Logs - Scatter Terrain

 After assembling a piece of furniture, I had some of those wooden dowels leftover. I decided to glue them into piles and paint them like stacked logs as some simple scatter terrain. It will work.

White Scars Legion Destroyer Assault Squad

With the planet of Xhorik Prime now lost to the vile traitors, the Brotherhood of the Broken Blade continued their transformation from a heroic force focused on the liberation of mankind to a warband fixated only on vengeance and the death of their enemies. No longer did they think of saving the planet or its populace from the desecrations of the Warmaster's forces. Their only goal now was to kill as many traitors as possible, especially their leaders. It was at this final desperate point when they opened up the sealed containers storing the weapons of last resort, such as the dreaded rad grenades, toxiferran flamers, and phosphex bombs. If the planet had to die to save it from the traitors, so be it. There could be no consideration for mercy, honor, or innocence.

The few remaining White Scars would don the ancient, battle-scarred armor of their Legion Destroyer Squads, not used since the earliest days of the Great Crusade. They would take the oaths of the Sagyar Mazan and seek to atone for their failure with their lives... and the destruction of as many enemies as possible until the release of death should be given them.

I spent a long time modeling each of these guys, trying to generate unique and dynamic poses to make it feel like they were really swooping down to attack, using their jump packs to leap into combat. Given how chunky and generally static the marine models are, I was pushing for all I could do to open them up and give them some sense of motion. I raided the bits box quite hard for the variety of pieces and used a lot of non-GW bits to ensure they really stand out from the rest of the army on the battlefield. I also wanted to show all their equipment: dual pistols, chain swords, grenades (frag, krak, rad, and phosphex), as well as the obvious weapon upgrades.

In game terms, I fear they will be underwhelming for their exorbitant cost. They have lots of neat weapons and rules, but at the end of the day, they are WS4, 1W, 3+ save so will die as easily as a ten-man tactical squad, but cost a cool 275 points kitted out. I just hope they get one awesome attack in before they wiped out!

Horus Heresy 2.0 House Rules

These rules are agreed for all standard games of Horus Heresy 2nd Edition. These come mostly from Horus Heresy events run by hobby organizations. 

Army Selection:

Legion Heavy Support Squads armed with lascannons can be a maximum of five models (unless the unit is already painted).

A maximum of one dreadnought of any type per 1500 points of game size.

A maximum of one dreadnought per Talon (Force Organization Chart slot).

Rules:

Flyers can arrive from reserves on Turn 1 on a 4+.

A sergeant in Artificer Armor may only be allocated Wounds to save up to his initiative value. After that, remaining Wounds in the Wound Pool must be allocated to other members of the squad.

Units mounted on Scimitar Jetbikes, Shamshir Jetbikes, and Spatha Combat Bikes are T5. But this does not affect the Instant Death threshold.

An army can make a maximum of three reactions in a single phase, including bonus reactions from Warlord traits, wargear, special rules, and special circumstances such as Interceptor.

Terrain:

Area terrain uses the old WH40k rules. Units cannot see through a piece of area terrain that is equal to their size class or greater unless they are elevated. Units in area terrain can only fire out or be targeted if they are within 6" of the edge. Any unit standing in the area terrain counts as being in cover and in difficult terrain unless they are two sizes larger than the terrain (size 3 monstrous creature in size 1 tall grass, for instance).

Cults and Militia:

A Force Commander may select up to three Provenances of War.

To Be Discussed:

Gravis Power Fist is Brutal (2) instead of Brutal (3).

Gravis Lascannon re-rolls failed armor penetration rolls of 1 instead of all failed penetration rolls.

Sniper Rifles are only Precision Shots on a to-hit roll of 5+?

M32 Battle Report 1: The Cleansing of Outpost Zeta-47

 Special Orders to A-Platoon, C-Company, 63rd Division PDF:

(1) This position will be held, and the platoon will remain here until relieved.

(2) The enemy cannot be allowed to interfere with this programme.

(3) If the section cannot remain here alive, it will remain here dead, but in any case, it will remain here.

(4) Should any man, through shell shock or other cause, attempt to surrender or retreat, he will remain here dead.

(5) Should all guns be destroyed, the platoon will use frag grenades and bayonets.

(6) Finally, the position, as stated, will be held.

-Lt. Gorman, A-Platoon, C-Company, 63rd Division PDF

Background:

After furious initial fighting with the ork invaders, the battered Planetary Defense Forces (PDF) were then set upon by a new threat: a novel type of Xenos. As the orks swept down into Chirosov Valley, the humans still held the mines and hills east of Vayya while the city itself was under siege. In the snowy hills, there were erratic and unreliable reports coming in about monsters appearing out of the snow and attacking. Then the garrison at Outpost Zeta-47 went silent. An expeditionary force was sent out to clear the threat and recover the outpost. The Tyranids were looking to sweep all resistance from the area so it could be harvested by ripper swarms. The PDF soldiers peered into the billowing snow, wondering what they would face at Outpost Zeta-47...

Major Dlonra led two heavy platoons reinforced with armor to secure the outpost.