One of the displays at Warhammer World was this Horus Heresy battle, entitled, The Fall Of Outpost Sigma-12.
Traitor forces breach the Imperial Fist’s last defensive lines at Outpost Sigma-12 on Cthonia. Undermined by the Sons of Horus’ subterranean onslaught, the Loyalists are determined to fight to the last in the name of the Emperor.
They ultimately reap such a toll of Traitor lives that any victory won was a hollow one. This battle would be one of the last fought during the Horus Heresy, for shortly after its bloody conclusion Horus launched his assault on the Emperor’s Palace on distant Terra.
A wider view of the Sons of Horus assault on the Imperial Fists. In the background is a loyalist titan.
The Fall Of Outpost Sigma-12The Fall Of Outpost Sigma-12The Fall Of Outpost Sigma-12The Fall Of Outpost Sigma-12The Fall Of Outpost Sigma-12The Fall Of Outpost Sigma-12The Fall Of Outpost Sigma-12
The Shadowsword is the sister tank to the Baneblade, a super-heavy vehicle employed by Solar Auxilia cohorts to engage and destroy enemy macro-engines with its volcano cannon. The same chassis has also been adapted to mount different primary weapons suited to their own modes of destruction, like the bunker-busting Stormsword siege cannon or the versatile plasma blastgun of the Stormblade.
The Solar Auxilia’s Medusa artillery tanks are behemoths of destruction, their Leman Russ hulls cloaked in heavy armor. Their devastating guns, protected from enemy fire and hazardous environments, can reduce enemy fortifications to rubble. These mobile fortresses, capable of shattering mighty walls, advance alongside the Auxilia cohorts, softening enemy defenses and paving the way for the main assault.
The Imperialis Militia Carnodon Battle Tank is medium battle tank which was one of the main armoured vehicles used by the Imperial Army during the Great Crusade.
As it was replaced by other vehicles a great many Carnodon Battle Tanks were placed in the strategic reserve. They were often used by planetary militia.
This is the Forge World model in the display cabinets at Warhammer World.
The Solar Auxilia use the Leman Russ Strike Tanks in various roles. The tanks have been upgraded with solar-pattern survival systems, this allows the tank and the crew to fight in any harsh conditions on different planets.
Solar Auxilia Leman Russ
It is usually armed with one of four primary weapons – a battlecannon, twinned heavy lascannons or autocannons, or a long-barrelled Vanquisher battlecannon with a co-axial autocannon.
This Blood Angels Legion Thunderhawk Gunship was in the display cabinets at Warhammer World.
The Legion Thunderhawk Gunship, used during the Horus Heresy, is a formidable aerial weapon platform, a testament to the Imperium’s technological prowess during the Great Crusade era.
This massive gunship, larger than a Space Marine Rhino transport, is equipped with a formidable array of weaponry, including twin-linked heavy bolters, a powerful autocannon, and a devastating missile launcher.
Its hull is reinforced with ceramite plating, providing exceptional protection against enemy fire. Inside the Thunderhawk, a crew of skilled Space Marines operates the various systems, while a troop compartment can accommodate a squad of Astartes.
The gunship’s engines, capable of reaching incredible speeds, allow it to rapidly deploy troops and provide crucial fire support during battles.
The Thunderhawk’s versatility and firepower made it an invaluable asset to the Legions during the Great Crusade, and its legacy endures even after the Horus Heresy.
This Imperial Fists Arquitor Bombard with Spicula Rocket System was in the displays at Warhammer World.
The Legion Arquitor is a heavy artillery platform designed to operate at the forefront of a Legiones Astartes advance. Equipped with a reinforced chassis and brutal short range firepower, it is called upon to break the most stubborn of fortifications or to annihilate massed enemy infantry and armour.
The spicula rocket system fires rippling salvos of unguided missiles that crash down on enemy positions, creating massive cumulative blasts that can scatter whole formations.
Built to approach its targets silently and with utmost stealth, the Kharon Pattern Acquisitor is deliberately made to be a thing of mystery and terror when its presence is unveiled.
Sisters Of Silence Kharon Pattern Acquisitor
Used primarily in a paramilitary role by the Sisters of Silence, it can suppress civilian resistance with lethal effect, its hellion cannon cutting through rampaging mobs and destroying makeshift barricades. Against greater threats, various payloads of missiles can be deployed, including sophisticated antipsyker warheads.
This Legio Custodes Caladius Grav-Tank Annihilator was part of the displays at Warhammer World.
Legio Custodes Caladius Grav-Tank Annihilator
Based upon the technology of the Coronus Grav-carrier, the smaller Caladius grav-tank is designed to utilise the firepower afforded by the heaviest elements of the Legio Custodes’ arsenal on a highly mobile, protected platform.
Legio Custodes Caladius Grav-Tank Annihilator
Given the fusion of advanced systems and weapons, the Caladius is perhaps the most powerful battleline armoured unit of its size in the Imperium’s forces, utilising technologies and materials derived not only from the Dark Age of Technology, but from developments made as a result of the Great Crusade’s two centuries of warfare. A particularly powerful variant was the ‘Caladius-Annihilator’ which featured an enhanced capacitor-fed Arachnus blaze cannon potent that is enough to pose a threat even to super-heavy armour.
There were a number of Legio Custodes vehicles in a huge diorama display of The Burning of Prospero.
The Burning of Prospero, is the name of the full-scale invasion and planetary devastation of Prospero, homeworld of the Thousand Sons, by Imperial forces that mainly included the Space Wolves Legion, the Adeptus Custodes and the Sisters of Silence.
This is a Legio Custodes Caladius Grav-Tank.
The principal armament of the Caladius is the double-barrelled Iliastus accelerator cannon, an advanced weapon which was to become the precursor to the main weapon of the Legiones Astartes Sicaran Battle Tank.
There was also a large Orion Assault Dropship.
Created as a dedicated assault dropship for the Legio Custodes, the Orion can carry a full task force of the Emperor’s Talons into combat. Protected by frontal armour superior to that of the Legiones Astartes Thunderhawk Gunship, its Arachnus heavy blaze cannon and Lastrum bolt cannon can swiftly clear a landing zone of hostile infantry and armour with brutal efficiency, allowing the units within to deploy before it soars back into the sky to unleash death upon any foe who dares approach.
The Mechanicum Ordinatus are massive weapons of destruction that the forces of the Imperium use when faced with unprecedented enemy forces. Essentially they are Titan style weapons on tracks.
In the time of the Great Crusade the Ordinatus macro engines were rarer than even the Battle Titans of the Legio Titanica, and only a handful of Forge Worlds had the resources or indeed the doctrinal blessing and religious authority to produce or maintain such embodiments of the Omnissiah’s divine wrath. Such was the sacredness of these machines above all others, that an entire subcult of the Mechanicum was devoted to their worship and propitiation.
We first saw these vehicles in Epic, and then Forge World released 40K scale Horus Hersey versions of these massive vehicles.
The Ordinatus Ulator is a rare and truly arcane weapon system of huge power. Its primary weapon is the Ulator class Sonic Destructor.
Mechanicum Ordinatus Ulator
Another version is the Ordinatus Sagittar, similar to the Ulator, it is armed with a Volcano Cannon.
Mechanicum Ordinatus Sagittar
These are nice models, but I am not really a fan of them. They look very vulnerable to enemy fire, there is no armour to speak of. They also don’t look very mobile (despite the four tracks). What do you think?
