So why start with a new army at all? I've already got a decent Rogue Trader SM army collected, as well as a much larger Tau army, why not use one of them and just build up to a 5th edition force?
Well, for one I would like to keep all of my RT Space Marines relatively untouched; mostly for nostalgic purposes. Besides, the older models look so small and unthreatening compared to modern ones.
From left to right: Old Dreadnought,8-year-old in Halloween costume, Space Marine
As for the Tau, I just don't really like them that much anymore. Sure they still look cool and all but...eh.
Mainly though, I want a new army just because.
I am a heavy reader of 40k novels. About 6 months ago, I picked up both of the Space Wolf Omnibuses and proceeded to read through them with great enthusiasm. It was at this point that I decided that Space Wolves were really cool. It was them I decided to play this time around.
I went to pick up their codex and learned a new one had just been released for them. Just my luck! So I spent the next few months reading over it repeatedly and putting together lists that I liked in my head. I don't consider myself a very competitive player, far from it in fact, and so I was really having a good time coming up with fun lists and finally came up with a few that I wanted to use.
So after spending all this time getting to know and love the codex, it finally came time to start thinking about building my army. I did a lot of pricing, looking at what sorts of boxes I want to get to make this happen, weighing my eBay options, etc and I came upon a major problem with my plan: I really don't like Space Wolves.
Reasons I don't like Space Wolves:
1) They use bad colors.
I like the blue well enough, definitely not a fan of the yellow though. And NOT grey, ugh! Don't get me wrong, I respect the guys over at http://space-wolves-grey.blogspot.com/ to no end and that is one of my favorite 40k blogs for sure, but the grey they use on their Space Wolves looks so bad to me. All I see is unpainted plastic with squad markings.
2) NO HELMETS!!!
This is a major problem for me. On the one hand, I would never put a Space Wolf model in a helmet, it goes so strongly against their background; it cuts off their sense of smell! On the other hand, I would never field a single Space Marine with his helmet off because they look so ugly. Ok, well, maybe one or two for special characters and such, but in general the SM helmets look good and are way easier to paint. It is definitely a deal-breaker to have an all-helmetless army.
3) They're barbarians.
I love Werewolves and Vikings as much as the next guy that loves Werewolves and Vikings (I'm the guy that never got anywhere in Viking: Total War because I refused to build anything other than Viking Berserkers the whole time) and Werewolf Vikings in space are no exception. That being said, I'm somewhat of a snob and I can't shake the feeling that if I ever met one of these guys irl we would not get along. Too much noise, drinking, rough-housing, etc. Why can't everyone just sit down and eat like normal people? Deal-breaker.
So, what to do? I've fallen in love with this codex, but can't bring myself to actually field the ugly fellas. Guess I'll be painting them in a different scheme. Ho-hum. It's not really something I like to do because people see it and brand you WAAC (if you like ChapterX so much, why not just use their codex instead of pretending they're something else? clearly the only reason it could possibly be is because you want the more powerful army list and therefore, by my infalible logic, are a powergamer... '-.-) but it seems like a necessary choice at this point. Enter project: The Wolves Templar.
My favorite-of-all time Space Marine group has to be Pre-Heresy Custodes. The awesome gold ones, not the ones that run around with their shirts off. This was naturally my first thought. They fit fairly well with the codex: powerful/diverse characters, tending to favor foot/mounted lists rather than mech transports, etc. I could even use some sweet jetbikes count-as Thunderwolf Mounts. The only problem is they are fairly out of my reach as a modeler, and not to mention my budget right now. So, I fell back onto my second favorite SM group: the much-easier-to-paint, much-cheaper-to-build, Black Templars. Unfortunately, they don't mesh quite as well with the SW codex: no psykers, nothing that really lends itself to being a TWM, etc. Jump on over to the BT codex to make sure I shouldn't just use that instead, discover that I pretty much hate it, and so I've decided to stick with the BT motif on the SW codex. I'll just have to use a slightly more limited list. Not totally BT fluffy, but just nothing overtly out of place. Mostly just no Rune Priests or TWMs. I can deal with that. (It is at this point I'd like to point out that running SW sans RP and TWM basically exonerates me for life of any powergaming accusations)
I still plan to slowly build up a custom Custodes army on the side to eventually replace my BTs. I wholly expect that to take a very long time though, and I want to start gaming now. One day I will be the guy that shows up with the army of lovingly converted custom models, but until that day comes, it's The Wolves Templar full steam ahead.
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