Help Converting From Regular Marines to Wolves

[Blank Dave]

For starters, I'm not 100% sold on going Wolves, simply because the IWND of the Hands keeps popping up as an appetizing concept. So before I dive in, I have some questions...

 

Can Wolves function as a defensive/reactive army, or are they best suited to a more aggressive playstyle?

 

Now my marines date all the way back to Rogue Trader, then to 3rd ed, and now 6th....So yeah, there's some gaps in there. So, I'm hoping for some suggestions for a shopping list to make them more in line with the current situation.

 

What I have....

About 5-6 Librarians

3 Chaplains

1 Techmarine

6 Tactical squads, with magentized special weapons, and a ML

2 Assault Squads, 1 of which has magnetized jumppacks, both with 2 PPs

2 Devisator Squads, with just about 2 of each weapons choice per squad.

3-6 bikers, some with magnetized special weapons

2 attack bikes, with magentized weapons

2-3 dreadnaughts, in various stages of assembly

3 speeders, one of each varient

2 Raiders (1 standard, 1 crusader)

1-2 razorbacks

1 Whirlwind

2 Preds

About 6 Rhinos.

 

Then of newer stuff

1 box of Ferisian Wolves,

1 Thunderwolf Cav

1 Sternguard

1 Marine Commander

 

Also kicking around I believe I have an old Blood Claw box, a chaplain on a bike, probably enough parts for another squad. And I think I was screwing around making scouts out of catachans and marine chests....

 

Oh, I should add, those are 10 man squads each.

 

So, I'm thinking I might need 1 or 2 more boxes to round out my infantry portion of my army,, to make wolf guard leaders, replace the MLs with special weapns, swap out some of my 'questionable' figures, and finally for wolfy parts.

 

Any other suggestions as to what I might 'need', besides a smack in the head, and black paint to make them Hands instead? :p

 

Though a link on how to make razorback turrets would be cool too. :D

 

Thanks,

Dave

[skeletoro]

Wolves, in some ways, are very 'reactive'. Counterattack means you want to get your grey hunters right into their face, but not necessarily charge into melee yourself. If you get charged, you can take it like a boss. Not exactly defensive though, per se.

 

In terms of conversions... to what extent can you disassemble your marines? Vanilla bits mix easily with space wolf pack bits. At a 1:1 ratio the models still look very clearly space wolves. Also, aiming to use as many viking style heads rather than normal bald marine heads as possible should help, even if you leave the power armour relatively unembellished.

[Leif Bearclaw]

You've referred to Iron Hands as Fists at the start of your post btw.

 

I've always found Wolves are a reactive/jack of all trades army at their best. Marines can do this too, but they also get the shiny stuff to specialise. We don't get the same high end shooting/assault toys as many other armies, but our basic troops are solid and capable of making the opposition fight the fight they aren't specialised for. Which is how many of my games have been won, get into the faces of IG, give Nids open space they need to cross under your guns etc.

 

Conversion wise, have to agree with skeletoro, hairy heads and grey armour would do most of the work, then add some company symbols of the shoulder pads and you're fine.

 

As for overhauling your collection, personally I favour the wolf guard pack leaders, so I don't have the 10 men for the second special, but running 10 hunters with 2 specials is a very popular configuration. Otherwise you essentially have 3 choices, vehicle heavy, drop pod heavy or footslogging (there's a thread about the latter on the forum atm, cliff notes: probably not the best idea currently). Vindicators are always a good idea if you're going to take vehicles (this is a good idea regardless of Wolves or Hands). More Land Speeders would be a good shout as well, especially typhoons. If you want to shy away from tanks (although going drop pod does make you something of an 'all out offence' army) then Terminators are useful to give your army a bit more durability/firepower/intimidation value, depending on how you equip and deploy them.