How to start this game?

[LameBeard]

Thanks again everyone, it's arrived!

Take my word for it that I am hanging on every word you wrote above, and still welcome other frater to add their thoughts. I thought what I'd do to save a super-long post is choose one topic to build on from each post above, rather than reply to every single point.

Welcome, Princeps!

1) Yes, terrain is fairly important, but you can make almost unlimited amounts of it with one sheet one "pink board" insulation from your local home improvement store. No need to buy the expensive stuff.

Terrain: Dropzone Commander looks like a great start, but I also like to make my own. I realise a city-fight will look cool, but what do people think about 'natural' terrain features like hills, forests, maybe mesa formations. Do titans ever go out in the countryside? I guess without walls you get a large footprint relative to the height, which might not be so good for the game. What's more important, LOS blocking or movement blocking? Are there rivers or canals at all?

Rulebook and precept is a great way to start,but bite the non-bullet and get the starter kit too.
You'll be able to actually have a selection of units and you'll get most of the peripherals, which is important because unfortunately you kind of need the reactor and d10 dice, as well as the templates.

I'd really consider not selling the warbringer. The aesthetics aren't for everyone, but it's very good and also adds variety. It kind of depends on weapons and skill, but a single warlord would get hosed by the reaver+hounds; warlord+reaver vs. Bringer+hounds might work pretty nice.

Game balance and the Warbringer: really interesting to see the different views here about relative strength of the Warlord vs Warhounds. From the little I've read, I guess that is partly mission and terrain specific? But since I know I will never have the enthusiasm to paint it, I have to let the Warbringer go - let him go to someone who will love him. Maybe down the road we might branch into knights for variety (my son seems keen but I know even less about knight houses than I do about titan legions).

If you want to be strictly fluff-accurate, Tempestus split. Most of the Legio turned traitor, but the element that was stationed on Mars remained loyal (and was wiped out in the Martian civil war). There's some nice detail on this in the novel Mechanicum. And there'll no doubt be more detail in the Traitor Legios book, whenever we get that.

As for which Legio you should go for... that's kinda impossible to answer! It depends a lot on what you like in terms of paint scheme, background and playstyle. Presumably you'd prefer a loyalist Legio to face off against Traitorous Tempestus, but GW have been at pains to point out that even avowedly traitorous Legios such as Mortis had loyalist elements, so you've got free reign really. And you can always come up with your own.

Which Legion: OK so my priorities for legion choice are:

1) Cool colour scheme which contrasts with Tempestus, and contrasts with basing choice. (My son hated the idea of me painting mine Tempestus, he wants to be unique!)

2) Fluff. I don't mind traitor/loyalist, but would be interested if there were any Tempestus "arch rivals". Who wiped them out on Mars? But I am also happy to bend things and create my own legion or my own 'take' on an existing legion.

3) Playstyle. I won't be playing competitively, so once I get supplements, if I hate the rules, I'm sure my opponents will be kind and let me proxy another.

So here's the shortlist (based purely on me looking at pictures so far):

• Legio Defensor could be a good contrast against a Mars base, and still different enough from Tempestus.
• Alternatively, Legion Honorum would be a good contrast against Tempestus, but a clash with the base. I'd need to go urban rubble, or maybe snow (I've never done snow before).
• Green could be a good colour also - maybe Krytos, or is there a green loyalist legion? Something a bit brighter? Might be the way I make my own legion.
• Finally, I am old enough to remember 1st edition Adeptus Titanicus in White Dwarf, even if I never played it, so there is a little bit of me really wants to go Fureans or Infernus and just hit the flames like a Heavy Metal t-shirt (and a little bit of me thinks I should have grown out of that).
• I also liked Osedax and Praesagius, but they seem too similar to Tempestus.

2) Can I busk it without the special dice and templates?

2. Weeell... I know you said you didn't want to be told you'd bought the wrong thing, but if you'd bought the starter set you'd have these. The good news is you can probably get them off ebay for fairly reasonable amounts, from someone who bought the starter set for just the models. Or you could just buy the starter set because it's incredible value. The good news is that the stuff you've bought is excellent value, so you haven't made a mistake exactly. Put what you get for the Warmaster towards a starter set.

Getting the starter kit: ok, ok, I should get the starter kit. I think this could still work out for me though. For now, we build the Warlord (will take a long time for us) and learn the rules. Then down the road we buy the starter kit. What I'd like to do is convince a friend to split it. They could have the rulebook, maybe we get a good share of the extras, and then we'd have a Warlord+2 reavers+3 warhounds+1 knight between the two of us. Opens up some options without breaking the bank?

2. You could probably get round not having the dice, but you'll need some charts to convert the options for the reactor and location dice. You could use a spinner for the scatter I suppose? But honestly, the starter box is the boy here. The value is really, really good. (You almost get the rules, most of the Warhounds and the Knights for free compared to the cost of two new Reavers.)

Anywho, if you're UK based, drop me a PM and you can have a set of dice for the postage. I have three sets thanks to circumstances, and your need is greater than mine,you will probably need some damage counters too I imagine of you don't have the assets frame?

Also, thinking about it, I bet you don't even have the arc templates?

Dice and peripherals: so I have D10s, and I probably have a scatter die somewhere, because we've been using them in 40k since 2nd edition? Otherwise I could just go with D12 clockface like in the good-old 1st edition days. I was thinking of making tokens for the order dice, and my son seems to like the idea of marking the fire arc on the base, so with charts I can probably make a start.

Thanks for the offer - full disclosure: I am trying to keep spending down, not because I can't afford it, but because I want my son to learn the value of money, and not think with a bit of whining I'm just going to fork out for everything, and also be fair to his brother who, to quote, thinks Warhammer is "boring and rubbish" and so far, doesn't have any expensive hobbies. I'm making my son pay me for the Warlord for a start. Also, sometimes I think it's more fun to rely on your own resourcefulness and improvise, but needless to say my son already wants "the proper dice". So as you can see above, I'm not a very needy case, and will probably get them in due course, but if your offer stays open, it sounds very generous, and I'll find a way to pay it forward.

Wrapping up: this post is already too long, but thanks again to everyone, and I will reply to the special post on building as we get building. But yes, I have at least a few N52 5mm magnets ready to go.

[SkimaskMohawk]

I mostly play on boards with a lot of natural formations. You do want to mix in some man made structures, since humans tend to exploit everything they can and the resources/urban centers are usually the target of fighting.

 

[image]https://images.dakkadakka.com/gallery/2021/3/19/1099456-.JPG[/image]

[1ncarnadine]

If you want to be strictly fluff-accurate, Tempestus split. Most of the Legio turned traitor, but the element that was stationed on Mars remained loyal (and was wiped out in the Martian civil war). There's some nice detail on this in the novel Mechanicum. And there'll no doubt be more detail in the Traitor Legios book, whenever we get that.

 

As for which Legio you should go for... that's kinda impossible to answer! It depends a lot on what you like in terms of paint scheme, background and playstyle. Presumably you'd prefer a loyalist Legio to face off against Traitorous Tempestus, but GW have been at pains to point out that even avowedly traitorous Legios such as Mortis had loyalist elements, so you've got free reign really. And you can always come up with your own.

Which Legion: OK so my priorities for legion choice are:

1) Cool colour scheme which contrasts with Tempestus, and contrasts with basing choice. (My son hated the idea of me painting mine Tempestus, he wants to be unique!)

2) Fluff. I don't mind traitor/loyalist, but would be interested if there were any Tempestus "arch rivals". Who wiped them out on Mars? But I am also happy to bend things and create my own legion or my own 'take' on an existing legion.

3) Playstyle. I won't be playing competitively, so once I get supplements, if I hate the rules, I'm sure my opponents will be kind and let me proxy another.

 

So here's the shortlist (based purely on me looking at pictures so far):

• Legio Defensor could be a good contrast against a Mars base, and still different enough from Tempestus.
• Alternatively, Legion Honorum would be a good contrast against Tempestus, but a clash with the base. I'd need to go urban rubble, or maybe snow (I've never done snow before).
• Green could be a good colour also - maybe Krytos, or is there a green loyalist legion? Something a bit brighter? Might be the way I make my own legion.
• Finally, I am old enough to remember 1st edition Adeptus Titanicus in White Dwarf, even if I never played it, so there is a little bit of me really wants to go Fureans or Infernus and just hit the flames like a Heavy Metal t-shirt (and a little bit of me thinks I should have grown out of that).
• I also liked Osedax and Praesagius, but they seem too similar to Tempestus.

If you're looking to run a Loyalist against Traitor Tempestus, I'd highly recommend Ignatum. To start with, it's a strong, relatively straight-forward rule set. They're both members of the original Triad Ferrum Morgulus, the first 3 Titan Legions of Mars, and Ignatum super hates Mortis and the elements of Tempestus that betrayed them. It's also some decent Red vs Blue on the table. Very different schemes. They are red, but have a blue-black/gunmetal trim that may still work on a Martian base, depending.

 

Mortis engaged the Loyalist Tempestus on Mars and are also a good "red team" option, just on the other side of things. However, Mortis and Tempestus as Traitors are also sworn enemies/rivals. They're both slowly succumbing to the influence of two gods who hate each other.

 

I'll never miss a chance to rep Defensor. They're Word Bearers allies who missed the "Chaos is the new hotness" message and kept on preaching Lorgar's early take on the Emperor's divinity, and their home world is religiously controlled by what amount to giant Lite Brite displays on its moons. They're great. According to a recent poll on reddit's AT sub, they're one of the least commonly collected Titan Legions, too, which is a real shame.

 

If you do want a brighter green scheme, I might look at Legio Astraman. Very pretty emerald green.

[Sword Brother Adelard]

The offer was genuine. Because I keep buying people's barely used collections I've ended up with three sets of Titanicus dice, and a loyalist set. I also have spare arc templates, and once you have three, more is just superfluous. I'd happily send you the dice pack, arc templates and some damage marker cogs.

By the way, the problem with the AT scatter die in particular is that even the hit side scatters in some instances. So you need to draw an arrow on the hit face of your 40k scatter die to use it for AT. Fortunately, the symbols for orders are almost identical to the BFG ones if you still have those.

 

I get the value of money thing, and thanks to second hand purchases on Facebook, troll trader andy FLGS discount, I doubt I've bought anything at full retail price yet. The Precept is probably the best value going, and the Starter a close second.

[Nakuth]

If you do want a brighter green scheme, I might look at Legio Astraman. Very pretty emerald green.

I'll admit I'm also new to AT, but I just wanted to throw my vote behind Astraman.

 

They're also know as The Morning Stars (which is awesome!), and they have a mix of defensive traits/stratagems with a pricey but what I believe is really good offensive wargear.

[LameBeard]

I mostly play on boards with a lot of natural formations. You do want to mix in some man made structures, since humans tend to exploit everything they can and the resources/urban centers are usually the target of fighting.

What a fantastic table! And that is suitably grimdark, that some beautiful natural environment is being steadily devoured by the Imperium's industrial machine - maybe I might do a board inspired by that kind of idea, like in the Black Library novels where the forests of Caliban are nothing but fodder for the Imperium's expansion.

If you're looking to run a Loyalist against Traitor Tempestus, I'd highly recommend Ignatum. To start with, it's a strong, relatively straight-forward rule set. They're both members of the original Triad Ferrum Morgulus, the first 3 Titan Legions of Mars, and Ignatum super hates Mortis and the elements of Tempestus that betrayed them. It's also some decent Red vs Blue on the table. Very different schemes. They are red, but have a blue-black/gunmetal trim that may still work on a Martian base, depending.

Mortis engaged the Loyalist Tempestus on Mars and are also a good "red team" option, just on the other side of things. However, Mortis and Tempestus as Traitors are also sworn enemies/rivals. They're both slowly succumbing to the influence of two gods who hate each other.

I'll never miss a chance to rep Defensor. They're Word Bearers allies who missed the "Chaos is the new hotness" message and kept on preaching Lorgar's early take on the Emperor's divinity, and their home world is religiously controlled by what amount to giant Lite Brite displays on its moons. They're great. According to a recent poll on reddit's AT sub, they're one of the least commonly collected Titan Legions, too, which is a real shame.

If you do want a brighter green scheme, I might look at Legio Astraman. Very pretty emerald green.

Aargh! Still so difficult to choose. I love the idea of Mortis/Tempestus traitor rivalry boiling over into outright war. What's holding me back is they seem a very popular choice, and I've also painted black/red/white schemes before, so might want to try something new. Also, I like the look of the loyalist bling on the reaver and warhound sprues. So Defensor, Astraman (and Fureans) still in the mix. I need to decide soon (because see below)!

The offer was genuine. Because I keep buying people's barely used collections I've ended up with three sets of Titanicus dice, and a loyalist set. I also have spare arc templates, and once you have three, more is just superfluous. I'd happily send you the dice pack, arc templates and some damage marker cogs.

By the way, the problem with the AT scatter die in particular is that even the hit side scatters in some instances. So you need to draw an arrow on the hit face of your 40k scatter die to use it for AT. Fortunately, the symbols for orders are almost identical to the BFG ones if you still have those.

I get the value of money thing, and thanks to second hand purchases on Facebook, troll trader andy FLGS discount, I doubt I've bought anything at full retail price yet. The Precept is probably the best value going, and the Starter a close second.

I know it was genuine, just checking you don't mind helping a rich man trying to teach his kids to be careful with money, rather than a poor man who has to be careful with money. Thanks again. And I think those older dice had a tiny arrow hidden over the "I" of HIT? Need to check back of cupboard. BFG: sadly another one I didn't get into. Looking enviously at those ships, but I at least had the discipline to keep to 28mm back in the day (and I was poor then too).

If you do want a brighter green scheme, I might look at Legio Astraman. Very pretty emerald green.

I'll admit I'm also new to AT, but I just wanted to throw my vote behind Astraman.

They're also know as The Morning Stars (which is awesome!), and they have a mix of defensive traits/stratagems with a pricey but what I believe is really good offensive wargear.

If they are the Morning Stars then I think that means they have "orginal' Adeptus Titanicus pedigree - that is absolutely worth bonus points. They are still in the mix. Not sure about the blue stripe, but the green is gorgeous. Do you think metallic green would work?

@Mandragola - sorry I haven't got to all your great tips yet. Events have overtaken me. This is one of the great things about kids and warhammer. I'd be agonising over which YouTube tutorial to watch first. Hell I took a week to fit a pair of space marine arms I wasn't sure about. Yet despite my warnings and pleadings my son has said "it's fine dad, I'll follow the instructions, I'll be careful, I just want to get on." Here's where he'd got to by the time I saw it. Can you tell what went wrong? Answers in the spoiler.

The feet are 45 degrees away from where they should be, making the toe-to-shin-noggins impossible to fit, making the shin plate impossible too. It had been drying most of the afternoon, but thanks to a different thread on this forum, and the loan of his mum's hairdryer, we blasted it with heat and twisted it. We think we have saved it. I am keeping fingers crossed that we don't have too much lean and a suitable distance between feet, it's difficult to visualise without the plates on.

The Warlord took the 5mm magnet like it was made for it - no drilling at all. But the warhound looks more involved. Should I magnetise warhound weapons? Or make a commitment? I like the look of all of them, maybe plasma and the twin-lazers best.

Thanks everyone for letting me take over this thread - keep the advice coming (or your votes for legions).

Edited April 24, 2021 by LameBeard

[Gattopardo]

I would definitely advise magnetising the Warhound's guns. Plasma and vulcan mega bolters is pretty clearly the best all round option for hounds, so if you're going to glue them I'd go for that loadout. But really it's best to magnetise. There are times when you won't want plasma / VMB, and it's also possible that points and weapons might be adjusted in future, not to mention new weapons being released. So magnetising is the way to go. It's not as easy to do with the Warhound (or the Reaver's arms) but it's still not that hard really. Also definitely magnetise the Reaver's arms, as there are a lot of different loadouts for the Reaver that you'll want to experiment with.

[Mendi Warrior]

Welcome here!

With regards to choice of legio, you could go for one that split loyalist - traitor and use flags with magnets to differentiate between them. But that might not answer your son's wish for a different paint scheme between the two forces.

Here's where he'd got to by the time I saw it. Can you tell what went wrong? Answers in the spoiler.

The feet are 45 degrees away from where they should be, making the toe-to-shin-noggins impossible to fit, making the shin plate impossible too. It had been drying most of the afternoon, but thanks to a different thread on this forum, and the loan of his mum's hairdryer, we blasted it with heat and twisted it. We think we have saved it. I am keeping fingers crossed that we don't have too much lean and a suitable distance between feet, it's difficult to visualise without the plates on.

I'm afraid there is another problem showing on the pic, the top of the legs seem to be glued with their back at the front. It is a classical mistake. If you used super glue, a night in the freezer can help as it makes the bond less strong but you'll have to carefully apply brute force and do come cutting to fix it. Don't despair, it can be fixed but it is not easy. Best of luck!

For the feet, you can cut them at the ball join and pin them back quite easily. In fact, pinning the titans to their bases can be quite helpful.

My advice is always to dry fit, dry fit again, and again and again before actually glueing things together. Read the instructions but beware they are sometimes not super clear and there are also a couple of mistakes. Checking the 360

[LameBeard]

Welcome here!

 

I'm afraid there is another problem showing on the pic, the top of the legs seem to be glued with their back at the front. It is a classical mistake. If you used super glue, a night in the freezer can help as it makes the bond less strong but you'll have to carefully apply brute force and do come cutting to fix it. Don't despair, it can be fixed but it is not easy. Best of luck!

 

Eager to see your next steps.

Thanks for your help. I don’t blame my son here - I spent ages looking at the instructions before I could even work out what went wrong and how! As I understand it, the left and right thighs must have been swapped. So to fix it I’d have to prize open the hip joint and the knee joint. Hips fine, because they are balls, but knee with make a mess since it was polystyrene cement. So I could try the hairdryer again, but my instinct is to modify the thigh plates (pin them maybe) and patch the hole in the back of the thighs and move on. Or will this cause other problems? I’ll check out the logs later.

 

I also spotted he stuck the first toe/shin noggin upside down. Can probably fix that.

 

On the subject of Loyalist/Traitor swapping (Reaver and Warhound), does anyone ever magnetise an armour plate, so you could swap out, say an eagle for eye of Horus using the spare plate. Or is this just being silly - I’m so indecisive!

[Mendi Warrior]

Yes, that is basically it. The pistons that you see on the upper part of the legs should be on the back.

The first option would indeed be to prize open both the hips and knees' joints. Now that is easier said than done.

The way I would tackle this is to cut vertically the hips ball joints, two cuts in total, and to do it at the exact same spot on both left and right so as to avoid any need for filling gaps when swapping them. The Warlord being quite top heavy, I would probably pin them together. For the knees' joints I would carefully separate the upper and lower parts of the legs by cutting vertically along the cogged knee part, that is four cuts in total. I would then carefully move the lower part back and forth so as to slowly break the bond. This step would of course be highly dependent on how much polystyrene cement was used and where exactly it was applied. I did a quick schema in powerpoint, see here:

The other option would be, as you suggest, to modify the thigh plates and patch the hole on the back of the tighs. If you have blue stuff or something else you can use to make imprints of the back parts of the upper legs, that might be the easiest approach. Making an imprint would allow you to get the back similar to what it normally is (instead of having a flat area). The front is covered by armour plates, but not the back.

To fix the toe/shin noggin, it will be a bit more cutting I think.

In any case, it is possible to fix. And dry fit, dry fit again, and again and again before glueing (it is a mantra with AT stuff).

You can certainly use magnets for armour plates but I haven't seen anyone doing it. I am probably amongst those who have made the most use of magnets, I contemplated the possibility but never did it. I felt it would drive me too deep It might work well for some carapace armour plates made of a single piece (e.g. Reavers, Warhounds), but it is already more intricate for Warlords (they are made of 6 pieces and the ones you want to change have their edges covered by the others, so you would have to use magnets for all 6 parts).

The choice of a Legio is a hard choice to make, unless you already have some very specific things in mind (e.g. Legio Audax if you want aggressive Warhound packs and no larger titans).

So, in the end, several of us just buy more titans and start a new legio. The starter set as well as the battleforce box are great value for that.

[Sword Brother Adelard]

It would be a pain really. Doable on Reaver, but you don't get a dedicated traitor carapace on them, just a blank and a more overtly loyal version. So you may as well just go for the blank?

 

Warhound kits come with some variety, and that carapace would probably be the easiest to swap out.

 

Warlords would be more of a job. The plate with either the eye of Horus or the titanicus symbol is attached to the frame which holds the shoulder armour, and then the other panels are glued on top of the central one. So to swap the central one, you'd need to mag the whole lot.

 

Personally, considering that all of the symbols pre-date the heresy, with even loyal pre-heresy troops wearing the eye I think you can have all the styles in a Legio of either allegiance. Maybe they fought alongside the Warmaster before his fall and wore his eye as badge of honour, but refused to renounce their vows to the Emperor.

[Nakuth]

If they are the Morning Stars then I think that means they have "orginal' Adeptus Titanicus pedigree - that is absolutely worth bonus points. They are still in the mix. Not sure about the blue stripe, but the green is gorgeous. Do you think metallic green would work?

 

I'm not an expert painter, but a metallic green could work. I've also seen a slightly muted green, with an off-white & minimal blue stripes that looks really nice.

 

The Goonhammer focus on Astraman has a decent painting tutorial for this sort if scheme.

 

https://www.goonhammer.com/warlord-wednesdays-legion-focus-legio-astraman/

[Sherrypie]

Definitely use a variety of environs as you play, varied terrain is the third army and adds so much to any wargame.

 

Here are some examples from my games (click 'em bigger):

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited April 25, 2021 by Sherrypie

[LameBeard]

Yes, that is basically it. The pistons that you see on the upper part of the legs should be on the back.

The first option would indeed be to prize open both the hips and knees' joints. Now that is easier said than done.

The way I would tackle this is to cut vertically the hips ball joints, two cuts in total, and to do it at the exact same spot on both left and right so as to avoid any need for filling gaps when swapping them. The Warlord being quite top heavy, I would probably pin them together. For the knees' joints I would carefully separate the upper and lower parts of the legs by cutting vertically along the cogged knee part, that is four cuts in total. I would then carefully move the lower part back and forth so as to slowly break the bond. This step would of course be highly dependent on how much polystyrene cement was used and where exactly it was applied. I did a quick schema in powerpoint, see here:

The other option would be, as you suggest, to modify the thigh plates and patch the hole on the back of the tighs. If you have blue stuff or something else you can use to make imprints of the back parts of the upper legs, that might be the easiest approach. Making an imprint would allow you to get the back similar to what it normally is (instead of having a flat area). The front is covered by armour plates, but not the back.

To fix the toe/shin noggin, it will be a bit more cutting I think.

In any case, it is possible to fix. And dry fit, dry fit again, and again and again before glueing (it is a mantra with AT stuff).

Let me tell you about the saga! Thanks for the advice, I really appreciate the time you have taken with these diagrams - that gave me the confidence to try something. I really didn't think I could get knife or saw to make the cut without some force applied elsewhere that might not be good. So we tried the hairdryer again, and it (sort of) worked! I undid knees and hips, swapped the pelvis, swapped the thights round, only breaking an ankle and losing a bit of cog detail in the process. Here's the result. Again, can you spot the latest mistake? Difficult to see from this angle. Answers in spoiler.

In fixing that broken ankle I put the shin on backwards, the shin should sit slightly behind the cog knee, not in front. This proves that I am just as easily fooled by the instructions - even when you are trying to be careful, sometimes you just get "change blind" - like sitting at the traffic lights looking at them, and still not seeing they've gone green. My son noticed after about 40 minutes.

So after the hairdryer a third time, we fixed again, and have undercoated. Personally I wanted to shift the feet further apart and pin the hips like you advised, but we are at the stage where we are worried about doing more harm than good. I think we have pushed our luck already. Luckily we have both worked through the "we're really upset we wasted time and money" phase, and are out the other side, in the "anything we get out of this is a bonus" phase.

It would be a pain really. Doable on Reaver, but you don't get a dedicated traitor carapace on them, just a blank and a more overtly loyal version. So you may as well just go for the blank? Warhound kits come with some variety, and that carapace would probably be the easiest to swap out ...

... Personally, considering that all of the symbols pre-date the heresy, with even loyal pre-heresy troops wearing the eye I think you can have all the styles in a Legio of either allegiance. Maybe they fought alongside the Warmaster before his fall and wore his eye as badge of honour, but refused to renounce their vows to the Emperor.

Quite. In the rulebook there is a (presumbaly traitor?) Mortis Reaver with what I've called the "loyalist" carapace. They didn't go back to the dock and get the servitors blasting off eagles on day one of the heresy. This is my favourite carapace because it avoids the scary blank space that might otherwise need a fancy decal, masking for stripes or even (ominous music) freehand.

My crazy idea is to get over my indecision. Let's assume for the sake of argument I make a Warhound or Reaver mostly with (fixed) black and white plates, and then I have a couple magnetised (where duplicates exist in the frame): red "spiky" option for Mortis, white with green stripe "eagle/cross" option for Defensor. Change legion depending on your mood? Is this just self-indulgent and foolhardy?

I'm not an expert painter, but a metallic green could work. I've also seen a slightly muted green, with an off-white & minimal blue stripes that looks really nice.

The Goonhammer focus on Astraman has a decent painting tutorial for this sort if scheme.

https://www.goonhammer.com/warlord-wednesdays-legion-focus-legio-astraman/

Thank you!

Definitely use a variety of environs as you play, varied terrain is the third army and adds so much to any wargame.

Here are some examples from my games (click 'em bigger):

<snip>

What outstanding, beautiful tables. An inspiration.

Edited April 25, 2021 by LameBeard

[Mandragola]

Glad you were able to fix those Warlord legs. In future try to compare with completed models as you go. And really *really* pay attention to the instructions.

 

Unfortunately Astraman have offensively bad rules. Forgeworld occasionally comes out with absolute howlers and Astraman have fallen victim to this. Their main “ability” is to add two heat to their reactor (which is dreadful) to get a repair roll, but not move or shoot. The problem is that adding two heat means they’re probably worse off than they were before, and gave up their whole turn.

 

Defensor are pretty good. They do a massive alpha strike.

[Sword Brother Adelard]

Humourously, my approach to panels is the exact opposite. I live for the blank panels! I've got a Warlord to finish, (second hand purchase) which has the Titanicus plate which I would love to swap for blank. But they're all glued on the frame. I may try the hairdryer myself!

[Mendi Warrior]

Super glad you could fix the legs! Excellent salvage job 

 

Have a look at the various project logs here before going head on to build all the models, we have collectively experienced many of the problems you can be faced with and we came with solutions, so definitely a good idea to check. Also never hesitate asking for advice, we'll gladly answer.

 

Eager to see the next steps. Don't hesitate to set up a dedicated project log, especially if you plan it to be picture heavy.

[LameBeard]

Humourously, my approach to panels is the exact opposite. I live for the blank panels! I've got a Warlord to finish, (second hand purchase) which has the Titanicus plate which I would love to swap for blank. But they're all glued on the frame. I may try the hairdryer myself!

Well my son has used the Eye of Horus panels, so if you need those blank panels in the middle of the shoulder, I'm happy to send them to you.

 

Super glad you could fix the legs! Excellent salvage job 

 

Have a look at the various project logs here before going head on to build all the models, we have collectively experienced many of the problems you can be faced with and we came with solutions, so definitely a good idea to check. Also never hesitate asking for advice, we'll gladly answer.

 

Eager to see the next steps. Don't hesitate to set up a dedicated project log, especially if you plan it to be picture heavy.

Friends, thanks again. We have talked about the fluff, we have talked about colour schemes and rules, and we have talked about collecting and modelling - pretty much every aspect of the hobby.  The original post says "How to start this game?" and I think we have answered this pretty conclusively: "Not how LameBeard and son did."

 

But started we have! And so our continuing adventures do not belong in this thread. I have started a project log here: http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/topic/370073-lamebeard-and-son-start-adeptus-titanicus/?p=5692804

 

I'd really like you all to come over and say hello. Just put in a little post of advice or encouragement, anything really, which will put the thread in your 'content I follow'. I can't promise regular updates, but my son at least is making progress, so we shall see.

Edited April 27, 2021 by LameBeard

[Sword Brother Adelard]

I have some blanks, but thank you for the kind offer, the kit I bought came with them all. I'm just a bit nervous about trying to remove them when they have already been glued together, and into their support frame. I'll see how a hairdryer affects them before too much damage is done. I like blanks as they are much easier to mask than detailed panels, hence my preference. (I wish the Warmaster had scroll-less front panels for instance).

 

Good luck with your endeavours!