Heresy-Era Salamanders Work in Progress: Recon and MkIII Marines

This year, my team for Adepticon has decided to go with the tried and true power armor for our theme. The bonus, you would think, is that many of us already own Marines as armies.

Huzzah! No Work!

…yeah, you know me better than that, right? I'm actually using this as an opportunity to use some of the Forge World resin-crack I've had for a while now, and move forward with a Pre-Heresy Era Salamanders Force! I've loved the story behind the XVIII Legion ever since I got back into 40K during 3rd Edition, and am looking forward to collecting them as both a playable force, and a labor of love.

I'm starting off with a squad of 5 Recon Marines, and a full 10-man unit of MkII Tactical Marines.

"Wait Tim! Recon Marines aren't legal in standard 40K!!!111!!11!"

Legal-schmegal. When have I ever cared about a model being exactly what everyone thinks it should be? They look cool, and I'll be using them as sniper scouts. Simple as that. I've never had anyone try and call me out on any of my far more outlandish conversions in the past, and I don't see these as being a problem.

The newer releases of Heresy-Era squads are very well done. The level of detail is amazing, and I'm very happy with the quality of the product. There are even numbered pips in each shoulder, matching to the appropriate arm so no mishaps would occur with the pose. With a little care in the assembly stage, the Recon Squad went together in a heartbeat. I did pin the Stalker-Pattern bolters to their hands, without glueing them in, so that I could get the other arm in the right position, but I do that anyway. The only real gripe I have with the is kit is that the core figures of the Recon Marines are far more set in their pose than other Marines from Forge World, only offering 5 different sculpts/poses. The good news is that I only ever plan on owning a squad of 5 so I'm happy!

Since the Recon Marines are wearing MkIV armor, I can also use some of the standard Salamanders sculpted shoulder pads I had already purchased for use on more recent marks of armor! Bonus!

I also own a squad of MkII, MkIII and a 5-man of MkV armored Marines to choose from for my 10-man squad. Since Forge World came out with MkII and MkIII shoulder pads just recently, I scooped up a pack each, and decided to run with the MkIII armor for this go-round.

Now where the Recon Marines had some fun camp cloaks already sculpted to them, the MkII Marines obviously do not. So what to do to represent the Salamander scale cloaks? Well I could hand sculpt each one, painstakingly adding detail and making each one unique….

…or I could buy a box of these.

Guess which I did.

Now before you start going on about how I should use this as an opportunity to sculpt some original cloaks, let's take this time to remind ourselves about how little time I have before Adepticon, shall we? Don't worry, I have no plans to just slap these on their back and call it a day. I'll be doing some creative caring and shaping of them to make them a little different per Marine, I just need a quicker starting point is all.

What do I have left past these two squads? A Heresy-Era Rhino, a Techmarine and Thunderfire Cannon converted from a Rapier, a 5-man Tartaros Pattern Terminator squad, a converted Librarian in Cataphractii Terminator armor, an Aegis Defense Line, and finally a Relic Contemptor Dreadnought converted into a hammer and shield-toting Ironclad in a Drop Pod.

Whew…

More to come!

- Tim