Salamander progress

Wow, you think.  That's been a long time.  Yes, but nonetheless, progress is made !  In the dim mist's of the internet's past, a nice man who goes by the moniker "Sheep" (he now does a fine line in SoH) did a very nice DKK titan hunter army.  One of the things I sort of half remember is putting tarpaulins on vehicles. So all that time ago when I began the salamanders this what I intended to do. 

Apologies for the ifone pictures. 

A weak white glue solution.  My thanks to Costa for the stirrer and our local Chinese takeaway for the tin tray - I grab the ones which had the crispy duck pancakes in them - the pancakes are plastic sealed and the trays do not need cleaning.  Not that we have that many takeaways....

Reasonably heavy paper for the actual tarpaulin.

Vehicles awaiting these tarps before they can be loaded up with the final bits of stowage and the weapon systems and crew. (see laying about in the other tray)

Way more than enough paper - its a strip off the bottom of a page cut roughly into four sort of equal bits of the order of size for the Salamander similar to those I remember from my previous life.

In the end, tiny amounts are pressed into place - air recognition panels perhaps.  I didn't want them too large as I've already put a bit of effort into weathering these in the first instance.  But this stage is now done and I can on with the rest of the build...

Edit: It was Bungaroo's thread on Warseer.

Armageddon Steel Legion heavy armour

So this update does not include the Chimerae of the Infantry screen or the Sentinels, so these arn't complete family portraits, just the heavy armour element.  

A group shot showing the corpus.  42 troop look conspicuously dirty (not a problem).  The new tanks of 43 troop look even more conspicuously clean.  Because they still are, in this picture (taken quickly whilst the small people were out).

Squadron HQ and 41 Troop, with the Commandant's Crassus in the background.

The newer elements here, 43 Troop and the Stormsword, obviously in need of a little more work.  Once this photo was taken I actually time to finish all of the base colours on 43 Troop (hurrah !) which means the next stage is the oils wash for these four tanks.

The Commandant's Crassus doubles as 902 Div HQ, it is from here that General Commandant Welbhann commands 902 Div.

The Stormsword is provided for a Steel Legion tank regiment commander to command his tanks from during an engagement.  In reality, as Divisional commander, he cannot afford time away from the Divisional HQ, meaning that command of the Stormsword is delegated to one of his trusted subordinates.

But overall the whole lot them look OK and when the washes are done, the other rest of the weathering should be fairly swift to complete.

Pheaton & Sacramento Pattern Wolverine Armoured Cars

Elements of Cadian 144th LRRR (in Pheaton pattern Wolverine Armoured Cars) deployed as part of 17 Korps Screen to the North of Fort Nuttar.  Practically all of 17 Korps recce elements were deployed as a screen and pushed out from three to seven kloms in front of the lead Division as the Korps formed up on its departure line for the offensive mounted in some haste as 18 Corps "Operation Dragonfire" stalled to the south. 

The pict shows a troop of three Wolverines in mutually supportive formation making their way cautiously through the unusual growth on the prairie brought on by three years of 'no grazing due to the war'.  The normal steppe growth, untrammelled by the ambull herds of peacetime, has gone wild as the unpredictable side effects of terraforming are given the chance to manifest.

This view shows the demountable battery pack, similar to the one mounted on the astartes Predator Annihilator.  The battery pack normally recharges from the oversized alternator mounted behind the V8 multifuel engine.  There is one large twist coupling for power and recharging and then three twist to release fastenings to allow the battery pack to be quickly swapped out if required.

What remains of the Cadian 144th LRR is equipped with Pheaton pattern Wolverines and a taros equivalent vehicle called the Warthog.  Assigned to the woefully understrength 903rd (Devos IV) Inf Div, by the time 72AG regroups at Fort Nuttar the Cadian 144th and Valhallan (Kado) 540th Infantry Regt are nominally under the direct control of 17 Korps HQ.  For practical purposes, they lend their strength to 902 Div.

If you're wondering "why Wolverine ?" there was a conversion in an ancient White Dwarf showing a six wheeled armoured car based on a backwards facing Leman Russ hull.  I think it even had sponsons.  Obviously this would predate by well over a decade any notion that the X-men could ever be made into a film by a major studio.  Anyone who can find a picture of that beast has far too much time on their hands (he threw out there, more in hope than expectation).

So this is how the GW Leman Russ wolverine and Secret Weapon RAV look next to each other.  The GW one is definitely top heavy, but it does fit the rest of the vehicle fleet OK.   The SW Wolverine is wide where the GW one is tall, but once its wearing its Armageddon livery it should fit in quite nicely.

And speaking of the Steel Legion motor pool, more of them during the week.

Horus Heresy Book Six

So the sixth book in the series is out.  Should be good, it includes the 'black sheilds', marines from Legions now in Horus' army who remain loyal to the Emperor.  Which sounds like a great idea for an army.   

This link to the FW page has the obligatory little you toob clip.  

I'm imaging using all of those kool WE, SOH, DG and NL heads on my betrayal of Calth marines to make a kool but battered looking army (yeah, I can count, I know, I know). 

But hey, it's not like I have a 30K army...

Oh No !

I had no idea...

From here Siege Studio face book post

Saddened to hear that Wayne England has passed away. He created some of our childhoods most memorable artwork from 40k & Magic. Our thoughts and condolences go out to his family and fans. A true loss who will be remembered.

Armageddon Steel Legion 3rd Troop Progress

Antennae, decals, spare turret, base coated stowage.  And yes, despite the blue, these are daylight photos (iphone 4S). 

I had to go back over the decals the day after with 'ard coate as they had mostly began to peel off.  It's almost certainly due to their being up to twelve years old, rather than any actual quality reason.

And this is another broken rule.  From Secret Weapon who are one of the manufacturing dynasties of Forge World Sacrmento in the California System.  The casting is good and the detail is superb.  And it all fits and is so simple it doesn't need instructions.

With TL Lascannon from a Land Raider sprue, this will be a new Wolverine for the Steel Legion.  Of course, I might stretch to one more, these babies ain't cheap...

After the War

Miniature corgis aside...

As you already know, 14 million civilians from the Hive cities of Palladia (Pop ~74 Trillion) were re-located, some willingly, some less so, to Devos IV.  It is well documented that the astropathic message warning those on Devos IV that the immigrants were coming arrived some eight decades after the war had finished, such are the vagaries of the warp.

Doubtless you were wondering where they came from; there were a few neuveu riche and some scions of the great houses of Palladia.  But the vast majority were those whom the rulers of the Hive cities wanted moved for whatever reason.  So here is a sample:

Cité Soleil, or “Sun City” is Danter Hive’s largest slum and its most dangerous. The gangs run this ghetto. Some parts are too dangerous for the Adeptus Arbities to patrol.  It’s eight constituent districts are buried deep in the bowls of Danter Hive and the sun (or wind, rain or any other meteorological phenomena) has not shone on Cité Soleil since the rest of the Hive scabbed over it over 500 years ago.

A population of roughly 500,000 live in Cité Soleil, the majority in poverty. Outsiders need permission from the gangs to travel in certain areas[1]. “Ahh, the gangs,” Arbities Inspector Lemastre Dominique said. “All sorts of crimes — rape, murder, a little of everything. Guns, stealing organs from people and running a black economy based on illegal narcotics.  All controlled by the gangs.”

In Danter Hive, Law-and-order effectively collapsed following an earthquake eighteen years ago.  Thousands of prisoners held in the hive’s jails escaped back into the slums.  The authorities overwhelming response quickly restored the rule of law where it was demanded, however valuable resources are always in demand and perhaps they left a little too soon.

The Adeptus Arbities have a reputation for impartially enforcing the Emperor’s Laws, being extremely resistant to corruption by being largely removed from local politics and recruited from off worlders.  On Palladia, there was a policy move five decades ago to increase the number of locals into the serving Arbities in order to bring more local knowledge and a better ‘feel’ for the Hives into their work.

This policy has largely fallen by the wayside but in neglected areas, like some underhive areas of less important spires of less important Hive clusters, a lack of oversight by more regularly governed Arbities has resulted in an almost feudal or hereditary local arrangement.  Political immunity, a lack of independent checks and balances, constant exposure to gangsterism and ample opportunity to indulge ensured that last two decades of Adeptus Arbities presence in Danter’s underhives were infamously corrupt.

Across Palladia, Policing all levels of its Hive cities, including underhives like Cité Soleil officially falls to the Adeptus Arbities, which has received Trillions of dollars in funding and equipment from the Departmento Munitorum and the High Lords. But as number of Astra Militarium peacekeepers[2] in the underhive declines, a greater share of the security burden falls onto the newly formed Local Police.

The Local Police[3] has replaced the military as Danter Hive’s security force twelve years ago. Before the Adeptus Arbities officially left Danter Hive, it’s officers controlled the population through the deployment of sheer terror. Adepts executed dozens of people every month, killed children with chainswords and displayed bodies in public to frighten people into silence. And the Adeptus Arbities were still struggling to keep a lid on the cauldron of discontent in the bottom levels of the Hive.   Something new was needed[4].

“I do the patrol, in a brick of five officers, every day to protect the streets,” Yoles Charon, a Local Police officer, told us during a patrol. “We do our job to protect the population in Danter Hive.”   The Bricks are organised into cohorts of twenty bricks, each commanded by a Centurion, twenty cohorts form a brigade commanded by a Commander.  The eight Brigades, all recruited from other Hives and demobbed Palladian Guardsmen, are each responsible for a specific district of Cité Soleil[5].

The Local Police has a reputation for excessive force, but it’s a “stronger and more respected force today,” according to the local representatives of the Holy Inquisition. The Local Police, since it formed, has focused heavily on arresting kidnappers.

When the opportunity to divest itself of nearly 15 Million citizens arises[6], there are second and third sons from wealthy dynasties emigrating with sufficient funds and significant retinues in order to establish new branches of their family in a new territory[7].  But the vast majority are the lower Hive population, all of Cité Soleil and many other such places, plus a heavy handed coterie of religious mentors representing ecclesiastical sponsorship.

Whilst vast number of Palladia’s Hive dwellers would jump at the chance to start a new life somewhere where they were not breathing each other’s skin and drinking filtered condensates, clearing out whole swathes of multiple hives would take a long time and require the combined might of the Adeptus Arbities, Palladian Guard and Local Police forces to move the unwilling. And there would be many unwilling.   

In the confines of the transport fleet, there is an uneasy peace[8] as the gangs adopt a lower profile and wait to see what opportunities[9] they will find on Devos IV.

---

[1] ie everywhere that isn’t neutral ground between gang strongholds.  Public places like church precincts, mass transit nexus points, hospitals and other welfare facilities, all of which are chronically underfunded, dilapidated and barely functional (in the underhive), also serve as neutral ground for the gangs who often use these places for negotiations and prisoner exchanges and so on. 

[2] Due to the perceived lack of legitimacy of the Adeptus Arbities in many places, the Palladian guard, sometimes as themselves, sometimes as paramilitary ‘Planetary Unity Cadres’ deployed to the underhive.  Whilst they could aid in the policekeeping and temper the worst excesses of the Arbities, the Commanders of the Palladian Guard principally saw this as a warm up for any unit deploying to the Third Edethorian War.  When this ended they swiftly lost interest in sending battalions to gallivant around the underhives.

[3] Legally, they are defensive municipal militia.  They carry military weaponry and wear flak armour with grufallo hide boots and gloves. Their navy uniform is topped off with bright red head gear.  Each of the eight brigades wears a different red hat to identify itself; berets, kepi’s, forage caps, side hats, Stetsons, bandanas, top hats and Phrygian caps.  Of course all are replaced with the Cadian Mk8 tri-dome helmet, as worn by the Palladian Guard, during combat operations.

[4] It had got to the point where the lack of trust between the Adeptus Arbities and the population of Cité Soleil had come to the attention of the Hive President who, of course, would have to answer to the Planetary governor if he lost control of (part of) his Hive.  Hence the need to remove the Adeptus Arbities and replace them with something different; the long term outcome would not be any different, but this would postpone it for another few years.

[5] 16000 front line Policemen are not enough to establish the rule of law in a place like Cité Soleil.  However they are the biggest, best armed gang (and still able to call on out of area resources) and can establish the rule of law in localised areas for significant periods. Their effectively unlimited resources and reinforcements mean that the criminal gangs are loathe to take them on, preferring to lay low and re-establish themselves when the Local Police move on to their next assignment.

[6] When the opportunity was tabled at the Planetary Governor’s cabinet meeting, like his peers, the Danter Hive President already had a readymade population of volunteers. 

[7] These privileged few will travel in comfort and arrive well resourced.  On post war Devos IV, many will fail, some spectacularly, but some will succeed beyond their own expectations and those of their sponsoring families.

[8] In some of the larger ships, there is literally a truce between gangs.  Some smaller ships are host to one gang who rule the rest through fear and intimidation.  In other places, previously harsh and unpopular gangs, outnumbered by those they oppressed, did not make it to Devos IV. 

[9] Exactly the same as the scions of the ruling houses of Palladia, the gang lords see the possibilities and are biding their time.