Today, I'm gonna talk about the Wargames Atlantic Cannon Fodder kit (Females), how I used them for my Astra Militarum army, and how you can use this kit for general kitbashing. This is part two in a two part series, please take a look at part one, as I don’t want to repeat myself.
Why Kreig? I gave a brief overview back in part 2 of Project Chem-Dogs, but some context here won't hurt the word count. With one of the least subtle names in the 40k setting, the Death Korps of Krieg are more or less scifi WWI. We're talking folk memories of gasmasks, trenches, mud, bayonets, and absurdly wasteful expenditure of human life. They are a gasmask wearing death cult with no concern for thier own losses or individuality. This makes for a good addition to 40k in general and the Astra Militarum in particular, but their prominence is relatively new. Stop me if you've heard this one before, but the Death Korps were something Forgeworld was very interested in, that has since made the jump to plastic, and are due a range expansion shortly. Mechanically, they are one of those odd units whose options are (currently) dictated by a Killteam boxset. These feature more specialist weapons than the other battleline units, and a resurrecting model mechanic. The reason I wanted them is to act either as frontline troops or APC passengers, thanks to their weaponry and odd ability to become better fighters as they loose models.
Using Cannon Fodder as Death Korps of Krieg: The use of Cannon Fodder for these is somewhat head dependant. The bodies don't have anything about them that screams Verdun, but you do get full space helmets on the sprue. I'd made most of mine with green stuff gas masks, thus making them passable as Kreigers, incorporating wire and tiny beads for the hoses. That's fiddly work even if you've sculpted before, so don't be afraid to source heads from elsewhere. Otherwise, turning the girls into the Death Korps is a similar challenge to regular Infantry Squads; you don't need heavy weapons, but you are looking at a greater density of specialist weapons, and the need for a medic.
What I did: As before I made these as plugins for an Infantry Squad to simplify matters, while taking the opportunity to make a few weapon specialists to round things out. The heads here were often leftovers from the Bulldogs, as well as assorted bits from the Stargrave Mercenaries sprue. I probably need to talk in more detail about that last one actually, I use that kit a lot. Expect an article, um, Novemberish. Meanwhile some crude recasting was used to create the medpacks, and melta nozzles for use with the energy weapon on the Cannon Fodder sprue. I did the same thing for flamers and such in part one, you can do a lot with a new barrel and some new furniture. Menawhile, Sniper rifles were created by using the CF scope with a regular gun, a fiddly little bastard of a thing, with a bead as a barrel extension, and sculpted rags to hide the join. The grenade launchers are from the aforementioned Stargrave sprue, lengthened wih a bit of tube. Painting then followed, and turned out OK.
I hope this brief series was of use to you. Next week, back to Transformers.
