Chaos Cultists Pass In Review

When it comes to miniature wargaming; ever since I joined the military, I've felt compelled to collect multiple factions of miniatures.  I have my own World War II and Modern Micro Armor, consisting of vehicles from nearly all sides.

I've done this because I'd often be located in an area with few gamers and it would be up to me to provide both of the opposing factions' figures.

I'm no longer "globetrotting," but I work a rotating shift. Which means more often than not, I'm a "no-show" for scheduled gaming events.  I also like to concoct webcomics based on miniature gaming.  So I like to have an opposing faction on-hand for a photo-shoot, or even the rare game.

This has bled over into my Warhammer 40K collection.  The bulk of my figures and vehicles come from the ranks (upon ranks, upon...) of the Astra Militarum--the common foot-soldiers of The Imperium of Man.

But for the past couple of years, every time I purchased stuff at a game store, usually The Game Matrix, I'd pick up a small, 5-figure box of easy-build Chaos Cultists...

...until I had a total of 7 boxes/35 figures.  The box's content description lists the typical weaponry carried by the cultists.

A few months ago, I assembled the figures, then I sent the whole kit & kaboodle to Dan, my go-to guy for painting WH40K figures and vehicles.  When I got them back last month, I painted and flocked the bases.

I divided my Chaos Cannon Fodder into three groups differentiated by their bases.  One group of 10, are mounted on green, grassy bases.  The second group of 10 are on ash-grey bases, while the last group of 15 are on tan/brown sandy bases, with the darker brown-based figures forming a "command" group of sorts.

The next 11 pictures are a sample of one finished, 5-figure box, which I'll assume is a fire team or half squad.

A fire team of Chaos Cultists on patrol in the wilderness:

The first figure, I assume could be a team leader, or at least a close-combat specialist brandishing an auto pistol and morning star:

A side-view of Figure 1:

The second leader/close-combat figure is similarly armed with an auto pistol and flail:

A side view of the flail-bearer:

The third figure is cloaked and lugging an autogun of some sort:

A side view of the cloaked figure:

Because this figure leans so far forward, it was the most "tippy" of all the Chaos Cultists.  To resolve the tipping issue and to add more weight to the light plastic figures, I super-glued washers to the bottom of each base, then painted over each one.


The fourth figure is also a rifleman carrying what's generically described as an autogun:

The rifleman's side profile:

The last figure is another riflemen with a bayonet fixed to his autogun:

The bayonet-armed rifleman's side profile:

The remaining 30 figures were painted-up by Dan in a similar fashion.  No two look exactly alike.

Here's the entire 5-man "brown" command squad, and 10-man tan rifle squad:

My fully-mustered Chaos Cultist force looks something like this on the battlefield:

One of the main reasons I chose to collect the Astra Militarum is because the figures have a generic enough look I can utilize them in other sci-fi game settings.  Like US Colonial Marines in the Alien vs. Predator 'verse.

I can also use these Chaos Cultists as mutant soldiers in various post-apocalyptic/sci-fi horror settings.

Getting back to the grim darkness of WH40K, I couldn't find any printed game statistics for a mob of Chaos Cultists.

However, I found a few on-line sources.

For anyone still playing previous editions of WH40K, there's--

--Dark Future Games' 100-point Chaos Cultist force w/stats (2012), and

--Frontline Gaming's Chaos Cultist review (2017).

And for 8th Edition players, Creative Twilight brings the cultists up-do-date.

I certainly don't have enough cultists for a full WH40K Chaos force.

But I figure it will be enough as a mob of minions to throw at a Kill Team, or player characters in a session of Wrath & Glory.

Dark Angels Kill Team Pass In Review

(Image:  Dark Angels Symbol)

Opening Scene:

On a desolate spot on a desolate planet (is there anything else in WH40K's grimdark?)...

...an Imperial Valkyrie, flying nap-of-the-earth, slows, hovers...

...then lands.

As soon as the aircraft touches-down, a squad of scout marines from the Dark Angels Chapter egress, then fan out across the arid landscape.

The Valkyrie takes off, leaving the scouts...

...to accomplish their clandestine mission.

Collection Details:


What ever the Dark Angels Scouts are up to, I won't know for a while. And it won't be me telling their tale of derring do.

Sorry.

I intend to pass these on to my son-in-law.  But while I still have them, I figured I'd do a write-up.

I wasn't planning on acquiring any Space Marines in my Warhammer 40,000 (WH40K) collection, but among my on-line purchases of used figures, this guy was among them:

I'm not sure what Space Marine Chapter he belongs to, or if he's completely painted.

I changed my mind--sort of--when I stumbled across a handful of Dark Angels Scouts for sale on-line by Arthur Woo.  I've bought most of my used & pre-painted WH40K through Arthur, who lives in Canada and currently operates on the various Facebook Marketplaces.  He'll have a Facebook page soon, that I'll link to in upcoming WH40K posts.

When they arrived, I contacted Dan, the guy who's been painting my Astra Militarum figures, to see if he'd repaint them.

I decided on a squad/kill team of Raven Guard Scouts.  Of all the Space Marine Scouts, I liked the uniforms and mission of the Raven Guards the best.  I find the other Space Marine Scouts to be too brightly attired and kitted-out with too many close-combat weapons which appears at odds with their reconnaissance role.

Unfortunately, when Dan tried re-painting them, the figures' details were lost once the primer coat was applied to two test subjects.

He said the figures would have to be stripped first, which would take more time--and more money.

I told him not to do anything else with the figures and leave the rest as is.

It just so happens that my son-in-law is in the initial phases of collecting a Dark Angels force.

So my purchase isn't a loss at all.

When I got the figures back I touched-up and flocked the bases.

This particular scout team consists of 5-6 members, all armed with sniper rifles.

The first figure is the squad leader:

The next figure can either be the squad leader with his vision enhancement goggles down over his eyes, or the assistant squad leader:

The next two figures are riflemen on sandy bases:

The final figures for this squad are two more riflemen on grassy bases:

But these, along with the double-primed black figures aren't the only ones I received.

My purchase included this odd pair of riflemen:

I contacted the seller and asked him who these two are suppose to be.  He said he purchased them from a third party who kit bashed two Dark Angel Scout bodies with Aeldari heads.

Why?

The seller didn't know.

Well, at least they're not Drukhari.  They creep me out.

So I decided to keep the Aeldari Dark Angel Scouts, along with the blue-coated orphan scout.

I'm not sure what their backstory will be, so I'll ask around and see if anyone has ideas on how they can fit into the "...grim darkness of the far future..."

WH40K & Kill Team Pass in Review: Kroot

(Image:  Kill Team Logo)

It's been nearly two months since my last post and all of it is due to Life Getting In The Way issues.

Specifically, my daughter and son-in-law had a baby boy so my wife and I made, not one, but two cross-country trips to visit them.

Prior to the family visits, I bought several WH40K Kill Team products, along with numerous figures and vehicles from individuals via on-line sales.

My main force, the Astra Militarum, is based around a reinforced armored cavalry squadron.

But sometime last year I stumbled across an individual selling his small collection of Kroot.  (I can't remember his name).

Most Kroot figures look nice, clean--and beautifully painted--like these:

(Image by:  Steve Greeves)

But these were painted as if covered in the blood of their recently eaten victims.

For some disturbing reason I liked them and was the only one who offered to buy them, nearly 20 in all.

Age and the rigors of shipping were rough several of the figures.  Most suffered from broken arms, right above the wrist which required super-glue surgery.  One figure's support weapon was broken.  I also touched-up the bases and figures, along with flocking the bases and adding painted pennies underneath each figure to add some weight.

Other than these dings, I was happy with my purchase.

I've read several reviews of the Kroot.  While individually fierce, Kroot units are under-armed and have very little staying power.

Which in an odd way, would make these creatures perfect for me to learn Kill Team, or WH40K, whenever I get around to actually playing either game.

Games Workshop has developed a reputation for not fully supporting sub-factions within the WH40K 'verse.  However, the company appears to be making some amends.  The January 2019 Issue of White Dwarf Magazine featured the article Mercenaries for Hire. This 4-page article (pages 62-65) contained the stats for players to run Kroot kill teams.

Here's what mine would look like:

To identify them better, I used the Kroot Name Generator Table and labelled every figure.

First the kill team's specialists, (names listed under the picture):

Kra to Tohorrok--Leader

Dohra cha Yotoh--Scout

Khar grok Tohorrok--Sniper

Dihra cha Gorrkha--Close Combat Specialist

Ohrak yo Ga'ah--Zealot

Ahkra to Choh--Veteran

According to the rules, a battle-forged kill team can only have three additional specialists along with the leader, which is mandatory (page 66).

So I'll have to select which figures to use in any given game, or "demote" them to regular warriors, like these:

Ohrak cha Dohr

Cho grok Krrah

Tehk yo Kyrek

Byahk yo Gota

Gohk ohk Ga'ah

Byohk ka Yotoh

Khir ah Dohr

Grohm ek Rhekk

Grohm grok Rhekk

Ohrak ek Krrah

Khor grok Choh

Since this Kroot's weapon was broken, I can't identify it (flamer?).  So I'm not sure what role he'd fill.

Gehk ok Krrah

So there you have it:  My practice force of "disposable heroes."

My Road to the Grim Darkness...

(An image from Rick and Morty posted on Tumblr by Warhammer 40K Fantasy)

I've known about Warhammer 40,000 (WH40K) shortly after its initial release in 1987.  However, I've avoided getting into it--until several years ago when my daughter met her now-husband.

While he did some other gaming, he was primarily a WH40K player and collector.  So in order develop more common interests between us, I thought I'd just buy the core rules and a "few models" so I could at least talk to him about the "...grim darkness of the far future...."

Yeah. Right.

Five years and 20 blogposts later, my "small" collection exploded into this--

(Image:  My WH40K vehicle collection in a display case)

--21 armored personnel carriers of various types and from 3 different factions, mostly Astra Militarum, with a few from the Adepta Sororitas (a.k.a. "Sisters of Battle" nuns with guns of the Ecclesiarchy) and even the Inquisition.

--8 Lehman Russ Battle Tanks and variants.

--3 self-propelled artillery vehicles and one anti-aircraft vehicle.

--3 static gun positions.

--25 heavy weapon teams and,

--230 troops, mostly foot soldiers of the Astra Miltarum, along with a few squads of Battle Sisters and a couple Inquisitor retinues, along with some alien warriors.

And I'm having another 35 figures painted as I'm writing this.

Initially, I bought kits of un-assembled vehicles and figures.  But then I stumbled across buy/sell/trade pages on Facebook and began buying assembled and painted miniatures for about the same price as the un-assembled kits.

I apologize for the sparse details, but I intend for this to be a "teaser" for future posts on my collection.  I'm currently suffering from a foot injury and I made it worse by attempting to do a prolonged photo shoot.

Besides the pictures didn't turn out well.

Of course, one can't simply buy miniatures without any guidance on what to do with them.

So over the course of about 5 years, I acquired 63 rule books and splatbooks of the main game, along with role playing game by Fantasy Flight Games and the new Wrath & Glory role-playing game which WAS produced by Ulisses-US, but now seems to have been dropped from the company's website, possibly due to a considerable number of negative reviews.

The main game, is now on it's 8th Edition, which I started buying two years ago.

Notice, I said "started buying?"

That's because Games Workshop, like every other game company, would produce new supplements, accessories, etc. after the core rules are published.

The bulk of my book collection are earlier editions of the rules, or Forgeworld reference books.

(Image:  Shelf space devoted to older issues and Forgeworld books)

When 8th Edition hit the shelves in 2017, I limited to my purchases to the main faction I was collecting--the Astra Militarum (a.k.a. the Imperial Guard).

(Image:  My main collection of WH40K books and RPG material)

Back when the short-lived 7th Edition was being played, I picked up almost all of 6th Edition rules and Codexes at used book stores for $5-$20.  I figure while the gaming Crunch has most likely changed since previous editions, the background Fluff should remain the same.

Of course, my feeble attempt at pinching pennies went out the window when Kill Team came out last year:

(Image:  My infantry storage cases and new Kill Team sets)

So there you have it.  My "small" investment into the wacky world of Warhammer 40K expanded to fill the empty spaces on my shelves and in my closets.

And speaking of shelf space, I can safely say I'm approaching my limit.  I'm at the point now where if I buy anything new--of any game--I have to get rid of something old.

I'd love to purchase a few more vehicles, specifically some Salamander scout vehicles, Destroyer tank destroyers, if I could find them in the first place since Forgeworld no longer produces them; along with a Lehman Russ Vanquisher.  But I have no room to put any of them.

The irony of all this is:  I have yet to play a single game of any edition of WH40K, Kill Team or either editions of the role playing games.

Nor is WH40K the only game system I've invested in, but have spent little to no time at the game table with.  I've whined about explained my game-time shortage in previous posts, so I won't bore readers (again) with the details.

Anyway, when a friend of mine shared this meme on Facebook...

(Image found on Solitaire Wargames Facebook Page)

..I felt it certainly applies to me regarding my entire collection of games.

I'm sure this is true for some (many?/all?) of you gamers out there.

Despite my lack of table-top time with WH40K I'm happy with my "small" collection, which is about the size of a reinforced mechanized infantry company.

I have a concept of how I'm going to organize it, what the unit will be called and webcomic stories I'll concoct about.

As soon as my foot heals and I can withstand standing for long photo shoots, I'll start posting what my contributions to the Imperial war efforts are.

Stay tuned!