Back in February, in anticipation of possibly getting a game or two of Epic in while I was down in Southampton, I made a few small additions to my Chaos army. These were mostly to make the army work with the latest NetEA version of the army list, which has made a few changes that would affect my army.

The first of these was a fourth Defiler/Daemon Knight. Under the current rules these aren’t much use as an upgrade to other formations any more, but are quite good as a formation in their own right. However, to use them in this way, you need four, so I needed to convert and paint another one. Fortunately, I had one Knight Paladin model spare:

And here is the formation of all four:

Another addition were these Stalker AA tanks. The Stalker is a proposed addition to the Chaos army list intended to offset the fact that Obliterators are having their AA capabilities toned down a bit. My conversions are just E40k-era Whirlwinds with one half of the missile launcher removed and the other re-angled skywards. The result is slightly odd and lopsided-looking, but in a way that I quite like.

While I was at it, I also converted and painted this Thousand Sons Chaos Lord (along with transport and an extra stand of rubric marines). He doesn’t have any use in the Black Legion army, but if I use the Red Corsairs list he’ll be useful for the Cult Marines formation.

I also made a couple of changes to the Lord of Change. I was never entirely happy with his loincloth, and it didn’t look quite right being the same blue as his torso, so I re-did it in white. I also tidied up a few imperfections on his head.

In the event, I didn’t get any games in with this army (only the Eldar). However, a couple of things prompted me to continue working on it. Firstly, under the current NetEA Chaos list my army wasn’t quite legal: I need one CSM retinue for every formation of Chosen, Chaos Terminators or Decimators in the list, and I was one short. The other factor was that Forge World had produced a few more Warhound titans. So over March and April, I made the following additions.

Firstly, based on the FW Warhounds, a pair of Feral Titans:

For some reason the photo has made the mould line on the tail of the one on the right much more visible than it is in reality.

Having painted these, I got out my Ravager conversion and concluded that it needed a bit of work. It showed that parts of the paint-job were done several years ago when my painting skills were not up to much, and the base was a little too plain and lacking in scenic detail. I don’t like excessively detailed diorama-style bases for gaming figures (although they’re great for models intended purely for display), but on a large base like this one, a little bit of detail is necessary. So I touched up the paint-job a little and re-based the model. Here it is:

While I was working on War Engines, this seemed like a good time to convert some Death Wheels. I put together one, but didn’t quite have enough parts for any more, so I ordered some more, along with the infantry I was going to need to make the army legal.

While waiting for those to turn up, I converted up some objective markers. I did some of these for the Eldar, and had always intended to do the same for my Chaos army but hadn’t got around to it.

So after a few days the remaining bits turned up and I was able to finish off a Deathwheel Squadron:

The design is, I must confess, completely ripped off from these. I’d have liked to be a bit more creative, but I couldn’t find enough suitable parts in my bits box(es), so in the end I just went with the straight-up steal. I’d like a some point to do a third (they come in squadrons of up to three), but I didn’t have enough spare tracks at the time, so two will have to do for now.

Having done lots of exciting War Engines, it was now time to knuckle down and get some more infantry done. First up, a detachment of Havocs:

The Rhinos were actually painted back in September, as I had a few spares.

Following those, another Retinue, which makes the army legal again:

No Rhinos for these guys; they’ll have to slog it out on foot. I’ve included both a Lord and Sorcerer Lord for the retinue, and an option for an Icon Bearer. No Champion, though, as I’m out of Space Marine Chaplains to convert them from.

I also have another four stands of Flamers, bringing the total up to twelve:

I then went on to paint up this squadron of Hellblade fighters:

And finally, I added this Daemon Prince:

This is just the Warmaster Daemon Prince model with a couple of Terminators added to the base to make it legal as an infantry unit. I think the Epic Daemon Prince unit was originally intended to represent a slightly smaller daemon than this one, but it’s a cool model, so I’m not that bothered.

All of this brings my army to just short of 8,000 points, making it my second largest army (and legal again). However, I do not intend to stop here. I have some more infantry on order, and once those are done I’m going to have a go at converting a Warplord Titan. After that, there will be only a few bits and pieces to add before I can declare the army to be done and finished (at just over 10,000 points).