Horus Heresy General /hhg/

What do you think the ratio of MKIV distribution was within each legion by the outbreak of the Heresy?

80% - Sons of Horus
70% - Emperor's Children
60% - Word Bearers

etc?

50% - Night Lords

Those numbers seem a little high, though I agree that the SoH and EC would have the highest proportions. Never mind that the Book 1 color plates show a lot of SoH non-Mk IV armor, even among the traitors. Ultramarines would have the most among the loyalists because they had their own manufacturing capabilities.

But who actually builds armies representing the start of the Heresy? Hmm, that brings up a good question - when are all your armies set?

Ironically, a pre-Terra White Scars army should have very little Mk IV. Lots of Mk II, but also Mk III despite it not being fast. They spent four years trying to find a way to break through the warp storms keeping them from Terra, during which it sounds like a lot of their combat was ship-based. So lots of breacher squads. Not what you'd expect, but it's what they did.

That diagram is weird. Why is the left wing unlabeled? Also, I thought the aquila was just an eagle, because that was the Emperor's symbol during the Unification Wars, plus a second head added to recognize the union of Terra and Mars.

When I get around to building my HB Word Bearer chapter, they'll be in the Shadow Crusade - enough wiggle room to add Chaos-y greenstuff modifications on armour, which will lend itself nicely to closer to Terra.

Would the Khornate, Slaaneshi, Nurglite and Tzeentchian runes manifest in the Shadow Crusade time period? I'd like to daub them on pieces of armour, weaponry and vehicles desu. Not just the cryptic patterns.

Weren't the world eaters all over mkiv because it was easy to repair or something like that?

It's from ye olden Rogue Trader book so it might be outdated.
>why is the left wing unlabeled?
I don't know.

My army is set somewhere after the Thramas crusade where everything is messed up for the NLs

But I I'm starting to do DG allies and I have no idea when they worked together

My EC are late great crusade, basically in their prime.
Some time before Horus convinced Fulgrim to fuck it all up, not sure if I want them to be pre- or post-Laeran though. I want them to have slightly questionable undertones with secret genetic engineering and such, but not full retard Slaanesh mode.
Fuck Slaanesh.

Giving heavy squads tank hunters, that's pretty much it. Don't give medusas phosphex unless you're against a foot slogging army, even then phosphex rapiers are better.

That pleases Slaanesh

Why are you giving your medusas phosphorex?

The Administratum is the asshole because nobody likes being around it but you really need it to do it's job

What was the best, most competent legion pre-heresy if you don't count the direct tactical acumen of the primarch?

Dunno, but maybe Dusk Raiders.

I'm not going to use Medusas. Was more thinking of putting him in a Reaver squad with jimp packs and Meltas, believing that their outflanking rule would be good with tank hunter. That or Heavy support squad.

The Eighth

Remember he only gives tank hunter to his squad's heavy weapons.

Everybody, when filling their niche. It's not like there was a legion that just sucked.

Ultras were the biggest and did the most heavy lifting near the end, Sons of Horus had a primarch first and covered the most ground, Imp Kids were tiny but punched outside their weight, Sons had crazy powers. Everybody else fills a role.

...Night Lords kind of always sucked

>Night Lords kind of always sucked
no

My reading comprehension is wack today. Ty for info.

terror tactics on planets you intend to tax is like shitting where you eat

I'd say the Dusk Raiders. They were actually better as the Orphan Legion before Mortarion found them.

I would argue the EC, no real specialization besides be the best and they were constantly receiving praise for their actions (book 1 mentions Sanguinius complimenting the EC doing something and Guilliman mentioned them executing his own doctrines better than the Ultramarines).

NL were never intended to fight astartes level enemies

What is the most Miyazaki Legion?

youtube.com/watch?v=bCM3clq-_c0

That's not what I said. They were intended to terrorize populaces into compliance and move on, but that theory didn't hold water. A populace subjected to the Night Lords became a liability as soon as they turned their backs, Nostromo is the prime example.

Also you don't want cravens wearing your most expensive armor and carrying your most expensive weapons, even if you only use them to mop up dinks.

Don't blame the Eighth. Blame Emps.

Yeah but they barely had two marines to rub together. They were competent, but they couldn't cover ground

Blame Kurze. He was when they jumped the shark.

For all intents and purposes the Alpha Legion probably excelled at what they were supposed to do prior to re-uniting with Alpharius, but given that they're also really good at ensuring nobody tells shit about what the hell they did, they don't appear to have done all that much.

Curze was a victim of fate. He knew what was coming and just went along

Just maybe if he wasn't so fatalistic he could have changed the future? Ever thought about that?

Sounds like a submissive lazy little bitch

>Would the Khornate, Slaaneshi, Nurglite and Tzeentchian runes manifest in the Shadow Crusade time period?
Probably. I don't remember any actual use of those runes, but Lorgar tries to force Khorne onto Angron during that campaign. (Hopefully that's not too direct a spoiler for the novel Betrayer). The Word Bearers were clearly knowledgeable about the individual gods before Calth.

We don't know if the World Eaters will go Khornate as a legion before the end of the Shadow Crusade, but it's a possibility.

They numbered 110,000 marines at the time of the heresy. He didn't mention pre-primarch, just ignoring the primarch's influence. Even in battles without Fulgrim the EC fought extremely well. For example the Praxil Compliance where the EC were constantly praised but their commander was too butthurt over needing reinforcements to care about the praises showered upon him.

If you were mentally ill would you think about stuff like that seriously?

Alpharius didn't alter his Legion's methods and doctrines as radically as other Primarchs, he used them the way they were intended to be used. He just used them for his own purposes.

No but...mentally ill people aren't cool OR effective at their jobs

Unless they're high functioning autists like Lion and probably Gulliman

I know, but he requested effectiveness without counting the primarch, so referring to the period prior to re-discovery of their primarch makes the most sense.

Alpharius used his legion exactly like it should have been, how it had been envisioned. It's just that the target priorities changed in a subtle way.

Yeah but is a scalpel really more effective than a broadsword or, for that matter, a nuclear bomb?

It depends on the strength of your malpractice insurance

Curze had his instincts.

I think it's more likely the Chaos Gods just liked to fuck with Curze by showing him visions of people dying at his hand that he just...didn't question.

"So that's my line in the script huh? Okie dokie I guess"

>that combiweapon
>do you love me brother

All 3 can be effective, however what you target with it makes a big difference.

AL could in theory be all 3, but preferred to be the scalpel.

It works mate

The problem with being the legion that has it's hand in many sinister soups is that a truly sinister soup is one you can't just pull your hand out of.

AL could never be a bomb like, say, the Death Guard could, because Mortarian has the luxury of saying "alright guys drop what you're doin we're headin in this direction"

That is probably the case.

I imagine that most of the "fingers" in the various sinister soups are human infiltration agents recruited at various points of campaigns.
In theory they wouldn't need to have their marines spread out that much, but I'll admit that it is likely that they had small cells of them everywhere.

However that doesn't solve the mystery of the ALs manufacturing and recruiting base, which was and as far as we're aware still is an unknown factor.
They may have had far more marines than anyone ever expected, especially once they steal the perfect rapid manufacturing technology for them in Deliverance Lost.

The AL fleet was certainly much bigger than anyone expected them to have.

Mortarion didn't change the Dusk Raiders THAAAAT much. He pretty much told them "take it like men", and the Dusk Raiders, already used to take it like men, cranked it up to eleven.
As for their effectiveness without counting Mortarion, that's hard to say given that they almost always deployed alongside him, and the one dude who didn't managed to fuck up the legion.

Curze saw the worst possible future for each event that he saw. He had no context of when or why this happened, just the continuous worst possible outcome.

Personally I think he witnessed so much and so many conflicting things that could happen. His brothers murdering each other when the lived. Primarchs possessed by daemons. He probably saw Sanguinius if he had sacced him self at Signus. He probably saw Magnus if the chaos gods choose him instead of Horus. Dorn opening the webway and letting the warp pour forth into reality with the Emp's head in his hand. Just every single worst case scenario with no context on what led to it or how to avoid it or what could be done to prevent it.

Eventually I think he just decided that if he could just avoid the stuff he saw from happening it didn't matter what took place.

Half his brothers are daemon princes? Atleast they still have control.

10k years of war? Atleast the souls of everything aren't immediatly forfiet.

Nostromo a daemon would and being purged by his brothers? Better smash it now and let them have this mercy.

>What is the most Miyazaki Legion?
We do not talk about our two missing brothers anymore, user...

How shit is this?

RoW: The Reaping

Praetor:
-Cataphractii Armour
-Combi-Bolter, Master-Crafted Paragon Blade
-Digital Lasers, Rad-Grenades
= 195pts.

Centurion:
-Siege Breaker
-Bolt Pistol, Power Axe
-Artificer Armour, Refractor Field
= 125pts.

Legion Rapier Battery (3x):
-3x Quad Launcher, Frag Shells, Phosphex Shells
= 240pts.

Legion Rapier Battery (3x):
-3x Laser Destroyer Array
= 165pts.

Apothecary Detachment (3x):
-Artificer Armour, Augury Scanner
= 180pts.

Mortis Dreadnought:
-2x TL Lascannons
-2x HK Missile
= 165pts.

Tactical Squad (20x):
-Vexilla
-Nuncio Vox
-Sergeant, Artificer Armour, Power Axe, Rad Grenades
= 260pts.

Tactical Squad (20x):
-Vexilla
-Nuncio Vox
-Sergeant, Artificer Armour, Power Axe, Rad Grenades
= 260pts.

Heavy Support Squad (10x):
-Flakk Missiles
-9x Missile Launcher
-Sergeant, Missile Launcher
= 330pts.

Grave Wardens (5x):
-4x Power Fist
-Chem-Master, Chainfist
= 205pts.

Artillery Tank Squadron:
-2x Medusa
= 310pts.

Wall of Martyrs Defence Wall:
= 80pts.

Typhon:
-Armoured Ceramite
-HB Sponsons, Havoc Launchers
= 450pts.

2,965pts.

I still remember them..

youtube.com/watch?v=8XOV2L-eM38

He can see fate, he wasn't like an elder where they see possible futures, understood fate was changeable he just saw the future and knew he and everyone else was doomed to fall into it.

He had no idea if the future could be changed and if so how. Remember that seeing the future usually means that the future your observing is already taking into account every action you could take to CHANGE said future, otherwise it isn't the actual future.

>Sees every worst possible scenario
>"Gotta be the worst possible me, then!"
Classic Night Haunter

If he was "worst possible me" we'd have Daemon Prince Night Haunter who flays reality, reaches out and grabs ya, then goes back to torture you for an eternity.

The he does this to your friend standing next to you because he's a daemon prince and fuck your conventional understanding of space-time

Said "worst possible" as in "the lamest", not the most dangerous.

Powerful. "Cheesy" is too strong a word, but it's certainly going to stomp certain builds.

It is? A Lascannon Deredeo would outrange the Typhon and outshoot the Mortis, not to mention killing that specific model opens the gate for that list to be pummeled from the air non-stop.

How much would dropping the typhon and phosphex for a 2500pts. game balance it out?

There are three red flags: the Typhon, phosphex, and quad mortars.

I'm not sure if the Typhon is considered fixed after its points increase - it may be too early to tell. But taking those three together is a strong combo. Broken? Not 40k broken, but it'll absolutely crush BaC-based footslogging lists.

I'd take it a tournament but I wouldn't use it against new players without warning them.

Yeah it is, just because one model can pretty much hard counter another doesn't make the list bad.

What's your recipe for metal? It looks super clean, but it might just be the lighting

Surely plain frag mortars aren't THAT powerful.

Would switching the Typhon for an Achilles help or is the quad mortar going to fuck with the balance as well?

There's still the flakk missiles.

Boltgun metal with chainmail highlight and devlan mud wash

Where should I start upon my models arriving? Cleaning the sprues? Washing them? Base coating? Assemble after base coat? Paint the models?

Quad mortars are just plain good. All 3 firing drops 12 3" blasts up to 60" away and don't need line of sight since they are barrage. One squad should be fine but if you are doing regular mortars.

Achilles should help alot. It's a regular tank with a quad motar, so it's dropping templates but nothing too excessive.

Typhon main gun is a 7" S10 AP1 Ignores cover pie plate of fuck you. Basically, you roll the dice and everything that isn't a 1 is a model to pick up. The only reason I like the Typhon is it's good at running over shit and if they had another tank with +1 to thunderblitz, I would probably use that.

Clean sprues
Wash with soap
Glue into major assemblies - some models paint up better in 2-3 pieces, e.g. keep the bolter arm separate to have access to the chest
Basecoat
Paint
Scrape paint off the joint between assemblies
Glue

1) Wash in warm, soapy water (rinse well!)
2) Remove from sprues
3) Remove mouldlines and/or flash from parts
4) Assemble (convert/greenstuff/etc. to taste, leave certain portions unglued if you want to paint them detached)
5) Add basing material(s)
6) Prime
7) Basecoat
8) Apply washes
9) Tidy up excess wash with base colour if needed
10) Highlight
11) Seal (if so desired)

I was mainly taking the Typhon as my LoW for larger games.

Any tips for increasing paint quality outside thin your paints?

Patience and Practice.

And Layers
Many Layers

This user has the most important bits of advice down. Take your time, thin your paints, and work up layers rather than slobbering on a gallon of chunky paint.

Even a flat basecoat that's competently applied will look better than a rushjob mini with patchy coverage, wash stains, chalk-thick white, or extreme highlights that are half the width of the figure's arm.

From there on, it's just a matter of applying that same patience and moderation on the basecoat to washes/shading and highlighting.

Don't be afraid to try out new techniques or colour schemes on test pieces. These could be anything from a cheap pack of miniatures that can easily be stripped in Simple Green, to even random leftover components or pieces of sprue.

So I'm working on another 20-man strong squad of Iron Warriors. Does FW MKVI always get those bubbles at the very tip of the snout? It's not a huge issue, just a little annoying to constantly plug and sand them.

I have to say I really like the old Pre-Heresy AL scheme, I think the purple and green with the more utilitarian logo makes them stand out against other legions much more than the revised blue and silver in FW's books. Honestly I was considering making a legion force with that scheme before I decided on my IW.

I want to get the MkII command set and use the Thunder Hammer artificer armor guy as my Praetor for my future IW army, and I also want to use the banner-wielder to form a command squad.

But now I realize that it would trigger my autism to form a command squad, as if I bought a MkII tac set, I'd have one left over if I wanted to make four chosen, or three left over if I wanted just the bare minimum for the command squad.

Also, are legion standards useful or not in an IW army, seeing as they have some pretty good morale rules anyways?

In that order?

>Iron Warriors
>MkVI
REEEEEEEEEE

yes

Pick your primer color carefully (i.e. don't paint light colors over black without expecting to build up several increasingly light-hued layers). On the other hand, n00bs using white undercoat sometimes fail to go over the white in crevasses and that looks bad too. It's not easy. Colored primers are good, imo.

Never glop on paint thicker than the consistency of milk (i.e. thin your paints). If it doesn't cover very well, LET IT DRY before you touch it again.

Drybrushing is good if you're a beginner, but it'll kill the brush you use. Use a different brush, and do try edge highlighting without drybrushing.

imo, it's never too early for the following as a minimum:
Prime
Solid basecoat - more than 1 layer if it's a light color
Secondary colors (larger areas) - black parts, bolter, trim
Wash/oil (if in doubt - nuln oil everywhere)
Secondary colors (small areas) - eye lenses, little details
Single pass of edge highlighting on each major section
Dullcoat for protection

That'll give you a clean look.

Oils/washes work better over a glosscoat, as do decals. Before long, I think you'll do the following after the first Secondary Color stage: glosscoat, apply decals, wash/oil, then do the rest. And that single pass of edge highlight will turn into multiple passes.

Fags can't handle the truth.

Ah yes, 1 image compared to the literal sea of MkVI

FW's scheme replaced the one in that illustration. However, FW also said that the Alpha Legion appeared to have a wide range of schemes in use before the Heresy, with varying shades of blue or green, sometimes gray, and sometimes even amaranth (which I think is magenta).

...

>IW
>Not Mark three
I'll decimate you user

>Alpha Legion
GET OUT REEEEEEEEEEE

That's the Malborn Squad, user.
Take the mk6 like a man or prove you lack the iron within more since you already proved yourselves weak by allowing the Word Bears to push your buttons. I would not be surprised if Pert put some personal touches on mk6 though.

You mean MKII. IW in MKIII is a Black Library-tier meme.