A Closer Look At Chapter Tactics by Darren Driver of The Art of Warhammer!

A Closer Look at Chapter Tactics by Darren Driver at The Art of Warhammer

While looking through the DFG Blog Network, I found an article on Space Marine Chapter Tactics that summed up everything I had thought about the new tactics, especially in comparison to the old 4th edition version of the chapter traits. The article is by Darren Driver at The Art of Warhammer, an excellent blog that I recommend you check out and follow. Darren has a lot of great paint articles and has been doing a hell of a job with his own Marines. Please check out The Art of Warhammer or read the article below and then go check out the blog, you won't be disapointed:

It's been about a month and I still haven't said anything about the new Space Marine codex, so this article has been a long time coming.

I think it's fair to say that the Chapter Tactics are the hottest thing in the new codex. Who remembers the old Chapter Traits in 4th edition? I do. They're like them without the opportunity to abuse the rules. I mean, let's face it, who didn't go with a custom chapter and use whatever tactics worked best every time? And then there were us suckers who used established chapters. Us Ultramarine fans especially had our faith tested with no traits at all.

Fortunately, in my honest opinion, Games Workshop got it right this time. You're guaranteed unique special rules that shape your army in a way that others can't. For me the best thing is, aside from the Black Templars, no chapter is limited in what they can take, but their rules will naturally make collectors evolve their armies in different  ways. I thought I'd take some time to go through each chapter tactic and what they do for their respective chapters.

Dark Angels in 6th Edition Part 4: Brothers in Arms

Old School here, if you plan to take the Dark Angels as your main detachment or as an ally, there are some great options now and we are Brothers in Arms with some that offer us a good boost. I will be covering Brothers in Arms in this post and will follow this up with a very brief post later concerning other allied options, but that post may not come for some time. As always with these early 6th edition posts, I am not an expert and I think there is much to be learned from discussion as this is a new game for all of us at this point. I don't want to waste your time building it up any more, so here we go ...

It Came From the Forums: The Best Black Templars - Mad Matt's Barbarossa Crusade!

Old School here with a new addition of It Came From the Forums, this time focusing on one of the "Forgotten Chapters" - The Black Templars. In this case, we will be looking at the very best Black Templar army I have seen to date: Mad Matt's Barbarossa Crusade! Let's take a look at what he has come up with so far.

FAQ Updates! Black Templars & Dark Angels Updated! Start Dusting!

Dust off your Templars and Dark Angels folks, the guys at GW have reached down and grabbed their dice bags and FINALLY dropped a series of FAQs to bring them closer in line to the 5th edition codices! So, let's take a look at a few of the changes. There will be real cyclone missile launchers, real apothecaries and yes Virginia, there is a 3++ Storm Shield ...

Black Templar Commission (pic heavy)

Just a couple of pictures of some Black Templars I just finished up for a local commission. Enjoy the eye candy. One day...someday...we'll be doing commissions on here and these are all level 2. As for now, business is steady enough locally to put a couple bucks in our pocket.

There are tons of photos, so keep reading to see more ...

New Take on Emperor's Champion

Captain Obvious here,

Since my latest game with my Black Templars counts as Blood Angels i have been inclined to start making my Templars around this aspect. Since i will be running The Sanguniar i have come up with some cool ideas for the army. Since the Sanguniar makes one of my Sgt. a beast i came up with the idea of have that be the Emperor's champion. Im trying to keep with the templar fluff as much as possible so an Emperor's champion will have to be included in this army some how, i just wasnt sure how. Till i came up with that idea. Im painting it a bit differently than a normal Emperor's champion, Why? BECAUSE I CAN.....ITS MY CHAPTER LOL. Heres some pics of the champ so far:

Inheriting the showcase Black Templars

Old School here,

In efforts to bolster his funds for other army goals, Captain Obvious has sold me his showcase Templars. This is a sad thing to think of, but at the same time very exiting for me! I am getting 2 forge world dreads, a really awesome Marshal and Emporer's Champ, not to mention 60+ Black Templars with metal M4 heads, metal BT Backpacks and each bearing 2 Black templar shoulder pads .... and every swinging one has his weapons chained on (from the conversion kit!)

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This army has been started with only the highlighting and finishing touches to be done on the troops and several models which have yet to be painted ... so I have my work cut out for me completing C.O.'s work along with a little more work expanding this army to include a couple Land Raiders, forge world upgrades for them and som termies with forge world upgrades.

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Keep your eye out for more on this army in addition to the World Eater's army I am now underway painting (currently the Brass Scorpion is my test model!)
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Edit: I just realized the pics were small, they came from a previous post here: http://darkfuturegaming.blogspot.com/2009/08/showcase-black-templar-wip.html

Captain Obvious joins Dark Future games!

Allow me to be the first to welcome my friend Patrick AKA Captain Obvious to Dark Future Games as our local Dark Eldar and Black Templar expert (rejoice all ye fans of Altar boys and Bondage wearing elves).
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I am going to go ahead and issue a disclaimer for those of you who may be a little sensitive. The Capitan can be a little blunt at times and downright nasty the rest of the time. I promise to do my best to keep him in check and he promised not to post when he is (too) drunk. All kidding aside, it's nice to have him on the team and I look forward to seeing what kind of stuff he comes up with. He is probably has the best record of any Black Templar player I know of in our area and he is the only Dark Eldar player around (though he is pretty good with them too), so his indight here may be helpful to folks who play as or against these two armies.
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In addition to tactics, Obvious is also a pretty accomplished painter, currently working on his Black Templar showcase army which has been featured on this blog before. Someday when he is not too busy staring at his witches, he might actually start painting his Dark Eldar as well, but we'll see. Keep your eye out for C.O. and feel free to welcome him to the Dark Future!

Showcase Black Templar WIP

I went over to Evolution Games this weekend and Pat brought his budding Black Templars army that he has been painstakingly building over the course of the last month. When I saw it, I had to post it.

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He started this off right by collecting Metal Black Templar shoulder pads (enough for 2 per Marine). The he got Metal Ferrum pattern Helmets for every Marine and even got his hands on enough Templar backpacks for his whole army. Every Bolter and close combat weapon in his army are all from the Templar upgrade sprues (weapons chained to the Marines.)

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The army you see in these photos is based so far, but I think it is still imposing. He is in the process of painting red crosses freehand anto all the helmets and not only painting the shoulder pads white, but also the weapons. The only two models that are finished are his Emperor's Champion (model in the last photo with the green sword) and his Marshal (second to last photo with lighning claws)> Both of these models are outstanding to include small amounts of source lighting. If you would like to see more of those two just ask and I will get better photos of just those.

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Perhaps the most impressive peice in his Templars is his Forgeworld venerable Dreadnought. The Templar Dread is a beatiful scupt on Forge World's part and his WIP paintjob is amazing so far! He is taking his time however as this model has TONS of hidden, little details (ie the tiny squares on the tiny sheilds on the purity seals. Enjoy the photos and let me know if you want more of Pat's Templars!

Emperor's Champion Finished! Righteous Conversion!

Well, with my friend Luke from the FLGS heading off to school, I finally had to finish his Emperor's Champion, but before I turned it over I managed to get some pics of it. I must say that it looks really good on the table at the head of a Crusader Squad! As always, feel free to comment!

Friday Pic, Genestealers Vs. Emperor's Champ & Templars!

Alright, so here we have a pic of a big of 2 squads of genestealers rushing a squad of Templars with their Emperor's Champ. The stealers outflanked and popped the rhinos and everything looked good for them, but two turns later, the Emperor's Champion crawed out on top! WTF! Enjoy the photo!

3500 teams game Chaos + Templar vs Guard at Evolution Games!

This was no doubt the funnest game for 40k that I have played in a longtime. The teams were 1750 of my Chaos Deathguard/Iron Warriors paired with 1750 of my buddy's Black Templars versus two Guard armies both at1750. We used standard 40k rules, no Apoc and it was brutal.

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The pics are pretty much in sequential order.

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Just to give you an idea of what was fielded, we had a vindicator, 6rhinos, 6 Oblitz, 3 5-man tacs with las cannon, 2 Lascannon dreads, 2Assault squads, 2 tac squads (one with the emporer's champ and one withthe Marshal), 3 plague marine squads, 2 daemon princes, and a 5 man chosen team with 5 meltas.

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The Guard players had 3 squads of Storm troopers, an executioner, 2Russes with Battle cannons, quite a few vet squads with meltas in tricked- out chimeras, a Medusa, an inquisitor Lord with retinue, a Banewolf, a big Psycher squad, 3 armoured sentinels with autocannons, 1armoured sentinel with a plasma cannon, Sly Marbo, a big squad with heavy weapon team, Creed and a partridge in a pear tree.

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They got to go first and what a first turn it was. I think the shooting took about 45 minutes and was filled with Large and small blasts,exploding vehicles and dead Plague Marines. In turn two, we pressed forward and failed to pop any vehicles.

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Turn two, they shelled us again and for the most part, my armour was all gone along with a couple oblitz, but the real killer was when Sly Marbo popped out and dropped a demo charge on a team of Assault Marines and killed 7 of them. In our reply, we lashed the ratlings out of cover and assaulted them, the templars still pushed forward and a group of Plague Marines got into assault with some Storm Troopers.

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Turn three saw the destruction of all but one of my oblitz at the hands of the executioner and the death of both dreadnoughts, one from a team of vets with melta bombs. Our reply got us into assault with the psychers with an assault squad, taking them out of the game and a group of Marines in combat with an Inquisitor Lord and his retinue. My loneoblit took out the executioner, another lone plague Marine Popped a sentinel and two surving plague Marines from another squad managed to pop a Banewolf. The Lash Prince also managed to feed the psycher squad to the assault marines. Marbo hit and ran a squad and then ended up near some guardsman in combat with a las cannon tac squad.

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Turn four brought the death of my Lash Prince, the end of my last obliterator and a group of Plague Marines killed in CC by Stormtroopers. Sly Marbo helped kill a squad of tac Marines and ran further across our deployment zone. We still hadn't gotten our chosen in, but the templars were starting to walk the Guards gun line unit by unit with their Marshal Squad.

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Turn five, we had no more assault Marines, Sly Marbo managed to get intoCC with 5 Plague Marines, The Templars seemed to keep walking the back line while the Inquisitorial retinue held back the squad they were in assault with. I got my chosen and wrecked a Russ while the templars scored a kill on the Medusa with a melta gun. The bad news was that Ionly had a few models left on the board.

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Turn six and seven were like a blur, but Marbo managed to kill the Plague Marines and run out across the board, my Nurgle Prince died uneventfully, my chosen were killed except for one, who popped a chimera and then got into assault with the inquisitor retinue and managed to be he last Chaos model on the board. The Guard line was decimated, but if it had gone on another turn, there would be no doubt they would have won.

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The end result was what was really incredible. WE TIED! 19 to 19 kill points and the same number of HQ remaining on both sides. Points-wise,the Guard still had more points on the board, though, but we called it a draw..This was so fun, we saw a lifetime of crazy scenarios from a vindicare assasin who killed or wounded nothing and spent the game relaxing on a rooftop to Guardsman Marbo killing a total of 15 Space Marines (some with FNP)and travelling about 6' around the table. Absolutely fun and Iwould do it again any day. If you live anywhere near Lansing MI, you need to come on in to Evolution Games and play a game! I promise you will have fun against any of the players here!

Black Templars v Chaos 1750 Garage Warfare!

Alright, so I finally got my new garage up to speed and set my table up. A friend and I wasted no time in setting up the game table and throwing down. He brought his new Templar army to bear against my Black Legion in three 1750 battles.
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The first game was A pitched battle take and hold mission. I set up in a spearhead mostly because my army is mech and castling works out well for me most of the time. He wasted no time in rolling up the field while I hid my obliterators, Nurgle Prince and vindicator behind a building. I also set out with two squads of Plague Marines toward his objective. One rhino got popped, which led to him assaulting a squad of plaguers with a tac squad and an assault squad; a battle which took the rest of the game to come to a grinding halt.
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All in all it was a great match and looked like it could have been a draw, but he lost his Emperor's Champion and a tac squad in the last turn of assault as my other plague squad that rushed out earlier got onto his objective, resulting in me holding two and him holding one and contesting another.
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The next game saw me drop a vindicator and one squad of plaguers to upgrade one prince to a Tzeench Prince with WoC and Warp time. We played an annhililation game with pitched battle deployment. This game saw a lot of crazy close combat action, with his EC proving to be a beast, stomping 2 obliterators, a fair share of plague Marines AND a Daemon Prince. Even with all that, my Chosen managed to outflank with 5 flamers and knocked out one 5-man tac squad after another, resulting in a 7-6 game in the favor of the Dark Gods!
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The final battle was for fun and he decided to pull out an old twist on objectives; we wrote the numbers one-five on peices of paper, mixed them up and then scattered them all crumpled up on the board. When a unit reached it, they could reveal the number. We rushed out and took our objectives as fast as we could and I found the magic number! 2 was the victory objective and thanks to some REALLY LUCKY templates, he conceded noting he would be unable to make it to the objective in the next two turns.
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Overall, the list he ran was pretty competitive and had some great firepower and assault capabilities. Unfortunatley, he was not so lucky with his dice and he is also coming back from a break he has been on since 3rd edition!
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He ran this list all night;
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Marshal w/terminator honors, Lightning Claws, Iron Halo, Jump Pack
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Emperor's Champion (accept any challange vow)
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Dreadnought w/ Twinlinked Lascannon
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Venerable Dreadnought w/ Twinlinked Lascannon
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10-man crusader squad w/ CC weapons in Rhino w/smoke and extra armor
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9-man Crusader squad w/cc weapons and 1 powersword in rhino with extra armor and smoke (this is the EC's squad).
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5-man crusader squad with bolters and 1 lascannon
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5-man crusader squad with bolters and 1 lascannon
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5-man crusader squad with bolters and 1 lascannon
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10-man assault squad with 1 power sword
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9-man assault squad with 1 power sword (this is the marshal's squad)
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This was his 1750 list for the three games and it fared pretty well all things considered, but he is back in the lab today tweaking his list and moving points around, so we will have to see what he comes up with.
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Here is my usual list for 1750 in chaos;
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Daemon Prince with Mark of Nurgle, Warp Time and wings
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Daemon Prince with Mark of Slaanesh, Lash and wings
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5-man Chosen Squad with 5 Meltas in rhino
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7 Plague Marines with 2 meltas in rhino
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7 plague marines with 2 meltas in rhino
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7 plague Marines with 2 meltas in rhino
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3 oblitz
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3 oblitz
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Possesed vindicator
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Over the corse of the three games I just wanted to field some different units that I would like to test, so in the second game I used a Tzeench Prince with wings, wind of chaos and warptime, which was pretty impressive, but I think with the amount of cover in the game, my cheaper nurgle prince is more survivable, though wind of chaos was pretty nasty on the table top.
I also tested a 5 man flamer squad of chosen and have to say that the templates could reliable drop 6 marines a turn, even with just 4 flamers I managed to drop 5. COmbined with outflank, this is a troop buster squad, though usually I run the meltas because most of the time, you will find the heavy tanks in the back of the army which is where I will need to be to outflank.
Thanks for reading and next time, I promise to take more photos. Feel free to comment!

Emperor's Champion Update! Getting close to finished!

Alright, so this model is still a few hours from completion, but it is coming right along. There are a lot of colors and shades involved in it, many more than I would have first believed before I sat down to paint this, my first Black Templar model.

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So far it has been fun to paint, with areas that I washed, some drybrushing and some layering as well, it really is encompasing all of my basic techniques. I know it pales to some of the stuff that is out there, but once it is touched up I think it will make quite a centerpeice for my friend's army.

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Like I said it is still a way out from completion and need some highlighting and clean-up work to do before it gets based, but with that being said, feel free to offer you comments and critisism!

Emperor's Champion Commission update

I am working from the top down on this model and have gotten most of the major work out of the way for the standard. If you look closely, you will see that the banner wrapped around the reaper is freehanded with the first lines of the ACCEPT ANY CHALLENGE ... vow "O, Emperor, ever rejoicing at bloody wars; fierce and untamed" The ever rejoicing is assumed to be lost in the wrap, but the rest of the prayer continues and is present finishing with the word untamed upside down in the front following the wrap of the banner. Fear not, the shield has more work to come, but I think this is a good start for painting a really well converted model. As always, feel free to comment.

Emperor's Champion Commission Underway!

Well, I am finally painting this Emperor's Champion for a friend of mine. I am taking it slow because this comission is very cool and I will more than likley face it on the table quite often, so I want it to look extra awesome. Now the initial work has mostly been done to the vow standard that he is carrying. I wanted to hit the whites first as it is easier to touch up the blacks later.

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For the wings, I basecoated the skull white (GW) and washed them with two coats of Gryphonne Sepia(GW). The banner was based skull white then painted Ochre Yellow (Artist Pigment Brand). The banner then received a single coat of Sepia wash to add depth to it.

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My next moves on the Vow standard are to re-black the spots that were accidentally hit with whites, then paint the shield white, then paint half of it red, then freehand a Templar symbol that I have yet to decide on. Wish me luck and as always, feel free to comment!

Black Templar Emperor's Champion Conversion for Commission!

Here is a Black Templars Emperor's Champion that I have converted to match the look of a EC I saw on an Ebay sale by a seller named PlutoPokes. Anyway, this peice is now a commission I am making for a friend that I play with at Evolution Games in Lansing, MI.

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Basically, I used a torso, head, sword arm, pistol holster and gear from a Black Templars Upgrade set, added some Templar logos that I press molded with a GS mold, added a Standard Bearer arm from the Space Marine Command squad sprue and finished the model off with the standard from a WHFB General and some laurels from an old bitz box.

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The conversion is fairly simple, all you need to do is gather the parts for the model and assemble them. I bought almost everything I needed exclusively from Hoard O' Bitz on Ebay.

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My next move will be to add a Backpack from an old EC I have lying around and painting the model.

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Keep your eyes peeled for the finished model and as always, feel free to comment!