The Arrival of the Archdaemon

For my birthday this year I was bought the archdaemon of Nurgle. I green-stuffed a couple of extra horns onto him, as both me and my pal Jack picked ours up at the same time.

He was a joy to paint and now all I need to do is base him before my birthday event on the 17th of the month. The fluff for him is below. 

The Arrival of an Archdaemon

"To me, to my house, you shall all come after your deaths,” spoke the gutteral phlegm-filled whisper on the wind.

Having seized the Charadon Sector with the help of the Deathguard and the greenskins, the Aureus held their territory. Enough sacrifice had been made in the name of Nurgle to win the favour of the Plague Lord.

The forgotten chapter had lost many great warriors on all fronts. Ancients that had served them for thousands of years. But now with the support of the immortal, ancient and twisted beings, hopefully the Jackals would be able to advance even further. Over the coming months the opposition had been intense and the astartes had suffered even greater internal division. Jostien and Asger had started to aid the cause of the greater good against Tyranid invasion, while the renegade forces, under the lead of Fenerus, struck at any force within reach, proving their might and prowess.

Too many Lords sought to prove themselves by going off on their own, dividing the chapter further. Honour dictated that not one would turn their blade on the other, although the old scripture also encouraged warriors to prove themselves through actions not words.

Some fought to restore the good name of their Chapter among the people, while the damned fought for vengeance and the annihilation of the Imperium of man. Each warrior had a following of both sworn brothers and allies new.

Now the Wolf Mother’s plans were coming to fruition. Rognvaldr Pa Veg and Med Leen had guided the Aureus in finding allies and bringing worlds to decay. In doing so, the bargain had been completed and in two months Donn Hel would be released from his eternal prison. Unlike the rest of his kin, Donn was selfish and nihilistic in his approach. Many ancient societies had names for him Donn, The Eater of Men, The Fly-Blown Reaper, Hel and many more. He was a god of death in the eyes of many past. He fed on their souls and revelled in their worship, spouting hate, spreading decay and ending the lives of millions wherever he went.

Twisted by Tzeench a millennia ago, Donn Hel is far from what a Great Unclean One represents but also possesses a much darker lust and power. After having slain and digested hundreds of his own kin within the warp, Nurgle banished him to his eternal prison. Here he has waited and plotted for fifty-thousand years, longing to taste the flesh of his own kind once again. Another rejected daemon fit for the service of the Wolf Mother, a believer of nothing who only wants to see the universe crumble into darkness.

St. Nic's Return

Instead of attending the Christmas event this year at my local games shop (As it was another apocalypse game) I decided to just deploy St. Nic in a normal game of 40k later that week. Daemons and a handful of Marines vs Jack's Tyranids.  Two games in a week, both of which were great fun. The first wolves and T'au vs tyranids and the second Chaos vs Tyranids.

In both games Jack generated plenty of tyranids without paying reinforcement points (an honest mistake made by us all), both with the stratagems and the tervigon, adding up to at least an extra 50 bodies (200+ pts a game). Therefore we decided to void the results of both games.

Regardless they were amazing games and much fun was had.

Here is my silly poem for the holiday season.

St. Nic's Return

The alliance with the T'au,
Had been awfully strong,
But Jostien did not prevail,
The tyranid too stong.

They fell back to the skies,
Greater good, not today,
Asger roared in defeat,
The Aureus way.

A day or two later,
The bells could be heard,
Of the wolves and the deer,
Tyranids knew not a word.

St. Nic came to the aid,
Summoning allies in his wake,
The two great daemons came,
Much trouble to make.

Throwing down his axe,
Rognavaldr knew,
Cleaving the broodlord in half,
Ended his life, synapse too.

Pa Veg and Med Leen, 
Prefered human prey,
But on St. Nic's call, 
Dived into the fray.

The twin-headed bird,
Released a psychic force,
Decimating all in their way,
Except St. Nic of course!

For the Saint had much power,
Innocence long lost,
Neither chaos nor Imperial,
He mastered the frost.

The objective, a bomb,
The termegants overran,
The timer couldn't be set,
Not part of the plan.

Over seconds,
Many tyranids birthed,
St. Nic aimed,
Empty of mirth.

As the warriors cut deep,
His body in two,
A shot rang out,
It's aim so true.

Impacting on the bomb,
It sent the ground asunder,
Everything evaporated,
In a cloud much thunder.

Greater daemons and their kin,
Were sent back to their mother,
St. Nic reformed,
His plane as another.

The battle was over,
A war neither lost nor won,
St. Nic would return,
With a much bigger gun.

An Apocolapse

Last Saturday I attended my first ever apocalypse game of 40k. It was 3000 points a person with the intention that everyone would bring a battle forged force.  I brought along ten dreadnoughts and two lords of war across 6000 points, split between me and my pal Alex.  

The forces were Canis Aureus and Eldar vs Tau, more Tau, Guard and Salamanders.

We were outgunned and the opposing team gained first turn. During turn one we lost both lords of war and a few dreadnoughts. Pitting us against three lords of war (Two stormsurges and a shadowsword) and four Tau forgeworld flyers. At this point the game was pretty much decided but we carried on for two more rounds.

David's Eldar versus the T'au/Marine coalition did well, but down on the heavier side of the table it was cleaned pretty quickly.

The only positive of the event was that the enemies warlord never deployed so technically was killed in orbit, whereas Vlees was on the battlefield and also survived (Unlike 80% of my forces).

It was a painfully slow game, each turn taking almost an hour. 

The Imperiam-T'au coalition fended off the forces of the Aureus in one strong push, crippling their advance. Vlees once again lived to see another day, along with his terminator bodyguard, but lost many valuable renegades in the process.

The Coming of the Iron Hide

Today the Canis Aureus faced Ron and his Vostroyan Guard. The first game he drew no useful objectives and rolled pretty badly and the second did not fall to his favour either. The jackals held their territory and Cleaver the Choppa managed to fell a Russ in both games.

The Coming of the Iron Hide

A spinning vortex of a sickly yellow haze clouded the sky at least two-hundred kilometres in diameter. It held its position unerringly above the battle front. It's power and force so great it had held the Aureus forces on the T'au planet and subjected them to a foul barrage of their own creation. The jackal's forces were held on the ground, a large percentage had taken casualties from the plague storms. Those that had not been swept away or mired, began to pull back to their lines, making the headway they could in the dreadful conditions. many units, most of them astartes and light infantry, were cut off by the plague hordes generated by the widespread miasma of the Plague Lord.

No one, not even Cutter the Choppa could make progress through the maelstrom. While the rest of the Aureus forces were claiming land in the name of the Wolf Mother, the forces of fury and blood were stuck and unable to further the cause. It wasn't until they saw the first of the Vostroyan regiments appeared passing through the thick storm clouds, that the demented Chaos Lord was happy he had been trapped.  

Filled with titanic fury, almost pure and undiluted with thought or other emotions, he mounted his nearby rhino and became locked in combat. After chopping down two of his own renegades in blind rage he punctured the Leman Russ's hide as it came through the dense miasma.  Fuel tanks exploding it threw off the renegades, tearing the pack of Jackals to shreds. Witnessing the Vostroyan's fall back he gritted his teeth and bellowed insults into the wind, before calling on more renegades to enter the fray.

* * * * *

With bitter resentment, Quadir pulled the Endless Cacophany back from the edges of the ruin and into the nearby rhino.  he could tell from this position they would be outgunned on the Vostoyan's return. A quick vox exchange led them to the East flank where they deployed as their transport was hit by the advancing Vostroyan gun line.  

Fell picked up on the faint sound of the Commissar's shouting amongst the bombardment. Honing in on it he directed the rest of his squad to open fire. The howls that erupted tore through the structure and through the mortals behind it. Flesh was parted from bone and their screams suppressed by the audial bombardment. As the Commissar advanced to the edge of the building the Cacophony hit him with a vicious blast as two of the astartes fell to the Vostran's deadly aim. Steadying himself on his feet the Commissar fount his footing as Quadir impacted with the officer, tearing his head from his shoulders with one solid punch.

Explosions crackled through the plague infested ruins in the direction of the plaguebearers advance. The Noise Jackal watched in disgust as they shambled into the scout walkers, preventing them from being a threat.  Just behind the fray he could also make out the form of Cleaver holding a leg into the air and whooping with glee as the Vostroyan's retreated. They had held the territory against the forces of the Imperium, but to what end? There was no merit in them holing this fetid landscape, all was dead, all was lost, their job had been done. 

Quadir longed to be under the command of Salazar once more instead of the brutish oaf that was Cleaver.  Turning the amp up on his weapon he faced the advancing, mindless plague horde. 

"Where the hell are the Deathguard? Isn't it their job to control this mindless scum?" He yelled blasting the flesh from the amassing assailants before him.

A Mighty Victory

A few weekends ago Jamie, Mia and Me went to the Dice Saloon in Brighton. It is one of our favourite venues despite being quite a trek away from where we all live. While we were there we played one large game, followed by a smaller game. It was the first time seeing a Tiger Shark on the field and the potential of that beast is certainly scary.

Once the games were done we relaxed with some food, drinks and a handful of board games. Below is the fluff from the games.

With trepidation the greater daemon had launched his assault on the heart of the Pax’nera’s home world. The avian ancient knew that this was the path he must take despite the inevitable defeat. Not one but two of the tiger sharks were above them. The first fell to the blast of the macro-ectoplasmic cannon and then the second, but not before the Mother’s Cannon had been crippled. Leaking phosphorus neon liquid it sizzled and spat, until it internally ruptured and split under the fire of the enemy. The twisted beast had taken many months to build and it’s loss would not be taken lightly among the renegade Astartes. På Veg craned around to see the loathing emitting from Vlees. His sockets brimming with internal fluids as he swung his axe in the air, gesticulating for his deredeos to take down the opposing forces. The twin-headed daemon Lord hoped this grinding stalemate would be enough to draw the t’au’s attention from the Charadon sector. He could not foretell their fate, but he knew in time the forces here would be defeated and only Vlees and the horrors under his command would escape.

* * *

Crashing into the landscape below, Cleaver the Choppa was full of confidence. Despite the overwhelming odds that he knew that his forces were about to face, he showed no hesitation. Beneath his helmet his face was twisted with glee. The Lord knew at this very moment a heavy bombardment and assault was taking place on the Pax’nera’s home world. A force not large enough to take the planet but strong enough to be a distraction. No hero’s faced them today. Only a force of nameless officers and a solitary commander greeted them. He recognised the landing craft of the Bay’be Sept’s Ethereal. She had pursued them at a distance and had clearly warned of the incoming threat. Cleaver cared not. He welcomed the challenge. Diving out of his rhino as it caught fire, the crazed Lord cleaved his way into the transport craft before him. Rushing forward his entourage shot and hacked into the breacher team. As the blue bodies fell, the Pax’nera firing line took aim. The six berserkers and their champion all fell to the gunfire and the explosion of the nearby transport tore their corpses apart. Cleaver in his fury had failed to spot the concealed payload of explosives. As his axe impacted into its core, armour, flesh and bone were torn from his frame. Out of the machine span a whirlpool of flame and fire that tore at everything around it. T’au and heretic burnt alike in the supernova that was born from the wreck. Rising from the ash, parts of his skull and rib cage exposed, Choppa pressed on. The defiler given to him by the Deathguard, ate, burnt and shot its way through the main body of the t’au, while the bloat drone tore across the landscape, burning everything in it’s wake. Hooking up to the central air filtration system the drone emptied its fetid fluids and life force into the air filters and pump system. Plaguebearers shambled and threw themselves off of the railings and into the water tanks below. Alarms sounded. Within days this section of the planet would be covered in plague and disease. He hoped it would be enough to claim at least a quarter of the planets population. Perhaps then the Plague Lord would release the arch-daemon from his eternal prison, so that the Aureus could get the answers that they needed. Drinking from the soiled water, Cleaver felt the disease and corruption eat into his injuries. Rage and knowledge were his, he hoped this would bring him the protection that the Plague Father has promised him. Protection that had allowed his rival Gurth to survive such crippling defeats.

The Landraider with the Power of a Titan

Still on a creative high from our trip to Warhammer World, myself and Jack decided to have a hobby day today. My first project was to fit a Warhound Titan's gun into a landraider. Originally, Jack said he would give me the gun if I could fit it into a russ but the gun was just too big!  

After a fair bit of sawing and some careful snipping, I managed to secure the gun into the main hull. Due to the lack of stability at first I green stuffed it and put in a fair amount of super-glue. Once it had been held firm I coated the top of the raider and all the green stuff with half a sprue of skulls.  

As you can see in the first picture above, I was also inspired by one of the landraiders in the main display at Warhammer World. Instead of its standard heavy bolters they had replaced them with forgefiend plasma cannons. As this is a proxy for the Cerberus heavy tank destroyer I thought it only fitting that it had two animalistic type heads along with the main gun.

Overall I feel it is getting there, but it still needs a lot of work.

Myself and Jack also both bought the Arch Daemon of Nurgle from Forgeworld, therefore I thought I should make mine look a little different. Instead of three horns mine now has five.

After our day of being creative, we set up Jack's freshly delivered scenery and took to the table. Wolves vs Deathguard. I won, almost tabling by the end of turn three so we called the game there.

The Landraider with the Power of a Titan

It was in the Pax'nera's interests to support Jostien. He was the only ally of great sway that the t'au forces had outside of their own race. It was clear that the Aureus were becoming as feared as the absent Black Legion. A force that could unite the sprawling bands of chaos and command them was not to be ignored. 

After many months of work it had been completed. The shell of a landraider, with the raw power of a supremacy suit's generator and the weapon of a titan were forced onto the thrashing daemon entity.  Contained within it's Ion prison the beast fused with the energy of the generator and, when provoked, created the energy needed to harness the re-purposed, titan-class weaponry.   Witnessing the devastation of the pre-battle testing procedure, Steadstrike was certain of his choice despite some of the others protests. He knew one day the might of this weapon would be turned against them, but he hoped by then they would be prepared. Signalling his crew to leave he bid farewell to Jostien.

Still in the process of regrowing his organs, Jostien was hunched. His tubes and servitors were feeding him with everything his vast form needed to be fighting fit again within the next few days.

"I thank you for your efforts Steadstrike, you have aided us well," said Jostien to the bronze clad giant leaving the disembarkation deck. "We will deal a blow to the Deathguard that they will not recover from."

* * * * *

Landing on the planets surface did not go to plan. Kai had drifted off target and had become wedged into the nearby dilapidated tower block. The battle had already begun and he had cursed himself for missing the start of it. Licking his bloated, daemonic lips he fired his ectoplasmic barrage into the Great Unclean One in front of him, popping the already damaged greater daemon like an overripe fruit. 

"Good work Kai," spoke Jostein from his position to the Ancient's right. The Captain was propped up against the wall of the ruin, his body fairly useless after the tyranid onslaught that he had narrowly escaped only a few days before. Signalling the two deredeos in the building he filled them with calm, making each of their barrages more deadly than the last. 

The blasts from the experimental tanks shook the battlefield, wrecking the Deathguard's Typhon heavy siege tank in two shots.

Within mere minutes the battle had been won. Those of the enemy still alive were put to death, while the daemons were banished back to the warp.

Jostein knew this attack would enrage members of his Chapter but he cared not. He would bring his Chapter's name back to the records of history, not through vengeance and terror but hope in the darkest of times. For the greater good.

The Guardian of Donn Hel

My good friend Jack often acquires job lots of 40k armies. In one of his old batches he received an old sad deredeo. This poor soul had been put together in a rush and sprayed badly. Being the decent gent he is rather than bin it or try to sell it on the cheap, he gave it to me.  It was given to me on the condition that I "Chaosed it up" and made something unique out of it. 

As I already had one deredeo I wanted this one to be equipped with something different. On our trip to Warhammer World both Jamie and Jack encouraged me to buy him some new weapons. After much debate I settled on the plasma weaponry.

The next day i took to building him. First I constructed the basic deredeo then attached the guns and stuck on a skull. 

Soon after I got carried away with the green stuff and had sculpted something quite unique.


Demens was pretty terrifying but Kai is really something else.

The Guardian of Donn Hel

Long fused into his armour, Kai no longer knew where his body ended and the machine began, the daemon had blended with his flesh and fused him into the machine. He cared not for his old form, he knew his father loved him, he knew his father cared about him and would always protect him against harm, a truth he had never felt as an astartes under the command of the Imperium.  The beast had stood and waited, guarding the prison of his master. The Imperium had forsaken him as the Dark Gods had forsaken his Master. Sometimes he wept from his beady black eyes deep within his huge seemingly barren eye sockets, but most of the time he laughed, laughed in the knowledge of knowing his master was soon to wake.

In return for his service, the Canis Aureus had promised to release his master and break the shackles that held him deep within his tomb. He knew that this would be no easy task and swiftly pledged his allegiance to their cause. In time he would make his master's father pay. The Plague God would have no power over this system once his forces met Kai on the fields of battle. Warming up his ectoplasmic generators he made his way to the surface, singing in the tongues of his master.