Next Project: Codename Cherokee

  Once I do a unit of 4 Mournfang Cavalry, I think my Ogre army will be pretty much complete.  I'm not such a huge fan of the large monsters in our army so I don't really feel compelled to paint one.  So I've been thinking about what to do next. I would love to finish my Tau army, but quiet frankly I hate losing.  Until they get a new book (which the rumors say will be next year), I'm putting them on hold.  

  When I started playing 40k, I was torn between 3 options.  Tau, Sisters of Battle, or doing a White Scars army.  I ultimately chose the Tau because its just too difficult to do a Sisters of Battle army without spending an arm and an asshole, and because I didn't want to be "just another space marine army."

Well the SoB are still too rich for my blood, so I've decided that I'm going to go with the Space Marines. I was doing a bit of reading of the fluff of the White Scars and while I really do like them, some of the stuff just didn't set well with me. For example "Also, the majority of heavy weapons normally used by Space Marine forces such as the Heavy Bolter, Missile Launcher, Plasma Gun or Heavy Flamer are frowned upon by the Chapter, and any tank that cannot keep up with the rest of the army is avoided in the order of battle. For instance, the White Scars have no Devastator Squads, and their few Predator tanks may not carry sponson weapons. The White Scars also do not field any Dreadnoughts, not only because of the slowness of those cyborgs, but also because every White Scars Astartes does not want to be crippled to the point that they must be entombed in a Dreadnought's cybernetic sarcophagus. Far better to die and allow their spirits to pass into the afterlife where they may roam free." I know that there is no steadfast rules saying I have to play them this way, but I don't want some pimply faced fluff nerd telling me that army isn't "correct"

So the only logical next step, would be to make up my own space marine chapter. It will still be that highly mobile bike and land speeder heavy army just my own. A long time ago I saw these and saved the link cause I though they were awesome.

  So this has become my new idea, I'm going to do a native american based space marine army.  It would fit with the highly mobile idea, plus it's a nod to my own heritage.  I'll do a headswap for most of the marines in my army with these heads from puppetswar.com.(Helmets are for sissy man!)  At about a dollar a head(9.87 for 10), I don't feel that I'll be breaking the bank for my theme. (Plus pointwise, biker marines get expensive, so fewer models, fewer heads!)

 Games-Workshop makes the Dark Angels Ravenwing Battleforce that I'll be using pretty heavily as a cheap source of biker marines.  (105.00 dollars from GW, but through Miniature Market its only 78.75.)  In the box you get 6 regular marine bikers, 1 attack bike, 1 land speeder, and a bunch of sprues of Ravenwing stuff to make them ravening.  So I'll just throw out the ravenwing spures and TADA!  Its just regular ole marine stuff.  

  I have some other ideas of how to make the army feel more native americany.  I have been looking all over the internet trying to find some 28mm scale tomahawk to give them as their close combat weapons, but no luck so far.  I might end up buying a model that has one, making a mold of it and using one of those make your miniatures kits to mass produce them.  This is certainly not the prefered method but I'll make it work if I have to.

  On GW's website, if you do some searching for the metal alternative shoulder pads, the "Eagle Warriors Shoulder pads" come up.  Sadly I can't use Miniature Market for these so I'll have to pay the standard GW price of 8.25 for 10.  Less than a buck a piece, which is not too bad given that I'll only put 1 per marine.  

  The math works out well for this as there are 10 marines (6 on bikes, 2 in the attack bike, 2 in the land speeder) per every battleforce.  78.75 + 9.87 + 8.25 = 96.87 for roughly 360 points.  

  Every army need their commander so my idea for HQ is to do my own version of Kor'Sarro Khan the white scars commander.  Since there is no model for Kor'Sarro Khan on Moondrakken (his fancy named bike), I'll do like most White Scars players do and convert something up.  Trying to make him fit the theme and stand out, I've decided that you know, maybe my Moondrakken isn't a bike, and instead is a mechanical horse.  With not too much work, I think I can make the horse from this empire engineer into a pretty neat HQ for my army.

  

  As for paint scheme, I really like the way some of my all white models turned out for my Tau army.  So I'm thinking of doing mostly white and have some red and blue details. I considered doing a turquoisy color with the white, but turqouise doesn't really play well with my colorblindness... also I don't wanna be turqouise army guy.  In a lot of the imagery of old "cowboys and indians" days, you see the horses with hands and other symbols painted on them, and so long as I can pull if off I'd like to do something like this to the bikes.

  I'm back and forth with myself on how I want them based.  Part of me says to do them in the Lava look that I did for my Tau, this way I can use the same display board for both armies.  I'm keep talking myself out of the idea since A. I want them to look different, and B. Why would you deploy an army of bikers on a place full of lava?  I don't know what kind of tires they use in the grim future of 40k, but I don't think they're lava proof.

  I think a highway/asphault/tarmac look would be more appropiate, but I think it might look kind of boring and plain.  The bike bases give you some room to really get creative with it and I can't think of much to do other than putting up street signs, and doing things like painting cross walks  and whatnot on them.  I'd love to be able to pull it off, but so far I haven't found any articles online about how to easily do it and have it still look good.

  Option 3 is to try using the Autumn Basing Kit from BaseCrafts.  I've seen reviews for it on Beasts of War, as well as their Winter Basing Kit and I am really impressed with it.  It would be something a bit different, and there would be that contrast of earthy colors with bright white of the marines.

  That's the short(well shorter than it could be) kind of rundown of the ideas I have bouncing around in my head for my next project. I've got some more ideas as to what my army will be comprised of, but I'll not bore anyone still reading this with the details.  If anyone's got any suggestions or comments I'd love to hear them.