Dark Angels - Part VIII - Tactical Marines III

And then it was complete, my first complete tactical squad. The last four members include a plasma gunner and a squad leader as well as the last two squad members. I decided to make all my sergeants in the army with back banners of one kind or the other and then make all squad leaders with some kind of symbol. And as the Dark Vengeance box comes with a symbol for the sergeant, this just had to move and be the squad leader. Quite simple really, but I think it will look great on the table top.

So with this and a few more pictures of the individuals I leave this squad to the shelf and prepares to get another done, I might try to get that bike of mine some squad mates.

Dark Angels - Part VII - Bases II

Now I've got bases fixed for my miniatures as well. After all I decided to go for a more urban look, but not quite as grim and war-torn as they are normally made. So I did this kind of bases instead, I've kept them quite clean, so that there is no problem to place miniatures, and not have too much distracting from the miniature itself.

Dark Angels - Part VI - Tactical Marines II

Next up is the sergeant and heavy weapon to my Tactical squad. I got these painted up right after the last four tacticals, using just the same techniques. I did however decide that I wanted a banner on my sergeant, so that what he got.

I used one of the banner from the tactical marines box and added a Dark Angel symbol to it from the ravenwing upgrade sprue, it did not quite work as I hoped, but it worked good enough. Next time I might try to do it in green stuff so that I can mold it a bit more over the texture of the banner, but I'll have to see.

Here are some awfully green pictures, I will get some better ones taken now that I got the bases on they way, they are just drying up now after one of the final paint layers.

Dark Angels - Part V - Tactical Marines I

I've finally got some new Dark Angels painted. As usual the going is slow, but every now and then something new gets done.

This time I've finished 4 ordinary tactical marines from the Dark Vengeance box set. The minis are actually quite good, a few strange pieces are on them, and a few details looks good from one angle, but is mostly a lump of plastic from another. But overall they are nice and paints up really well.

I did the first four here in one go, now that I have the paints down it's not that hard to do a few at a time, but I don't think I'll ever do more than 4 or 5, it just takes to long with each color then.

Here I have some pictures of them. As usual there are no bases on them, but I do have an idea of how they are going to look, and I've started to make bases for all of them, and they are not any of the variants I've done so far.

The photos then… well they turned up green, so they are not my best work. It was quite dark when I took them, but I'll try to do a better job when I get them based.

Battle report: Space Marines Salamanders VS Imperial Guard

A little over a month ago I played a game against the Salamanders player down at our club. As it was quite a long time ago and I didn't get to write a report at the time so a lot of details has been lost in the time that has passed, but I'll do my best to recreate what happened.

The armies was something like this;

Imperial Guard

Company command

2x Vets in chimera, plasma/melta

5x Infantry squads

2x Platoon command, one with plasmaguns and one with meltas

3x Heavy weapon squad, 2 with ML, 1 with AC

3x Scout sentinels

2x LRBT

Manticore

Salamanders Space Marines

Master of the Forge with Thunderfire cannon

2x Sternguard squads in Rhinos

2x Scout squad with SR

2x Vindicators

Storm talon

2x Land speeder

Ironclad dreadnought in Drop pod

The mission was Big Guns Never Tire with a Vanguard Strike deployment.

I got three objectives to place on my side, and my opponent got two, we both placed them in our deployment zones.

The Space Marines deployed first and spread out mostly all over the battlefield, with the heavy guns on my right flank supported by infantry in rhinos and on the left scouts, thunder fire cannon and the land speeders. Each scout squad setteled in on a objective.

I deployed all over the place, on each flank I placed some heavy weapons and a veteran squad and in the center most of the infantry was placed and I hit my manticore the best I could behind some ruins

Salamanders turn 1

The first thing that happened was that a drop pod landed right next to my Leman russ tank, and from it spilled a big and rather angry looking dreadnought. While this was happening the rest of the army surged forward, ready to pour some fire into my lines.

Fire from the thunderfire obliterated my auto cannons on the right, earning the first blood objective to the marines, the dreadnought fired of its hunter killer missiles and everything else it got into the side of my russ, but only succeeded with taking a single hull point from it. To get some more fire into the tank, both the vindicators opened up on the russ and the infantry squad right next to it. But only killed a handful of guardsmen.

Imperial Guard turn 1

It was the guards turn to bring the hurt to the marines. There wasn't much movement, but the front infantry advanced up to the razor wire, gaining a bit cover at least and the veterans on the left moved up and disembarked so that they could bring the meltas to the dreadnought. The veterans on the right wanted to get closer to one of the speeders that had moved down that flank, but they only got a few inches before the chimera bogged down in the forest.

The shooting was a bit more eventful with both my russes opening up on the rightmost vindicator and rhino, successfully exploding them both even killing a few marines as they climbed out of the wrecked rhino. The veterans took good aim and blew the dreadnought up as well, it did however cost them a few losses in the resulting explosion, and took out a missile launcher team as well. Those teams remaining took aim on the last rhino, but failed to cause any damage at all. Then the manticore fired, for the first time since I got the model painted. It took aim right in the center of the rhino, but scattered of a bit, towards my foremost russ, but fortunately it did not scatter so far that it hit it, until i remembered that it does 1D3 templates, rolled two of them and the other one landed square on my russ, blowing it up, taking a few infantry around it in the explosion… The rhino was hit as well, but only got a glancing hit…

The imperial guard is apparently more proficient in killing itself than marines are..

Space Marines turn 2

The second turn saw the introduction of a Storm talon for me as it came swooping in, setting its sights on the manticore. Other than that, the Land speeders shuffled around a bit, the remaining rhino darted forward into the guard lines and the remaining Vindicator took refuge in a nearby forest

The shooting started off with the storm talon letting it rip into the manticore, but by some miricle it only did one penetrating hit, and that only immobilized it, very luchy for me. Other than that the thunderfire cannon obliterated another unit and the vindicator got the last russ to explode.

Imperial Guard turn 2

I did not like the thought of a flyer in my lines, but my AA capabilities was somewhat lacking, so I moved forward with my melta squad, disembarked my plasma vets and made ready to kill marines or try a shot at the flyer. Also my sentinels walked into the board on the left side, getting the remaining rhino in sight.

The shooting started with some missile launchers blowing up the rhino and the sentinels firing into the marines that came out, but not making much of a dent in them. What was effective this turn was the manticore that landed a shot right on top of the remaining vindicator, blowing it up. My melta command outdid itself by not only hitting the storm talon, but also blowing it up, showering the battlefield with debris . The opened up the opportunity for the melta vets to shoot some of the marines that came from the first rhino in the center. Killing all but one of the front combat squad.

Fire from the immobilized chimera got the land speeder on the extreme right to crash into the ground.

Space Marine turn 3

The marines third turn saw the marines getting into position to get into HtH next turn, with the squads from the leftmost rhino moving forward and the ones in the center creeping forward another few inches, trying to get out of the difficult ground. The rearmost squad had now moved a total of 5" in two turns...

The marines in the center fired on the plasma vets, killing all but tree of them that then tuned and fled of the board, with a little bit of help from the thunderfire cannon. The marines punching into the guard lines on the left shot a few of my HQ members, but the shots did not get into my commander. On the other side of that ruin a few infantry men died, and the squad started to flee. The remaining land speeder shot my sentinels, blowing the gun of one of them.

In assault the squad shooting my commander missed a charge of 3", not getting into combat, the same happened with the lone marine in the center that tried to get my melta command AND the same happened to the marines by my melta vets. All failed charges, and none of them was over 5". An incredible roll of bad luck for my opponent. He even lost a marine or two trying to get my melta vets.

Imperial Guard turn 3

I now had the oppertunity to contain the rampaging marines in my lines, so most of my army turned to face them. What did not was the remains of my plasma command that went into hiding ontop of the objective, my melta command that was determined to kill that marine right in front of them. And the sentinels that moved up to take on the land speeder.

The shooting started with my meltavets on the left killing all remaining marines, with the help of the now rallied squad and the chimera, in the center my commadn, AC squad and flamer squad all opened up on the marines there, killing most of them. My melta command did what they was supposed and killed the lone marine in front of them, melting him into a pile of goo.

When the assault came around my HQ charged the remaining marines, killing all but one, but loosing one wound on the commander and my officer of the fleet.

Space Marine turn 4

With not much left on the board, the last few marines in the center advanced a bit, and that what that.

The shooting saw the snipers finally killing something by taking down the last missile launcher on the right, also the center marines killed all of the melta command again with some thunderfire help.

Assault saw tha last marine go down, but not before he put another wound on my commander.

Imperial Guard turn 4

Not much hapend this turn, the sentinels moved to get a shot on the center marines and my other squads consolidated a bit to get objectives more secure and if possible get in LoS of the marines.

After the shooting phase not a single marine remained in the center (the one on the picture has not been removed yet) and we decided to end it there as there was no chance for the marines to get another objective away from me, or take one more for themselves, so we ended it here with an Imperial victory!