My new project

WARNING: 4TH LEVEL NERD SHIT AHEAD.

Short post this week; it's been a difficult few days and I don't really feel like making a longer post.

I'm back into Warhammer 40K in a big way...painting, building models, and now, beginning new projects centered around it.

SPEAKING OF.

I play a faction called the Astra Militarum. It used to be called the Imperial Guard, but Games Workshop, the company that makes this incredibly time-and-money-consuming hobby realized they can't copyright the phrase "Imperial Guard," so they renamed it something super gothic cyberpunk.

The general strategy for the AM is this: bring bigger guns and more of them than your enemy, and shoot everything in your army at them at the same time before they get in range to start messing you up. Unlike some factions in the game, the AM are not supersoldiers or indestructible undead robots or ancient aliens with advanced technology; they are normal dudes with normal weapons taking on impossible odds, which I find endearing. They attack from afar in well-disciplined formations, and when that fails, they use their numbers to their advantage - very Napoleonic.

The trouble is, when you have to individually assemble and paint each and every one of the little bastards by hand, it takes a very, very long time. Unfortunately, the time has finally come - I'm running out of things to paint.

The great thing about playing the AM is that the rules for them are versatile, in terms of both hobbying and painting: according to the rules, within certain loose stipulations, you can make your army look however you want. The same is true of each army in Warhammer and Warhammer 40K, but the AM is a diverse military machine encompassing countless worlds across the galaxy, each with their own unique style of waging war, meaning you can get more creative with them than any other faction.

These are non-standard models. Somebody on the Internet worked very hard to make them look unique and dope, and that is one of my favorite things about this hobby.

For example: want to make a futuristic army of dudes with laser rifles...who are modeled after WWI-era trench rats? No worries, they are still playable.

You want a "Star Wars" themed army full of stormtroopers with Darth Vader and the Emperor leading it? GW's got you covered.

Want your army led by famous WWII-era general George S. Patton? Well you can technically create whatever backstory for OH WAIT THEY LITERALLY CREATED A CHARACTER BASED OFF OF HIM, ONLY TWICE AS SMART AND TEN TIMES AS CRAZY.

There's a particularly cruel tactic that until recently I wasn't a huge fan of. In the Astra Militarum, you have the option of beefing up your forces using "conscript platoons." Basically, it's a bunch of green recruits fresh out of boot camp. The idea is that you put them in front and let them take most of the hits, so your more competent troopers don't take casualties. Even in a pretend game about the darkest possible scenario for humanity's 41st millennium, I detest the idea of throwing the lives of a bunch of teenagers with rifles away like that.

However.

One of the older editions of the game included the option to take "penal legionnaires," or soldiers inducted out of the prison system. The idea was, you take a bunch of hardcore criminals and killers out of a life sentence, give them shock collars and rifles, and tell them to go earn their freedom...in an active warzone. Basically, you create an army based off of "The Dirty Dozen."

I refuse to believe nobody has ever thought about this before, yet I can't for the life of me find any examples online.

It occurred to me that for all the interesting "themed" armies I've seen, I have never once seen an army that piques another particular interest of mine. It's an idea I have had for at least 3 years.

I always liked the idea of crime syndicates playing a part in stories like that of "Star Wars." The Black Sun may not have a huge role in the main movies, but I've always wanted to see an AM army based off of them, or the Omega gangs in "Mass Effect." Surely there has to be an equivalent in the lore of 40K? Surely someone, somewhere has created, I dunno...a "Cowboy Bebop"-esque AM army? In time, these "conscripts" may turn into a cool space pirate proxy army, using AM rules when playing the game.

At the very least, I'll finally have an army of badass, rugged cutthroats, instead of the stoic, if slightly corny GIs of the Astra Militarum .

I'll be posting my progress mostly on Instagram, so you can follow it from start to finish by looking for @MattsRaebels.