The planet of Traja lies in the Reductus Sector under Imperial control. It is home to a relatively small specialist Imperial Guard regiment, the Drake Airborne. Recent unexplained warp anomalies in the sector picked up by the adeptus astronomica have sparked curiosity from the Imperial Inquisition. An investigatory mission drew blank when contact was lost and they failed to return. With ever increasing warp activity in the area the decision was made to call upon the resources and expertise of the Crimson Fists Space Marines.
A scouting force was deployed purely to observe and report any significant findings back to the high command. Reports of the society came back all but clear, their military forces seemed healthy but there seemed to be no cause for concern. However the space marine’s personal reports all suggested that there was an unwelcoming presence on Traja. Many of the brothers reported instances of incomprehensible ‘voices in the wind’ that could not be of human origin.
The Adeptus Arbites knew all too well that this had a faint aroma of chaos about it. They had seen huge uprisings in history seeded from less. The decision was taken to take a rather heavy handed approach and request a Space Marine strike force to be sent to take and secure control of the planet.
The mission, coordinated by Commander Vortae, was to take control of the capital city, Salus Atten, which should essentially ensure control of the planet ready to hand over to Inquisatorial control. The initial landing was scheduled to insert a spearhead force into the area around the city of
The landing was successful, met only by insignificant quantities of local ‘gang’ militia. Portalus quickly secured and scout patrols deployed on an observation role to obtain more accurate estimates of resistance to come on entry to Salus Atten. The communications from the scouting party to base were distorted and the findings unexpected. The city had a significant military presence which had obviously now initialled preparations to defend the city from the recent threat. The quantities however of mobile artillery and sheer man power could be large enough to potentially launch a counter attack. Commander Vortae and his Space Marines would have to act quickly before the enemy could consolidate its full force, as a delay could carry the risk of being forced to defend against a counter attack, and therefore could compromise the mission.
Conditions were not ideal; Vortae had just received information that one of his supply drops had experienced difficulties and had failed, as yet, to be recovered. The supply canisters had been dropped annoyingly close to Salus Attem. Scouts were immediately sent out to locate the drop position, but being so close to enemy soil they anticipated a degree of resistance. They could not afford for these supplies to fall into the hands of the enemy. Master Cyrus was assigned command of a recovery task force to ensure safe retrieval of the supplies.
Master Cyrus headed up the recovery team alongside Sergeant Curtis and his tactical squad. They were closely followed by Sergeant Ransol’s Tactical Marines and a dreadnought, Brother Barsov, veteran of many a war, clad in a highly armoured sarcophagus and armed to the teeth with assault cannon, heavy flamer to barbeque the traitor and blessed with a dreadnought close combat weapon to crush the heathen. The force was supported by two lascannon armed Razorbacks for mobility and fire support. As they closed in fast on the confirmed supply drop site Cyrus received a report from the scouting party that more drop containers had been located and that they would secure the site 2 coordinates while the recovery force dealt with site 1. The scouts also reported unconfirmed sightings of local militia heading towards the recovery force, most likely local gang members.
On arrival at the drop site 1 coordinates the Space Marines split down into 4, five man teams and began to secure the area. Sergeant Curtis’ squad began to secure the first canister.
“Incoming!” the razorback tank commander yelled through his communicator. A cascade of heavy weapons fire began ricocheting off the abandoned communications shack which stood about 5 metres away. The squad turned its attention to returning fire. From the sergeants position he could see at least fifty guardsmen in the distance in urban camouflage supported by what he recognised as an Executioner class Leman Russ Battle Tank. These were not gang members. These were organised traitor guardsmen facing themselves off against the Emperors finest warriors. Brother Sercosa raised his missile launcher to his shoulder and took aim at the leman russ and launched a krak missile, hitting the tank but failing to even slow the behemoth trundling into firing range.
The Leman Russ began to unleash its autocannon shots in a successful attempt to slow the razorbacks advance. As Sergeant Ransols razorback came into view the Space Marines continued to advance to secure the objectives. Master Cyrus refused to allow these traitors of the Imperium to get their hands on the canisters.
Brother Barsovs sensors scanned the area trying to locate the currently unclaimed canister. It appeared that the enemy militia were positioned directly on top of its location. Did they even know it was there? The two razorback lascannons provided consistent covering fire to subdue the enemy battle tank while, assault cannon blazing, armour clad Brother Barsov took it upon himself to repossess what was rightfully his. The marines looked on in sheer admiration as this veteran tore limb from torso as if they were made of nothing more than bread, burning the heretics in the promethium inferno they deserved while not even acknowledging the numerous projectiles ricocheting off his sarcophagus.
On the left flank Master Cyrus and Sergeant Curtis were being ambushed by the Guard’s elite. A unit of battle scarred veterans immerged to be met by the well rehearsed return of bolter fire, burning promethium and even Master Cyrus’ adapted plasma cutter. As the failed ambush broke, Master Cyrus turned to the sergeant. “I’ll take care of this”. Sergeant Curtis could only smile as he turned his attention back to preparing the supply container for transportation. The Master of the Forge, power axe in hand, began to pursue the falling back unit solo, flaming and cutting them down as they attempted to retreat.
The traitor guard still however seemed to think they still had some fight left in them. They refused to stand down despite their sorry position and launched a counter attack down the right flank towards Sergeant Ransols combat squad. Ransol readied his fist for the inevitable onslaught. All the recovery forces fire power was immediately redirected to address this right flank assault. The traitors took yet more horrendous casualties so the guardsmen thought better of the situation, finally accepted defeat and began a hasty retreat.
The mission had been a great success. Master Cyrus and his recovery force had succeeded in recovering all of the missing supply containers without conceding a single injury, but what would you expect from the Emperors finest?
This was a good day for heroes.
The conversion was pretty simple, i just cut out the basic lightening tail shape out of plasticard then covered in greenstuff to bulk it up and round off the edges a little. I then sculpted the ears in greenstuff
The picture above is a WIP pic of the paint job. I undercoated it with chaos black primer spray. I then brushed on iyanden dark sun leaving only the deepest recesses black. I then washed the whole model with baal red wash. I then drybrushed on iyanden dark sun again to brighten up the model, then drybrushed shining yellow to highlight the model further.
This is my recently finished scratch built ork warkopta 'chinork'. It is currently on display in the cabinet at my local GW store. I've gone with an oily bad moon colour scheme for my army. The bad moons are the richest so they can afford to pay buzzgob and his boyz to build some extravagant flying machines to throw them into battle possibly even faster that the evil suns speed freaks, sucks to be them!
I started off with an AOBR deffkopta, used a hacksaw to remove the rear rotor, then used 2mm plastic card to build the frame. I used some greenstuff to make a tighter and stronger connection between the deffkopta and the plastic main body.
This is the warkopta at the painting standard i was originally aiming for. However, when i took it up to show the guys at GW they told me about a vehicle painting competition they were running in the store so i decided to up my game and get it ready to enter. The guys up at GW also let me have a look at their store copy of imperial armour 8 with the rules for the warkopta. The model was built just with the rokkit launchas that were on the original deffkopta. After seeing the rules i added the wing mounted twin linked deffguns using magnets and changed the rokkit launcha for a big shoota simply by cutting off rokkits and adding 4 shoota barrels in their place.
I think a mega dread could well be a future scratch building project for me.... watch this space...
This is my WIP three door dreadnought drop pod pictured next to an unpainted drop pod kit. It is slightly taller and ever so slightly wider than the kit which it needs to be to carry my ironclad dreadnought (it's not actually big enough to put the actual dreadnought model complete with base inside). It is almost completely made from 3mm foamboard so far except for the door hinges which are made from two different thicknesses of plastic pipe which fit snugly inside each other. The black pipe at the top is a pqd till roll tube. The next step, should i get round to it, is detailing which i plan to do with plasticard and possibly do detailing on the floor using double tred textured plasticard.
My Asdrubael Vect conversion in all its glory. It's basically a falcon and a ravager spliced together with a converted dark eldar lord and converted incubi atop.
The base is a cd with bits of painted slate, flock and lichen on it. This conversion is in 3 parts for easier transportation, the base, the hull and the 'throne'. Also it means i can use it without the top 'throne' just as a normal ravager.
She is made using the Serevina Devout inquisitor model and the wings from the winged nightmare. The base is just slate from the garden. The photos don't show it that well but i sculpted all the damonette bases using greenstuff and a couple of bits of stone then painted it to look like the ground is cracking beneath them and glowing purple.
