Krootox?

Today has seen some more rumours for the Tau codex. One of the supposed units is the Krootox Giant. Since I plan on using Demiurg for Tau, with some Kroot mercenaries, I like the idea of using the FW Knarlac in place of the Krootox Giant model.

Space dwarves and dinosaurs sound like fun to me.

A Krootox Giant?

I much prefer the idea of fielding this model.

Thursday wibbles

So my friend Fish came over this afternoon for a couple hours painting (his Imperial Guard and my marines) and we got to nattering about lots of 40K stuff. One thing I mentioned was the idea of picking a couple armies and working out a HQ and two troops for around 600pts, playing small games, and over time slowly add to each. Fish quite liked the idea and we are going to do something a long these lines but work to do really good painting jobs on them rather than the table quality we normally do. He is looking at doing a dark mechanicus army and I am finally going to get started on my squats, sorry... demiurg, that I've being meaning to do for ages. We are thinking meet up one or twice a month when he has an afternoon free.

It's a good idea I think and something I am looking forward to.

You can check out his gaming blog here.

New from Mantic is this cool model for their Forge Fathers line. I'm thinking possible battlesuit if I decide to go Tau with my space dwarves. Thoughts?

An update

Well, my Forge Fathers arrived from Mantic a couple weeks ago and I have to say that I love the models. There's no room for converting at least not easily but I don't mind. I've got ten of the twenty built and I finally build the White Dwarf promo mini as well, but so far lack of time and worse, a lack of desire has prevented me painting any of them. I think part of it is also that I desperately want to know whether Demiurg are in the new Tau book or not, and depending which rumours you follow the book may or may not be out in a few months. The lack of info has halted my desire to do anything with them.

I am also in the process of trying to get the flat rearranged so I have a dedicated games room again. Once I do then I think I'll be in a happier frame of mind to sit down and do some painting whether it be my Salamanders or my Squats.

Another reason for getting the games room done is because for a while now I have had the desire to build a fixed games table for 40K. I know some folks out there don't like the idea of a fixed table but it's something I want to do and do well. I was influenced by the following vid on youtube:

Rather than a factorum complex I want to do a burnt out city block. If you've seen photos of the ruins of Stalingrad during the second world war you'll have an idea of the look that I want to go for. It's going to take me some time to organise and arrange but hopefully once I can start I'll post details on here.

Squats!

Way back in the day when 1st edition (called Rogue Trader back then) came out the game was much more fantasy in space mixed with the feel of 2000AD (a British sci-fi comic from the 70's & 80's). While the game didn't have Chaos until a couple years later, it did come with space elves, space orcs, space ogres and space halflings. It also had space dwarves known as Squats who were allied to the Imperium.
The problem was that Squats never really got a good shot at the game. I still have the original 1st edition Squat army list and they were a sort of weird biker army with a few heavy weapons. Games Workshop were never happy with the take they had and somewhere during the reign of 2nd edition they made the move of having them devoured by the Tyranids. For all intents and purposes the Squat race was dead.

But then in the late 1990's GW made mention of a race allied to the Tau called Demiurg. While there was no pictures or descriptions of the race itself they did get a ship in the Battlefleet Gothic game. Then a few years later a piece of concept art made the rounds.

Looks like a space dwarf to me anyway. Now in the last years worth of rumours it has been repeated over and over again by many that the new Tau Empire codex for 2012 will allow Demiurg as a playable race. Take the appropriate HQ and it unlocks Demiurg as troops. It also sounds like there will be a special character and a heavy weapon team type of unit as well. Which basically gives me hope that it will be possible to play a full Squat, sorry, Demiurg army again.
However, there is also a rumour circulating that GW still doesn't want to bring back the space dwarf and Demiurg are being turned into little stone men-like aliens. I will not be happy if this is true. I want my Squats dagnamit! There are people out here in the real world who want to see the return of the Squats, so GW sort it out.

Anywho, the Squat army is in my blood at the moment and I'm looking around for potential miniatures to use assuming rumours are accurate, the GW ones look awful or Demiurg become stone people. So far I have bought myself the 2009 White Dwarf mail subscription miniature:

I love the mini and want to use this as my HQ. Actual Squat minis on EBay are going for stupid prices and I refuse to even look there. Instead I found a company called Mantic who have just released a sci-fi wargame called Warpath (written by Calvatore who wrote 40K 5th edition). So far the only armies released for it are Forge Fathers (space dwarves) and Maruaders (space orcs).  They are the same scale as 40K, plastic for the most part and a hell of a lot cheaper. So I have ordered myself a set of their standard soldiers:

Click to enlarge for a better look. So far they also have a heavy weapon team, a thudgun type tracked cannon, terminator army looking guys (though they don't look as good) and a special character. I really want the special character but I doubt I'll get an accurate weapon load out to represent him:

The only issue I have right now other then desperately wanting to know more about the Demiurg in the new codex is if not, what codex would I use for my Squat army?