+ inload: Big guns never tire +

+ Imperial Guard field guns +

I've been saying we need fire support – you think the supplies have arrived?

+ Ka-boom! What do you call a tank without a hull or tracks or a turret? Well, a wreck, probably, but it appears that this is how I've decided to start an inload on big field guns, so let's make our peace with it and move on. +

+ The Field Ordnance Battery, or FOB (which gives pleasing onomatopoeic imagery) is a new addition to the Imperial Guard Codex, and finally allows Guard players to have field guns, something they haven't really had since 2nd edition. +

+ Field guns are not something that I've ever really felt the absence of in 40k – but now they're here, they seem an obvious missing piece for the Guard. For me, they look like a good balance between a centrepiece-size unit (like a tank) with the character of infantry. Little mini-dioramas – very cool. + 

+ I'm hoping for the big Cadia Stands boxed set for Sanguinalia, but bought these second-hand – partly because they were a bit of a bargain, and partly because I wanted to see how the new figures compare in scale. +

+ As noted elsewhere, I've collected a few Lamb's World armies over the years, and ended up settling on using the Elysian models as a basis because they were much better-proportioned than the old Cadian plastics. Combining them with the Cadian upgrade sets from Forgeworld (to differentiate them from the Elysians) made them eye-wateringly expensive, so I'm delighted to see that the new Guard models are much more reasonably sized, as you can see in the comparison image above, and will fit in largely unaltered. +

+ I've built this gun completely stock, and visually, I think they'll fit in to my Lamb's World force without any modifications. I will, however, likely chop and change a few bits and bobs to help integrate things – and I'm likely to include parts of the new Cadians (particularly the awesome heads) in any future Elysian-based Lamb's Worlders I make. +

+++

+ Field Ordnance Battery mini-review +

+ The kit comes on three sprues (two of the one on the left, one of the one on the right), and builds two guns with three crew members each. It seems quite well future-proofed, as all the Regiment-specific crew are on one sprue. If GW are canny enough to expand regiments like the Death Korps or Catachan Jungle Fighters, I hope we see crew sprues for them, too. +

+ The gun itself goes together very nicely, and there are some clever touches to make it sturdier than I feared, including a two-part winding handle(?) at the back, to which the sitting crewman attaches. This is a neat way to make this potentially fragile part a bit sturdier. +

+ There are a few options in the kit. Most obviously there are three different guns: what looks like a lascannon, the 'standard' big gun I've used above, and a multiple missile launcher. Now, I like werfing nebels as much as the next man, so I suspect I'll probably try building one of the other options when I tackle the next gun. +

+ The crew are the star of the show for me, and I love the new look Cadians. A huge improvement over the older models. There's lots of options here, and some very characterful parts like the fingers tapping the side of the helm/cap, presumably to listen in to some vox note. The kit looks like it's had a lot of thought put into it. There are some cool little touches like rank stripes on some of the right arms, two options for the manned winding handles (so not every gun will have an identical sitting crew member) plus an ungripped version, so you can have your crew standing away from the breech, should you wish. There's also a very welcome surplus of heads – there's something like a dozen, which means you'll be unlikely to have identikit guns. +

+ It's not all glitter; there are some less than ideal joining points – it would have been nice to have gun barrels that don't have a great big seam running down the most obvious point, for example – and the crew members' legs are awkward to put together. These are fairly minor problems, and I certainly don't think they should stop you from picking up a set if you're in the Guard. +

+++

+ Lamb's World reorg and resupply +

+ Painting continues on the Lamb's World infantry, too, with four of them complete save for basing and orange shoulder stripes. The remainder of the first squad are ticking along too, as you can see below:

+ It's been a real treat to return to the painting this scheme, and although I'm a bit rusty on the details, I think it's close enough to the originals for these to fit in alongside them without sticking out too much. +

+ As usual, most of the fun comes in for the last minutes, as I work on the faces and details. Random chance – or happy accidents – mean that a slight twitch in brushstroke or variety in tone can give a different character to a model's face, even if the underlying sculpt is the same. The model immediately below, for example, ended up looking curiously worried to me, so he ended up with a bit of lasgun graffiti. I used an off-white for this, so it doesn't stand out too much. +

+ On this grenade-lobbing, autogun-toting, helmet-spurning model, I had to add a little dollop of greenstuff to help the Van Saar head his on the Elysian neck. Rather than trying to hide the join, I sculpted a little neckscarf. Little flashes like this add some humanity to the army, I think.

+ Being a Guard fan, I've been keeping an ear open about the new Codex, and it's sounding like the army's not going to need too much reorganisation. The main change that affects me is the removal of Special Weapon squads. I've got two of those – one with meltas and one with Sniper Rifles. From the sounds of things, however, there are options for infantry squads to take two special weapons, so it may simply be a case of spreading things round (since I didn't take heavy weapons in squads anyway). Another option is for some of the special weapons to go into command squads. +

+ I'm quite excited about the command squad approach, as from the sounds of things they're going to get some fun upgrade options, including ogryns. It'd be nice to add a couple of bodyguards here and there to boost my ogryn numbers.