I finally finished study for the year, which means that I now have time to do some painting and gaming. To kick things off, I attacked this Epic Scale World Eaters army I’ve been nursing for the past seven months.
A few years ago I was at a 40k tournament and noticed that there was an Epic Armageddon tournament also happening on the other side of the hall. Always intrigued by Epic Scale, I went and had a look. To my surprise, I noticed that fans were now producing their own miniatures, in spite of Games Workshop abandoning the system almost a decade ago. Since that point in time, I’ve been hooked. I have to say, these fan made miniatures are superb. If you look at the post just before this one, where I painted an Epic Armageddon Renegade Milita army, you’ll see what I mean. The fans that make these models appear to design them using CAD, then 3D print them out. The quality and attention to detail is truly astonishing. A real testament to the dedication and commitment that members of the gaming community have to the hobby.
So after much researching, I discovered there is a hardcore, dedicated community that still play using the Epic Armageddon rules set. To bring the system to modern standards, the community has created their own supplements to contemporarise the army offerings in Epic Scale that have since been made available in 28mm scale that were not around when GW abandoned the Epic format. These rules (not surprisingly) are balanced and comprehensive.
There are a few very positive aspects of this ‘garage’ version of Epic Armageddon when compared to its 28mm counterpart. The first is cost. The army that you see below, which is about 5,500pts worth (most 30k Epic scale games are 4,000pts) only cost me around $400AUD. (interestingly, 40k Epic Scale games are around 3,000pts) The other point is storage. If you’ve been following this blog for a while, you’ll know that I (used to) have a vast collection of armies, Titans and scenery. These armies and scenery are very difficult to store. A 5,500 point Epic army fits very comfortably into a shoe box. Finally, the actual game itself. This is a real tacticians game that is very interactive and dynamic. It’s not a strict “you go, then I’ll go” style of play such as that found in 28mm scale 40k. This means that rates of advance, synchronising the effects of supporting units (so called force multipliers), weapons ranges, weapon effects, terrain and close air support are all critical considerations (far beyond that of 28mm 40k). I’ve only had a handful of games, but I’ve thoroughly enjoyed each game, and learnt more and more each time. As well as deepening my appreciation of the subtleties and nuances of the gaming architecture of the system too.
If you’d like to download a copy of the core rulebook, it’s available here. You’ll also find there many of the army lists for the various 40k races. If you’re interested in using this system for games of 30k (as far as I’m concerned, Epic Scale is the scale that 30k should be played in, and will be my hobby/gaming focus for the foreseeable future), you can find an excellent fan site with the various Legion rules here. This last site is very good, as it has, amongst other things, an excellent outline of how to build an army list, along with army lists summaries and quick reference sheets. If you think of this site as a supplement for the core rules, similar to how a Codex works in 40k, that will help put it into perspective. I doubt I’ll get into Epic Scale 40k in any meaningful way, for the same reason I’ve more or less abandoned 28mm scale 40k (its become a caricature/parody of itself).
Ok, let me give you a quick breakdown of what I’ve put together here.
| Traitor World Eaters | |||
| Unit | Qty | Uprade | Pts |
| 5400 | |||
| Legion Detachments | |||
| Tactical Detachment | 1 | 8 x Tacticals | 275 |
| 1 | Drop Pods | 25 | |
| 4 | Tactical Spt Squad | 200 | |
| 1 | Lieutenant Commander | 50 | |
| Tactical Detachment | 1 | 8 x Tacticals | 275 |
| 4 | Heavy Spt Squad | 200 | |
| 1 | Centurion | 50 | |
| Tactical Detachment | 1 | 8 x Tacticals & Rhinos | 275 |
| 4 | Heavy Spt Squad | 200 | |
| 1 | Centurion | 50 | |
| Legion Support Detachments | |||
| Rampager Squad | 1 | 6 RP & Centurion | 350 |
| Rampager Squad | 1 | 6 RP & Centurion | 350 |
| Thunder Hawk | 1 | 200 | |
| Thunder Hawk | 1 | 200 | |
| Strike Cruiser | 1 | 200 | |
| Contemptor Dreadnought | 4 | Drop Pods | 265 |
| Landraider Battle Squadron | 6 | 480 | |
| Storm Eagle | 3 | 375 | |
| Legion Lords of War | |||
| Angron | 1 | Teleport | 475 |
| Fire Raptor Wing | 2 | 300 | |
| Fellblade | 1 | 250 | |
| Glaive | 1 | 250 | |
Here is the army in full…
Ok, so now some details shots
Angron, Primarch of the XII Legion, The Red Angel
A quick scale comparison.
The first Tactical Detachment. Note the Tactical Support squad at the rear
The second Tactical Support Detachment
The second Tactical detachment, with a closeup of the heavy weapons
The Rhinos for the third Tactical Detachment
One of the two drop pods, utilised for the first Tactical Detachment and the Contemptor Dreadnoughts
Contemptor Dreadnoughts
Objectives play an important role in Epic Armageddon. Each side requires three. I decided to make destroyed/crashed vehicles with injured/wounded/survivors to rescue.
The Landraider Battle Squad
One of the two Thunderhawks. To be thorough, I created both a flying and a landed base. You’ll notice the ‘cleared landing zone’ on the landed base. I really can’t stand Astarte’s flyers with their landing gear permanently down.
Fellglaive
Fellblade
Storm Eagles
Fire Raptor
There you go. I’ve had one game with them (I got hammered, thanks Alan). I plan on adding some Spartan’s, Rampagers (there are now some fan made ones, I used assault marines in this incarnation), Predators, Vindicators, plus a few other random bits and pieces.
A quick note on the the bases. A few people who’ve seen this army already have asked me where I got the flying stands from, and the tank bases. I’m a real stickler for consistency. The bases for the infantry are the rectangle ones that GW produced back in the day, so I wanted everything else to be rectangular too. The various sized bases for the tanks etc are generic Flames of War bases produced by a British company called Plastic Soldier. It’s there “15mm Mixed Base Set”. The flight stands are from Hawk Wargames. I just take the clear rod part and attachment and fix it to a plastic soldier base. I did consider the GW flying bases, but this would mean they’d be round and also, I wanted the flyers to have a little bit of height on the table too. GW stems are quite short.
One final thing. I’ve not posted for well over 10 months. However I wanted to say thank you for everyone that keep on visiting this blog while I was away. It’s astonishing how many people visit this blog on a daily basis, even when I’ve not produced any new content for such a long time. So thanks for you’re continued interest and support.
I’ve already got my next three projects on the bench, so stay tuned.
Thanks for dropping in.
John
The Painting Bunkerc y 
[…] The blog also offers up some great displays of John’s painting in 6mm and those other scales. You can check out the article here. […]
Awesome ! Simply Awesome ! As always. ^^
My next Epic Army will be a Horus Heresy Death Guard Legio and this World Eater Army is inspiring.
Thank you
Nice write up on the Epic Armageddon system and that’s another fantastic looking army mate. Hopefully you see some success with them shortly.
Regards
Thanks Geoff. I’m sure once I get the swing of things more victories will be forthcoming
Really cool stuff! Love the 30k epic armies, got interested in epic 30k while listening to the Eye of Horus podcast and such beautiful armies like yours are too much to resist the urge any longer 😉
Also a frequent visiter even when you haven´t posted in a while, because every post is gold. So now to read more about epic 🙂
A really great looking force. The World Eaters scheme is always a striking one and you’ve done it brilliantly. Looking forward to the additions.
The quality of the models themselves look superb as well, i’d love to get my hands on some of the Heresy range in Epic scale. All I seem to do at the moment is collect 6mm terrain.
I hope you can make it to Brisbane for a game soon.
It’ll be a while before i can make it to the southern hemisphere…
Forgot to say thanks for posting those links to the Epic rules, will be very useful.
Ah, of course. I got confused with your handle and somebody else’s.
Welcome back. The sculpts and painting look fantastic.
Thank you. It’s good to be back
Looks great,
but where can I get these epic models?
Msg me via fb
Very nice army.
Two questions:
1. How do you get the “used” metallic look. The rust i get, but the metal look is very nice to simulate combat use.
2. How do you get the small symbols onto vehicles? It looks like stencils and an airbrush or is it decals. Whichever it is, where did you get it that small?
Thanks
Ronnie
HI Ronnie, the first question I’m not sure what you mean. Are you talking about the tracks or the sponging on the hull? As for question two, they’re simply decals from the Forgeworld Workd Eater decal sheet. Hope this helps
Thanks for the quick reply.
For the first question I mean the technique you use to pain the models. When looking at them they have very nice “combat” use on them. One part is the rust effect, but you also have a “metallic” (silver) look on them that makes them appear to have the metal scraped off in places which gives a very nice effect. Some use a sponge for 28mm figures to achieve a similiar look, but for such small models I am uncertain how you achieved the used/scraped off paint look.
Dident know the decal sheet has such small icons and numbers.
Thanks alot for all the help. A real inspiration for when I start my army (just ordered 300+ models for it)
No worries Ronnie, yes indeed I did use the sponge technique on the models. The paint is actually a dark grey. It’s pretty tricky using that technique on such small models.
Yes, the FW decal sheets are amazing. They contain so many useful little bits and pieces.
300+ models sounds like a massive army. Good luck!
Out of curiosity, do you do comission work for epic?
Love your painting scheme for world eaters so thought I might as well ask and if you do, see what the approximate cost for comission work is (as its a very large force, roughly 4x what you have shown in the army above). It is not a rush job though, can wait quite a long time on it if need be 🙂 I know quality comission work costs (have anouther army at the painter atm).
Hey Ronnie, msg me via my FB page
[…] Epic Scale World Eaters 5,500pt army complete […]
Amazing work there.
How easy are the figures to purchase? I’ve recently been looking into the dark underworld of China Forge and am assuming that there is something similar for Epic – I guess that Games Workshop would still Lawhammer anyone selling these openly.
I’m not sure where these come from, but I doubt it China. They look 3D printed, so probably fan made. From what I’ve seen there is a vast and diverse amount of fans producing these models.
Awesome army dude
Quick question,where did you get the Angron model from?
I’m doing a traitor WE force too,but it’s a bit further into the heresy as they’ve got demonic support,even managed to get a demonic Angron.
Thanks Matt, just msg me through my FB oage
Hi Matt.
I’m putting together my last things for the second army but need some 30k items. Any chance you could help out getting into contact with someone that can help out? You mentioned earlier that it would be possible and my other supplier has problems with casting some of the models (USA based).
Hey, looks awesome. Question, where did you get your minis?