Death Korps of Krieg - Company Command Squad.

 

"Hive Heleradon stands or falls by our actions gentlemen" Captain Sain-Stagier said to the assembled officers and unit leaders of his command. 

They had gathered to discuss the coming assault on the next objective, a ruined Municipal Building which would become the next HQ post as they pushed further into the counter attack.

"Red platoon will form on the right flank and move forwards through this Commercia here" he indicated on the map laid out on ammunition crates, drawing and arrow with a wax pencil as he did so.

"If you need support, I'll have the Armour drawn up and ready, however, keep in mind they may be needed elsewhere if the heretics attack with their own armour".

"Understood Captain" lieutenant Abelin replied with a nod, the red shoulder pad marking him out as the leader of that platoon, the one flash of colour on his outward uniform of dull blue-grey.

"Good, now Blue platoon, Calvet that's your lot. You're going to Anchor the left flank, that's this Hab unit here" Sain-Stagier stabbed his pencil at a series of buildings on the map.

"Take the Hab quickly and work your way upwards, the overlooking windows will be perfect vantage points for your sharpshooters".

"Yes Captain" Calvet said, his own should plate a deep blue to stand against his greatcoat, each man had a blue-grey coat, but some were more grey then others depending on how long they'd been deployed for. Calvet's was more washed out and grey then blue these days, in contrast tomthe Captain's own which was much newer.

"Once that is done, Vallotton and myself will storm the building with Yellow platoon, under supporting fire from the Autocannon squads positioned here and here" Sain-Stagier said, again marking positions and movements on the map as he briefed the men.

"Silvestre, I haven't forgotten about your riders, you're squadrons are to ride to these positions, your orders are to prevent any counter-attacks forming against us and to ride down any fleeing enemies from our assault"

The Death Rider commander nodded in silence, the braiding of his uniform a contrast to the utilitarian greatcoats of the infantry.

Sain-Stagier studied his gathered men, his grey eyes meeting every man present. Not one looked away from his scrutiny, 'good, fighting men' he thought and grabbed his cup off the edge of the map.

"Gentlemen, If you'll raise your cups, a toast to victory." Each man raised his enamel mug with what little recaff they had left in it.

"In the Emperor's name" Sain-Stagier intoned.

"In the Emperor's name" the officers replied.

*****

Over a year ago, nearly two years in fact, my friend Fraser bought himself a huge Death Korps of Krieg army, and Voluntold me I was painting it.

I started off and then things sort of tailed off for a while and I'd come back to it and then leave it a bit and come back to it, etc etc.

Well this year, keeping momentum up, and using it as a pallet cleanser before diving back into the Feudal Japanese Project, I decided to make a concerted effort to get units for this army finished.

I started with the Company Command Squad, as I'd converted a few of them from eBay spares and repairs, and had the Commander built and primed for over a year before going back in and deciding to get painting!

Fraser requested "World War One French" uniforms, so several bottles of Vallejo Model colour, French Mirage Blue were purchased as well as a couple of khaki colours, everything else was Citadel paints (as those are what I am most used to working with).

For the Officers and Command Squad I decided to go with the Blood Red trousers of historical French Officers and then the blue-grey greatcoats.

Here they are, paired up with the Company Commander*:

The plastic veteran guardsman unit is a lovely kit and includes a LOT of lovely little extra details, such as mess tins and cups, bed rolls, wire cutters and shovels to add to the models.

I particularly like the Kill Team upgrade frame with the selection of medals that you can pin to one of your soldiers to denote a veteran.

One thing I know Fraser likes to do with his forces is to double-up/maximise his special weapons where possible.

The Forge World Command Squad for the Krieger's comes with a Meltagunner and a Plasmagunner. It was therefore quite easy to simply swap out the meltagun with a spare plasmagun from the plastic kit.

I built the Vox-Operator in a kneeling pose and used one of the robotic arms**, obviously this veteran has seen some action!

You can also see the Blood Red trousers I used most clearly on the Vox-Operator, I decided that everyone in this squad was at least Sergeant rank, maybe higher depending.

Here, with the rear of the models, you can see their packs and bedrolls, and the details I added, like the wire cutters and the extra roll on the left hand Plasmagunner.

The Vox-Operator has his Lasrifle secured to his Vox so he always has a weapon:

Up next are the Company Standard Bearer and the Company Commander himself.

The urban bases, whilst matching the Tyranid army, are also a blessing in that they let me disguise the fact that the Standard Bearer has no feet!

He is a Forge World resin model, and out of the spares and repairs bag I bought, he had no feet...some cork torn to represent blasted concrete and I had the perfect illusion and an extra model for pence.

The Company Commander was built from Forge World resin again, but with his weapons replaced by a plastic Bolt Pistol and Power Sword:

I took extra time over the standard itself, as it really is the focal point of the squad. I was originally going to try to work something like a military green onto it, but after watching a few of Mediocre Hobbies videos on YouTube, I decided to take his Blue and Red and work that onto the banner instead. I'm really, really happy with his it turned out with the various highlights and the half checkered shield, I think the skulls are a bit much personally, but we're in 40k land, there HAS to be skulls everywhere:

And the work done on the rear of these two leaders, the banner highlighted up and you can see the detailing with the extra pouch and shovel added to their backpacks:

Next week have a Master of Ordnance.

This guy is basically the Imperial Guards version of a Forward Artillery Officer, he calls in the bombardments and provides fire support for the company.

What I love about this is that you don't have to actually model the artillery guns (although they're very cool, why wouldn't you?) because as long as he stays still, you can call a bombardment in anywhere in his Line of Sight***.

I went with a very standing tall pose, and gave him some extra rubble under his feet to make him that little bit taller, the binoculars are a great touch to add, and whilst he has his own vox pack on his back, ties to the regimental artillery group no doubt, I also added a small signal booster pack at his feet, make from the detonator of the demolitions veteran, just with the terminals painted as is they were flashing lights:

Details of the box, I replaced the original plastic Ariel with a pair made from Detonator wire I pilfered from the scrap bin at work:

The book arm is again, a favourite piece from the Kill Team sprue, I imagine this time that it isn't the Imperial Infantryman's Uplifting Primer, rather a Time on Target chart to co-ordinate artillery fire over long range:

Finally here is a group photo of the Commander, Master of Ordnance and the Company Command Squad:

Not shown very well in the photos, but I have tried to vary the blues and greys subtly on the different models, so not everyone has the same.colour greatcoat, some campaigning and weathering has already taken place.

I will be happy to get going on this project in the long term (not that it hasn't been long term already), as there are some choice kits coming up which I want to paint, but I'm going to work up a playable force for 5th edition, so that we can at least play a couple of games as I work on the rest of it.

I'm not going to list everything which he bought here, I'll just update as and when I build/finish something new for the army.

Until next time, have nice day...

*In my preferred 3rd/5th edition of the rules, these would just be bought as one unit of the Commander and Command Squad.

I'm the current 10th edition, which Fraser will probably be playing them using, you buy the Company Commander as one choice and the Command Squad as a separate selection, a bit daft if you ask me, but I don't like the current rules.

The Master of Ordnance was always a separate add-on to the unit, similar to how Commissars have always worked.

**Additionally, I am giving all Vox-Operators the flare gun from the Kill Team sprue as a way of denoting their duties.

Often a coloured flare would be used for a signal, the colour depending on the order. It would be kind of hard to send and receive orders to a squad spread out on trench fighting, so the Vox's responsibility includes firing the correct flare for the order.

***This is how he worked in 5th edition, I don't know how he works in 10th.

Stormbreaker Half-Track, part 1.

In last month's Hobby Spending review, I mentioned that I had taken a punt on a 3D printed Half-Track off of eBay.

The item in question arrived safe and sound and I've been busy working on it, so decided to document it here.

For reference, the Stormbreaker kit is a 3D printed proxy of the Games Workshop Taurox transport for the Imperial guard (Astra Militarum for you new people):

I mentioned that it was safe and sound, because after looking at reviews from other sellers, and a previous experience with a seller on Etsy, it can be something of a shot in the dark as to whether you're going to get your item in a timely fashion or even at all.

Onto the kit, very well produced and packaged, my only gripe here is the amount of plastic used to send it in, nearly every part was individually wrapped with plastic, if you're environmentally conscious this may be a turn off for you:

Getting the rear hull/transport piece out of the bag, it's very nicely printed, and rather refreshingly cured and dry!

I've had prints before which have leaked as I've taken them out of the box and I've had to then take time rinsing everything off and leaving it to finish curing for a few days in a sunny window:

Hollowed out to save resin and weight, you can see the drainage holes, a thorough check of these ensured non of the leakage issues I'd mentioned above.

I was very impressed:

You can just make out the bobbling texture on the underside of the hull, this is where the support raft will have been and torn away after printing.

It leaves this sort of texture, but being well planned and on the underside of the hull is a blessing as I don't have to clear it up:

The full kit laid out on the cutting mat.

A reasonable number of parts and shouldn't take too long to put together:

A few details comparisons now, obviously the company cannot use the Games Workshop Aquilla symbol, so here is their "winged skull":

Likewise the Comms Array next to a GW Sentinel version:

And Autocannon, again from a GW Sentinel:

Getting into the assembly, the axles and motion units all have a T shaped connection so that you cannot assemble them upside down, hard to do, but I know someone who probably could:

And then there was this piece which took me a little while to figure out what it was for and why it wasn't just moulded straight onto the vehicle:

After looking at the photo of the kit on eBay, I realised that the other versions of this tank come with a Missile Launcher which gets attached here, and this is just a blanking plate to cover the slot:

The main parts assembled, the turret and motion units are complete, I'm leaving the Bullbar loose for painting, but wait...:

Drainage holes, in an awkward place!

I'm not sure if there was meant to be something to fit there or not as I didn't have anymore pieces in the box, but we can't leave a pair of holes in the main hull.

Out with the plasticard then, a 20thou section cut and glued into the space, bent into shape by pressing the front hull against it:

Now most of the kit was in fantastic condition, no warpage or misprints that I could see, then I got to the rear exhausts:

The kit is meant to have two rear exhaust stacks, one on either side of the vehicle, however in the photo above, one was slightly misprinted and wouldn't fit in the mounting hole, and would have been at the wrong angle hanging off the tank entirely.

I just added the correct on, as below, and will cover the mounting place for the misprinted one with some stowage.

The magnet in the photo above, I added myself, it doesn't come with the kit.

I was trying to be clever and thought I'd magnetise the Hotshot Lasgun Arrays to the side, as their mounting lugs were misprinted and wouldn't fit into the tank, also I could swap then off it needed, etc.

Whilst it worked, I'm not entirely happy with how I mounted the magnets, so I may ditch the weapons and just add stowage around the rear moving forward:

Finally, as a friend said that the above photo looked almost epic scale (6-8mm), I took a scale shot with my Vanquisher and a couple of Catachan Guardsmen to give a sense of the scale: 

I'm impressed with the tank itself and the service from the seller, as said something it can be a bit of a gamble buying 3D printed as sellers often don't cure or drain things properly and I've seen too many horror stories for it to be a coincidence...

There was no residue or resin leakage at all with this kit straight out of the box and it went together in about an hour, whilst cooking dinner as well.

There are a few things, such as the misprints on the exhaust and Lasgun Arrays, and the drainage holes which I had to cover, I'm not sure if i was missing parts there. 

The details on the track unit are a little soft if I'm getting REALLY picky, but I can live with that as it's a gaming piece.

When compared to a plastic kit, I don't think ANY 3D printer will be replacing them for quality, the main draw I find is cost:

Games Workshop Taurox - £35*

Stormbreaker Half-Track - £15*

I purchased this on a special offer from the seller for £11.40, which was less then the cost of a pub lunch*!

I'll provide a link to Ruins of Ashelnia the seller, and would highly recommend them given the service i have seen so far, it took about a week, maybe ten days in total from placing the order to being delivered to my door, which again, is very reasonable and impressive turnaround time as i imagine that these are printed to order, not kept lying around on shelves waiting.

Also, after being in contact with the guys who run the store, they informed me that the original al STL design comes from Surrogate Miniatures, who make many proxy models for various games.

I am tempted to go back and order a couple of other bits, looking at their Chaos Warlord kit in particular! I wonder if they have any Tyranid offerings?

I'll do a follow up post once I've detailed the tank to match my Vanquisher and gotten it painted, as it's going to join the armoured squadron.

Until next time, have nice day...

*At the time of writing.

Useful kit...

 

April fools...

Until next time, have nice day...