Mk III kit from Forge World

Well, it's old news now I suspect, but Forge World has released pictures from their upcoming range of Mk. III "iron" power armour. These look very cool to me. Not only are they appropriate for both loyalist and traitor marines, but there is a supporting range of weapons available as well. The weapons (bolters, pictured left (copyright: Forge World), and special weapons) look as if they are straight out of the original plastic RTB-1 space marine boxed set of 20+ years ago.

The Umbra pattern bolters are able to have close combat accessories (bayonets) attached to the front of the bolters. As pictures, this can take the form of a traditional knife extension, or a chain-axe like extension. Both are great looking for space marines and have the advantage of counting as the close combat weapon for melee (i.e. no more glueing combat knife accessories to the waists of space marines). Thanks Forge World!

Slaanesh Possessed Marine (or Sorcerer?)

Hot on the heels of the bloodletter possessed marine, this chaos devotee has allowed himself to be possessed by a Slaaneshi villain. I'm not quite sure whether it is a daemonette, or something more sinister, but it is very Slaaneshi!

The bits consist of a back-2-basix resin base on top of which I've attached a Dark Angels veteran body (with imperial iconography scrubbed away). The back pack comes from the possessed chaos space marine kit. The marine's right arm is a regular chaos marine arm, but cut off at the hand. Pinned to the stub of the wrist is a daemonette banner hand and icon. Meanwhile the left arm is a standard possessed marine arm - chosen to be the clawed arm to be suggestive of Slaanesh once more. The shoulder pads are just standard chaos space marine ones (the right pad being the aspiring champion shoulder pad of Slaanesh). The head is taken from the daemonettes plastic boxed set -- it is actually the instrument! The excessively long tongue on it immediately cried out to be used as a Slaaneshi head when I first saw the daemonette sprue, and I've been wanting to use it as such ever since.

The marine could be used in a number of roles, much like the bloodletter possessed one. I'm thinking not only a standard possessed marine (with icon?), but also a chaos lord or a chaos sorcerer of Slaanesh with the Lash of Submission psyker ability (where the icon will be a force weapon).

Plague Marine Squad Number Three (and Variant)

My third plague marine squad varies in its content depending upon the opponent and the mission (if either are known in advance). The first is a standard load-out of a flamer, a melta gun, a plague champion with power fist, and an icon.The second load out swaps the special weapons for a pair of plasma guns. Although dangerous, they can be worth their weight in gold if I can settle these guys in some cover during a game. The plague champion here has a combi-plasma and a melta bomb at the ready incase a dreadnought gets too close. These guys are ideal for taking out squads of bikers and taming some terminators before they charge in to close combat. But they often need support if they're not to become a simple road bump.

Painted Bloodletter Possessed Chaos Marine

The painted up possessed chaos space marine. There is lots of detail here ranging from red and black washes, gold highlighting, and a wet blended power weapon in frost brand colours. Some images of this guy in action can be found in this battle report. I'll say little more and let the images do the talking.

Gallery: Thunderstrike

The lone surviving Blood Raven strikes against a chaos predator in a last ditch attempt to cripple it before casualties mount.

Imperial Ruins Project - VI. Entrance

Continuing my mini-series on CNC's Imperial Ruins scenery, this is the Entrance fully assembled, but not glued or painted just yet.

Notice the extreme left and right hand sides of the building: they tessellate with each other and can connect up to the other pieces in the series in a modular fashion.
The size of the entry is large: a dreadnought can easily stand guard in the middle of the main gate way. The finished painting will be shown in a future posting.