Violence Solves Everything - Modelling the Mordant 303rd Part 2

I arrived back from holiday late last Saturday to see an unexpected package waiting for me, then it dawned on me the Victoria Miniatures Arcadian Rifles miniatures I had pre-ordered several months ago had finally arrived. They are rather lovely resin figures with pretty reasonable prices in comparison to Games Workshops resin products (and free postage from Australia).

With some proper female miniatures in place I now have the job of converting and painting figures to represent my long term Dark Heresy character and the PCs and NPCs in the Only War prequel campaign that I am running. In the roleplaying game roughly half of the Regiment is female, I doubt I'll manage anywhere near that in the 40K army but I aim to create all of the important players from the campaign

I am planning on making two versions of my character, Veteran Sergeant Rizpah Jair.



Female Arcadian Guard from Victoria Miniatures.

Metal Cadian with head sawp for size comparison

One will be "Riz", the fresh faced hyperactive teenage punk that features as an NPC in my Only War game, featuring Tank Girl-esque bright pink hair and a slew of tattoos showing her allegiances prior to joining the Guard. Actually in my version of the Regiment all of the Mordant troopers use tattoos to show their allegiances to gangs, mining companies and fellow troopers (They also have their ranks tattooed to their arms - if your uniform is sleeveless what better place to put them).

The second version will be the hardened veteran who faces the horrors of purestrain genestealers when her company are almost entirely destroyed whilst reconnoitring a space hulk. The bright hair is long gone, now dyed black, and her face is heavily tattooed in the style of black metal makeup. In addition to her standard regimental equipment she also now carries a pair of Triplex pattern "Fury" assault laspistols and a trophy knife fashioned from the claws of a Tyranid.

In my next Mordant related post I'll introduce the other PCs and NPCs of the Only War campaign that I intend to convert for my 40K army.

Men Must Die So Man Endures: The First Squads of the Mordant 303rd

1989 Imperial Guard Commissar.

 

Over the last month or so I have been putting together some miniatures for the start of my Mordant army. I already had 2 old metal Cadian squads, however some of these are already pained in other colour schemes and I don't want to use the old flamers or heavy weapons. I also have an old Cadian Lieutenant model with shotgun, an old Cadian Comms trooper and a very old (1989) Commissar with power fist and power sword. Added to these I have a squad of old metal ratlings, who I may or may not use, a Mordian Lieutenant, who will be used as my Captain, and a Chimera.

Cadian with sleeveless arms

from Victoria Miniatures.

 

I've been lucky that one of my friends is converting a Genswick guard army and has gifted me a load of plastic Cadian parts, which I have used as the basis for my next squad. These Cadian bitz were pretty much complete models but without the arms, looking around I found that Victoria Miniatures produce sleeveless arms, and I have bought a handful of these to use. Rather than just use Cadian heads I plan to make everything a bit more varied, using Catachan heads and converting some heads from other manufacturers such as MaxMini.



One notable feature of the army will be inclusion of female guard, this is a bit of a difficulty because there is a distinct lack of suitable female miniatures. Head swaps with the old Escher miniatures would have been suitable but they are rather pricey now they are out of production. So instead I've bought some female heads from two other companies, Statuesque and Brother Vinni, and have acquired a couple from Wargames Factory via my friend. Sadly the Statuesque ones are simply far too small for use on GW minis and though the Brother Vinni ones are really awesome sculpts they are also a little on the small side. Thankfully Victoria Miniatures are currently pre-ordering for some female guard who will fit right in, so I have bought a squad of these.


Conversions for my Mordant Army. From left Brother Vinni Machine Gunner

 with Cadian Head swap, Cadians with Victoria Miniature Arms and Brother

Vinni Head, OOP Metal Cadian Head and Regular Cadian head with Victoria

Miniature Goggles.

My next move is to buy the Cadian and Catachan command squads as well as a couple of regular Cadian squads to finish the bulk of the troops before picking up some Sentinals and converting some more unusual pieces for the army, such as the sentry guns.

Fire in the Hole: Planning the Mordant 303rd

Having decided to build an Imperial Guard army and decided the armies theme, I have to decide upon what models to buy and what to arm them with. I'm not all that fussed about creating something that is completely legal to use in 40K games, more about creating something that fits the background and looks cool. I need to create an army that appropriately represents a force that is a veteran of five long campaigns against mutant rebels, Hrud infestations and Genestealer cultists. An army that is designed to fight in close quarters against the Imperium's many enemies, to cleanse the narrow sewers of ruined cities and corridors of spaceships.



No Tanks!

The first thing that is out for my army is tanks. Tanks don't really do narrow tunnels, so the mainstay of many an Imperial Guard army sadly isn't suitable for mine. Somewhere at home I already have a Chimera, so that may get used but anything else is out of bounds. Equally unsuited for small tunnels are Rough Riders and Ogryns so I won't be having any of those either, or any of the now ubiquitous flyers.



To fit the theme of a force designed to board a spaceship I'll have some troops with equipment for breaching bulkheads (las-cutters, melta bombs, demo charges etc) but the bulk will be armed with weapons aimed for short range combat. Primarily these will be weapons that wouldn't cause structural damage to the hull of a ship (so shotguns, las-carbines and flamers). For some more heavy support I'll have some rapid firing sentry weapons (heavy bolters and heavy stubbers). The troops will be festooned with grenades so that they fit with the background for the regiment that I created in Only War (I am currently running a prequel to the long standing Dark Heresy campaign that I played in, charting how my character became an Inquisitorial Agent).

One of only three bits of artwork for the Mordant

Acid Dogs. Copyright Games Workshop.

There are only a handful of pieces of artwork for the Mordant Acid Dogs these show the troops being armed with a variety of equipment but broadly dressed like Cadians with a vest rather than a sleeved top. The conversions I've seen so far of Mordant troopers use Cadian bodies with Catachan arms, however I'm not a fan of the ridiculous body builder arms of the Jungle Fighters so will be looking elsewhere for some sleeveless arms. I'm also planning to use a variety of head swaps to emphasise the rag tag punky element of Mordant Troopers.

I've already stocked up on a selection of models and bitz to make my conversions but you'll have to wait until my next post for the details.

The Mordant 303rd - My New Army

For my sins I have decided to start an Imperial Guard army. A foolish prospect given that I have played 40K twice in the last decade. I am going to collect a Mordant Acid Dog army....

I imagine a lot of you will be scratching your heads wondering what I'm on about, you think I'm confused with how to spell Mordian. But no I'm not going insane, Mordant are a regiment in the 40K universe and I didn't even make them up myself. The Mordant Acid Dogs featured in the Eye of Terror campaign that GW ran back in 2003 and renown as tunnel fighters.

You may wonder why pick a Regiment with about half a page of background rather than one the many regiments with loads of cool background. The reason for me collecting them takes us back to 2009 and the publication of Dark Heresy Ascension.



Darius Tarrantarm: Noble rogue and

chancer (and sometimes hero of the

Imperium)*

We had been playing Dark Heresy for a year or so and had a group of miscreants that bumbled around falling upon evidence of heresy in their service to the Inquisition. I played Darius Tarrantarm a noble born chancer and wide boy, my brother played Mercutio Harrigan a drug addled former ganger turned dubious law enforcer and our friend Chris played Kaarl Raga a smelly, feral world assassin. When Ascension came out we had the chance of adding some actually competent characters into the campaign. Chris chose to play Rhoda Roskruger, a hive gang boss, my brother Navonax, a Tech Priest Magos specialising in wave research, and I Rizpah Jair an Imperial Guard Stormtrooper.



A Mordant Acid Dog

Copyright GW

I had decided I wanted to play a female guard and had a quick look through my back copies of White Dwarf to find a suitable regiment. I stumbled across this picture of a Mordant Guardswoman and I decided it fitted the bill perfectly. A tunnel fighting specialist who find herself the other side of the galaxy as part of an elite Ordo Xenos Stormtrooper Killteam, fighting against the dreaded Tyranids.

Move forward 5 years and my Stormtrooper had moved on from fighting aliens to killing an Emperor's Children Space Marine with a Fury Pattern Laspistol (Stormtoopers in Dark Heresy are pretty hardcore). So it seemed the perfect choice to bring out some of my old Cadian models and create the ill-fated force that was sent to reconnoitre a space hulk leading to much death at the hands of genestealers and the induction of my character into the forces of the Inquisition. I might even play some games of 40K with the new army I create.

So over the next months expect to see more posts and photos cataloguing my progress in this modelling project.

* This picture was created using this photo fit web app provided by the Open University.