Beyond the Praetors of Calth

[Doghouse]

Fantastic stuff as always mate, these guys are looking seriously cool! :tu:

 

As I'm back working on my heresy stuff again that truescale showdown might be on if you are up for it still mate?

[apologist]

Sounds great – your Iron Warriors are coming along nicely, and it's totally got me geared up to get my Ultramarines up to scratch. You won't find the sons of Macragge wanting!

 

+inload+
WIP Astartes

Lots of new marines to paint.

A veteran directs the fire of his brethren.

Marines scan for new targets.

Two Ultramarines discuss the reports from an auspex during a lull in the battle.

The new force so far.

+++
I'd love to hear your thoughts on these.

Death of a Rubricist
On an unrelated note, I've started a new offsite blog. If you have a moment and would like to have a look at some of my other stuff, please feel free. The link's in my signature.

[MagicMan]

Looking awesome as always. Always great to see your Ultras, Apologist. :)

[apologist]

Ta very much. I'm looking forward to pitting them against Doghouse's Iron Warriors sometime soon. On that note, are you happy with ice world basing, Doghouse? It'll give a nice contrast to dark iron, and it should photograph nicely if we do an old-school battle report with some nice pictures for everyone.

[Doghouse]

Looking good mate, sure Ice World is fine with me. Have a butchers at the old epic space marine stuff and we'll see if we can base a battle around one of those stories.

I'm getting a load of stuff at the end of the month so my army will kick off properly then. ;)

[apologist]

Cool beans – keep us updated

+++

One thing I haven't posted up is a scale shot next to one of my Guardsmen. So here's one:

While I like the proportions of my Ultramarines alongside Cadians and similar models, next to the more reasonably-sized forgeworld models, they do appear a bit big! That said, the heft of the armour is what's making him look big. If you stripped away the armour, the marine would probably be around seven and a half foot tall, which sounds about right.

[Unknown Chronicler]

Wow these are great! I really I want to make such models, possibly for my DIY chapter so they can go in style. Can't wait to see more

[Tyrannicide]

Cool scale shot. Your Guard are just as impressive as your Ultras. 

[apologist]

+The Olympian Purges – Mithrax, Chaeronea, Orchomenus+

 

Theoretical: Embedded holdings in Legio IV's Olympian dominions. Treacher-legionnaires presence high. Their morale may be low, but we can expect all the bitterness, spite and bile that implies from the Warsmiths' forces. They'll skulk in their fortresses; then draw us into guerilla war.

 

Practical: Three stages. Identify, then abrade their fastnesses. Drive them into the stony ground. Scrub them and their stain from these worlds.

First; orbital bombardment – macro cannons, lances, gravity shunts, rad-missiles, primary impact detonations. Carbo-mines, inflagration shells, horror-war. Total destruction. End this world. Exterminatus.

Second; draw them onto the field. Use the atomic winter to craze and unstep them. Draw them out with courage, with guile, with force. If necessary, by pulling each one out from his individual foxhole to face his crimes in the light. 

 

Third; execution by any means. Justice to be done through annihilation. Deployment? Total. The Imperium is watching us. Courage and Honour.

 

Addendum. 'Purge'. From the High Gothic Purgare – to cleanse. This dirt is ingrained. We will need to scour it out.

attr. Honour-Captain Sulla, Ultramarines Commanding.

 

[malika666]

Yes! Scouring FTW! I really love to see this part of 40k lore getting some love. :)

[apologist]

+inload: Brother Bastapol Einhorn, Chapter 190, Ultramarine Legion+

 

Legionary Einhorn

 

+ Brother Einhorn is a typical member of the post-Centesimine Chapters; a catch-all term that refers to all of the Chapters of the Legion beyond Chapter 100. Sometimes interpreted as a perjorative by outsiders who guess that those serving in Chapters 1–99 are somehow privileged above those later brethren, the term is meant as approbation. It is meant as a celebration of the Legion's success in gathering and maintaining such high numbers.

 

Telacos of the 15th Chapter, demonstrating
greater use of  personalisation, including heraldry.
 

+ While no Ultramarine courts anonymity – the Five Hundred worlds from which the Legion draws its intake take their cue from Macragge's tradition of 'Pride with dignity' – the post-Centisimine Legionaries tend to have less variety in their appearance than the older Chapters, who served through the early years of the Great Crusade. Contrast Einhorn with Telacos (see above), for an illustration of the greater customisation of the older Chapters.

 

+ That said, some decoration and variety is almost inevitable in a warrior brotherhood – whether through honorifics and awards achieved, battle damage to equipment and armour, or the myriad personal fetishes and charms that even the warriors of the Imperium hold close.+

 

+ Einhorn is a fairly typical example, then, of an Ultramarine of the later Great Crusade and Horus Heresy period. Like most amongst his Chapter, he wears mark II Crusade armour. The Legion was relatively isolated from Terra and Mars by both sheer distance and because the manufacturing might and organisation of Ultramar ensured that the Legion could mostly meet its own needs through allied Forge worlds and vassal manufactoria scattered across the region.

 

+ The torso piece, a common variant has the central sternum reinforcement decorated with inlaid ivory in a key pattern, which represents the interlocking and fluid nature of Legion warfare. It is a common decoration, widespread through the realm of Ultramar at large.

 

Assault tank crew, Praetor-pattern helm
 

+ Like many in the Legion, the 190th were kitted extensively with Praetor-pattern armour, a locally-manufactured pattern peculiar to the Ultramarines that owed much to the standard Mars pattern internally. Naturally slightly less efficient in overall protection owing to the difference in materials from the Martian ur-example, Praetor armour was sometimes reinforced with additional plates at the hips, across the chest and on the outside of major long bone areas; bringing the level of protection back to comparable limits. Most famously, the helm often had a flat plate added over the front, giving the armour – and Legion – a distinctive appearance.

 

 

+ Einhorn's helm is not only lacking this additional frontispiece, but also the top section! This neatly demonstrates one of the great advantages of power armour; namely the modularity and redundancy. Presumably damaged beyond utility, the Legionary has removed the top section while retaining the frontal grill. This lower section of helm contains the vox-system, aural dampeners and much of the atmospheric systems, while also protecting the rebreather – and face – beneath.

 

+ While loss of a section of armour during combat is not unusual, removal of the helmet (while frowned upon) was sometimes done deliberately; allowing the terrifying Astartes a more relatable human face in order to win support on human worlds. The removal of the helmet does allow us a visual record of the strip haircut, a practical style that offered some cushioning to the head inside the notoriously uncomfortable Crusade armour helm if a skull cap was not worn. This image also shows Einhorn's main rifle, a Tigrus-pattern boltgun. This was not uncommon in the Legion, though most of the 190th Chapter bore the Umbra pattern that was common across the Legions during the Great Crusade. Note the three kill stripes near the muzzle.

 

 

+ This shows how the reinforced rim of the pauldron in the upper portion provides protection to the critical area of the upper torso and head. The distinctive size and shape of the Astartes shoulder pad, along with the unmistakeable icons of the respective Legion left no enemy in doubt as to who they were fighting.

 

+ Einhorn bears a small skull-and-crossbones honorific on his forearm, marking him as a tactical assault specialist. Perhaps this explains his unusual Tigrus-pattern boltgun – it may be recently issued to allow him to join a standard Tactical squad, rather than his preferred Tactical Assault (bolt pistol and combat weapon) formation.

 

 

+ Unfortunately, the answer to the question is muddied by the absence of tactical markings on Einhorn's left pauldron. This area would normally include Chapter markings, squad designation and sundry other information. Instead, Einhorn has merely a hastily-stencilled tactical arrow perhaps added in the field.

 

+All of these slight variances from the norm point to Einhorn's being attached to a unit that is not his usual squad. It is likely he is a fully battle-fit member of a unit mauled in combat – and he has thus been attached to fill a hole left by a casualty in another squad. This may be temporary or permanent, depending upon the level of damage the two units sustained, and whether the other members recover sufficiently. Astartes were, and are, extremely survivable; with a fatality rate of casualties being circa 6 per cent in 'normal' conflict (compare this to standard Imperial Guard figures of 16 per cent of casualties being fatalities). This is adjusted for the additional protection of the Astartes and capabilities of the enemies against which they were deployed, making their resilience all the more remarkable. A marine who is incapacitated on the battlefield – damaged to the point he cannot continue as an effective force – is still likely to heal and return to the field within weeks, if not days.+

 

 

+ The mark IV power pack here indicates this pict capture was taken towards the end of the Horus Heresy, after the War on Calth. It is almost certainly a replacement of the original suit. Note also the chequered pattern on Einhorn's mag-holstered boltpistol, a common decoration of the period.

+ More chillingly pointing to this date is the Mark III helm of an Iron Warrior from the IV Legion, upon which Einhorn is treading. The Ultramarines, by dint of their numbers, were instrumental in clearing the Imperium of pockets of resistance loyal to Horus. It is likely that these images date from the clearances of the Olympian Hegemony, Perturabo's micro-empire around his homeworld, a black mirror to Ultramar. These worlds were honeycombed with ingenious fastnesses and terrifying holds, and were only won through blood, toil and sacrifice.

 

Detail of the Iron Warrior helm.

 

Legionary Bastapol Einhorn, 150th.
+++

[Dosjetka]

Some of your picture links are broken, but I'm loving what I'm seeing. Sterling work mate :tu:

[apologist]

Thanks – I think I've ironed out the scrapcode, so the pics should appear now. I'd love to hear what you think :)

[Dosjetka]

I love the amount of character you manage to cram into each and every one of your models. You really are a great inspiration and it's pushing me more and more to come up with fluff for each member of my army and not just for squads, characters, vehicles. And I'm more and more thinking of going into "tru-scaling" and building an Alpha Legion strike force.

Gaaaah! Decisions, decisions...

[apologist]

That's much appreciated, and I'm glad to have got your enthusiasm for your own hobby going :)

If you don't mind me suggesting it, why not just forget 'game legalities' and the big picture, and just go ahead and make a cool model? It can be intimidating taking the first step on a big project, but making and painting one model; and lavishing all your attention on it, is a great way to see how far you can push yourself. At the end of it, you'll either have a noble effort, which will improve your skills for the next project, or you'll have the first marine on the path to a whole squad, strike team, or complete army.

[Doghouse]

Fantastic stuff mate, really loving the amount of detail you are putting into these guys and you are really setting the bar high for our battle.

[Tyrannicide]

Well the fluff sure doesn't disappoint. Really like all the details you've included, even inadvertently explaining why you did the things that you did with the model. Seeing into your thought process is helping me think of some key elements that need answering when I fluff out my own boys. The battle damage looks particularly natural. Would you be able to give a rough rundown of the colors you use for your blue?

 

Thanks for being such an inspiration, dude. :)

[Hyaenidae]

I was totally psyched that you started posting your Ultras again, until I saw the helm and read the fluff.

Now? Burn in hell, son of Guilliman. You want my Father's Realm? Molṑn Labé.

Kidding of course, loving the new stuff, man.

[apologist]

Fantastic stuff mate, really loving the amount of detail you are putting into these guys and you are really setting the bar high for our battle.

Cheers – the feeling's mutual :)

Well the fluff sure doesn't disappoint. Really like all the details you've included, even inadvertently explaining why you did the things that you did with the model. Seeing into your thought process is helping me think of some key elements that need answering when I fluff out my own boys. The battle damage looks particularly natural. Would you be able to give a rough rundown of the colors you use for your blue?

Thanks for being such an inspiration, dude.

Thanks; much appreciated – I hope you like today's marine as much!

I tend to work quite instinctively with modelling these marines (though some get the full work-through process) and then do free-writing with the pictures in hand, after I've developed and worked through what the various little bits and distinctive elements of the model have suggested during painting.

Regarding the blue, the recipe's as follows:

1) Prime white.

2) Mordian blue layer.

3) Wash with Asurmen Blue. While wet, add Leviathan Purple into the recesses.

4) Once dry, shade with a mix of Mordian Blue and Liche Purple; leaving around four fifths (assuming flat light) clean midtone.

5) Zenithal highlighting with mixes of Space Wolves Grey and Mordian Blue until you're working with pure Space Wolves Grey.

6) Edge highlight with Space Wolves Grey and White, if necessary (I use this mix for the sharp battle damage highlights, then add lines/spots of Charadon Granite over the top to help ensure the lines are fine).

I was totally psyched that you started posting your Ultras again, until I saw the helm and read the fluff.

Now? Burn in hell, son of Guilliman. You want my Father's Realm? Molṑn Labé.

Kidding of course, loving the new stuff, man.

:D

You'll have to get your cheerleading on for Doghouse, then – no mercy for the traitors!

Glad you're enjoying the show, and just to prove the Ultramarines aren't having everything go their way... read on:

+++

+inload: Brother Aper Vipsanion+

+ Aper Vipsanion is a native of Manes Otra, an obscure system rimwards of Macragge. Manes Otra orbits its star closely, but habitable zones exist near the Marco Culumo mountains thanks to the prodigious amount of cloud generated through hyper-evapotranspiration. As a result, the people live in mist-shrouded heathland despite the vast majority of the surface being rad-scarred wastes.

Legionary Vipsanion

+ Manotrans, as the natives are called, traditionally wear great torcs around their necks fashioned from sea-ivory that turned from peach to a blotchy pink under dangerous levels of radiation. Since Compliance in the mid-decades of the Great Crusade, these have been replaced with rad-counters, but the natives continue to regard items worn around the neck and chest as protective. Such superstitions, though officially frowned-upon, are generally tolerated as part of the cultural heritage of the planets of Ultramar. Guilliman regarded diversity – where it did not conflict with the Imperial Truth or the aims of the Imperium of Man – as beneficial; offering unique insights into specific theatres of war.+

+ Vipsanion has hinted at his heritage by decorating his chest armour with the legend 'CXC'; a numeral representing the 190th Chapter to which he belongs. Besides this forgiveable indulgence, Vipsanion has embraced the culture of the Legion like almost all Astartes, subsuming his personal desires to the good of the squad; and to the Legion as a whole. This is demonstrated not least through his name – like almost all Ultramarines, he has chosen a new name from the Core Worlds of Macragge, substituting it for his birthname Jorés Joréssen as an act of personal compliance.+

+ The mark II power generator pack is Martian standard; containing a stacked fusion core. The mark IV suit saw number of marked improvements over the Crusade armour, most notably in the 'under the hood' power generation.

+ This pattern of power pack produced prodigious amounts of heat, which needed to be vented through three fanned heat sinks, and necessitated bulky cabling vulnerable to attack. It also produced a low hum that set the teeth on edge when brought in close proximity; though autosenses inherent to even the earliest helmets filtered this out.+

+ Vipsanion has a white helmet stripe running down the crest of his helm, a common tactical marking on campaign that marked the marine out as a standard line trooper. This was largely redundant, but it was nevertheless common amongst older Legionaries, or those who preferred to keep campaign armour markings where they did not interfere with current duties.

+ This shot also shows the chemical snows upon which the 190th were deployed during the lamentable campaigns of the Olympian Hegemony Clearances, a notorious set of actions that foreshadowed the actions of the Great Scouring. The Clearances involved a number of Chapters, though the 190th, under their Honour-Captain Sulla Proxemides, were notable for their aggressive prosecution of the Iron Warrior defenders. A number of Ultramarines of the Chapter were censured following the campaigns.+

]

+ Vipsanion has been deployed with an augmented auspex set to defeat rad-interference and the iron Warriors targetted baffling measures. Early in the campaign, many Ultramarines of the 121st were lost to minefields shrouded to even sophisticated narrowband auspex scans – a lamentable oversight that well illustrates the dangers the Imperial forces faced when attacking rebels loyal to Horus, who had access to standard protocol measures.

+ The augmented auspex set required heavy cabling to feed its prodigious power consumption, and the high-gain pick-ups also required modifications to the bearer's armour to override interference – these can be seen embedded on Vipsanion's forearm bracer.+

+ Having served for just over fifty years in the Legion, which included Compliance actions on thirty-eight planets, numerous xenocidal campaigns, and seven tours of duty following the Calth Atrocity, Vipsanion was killed in action during the Clearances by Iron Warrior action in the Carybid pass of Sorrow Peaks.

+His body was unable to be reclaimed in the narrow pass, and his geneseed had unfortunately decayed beyond viability by the time the Ultramarines could force the route.+

[apologist]

+ The Legiones Astartes were created to be undefeatable. They are plated in nigh-impenetrable armour; receive biological, alchemical and chirurgical alterations that increase their bone density and muscle mass, and give them preternaturally acute senses. Their reactions are many times the human normal; their minds burn with myriad unconscious calculations and observations in every moment. They do not flag, or tire. They can fight at peak efficient for days on end, requiring little rest or sleep.

 

+ Physical redundancies and back-ups abound in their post-human flesh. Their core refined into perfect machines, they are all-but-immune to disease; their enhanced blood and immune systems defeating chemical attacks, shrugging off lethal radiation and – so perfect in its ability to replicate – even degradation and death.

 

+ Bound into mutually-supportive groups, they are experts in all forms of warfare; capable of adapting to any terrain or worldscape. Thanks to their physiques and equipment, they can fight and defeat anyone or anything from the crushing weight of ocean trenches to gas-swathed hellholes to the inimical vastness of the vacuum.

 

+ Most crucially, they are psychologically altered and indoctrinated to be the perfect killing machines; balanced, poised, terrifying – and immune to fear responses or the idea of defeat. Every part of them is designed to keep advancing, victoriously, under any forseeable circumstance.

 

+ The Legiones Astartes were created to be undefeatable. They were never designed to fight each other.+

 

A Contemptor-pattern Dreadnought stumbles across a dead legionnaire during the conflict with the Iron Warriors.

 

 

+++

This dead marine was a tester for the paint scheme, hence he's a little scrappy. He'll make a nice base decoration for a Dreadnought, but I'd like to look into creating lots of dead or injured marines to scatter about and add to the feel of a battle.

 

 

 

 

[Unknown Chronicler]

Great work on Brother Apes Vispasion and that Contemptor! I swear I've seen that dead Ultramarine when I was scanning through your thread in Warseer, the one in the crater with the banner perhaps? Anyways you have moved me to creating my own Horus Heresy army, which will be the Iron Hands and after that the Ultramarines. You are really an inspiration, can't wait to see the rest finished

[apologist]

 

Great work on Brother Apes Vispasion and that Contemptor! I swear I've seen that dead Ultramarine when I was scanning through your thread in Warseer, the one in the crater with the banner perhaps?

Yes, I peeled him off the crater to see whether or not he can be salvaged and put to use. Even in death we still serve, and all that ;)

 

I got cracking on building more last night. Here's the work-in-progress. Apologies for the confusing bits, variously in black/blue/grey and white. A lot of my models get to an early stage and then abandoned, and when I next get enthused I notice that such-and-such a bit would be perfect just here. You can probably see everything from resin to plastic to ProCreate putty, as well as undercoated and even fully painted bits!

 

Number 1: Pleased with this chap – the pose is not super-dynamic, but sufficiently open to interpretation to provide interest. Is he reaching for a door handle, or tenatively signalling for caution? I like to imply cross-model interaction, as long as it doesn't compromise the pose for the individual. I think some of you will like the return of my Praetor-pattern helms. Kudos for those should be paid to the ever-inspirational Iacton, who did (as far as I'm aware) the first version of these distinctive helms back in 2007ish, and provided the direct inspiration for my version.

 

 

+ Number 2: Hmm, least successful of this batch so far. The smaller Mk IV shoulder pads rob him of some presence, and the shield confuses the angle of movement. I'm tempted to strip these shoulder pads and go to the usual Mk II ones I had printed. He will likely receive a combat blade or similar weapon in his right hand – or have his arms replaced entirely with arms aiming his boltgun. Thoughts?

 

 

 

Number 3: Definite potential here. The reloading/reaching for a new magazine pose is working fairly well. He needs a pouch (obviously!) and I'll probably tilt the head differently – he's staring off into space at the moment, which robs the piece of immediacy.

 

 

Where possible, I'm trying to add distinctiveness and interest through minor variations from the basic set of armour. It's a delicate balance between making the model interesting and keeping it looking uniform. Number 1 has a Praetor pattern helm, an Umbra(?) boltgun and a different powerpack, but is otherwise standard. Note that number 2 sticks out the most due to the absence of the big Mk II shoulderpads, a very distinctive part of my vision of marines. Aside from this change, he is the most standard, which shows what an effect changing iconic/focal points can have. In contrast, number 3 has non-standard legs, non-standard torso, but still looks more like the basic marine pattern of this army.

[Brother Melice]

Return of a legend???

 

welcome back mate! great to se you here once more!

[GrandMagnus]

Your marines serve as a great inspiration for my own force. Its amazing work, even though Im no fan of true-sized marines.

[Aristander]

I'd just like to echo the sentiments of others posters here and congratulate you on your work - both the painting, modelling and background you're posting is the type of stuff that encouraged me to get back into 40k, and to use Ultramarines in particular.