Thursday, March 3, 2011

Valhallan Infantry: "B" Squad + Commissar

Second infantry squad down now, which means as soon as I paint up the two command elements, I will finally have a playable army!  It will be entirely overbalanced by armour for a while, but there are worse problems to have than too many tanks, I figure.



Not a lot different here from "A" squad, except perhaps for the Melta-gun in the front row there, but I would like to draw attention to a handful of figures, beginning with the heavy bolter crew:



Mounting the crew served weapons on 60mm bases as opposed to two 25mm bases might make things a little unwieldy, but since you then treat it as a single model with two wounds, it does make the piece more survivable.  The bases are far too open by themselves, and even the snow flock isn't enough to overcome the vacant lot feel, so I threw on an ammo crate from a tank accessory kit.

The Sergeant originally came with a hand-flamer, an outmoded weapon harking back to Warhammer 40,000's "3D Roleplay" roots, so I snipped it off and replaced it with this autopistol.  I think the variations make the army look like they are hanging onto scavenged arms, trophies, or gifts sent from home.  A Strength 3 popgun like this won't intimidate anyone, but the power sword might let the squad hang on a little longer in a melee.



I am extremely happy with how Commissar Sark turned out, with his frogged coat.  Commissars are political officers with an ominous reputation in the game, since if a squad they are with fails a morale test and tries to run, he summarily executes the officer and takes command!  In two years of playing against Jeff's Cadian Guard, I never once killed his commanding officer, since his Commissar always beat me to it, but it's these kind of random elements that make the game fun.  Besides,I'm not obliged to put him close to the army commander the way the old rules coerced Jeff, so I plan to keep with a combined squad of twenty men who can run up, go to ground and take an objective.

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