It’s month three of the March to Terra, and our authors have been hard at work on their Legions (some harder than others). Fowler has joined in with his World Eaters, bringing the Traitors back to having more than half as many armies as the Loyalists.

You can check out part 1, part 2 and 3 here to see where we’d gotten to so far, and as a reminder, here’s which Praetor is taking on which Legion:

• Magos Sockbert IV Legion – Iron Warriors
• Soggy: V Legion – White Scars
• Bair: VII Legion – Imperial Fists
• Rockfish: VII Legion – Imperial Fists
• Jack: IX Legion – Blood Angels
• Liam: IX Legion – Blood Angels
• Beanith: X Legion – Iron Hands
• Fowler: XII Legion – World Eaters
• Lenoon: XIII Legion – Ultramarines
• Contemptor Kevin: XIII Legion – Ultramarines
• Serotonin: XIV Legion – Death Guard
• RichyP: XVII Legion – Word Bearers
• NotThatHenryC: XIX Legion – Raven Guard (and Legio Astorum)
• Lupe: XX Legion – Alpha Legion

Let’s see how everyone’s progressed since last month.

Lenoon

After a month of doing an awful lot, this month has been slow, ponderous and deadly, as I’ve mostly just been painting a big dead guy with a fist and a drill. Christened “the Ska dread” by Goonhammer Patrons (hey you! come join us on the discord and you too can mock my chequerboard obsession), I spent about as much time on the right shoulder plate as I did on building the bloody thing. Continuing my theme of roaming cultural references for the Mortificators, I ripped apart elements of the Korean word for “Ultra” for the name plate, which makes it feel just alphabetical enough to be recognisable word-symbols, but nothing like anything today. Scifi eh? How mindblowing!

I feel quite smug because bypassing the whole “oh no i need a specific 3d printed arm part to magnetise between ranged and fists” conundrum was exactly as easy as I’d expected, simply popping a magnet behind the “shoulder” and taking the arm off at the cable. I’ve also put two dangerously powerful magnets into the base, for absolutely no reason other than I could.

Getting him onto the table last weekend was satisfying, and he ripped apart a Landraider with ease (though not quick enough to stop a Palatine Blade squad from ripping through my tactical marines). Double Volkite and a phosphex launcher makes for a tasty roaming threat to virtually everything, and is just generally bloody funny to boot.

Soggy

This month wasn’t too productive on the Heresy front, with only one completed model which is technically in the 30K setting so I’ll include it…

I completed the Warbreaker Titan from Battlebling, which was received as part of our review. It’s rather large.

This month I hope to do a bit of a palate cleanser of Support Squads before looking at getting some Golden Keshig for my White Scars while I’m up at Warhammer World.

“Contemptor” Kevin Stillman

With the completion of the Goonhammer Open and no longer needing to focus as much on terrain, I was far more free to focus on Horus Heresy stuff *despite* NoVa.  To that end, I managed to get a fair bit done.

First and foremost was the completion of my second Ultramarines Sicaran Battle Tank.  Unlike the last one, seen off in the corner, this one was done in 2022 on the amazing new plastic Sicaran kit.  I also built an Ultramarines Tank Commander, so that this model can serve as my command tank for if/when I run an armored spearhead list.

The next full unit I finished was this Ultramarines Veteran Squad, which will double as a Kill Team for playing 40K.  Notable because this squad is, as I mentioned in my NoVa Open Recap, entirely composed of RBT-01 Marines.  There is also a Plasma Gun toting Marine with a ridiculous face.

Incidentally, this is my first ever metal Space Marine.

Going back to the Age of Darkness Box Set, I finished a total of six additional models from it.  The first unit I finished from the set were these five Sons of Horus Cataphractii, which are designed to count as Justaerian Terminators.  They’re painted in the same color scheme as my official Forge World Justaerian, and three of them have the official Justaerian Forge World bolters.  One does not because the set only came with four Bolters, and a second was destroyed by the Vengeful Salsa when I dropped the box that had these guys in them and I missed one.

Lastly, I finished the “Sword Praetor” from Age of Darkness by making him as an Ultramarines Praetor.  I did this by cutting off his sword hand and replacing it with a spare Legatine Axe.  The helmet was replaced with the helmet from Remus Ventanus, to make him more Ultramarine-y.

Not pictured are the arms I finished for my Locutarus Storm Squad – ten Ultramarines power sword arms, nine bolt pistol arms, and one plasma pistol arm because I ran out of bolt pistols.

Next up: Ultramarines Leviathan Dreadnought, Ultramarines Veteran Squad #2, Ultramarines Missile Launcher Heavy Support Squad, and Sons of Horus Tactical Squad.

Lupe

The first thing I did over the last month was get the second five of my Lernaeans painting up, with a couple of Volkite Culverins to beef up the number of shots (Volkite isn’t great, but it is cool looking).

Excited with my new cadre of big Tough Lads and armed with a Large Tank for them to ride in I excitedly headed over to Warhammer World the next day… only for disaster to strike.

I fell up the stairs, breaking my nose on my boxes, and scattering my minis across the concrete floor.

It was brutal. The game was called off (obviously) an I retreated home to spend a few hours fixing my army and icing my face. Somehow I managed to repair every single model, and after a little bit of work I was ready to do some touch ups and get back to hobbying and gaming. I got back into the swing of things with three big lads ready to have a good time.

I also wanted to finish up those Dark Angels for my “useful idiot” detachment. Say hello to Ser Alasitar and co:

Finally, I painted up a Legion Praevian, ready for some exciting robot shenanigans next month.

Magos Sockbert

Last month? Painting and building up my horde of shame. This month? Ignoring that horde in favour of GAMES. I had a chance (finally…) to test out the Zone Mortalis scenario, having played a plethora of custom missions before, and, uh… It sure is something, huh. Defender camping an objective in their deployment zone while I bull rushed in to try and take the other two simply to catch up was a… challenge, but I think the real winner is I finally have my own Zone Mortalis board! Isn’t it pretty?!

This month saw more games for me than any period since The Before Times, whomping Imperial Heralds, Emperor’s Children, Ultramarines and more before slamming head first into Imperial Fists in a thematic, but deeply unfun game of “how many re-rollable saves do our Phalanx Warders need to pass before your entire shooting phase becomes meaningless?” I do love Fists, but I do not love Stone Gauntlet.

A bit more in the painting side, 10 Tartaros Terminators made their way into my fleet to fulfil the role of “gunpig with Line” in a Pride of the Legion ZM force. Iron Warriors have two lovely unique terminator units, so it was a little odd painting another ten as a tax.

I really didn’t get a lot of painting completed this month, with an awful lot of “almost, but not quite” sitting on my desk shaming me. Next month will be a doozy, with a range of deeply unpleasant phosphex based artillery making its way towards Terra alongside a host of special characters, including a few models which have made their way from Ukraine!

NotThatHenryC

I had been rushing to get a Raven Guard army ready for the LGT but then found I couldn’t attend, due to work. Boo! I also went away on holiday and bought a Warhound Titan. These events have changed my hobby plans significantly, and in a Warhound-Titan-shaped way.

As you can see, said Titan is not finished, but is largely built. I’m pretty happy with the pose I’ve got for it and the fact it actually stands up. Why March to Terra when you can run?

These are the 10×5 N42 magnets that hold the waist together. They are strong, to the point that it’s a bit of actual effort to get the legs off. I think that’s necessary though, for storage and transport. The guns are held on with a pair of these each, which is easily strong enough – I’m relieved to say.

I got hold of a 16cm GW base and reinforced it massively with plasticuard (underneath as well as on top) and bits of ruin stuck on with epoxy. This meant it was pretty rigid and thick enough to drill into for the four pins that secure the foot to the base. I’ve got 3mm brass rod going right the way through each toe, connecting the base and the bottom of the leg, plus a pin straight down from the sole of the foot. That one is visible from some angles (though not this one) but not too obvious. I might add more junk to the base to hide it better.

I made a start on some armour (sort of out of sequence, I really need to do the inside). I’m pretty happy with the flames and freehand Astorum symbol on the one on the left, though the gold there needs a lot of work. I’ve only just started the right hand one so the stripes are very messy, but they’re roughly in the right place.

I have made a tiny bit of progress on the Ravens. This will be a Chaplain/Praetor. He’s based on Zephon and Dark Fury bits. He’s getting put away again till the Titan is finished though.

RichyP

Not a usual load of models from me this month sadly, lots of real world stuff to deal with. Right at the end of last month I did get to finally play a game with Serotonin and Corrode (took a road trip for some Heresy).

Since the last update I painted a unit of Cataphractii Terminators with a Plasma Blaster which totally isn’t two Volkite Culverins glued top to top:

A couple of Veterans to make a Command Squad (complete with repurposed Legion Herald):

A very quick 5 man Plasma Blaster unit (I painted these an hour before heading out on my road trip as I couldn’t bring myself to proxy the Rotor Cannon ones):

And finally for the newly painted units, some Cultists. I know they don’t have rules yet, but I really wanted to see how the colour palette would translate to non-armoured models:

Here they are with some Marines mixed in, I think the colours work well:

Finally, as I mentioned at the start, I took a road trip south to play some Zone Mortalis. Here are some shots:

I didn’t win anything, but I was really happy when my Diabolist exploded the Contemptor and took the remaining wound off the Blood Angel Praetor on the same turn. Also, while not super effective I did decide to “go all in” on Gal Vorbak as they were fun but less effective Terminators, so next month expect some more of them in the update.

Liam

A quiet month for me painting-wise with just two models, a Leviathan Dreadnought and a Predator:

Not wholly ZM focused, admittedly, but they’re cool and I wanted to paint them so I did.

Otherwise my biggest 30k thing of the month was getting to play a couple of games with RichyP and Serotonin, as Richy has written up above. It was fun to actually get stuff on the table and play, although my main takeaway is that the default Zone Mortalis mission is horseshit that massively favours the defender – which is a shame because it feels like it doesn’t need that much tweaking to be much more fun. Still, getting to grips with the rules (and then getting them badly wrong – sorry Richy!) was nice, as was getting to spend an afternoon hanging out with both Richy and Sero.

Fowler

Hey wait a minute, who let this guy in? After much waffling and gnashing of teeth, I have finally decided which legion I am going to do and what units I want to paint up for the project. Technically I guess this is a sprint to Terra? As I didn’t want to have the 3rd best Blood Angels, the World Eaters called to me.

I commissioned my friend to do the majority of assembly and magnetizing for me (thanks Eric!), as my draw to Heresy is as a painting / kitbashing / playing sort of project. Keeping up with other hobby projects means that the World Eaters will be a sometimes snack, but I am excited to dive in! The current queue is:

• 2x 10 MKVI Tactical squads
• 10 fully magnetized Cataphractii Terminators (will eventually bash Red Butchers weapons)
• “Sword” Praetor
• Axe Praetor
• 10 kitbashed Ravagers. (Maybe using Necromunda Corpse Grinder weapons?)
• 10 MKIV bodies for heavy support squad or etc
• Magnetized Contemptor Dread
• Magnetized Leviathan Dread
• Kratos Heavy Assault Tank
• Land Raider Spartan
• Deimos Rhino

When I manage to pull that off, I will treat myself to Kharn and Angron and think about round two.

Now that I have taken delivery of bunny hats, chainaxes, and a pile of assembled plastic I am ready to get working! Here are some of my guiding principles for the project:

• Keep shoulders and backpacks separate to speed up painting
• Lean on enamels, oils, weathering, and airbrush tricks to speed work up
• Replace melee weapons with axes if at all possible
• TASTEFUL blood and gore

I have my test models in hand and am excited to try out my scheme on them! There is a bit of uncertainty here as World Eaters transfers have been out of stock at GW for a while. Hopefully the release of the new WE upgrades kicks that back off.

Serotonin

Feeling slightly shame faced this month (again). My output hasn’t been great, but I do have some updates.

I finished my Spartan, with which I was very pleased. I keep looking at it wondering if I could add some more weathering, and judging by the pile of  new contrast paints and weathering powders and FX paints I have, the answer is almost certainly yes.

You have to call a model done at some point though and with the announcement of the new Land Raider Proteus, the other argument is, am I likely to ever field the Spartan? Ive been starting to toy with 3000 point lists and despite wanting to lean very heavily into foot slogging infantry backed by artillery my test games at lower point values lead me to believe I need transport for Typhon and my Deathshroud terminators, and given the scarcity of heavy slots, the proteus as dedicated transport seems the best bet. Good thing I enjoy vehicle painting isnt it?

The other big news which leads nicely on from talking about planning 3000 point lists is that a friend sold me his entire collection of Death  Guard. Some of it painted but mostly not and numbering about 80 Mk3 and Mk4 infantry including about 30 heavy weapons, almost entirely using Forge World legion bits, as well as over 30 Deathshroud and Grave Wardens, countless character models, many nicely converted and Mortarion himself.  A fantastic haul that I still keep gazing at in awe and fear and wondering how long its going to take me to paint it all!

Jack

Shamefully coming in here at the bottom, I accomplished very little this month. Got a 1000 point game in for my local escalation league, in which my Blood Angels tore up some Alpha Legion. Reinforced my desire to have multiple squads of Dawnbreakers and a Telepathy Librarian.