Must-have units: Plague Marines and Plaguebearers

In what promises to be another great post, Ron at From the Warp is putting together a list of the FtW group's must-have units. Since Warpstone Flux is mostly about Chaos, I wanted to give two choices: one for the chaos daemons codex and one from the chaos space marines codex.

Firstly to the chaos space marines. My must have unit there are plague marines. For my long time followers, this probably isn't too much of a surprise to you! Their survivability is legendary for their points costs. I've talked extensively about their advantages, thinking of them as terminator-kin, various special weapon set-ups, and firepower draw-backs. Their utility to the codex has been shown time and again on the battlefield for me, in numerous roles. One of their chief roles is to "objective grab" -- they persist for such a long time that they're hard to pass by without thinking of them in that role.

Continuing with the general Nurgle theme, in the daemons codex, I usually always take plaguebearers. They form part of my first-wave and usually take an icon with them to ensure that second wave daemons have something to deep-strike off when they come in to play. Their survivability (in common to the plague marines) is very good. With a chaos instrument, they can tar-pit and bog down opposition units for turns on end. In addition, they have poisoned attacks which means they can take on monstrous creatures and stand a chance of both doing damage to them and bogging them down for a few turns. On the negative side, they are on the slow side with regards to movement. But with a reasonable deep strike, they probably don't need to be moved around too much anyway.

I'm looking forward to reading about everyone else's choice!

Chaos Objective

This is one of a small number of chaos objectives that I built a while ago for use in games. I can't say it's very original in design or execution, but it does fulfil a dual role in both of my chaos space marine and chaos daemons armies.

It is principally an icon taken from the new plastic bloodletters sprue, affixed to a small circular base, and given a (very) rough paint job with a chaos star icon. It works, it is functional (i.e. it doesn't tip over readily) and represents the theme of my armies well. However, I'm now looking for better ideas for chaos objectives. I'm thinking along the lines of a roughly carved stone (styrene) with a chaos symbol etched in to it -- a little like what was depicted in the old Realms of Chaos books. I'll have to get around to it at some point! Anybody got any further suggestions as to what might work well for objectives in both daemons and chaos marine armies?

Purple Daemonette

This daemonette follows a purple colour scheme that was commenced with a basecoat of hormagaunt purple followed by liberal inking in a blended purple and black ink. The flesh areas were then shaded progressively lighter to an almost grey colour -- this can be seen clearly on the forehead region which really doesn't look as purple as the bulk of the rest of the miniature.

The clothes were basecoated in goblin green and inked a deep green colour in the recesses of the folds, before highlighting back to a tone lighter than goblin green on the raised portions. The green gives a jagged contrast to the purple tones of the flesh (not quite as bad as blue and green!) but still suitable for a daemonette of Slaanesh. The armoured portions were based around boltgun metal silvers and highlighted to skull white levels around the rim. The lining of the skull white is probably a bit too thick; I need to get a new fine detail 000 paint brush. The final details included adding dots to the eyes and completing the claws in a two-toned cream and white combination.

The base of the miniature is simply plasticard cut in to a regular shape and painted up to look like a street scene.

Golden Demon Next Year

Well, I didn't make the final cut for Golden Demon this year with my various entries (plaguebearers, great unclean one, lava screamer, a bloodletter and a LotR wraith that I've not posted about yet!).

Next year I'll be more prepared! :)

However, one thing that I did notice was the relative number of entries in each category. As I might have expected, the most frequent entry was in the single miniature category for both fantasy and 40k.

What was a bit of a surprise to me was the scarcity of the following: 40k squads, 40k monsters, fantasy regiments, and Lord of the Rings categories.

Although also few in number, the duel and large model categories were fantastically well painted.

I'm not sure whether this is noticed elsewhere on the planet, but it certainly indicates that (e.g.) Lord of the Rings might be moderately easier to get placed in than others?

Group Photo: 1500 points of Mixed Daemons

Following on from my army list posted yesterday, here's the big group photo of my mixed daemons horde!

At the front and centre are the Herald of Tzeentch on a Chariot with a bunch of screamers.

To the left of them are the Khorne contingent: a Herald riding a Juggernaut surrounded by bloodletters with wicked lava-like hellblades.

To the right, are the putrid Nurgle elements: a Great Unclean One surrounded by plaguebearers.

At the back and centre, we have a large Soul Grinder, lurking in the same way that skyscrapers don't.

To the left are more Tzeentch elements: this time a squad of pink horrors with the Changeling.

To the right are the Slaanesh daemonettes cavorting around a daemon prince.

Army List: 1500 points of Mixed Daemons

This is the mixed daemons army list that I've been playing around with recently. It consists of all four of the major powers in (approaching) equal quantities. I've taken it to tournaments and had reasonable results with it. It's not supposed to be "killer" or "top tier", but it is competitive without being overwhelming to newbies. It is somewhat changed from my usual "friendly" style list. I've linked to my random tactical thoughts on a couple of the choices that I've made, for reference. Comments welcome!

HQ:
Great Unclean One of Nurgle, Cloud of flies (165 points)
Herald of Tzeentch on a Chariot, with Bolt of Tzeentch (95 points)
Herald of Khorne on Juggernaut (105 points)

TROOPS:
11 bloodletters of Khorne (176 points)
11 plaguebearers of Nurgle, icon of chaos, instrument of chaos (195 points)
11 daemonettes of Slaanesh, transfixing gaze (159 points)
9 pink horrors of Tzeentch, chaos icon, bolt, The Changeling (195 points)

FAST ATTACK:
5 screamers of Tzeentch (80 points)

HEAVY SUPPORT:
Daemon prince with flight and iron hide (170 points)
Soul grinder of chaos with phlegm (160 points)

Total = 1498 points.

Footnote: My preferred first wave of deep-strikers are the Herald of Tzeentch, the plaguebearers of Nurgle, the daemonettes of Slaanesh, the soul grinder and the screamers of Tzeentch.

Finished Soul Grinder

It took a while to paint (and then to photograph and post!), but here is the finished soul grinder.As can be seen, I've generally stuck to the Khorne themed Soul Grinder throughout the painting scheme. I started with the legs some time ago in a red colour with magma / lava like highlights. Having inked the torso of this chap, I then set about gently highlighting each ridge line progressively lighter. The brightest tone on the torso reaches about blazing orange.

For the (pneumatic?) piping, I went with a contrasting green colour that can be seen at the joints of the soul grinder. The sword follows the bloodletter style of my daemons in a fiery manner. The texture of the sword doesn't take too well to this painting style though -- I had trouble trying to get this looking right. Other small details included the facial region (eyes, mouth, etc.) and highlighting the black claws with boltgun metal and silver colours to suggest long service wear and tear.

Overall, this has been a good project and one that I would repeat. However, if and when I get another soul grinder, I shall probably use a completely different paint scheme, just for variation.

Result of the October Army List Challenge

...And the winner from this month's Army List Challenge is: Heinz!

Congratulations mate! Good win with your Nurgle plus Daemonic Possession Death World list!

Not a Golden Daemon Finalist

Having done well in painting competitions this year, I thought that I'd give Golden Demon a go for the first time ever. I've entered in a number of categories and the first round is already over.

This Great Unclean One of Nurgle got cut at the first hurdle, however.

Still, I've got a number of other entries left in the competition. I'll find out next weekend whether they'll survive the next hurdle. Until then, I'll keep their identities under wraps...

Shadow Sword: Part III. Hull and Sponson

The Shadow Sword is starting to really take shape now, after a little bit of a hold. In this update, I wanted to show how it is coming together. The lower portion of the main hull has been glued in to place with the two side tracks and I'm beginning to see the shape of the final piece.Of particular note are the chaos star symbols on the front of the tank (just below the lights on either side of the track; and on the central front bumper region). They replace the usual double-headed eagle of the Imperium the are usually moulded on in these locations. To get rid of the imperial markings, I used sand paper in the end! Yes, I know it is somewhat crude, but it did the job in next to no time. The only issue was to try not to rub off the small bolts whilst eliminating the eagles. This was achieved by cutting up a very small bit of sand paper and wrapping it around the tongs of a pair of pliers and carefully rubbing the right place. Although one or two of the small bolts did get rubbed half-way down, I think the job is reasonable. The finish on the sanded surface is somewhat rough, but I believe that the glued on chaos stars will hide the roughness when combined with the paint job. Indeed, some roughness might even be desirable -- a direct effect of heretics scratching off the Imperial symbols in favour of chaotic ones!

Also in the image is the first of four side sponsons that I'm building. This particular one is the heavy bolter variety, and like the side armour: it is magnetized to attach to the side. The sponsons are rather tricky to glue together such that they can still freely pivot. This particular one has seized up, despite my best efforts. It can still track up and down, but just not left and right! I will be adding the las cannon to the top of the sponson at a later date. I'm not sure whether to assemble a pair of the other three as flamers or not; I'll have to think about it.

A Few More Tables

Some additional tables that I managed to get some photos of from Gen Con earlier in the year.
The first one is a basic board, but consisted of a number of exquisite looking buildings that my photo doesn't do the correct justice to. There were small notices on the sides of these buildings that warned local citizens against mutants and told them of the signs to look out for!
The second one, picture above, looked very Khorne-inspired: a dark and brooding table that oozed with skulls ready for the skull throne. Enjoy!

Plotting Chaos Chosen Load-out

I'm trying to come up with a competitive load-out for some chaos chosen that I'm thinking of assembling. I want to use the Night Lord's standard bearer in the squad and (as a consequence) have the entire squad as Night Lords.

With Chaos Chosen, my thoughts are that their equipment depends critically upon what battlefield role one wants to choose for them. Since it's Night Lords, I wanted a squad that are able to significantly disrupt the back lines of the enemy. Hence their mission is to infiltrate and cause havoc to any heavy support choice.

I started thinking that I'd go down the shooting route (as opposed to the more expensive close combat route) and therefore, I needed meltas for destroying tanks and massed fire for taking out embedded devastator-like squads.

Here's what I came up with:

8 chaos chosen, including 1 aspiring champion with power fist, 1 icon of chaos glory, 2 melta guns, 1 plasma gun, 1 flamer (229 points)
Dedicated Rhino transport with havoc launcher and combi-melta (60 points)

Its slightly expensive, but gives flexibility from the turn that the infiltrate on (i.e. the havoc launcher), and then can get close up to use the melta guns (including on the rhino) to get rid of pesky heavy vehicles, and perhaps tap plasma or flamer hits as required. If they get out to go for a close assault, the champion has a power fist to help out and the icon will (potentially, depending on the rest of the army) bring down lesser daemons and obliterators. Maybe the plasma isn't required for this kind of build? Regardless, its very balanced and a distinct early threat that can draw fire away from the rest of the army.

October Army List Challenge: Poll Open

The poll is now open to vote on which army list should win the October army list challenge. The theme for this month's challenge was to design a 1000 point army to claim objectives on a death world (automatic S2 hit every game turn to infantry and automatic glancing hit to vehicles as well). Which list wins? Time to decide!

List 1. Heinz:
Auto S2 + glancing hits are negated best by Nurgle and Daemonic Possesion!! ^^

Daemon Prince (165)
Mo Nurgle
Wings
Nurgle's Rot

1st Plague Marine Squad (231)
Champion w/ PF, Combi-Flamer & Icon
Melta Gun x2

1st Rhino (70)
Daemonic Possession
Dozer Blade
Combi-Plasma

2nd Plague Marine Squad (226)
Champion w/ PF, Combi-Melta & Icon
Melta Gun
Flamer

2nd Rhino (70)
Daemonic Possession
Dozer Blade
Combi-Plasma

Defiler (150)
Heavy Flamer
DCCW

Obliterator (75)

T6 on the Prince means no wounds from noxious fumes. Rather, his rot will stack nicely with the fumes to thin out hordes. Prince should try to assault any low T infantry.

The Plague Marine squads are general purpose squads with a mix of melta and flame weapons. The short range is not a liabilty due to the low visibility. Should be able to handle anything. T5 + FnP should minimise any casulties from the noxious fumes.

The Rhinos have possession to ignore the auto glancing hits. The dozer blades will be useful for crashing through the dense terrain. Combi-Plasma on the rhino because overheating doesn't affect vehicles. No chance is still better than the minimal chance on plague marines. Also, it's cheaper than paying 15 points a pop! Not likely to need many AP2 shots because of the plentiful coversaves and since there won't be many of any targets that require AP2 love like terminators or other FnP models.

Defiler has battle cannon to shoot in the rare case there is LOS for such range. Otherwise, it's job is to assault anything that has powerweapons or such that would negate the plague marines' advantages. Heavy Flamer will be useful in the dense terrain. Of course it is also possessed to ignore the auto glancing hit!

The obliterator teleports in guided by one of the personal icons to where it's needed. Slow and Purposeful means it isn't really slowed by all the difficult terrain. It's 2+ save and being in reserve should limit it's vulnerability to the fumes.

It's low model count won't be a problem in dense terrain as it favours superior quality rather than numbers. You just can't really bring the numbers to bear effectively.

This list is also able to be quite fast with transports, winged prince and a fleeting walker. With it's smaller size and manuverability, it should be able to concentrate it's focus to butcher more numerous opponents piecemeal.


List 2. Suneokun:
Tyranids ... Right at home!

Broodlord (flesh hooks, feeder tendrils, toxin sacs, plus Retinue of 8 with implant attack, toxin sacs and flesh hooks (280)

Genestealers (8) - flesh hooks and toxin sacs (160)

Genestealers (8) - flesh hooks and toxin sacs (160)

2 Carnifex (T7, I2, W5, Tail Scythe, spineback, Crushing Claws, Barbed Strangler, Toxin Sacs, Tusked) 404

Total 1004

The Genestealers are the only ones hit by the toxic atmosphere (hence the toxin sacs are more of a theme than anything) as well as the additional S5 attacks are helpful against the other 'tough lists' arriving on planet.

The short visual range means that the uber-Carnies and Broodlord can get into combat ... with spinebanks/flesh hooks all round they'll hit first and rending/monstrous strength will negate many FNP/Armour saves. As a bonus the retinue have inplant attacks with their feeder tendrilled boss's reroll to hit - meaning monstrous creatures/characters should watch out. Just two 6's will kill much of anything with no save (beyond invulnerable)...

The Stealer Horde holds things up (everything gets move through cover) while the Carnies pile in to finish the job!

With a high chance of a 12" charge - why'd you bring melta?

Toxin Atmosphere Planet of Death - who else do you think lives here?

The Nids.


List 3. Big D:
1000 Pts - Eldar Roster

Troops: Wraithguard (11#, 381 pts)
10 Wraithguard @ 381 pts (Fearless; Wraithsight; Wraithcannon x10; (pp.46 & 62 Eldar))
1 Spiritseer (Warlock) (Psyker; Fleet; Spiritseer Upgrade; Rune Armour; Shuriken Pistol; Witchblade; (p.27-28 & p.60 Eldar))

Troops: Wraithguard (11#, 381 pts)
10 Wraithguard @ 381 pts (Fearless; Wraithsight; Wraithcannon x10; (pp.46 & 62 Eldar))
1 Spiritseer (Warlock) (Psyker; Fleet; Spiritseer Upgrade; Rune Armour; Shuriken Pistol; Witchblade; (p.27-28 & p.60 Eldar))

HQ: Farseer (1#, 118 pts)
1 Farseer @ 118 pts (Psyker; Fortune ; Guide ; Fleet; Independent Character; Ghosthelm; Rune Armour; Runes of Witnessing; Shuriken Pistol; Singing Spear; (pp.26, 28 & 60 Eldar))

HQ: Farseer (1#, 118 pts)
1 Farseer @ 118 pts (Psyker; Fortune ; Guide ; Fleet; Independent Character; Ghosthelm; Rune Armour; Runes of Witnessing; Shuriken Pistol; Singing Spear; (pp.26, 28 & 60 Eldar))



Total Roster Cost: 998

This strike force would contain two units. Each a ten man squad of Wraithguard with Warlock to make them troop accompanied by a Farseer with Guide, Fortune, Runes of Witnessing, and a Singing Spear.

These two units would be immune to the S2 hit each turn because of mixed toughness. With the excess of cover saves and short range fighting the Fortuned Wraithguard would be hard to put down with shooting and would deliver back a hurting on their shooting phase. These two units are able to take out anything in the game with ease and would handily claim the objective.

Tutorial: How to Build Beasts of Nurgle

Beasts of Nurgle are non-trivial to assemble. This posting is intended to be a guide to constructing them and I hope that it helps some other people out there who have looked at the parts and wondered how they all fit together. The idea for this post originally came about as I was being asked this very question by a couple of other players.

Starting Off.
In total, there are seven (Nurgle's magic number!) different metal parts to contend with. There are also no instructions about how they fit together provided - I guess one is supposed to look carefully at the images in codex: daemons and see how it all might work. The real problem is seeing which one goes where and how they inter-connect.

In the picture below, I've laid out the seven parts. I'm going to piece the beast together using glue and milliput (a type of greenstuff that I favour using). I've already trimmed the pieces and removed the excess metal flashes - this is necessary before you start to put the beast together, otherwise the parts won't fit snugly.
The parts (as labelled) are:

1: The back
2: Lower body, Left
3: Lower body, Right
4: Tail
5: Leg elbow
6: Tongue
7: Main part of the head

Lower Body.
After sorting out these seven bits, the first thing to do is to assemble the lower body. This is done by joining parts 2 and 3 together. Below, I've pictured the lower body being assembled on a standard warhammer 40,000 40mm circular base to give an indication of the scale. I've also left the other bits in place so that it is obvious which pieces I've used. Gluing the bits to the circular base may also be a good idea at this stage.The Tail.
The tail (part 4) is a large piece that fits on to the rear of the body and snakes around to the front. It also contains the claws of the beast's left foot.
Leg Elbow.
The next part to work with is part 5 -- the elbow, or knee of the leg. It attaches on to the side of the beast's lower body (part 2) and connects up with the tail (part 4). I found a liberal blob of greenstuff really helped at this stage to smooth over the connections!
The Back.
One of the trickier bits comes next: the back (part 1 as labelled above). The first step here is to figure out which way around the back is supposed to connect up to the main (lower) body with. This can be done by inspecting the socket of the lower body and dry-fitting the back to ensure you've got it correct. The back must be strongly glued and greenstuff-ed in to place at this stage.

In the picture below, I've now rotated the view of the camera, but you can still see parts 6 and 7 waiting for their turn in the background. I'd strongly suggest waiting until the back has firmly set in place before attaching the other two parts to the rest of the body.
The Head.
Whilst you're waiting for the back to dry off and become a solid addition to the rest of the body, you can work on the head. Although it may not look like it at first glace, the tangles of tentacles that make up parts 6 and 7 join together to form the head of the beast. They connect up in a relatively simple manner: just ensure that the tongue sticks outward and it should be easy from therein. As a hint: look for the teeth (above the tongue) to guide you as to which way around things are meant to be. The eyes of the beast are very recessed areas just above the teeth. Finishing off!
The final step is to attach the head (now in one piece) to the rest of the body. Don't attempt to do this until both halves of the miniature that you've assembled in the previous steps are solid (i.e. the glue and greenstuff are dried off).And there you have it: a completely assembled beast of Nurgle! Painting still required...

Nurgle Herald Painted

Another potential herald of Nurgle to add to my plaguebearers today. This fellow has been basecoated in dwarf flesh colour and deeply inked in chestnut to create the base flesh tones. The model was then drybrushed to lighter and lighter shades of cream using various colours ranging from dehneb stone through to pinks and oranges. The belly of this chap has the Mortarion tripartite of skulls on the front which were highlighted in bleached bone to a lighter tone than most of the rest of the body to help them stand out.

In keeping with the majority of the rest of my plaguebearers, the plaguesword is painted in an unnatural shade of blue with a drop of red blood (from somebody else!) hanging from the top of the blade. I was tempted to paint the blade in a more traditional rust colour for this miniature, and I may yet change my mind on this. I just don't think the blue colour is working as effectively as it did for my other plaguebearers: principally because this miniature is much larger and this blade significantly different / stands out compared to the others.

The base has a grid of plastic stuck to the bottom of it. I've painted this in boltgun metal and highlighted with a thick line of pure white, but only of two of the four sides of each individual square in the grid. This gives the suggestion of glinting metal that the herald is stepping over. Additionally, it also has some hirst arts bits (to the rear), black gravel, and a small clump of static grass glued on as the final touch.

Reminder: October Army List Challenge

A quick reminder that the October army list challenge can be found by following this link. Will your forces be able to recover the cache from a Death World?

Chariot of Tzeentch, Part III -- Painted

Chariot of Tzeentch, Part II -- Herald and Disk

For the actual herald and his disk, I wanted something that was in keeping with the older Realms of Chaos stuff -- a disk that was more like a circular flying creature than a screamer or a floating (unintelligent) platform. To create my vision, I used a standard 40mm circular base and got to work with a whole load of milliput (greenstuff).As can be seen, the disk has a mouth sculpted at the front (pure greenstuff) coupled with a pair of peering eyes either side of it sourced from circular globes that come as part of the chaos spawn boxed set. At the sides of the disk, I added a couple of protrubers: a pair of horns from the chaos spawn set and a metal pair of Keeper of Secrets horns that come with one of the alternate heads on the Keeper.

The herald itself is a standard pink horror of Tzeentch. The arms of the horror have all been drilled and pinned however. For the outer arms, I decided that I wanted them to be spread to either side of the miniature: they are ultimately going to be holding some reins that will attach to the screamers on the decorative base of the whole chariot.
Although the other arms were all standard, I did add one additional arm that comes out of the pink horror's mouth! This arm is a pointing arm and adds to the chaotic (random) appearance of the daemon. Additionally, when I paint the chariot, this arm is going to be blue, to be in keeping with my earlier miniatures colour scheme.

The final additions consisted of placing a rune of Tzeentch in the centre of the disk near to where the herald is standing; adding some swirls (with a crafting tool) around the rune and stretching to the outside of the disk; and adding a magnet to the underside of the disk (buried in the milliput) to help with both balance (i.e. low centre of gravity) and attaching chains that the herald will use to "drive" the chariot with. I'll show the painted result of this conversion soon.

Chariot of Tzeentch, Part I -- Assembling the Base

Over the next few posts, I'll be writing up my scratch-built Herald of Tzeentch on a chariot that I built a while back and took to a recent tournament with me. For the chariot of Tzeentch, I wanted to build a convincing looking pink horror being pulled along on a disk by a pair of screamers. To this end, I started to build a base for the herald from scratch.
For the base, I simply used a thick rectangular cut of black plasticard and added a layer of textured (white) plasticard on top. From therein, it was a case of thinking about how the chariot might be constructed. I knew that I wanted to have two screamers on the base, so I thought about some ruins. My previous work with the Hirst Arts range came in handy here: I cast several pillars from their range and added them to three corners of the build. On one of these pillars, I wanted to rest a screamer. On the rear pair (as pictured above), I wanted to (somehow!) rest the disk and herald.

The second screamer was going to be a problem though. In the end, I elected simply to drill in to the plasticard base and insert a flying base stand for the second screamer to rest upon. That way, I could take the screamer off for transport and also use it on a different flying base as an individual screamer as required.

For the rest of the base, I scattered around a large number of debris items and fine, small grit to be suggestive of some ancient temple ruins.
The second picture shows how the screamers fit in with the base in the grand scheme of things. They rest toward the front of the rectangular base, with one balancing on the intact pillar.

In the next part, I'll detail the herald itself and how I solved where it would fit in to the scenic base I'd built. If I'd have been thinking more clearly about this, I might have build the herald FIRST, rather than the scenic base...

The Girl with the Blue Hair

A little addition to my daemonettes today: a girl with blue hair and some work on converting a base.

The miniature is a standard plastic daemonette, but on the base, I placed her on top of a wrecked rhino door (painted in a dull green colour) alongside some general detritus: a wire mesh and a loop of twisted florist wire. The base gives a wrecked city feeling to the daemonette that offsets from the blue of the hair.

Painting the daemonette began with the exposed flesh regions: base coating in a light brown colour, inking in chestnut and then steadily working the colour up toward a more bleached bone plus denheb stone mix highlight. With the flesh painted, I tackled the clothing and hair next -- this time choosing blue as the contrast colour. After inking the recesses in a dark blue stain, I gently drybrushed the vestments with silver to suggest a shiny corset. The hair on the other hand was painted up to space wolf grey using steady highlights.

The fine details were painted on last: including the white eyes and the tattoos on the right thigh and Slaanesh symbol on the forehead. Overall, I'm pleased with the outcome of both the paint work and the base on which the miniature is situated. The daemon is really offset well by the base in this case with the contrasting colours doing all the work for me.

October Army List Challenge

Overview.
On a forested death world, not too dissimilar to Barbarus, lies an ancient cache. The Mechanicum suggest that it might be components of a STC. The Eldar think its a huge source of wraithbone. But the atmosphere of the planet is too thick and poisonous to be sure that the intelligence is correct. Your team must go to the surface in person and recover the cache. But others are bound to be doing the same.

Rules.
(1) Design a 1000 points (standard mission) strike-force army from any codex to explore the surface of the death world and claim the objective. You can expect other teams of similar points value to be trying to do the same.
(2) The action takes place on a death world. At the end of every game turn, all members of your team will take an automatic S2 hit as the acrid atmosphere takes its toll. Additionally, all vehicles will take an automatic a glancing hit as the acid eats in to their hulls.
(3) The death world is heavily forested by acid-resistant plants. Line of sights are going to be small range! There may also be wandering monsters to take care of.
(4) Post your army lists as a comment to this posting and suggest why they're well suited to the mission.
(5) On Oct 14th 2009, I'll start a voting poll that will be open for 1 week to vote for what Warpstone Flux readers consider to be the "most effective army list that also best articulates the theme" (whatever readers interpret that to mean) out of all entrants.
(6) Winner will be tallied and announced on October 21st.

Remember, the real aim of these challenges is to help others design effective army lists that are both themed and effective. There are no prizes beyond honour and kudos!