"The enemies of the Emperor - our enemies - believe us weakened; they believe they can attack His worlds, bringing fire and tumult, till all that remains is the ashes and blood of our defeat.
No.
When they come, they will find that we stand, that we defy them, and that the ashes and blood which remain is the sign of their defeat."

- Chapter Master Noumen Arkos, Ashen Sentinels, prior to the victory at Genovian III

Greetings Frater  I'm starting a new army, one that has (believe it or not) been three years coming. After picking up the 8th starter sets, various issues of Conquest, subscribing to Imperium magazine, I've got a sizeable collection of Primaris miniatures. I've spent a bit of time thinking about what I wanted to do with them - my initial idea was to do an Indomitus 'Greyshield' themed army, with units from different first founding Chapters. But eventually I decided to make my own Chapter, eventually settling on their name - the Ashen Sentinels.

In terms of colour scheme, my inspiration is a bit random: I've been noticing a lot of new cars on the road that are grey, and each time I've seen one I've found myself thinking "Marines would look good painted that colour"   Here's a test miniature, my first attempts at how I wanted the tones and shading of the grey to look:

Since painting this tester marine I've decided to give them red helmets - something to give a bit of variation to the look, a bit of visual interest. 

The background of this army is being developed, but the broad strokes:

- they are descendants of Dorn - forged from Imperial Fists gene seed

- they were intended as reinforcements of a Chapter that was actually destroyed just as the Great Rift spread across the galaxy, when this was discovered it was decided they would be a new chapter

- they are based at the edge of the Segmentum Pacificus, and have taken up the mantle of defending an area known as the Strontium Protectorate

For this army, there are kind of 3 parts that I'll work on:

- about 900 points for use in games of Boarding Actions 

- the 'main' army wil be 2k points, but I've got enough miniatures to take it to 3k

- 1k 'Phobos' themed force

First of these is the Boarding Patrol - I've started with Assault Intercessors. I'm painting this squad as a vow for Call to Arms:

But I'm currently batch painting these with another squad - here they are after two thinned coats of Dawnstone grey paint:

I will post more wip pics and background as this army comes together. In the meantime, thanks for looking!