Dusk is upon us...

...and with it Death follows.

The Death Guard...my choice for this project began their existence as the Dusk Raiders and upon being handed over to Mortarion he changed the name of his Legion. An interesting bit of history to be sure, but why does it matter? Well I'm what you might refer to as a fluff builder - I love creating armies around a theme, a story or a bit of fluff. I've always done it for a few different reasons. First it lets me set a design direction, second it lets me really get into what I'm doing as I love a good story.

With the launch of the Horus Heresy line from Forgeworld, it opens up a huge option to explore the rich universe of the 40k history in the form of some fantastic modeling projects, army builds and options for adding to existing forces if you so choose.

The topic of this post will be a little discussion on why I chose the Death Guard and what some of the choices I've already made for what I will include in my army build. I don't have a final build all laid out in front of me, but I do have a basic scope with a number of choices already made and models on order. I am going to put up a quick caveat - I am moving from Washington state to Georgia in a couple of weeks, so the next update will most likely be after I get settled and well I won't actually start building things for a bit after that as well sadly...oh the timing of things. :(

The initial choice in the project was a bit of a toss up really as I've always been a fan of crazy ultra hyper zealous religious freek armies and the Word Bearers have always been one of my favorite forces of Chaos...however having just read the Word Bearers trilogy and the misbegotten climb to power by Marduk the nut ball, I have become disenamored with the Word Bearers as they have been written into the light of scheming, conniving, back stabbing, self important, egocentric, power hungry cry babies. Hardly an army worth my time...but we're talking pre-heresy here, the Word Bearers were the whole reason for the season. But still having been so off put by the recently read trilogy, I now have a bad taste in my mouth for them. Second, Chiller already has a huge ass WB force, thus making my choice a lot easier.

As a loooong time 40k fluffboi, having bought the WH40KRT book the month it was released here in the US, (I an say I was around at the beginning I guess) the other fanatical nutters I've always loved are the crazy witch hunters of the Inquisition and the Demon smiting Golden...er Silver boys of the Grey Knights. Based off of this and the fact that the Death Guard are not only one of the 4 Legions in book one, but also have some of the most amazing Terminator models out to date, the choice was simple.

SPOILER ALERT!!!!

So for those of you who have lived under a rock the last few years and have yet to read through all the Horus Heresy books (like me) or have not listened to the Garro audio books (like me) this might come as a shock to you, but the Inquisition and the Grey Knights may have originated with Nathaniel Garro, Captain of the 7th Company of the Death Guard and the marines he was charged to collect by Malcador. As it has not been confirmed yet, this seems much more likely than the other possibility (do the research if you're curious). And with that story arc firmly seated in my mind the choice to go with the Death Guard as my first Legion project is firmly made.

As I started to look at they force lists and layout of the Legion structure, I returned to the vast resources of the 40kwikia and the Lexicanum to read up on the origins, the pre-Mortarion and the pre-Heresy Death Guard. As one of the few Legions that have histories of name changes and actual service under the Emperor of Mankind before being turned over to their Primarch, I find a need to portray that in my project. After having discussed the idea with my fellow Generals, everyone was in agreement that I should at least have a unit or two in Dusk Raider colors:

Dusk Raider color scheme

As the Death Guard heavily favor MKII and MKIII armor varients, I plan on having a large number of these two armor variants in my units, with the 2 or 3 squads of them painted or partially painted as Dusk Raiders. 

With this in mind I know I'll have a fair number of Tactical Squads, so I'll be starting off with those. I'll be adding a couple squads of the AMAZING Deathshroud Terminators and as the combat doctrine of the Death Guard is one of relentless assault and resilience. The Death Guard are not about fancy tactics, feints and ploys, they instead chose to wear their opponents down with sheer indomitable tenacity. With this in mind the Breacher Siege squads are a must, not only do they look supremely bad azz with with those big azz shields, but they provide the resiliency the Death Guard are known for. 

Alongside the Deathshroud Terminators, I feel the need to field a unit or two of the Cataphractii Pattern armor as well, not only due to this armor being the older Terminator suits, but also due to its steadfast heavy protection, it just seems to be fitting to throw some in there. The Death Guard are also know to have high numbers of Terminators, so this won't be out of place. With the basis of my 'core' force in place it's time to give some thought to the 'extras'.

The Death Guard are not known for having a large number of assault squads, bike squads or other fast attack options. With that in mind I look in two other directions Heavy Support in the way of Devastators and Siege tanks as well as the Elites in the form of Destroyers and Dreadnoughts. As the Death Guard are known for their use of the alchem and radiation weaponry more than any other Legion, I'll be putting a few Destroyer Squads into the list. Dreads are always a must, so a pair to anchor a flank should do me well and as much as Mortarion liked to foot slog, the Death Guard did have a heavy compliment of heavy assault tanks, so I've got a Spartan, a Typhon and quite possibly one of those new Glaives on my list as well.

As of now, I'm awaiting the arrival of some marines, but with the move just 2 weeks away, I may have to divert them to the new address...more to follow!

Not so humble beginnings...

The Great Crusade, launched by the almighty God Emperor of man to retake the stars and eradicate all threats to humanity. With the end in sight of this seemingly impossible task, The Emperor turns the Crusade and all of his armies over to his chosen son Horus Lupercal and in turn Horus turned on his father in what has become the greatest war ever known to humanity.

The Horus Heresy.

Welcome everyone to the 4 Corners of 30k project blog, a blog that will track the progress of a wide spread group project. This blog will chronicle and represent the work of a group of friends from all corners of the US and the gaming industry. Some of us work in the industry, some of us don't, but all of us are fans and gamers who come from many different places, but do get the chance to spend time together at least once a year at a variety of different conventions.

My name is Derek Osborne and I will be the primary contributor to this blog, however each General has full access and will be posting from time to time, however we all have other blogs as well which can be found in the menu as well as in each little bio I add below.

So how exactly did this blog come about and why is it here? Well at the CMON Expo there were a few of us having an in-depth conversation about the Horus Heresy and the chapters involved as well as some of our  own personal history with the 40k universe. As the discussion moved along we were all talking about how we had plans on building a 30k force in the near future and which of the chapters we were all wanting to build and why, so naturally the topic turned to chronicling the entire thing through a single blog and having all of us record what we were doing as we gathered, assembled and painted our forces.

With that I'll introduce the 'crew'; I will layout the who, a link to their personal blog and which Legion they will be building however I will let each speak in turn to his own history of gaming and motivations behind their  choices.


I'll start with Sean Dooley.

I met Sean a couple years back at GenCon and refreshed our meeting and sparked a quick and wonderful friendship with Sean this year at Adepticon. He's one of those duuds that you find easy to pal around and talk games with. Sean hails from the state of Ohio and will be cracking out the uncontrollable un-showered feral wolf pack, the pre-Heresy Space Wolves.

Sean's blog can be found here: The Thirsty Gamer
He cracks out reviews for some kule geek stuffs.



Next up is the wise cracking Kyle Kinghorn.

I met Kyle at some con at some booth somewhere, duud is full of funny and is one helluva practical joker. Kyle calls the state of Arizona home. Kyle is breaking out the Legion of the Pursuit of Perfection prior to becoming the Legion of Nasty Habits, the pre-Heresy Emperor's Children.

You can find Kyles blog here: The Flawless Legion
He'll be posting random things about marines that get buck wild with anything they can get their hands on.


Rolling right along we come to Chad Cooper aka 'The Chiller'.

Chad's another one of those guys I met at some con at some booth somewhere, however he works with Kyle, so it was probably that same booth I met Kyle at...I don't recall for sure. Now Chiller here is so relaxed that he's barely got a pulse...no really, sometimes I wonder if he's breathing. The one thing about Chiller though is he's one helluva sculptor and for some reason avoids the interweb with a passion, so most likely I'll be delivering his updates while he slaves away sculpting Primarchs and shit for the rest of us. Another Arizona resident Chiller is busting out the masters of the preemptive strike, the kings of Shock and Awe, the pre-Heresy Sons of Horus.


Up in the North East is my good pal Bo.

I met Bo in person at one of the Privateer Press Invitationals up in Seattle, WA. Up to that point we had chatted on the phone a few times as we were both on the same 'team' for the big team game. Bo's one of those instantly likable guys who's super dedicated to his family, friends and his HOBBY. I knew he was a perfect addition to this project so I called him up after the fact and asked if he wanted in. Not one to turn down a crazy ass random group project, he said yes and was in! Bo initially jumped in with that bullshit made up replacement founding chapter the Impotent Fists, but changed his mind at the planning stages and dropped into the twin terror lead masters of misdirection, the pre-Heresy Alpha Legion.

Bo's a bloggaholic and can be found here: Dusk til Dawn Games
Right now he's kickin all our asses at updates, but I'm sure he'll be posting up other sweet gaming goodness there as well.


And then there's me, Derek Osborne.

I met this guy in a dark alley once...didn't go well...I'll never be the same. However he started down the path of miniature gaming in 1987 with the purchase of the brand new Warhammer 40,000 Rogue Trader, which along with Slaves to Darkness and The Lost and the Damned are still sitting on his shelves. Coming at you from the state of Washington (for another month at least...and then it'll be the state of Georgia) Oz being a long time fan of the Grey Knights and all things =I= will be rolling those atrocities of attrition, the plague of persistence, the pre-Heresy Death Guard, specifically the company of Nathaniel Garro, the Great 7th Company.


I can be found on the web in two places; first my written blog which is sadly abused by lack of updates can be found here: Throne of Angels

However I am much more active with the video blog here: Throne Of Angels YouTube
I talk a lot of skirmish games and accessories, review stuff and have contest and give a ways on a regular basis.

As you can see we have the wet Pacific North West, the dry ass South West, the storm laden mid-west and the cold as eff North East represented here. However the PNW representation is soon to be the dirty South East as I'm relocating at the end of July, which will fill the current hole in the SE and leave on in the NW. I'll try to fill it. :P

So for now that's us and a little bit on what we're doing. Next update, my thoughts on building a Death Guard army and what I have planned!!

Til next time!

Oz