In the name of the Inquisition, you are now expendable...
With the advent of Warhammer 40,000 6th edition, it seems that many hobbyists are taking advantage of the new rules for allies, not least the followers of the Inquisition. Today's pictures were sent in to us by Koen Cambré, who has recruited his Imperial Guard troops as allies to his Grey Knights. "I did a bit of refurbishing on my Imperial Guard models to give them a new colour scheme that would look great next to the Grey Knights," says Koen. "They'll bring some much-needed long-range firepower to the army and also provide me with some expendable bodies to hold up enemy units." The Imperial Guard are definitely getting the short end of the stick in Koen's allied force.
The Grey Knights in the force were given a basecoat of Runefang Steel mixed with Leadbelcher, which was applied using an airbrush. Koen then reloaded the airbrush with pure Runefang Steel and sprayed each of the models from above, creating a natural highlight on the armour. Once this was dry, he washed Drakenhof Nightshade into the recesses of the armour to provide shading and then applied a final highlight of Runefang Steel to the top edges of the armour.
The gold letters were given a coat of Auric Armour Gold and then washed with Seraphim Sepia followed by Agrax Earthshade. A tiny highlight of Runefang Steel was then applied to the top of each letter to represent light glinting off of it.
The red areas were painted with a coat of Wazdakka Red, which was then shaded with Nuln Oil. Highlights were achieved by mixing progressively more Evil Sunz Scarlet into the Wazdakka Red. The last stage is a glaze of Bloodletter Red to blend the layers together.
"Most of the modelling and converting went into the Imperial Guard," comment Koen. "I wanted them to look like the personal standing army of an Inquisitor and not just regular Guardsmen. All of the Guardsmen have a little extra armour sculpted on using Green Stuff and many of them have purity seals too. The vehicles have also been kit bashed a little and many of them have Forge World doors and purity seals."
"As far as tactics go, I use a lot of Strike Squads in Rhinos and Razorbacks to establish a firing line in the middle of the battlefield. I can then get closer if I am facing a shooty army, or make a slow tactical retreat with all guns blazing if they're combat orientated. The whole idea is to soften up the enemy a bit before the final strike is delivered in close combat.
That final strike comes from a unit of Paladins in a Stormraven backed up by a Grey Knight Librarian. His psychic powers can boost an already powerful unit to become virtually unstoppable.
Meanwhile, the expendable troops... I mean, Imperial Guard, allow me access to AP2 plasma guns, which sadly the Grey Knights don't have. The one thing that can stop my Paladins dead in their tracks are other Terminators, so a hail of plasma fire can come in very handy. On a similar note, the Leman Russ also gives me some super-heavy firepower, which is useful for taking out anything in power armour."
