Reminder for the March 2011 Army List Challenge

The March Army List Challenge is still open for entries. 
Can you designed a themed force to take on the xenos Laer threat?

Good luck!

Assembling Abaddon the Despoiler - II: Final Conversion.

In converting Abaddon using a plastic chaos lord body, the head is a problem: not only does it feel like it is incorrectly proportioned, but it also extends very high with the top knot.  To alleviate this, I've leaned the body of the terminator slightly and had the head protrude over the edge of the upper torso -- giving the impression that the big guy is leaning forward in his armour.  With a little bit of milliput to fill in and raise the head in the head alcove of the armour, the effect is completed.

The other metal parts have been pinned to the upper arms and elbows of other terminator bits.  The body is a standard plastic chaos lord body, with a chain mail tabard hanging from the groin, much like the original metal body of Abaddon.

The base is standard for the chaos terminator lord, and I've added a couple of smaller protrusions scattered around the base for added detail.  I'll eventually add a bit of static grass and grit as well.  Am looking forward to painting this one up in a little while.

Assembling Abaddon the Despoiler - I: The Arms.

Many folks tend to use a proxy for Abaddon, typically building him from the chaos terminator lord and associated parts / bits, perhaps using some of the metal components from the blister pack.  My intent is to do the same, motivated by the desire to have a suitibly intimidating looking commander for my Sons of Malice marines.

To create the conversion, we need to use the metal bits from Abaddon and attach them to suitible upper arm substitutes.  The simplest way of getting these is to carve up either a plastic chaos lord, or a terminator.  I chose to use the upper arms of the bits I don't tend to use: e.g. the mutated tentacle arm.  I intend to pin the upper and lower sections of the arms together and then glue the plastic upper arms on to a plastic choas lord body.

The head of Abaddon is a problem though.  As pictured (lower left), the hair piece / top knot extends for a long way up and the head is not fantastically proportioned in relation to the standard terminator.  I'll look at how I worked around this problem in the next post.

Wargames Gallery: Daemon Prince Rampage

This picture comes from an earlier battle report where the strength of the Death Guard took on the Blood Ravens chapter.

Here, the Daemon Prince of Nurgle up-ends a rhino and pours out the contents: a space marine commander with his squad of marines.

Particularly awesome is the interior of the rhino -- check out the hand painted Blood Raven's icon.

Gargoyle Headed Backpack

This is a simple and easy conversion that I know many chaos players like to make.  Perhaps it is so obvious that it doesn't need posting, but I probably wouldn't have thought of it when I was a newbie to the hobby. 

Ingredients: one marine backpack (chaos or loyalist) and two gargoyle heads from the chaos tank sprue.

Method: chop off the exhaust vents from the backpack and ensure that the remains are filed down to a flat-ish surface (likewise for the back of the gargoyle heads).  Then simply glue the heads on to where the vents where previously located.  [The image shows a plague marine with a gargoyle headed backpack].

A simple, easy and effective way to create variety in your squads.  (Note that some loyalist chapters come with similar designs for free -- see the space wolves marine sprue for instance).

March 2010 Army List Challenge: the Laer

The Laer are xenos and therefore must be cleansed.  Moving on a snake like lower body, their weaponry is deadly: easily able to melt even space marine armour.  They're also very much in to body modification and enhancement (e.g. some are modified to be able to fly, etc.).  And they're Slaaneshi worshippers.

In the Horus Heresy, the Emperor's Children cleanse the Laer, but Fulgrim gives in to temptation and recovers one of their Slaaneshi artifacts along the way.  Can you assemble a better army than Fulgrim to take on the Laer and cleanse their world ... without falling to Slaanesh along the way?

Rules

(1) Design a 1500 points army list from any codex to take on this mission.

(2) Post your army lists as a comment to this posting and suggest why they're well suited to this mission. 

(3) Entries close at 01:00 GMT on March14th. 

(4) On that same day, I'll open a poll for Warpstone Flux readers to judge which army list they consider to be the "most effective army list that also best articulates the theme" (whatever readers interpret that to mean) out of all entrants.

(5) Winner will be tallied and announced on March 21st (and entered in to the hall of fame!).

(6) One entry per person please.

Remember that there are no prizes for these contests, beyond kudos, honour and entry in to the hall of fame.

Good Luck!