Several years ago some friends tried to get me into Horus Heresy.
Playing both 40K and WHFB (and Warmachine and X-Wing), I wasn't looking for a new game, and one primarily dedicated to marine on marine action didn't strike me as being particularly exciting.
But, with my hobby drying up (and my miniatures packed away in storage), I gave it a go and found it a remarkably engaging and enjoyable game - what I feared would be a dull conflict between two identical sides turned into a deeper appreciate for the differences between the legions, largely omitted in 40K. With a host of new legion specific units, wargear and rules, I felt I was playing Marines with a whole new perspective.
I borrowed and proxied armies for a year, lamenting the lack of hobby tools/space when finally I broke down and decided to build a stock army - no conversions, just snip and glue - no hobby space required.
As to what army, that was long decided - the 14th legion, the Death Guard.
Having played mostly loyalist forces in 40K, switching sides for 30K seemed obvious. Of the traitor forces, there were a number of contenders: I liked the Sons or Hours and Emperors Children colour schemes, but wasn’t gripped by their backstory. Thousand Sons playstyle didn’t suite me (I had proxied a few games as I liked their imagery). Iron Warriors and World Eaters were too similar to other armies I had and other members of the group already played Night Lords and Alpha Legion.
In the end, it had to be the Death Guard. From a fluff perspective, I liked they always had their own agenda vs following Horus. I liked their relentless, no frills, approach to war, slow grind, use any weapon to achieve their objective. Their play style filled a particular hole amongst my armies - close range shooting, vs gun line or assault. And I liked their colour scheme (and painting a light coloured army would be new). There was also an easy tie into a Nurgle force in 40K, which I always wanted to build.
I'm also quite a fan of the Mk III 'Iron Armor' (which the Death Guard favor) and found I was quite militant about not having any Mk IV in my force. Unfortunately many of the HQ choices are in non-Mk III armor, so ended up converting several of them (so much for no conversions!)
I picked up a Battle of Calth box set (just as GW discontinued it) to get some ‘cheap’ plastic MKIII suits and got the Death Guard shoulder pads from Forgeworld. Also picked up a mix of Imperial Sector and Necromunda bases to allow for some scenic basing options without any hobby space or tools required.
Here is the army in its early days. The five tactical marines. I also got some Breachers, Grave Warden Terminators and the Apothecary/Legion Champion combo. Both the Apothecary and Breachers seemed to fit with Death Guard feel - marching forward, the ‘hardened armour’ of the Breachers shrugging off incoming incoming shells, the ‘feel no pain’ of the Apothecary pushing their unstoppable march forward.
I also dug out some old Thudd Gun’s I had for a Death Corp of Krieg army (it was just a fluke I was able to find these so easily). I thought these would make good Rapier Quad Launchers - they had a little more of that ‘old school’ artillery feel that the actual Rapier Carrier.
Here is a close-up on the first conversion - a Death Guard Legion Champion (next to a friend’s Thousand Sons as we compared our two different takes on this mini) - more on him later.
That’s it for now - next post will continue with the Death Guard as the army grows.