45th Terran Commandos

[Marshall Bretton]

With the reveal of the new tempestus aquillons I have been inspired to finally put my own Scion regiment up here. I will post the background of my regiment here and add some model pictures later on.

 

The history of the Terran commando regiments is ancient with their earliest fragmentary records dating back to before old night. During the wars of Terran unification the commando regiments served the monarchs of albia as elite shock troops, gaining a fearsome reputation among the techno barbarian warlords. After Albia was brought under the rule of the Emperor through a relatively peaceful transition, the imperial commanders recognised the value of the commando regiments and integrated them into the imperial military as shock troops.

 

Now outfitted with the latest imperial equipment, the commandos immediately showed their worth, not only as specialist shock infantry, but also as special forces operatives, able to deploy behind enemy lines to neutralise high value targets in preparation for assault by other forces. Many campaigns were won by a commando team neutralising a key commander, annihilating enemy logistics nodes or other vital tasks ahead of the advance by the rest of the imperial forces.

 

After the unification was completed the great crusade to unite the scattered world's of man was declared, the commando regiments were placed at the forefront of the campaign and most crusade fleets had an element of the commandos attached. During this time they built on their reputation as special forces operatives but also developed a prowess with ship boarding actions and orbital assault. So much so that crusade fleets would often request support from commando units when Astartes support was not available.

 

The best known of the commando units at this time was the 45th regiment who were attached to the personal crusade forces of the emperor, winning many battle honours at his side. When the emperor withdrew to terra, the 45th went with him to guard the walls of terra and as such were relatively untouched by what was to follow.

 

Because of their exceptional reputation, when the time of the heresy came most crusade fleets had commandos attached. Given the absolute loyalty the regiments showed to the emperor, the heretic forces disregarded attempts to turn the commandos to their cause and as a result almost half of their total strength was wiped out in the opening stages of the campaign, although to their credit it was no easy task for the forces of the warmaster and the commandos exacted a heavy toll for their lives in heretic blood.

 

Over the long years of the campaign, the commandos units fought hard in the name of the emperor wherever they could. With the supply of reinforcements from terra cut off, many of them were reduced to a small handful of troops, however these small forces were the very best and used their expertise as special forces to cause chaos in the rear lines of the traitors.

 

As the long war ground on, the heretics gradually fought closer to terra, eventually reaching beta Garmon. At this point the 45th regiment, having been refused permission to leave terra and participate in the war, petitioned lord Dorn himself to let them leave the throne world to defend beta Garmon which he finally relented to. There they joined the great muster and prepared for their hardest battle yet. As the only full strength commando unit remaining, the 45th took operational command of all the commandos who had managed to muster there, a sizeable force, but paltry compared to the masses of Astartes and titans that would soon clash on the world.

 

Understanding that as skilled as they were, the contribution they could make in a war of god engines and demi gods was limited, the commandos used their specialist skills to create unique tactics to increase the impact they could have on the war. Most notably they developed the titan drop manoeuvre, a highly risky tactic which involved dropping from high altitude using grav chutes onto unengaged enemy titans. The hope was that the small auspex profile of individual drop troops would go unnoticed, allowing the troops to land on the titans before their void shields could be activated and then destroy them from onboard. Grav drops are challenging enough without aiming for a relatively tiny moving target and many commandos were lost without managing to engage the enemy, but many more succeeded and a significant number of heretic titans were destroyed in this way including the traitor emperor class titan hand of ruin, although the resulting reactor detonation killed all remaining members of the 22nd commando regiment.

 

At the close of this campaign barely 20% of the commando forces were able to retreat back to terra and their contribution to the rest of the war would be highly limited.

 

After the heresy was defeated and the emperor interred on the golden throne, Lord Guilliman reorganised the imperial military and part of that was the creation of the ordo tempestus. There was no debate about the commando forces being included in this elite organisation and they were immediately redesignated as militarum tempestus scions. Due to their origins as a Terran based force, the commandos retain the exclusive right to recruit from the schola progenium on terra itself and to train their new commandos in the wastelands of terra and Luna.

 

The commandos have continued to serve with honour for 10,000 years and the 45th regiment has been at the forefront for that time, winning battle honours across the galaxy.

 

Each commando regiment is made up of a number of line companies specialising in larger scale deployments, as well as a single special operations company made up of the most elite commandos. In the 45th Terran commandos this is Alpha Company and is currently under the command of Major Charles Newman.

Edited August 20 by Marshall Bretton

[Marshall Bretton]

As promised here are some pics of my commandos as they are so far:

 

My whole force:

 

 

 

Major Newman, my OC (tempestor prime)

 

 

 

I originally started using tempestus scions but when the kasrkin were released I started to use them as the base for my troops.

 

 

Alpha team, my kasrkin kill team/Scion squad:

 

 

 

 

Sterling assault suits (counts as ogryn bodyguards):

 

 

 

Mortars:

 

 

 

 

Lascannons:

 

 

 

Snipers (sadly no longer an option):

 

 

 

I'm not the best at taking pictures but hopefully they show enough detail.

Edited August 22 by Marshall Bretton

[Harrowmaster]

What did you use for the assault suits?

[Marshall Bretton]

 

What did you use for the assault suits?

 

Space marine centurions, had to trim some of the armour panels and fill a few gaps with green stuff.

 

The heads are kasrkin, weapons are from a taurox and the pouches are just an assorted collection

[Harrowmaster]

Very cool, great mix of parts. Army looks great.

[Marshall Bretton]

Finished the first of my aquillons, I'm very torn now between which kit I want to use as the base for my army. I suppose the kasrkin do come with more weapon diversity in the actual box but both are extremely cool models.

 

 

Edited October 13 by Marshall Bretton