Legions Imperialis: Rhino Transport

I have been thinking about getting some miniatures for Legions Imperialis since it was released. So was pleased to get the Legions Imperialis: Rhino Transport boxed set for Christmas.

The Rhino is the most widely used armoured personnel carrier in the Imperium. Based upon ancient STC technology, the fundamental design is robust, reliable, and easy to maintain, with an adaptive power plant that can run off a wide variety of fuels. Within the Space Marine Legions, the Deimos pattern was the most widespread, serving as the basic armoured transport available to the Legiones Astartes and the foundation on which a number of other war machines were based.

In the box you get two sprues that can be used to construct ten models.

This was the first time I had seen these models in the flesh. They are smaller than I thought they were going to be, but are (obviously) bigger than the older original Epic miniatures. However I thought they would be larger than they are.

I like how the box has come with transfers covering the many legions of Legions Imperialis.

When it comes to painting models, I do like to see how others have been painted. These are the images from Games Workshop.

I am thinking I will paint these as Imperial Fists.

The first stage will be constructing the models. Unlike the older Epic models, which were a single casting, these are multi-part kits.

 

Epic Battle Group

This is an Epic Battlegroup of mine.The models are from the 1990s.

The Warlord Titan is the original plastic model from the original Adeptus Titanic game, complete with plastic weapons.

The Land Raiders are plastic models, whilst the dreadnoughts are the original metal castings from Space Marine.

The scenery is from the (now defunct) Snapdragon Studio.

The models were painted in a similar manner with a light brown base coat and an ink wash.

Epic Ork Great Gargant

I got this metal Epic Great Ork Gargant model when Space Marine came out in 1989. I have recently rescanned the original photograph.

It was an all metal kit, with the main body comprising three parts, with then  parts for the weapons (arms), feet, belly weapon and gunhead.

I really like this model and only really got it on the gaming table with Epic 40000. I know most Epic players don’t like Epic 40000, but it is my personal favourite of all the Epic games produced by Games Workshop.

I know there was a resin hybrid metal kit of this gargant, which didn’t get a wide retail release. This was a much easier kit to put together (and wasn’t as heavy, which I am not sure is a good or a bad thing.

I was disappointed with the metal Epic 4000o Ork Gargant, it never was as good as this one. It was also surprisingly more challenging to put together.

Of course with the focus on the Horus Heresy, we’re not going to see a Legion Imperialis version of the Ork Great Gargant. I would really like to see a modern version of this model. We know Forge World in the past may have produced something like this, though they never did for Epic, they have done retro versions of the Space Marine Land Raider and Rhino.

Epic Size Comparisons

Over on the Warhammer Community site is an interesting article comparing the new Legions Imperialis miniatures with Epic miniatures of old.

The new Legions Imperialis models are much bigger than the Epic versions. This probably means that it will be challenging to use any Epic models alongside the new ones. Many of the models were pretty much underscale anyway.

One mistake in the article is that they mention plastic Leman Russ tanks

On the left is an adorable family photo, depicting three generations of the Leman Russ. At the front in green is an old metal version from the Space Marine-era in the mid 90s, joined by a plastic model (we think) from Epic Armageddon. The new Legions Imperialis Leman Russ kit also builds Leman Russ Vanquishers, pictured on the right with a smaller plastic version below it.

These plastic models were in fact resin models from Forge World. Here they are advertised in the Forge World catalogue.

I had a few, but as they didn’t match the metal Epic 40000 models I had, so I sold them on eBay.

The Epic History of Small-Scale Warhammer

There is a nice article over on the Warhammer Community on the history of Epic that leads into the future release of Legions Imperialis.

The miniatures might be small, but the upcoming Legions Imperialis is a huge deal. It’s the first Warhammer game of combined arms at epic scale released in two decades – and the first set at the time of the Horus Heresy for more than 30 years. And as you’ll see while we take a lot of (tiny) steps down memory lane, it’s drawing on a proud and petite pedigree.

It’s interesting to read this about the 1991 edition of Space Marine.

This edition is one of the major influences for the Legions Imperialis rules – but it’s important to note that they are not the same game.

Personally my favourite edition of Epic was the 1997 Epic 40000 set of rules. As it says in the article:

…this game was all-change for epic-scale. The miniatures stayed the same size, but the entire scope of the game changed around them. Armies were no longer confined to set companies or detachments, making force selection more flexible, but the trade-off meant that the complexities of different weapon types were much reduced to make the game faster.

I am looking forward to Legions Imperialis and I do wonder what models will be on the horizon for the new game.

Legions Imperialis: Return of the Epic

Warhammer: The Horus Heresy – Legions Imperialis

Yesterday saw the announcement of Warhammer: The Horus Heresy – Legions Imperialis or the return of Epic back into the fold.

Legions Imperialis is a new game of small (or epic) large scale warfare. This is not quite Epic as we remember it, as the scale is the same as (the new) Adeptus Titanicus and Aeronautica Imperialis. This does mean though that all those legacy epic armies are not going to be compatible. They’ve not completely forgotten the Epic games of old.

Warhammer has previously made several games in epic scale, and we’ll be taking a look down memory lane later this month, and this new game system is based on the best bits of previous incarnations of these epic scale games – while adding lots of cool new elements.

There are some really nice new miniatures, and the advances in design and manufacturing shows in the preview photographs.

I think the downside maybe that, is these models contain lots of parts. I quite liked how in the olden days the models were complete on the sprue. The kits from Adeptus Titanicus and Aeronautica Imperialis do contain a lot of parts. Yes it makes the models more detailed, but it also makes it a bit of a modelling challenge. 

I like how they describe the boxed set contains 223 miniatures.

Warhammer: The Horus Heresy – Legions Imperialis miniatures

There are a whopping 223 miniatures in the box, split between Space Marines, Solar Auxilia, and Titans. That’s 106 Space Marine infantry and walkers, five Space Marine tanks, 104 Solar Auxilia infantry and walkers, six Solar Auxilia tanks, and two Warhound Titans with brand-new plastic weapon options. 

Well, 210 of those are infantry models. You get eleven tanks in total. True that the 210 figure incudes walkers and dreadnoughts.

Personally I would like to have seen more tanks. I do like the Malcador tanks, something we never saw in Epic.

malcador tanks

All the models look really nice.

I do wonder what new models for this game we will see released. Will we see a Capitol Imperialis for example, that would be great.

They did say in the preview page:

All of the scenery that was released with Adeptus Titanicus is also returning for use in Legions Imperialis, with more to follow.

So we will probably see some new scenery sets, wonder what they will be?

I am pleased to see this release and I do think it will be one I will pre-order. I am apprehensive about how much it will cost to build an army, but that is just something I will have to accept. Back in the day (we’ll the 1990s) I managed to get a bunch of Epic stuff in a series of sales at Games Workshop at really low prices. That I doubt we will see again.

Of course this is Warhammer: The Horus Heresy, so we’re not going to see any Xenos armies I would have thought. I would like to have seen new Ork models in this scale, a Great Gargant would have been nice. Ah well one can dream.