Grotmas Calendar Day 3 – Loyalist Legion painting guide

When it comes to the Horus Heresy, are you team Emperor, or team Warmaster? We’ve asked Da Red Gobbo many times which side he’d have pledged himself to, if he absolutely had to, but he just throws stuff at us and runs away cackling.

Today’s gift is a Legions painting guide for Warhammer: The Horus Heresy, designed to help get your Loyalist Space Marines looking their best so that they’ll be ready to take on the craven forces of the Warmaster Horus. Maybe Da Red Gobbo has a favourite side after all? Get your brushes at the ready....

Dark Angels

I Legion battle plate is black with heraldic elements and individual motifs commonly rendered in white or red. Where bone-white segments are present this indicates the wearer has sustained a mortal wound intended for another, while segments of dark green refer to the dark, beast-haunted forests of Caliban. No two Legionaries are ever likely to bear the same combination.

White Scars

The V Legion wears battle plate of ivory white, often adding a chevron patterning in red – the extent and placement of which appears to depend on the predilections of the wearer. Banding is either gold, bronze or occasionally enamelled red, and appliqué plates of hammered copper or bronze are sometimes worn. Many Legionaries display personal battle honours rendered in Chogorian script, the mastering of which is considered one of the most noble arts a White Scar is expected to pursue.

Space Wolves

The Legion of Leman Russ wears the colours of the savage seas and turbulent skies of Fenris – a brooding dark grey, often complemented with banding and other details of dark gold or bronze. Insignia is rendered in bone white, blood red, black or gold, giving the Space Wolves the aspect of primitive barbarians, a misleading impression they deliberately propagate so as to wrong-foot or to intimidate their foes.

Imperial Fists

The Imperial Fists wear a distinctive orpiment yellow, banded with black and bearing occasional details in red or white. The Legion’s elite First Company invert this heraldry, wearing battle plate almost entirely of black, with only the helms and pauldrons yellow.

Blood Angels

The Blood Angels make war resplendent in crimson and gold finery. The dominant colour is a vermillion red, with banding and other details shining gold. Individual segments, as well as cloth details are often black. Even when tarnished by war, the standard panoply of the Blood Angels is always a glorious spectacle to behold, superior to any other Legion except perhaps the Emperor’s Children.

Iron Hands

Mk VI Space Marine

The Iron Hands are ill-disposed towards superfluous adornment, and while they maintain their panoply of war as they would any other machine, the vicissitudes of war mean that most suits of battle plate bear the scars of shell, sword and flame, especially amongst those serving in the so-called ‘Shattered Legions’.

Ultramarines

The Ultramarines wear battle plate of azurite blue, with gold banding and other insignia rendered in white or black. Among veterans it is common to adorn specific segments of armour in white, and for ceremonial purposes in a striated armourial finish. Cloth elements are often white, black or leather brown. When possible, the Ultramarines strive to maintain high standards of appearance, taking a stoic pride in their heraldry even on-campaign.

Salamanders

The Salamanders wear heraldry of chromium-oxide green, with contrasting elements of flame-orange and black redolent of the volcanoes of their home world. Banding is bronze or gold and often highly sculptural, with other symbols in white or black. The Legion suffered terribly at Isstvan V and were thus rarely able to maintain their battle plate to their high standards. Nonetheless, with every Legionary an accomplished metalworker, even the most battered and abused suit was kept functional.

Raven Guard

The Raven Guard value stealth above all, and so go to war clad in the umbral black of night. Markings are kept to a minimum, but where present are white, grey or sometimes gloss black. Banding dulled steel or bronze. Some render their battle plate in a subdued, matt black that absorbs so much light that even a Legionary merges with the night.

You can also download this painting guide via the Warhammer: The Horus Heresy downloads pages, by following the link below.

If you’re still looking for tips on how to paint, there are loads of videos on the official Warhammer YouTube channel, and for more advanced painting you can check out Citadel Colour Masterclass on Warhammer TV.

Tomorrow on the Grotmas Calendar, we’ve got something spooky in store…