Horus Heresy - The Hype Train
'KRAW!' - attributed to un-named Raven Guard Captain
DON’T PANIC EVERYONE, DON’T PANIC! Okay, maybe a little more panic than that please. Good? Good.
Horus Heresy 2.0 as it’s been dubbed by certain groups is very much on the horizon. It was only a couple of weeks ago we had the announcement trailer at Adepticon and this week we got our first look at the Mark VI (that’s 6 for those that don’t know Roman Numerals) Tactical Marines. And oh boy does these models look nice.
To say that myself and the Damned were impressed with this would be… broadly accurate. The model(s) shown in this armour do look really very nice, lots and lots of little details from the grenades to the weapon straps and even the flex at the wrist joints depending on how the Marine is holding that boltgun. Also something about trigger discipline since that seems to have blown up as being such an important feature 1.
The range of options for the unit is really nice too. Yes from the looks of the article we’re only getting basic bolter marines and no special or heavy weapons on this kit. That is a little problematic… until you realise that both the Mk 3 & 4 kits have options in them and Forgeworld sells a bunch of weapons that are compatible with those kits. It would not surprise me at all if we saw something similar for the Beakie Boys here. Instead we have multiple options for the Sergeants (Fists, with lightning-claw add-on, swords, pistols) back banners and the important vox and augury skull scanner. Easy access to these two bit in particular is going to make for very happy people as you can just slot those parts onto other bodies.
But there is an elephant in the room. I could gush over the way these models look for days but there is a minor nitpick that I will have compared to the masses of Mk 3 & 4 plastics I’ve built over time.
I’m only going to ever want 20 of these models on the table.
Why? The image above kind of shows it, they have a very limited range of bodies. From what we’ve seen there’s only 5 distinct bodies throughout the kit. No I am not going to utter the dreaded ‘monopose’ statement since I know that my tactical marines border on pose-duplication a lot just by trying to have them in a somewhat sensible posture. But as I look at the shelf with the 10 tactical marines that started my Death Guard project, and knowing that at least 3 or 4 of them are in very similar poses, I struggle to pick out which. On these I think they’re going to stick out like a sore thumb. Don’t mistake me, the poses for these Beakies is amazing. I just wish there was 10 of them not 5 duplicated with arm swaps.
This is what happens when you don’t write a post for a few days and WarCom throws out another Heresy Thursday article.
We are torn on this one. As one of the Damned put it in our group chat, they “like the volkite and the ‘slightly more interesting hero rock’ and that’s it”. Others see it as maybe a good model for a Legion Champion. We’re definitely not sold on this one. And I can see why. The sculpt isn’t bad per-se. The sword looks stunning, the volkite is always nice to see (everyone needs more CHOOM). The head options aren’t bad. In fact it’s a solid 8/10 model. So what’s the problem? I can only answer for myself here.
Every character model I have made for Heresy has been converted. Some may just be simple weapon swaps, whilst another is kitbashed from about 5 parts. And this Praetor could make a great base for a model but… I’d not use it for my Dark Angels. I’d use the Deathwing Companions, or Knights Cenobium or the Legion-specific Praetors themselves as the base first. And that’s where I think these fall on first impression. They’re good but not what I’d want to use for a character that’s supposed to be leading my small contingent of the Legion.
Still judgement, as is the case with everything, isn’t final until I have these models in hand. These are just first impressions. 2
