The Ironhearts, an Ultima Founding Imperial Fists Successor

[Brother Captain Vakarian]

Hello all,

 

Longtime wargamer here who finally got into 40K for real with the 9e and Indomitus releases. I've always wanted to create my own Space Marine chapter (I dabbled with Blood Angels a bit back in 5e), so I finally took the opportunity to do so!

 

Meet the Ironhearts, an Imperial Fists successor and Ultima Founding chapter. By way of background, they're a crusading chapter that's currently assigned to Battle Fleet Secundus and are fighting around the Eye of Terror. I'm still working on their exact organization in the fleet, but my basic fluff so far is that the Captain of the Second Company, Captain Cyrus Vakarian, is the task force commander of a small task force split off from Battle Fleet Secundus and is currently conducting relief operations in support of other Imperial Forces around the Eye (primarily, my main gamin buddy's Raven Guard successor chapter).

 

We've started a narrative Crusade with several forces (we're each playing our own homebrew chapter and several Chaos forces, and I'm planning to add Necrons once the 'dex drops). I have to say, narrative play in 9e is the most fun I've had gaming in a long time.

 

Currently, I'm playing the Ironhearts as an Imperial Fist successor Master Artisans and Warded. I'm expecting that will change when the new 'dex drops soon, and I'll probably push them a bit more toward a melee focus because I've enjoyed playing up the Black Templar-esque nature of crusading Fists successors. In my chapter's narrative, they spent some time working alongside the Templars on crusade and have adopted some of the Templars' methods and tactics, leading to some divergence from standard Codex procedures. The clearest of these divergence points is that Assault Intercessors are so common in the Ironhearts that they're treated as Battleline, rather than Close Support.

 

My hobby plan is to build up the Second Company under Captain Vakarian, which will grow and change as our Crusade goes on, but I'm hoping to have a solid 100 Marines built and painted at some point. Their task force has some Tenth Company Vanguard units attached as well, because I want to play with all the toys at some point.

 

Here's Captain Vakarian, and more units to follow in additional posts.

 

Captain Cyrus Vakarian, Commander of the Ironhearts Second Company, Master of the Watch

Profile: Indomitus Captain

Relic: The Burning Blade

Warlord Traits: The Imperium's Sword and Indomitable

Crusade Upgrades: (so far) Artisan Bionics and Deadly Charge

 

Edited September 19, 2020 by Brother Captain Vakarian

[Brother Captain Vakarian]

I started working on some of the Dark Imperium units while waiting on Indomitus to arrive, so for units I'll start with the core of the Second Company. First, we have two units of Intercessors. Squad One is led by Sergeant Maxos Havillan and armed with bolt rifles.

 

 

Squad Two is led by Sergeant Fedraus Velmnar, and is also rocking standard bolt rifles.

 

 

Squad Seven is led by Sergeant Boreas Carnak, and they're kitted out as Inceptors, currently equipped with assault bolters, although I may swap to plasma at some point.

 

 

Squad Nine is led by Sergeant Arnult Haagen, rolling with standard plasma incinerators, although I may swap them to the assault version when the new 'dex drops provided they do go to 3 shots each.

 

[Brother Captain Vakarian]

Here we have the Second Company's two Lieutenants (or, as the Ironhearts call them after a bit of time out on Crusade, Brother-Adjutants).

 

The first (and senior) Brother-Adjutant is Nidus Paragund.

 

 

The second (and junior) is Brother-Adjutant Shoran Storn.

 

 

And a group shot of our intrepid LTs, who will (hopefully) make their Chapter proud and possibly see some tasty upgrades over the course of the campaign.

 

[Brother Captain Vakarian]

Finally (I'm done for today, I swear! lol), we have Squad Five, a squad of Assault Intercessors, led by Sergeant Antorus Vysach. Sergeant Vysach was previously seconded to the Deathwatch, and has returned to lead his battle-brothers in glorious melee combat with his Deathwatch thunder hammer. He's already slain a Death Guard Sorcerer in single combat, so that Deathwatch training and experience must be worth something!

 

[Bjorn Firewalker]

Good job on Captain Vakarian and his Company. As you stated Vakarian leads the 2nd Company, does this mean you'll add a Chapter Master to your army, or do you consider the unit a waste of points?

[Brother Captain Vakarian]

I haven't played with a chapter master yet, so I'm not sure, but my goal is to finish the Second Company and add a few reinforcements from other companies, the Tenth for sure and probably the Sixth also.

 

I'd like to make a chapter master, but I also have a though that Captain Vakarian may be destined to fulfill that role as his story grows.

 

Long story short, it will depend on where my Crusade goes and what the cost of a chapter master is in the new codex!

 

Edit: to say thank you for the compliment. Doh!

Edited September 19, 2020 by Brother Captain Vakarian

[jeremy1391]

Love the thunder hammer sergeant (I too did the same conversion lol). And am digging the look of your army!

[Brother Captain Vakarian]

I saw that and approved, it's a great fit on the Assault Intercessor body. And thank you!

[Ryltar Thamior]

Nice, crisp painting , and some decent illumination on weapons / thrusters. Well done. 

[Brother Captain Vakarian]

Thank you! My goal for this project has been to get models done efficiently, rather than taking forever to finish a single squad, so that’s much appreciated.

[The Pounder]

Yeah, they look great.

 

I’m a fan of the thruster burning effect as well as the sergeant with hammer.

[Brother Captain Vakarian]

Thank you, Jud! The Sergeant with hammer was a fun conversion, and the thrusters felt like they needed something to cover the flat area on the DI models.

 

After a long hiatus due to work and other personal things, I finally got back around to this project and finished up a squad of Bladeguard from Indomitus.

 

 

 

 

 

Now, the question is where to go next on the project! I'm trying to round my painted forces out to 50 PL for an ongoing Crusade my buddy and I are playing, so I want to stick to something that's in my Crusade roster and helpful to my overall list. I *think* that will be a unit of Incursors I've been wanting to fit in, but have been thinking about rounding out the Assault Intercessors to a 10-man, too, or maybe working up my Apothecary.

 

 

Edited December 12, 2020 by Brother Captain Vakarian

[Bjorn Firewalker]

Beautiful work on the Bladeguard models.

[Brother Captain Vakarian]

Thank you, Bjorn. They were a lot of fun, although they definitely slowed me down with all the white!

[Brother Captain Vakarian]

Hello again!  After a long hiatus brought on both by work (studying for the bar exam and beginning a new job) and by some other projects (Infinity, mainly), I've made some progress on the Ironhearts.  For a variety of life-based reasons, my main gaming buddy and I reset our ongoing crusade.  We are now focusing on the Warzone Charadon crusade and sticking to 9th edition forces because the crusade support is amazing and it's easier to build forces up knowing what the books already allow. 

 

So, the Ironhearts Second Company has redeployed to Warzone Charadon!  In doing so, Brother-Captain Vakarian's stike force gained some Tenth Company reconnaissance assets to provide some much-needed forward deployment and anti-materiel capabilities. 

 

And, based on the 9th edition Marines codex, I'm running the Ironhearts with Whirlwind of Rage and Warded (still Imperial Fist successors, of course!).  The idea is they've spent quite a long time in the Indomitus Crusade working alongside the Black Templars, so have picked up quite a lot of Templar fighting style.  This might also allow me to find some ways to bring in some of the new Templar releases effectively...

 

First up today, we have a squad of Incursors, led by Brother-Sergeant Dravyn Alvor.

 

 

 

And second, we have a squad of Eliminators with las-fusils for some extra punch to deal with the Death Guard that the Ironhearts will be seeing a lot of in Charadon, led by Brother-Sergeant Lordan Gerlach.

 

 

 

 

I'm particularly happy with the Eliminators - the camo cloaks kind of just came together brilliantly and the line work on the las-fusils is some of the best I've done in a while.  I did have to slow down a bit more than I wanted on them but it was worth the extra time.  Next, I will be heading back to the Second Company proper and working on the company's apothecary,  then perhaps additional Bladeguard reinforcements for Brother-Captain Vakarian's command squad or maybe some Inceptors with plasma. 

Edited September 26, 2021 by Brother Captain Vakarian

[Bjorn Firewalker]

Good job on the new models.

[Brother Captain Vakarian]

Many thanks Bjorn!

[Smoke Frog]

Great looking army! I like the color scheme, and how those phobos marines turned out!

 

Also great job with the camo on those infiltrator cloaks

[Brother Captain Vakarian]

Thank you!! Working up the geometric scheme for the camo was surprisingly fun.

[XeonDragon]

They look awesome, well done!

[Brother Captain Vakarian]

Thank you, XeonDragon!

[Spectral Bob]

Your models are well painted. I really like how your eliminators turned out.

 

Not to throw cold water on them however, your chapter looks like a near exact copy of the Ultramarines successor, Avenging Sons...

[Brother Captain Vakarian]

Your models are well painted. I really like how your eliminators turned out.

 

Not to throw cold water on them however, your chapter looks like a near exact copy of the Ultramarines successor, Avenging Sons...

Thank you!!

 

And funny that, the Administratum would never make such a mistake…

[Brother Captain Vakarian]

It's been a while again, but I've been busy and have some updates to the Ironhearts!  In their first outing against Death Guard using the DG 9e codex, they got wiped out to a man sadly... -1D is rough when your game plan revolves around a lot of D2 in Bladeguard and Hellblasters.  And of course my opponent shot the Eliminators off the board first.  So, I made a hard pivot in plans for my crusade roster's expansion, built up some Eradicators, and promptly got to painting.  Arriving as reinforcements to Brother-Captain Vakarian's battered forces, we have Squad 10, led by Brother-Sergeant Maxim Tassius. 

 

 

 

And, to round out the Bladeguard, we have three more veterans reinforcing Brother-Captain Vakarian's command squad, so his forces will have a better shot of hanging on in those center-of-the-board fights. 

 

 

 

Next reinforcements will (probably) be that Apothecary I keep talking about, to add a little more resilience. 

 

As always, thanks for looking, and happy holidays everyone. 

[strongbow]

I like these! Very clean, especially like the camo cloaks.