The Athu Elami

Hi, this is Olvebanipal. This time I’ll talk a bit about my take on the BaC cataphractii.

As I’ve stated in an earlier post, I already had ten Space Wolf terminators lying in their sprues. When the Betrayal at Calth boxed set was released, I decided that I wanted to go for the Pride of the legion ROW. It’s easy to field for beginners, as you don’t need too many models. I haven’t converted these guys too much, but I kitted them out with combi-meltas, some of which I took from the tactical sprue. The rest I magnetized with the combi-weapon set from Forge World. I can now choose which combi-weapon to use. The hand of the BaC cataphractii fits ok with the weapons from Forge World. Just use a knife and some patience.

It really was a bitch to fix, and I’m not really satisfied with the result, as the barrels of the bolters don’t align properly. Learn from my mistakes. I’m too much of an easy-way-out-guy.  

I would fall to the easy
path of the dark side
in the blink of an eye.

Anyway, here is some background fluff for this unit.

The Athu Elami

The Athu Elami, meaning the brothers of Elam, was one of the few surviving units from the great chapter of Elam. This chapter’s strength was in its deployment of fast speeders, jet bikes and terminators. When the enemy met with the light forces of the Elamites, they thought they were only facing the scouts of the chapter. Little did they know that the swarms of stinging speeders were the harbingers of the heavy infantry, the Athu Elami.

After the purge by the Vlka Fenryka, very few were left of the Elamite chapter. The stragglers were led by Helu sha Elam, and joined the vengeful, shattered remains of the Taurii. During the years of the Horus Heresy the Athu Elami carried a pair of great knives, with which they would carve the name of Apis in the skulls of their foes.

Shed blood in His name!

-        
  Olvebanipal

Modelling and painting the marines of the Taurii

Hi, it’s Olvebanipal again, now here to share how I modelled my first 20 marines.

So, you’ve seen some pictures of my marines now. Perhaps you’ve wondered where the different bits come from. When I decided to start a new Warhammer army, I wanted my own chapter. I’ve gone through that in previous posts. Therefore, I counted all the leftovers from my space wolf sprues, and saw that I could make at least ten new marines, if I just bought some torsos, backpacks and legs.

This guy looks like
he made his own helmet.
Greenstuff to the face!

I searched different suppliers online, and came over a look that I liked. Anvil Industries had decent prices and the right feel to their bits. I ordered 20 pairs of shoulder pads for tactical marines and ten for terminators, since I had ten space wolf terminators laying in sprues. I also ordered some backpacks, legs and torsos. The plan was to build ten cheap tactical marines… yeah right!

Marines in the 41^st millennium have a wide variety of armour marks, and therefore I simply bought a box of ten tactical marines. After sitting for hours on Battlescribe, trying to make cool, but competitive lists for 40k, I gave up. Adrian and Bjørnar simply said: “Then play 30k, for fucks sake!”

The vexilla has an
even more weird
helmet, but I like him.

YEEEEEEES!! I felt as if I were free! The room was filled with butterflies, rainbows, unicorns, and gritty dark shadows of ancient gods, forgotten secrets, occult whispers and eldritch horrors!

YEEEEEEEEES!!

This left me with a small problem. My tactical marines’ armour were in many instances anachronistic. After searching the internet for some answers, I simply sharpened my knife and bought some greenstuff. “I’ll make my own mark, GODDAMN YOU!!” The purists among you will maybe find my solutions crude and simple, but I kind of like it. Especially since it meant I didn’t have to buy the ones made from ivory and stardust from Forge World. Yes, I know. I’m a bloody peasant.

I'm happy with the way
my first sergeant turned
out. 

Since I wanted to make them look like space romans, I also made tunicas for them. I don't use the roman theme anymore, but it certainly make them stand out.

I am no expert modeller. I am at best a happy amateur, but I hope you can find inspiration in this first adventure of mine into the universe of the 31^st millennium.

Links:

Anvil Industries

Battlescribe

Walk in His shadow!

-          Olvebanipal

Starting to write

Hi

Bjørnar, to the left, trying to cheer
me  up after I've seen his glorious
ultramarines

I've changed name since last time, but I guess you already discovered that. This time I'll talk a bit about how I started to write the fluff for my version of the missing second legion.

As I said last time, I had several other attempts at writing the background for my legion. First I sent them to my pals, who gave me some tips, and then I posted it on the heresy forums.

Hobby tip: Make an account on http://heresy30k.invisionzone.com/, people there are very helpful and inspiring. Most of the painted armies they have posted, make mine look like trash.

Especially Uberlord Gendo helped me establish the second legion as a Mesopotamian-themed army. This reception was what made me want to write more, but first I had to begin anew. 

Hobby tip: Just write! The only way to gather your thoughts and ideas into sensible structures is through writing. Listen to inspiring music and write!

This little guy is the actual author behind the Sisters of Battle.
Do like him. Have an inspiring statue or something nearby.

Now, listen to this, while you read the rest of the text. 

The Taurii

The story of the second legion starts during the unification wars on Terra. Most of the legionnaires were recruited from the Achaemenid Empire and the tribes of Gyptus. They quickly adopted the Achaemenid way of fighting, which relied on large amounts of skirmishing bikes and jetbikes, screening an armoured spearhead.

Taurii sergeant
Post-reuinon with Apis

Legio 2 quickly were given the name Taurii, from the strength of their armoured assault, but also because of a rare, genetic flaw, which made some legionnaires grow horns. The name was used to describe their martial strength, but also their stubborn, almost bull-headed behaviour in battle, and their shameful mutation.

It is difficult to say if it was the mutation or their conduct which made them outsiders amongst the legions; perhaps both. After the unification of Terra, few legions had close ties to the second, except from the Blood Angels and the Vlka Fenryka, which had their own flaw, although they never admitted it at the time. Those of the second with the mutation began filing down their horns, both for practical purposes, but also for hiding their shameful flaw.

During the first years of the Great Crusade, the Taurii were sent to subdue the Amorite Federation, a conglomerate of merchant republics. We can see the early military doctrine of the second during the battle of Kesh in this conflict. The Amorite Federation’s seats of power were concentrated in huge cities in vast deserts and plains, and the Taurii understood that a drawn out siege of these cities would be far too costly. Therefore, Ashur Tiglatus, their designated commander at the time, ordered the light cavalry of the legion to harass and goad the wealthy merchants out of their ivory towers.

The rest of the legion were either waiting under the sand dunes, or in orbit, where they could strike when needed. Weeks went by, and the Amorites became annoyed with the constant attacks by jetbikes, landspeeders and bikes. The legion refused the spoiled nobility their precious sleep, and since the Amorite scouts (which the legion had let through the blockade on purpose) did not find any large force of astartes, the merchants struck.

The great gates of the cities of the Amorite Federation opened, and legions of disciplined mercenaries with gaudy armour marched out into the plains. Their speeders and bikes engaged with the light cavalry of the Taurii, and seemed to drive them into the desert, where the Amorite scouts had located the legion scout camps. As the Amorite mercenaries pushed into the desert, the legion cavalry engaged them constantly, keeping them always on guard.

The scorching sun took its toll, and the mercenaries were thirsty and tired. In the oasis, called Kesh, the armies of the different Amorite cities joined forces. By then, their gallantry had worn off. In the distance, they suddenly heard soft thumps, heralding the coming of artillery bombardment. All hell was upon the mercenaries. The shells from the hidden legion artillery tore great, bloody holes in the Amorite ranks. Their transports and tanks were in disarray, as the incoming rounds seemed to come from all around them.

Then, legion Spartans and Land Raiders burst from the sand dunes. They aimed for the weak points in the huge enemy formation, and cut deep into the Amorite host. The transports disgorged legionnaires armed for close combat, if they did not cut through the entire formation. This part of the strategy later became known as “the thrust of the spear.” In the field of Kesh, the moral of the Amorites was already at breaking point when the heavy cavalry of the Taurii attacked. Met with the full might of an imperial legion, their spirit was shattered. With the destruction of their mercenary armies, the Amorite Federation surrendered to Ashur Tiglatus, praetor of Legio II Taurii.

The Taurii were often cruel in victory.

PS: I have no idea why the font suddenly changed. Cursed machine spirit! I must have forgotten to apply the correct ointment.  

The road to Legio II

This is Olvebanipal again. Back for some tips on how to write your legion fluff.

As I said in my first post, I decided to make my own legion. One of the greatest parts of the 40k lore is that there are three legions which we don’t know anything about. Even though Warhammer Horus Heresy, or 30k as I will begin to refer to it as, is a historical miniatures game within the lore of the Warhammer universe, the missing legions can be used to go around the strict rules of established fluff.

I’ve studied history, so I know all about how accuracy is important in popular culture for us nerds. I can rant on about the inaccuracies of the TV show Vikings or be furious about the portrayal of the birkebeiners in the coming, Norwegian movie with the same name. That does not, however, keep me from enjoying these films. I believe that many fans of the lore of the Horus Heresy is equally frustrated when they see armour marks, tanks and iconography which do not belong in that period.

My legion started as a chapter in 40k, inspired by the roman legions. As you know, that is basically what the writers of the HH novels did, but I was in love with the whole space marine legionnaires mixed with human auxiliaries-theme. When I then went back to write about the primarch of these guys, the theme suddenly changed.

The amount of wololo in this screenshot
would make my headphones catch fire.

I’ve been interested in ancient history since I was a kid, and one of the places that struck me as mysterious and fascinating was the ancient near east. The original Age of Empires also did its part in this interest. The Assyrians, Babylonians, Sumerians and Hittites were some of the factions you could play in this old classic. In my teens I began to listen to the band Nile, and their atmosphere certainly influenced the feel of the background of my legion.

So, I went through several versions of the primarch’s origin story. Some of my friends, now a part of this blog, gave me tips and helped me make the fluff fit with the canon. I was still undecided about the iconography and name for the legion. Adrian had earlier bought nail decals from eBay for his imperial knights, and that made me look for legion symbols among a throng of flowers, puppies, horses and hearts.

This is the actual decal I ordered.
My legion of princesses shall be
victorious!

Hobby tip: Buy nail decals from eBay. It’s a super way to get cheap markings for your miniature army.

Anyway, I searched for different animals, Rhino, Elephant, Lion, Bear, Snake, Bull… Bull... I found a simple, decal of a bull’s head. “This will do”, I thought.

Well…

Now I kind of regret it, because my legion with the colour scheme and iconography became very similar to the Forge World Minotaurs chapter. But I say to myself: “There is no Minotaurs chapter. This is the 31^st millennium.”

So the second legion, because the eleventh is too hard to pronounce, was named the Taurii, which I later found out should be Tauri, but hell… if GW can use bastardized Latin, so can I.

Hobby tip: Don’t be too quick to establish your army’s fluff. You will have to revise it. Ask friends and on forums. You don’t want to change it after you’ve converted your whole army to fit with a theme, as I did.

One of my first legionnaires.
I'll go more in debth about the
conversion in a later article.

So the primarch of Legio II Taurii was Apis, inspired by the… yes I know… Egyptian, not Mesopotamian, bull god. I use a lot of Egyptian names as well, so I’ve not bound myself to Mesopotamia.

Hobby tip: Don’t base your background too firmly on a real world culture. It may prove to be restricting instead of guiding.

Next time I’ll post the first part of the origins of the Taurii. Until then, please leave comments below if you have enjoyed this small introduction, or just want to share your experiences.

May Apis, King of Kings shine his light upon you.

- O    

PS:
Here is the trailer for the movie I mentioned: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hf0zON29z3c

For you foreigners: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birkebeiner
Here is a link to the nail decal page: http://www.yrnails.com/bull-head.html