The guide thingy said I should make my first post count, and since my little info page thing doesn't count, I figured I'd ask for some input/ideas on modeling my army. I know it sounds kinda lame for a first post but stick with me here there's more to this.

Now, there's something you have to know about my army, while it is a Tau army, I'm taking my left over imperial guard and unused models and making them... Tau-ie. For example I ninja'd all the spare pulse rifles and shoulder pads and put them on guard bodies, legs and heads so it looks like a guardsman wielding a pulse rifle.

I have some fluff behind my army about an outskirts imperial world that Tau have joined them, then generic threat is seen to be on the way, without enough (or any) fire cast on the planet the other casts work to gear up the local PDF ect ect. While ideas about the fluff are appreciated I need more help with the modeling. So I'm going to list what I'm doing for each tau thing and then... ya. I'd post pictures but my camera is hiding right now, as soon as I can track it down and catch it I'll start posting pictures.

Crisis suits (including commander): I take a sentinel, put it on a smaller base, then modify the sentinel weapons by kit bashing suit weapons into them. Ie, cutting the barrel off a las-cannon and putting a plasma rifle in it's place.

Stealth suits: I don't know if I'm even going to use any, but I might make some to round out the visuals, and my current idea is taking Catachan guardsmen and giving them burst cannons or fusion blasters.

Fire Warriors: Guardsmen with Pulse Rifles

Pathfinders: Guard snipers with modified sniper rifles that looks like pulse carbines, hard to explain, but they look awesome.

Tau Vehicles: I figure that even with little to no Fire Caste members there are plenty of Tau skimmers laying around that can be made into fishes and hammerheads so I'm not too worried about making guard vehicles into skimmers.

Broadsides: Again, taking sentinels (clearly this world had a lot of those >.> ) and putting rail guns in place of the standard weapon. To keep cost down (and to keep with the 'not quite standard') look I'm going with the enclosed rail guns that Paulson Game's sells... at least once he finishes rebuilding his molds.

If anyone has any further ideas about any of these, or new ways to make guard stuff look more Tau then please, tell me! Or else!

Also if I did anything wrong with my first post then... IT'S MY FIRST POST DON'T HURT ME! -cowers-

Come on out, we wont hurt you! * dangles a shrimp-tail in front of Arc-aroth as he hides in the corner*

This definitely sounds interesting.....
My suggestion to you is: Go on a camera-hunting expedition, find that little guy! A picture is worth a thousand words, and some pictures would really help us to see what you have done/want to do.....

EDIT:
Before you look at the links I found remember one thing - the SEARCH function is your friend! It took me about 3 minutes to find these.


Anyway, happy camera hunting !

- null

I totally agree with Null, pictures would really help to show us what direction your heading. And I really like the idea, I've always thought about doing some gue'vesa, sadly I lack the money and conversion abilities to do it.

Can't wait to see some pics

Some great ideas cooking! I too hope you find your camera soon; it gives us a little more to work with. Fio'Ui Null is correct to mention the Search function. You'd be amazed at what you can find!

You absolutely need to also look at Martial's 5th Vior’lan Auxiliary Contingent. He has some great Gue'vesa conversions and other cool Tau models.

My advice for building count as models is to look at the models stats, consider what a (in this case human) would need to match those stats (be it equipment or genetic modifications) and then build up from there!

Fluff is also important here as it can affect the look of your army. Are they a well equipped auxiliary force or are they a rag-tag group of fighters? I know you said they are local PDF who are doing their duty for the new Empire, but a little more detail can help give your army visual focus. Do they still worship the Emperor (Tau are religiously tolerant as long as they submit to the Ethereal's) or are they fully immersed in the Tau way of life? The former means that some Imperial iconography would be okay, but the later could mean that they have gotten rid of such things awhile ago or have bitterly rejected the Imperium and the Emperor (I'm thinking gouged out Aquila symbols to show defiance).

The choice is yours really, but thinking this stuff through really gets the old gears turning! I'm really looking forward to those pictures!

One thing you could think about doing if you're taking an ethereal is to keep the Firewarrior Honor Guard as Tau considering it would fit the fluff of your cadre. I saw somewhere that someone had used Gue'vesa as Vespids, don't remember who's cadre it is but it was quite interesting in the application.

That Vespid conversion was me! You can check them out here.

It was one of my first conversions, so it's not great. But I still like 'em!

Cadian body, grenade launcher with a Fusion Blaster canister on the front, pig iron head and the jet pack was a Fusion Blaster front with a Burst Cannon drum on the side and a Pulse Rifle front as the antenna. I never thought of it, but this is a lot of bitz!

Alright after hunting around for about an hour, i got my bird out and she managed to find my camera in about 30 seconds >.>. Well, without going into questions about whether or not I'm as smart as my half-pound bird (who still isn't potty trained btw) I'll get to the important 'substance' that shall make up my historic 4th post on ATT!

As far as fluff goes, the people of 'Nametobedetirmindaria' still worship the emperor about as much as the USA tends to go to church. Pretty much it's in lip service only. The planet hasn't fully made the transition to 'full on tau action' but they are headed that way. So while there will be Aquilas here and there, they won't be either scratched or prominently displayed. They just... are. I might make a squad of fire warriors for an ethereal and his pet human commander type (who counts as just another fire warrior) but I doubt I'll field him until when/if we get a new codex that makes ethereal better then simply bringing more broadsides.

Ok, on to the pictures -wild applause- Nothing is finished yet so... DON'T COMPLAIN ABOUT THEM BEIN UNFINISHED. Starting out normal, here's my hammerhead (don't look in the background we'll get to the fishes later!)


Next up are the two suicide fishes, so named because of my increasingly aggressive way I use them at least one is always rammed into something, and the other I tend to throw in front of a mob of orks so I can make use of the Flechettes.



Ok, now is the pathfinder fish, also tends to be used as flechette bait. Currently unprimed (as I need to green stuff some stuff) but you can still see the aerial and little guard commander poking his head out of it.



Alright now we move into crazy-ville so brace yourselves. Next couple pictures are of my sentinel-suit commander, with custom cyclic ion blaster counts-as, plasma rifle and a shield drone glued to the front (counts-as shield generator).



And his little buddy, the body guard w/ plasma, missile pod and shield dron- i mean generator



Here's my four pathfinders, I need another four but they are easy to mod so... bleh.



And finally the whole crew (there is no bird, you're seeing things)



Well that's that... and no amount of shrimp tails will make me come out of the corner!

Yes I some how did all of that from the corner....

Just like my hammerhead pwned that land-raider the other day from the corner...

CORNERS FTW!

You really are a nervous fella, aren't you?

I like the conversions! They look good and are really dynamic. I especially like the Sniper Rifle conversions; way cool! I think they make perfect Pathfinders. As for your paint scheme, I know you said it wasn't finished, so I look forward to the end result. In the meantime though, my only suggestion is highlighting as that will really make them pop.

Oh and I was thinking about your Sentinel conversions and I thought you would like this:




The conversion are simple and they really give it a nice Tau look. What do you think?

Oh and next time, no need to hide each image. It makes it a bit harder to look back and refer to the pictures to give you some critique.

Those are some nice conversions, I'm glad the pictures showed up so quickly. Speaking of pictures I should probably put my tau up too. I like how the color scheme is, I don't know about other people but I think it still has some Imperial Guard feel to it despite them having joined the tau empire, and again agreeing with a superior (Wolfs16) some highlighting would really make it pop. I really like the Sentinel conversions.

Fine! more shrimp-tails for me..... *Yay!*

I like! Your painting looks really nice and smooth (it would be great to get some pictures that are a bit more in focus though!)

As far as suggestions go, would you add some extra comm-gear to your other skimmers to make them look more like your pathfinder-fish? IMHO it makes them look much more like a Gue'vesa vehicle! Check out Shi'ur's skimmers for a bit of inspiration, his addition of extra antenna's really look slick!

I'll definitely be back to check this out!

- null

IMO, subtle is the way to go with this. Gue'vesa shouldn't just be human Fire Warriors, the Tau would probably instead use them in specialized roles to complement the standard Tau army. For example, a unit of Gue'vesa artillery, "Krieg" siege engineers, or "Elysian" harassing units behind enemy lines. In this case, the Gue'vesa would keep most of their Imperial-style equipment, as that equipment and training are what make them useful in the first place. Even the "worthless" lasguns would still have a purpose* (though probably with some Tau improvements to their firepower), as the near-unlimited ammo supply is potentially a very useful thing. The main thing I'd see them getting is some small equipment items: improved radios, EMP grenades, etc.



As for vehicles, I'm not a fan of the extreme conversions. Fluff-wise, I'd expect Gue'vesa vehicles to fall into two categories:


1) Standard Imperial vehicles with minor upgrades (radios, blacksun filters, etc) and Tau numbers/unit symbols/etc (possibly next to their human translation). For example, a Basilisk probably wouldn't see very many significant changes, maybe a hull-mounted burst cannon instead of the heavy bolter at most. The biggest changes would be internal stuff that isn't visible on the model: improved computers/software, guided shells, etc. For a real-world example look at a modern tank like the M1 Abrams: even though the basic design has seen 30 years of upgrades, from the outside it still looks almost exactly the same.

2) Tau vehicles with human crew and squad markings/etc. Why attempt to turn a Sentinel into a railgun platform when you can just give your Gue'vesa a Hammerhead?






*Ok, so maybe I'm just making excuses to deal with the fact that my Elysian and Krieg Gue'vesa can't be given pulse rifles without ruining the model.

A good way to get around that is to take the small battlesuit antannae and cut off the base/attachment point and the narrow "arm", then cut off the end of a lasgun and glue on said piece, then take a spare Carbine or Puls Rifle, cut off the scope and glue it to the former lasgun as well. Remove the aquila, and viola! Easy Gue'la Pulse Rifle conversion!

Very poor shots, but here's examples of what I did:

After fiddling with the camera, waving incense and reciting the litany of focus a couple times I made the camera start focusing properly so new pictures are uploading now. Haven't gotten much done, mostly been stalking paulson's website waiting for the railguns to go back on sale, and going around to other gaming stores lookin for Tau bits. Hopefully I'll have a bunch of new bits and bases so i can continue producing firewarriors. Alright, here's the new, better pictures.

Here's the hammerhead





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The Kamikaze fish.



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Both >.>



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The pathfinders (now with actual focus so you can see where I have yet to put greenstuff on the gun!)





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And finally the commander! (again!)







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With that done.... what else... -scrolls through the replies-

@Null I might add some more guard bits to my other fish, like a guard spotlight or something, I'll have to look through my left over chimera bitz. The story with the skimmers is that they tried to do like Peregrine said, change as little as possible, just enough that guardsmen can use them without excessive training. As for the sentinels, it's easier to duck-tape improved tau weapons to sentinels then do the massive changes to a crisis suit or broadside to accommodate a human body, not counting training them and all that for the new equipment.

@Wolfs16 Those sentinels look more like... sentinels modified for tau then modified with new weapons so the guard can use them. They look sweet though, almost want some of those as being followed around by an earth-cast with a game controller.

I actually did get an idea from the vespid. Mainly in that my suits need to look more 'jet-ie' (not my word) so I ninjia'd the idea for useing fusion blasters as thrusters and, well... hope you don't mind. Here's a picture of my one commander w/ fusion thruster. Only had one blaster to modify so... .this is it for now till i get more bits.



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Edit: oops, forgot to mention, I plan to put two of them on each suit, one fusion thruster on either side of the main engine block thingy. then as for the paint...I dunno but might do a bright yellow within the cracks to give the impression of heat or thrust or something. Keep the ideas comin pls =D

I love that sentinel conversion, would you mind if I tried something similar?

GRRRR

nah, just kiddin, go ahead, I haven't copyrighted it.... yet...

just use a different color scheme.

In other news I just got back from my LGS having gotten my butt kicked in fantasy (granted I was outnumbered nearly 2 to 1) but still. Anyways, I forgot to get the lighter green paint I needed for highlighting. I was also going to get a crisis suit box to pillage for parts but... forgot that too >.>

so... not going to be much new till i get those.

For any conversions using imperial models I would seriously consider snipping/sanding/filing off the rivets that dot imperial armor plates and equipment...
Since the tau do not use rivets, they would lack the necessary equipment and expertise to repair those components in the field, and might as well just replace them during the process of refurbishing the sentinels with tau equipment.

I have found that this goes a long way to making a piece "fit" with the tau visual style. (typhoon missile launchers in particular make excellent SMS systems sans-rivets and other surface details)

Depending on your sculpting skills I would also extend the front and side armor plates to meet at the corners, forming a single angle instead of the step. The sentinel exhausts also have heat exchangers with circular holes which could be sculpted over with tau heat exchanges that have horizontal fins. And in general, areas with exposed wiring or pipes could be removed or covered up.

@Kies'el Thanks for tip, I'll take my modeling clippers to my sentinels after this.

Anyways, update time! and the crowd goes wild!

I finally got the correct highlighting color yesterday and proceeded to highlight my hammerhead and most completed Kami-fish. Currently I only highlighted the green sections, once my brush dries (and I finish some chores) I'll do the red sections take new pictures and upload those over these ones.

Also, Paulson games is up again and i ordered my railguns, so my broadsides should get started here soon. I'm also going to a less then local game store (or LTLGS) to try and buy some bits from the gamers there. So if a non-regular gamer shows up to your store asking for tau bits feel free to call me Arc =p

Well, image shack is still uploading so... stand up time!

What did the fire warrior in the hospital for a broken arm say to his doctor?

"Can I get a new cast?" -baddum pish!-

ok, they're uploaded, so.... moving on.

They look a little weird in this light, but the highlighting job isn't that obvious as it is in the pictures >.>







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Update time!

My railguns from Paulson's games finally arrived, they needed a little touching up but no more then any GW model so I won't complain about that too much. Sadly I'm down to my last sentinel so I'll have to wait for more money before I pick up more so I can finish the broadside teams. Anyways, I put together a Sentinel-Side pretty quickly, but I think it turned out great and as soon as image shack finishes uploading I'll show you....

taking a while today...

-whistles-

ok, they're done, here we go.

Just the railguns moments after opening package:


Cockpit with railgun & SMS attached:




and the fully assembled Sentinel-Side, looks kinda funky on the smaller base but it's actually pretty stable once I got the balance right







Lemme try to get a close up on the conversions I did to the gun itself. I have a energy conduit leading from the sentinal to the gun itself, and even a magazine for the projectiles underneath the gun it needs some green stuff before I go to the painting part but I think it turned out pretty cool:



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Thoughts/Comments/ect?

Those guns look great! Really well placed on the model. It doesn't look like it was just slapped on there, but looks like it has been fully integrated into the chassis. Very well done! (You make me want to go out and buy a Sentinel kit now!)