Part Seven: The Little Things
When I was struggling to come up with a suitable (and cheap) model to represent a Necron Warrior a friend of mine suggested a spider like robot concept seen in part 2.

I loved it as it reminded me of the ‘Tachikoma’ robots from a favourite anime series of mine called ‘Ghost In The Shell’. But then another obstacle for the project appeared which were the 5th edition rules. This caused me to ditch the spider robot because with the true line of sight rules a robot that short would be a nuisance for both me and my opponent. Until now.

All the models so far were coming out well but I was beginning to have my doubts about the Interceptors models: They were a pain to paint to a good standard and some Forgeworld stuff have the worst mould lines ever, which on a model this small is a problem. This made me reluctant to use them. Then I remember Wordbearer’s spider design. So I sat down with some bits and a new robot emerged:



‘The Steel Scorpion!’ Overall it looked fantastic and was kind of cute due to its small size; however I could only fit two to a base.
The way it works in regards to the scarab’s jet bike movement is it’s ability to jump great distances making it very agile allowing it to get where it’s needed quickly. Kind of like these robots but without the webbing: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=EQrIQ3E8- ... re=related

Overall these robots will represent my Scarabs now, as for the Interceptors they’ll be used for decorative purposes only.

I’m all set to begin construction of the army in May.
However I’ve been play testing some army lists using my local store Necrons so I know exactly what I need to build, problem is it’s becoming clear that I may need a C’tan in my Necron army (most likely a deceiver) so right now I’m coming up with concepts on how to portray a c’tan using this army’s theme.

Current rumour says C'tan will be Apoc only in the new book, so you may want to hold that idea for a while.

I like the spiders far more than your gnats. Go with them.

I’m currently having doubts about the project at the moment, the conversions all look fantastic but the Necron codex is one of the hardest codexs next to the guard to use with the 5th edition. And while the guard are about to be fixed up so they work better with the 5th edition rules the Necron’s will not be fixed till mid 2010. Do I really want to make an army that will struggle to win games against competitive opponents and tournament players (who I mostly face) for such a large space of time?

So far I’ve considered creating a 2nd army using a difference codex that will feature the Iron Guard conversions by creating them so they can swap out arms between ones armed with gauss blasters and ones armed with Boltguns. Certain codexs come with nice benefits with a few examples listed below…

Witch Hunters: Acts Of Faith representing Acts of the machine god and the machine god avatar will make a good model for representing the living saint.
Space Marines: I maybe able to use the destroyers as attack bikes plus design scouts as a sort of backup military force for the Zanatorians.
Chaos: Sadly I’ve already converted a Death Guard force for my undead theme so I can’t use them for the Iron Guard. Although the chaos list has things such as defilers, deamon princes and obliterators that may fit the theme well.

I’m in serious doubt here guys should I grit my teeth and stay with the Necron codex or should I consider a backup list and if so which force?

Part Seven: The Big Things

Apart from the C’tan there is one unit that is effective in pushing infrantry back in close combat and smashing up vehicles and that is the Tomb Spyder.

So far I’ve had only two ideas on what I could use to convert this mechanicial monster, the 1st was to use the large Inquisitor Tyrus model from the Inquisitor range and convert it into a large robot but I felt that wouldn’t work.

The 2nd was a lot more interesting which was to get a hold of 1 or maybe 2 of the old rogue trader dreadnoughts and use them as Tomb Spyders.



It would be a simple conversion to replace the arms with that of a Tomb Spyder and perhaps experiment a bit with the legs, they seem the best suited model to represent such a unit and still blend in well with the rest of the army. But before I begin my hunt I would like you opinion on using such a classic model in my army?

Try and find the WD with the kill team villains in it. There were quite a few nice conversions in there.

I still use them for the Blood Drinkers.

Old Models? They are at least a year younger than the Marines in my army!

Iron Guard Improvements & Alterations

I've been improving my painting skills and I decided to update the old model with a brighter base and some blending highlights to really improve the quality of the model.



I hope to repeat this level of quality with all my models.

A 2nd Army: Different Codex, Same Models

As I’ve mentioned in earlier posts I’m worried about how my army may perform using the Necron codex so I’ve decided to create a 2nd army that could be made by switching the robots weapons around.

I will still use the Necron list but only for friendly games when it gets down to being competitive like tournaments I will use this second army. The 2nd army will be a death guard force with 6 obliterators and some lash princes, mainly because 1. It involves very little models and 2. I’ve always wanted a cheesy list of my own to use and since this is my favourite conversion theme I’d thought I use them for it.


(Bolter Armed Mock Model 1)

Of course this means a bit of conversion and while the development of the bolter weapons and conversion ideas for the obliterators seem to be going well. I’m at a lost on how to convert transport vehicles that match the Iron Guard’s appearance?

Any suggestions on a transport conversion?

Boltgun Improvements

The current boltgun was too thin to use on the model so I instead tried using a storm bolter but that look very good, luckily I have a good amount of old ork bolters so I tried using on of them on the robot replacing the large magazine for the current Boltguns. The result is a vast improvement on the last weapon.



But to be honest I still much prefer using the Necron codex for these guys, I just hope I’m not forced to resort to using another codex for them in ‘plan B’.

Final Decision On The Codex Issue

I’ve finally come to a decision on what codex I should for the theme, now I’ve had a lot of people suggesting that I ditch the Necron codex and adopt a more effective one for my Mechanicus army.
Now I thought long and hard about it and decided that I would still build my Necron army but at the same time build another more effective army along side it to use until the Necrons get a re-release.

I was going to choose a small lash list from the chaos codex, but then a better solution appeared. The Deamon Codex seems the perfect choice for my 2nd list as most of the robots I’ve built to represent Necron units can easily represent the Tzeentch daemons as well without having to edit anything on them…

Machine Avatar: Keeper Of Secrets Or Fateweaver
Dragoons: Flamers
Iron Guard: Horrors
Steel Scorpions: Nurglings
Tomb Spyders: Deamon Princes
And I’ve got an interesting conversion idea for Screamers.

I will still use the Necron list from time to time but till the new codex comes out this codex will do perfectly.

The Zanatorian Golem

The Rogue Trader Dread and Spyder came through the post today and I decided to assemble it and get an idea on what it would look like when it was completed.



It's a simple conversion: replace the arms with that of a Tomb Spyder however I felt I had to cover up the ball joints with crusader shoulder pads (I'll have 2 soon). I feel it will fit right in with the rest of the force when it is completed but for now I'm looking for feedback on it and if any improvement can be made?

The Zanatorian Golem Part 2

The 2nd Rogue Trader Dreadnought came through the post today and since he was unpainted I immediately snapped the arms of the previous dread and placed them on him.



He’s a bit taller than the 1st dread which makes him look even meaner and tougher plus his the arm sockets were a bit higher making the arms look a lot better. Now I looking to get a another dreadnought the same height to replace the shorter dread.

Hopefully I know someone with 2 Rogue Trader Dreads and with luck I maybe able to persuade him to trade it for one of his taller models.

Unlucky

Tank Busters

While most of my Mechanicus models can effectively represent both Necron and Deamon units there are some deamon units that require me to convert new robots for them. 1 Of these is the Screamer an awesome tank buster unit for any all Tzeentch army.

After a night of experimental modeling I created a sweet little conversion which I can easily be made from left over bits from the Dragoon and Destroyer conversions. It works by flying close to a tank before unleashing a powerful electro magnetic wave that can either disrupt the systems (shaken or stunned) or overall load the vehicle’s systems completely (destroyed), course this means it’s useless against infantry which is exactly how the screamer is.



There are still parts of it that are imperfect such as the arms and inside of the wings and I hope to have those areas improved later this week.

I’m also trying to figure out a robot to represent ‘The Changeling’ whether it will be a psyker’s brain implanted into a robot or an ancient piece of tech that focuses on feeding info directly into the targets brain to create illusions I’ve yet to choose?

Psychic Tech

The Changeling is a must in any all Tzeentch army, for 5pts it allows me to force an enemy unit to target a friendly unit so they can either stand around confused or pass a leadership to try and see through the illusion if not they shoot everything they can at the chosen friendly unit.

Such an ability would certainly require a robot that has some level of psychic power I thought of two options 1. A psyker’s brain implanted into a robot or 2. An ancient piece of tech that focuses on feeding info directly into the targets brain to create illusions. I decided to choose both and created the Zanatorian Mastermind.



The legs were the biggest issue but I finally got it sorted, what do you think?

Also someone pointed out that the spine on the Disruptor screamed Necron so I decided to replace it with the destroyer’s gunner arm.



It's a vast improvement from the first model as it makes the model really look like it projects some sort of wave.