the enemy.

By far the best tutorial I have seen for Heresy armour is on the blog Eaters of Worlds:

Pacific's Mk5 Armour Tutorial

Pre-Heresy Modelling

Now, I've rabbited on about all these armour marks for quite a while (for me at least, I've spent half a day, between working, writing all this up), and it may come across to some that this time period makes for very niggly army construction. This can be very true, if you want your army to be as canonically accurate as possible. Most of us, however, would like to get an army on the table in the first hald of this century...

So, a small list of things that help:

- Avoid the aquila breastplates - either that, or file them down.

- Reserve the blank breastplates (the one with the skull in the middle of the chest) as well as any filed-down aquila ones for marines with boltguns or heavy weaponry. You don't want to waste bits that cost a lot (in terms of money or effort) on a model that is going to hide most if not all of that detail.

- It may be an idea to have your pre-Heresy army as a side project while you focus on your main army. That way, you can buy the bits you need for your current army and just set any useful bits to the side for your Pre-H one. If you go out to actively buy bits for a pre-heresy army, you'll find the costs mounting up VERY fast. I've found it better, for my peace of mind, to let the bits build up naturally.

- AOBR marines can be converted, quite easily, to Heresy era ones (as shown in this tutorial) and make a great way of bulking out your forces.

- If you're going to start cutting up individual components, like say, legs, cut up the ones you need then do the conversion - don't cut them all up in advance. That really didn't help with my motivation...

Right, I think I'm burnt out for now, so I hope this helps Levi (and anyone else looking into pre-heresy modelling). This is by no means a complete article - the amount of depth it's possible to go to with this subject is staggering. For the interested, I suggest you check out The Great Crusade - a forum dedicated solely to Pre-Heresy with some great (and very helpful) characters on there.

A few blogs from known Pre-Heresy offenders:

Eaters of Worlds by Pacific

Wolves of Cthonia by Yvraith

Halcyon Daze by Anodyr

My Wargame by (White)Horn

Ithmaril's Wargaming Blog by Ithmaril

Zen40000 by Aventine

While they don't all have pre-heresy stuff on them, they are well worth a look-see.

So, hope you enjoyed this. Any questions or comments, you can use the space at the bottom or e-mail me (USE the button, you know you want to... :D )

A Few Iron Hand Pictures

In response to an e-mail I received the other day, I'm just posting up some pictures of my non-Terminator Iron Hands. These pictures are quite old, and none of the models look the same as they do today, but they're close enough. Sorry Levi, no devastators though - they're too recent an addition.

So first up, we have my first PH Iron Hand - a Standard Bearer. He was supposed to be entered into a contest over at The Great Crusade, but was not finished in time and has since been disassembled. The right arm was based on a necron with added wires, though if I were to redo the conversion, I would add far more bulk to it.

At the time, these were going to be following CSM rules, hence the double special weapons. I've since changed my mind on this (interesting, related article here) so will have to build enough normal guys/heavy weapons to double the amount of squads I have.

1st Squad

2nd Squad

I've since added some Debastators as well as two characters to the army, and they're all stuck down my friend's place at the moment - which is probably a good thing, considering how hard it has been for the past few weeks to concentrate on the Morlocks.

Miscellaneous Gallery

The following pictures represent my meanderings into other worlds and designs.

Jyshite Resistance Gallery

The Jyshite have been fighting for their homeworld for three generations now. What was once a great mining and industrial world has been reduced to blasted dunes and shattered plains by the greenskin menace.

HQ

Elites

Troops

Fast Attack

Heavy Support