May 21, 2013
As I mentioned in my first post, I’ve actually gotten quite a lot of work done already to prepare for Valhalla this coming August. However, I’m far from finished! I thought I’d use this post to list out for you which units I’m working on, and their status.
Chaos Space Marines – Death Guard & Night Lords
My CSMs are a combination of Nurgle forces and Night Lords. Night Lords were my first 40K army, and what brought me into the hobby (I loved the 3rd Edition Raptor models, and when I found out that Night Lords could take more than the minimum 0-1 that every other CSM army could take, I knew which Traitor Legion I wanted to play). However, since 5th Edition, Night Lords by themselves are not exactly viable. Sure, there’s the “counts-as” version where you use NL models but use the Blood Angels codex, and I’ve considered that, but ever since 5th Edition I’ve really liked Plague Marines as basic troops, and the Mark of Nurgle in general for what it provides units that take it. +1 Toughness is nothing to sneeze at, and Feel No Pain on Plague Marines is awesome. So, my fluff is that my main army is Death Guard, with a contingent of Night Lords providing long-range fire support (Havocs) and air support (Heldrakes). Pretty much everything else gets the Mark of Nurgle, and I often give the Mark of Nurgle to my Night Lord Havocs when the points are available, since they’re usually what my opponent focuses his fire on in the early turns. (Hey, it’s not perfectly fluffy, but I’m forging a narrative here!)
When I knew I wanted to use Plague Marines as my basic troops (with a Lord with the Mark of Nurgle, or Typhus, to lead them, of course and make these Elite choices Troop choices), I had a choice of what to do to represent them on the tabletop. In 5th Edition I had just used my Night Lord troops and declared to my opponent, “Those are Plague Marines; I know they don’t look like Plague Marines, but I paid the points for them, so they’re Plague Marines for the purposes of this game”, which no one objected to. But this time around, with the new 6th Edition CSM codex, I wanted to accurately represent Plague Marines on the battlefield. I could have bought a bunch of boxes of the Games Workshop Finecast Plague Marines, but didn’t really like the look of them, and didn’t want to have to deal with that much Finecast. Plus, at USD$45.00 per box of 7, they’re a bit pricey.
So I turned my eye to Forge World, and found the Death Guard Conversion sets on their website for GBP22.00 for a set of 10 torsos and heads and 20 shoulder pads. That’s around $34.00 or so for 10 guys. Of course, I needed to buy the basic box of 10 CSMs at $37.25, but there are ways of getting around paying full retail, especially when you’re buying in quantity. So for a little bit more money per guy, I went the Forge World route and got 4 Death Guard Conversion sets and 4 boxes of CSMs and built 4 units of 7 Death Guard Plague Marines to be my core troops choices. (I used some of the extra CSM bodies, legs and arms to help me build my Havocs, so they didn’t go to waste, and I plan on moving on to Khorne when I’m finally tired of Nurgle (no end of that in sight at the moment), so the extra legs and arms from the boxes of CSMs I bought will go towards making Khorne troops out of the Forge World World Eaters Conversion kits at some point in the future.) I’m glad I went the Forge World route on the Death Guard, as the sculpts are amazing, and even unpainted I’ve been getting a lot of compliments on them.
So that’s the background of my CSM army. Here’s a rundown of what I’ve been working on for the CSM portion of what I’ll be bringing to Valhalla:
Primary Detachment:
HQ:
· Typhus (painted by a friend, Aaron Smith).
· Nurgle Chaos Lord on Bike (using one of my old, already painted Night Lords bikers, with an awesome morning star conversion to represent The Black Mace).
Troops:
· 4 units of 7 Plague Marines (Death Guard), with two Plasma Guns and a Power Axe on the Aspiring Champion.
o Almost finished painting all 28 of these guys...
· 25 Plague Zombies (converted from Cadian Shock Troops and Fantasy Zombies), to be used with Typhus, or as regular Cultists should the need arise.
Fast Attack:
· 5 Nurgle Chaos Spawn (these run with the Nurgle Biker Lord).
· 2 Heldrakes with Baleflamers, painted in Night Lords colors.
Heavy Support:
· 2 units of 7 Havocs (Night Lords) with 4 Autocannon.
· 3 Obliterators (already painted, in Night Lords colors).
· 1 unit of 7 Havocs (Night Lords) with 4 Missile Launchers (this is a stretch goal that I may not be able to get painted in time for Valhalla this year).
Allies (Daemons):
HQ:
· Great Unclean One (using the Forge World Nurgle Daemon Prince as my GUO, a model I like a lot better than the GW GUO, and which is much more affordable (and which I like better) than the Forge World GUO).
o I was able to get this guy painted in 3 days back in April.
Troops:
· 2 units of 10 Plaguebearers.
o I was able to get these guys painted in a hectic week back in March, the first of my Nurgle/Night Lords force's models that I got painted for Valhalla.
Chaos Daemons
Between the new Chaos Space Marines codex and the new Chaos Daemons codex, I’m going to be busy trying out new things and building and painting new stuff for quite some time. However, for the time being, I’m totally focused on Nurgle. I haven’t yet played a game with just Daemons, but I’m hoping to get some in at Valhalla. The way my schedule looks, it’s going to take me right up until the weekend before I leave for Valhalla to get everything I want to bring (below) built and painted.
HQ:
· GUO (same one used as Allies with CSMs above).
· 4 Heralds of Nurgle, including Epidemius.
Troops:
· 2 more units of 10 Plaguebearers to go with the 2 units that I use as Allies with the CSMs. (These guys aren’t even built yet!)
Elites:
· 3 units of 3 Beasts of Nurgle, using the Forge World Plague Toad models in place of the GW Beast of Nurgle models (which just look like big turds to me).
Fast Attack:
· 2 units of 3 Plague Drones.
Heavy Support:
· 2 Soul Grinders, using the Forge World Nurgle Plague Hulk models as these are just awesome models and are a great representation of what a Nurgle Soul Grinder should look like (IMHO).
So that’s the lists of what I’m working on to get ready for Valhalla in August. The way I’ve got it worked out, all of the CSMs and Daemon allies that I need for 2,000 points will fit in a single Battle Foam P.A.C.K 720 bag, and all of the Daemons that I need for 2,000 points will fit in a single 720, as well. That should keep things simple in terms of what bags I need to bring to each game that I play while I’m at Valhalla.
Please feel free to let me know what you think of these lists. I’ll get some pictures of what I have painted already posted soon, but I wanted to get this post up on the blog as soon as possible just to keep things rolling along…
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