Indeed it is fast approaching that time where the big fat dude in a red suit empties his sack down your chimney. Oh, and also Santa should be putting in an appearance too. I’m hoping that he’ll be bringing me the Forge World stuff I asked for, else I’ll set the Inquisition on his ass for use of witch power and xenos technologies.
This may be the last post I do for a week or so, as the preparations for the holidays are sucking up all my spare time, and then the day after xmas I will be hauling the family down to America’s Wang (apparently the affectionate name for Florida…) for a mini vay-cay and also to take my son to Disney…
So, first up for this one:
Land Raider Loadouts.
I have been having a spirited (but very friendly) discussion with my compadre back in the UK via email about Land Raiders and the positioning of sponson loadouts. It started initially by me telling him about some sweet armor plate upgrades that I purchased from Scibor’s Monstrous (which you can see here ). I wasn’t too sure where they were meant to go, but they do seem to fit quite nicely on the front quarters of the Land Raider, just forward of the sponson mounting.
Cries of ‘Heresy’ soon were abounding when I told him that my gun loadouts are positioned on the doors nearer the rear of the vehicle. When he was asking me where I had put mine, it made me wonder if I had cocked up when I was building the kit. Nope, the instructions show that, as do the images and diagrams in the Codex. Now i’m aware that just because the pictures show this, doesn’t mean you have to have them there, and I see plenty of pictures on teh interwebs with them on the forward quarter doors. In my honest opinion I think that they look freakin’ ugly and front end heavy with them like that.
His point, which was well made, was that surely troops embarking/disembarking would get shot to shit as they would be getting out of the vehicle right in front of the loadouts, and that having the armament on the forward quarter doors offers a little in the way of protection and cover for troops embarking the vehicle in the heat of battle. My counter to this was that as I use my LR primarily as a vehicle to get my assault terminators around, and couldn’t see marines in tactical dreadnaught armour trying to squeeze their asses out of those side doors when they have a bloody great assault ramp to charge down. I see those doors for getting into (before entering the combat zone), more than out of, but that could be me being pedantic.
A number of ‘real life’ examples where brought to the table by my buddy, who is a total treadhead at heart,and the points he made really did make sense. I guess I am sacrificing practicality over vanity. I also mentioned that real world physics mean little in 40K (I can see Dethtron rolling his eyes right now) and to try and rationalize some of the things in the 40K universe would probably give us a nosebleed.
So what are your thoughts, dear readers? Front quarter loadouts or rear quarter? does it even matter? I’d be intrigued to hear what you’ve got to say.
Black Templar Marshal
Amongst other things I have been tinkering with, I mentioned in my last post that I was going to convert a mini into a Templar Marshal, and showed you a sketch that I drew up. Well, I’ve been working on this chap, and here he is, ready for a little green-stuffing here and there, then some paint!
I still have to mess with the base as well, but I wanted to show you the fruits of my labors so far. I’m thinking i’d like to add a chain around his left fist and wrapping it around the shaft of the weapon, like the other Templars do. I’m a little apprehensive about modelling chain, but i’ll give it a go! It’s been a lot of fun seeing this chap develop from a sketch into reality. I think he seems to have a slightly haughty air about him, which is befitting of the chapter. I may well convert some more and have them as his command squad, we’ll see what happens with that.
So thats it for now. I may try and get another post in, but if I don’t, I’ll see you all in a week or two, so have a safe and happy holiday and make sure that you eat and drink lots!
TTFN
Paul
