And, while I mind me, there were even then, and always, men named Monstruwacans, whose duty it was to take heed of the great Forces, and to watch the Monsters and the Beasts that beset the great Pyramid, and measure and record, and have so full a knowledge of these same that, did one but sway an head in the darkness, the same matter was set down with particularness in the Records.
- William Hope Hodgson, The Night Land
Earlier, I made some Deathwatch marines. The project stalled at the time because Brexit had just happened, and GW's shipping was a complete disaster well into the spring. The first bunch of models here I couldn't finish because none of the Deathwatch upgrade kits I'd ordered showed up. However, I got lucky: I got one of these.
The Start Collecting Deathwatch box was an incredible bargain and I was kicking myself for not getting one before they were discontinued. At 2021 retail prices, the box has two Deathwatch Kill Teams at 32,50€ each and a 11€ Deathwatch upgrade sprue. So that's 76€ of stuff I was going to get anyway, plus the 22.50€ Watch Captain and a 45€ Venerable Dreadnought. Amazing value for money, especially since the Kill Team kit is absolutely first-class.
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The first model I finished was Venerable Dreadnought Lysistrata Tacita of the Prophets of Mercury.
The entire chapter was lost in the Abyssal Crusade in M37 - except for those members seconded to the Deathwatch at the time. One of them was Lysistrata, who still serves the Deathwatch as a Venerable Dreadnought, and is almost certainly the last survivor of the chapter.
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On to the actual marines: I'm a little bit proud of this Rainbow Warrior with a storm bolter and storm shield.
I since heard that storm bolters don't get special ammo any more in 9th edition, but who cares, maybe I'll try these guys out in 12th or whatever. I imagine frag cannons will still be good though.
The Marine carrying one is from the Black Guard. The next order to arrive was a box of Vanguard Veterans, where I got a thunder hammer for my Blackshield.
I also made a Vanguard Veteran from the Lamenters:
And with that, Malleus Kill Team Gydrael is done!
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Then, finally, I got my jump packs, which meant I could finish my Chaplain.
As well as converting the special character in the Start Collecting box into the far more interesting Watch Captain Andromache, originally of the Dark Brotherhood and with a Statuesque head and a bolter from the Deathwatch box.
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I built my marines to an 8th-edition roster, so I have no idea if my equipment choices or indeed anything makes any sense in the current edition, nor do I really care.
My close combat Kill Team will be led by this Sergeant. He's from the Emperor's Shadows; I'm kinda happy with how the chapter symbol worked out.
Because I had Dark Angels bits, here's a veteran from the Angels of Redemption.
And another from my Punishers. I used the skull pad that came with the Deathwatch box, and put a hazard stripe on the storm shield because why not.
This guy is from the Executioners, and I'm absolutely delighted with that chapter symbol! One of my more successful freehands.
Finally, I made an appropriately dramatic Blackshield.
If we add the Jade Paladins Terminator I painted earlier, we have another squad - I think this may need a fifth veteran, but I'll look into that later.
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I also made a whole bunch of guys with storm bolters, because I like storm bolters. The squad will be led by Watch Sergeant Dargaard Soth from the Death Knights.
Here's a Grail Knight: they're a homebrew Blood Angels successor chapter I invented, and I built the model out of Blood Angels tactical squad bits and a Deathwatch shoulder pad.
From the slightly disappointing video game Inquisitor: Martyr, a Stormwatcher.
Finally, there's this Black Dragons Vanguard Veteran.
When we add the Imperial Fist and the Smurf from the Overkill box and the Dark Angel Terminator I built earlier, here's a Furor Kill Team.
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The rest of the veterans will join the two jump pack dudes from the Overkill box to make a Vanguard Veterans squad. Here's an Exorcist:
And a veteran from the Mentor Legion:
And finally the sergeant, from the Crimson Guard, with an inferno pistol from a Blood Angels box and a Statuesque Miniatures head.
Here's the whole gang:
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I think that's all of my Deathwatch marines on foot dealt with. However, I did buy the new Horus Heresy box this summer, and when we split the contents with some friends, I ended up with all ten of the Cataphractii Terminators. So why not make a Deathwatch relic terminator squad?
Since I've already got all these thunder hammers and whatnot, I decided to go with the classic Cataphractii loadout of combi-bolters and lightning claws, but give the sergeant a chainfist. I also decorated them with purity seals and various other doodads from my box of space marine bits.
Because the armor is so old, I wanted the suits to be worn by Second Founding or otherwise well-endowed chapters. So here's my Sergeant, from the Inceptors.
A Blood Drinker, because the Blood Angels were being really subtle about the whole vampire thing. I had a little Blood Angel shield thingy left over, and also that blood-drop-themed thing, so I put them on this dude.
A Storm Lord. I gave him one of those spiky things from the Chaos Terminator Lord kit, as it had a Tyranid head on it and I thought this would be something a White Scars successor chapter would do.
A Reviler:
And finally, a Minotaur. Who knows who they stole that suit from. Possibly the Inceptors! I made the bronze color by mixing two parts Copper and one part Natural Steel.
I wasn't that enthusiastic about these models at first, I have to admit, but they were fun and easy to build.
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Of all the modeling projects I've done so far, I may have enjoyed this one the most. The classic marine kits are some of the best ones anyone's ever made, and the Deathwatch veteran kit is one of the best of them.
On top of that, a Deathwatch army really lets you make every single model unique: they can pretty much all have different equipment and be from different chapters, which makes for a really fun modeling, painting and even research exercise, where you can create individuals but tie them all together into an army. I've had fun just browsing Lexicanum looking for entertaining chapter colors and logos, let alone executing them and thinking about how to make each Marine a little bit different.
Now that I have a bunch of infantry, the next thing to do is to get them some support. I'm quite looking forward to building more Deathwatch!
