I finally got around to making a painting chart (Big props to Admiral Drax for this idea.) Putting it on "paper" like this was great to see how my force lines up. It also shows my build options. As you can see I don't have many basic guardsmen (riflmen) left. So building a traditional guard force is not a viable option. Sure I could probably build one full platoon. Then what, lots of heavy weapon and special weapon teams. Nah, I like the elite guardsmen route the army has taken.
This left me with quite a few heavy weapons and crew to spare. I mean, I'm not going to put one mortar in a veteran squad, so what am I going to do with all these crews? You can see what I did on the painting chart. They got drafted to be either carry a vox or a demo charge. The mortar crews are a good example of this I use the loader as a Demo charge guy, easily spotable. The gunner's "trigger device", looks like an oversided cell phone / walkie talkie that a vox caster would use to communicate, the lascannon gunners have the same "trigger device" so the vox guys have a similar look.
The theme of the army is BS4. With the preferred special weapon being the sniper rifle, and the preferred heavy weapon being the lascannon. I've added demo charges here and there to slow the advance. I could add one to all 6 veteran squad if needed as I have the spare mortar loaders.
I've added many of the named characters from the Sharpe series, and linked them with named character that best fits their style. I have "Inquisitor" Lord Wellington with his mystic command staff, not for the anti-deep strike...well that helps. But the Inquisitor Lord allows me to take a Vindicare assassin and call him, Rifleman Daniel Hagman. Those that know the series, know why Hagman has to be a Vindicare and not just another veteran with a sniper rifle.
Then there are the Tanks. It was hard to justify fitting Leman Russes into a Napoleonic themed guard army. I was thinking, maybe I could tie in the British Navy and treat the tanks like Ships of the Line. That lead me to using Knight commander Pask as Horatio Hornblower, and naming all of the armor in the force after ships that Hornblower commanded in his stories. Hornblower is currently in a basic LRBT, but will be moving over to the Executioner once I get it assembled and painted.
That just leaves how I named of the Valkyrie, but I'll save that story for another day. Though most of you will be able to figure it out.
Thanks for reading...
