Scythes of the Emperor and Black Library

GW's Black Library has just released a short story as part of their Summer of Reading. Their first release of the second week is The Shadow of the Beast, featuring the Scythes of the Emperor! Think of this as a beginning to their encounter with hive Fleet Kraken.

Completely used without GW's consent, but all credit goes to them!!

It is a short story. But being as it is about the Scythes, I am getting it. Add it to the other published Scythes story Orphans of the Kraken, in the now called Space Marines: The Omnibus. Excuse me, I have some reading to accomplish...

Storm Talons of the Scythes

Saving the best of my Scythes for last, I present my Storm Talons. These are the last pieces I have done for my Scythes as of now. Working in my usual style, I built and painted the pair at the same time. The two even are armed the same. Painting is where there are some differences.

                        

 

Talon number 1 on the left received some stripes and more of a yellow tail. I just wanted to experiment with striping a tad. It came out pretty good. Like all my other Scythe models, they were primed white to give the yellow more of a pop when it gets airbrushed on. Anything to remain yellow was then carefully taped off to completely painted separately, i.e. the cockpit. Black was then sprayed onto them. The black was given a stippling of blue/black that I had to soften it some. I had not yet gotten into using weathering powders yet that can be used to 'fade' the paint.

                 

 

The cockpit was fully detailed. A Techmarine is piloting the vehicle with accompanying Scythian shoulder pad. The canopy was taped over with the trusty Tamiya tape. Which was then slightly cut away in the corners of the glass to expose the framework. The entire glass piece then sprayed yellow, tape removed, and a clean piece was left behind. Regular PVA glue was used to attach the canopy. Use of superglue or plastic glue can cause the clear pice to 'fog' up, especially if it isn't given the ability to let the fumes escape.

The biggest experiment with these was on the bases. Number 5 was done in normal fashion of glue and sand after placing the wall. This resulted in a very flat piece even with a few rocks on it. On Talon number 1, I put some light modeling paste down (Golden). Wetting it, I added sand to the putty and molded a small crater into the base. This gives the ground a more realistic feel to it. Some undulations and even moving it up against the wall to show the build up of debris as you would see naturally. For large base like the guys use, the light modeling paste was much better in achieving realistic results. 

                    

 

The only drawback I had was with the clear stand. I taped it up with regular masking tape so I could save my Tamiya tape. During the gloss coating and dull coating, the tape failed in spots. I went ahead and sprayed the rest of it to avoid the splotchiness of the effect. Why not just glue the flying stand on afterward? By getting it attached in the first place you get the strong bond of plastic to plastic melting together. It's more work, but going the easy way in this case would not be the best way. Lesson learned that I did not hold back with the Tamiya tape when I painted up my Ravenwing aircraft in an earlier post.

Each time I do a project whether it be a squad, a tank, or terrain. I always want to add something new to the repertoire of techniques. The technique can be something simple like the striping on here, or using the modeling paste. I recommend trying something new each time you work on a project.

Scythes Transports

This one can be the boring post. Transports are rarely exciting. They fight through the fire to deliver their cargo. And much like a male spider after it delivers its cargo, they tend to die or get ignored.

Even still, I tried to make them look good! 

There are only two Rhinos currently. If or when I enlarge the company, there will definitely be more vehicles. I just have to remember most of the heavy tanks have been lost so I will avoid the Land Raiders and Predators. 

Should the Company Commander decide to ride, his wheels are suitably ready and unique in its adornment. The Grim Reaper is from a US Navy insignia I found on the internet. Using Photoshop, I resized it a bit and reversed the colors where all the black was clear and yellow was black. It is able to stand out nicely as a command Rhino.

                      

                  

I must say the Drop Pod kit looks great when finished, but it is a pain to put together! Why couldn't GW just put some pins in for the vanes to slide into? The entire process was extremely frustrating. Almost like they rushed it or a non-modeler built it on the computer. In order to get it to look good, you also have to pre-paint much of it before the final build. That's where I tried to do the electric look for the sensor dome or machine spirit. The Drop Pod is quite easy to paint up. Dry-brushing goes a long way with this item.

The last transport is for my Ironclad Dreadnought. I should have placed a picture of the two Drop Pods next to each other so you could get an idea of the size difference. The Dread Pod is fat with only three doors. A Dread base can just fit inside the Pod. Mine will not completely fit due to the Hunter Killer missiles on top. You will see him in another post soon. The Forge World Pod was much easier to build and is more stable than the plastic one. 

Update!

You can see the Dread Pod is about twice the size. You may also see in the back my latest WIP

Scythes' Space Marines

The Scouts may be the most numerous of members of my Scythes of the Emperor, but the graduated Space Marines are the backbones. Going with the theme that either they are rookies or veterans, my Scythes have two squads of Sternguard Veterans and one squad of regular Marines.

This is the regular squad. They tend to ride in a rhino transport. Why a multi-melta? Cheaper than a lascannon and still good at putting a wound on a Tyranid monster. Usually don't have to worry too much about range. The bugs tend to help you out there just fine. The Sergeant has a power pick for a weapon. I claim it as an axe ahead of time. The pick was a nasty anti-armor weapon back in medieval times. So, it fits just fine with the armor piercing of a power axe.

You can also see redeemed Lamenters amongst the unit. As the Scythes were assigned to oversee the Penance of the Lamenters following the Badab War; the Lamenters suffered heavily during the Kraken invasion. With the overall decimation of the Scythes Chapter, any surviving Lamenters amongst the Scythes number deemed vindicated were incorporated into the existing Chapter. I am sure the Inquisition will have questions regarding this action. Yet, it can be easier to ask forgiveness than permission considering the situation the Scythes current face. At the least, his gene seed may not be saved if it ever comes to it.

The first of two Sternguard squads is displayed above. The squad is made up of a mix of metal and plastic Marines. This squad has combi-meltas and a heavy flamer from a Terminator. The Veteran Sergeant is equipped with Lightning Claws. Usually deployed via drop pod into the middle of the enemy to draw them away from the front lines and to just cause as much damage as possible. There are only nine guys in the squad as a character sometimes deploys with them. They are great for chewing up Tyranid Warriors. The unit has successfully been used to alpha strike a Hive Tyrant leading to a complete disorganization of a Tyranid assault.

The last Space Marine unit is the heavy weapon Sternguard. I will combat squad this unit with the heavy weapons staying behind leaving the Veteran Sergeant and comrades to provide forward cover. It's also not too difficult to simply leave them all combined and shoot Kraken rounds too. It's difficult to see, but there are also a couple of comb-plasmas in here as well. I know it is not a standard use of the unit, but again, I play more for fluff.

Many of the plastic figures are modified to have service studs on their shoulder pads. The pads were made with Testors putty filled across the entire face then left to dry overnight then sanded smooth. With a pen, I chose several locations for the studs to go and lightly drilled into the putty with a pin vise. The studs themselves are tiny silica beads. You tend to get them with items shipped in boxes. I left a dollop of super glue on piece of paper, using a toothpick, I put a touch of the glue into the drilled hole. The silica bead was then carefully pressed into the hole. 

Some of the battle damage was a result of the pin vise drilling and the putty chipping off on the shoulder pads. Other was created by simply hitting the model with a file. Since the figures were primed in white and then yellow over the top, the file tends to show the white primer and the grey of the plastic underneath. This looks best on the black armor locations.

Each of the figures are individual with alternating color schemes and decal usage. Normally I make my Marines uniform per squad. Each one using the same numeration and symbols. Since many of the Veteran Scythes survived the Hivefleet attack, the disciplined rules are a bit more lax.

Now being colorblind, I never knew the lining I did on the yellow was red. I originally thought I grabbed the brown micron pen. It wasn't until the Necronomicon Tournament that I was told, 'I like how you used the red for the lining.' Aww, crap! Even still I can't tell it's red.

Scythes of the Emperor Revisted

While filling in spots while my craft room is under construction, windows being rebuilt. I thought my Scythes should get revisited. as I never really showed much beyond one of the scout squads. To get re-inspired I visited one of my favorite websites, The Scythes.com, and found that the owner is moving on to other endeavors for some time. I wish him well.

Anyway, I thought I would start with showing the Scouts again. Remembering that most of the Scythes died fighting against Hive Fleet Kraken, to rebuild the Chapter, Scouts would have to be groomed.

These guys are the first of two Assault Scouts that I have. Each Sergeant has a combo flamer. As for their makeup, their armament is a toss up between shotguns and pistols with close combat weapons. The idea being either two shots before engaging with the shotguns, or one shot and an extra attack with the pistol combo. These squads are designed to harass or dig out units in cover.

I also built up a full squad of Sniper Scouts. This squad can be a huge boost or a huge bust depending on how the dice are rolling that day. Being that a sniper rifle is useful against anything excepting vehicles for the most part, they can really threaten the largest creatures the Tyranids can throw. They can also give Riptides, Wraith Knights, and C'tan issues.

Just to add flavor, the Scythes have incorporated their own Sergeant Telion. I have added veterans throughout the company to give it the mix of rookies and veterans. As many of the Scythes that survived would have definitely earned their veteran status in spades, there would be a lack of generic marines.

 

As for the camo cloaks, this was the first time I tried to do a complex scheme. Each scout had a unique style. They came out okay for me. Knowing now what I didn't know then, I would have added a filter to tie it together. As they stand, I am fairly happy with them. The idea comes across.

I had some extra scouts and decided to make a support unit with a missile launcher and bolters. Potentially this unit could sit on a Storm Scout Speeder in the back field or just occupy an objective.

As for the Scouts in general, outside of the snipers, I tried to make each guy different. Mainly this was accomplished with their head selections. Having each guy looking the same can really lend to a boring unit. The power fist for the Assault Scout is an old terminator power fist. It fit in real well.