The Tactical Auto Reliquary of Lord Tiberius

Having hit a bit of a hobby wall in terms of motivation with regards to my various projects over the holiday period I went back to basics and just decided to make something out of my bits box,

I love Servo skulls, plain and simple, they're also a great little thing to knock up if you just fancy five minutes with the superglue, and if you've got a skull in your bits box, you're pretty much there...

I came up with the idea of making a skull to represent one of the relics (heirlooms of conquest) in the new codex 'the Tactical auto reliquary of Lord Tiberius'. A servo skull containing the memory and personality of a foul tempered, patronising old general who floats along behind the senior officer blaring a endless succession of tactical 'suggestions' from its speakers and cutting into the vox net and countermanding anything it deems a mistake! 

Very 40k in my book, but to be honest any excuse to have a servo skull in my company command squad will do, it's also interesting to think that prehaps this particular relic was created to give a use to the nice servo skull that comes in the Cadian command box...

My 'Tiberius' was made from an undead skull with space marine backpack vents for the engine pods and vox grille, space marine decorative bits and bobs like a banner top, and some technical doodads shaved from a Cadian helmet - simples really - but better than Turning up with a list and saying 'oh he's got this' I suppose. Here he is WIP, pre painting, and lacking a few little details.

A group shot of all my servo skulls...

I haven't been completely idle otherwise, I have sub assembled a hydra for the Kaylan Lancers - just need a paint restock now and I can get cracking on that one.

I had been using two old metal 'vehicle crew on foot' miniatures as bodyguards in my company command squad but that option has been axed from the latest codex, wanting to put a use to two great sculpts I envisaged making up a remnant unit.

" As squads take casualties and are merged to bring them up to strength, inevitably there are leftover troopers forming an under strength section. In the lancers these are bolstered by the surviving crew of knocked out vehicles and formed into squads tasked with providing a protection detail to the more vulnerable support vehicles such as the griffons, wyverns and hydra. Thus allowing the 'regular' units to concentrate on archiving their objectives." 

I dug out the third miniature in the 'vehicle crew on foot' set, which I had never painted as he had 'the wrong type of lasgun' for the lancers, and converted up another crewman from a frateris miliaman I had tried and failed to use as a starting point for an Inq28 character. Add in a couple of spare guardsmen and I'm halfway there allready!

Lastly I also finished up a heavy Bolter team to add a bit more firepower to the veterans, here they are with the company command squad, but they'll probably end up in the remnants squad, with the company command squad getting the missile launcher team from one of my veteran squads and said squad getting an Autocannon as replacement.

Nuclear Renaissance- Gang 3 - Children of the apocalypse

Here is the third Gang I've completed for Nuclear renaissance, weighing in at 800pts. I'm going to need to add 200pts of reinforcements to the other gangs to balance things up...

A group of Feral cannibal fiends, the vanguard of the feared wasteland warlord Psymon Sezz.

First up we have the man himself...

A really simple conversion of an old plastic blood bowl human player, spikes added to the shoulder guard, a horse skull mask, a Forgeworld Cadian backpack and noise marine Claw. In game terms he is a close combat monster.

Psymons ride is his armoured steamroller 'fist of Psymon' an old corgi steamroller armoured up with chimera parts and other usefull junk.

Next if the 'Feral Skulltaker' one of Psymons warriors based on an old metal blood bowl elf with the bone back banner coming from an undead horse, the axe from a lizard man Saurus and some imperial guard pouches.

Third is the 'Feral Headhunter' based on another Bloodbowl elf, I added a bretonnian's lance as a spear with an IG lasgun sling, an empire thigh plate, a greenstuff knee pad and more spikes to the shoulder pads.

Together these three and the steamroller comprise the close combat half of the gang.

Next up are the Warriors with ranged weapons, firstly the 'Feral Stalker' a deadly sniper again built from a Bloodbowl elf with an imperial guard longlas and backpack.

Next up are the Feral Shaman, feral runt and their 'Technical' the 'voice of Psymon'

Voice of Psymon is an old Kellogg's promotional Citroen 2cv, up armoured in the usual fashion and with a gunnery platform on the back to operate the triple mortars crudely grafted on. In game terms its a mounted grenade launcher. Most of the bits here came from the IG heavy weapons team.

Feral runt is the driver (it's all he's good for as a stunted little goon) mostly skaven with a dark eldar head, a genestealer's claw and a greenstuff cloak.

Lastly is the Feral Shamen, gunner and the gangs technical expert, another Bloodbowl elf with a Cadian vox caster helmet, a lizardman Saurus scythe, a backpack from the sentinel kit, greenstuff knee pad, more spikes and lots and lots of ammo pouches along with a mortar round to link him with his role as bombardier.

Group shot of the shooters...

All in all I'm quite pleased how these guys turned out, considering the minis I was using as a starting point and the zero outlay needed to create the gang (bitz box special!)

In game terms this gang is has some very powerful ranged attacks and close combat fighters, plus some very tough and durable models in the form of Psymon and his steamroller, its disadvantages are a lack of speed and mobility in comparison with the other two gangs and a lack of specialists, no medic, bard or mechanic here! It's been designed to be an easy gang for someone to pick up and play to learn the game with simple character archetypes and skill sets - sniper snipes, axe dude chops etc etc.

Now all I need to do is sort out the reinforcements for the other gangs to balance things up!