The Crimson Fists: Warhammer 40k

Everyone knows that GW kits cost a lot, and yes you can get them cheaper though places like Wayland Games, but making tank components interchangeable is by far the cheapest option, so I got myself some magnets and magnetised the razorbacks I got. Now, hopefully I can help someone else to save some cash.

I started by making a normal rhino, except with the top hatch and drivers hatch left unglued. I then made the turret section to go on top of the razorback, but cut off the pins on the side and drilled a 3mm hole all the way through, putting two magnets into the hole. (try to keep the same polarity throughout all of your tanks, that way you can swap weapons and other options such as hunter killer missiles between them as you like.)

Then put magnets in the holes on the guns. They are already 3mm wide so the magnets fit perfectly and require no drilling. The heavy bolter requires one per side, but the lascannon is deeper. Either fill the holes and redrill them, or put two magnets in as I did. The guns come with a square section, that fits together when on the turret. If you want it to make it easier to change guns, then drill out this section (it’s just a little to small) and place in a magnet. It will make them very easy to attach. Holding the two sides of the gun near the turret is all it takes.

Attaching the top hatch, allows the entire tank to be shaken around, upside down, without anything falling off. Cut a piece of sprue large enough to pass across the width of the hatch. Drill out two holes for magnets to go in. Then you need to put magnets the same distance apart and from the edges, on the hatch. If these don’t match up then it wont sit right, so measure twice and glue once. You also need to put magnets on the rhino hatch as well, so do the same as with the razorback one.

The drivers hatch is very easy to fit. Just cut another bit of sprue to go diagonally across the hole for it and another to go inside the hatch itself. Put a magnet on the one inside the hatch and one close to the centre of the other piece of spure. Place the hatch and spure in place first, and then glue it in place. That way it will always fit correctly.

Now you should be able to interchange the razorback weapons, as well as making it a rhino as well.

Hope this helped some people. Comments and Criticism welcome.

Cheers

We just had the local tourney this weekend, and it was a fairly fun one at that, if a little annoying at times. I decided to put together some battle reports of the day and I played with the following list…

Captain w/Relic Blade and Storm Shield

Tactical Squad, 10-man, flamer, missile launcher, rhino

Tactical Squad, 10-man, flamer, missile launcher, Power weapon, rhino

Tactical Squad, 10-man, Plasma gun, Plasma Cannon

Vindicator w/Siege Shield

Predator w/Autocannon and Lascannon (x2)

Game 1: Blood Angels

This game was objective based, with most of them being in his deployment zone. He won board edge and first turn. He parked a combat squad on each objective and left everything else in reserve. I then deployed all of my army as close as I could, with the vindicator controlling my left side.

Turn 1. He didn’t manage to hit anything in the first turn as everything he tried to shoot was out of range or scattered way off. So it was over fairly quickly. In my first turn I moved up the vindicator, a combat squad and 2 rhino’s worth of tactical marine with a force commander in one. I then had another 2 combat squads holding my objective so he would drop down and try to take them out. The vindicator killed most of a combat squad and took out half of the other with my predator. Both of them failed their moral and ran

Turn 2. His land speeder was the only thing to come in this turn and tried to drop right behind my vindicator to get it’s rear armour, but it scattered a fair way away. He narrowly missed landing on a combat squad, but was still within 12” to get the 2d6+S penetration roll. His squad regrouped and came back to were they started really, but he couldn’t fire his plasma cannon. I really didn’t want my vindi to die to the speeder so early into the game, but it turned out someone upstairs was watching. He rolled a 2. Nothing took any damage this turn. I then wiped out one of the combat squads with him positioning the other so I couldn’t see it. Even with true line of sight. Everything moved up except for the predator which made short work of the speeder.

Turn 3. He managed to get dante and his assault squad in this turn, landing behind my predator and plasma cannon combat squad. He took out three of the tactical marine, but it would have been worse if he took out my pred. He got a direct hit with the plasma cannon, but forgot to roll for get’s hot first. Typically it was very suspenseful with the dice spinning on a corner, but it landed on a one. My squad was saved, but he also passed his armour save. The combat squads moved up and took one objective with a missile launcher squad moving for another. The rhino’s moved up very close to his own objectives. The plasma cannon scattered way off and missed a tightly grouped assault squad. Damn! The predator managed to take out 4 of the 5, leaving only dante and 2 assault marine which was picked off my bolter fire.

Turn 4. His drop pod arrived this turn with a furisco dread inside. It landed right behind my vindicator and blew it up. Dante moved into assault with a combat squad and struck them all down before they turned to fight back. My combat squad with plasma gun opened fire on his drop pod so they could get his dread next turn. Managed to make it explode which was fun, but seemed to anger the dread. I moved my rhinos further away from the dread so he couldn’t get them and they were now right on top of his objectives.

Turn 5. This turn his death company arrived, which dante quickly skipped over to join. The dread stormed an objective and took me down to one guy after shooting with a storm bolter, meltagun and then assaulting. I can’t seem to pass cover saves for some reason. I fell back, and because I was under half strength he was a good as gone. I moved the rhino’s up 6” and flamed his squad from the top hatch. Killed none, even with the storm bolter from the rhino. The other flamer did squat as well. Predator took out 2 death company

Turn 6. He jumped the death company into assault with a combat squad and killed all of them before I attack back. But he could not claim it as death company are not troops. My last turn meant I had to try some sneaky tricks. I decided to get out of the rhino’s and tank shock him to get him away from the objective while the other squad just camped on an objective so my captain did nothing the entire game. I tank shock worked, pushing him away from the objective so I could try and take it. I moved up so I completely surrounded it, but then it looked lie he might still be within 3”. I decided to shoot at him with a squad of 10 marines. Surely I could take out the last 3. Surely…But it just wasn’t my day. I didn’t kill any. So we measured up the distances to objectives. 2.7” so they contested the objective. That was a kick in the teeth. Only got a minor win despite taking out almost all of his army and a pesky 0.3 or an inch.

Great game though, and I had a blast. We both got 1 extra battle point for having HQ’s within 6” on an objective. Minor Win

Game 2: Space Marines

Turn 1. Kill points for this game and dawn of war deployment. He went first, so I decided to reserve my entire army. This wasn’t the best idea. He moved up closer first turn, waiting for me to come on the board. My vindicator and predator arrived on first turn. (I know everything is meant to come on, but I wasn’t think straight, I thought it was only heavy support and I had to roll for everything else.) I moved the vindicator up and popped smoke, as well as obscuring the pred at the same time. I took out a rhino and killed 2 guys inside.

Turn 2. He shot at my vindicator and got a weapon destroyed, as I almost forgot about the smoke. With that he ended up taking no damage. Boo ya! He moved his meltagun closer to my tanks, but rolled a 1 to hit. My second turn a combat squad decided to arrive, but it wasn’t much use. Missile launcher, so I just ran for cover. The vindicator killed 5 devastators, but no heavy weapons. The predator took the meltagun squad down to 1, because of bad rolling.

Turn 3. He was within 6” of my vindi and I didn’t have smoke so he pen’d it easily and made it explode, but killed himself in the process. His army of the other side of the table was starting to get the idea that I wasn’t going to go over to them so they decided to come to me. I rolled to get my 2 rhino’s in this turn which was good. But they didn’t kill much, one combat squad between 2 flamers from the top hatch, 2 bolter and 2 storm bolters. But I managed to knock out a dread with a lucky krak missile.

Turn 4. Took out my predator, and blew up a rhino. While moving his own rhino in front of mine so I could not move. My last squad came on and ran for cover. The squad with commander then begain their rampage around the board. Got into combat in my turn and killed half.

Turn 5. His captain was still trying to get closer to me, but he did manage to blow the rhino. The combat ended with my captain slaying everything and consolidating 3” towards another unit. My plasma squad began to take shots at his devastators, but rolled lots of ones. My captain got into another squad this time so he couldn’t be shot again. But my other squad decided to sit in the middle of the table, because I couldn’t roll anything above a 2 for difficult terrain and running.

Turn 6. His captain got very close to my guys and looked like he was going to assault. He took out 3 with the devs and then I fail moral and ran 12” off the edge of the board. **Faceplamed** Oh well. My captain killed another unit and moved towards the devs this time. I went into combat with the devs and they failed the sweeping advance so they died.

Turn 7. Now I know we were suppose to end on turn 6 (not that it changed the end result, but still. Oops. His captain got very close, but then he ran him and he doesn’t have fleet so he couldn’t assault. He then tried to tank shock me, but death of glory prevailed. I rolled an imob result and stopped it in it’s tracks. Then in my turn I turn my fire towards the captain. He took a wound to a plasma gun and another to the cannon, but I couldn’t take the last with my bolters.

We both ended that game on 6 KP each. Great game Henry (he has another name but that was easier) He was from germany and is back packing around Australia. Hopefully we will see him again before he moves on. We both also got 2 battle points from this game, it was very even. Tie.

Game 3: Imperial Guard

This game was going to be interesting. I’m not good at taking objectives when I have to hold my own, and with only 1000pts to play with I didn’t have many scoring units. It was another dawn of war deployment and an objective in each deployment zone.

Turn 1. I started by moving the vindicator up my left side and my predator in the middle. Both and full speed then popped smoke. The rhino’s moved in close to the IG, but I knew they were going to die. The guys on my objective blasted his company command squad with plasma cannons and make a big mess of things. He then responded by blowing up the rhinos and taking it down to 3 men, one of who was the captain. His battle tanks came on the board, but even after rolling double 6’s for night fighting he still couldn’t see my guys.

Turn 2. I moved the command squad up, but I wasn’t thinking because it was now to risky to fire the demolisher cannon. I instead did a multiple assault. I got 3 units in an assault with 3 of my guys. I also managed to flamer another, but that was just good template placement. In the assault I didn’t do to well. Only took out 2, but I didn’t take any casualties. The other tactical squad on the right side of the boar moved up, flamed a squad and then killed them all in assault, not good when a battle cannon is pointed your way. He didn’t run away, but I had both of his command units in combat so he couldn’t use orders. He then took out my whole 10 man tactical squad with a lucky battle cannon hit. Grrr! Oh well. The assault was more productive. I killed off his company command squad and he killed the tactical squad.

Turn 3. It wasn’t very productive. I only killed 3 IG with plasma gun and bolter shots, which is pitiful. He then wiped out a combat squad so I had nothing over near his objective.

Turn 4. I then moved 6” away from my vindicator which I positioned so that I could hit most of them. With a couple shots from the demolisher cannon, the plasma cannon and the missile launcher as well as a few bolters, I managed to kill more than three quarters, but he still didn’t run. I then assaulted one of his bigger squad and managed to hit nothing. The predator decided to finish off squads that were almost dead so I could gain kill points. He shot everything he had at my vindicator, but failed to do any damage to it with it’s AV13 front armour and a 4+ cover save from a hill crest blocking his view.

Turn 5: I finished off his squad this turn and shot with demolisher cannon again. The predator and 2 combat squads spent the entire turn getting rid of one man squad for kill points. Again, he didn’t do anything to my vindicator because of cover, but killed 5 guys on my objective with battle cannon fire.

Turn 6. Final turn. Moved up my vindicator and took out the remaining remanets with the cannon, but my commander died this turn to two IG. TWO! He rolled 6’s to hit, 6’s to wound and then I roll 1’s for my saves. Grrr! He was down one wound, but I can’t remember when he lost it. Somewhere in the middle.

So the game went down to kill points as no one had both objectives. I won of kill points and we both got an extra battle point. Minor Victory

I didn’t do to well on the gaming side of things, but the games were a lot closer than the scores suggested. Great to play again everyone and there were some great looking armies there.

I was very surprised to find that I actually placed second because of my hobby scores (Painting and fluff.) So I now have a $30 gift voucher for hobby heaven and I’m thinking of getting the new IG codex, or maybe the wash set.