Lamenters: The story so far... (1)

The lamenters have been an on again off again project (like most of my projects).  I've had warhammer 40k marines for a while now, but was stumped on what chapter to do. I was going to do the mortifactors....

I planned on using bits from the legion of the damned, and plastic skeletons but finally decided against it when the price went through the sky and Bell of Lost souls did their Horus Heresy supplement. I divested myself of a lot of the bits and moved on...

I then thought I'd work a heresy force. I was tempted by the Luna wolves...but they switch paint schemes over to the sons of horus later. Also the difficulty in sourcing the beaky helmets and studded shoulder pads or the sheer amount of time to scratch build the amount you needed was a bit overwhelming. The moment passed. I divested myself of more bits....

Finally with the arrival of space hulk I decided on lamenters.

I hope my forces look even a fraction as good...

I remember staring at this pic and it didn't grab me, not until I saw some painted models did I fall in love with the Lamenters.

They are a successor chapter of the blood angels and I figured there wouldn't be many people who painted their space hulk figs this way. Well....not many but there are a few now.

Still, the lamenters are pretty cool in a doomed way. I first encountered them when I had advanced space crusade and they are one of the two chapters (the other the scythes of the emperor) to first encounter the galactic invasion (and almost totally wiped out).

While the Scythes were pretty cool the fluff has them reduced to a handful (literally less than 10 guys) of troops and some rescued gene seed fleeing ahead of the hive fleet to warn the imperium. I'd prefer something with a bit more numbers.....and more fluff. The lamenters are also participants (and villains of a type) in the Badab war. Bell of lost souls did a pretty wicked mini codex on the same (back when they were churning out original content rather then endless netlist analysis). I might even paint up my BFG ships someday for the lamenters. 

I've decided there are a number of miniatures an individual HAS to paint in this life. Marines are one of them (Orcs, dwarves, a dragon, elves, an a figure to represent a rpg character are a number of other ones I've come up with). This will be the start of a series documenting the growth of the lamenters.