While I now have a non-trivial number of armydudesmen, I don't have that much experience with the official vehicle models. Aside from the occasional indulgence or bargain, everything I have like that, is some form of kitbash/salvage job. While I have previously dabbled with the Chimera type vehicles, today's subject is my first new build example, a Hydra.
As a unit, a Hydra sits in a awkward place. Its an anti-air flak tank, designed to inexpensively defend against aircraft. 10th ed, as you may observe, has not been kind to aircraft. They were always an odd fit for 40k anyway, something best saved for the biggest possible games or Epic, so it's perhaps not a shocker that GW is seemingly phasing planes out. It's 28mm scale after all. Perhaps they should take the Knights too, but I digress. So why might you want a Hydra then? Well, in addition to being a relatively cheap tank-shaped object for doing tank things, it gets bonuses against Fly keyword targets. That list includes a great many nuisances that deep strike into your lines and any number of advanced xenos vehicles that think floating is cool. Under ideal circumstances, those autocannons reroll to hit, possibly with Lethal Hits, and then wound on a 2+, with a reroll. Said autocannons do not get as many shots as it looks like they should, which is sad. But these do have a 72 inch range, so it can cover an entire board. I've been thinking of acquiring one for a while, and then I saw one cheap at Brum Toyfair, and here we are.
As a kit, the Hydra is a revised, call it second generation, style of Guard vehicle. The base hull and tracks are visually very similar to the plastics we got in the late 90's, but refined and rationalised. There's no faffing with individual track wheels, which is nice. That's all on its own sprue, with the version specific stuff on its own separate sprue, which in this case involves the Wyvern as an alternative build. This does look like a simple thing to magnetise, but I couldn't be arsed. The Wyvern is currently a solution in search of a problem, and while hoards may well come back into fashion soon, I'm not short on blast weapons. While a largely straightforward build, two odd flaws presented themselves. The first was that while the Hydra sprue had numbered parts, the track/hull sprue did not. Odd, if harmless. The second is more involved and takes a moment to explain. The Hydra features crewmen models and an open structure, with the ability rotate the business end as a big turret. Now, the sensible thing to do in such a build is to paint the crew separately, you don't have the space to do otherwise, but here comes the problem. The gunner is holding on to the controls and acting as a linchpin for the rotation. Odd, and annoying to work around. As a kit its fine, inoffensive, but maybe 10% more involved than it needed to be. But then again, I’ve never been a fan of exposed crewmen on vehicles anyway, so maybe I’m being unfair?
I made a dumbass mistake with this one, I assembled the guns in the wrong order, which is why the barrels are a bit shorter than usual. I kitbashed a crude hunter killer missile, but only built one crew model, which received a headswap and green stuff rags. You only really need one for this tank, and the other looks good for use in a command squad or similar. Painting was then achieved via spraycan, drybrush and wash techniques. I’ve got nothing especially interesting to say here, these methods work well-enough, despite my mistakes. Which unfortunately include the crew controls, as that big screen was a problem.
I’m not especially happy with this model as a project. But I suppose its good enough for the gaming table.
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