Steal My Ideas - Volume 1

Gonna take a quick break from my comp hate, to bring you something a bit lighter. So without further ado:

STEAL MY IDEAS!

The sad truth of the matter is that I have way more ideas for painting and modeling than I have time or money to pursue them. I come up with all kinds of half baked, quarter baked, raw and/or double oak smoked back bacony ideas that I'll never get to use because I just won't get to them. So I'm going to give them away! That's right, a bunch of totally rad ideas that are totally free for anyone to steal and not one has to feel bad about it. Not even Jesus. And if you think these ideas suck - well then fuck you! 'Cause they're free. Haha!

Lauby's Totally Rad Tribute to Black and White World War Pictures
For whatever reason, we Americans have a boner for WWII. Its a pretty major part of our cultural identity when you think about it. But tons of inaccurate video games, a slew of strange beliefs Americans have about our involvement, a national predisposition to accusing someone of being a Nazi in every argument ever and a strange antagonism with the French aside one of the most fascinating things about the war is the photographic and film records.*

Whenever anyone thinks of a big-ass war, WWII invariably comes up and with it all these little slices of life preserved on film. Its actually pretty neat that all these records exist in the first place when you think about it. Anywho, all these WWII pictures get used all the time for inspiration and research for modelers. So go a step further:

Paint your entire army like its a black and white photograph of WWII!

How cool would that be? On a scale between 'lame' and 'totally rad' ('lame' being the lowest), I think it would be at least 12 ¼.

If you could actually force yourself to paint every last model in your army in a forced grayscale scheme, think you would certainly turn some heads. Remember, this include the bases as well.


Lauby's Totally Sweetdiculous CHiPs Themed Ork Biker Army.
This one came to me a while ago when Nob biker lists were the way to go when you wanted to pound face with Orks. I imagine that it probably still works. In any case, what is the quintessential motorcycle media experience? CHiPs!** And what is the standard example of Ork scariness? Nob Bikers! Lets combine the two!!

This one is pretty simple, all you have to do is paint all your bikes black and white like the California Highway Patrol and then paint all the boyz in tan uniforms. Genius! Hell, you could order some sweet Ork heads from Micro Art Studios and get added hilarious hat action!

But that's not even the best part. Nononono. Since the standard Nob biker list has two Bosses, you've got a golden opportunity to make your own Ork versions of Ponch and Jon. Now, Ork Erik Estrada and Ork Larry Wilcox can crush your enemies and keep the highways safe!


Lauby's Totally Awesome Robot Uprising Imperial Guard Army
This one was inspired by Stelek's LOLride tactics article a while back.

I've always had a secret, even... forbidden... love of the quirks of the Inquisition codices that allow for some pretty cool mixed forces type lists. Sadly this may not be the case depending on the contents of the fabled, new Inquisition book (if and when it comes out). But that's tears in beer for another day. Right, mixed forces... like I said, pretty cool stuff can be made. However, sometimes all that variety gets boring.

Let me explain: the inquisition models are some of the oldest that GW produces - lots of very static poses and little variation. On the other hand, mixing models from three armies is a real quick way to make your army look indistinct in appearance. Plus, when you get right down to it, lots of the inquisition codex users have already moved to inducted land so you're not being all that unique.

For whatever random reason, the LOLride article caused some ideas to gel in my head. Two Three words: Robot Uprising Army. This is probably the idea I'm most excited about out of the three I'm giving away. Also, I'm not entirely convinced I wont mess around with it some day. Who knows? Unholy Krondor? 'Cause I sure don't.

The basic idea comes flows from one of the underlying pieces of the Imperium fluff - they hate artificial intelligences. Big parallel to the Dune universe there. In any case, my idea was that on a remote mining planet, some miners decided to use some robots they found/made to do all the heavy work. Maybe even some forced human labor. Then: BAM! Robot revolution. Now you've got a small group of robots and their human slaves waging war on the rest of the planet using whatever captured weapons and re-purposed mining vehicles they have.

I think this list from Azarsgp is a pretty good base to work from. There are plenty of opportunities to model robot overlords - the Grey Knights in particular can be modeled as hulking mining machines. The commissar and the heavy weapons teams are others. The command squad as well. You could even get creepy and make Straken a full robot and then all the peons a collection of horrible cyborgs. The only thing I'd want to differently is somehow work in Sentinels. Because, you know... big robots.

You've also got a great opportunity to model a very random collection of humans for the big foot platoons. Maybe give them some kind of shock collar and some kind of horrible flaying machines as sergeants.

Keeping with the mining theme, you've got a golden opportunity to add drills and saws and so forth to EVERYTHING. You could do worse than basing your Terminators on the Tau Stealth suit kits. It also just occurred to me that some kind of transport shuttle carrying a shipping container would make a pretty baller Vendetta stand in. Hell, if you threw in some Sisters of Battle for whatever reason you wanted, you can make fem-bots. Please don't be creepy about this one, or everyone will feel bad.***

Other than that, go nuts. Lots of opportunities for kit-bashing and converting. Lots of ways to add character to your army. ...and lots of ways to add insanity. Also, don't get too bound by the standard metal box. About the only down side is if GW ever removes the ability to take Inquisitorial allies. Then you're fucked. No matter what, the key thing to keep in mind is that anything that is in charge of anything else or really dangerous should be a robot... or a robot vehicle.

Man, that's a way funnier picture for a robot uprising.

Right, sooooo... steal my ideas. Just be aware that I may just have pumped myself up about imperial guard for the first time ever.


-----[Foot Notes]--------------------------
*All kinds of actual, serious business downplayed for comedic effect. Man, I'm totally pussing out with this footnote.

**If you said Easy Rider, Torque, Renegade or Chopper Chicks in Zombietown you would be WRONG! Heatvision and Jack, while awesome, is also WRONG! If you said Sidehackers or Ghostrider, you're DEAD TO ME!

***Seriously, please don't go out and make a bunch of big-titted robot ladies. Doctor Thunder does enough of that kind of thing for everyone already.