Tau Crisis suits:FB/MP/MT

Today is the right time to introduce you to my kamikaze tank popper squad.

They are three XV-8 guys equipped with Fusion blasters and Missile pods so they can pop things near or far from them... They never get bored.

I´ll usually field them with multitracker for everyone and a pair of shield drones stuck to the leader, which eventually will be equipped with a target lock to be able to shoot another unit.

What I expect from them: Tank popping, here, there or wherever tanks are and survive enough to repeat the process as many times as possible and when no tanks left... Heavy infantry... here we come.

The guys, as ever the leader has white plates.

Doing a can-can move to their right so you can see the guys from another perspective.




The same from the other side.






What do you think?





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Space Hulk dead marine (objective marker #1)

Today a Space Hulk dead marine and a bit of story.


Long time ago, when I was (more) young, my group of friends played a game called "Dark age of camelot", we were all paladins and with a bit of munchkinism we were a very nice group of fanatic almost-unkillable warriors.

We founded a guild called "CUSTOS FIDIS" (guardians of the faith) and out colours were unpainted plate and blueish-white blue cape with a winged cup in the middle.

The thing is that when we were about to play W40K a friend of mine (Firlesnes from Maestros del capitulo told me that he was going to make a revival of our guild in the form of space marines, and I thought that it was a great idea.

We tried white, almost white, more than white, whiteish, not so white and cuasi-white and we weren´t totally happy with the results so now he has Imperial Fists and me... well, Raven Guard,you know.


Time passed by and I have improved my painting skills and ordered from a bits page the dead marine of the space hulk tabletop game and I did my try, because our attempt to revive our ancient guild should not be forgotten.

And of course, the mini is full of cups everywhere, which gave me the last push to try it.

And that´s the reason my Raven Guard will fight to recover the dead body and ancient armour of "Lhottar The Redeemer" (the name of my old paladin of the custos fidis guild).

It was primed white, then washed with badab black, cleaned with vallejo silvergrey and hightlighted with vallejo white.

The blue is vallejo´s turquoise, highlighted with vallejo light turquoise and re-highlighted with a 3/2 of vallejo bluegreen and white.

The golds are vallejo brass, badab black washed and highlighted with vallejo gold.

The yellow is foundation yellow, vallejo flat yellow and highlighted with 3/2 flat yellow and white.

The last thing is... How should I make the base?

I think I will try some kind of ruined building floor, but still I´m not sure.. Any ideas?

Hope you like it.

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Aajz Solari: Shadow Captain of the Second Company

Ahhhh, the Assault on Black Reach Captain, a real delight to paint and look at.

He will be my Shadow Captain Aajz Solari, the captain of the Raven Guard Second Company.

As explained in the codex Captain Solari is leading the efforts of two dozens of chapters against the Leviathan fleet tyranid invasion, what makes him in the guy with more space marines at his command... I suppose.

I will be using him as Sicarius as well as an standard captain with relic blade and sometimes with storm shield as well (nice and unexpensive combo).

He will be leading from the front charging whatever needs to be charged and inspiring anyone whose faith in victory is broken.

At the first moment I was going to convert him, adding some plasma fun, but decided to keep him unconverted (apart from the commander backpack, of course) because I really like this mini as well as my converting skills are not as good as I want them to be :D

This mini was painted about two weeks ago, but it wasn´t until yesterday I put the symbols on his shoulderpads, only to make him more characterful.

And there he is... the Shadow Captain:

I tried to make him a lot more Black/White than the previous paintjob, that had a lot of red everywhere.

I don´t know why I put the red line tatooed in his face, but i like it.

I think his cloak needs some freehand, but I´ll keep it this way until my freehand skills are upgraded... a lot :D

The guy with his Command Squad.

A cenital photo of them.

Bonus: I found a photo of the previous paintjob:

Hope you like it.

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Raven Guard Second Company Comman Squad

Here they are my Raven Guard Second Company Command Squad (GW don´t seem to know what colour goes with what company of the raven guard so I choose the classic red and a "II" in some shoulderpads and it´s done :D ).

It will mostly be a close combat oriented command squad, that is the reason of the energy weapons everywhere.

They will be accompanying my AOBR captain (count as sicarius... post pending), and they will be riding a razorback... mostly.

They are made by mixing the spare pieces of the ravenwing boxes (used to make my ravenwheel), the command squad sprue and the revered Raven Guard Upgrade Pack from Forgeworld.

The upgrade pack from forgeworld is nice, indeed... I need another four to make some guard and vanguard vets.

As you would notice... there is no champion or standard bearer... I think the champion is too expensive for what he adds to the squad (I still will be painting the old metal one to use it in case of need), and the standard bearer... I´m still thinking about the banner, so it will take long.

And now... the guys.

The apothecary: the only forgeworld stuff this guy has is the raven guard shoulderpad, the other things are the standard command squad sprue.

I like his martial artist position :D

The guy with the combimelta: chest, head, chapter shoulderpad and backpack are from forgeworld.

Nothing else to say... and assaulty guy with a shot to blow a tank up.

The mace one: the power mace is from the Dark Angels upgrade pack which a friend of mine (In Cavda Venenum from "maestros del capitulo") gave me cause I love this weapon, the only change I made is the DA symbol in the wrist.

This is the only guy who will not shoot during an assault (combi-plasma)... if the weapon I choose in a list for him is the one displayed in the mini, of course :D

The Chaaaaaaaarge!!! guy: Another assaulty one, with the classical plasma pistol/power sword combo, power sword that came from the ravenwing sprue.

The pointing guy: he points at the next target with a power fist, he will be the last in deliver the punches, but they will be punches to take care of.

I love his helmet, the real beakie from the forgeworld pack.

A family photo.

The same from a cenital perspective.

I like how homogeneal they are and still different from one another.

Next post: Aajz Solari, Shadow Captain of the Raven Guard Second Company (on foot).

Hope you like ´em

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Raven Guard Venerable Dreadnought.

The day the Raven Guard Upgrade Pack came to my hands, a Raven Guard Venerable Dreadnought came also, as well as a Dreadnought Plasma Cannon and a Dreadnought Drill Arm with encased Flamethrower.

The first time I saw a picture of the FW RG Vet Dreadnought I thought it was too simple to be a proper venerable dread, but since it came to my hands I´ve learned to love it.

Indeed, the major mistake I saw at the first moment (the lack of barroque decorations on this guy) came to be the major success, cause Raven Guard is a secretive and sneaky chapter, so they need to be as simple and black as possible, well, it´s not like the dread would infiltrate anywhere, but... I like´em plain and simple.

Here is the guy.

Do you see the wing in the sarcophagus??

About 8 layers of white (in different tones) went into the hightlight of them.

I´m specially proud of the plasma cannon, don´t know why, but I really like it.

A cenital view to show you the "old" gold of the sarcophagus and a tiny detail: the upper part of the smoke vents are painted in gold (to make it a bit more a jewel of the chapter).

I usually paint the mechanicum symbol gold, but I painted it in the official scheme and I like it a lot.

As ever comments and criticism will be welcome.

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Shas`xx.

In this post I´m gonna talk about my (at the moment) only HQ for my tau army.

The Shas´XX (where xx is "O" or "El" depending the needs).

I don´t have a name for him at the moment, but... soon I´ll have it.

This guys was built knowing the actual vehicle rage in the game, and is equipped with a Missile Pod for long range anti light vehicle and a Fusion Blaster for Short (very short, indeed) antivehicular power.

I´ll usually equip him with the proper fatigues to survive the short range "environment", and will have a 2+ armour save with feel no pain and a shield generator, as well as a multitracker and sometimes a computer for a +1 BS.

And of course... a pair of shield drones to keep this high priced piece of plaststeel alive as much as they can.

What I expect of this guy: Taking vehicles, light ones with missiles and heavier vehicles with the plasma, as well as survive as much as possible with all the upgrades he will be awarded with.And as ever... keep the morale of my guys high.
I also expect him to JSJ to death and not be charged, but this is only a hope.

The question is... Solo or with XV-8 guards?

What I don´t expect of him: Survive every battle while having to take tanks from near.

And here is the man... the alien, I mean.

He has some markings in red, this is cause I´m going to assembly and paint about four battlesuited HQ´s and every battlesuited HQ will be painted with markings of different colour, one red, one blue, one yellow, etc...

- Red: Missile pod/Fusion blaster (this guy)
- Blue: Missile pod/Plasma Rifle
- Yellow: Fusion blaster/Plasma Rifle
- Orange or grey: Anti-infantry HQ (mine projector, ciclonic blaster and flamethrower in some combination)
- Purple: Farsight.

And now... the photos.


The guy... a Forgeworld model, slightly converted (I will explain it later in the post).


I´m pretty proud of the position, like surveying the battlefield searching for objectives.

The stone is a piece of a cork from a bottle of wine... I think.

A detail of the optics and mark of the chest.

A photo showing the back (notice the custom made ankle-strengthers... a tutorial about this will be posted)

Another photo.

The ankle piece.

The weapons are conversions (very easy ones).

The arm is a standard forgeworld battlesuit arm, but the weapons are plastig gw ones cut and filed out a bit.

This one is a Missile pod, the round drum-like thing is the back part of a cicloblaster and the laser sight thing of the bottom is part of a tau flamethrower.

This one is a plastic Fusion blaster, which plasma deposit was filed and glued to the back part of the arm.

Do you like it??

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At last!!!

Look at what came to the mail 5 minutes ago:

Click the link to go to the preorder page guys: LINK

TAU: Crisis Suits: PR/MP/MT

And for today... the main body of my tau army: the crisis suits... well, the first squad.

They are the guys who will bring combat to the enemy lines, jumpacking or deep stricking near the enemy.

When my tau army will be finished, I´ll have about 5 squad of this guys.

They are useful, with great and varied weaponery and lots of tricks under theis armoured sleeve.

What do I expect from them?

Well it does depend of the weapon loadout, so, in this case I expect this guys never to get bored, they got 2 high strength weapons, so when in close combat missile and plasma and for far targets and light vehicles they´ll use the missile pods in the classical Jump Shoot Jump (JSJ for the new guys) tau crisis suit way of fight.

In the last battle they blew up a blood angel dreadnought with a single salvo of missiles.

Here they are, they guys in armour, and again, the leader is the guy with white garments (if you look closely they got their unit number in the right leg (THEIR right leg), which is the bottom one, which means they are the crisis suit first team.

And in the other leg they got their rank in the squad, the leader got the white patch in the bottom plate, and the second and third guy got white-painted the second and third plate respectively.

Another shoot.



The last one.

And that is all for today.

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TAU: XV25 Stealthsuits first squad

I still remember when the new tau codex was released.

At this time, I went to my local GW store and a staff guy assaulted me (yep, he gained +1 attack) when I was looking at the old stealth suits (the XV-15), and tried to convince me that the new stealthsuits were far way better than the old ones.

And as ever... I argued, and at last he ran off knowing he wasn´t going to convince me.

Yep, I think the old guys were great, fully encased into a power armour, and little enough to make the "stealthsuit" thing believable, but I have learnt to appreciate the new ones:

- Plastic minis... yay!!

- Poseable.

- They come with one fusion blaster and a markerlight drone.

- Easy to paint.

- Very distinctive shape.

So finally I got one squad painted and other squad pending.

I´ve been fantasizing about the possibilities of this guys, jumpacks, medium strength weapons, suit sistems... and there is one thing I want to test:

A full 6 squad man with the basic weapons and every one of them with a drone controller and 2 gun drones... 30 S5 shots wich can move up to 30 cm (12") and retreat in the assault phase.

Oh, and if you assault with them you get another 36 attacks (which being tau melee attacks aren´t an impressive thing, but they can pack a little punch to standard infantry).

The full squad of 6 guys.

The full six guys once again.

The full 6 guys one last time.

To observe the leader markings (white shoulderpad, as ever):

A detail of the fusion blaster.

A detail of the optics.

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