Return To The Kataphraktoi

Today I didn't feel like doing any more work on the Necromunda minis I have on my painting table, or on the Tomb Kings Casket of Souls, or the Quar, or indeed anything else. But I did feel like painting something. So I rummaged in my drawers and came up with some of my Lost and the Damned army! This is an army built using the 3rd Edition Codex: Eye Of Terror list, and is based heavily on the remnants of my old Karaboudjani XV Kataphraktoi army that I'd played through all the years of 4th Edition with. This was a heavy infantry force where each basic infantry squad cost well over 100 points before adding in special or heavy weapons. They had Hardened Fighters (WS4), Sharpshooters (re-roll 1s to hit), Carapace Armour (4+ save) as well as Iron Discipline (able to rally under half strength within 12" of officers) and Hardened Veterans (allowing them to take Veteran squads).

The army was not particularly competitive, and lost far more games than it won, but it did look cool - they wore black fatigues and gloss black armour with polished silver weapons and brown leather webbing. Their Combat Engineer units (Veteran squads) wore various camouflage kit that they'd picked up from here and there to mark them out as both elite within the Regiment and also to give them a bit more protection in their very dangerous job of combat engineering.

Anyway, after years of gaming with them I ended up having to sell much of the army to make ends meet. I couldn't bear to part with all of them, however, so I kept enough to make a small Lost and the Damned force. They'd always been Traitor Guard, and I figured that after lots of attrition they'd moved from being this elite shock infantry force to a mix of veteran Kataphraktoi supplemented by pirates, renegades, deserters, and true believers in Chaos. They'd been lured to the side of Chaos in the first place by a heretic Inquisitor who'd sparked an uprising on their homeworld and in many of the deployed Karaboudjani regiments, and so I have a model to represent that Inquisitor in her Chaos-uplifted form - wings, hooves, that sort of thing - who acts as the commander of the Lost and the Damned force. She's supplemented by some Heretic Astartes (a Word Bearer and a couple of World Eaters) who act as stiffeners and bodyguards, but the bulk of the current XV Kataphraktoi are a far cry from their glory days as heavily armoured elite infantry...

...as these close assault troops demonstrate. Some of them have retained their originally issued shotguns, but the presence of a civilian break-action and an alien-looking slug thrower illustrate just as well as the motley collection of camouflages and uniform pieces do that they have supply and logistical issues, to put it mildly. They have managed to retain some pieces of their original armour plate and all wear leather webbing, but whether it's the original issue or newly made pieces is unclear.

These ones lack the yellow or red Chaos star warpaint that some bear on their armour, too, but mostly that was down to me forgetting that was an option until it was too late...!

They only took me a little while to do; I picked them up this afternoon and sort of bashed them out quite quickly which was nice. I didn't even really need to refer to any of the previously painted Kataphraktoi - I've painted so many over the years that I basically had muscle memory for it. I'll probably do a few more this week, I think.

Painting Points:
Today: 5
This Week: 5
2024: 101