Beautifying AOBR-the Tactical Marine (Tutorial)

It is now February but we still have about half a year until the 6th Edition of 40K AND its respective starter set comes out. Starter sets over the history of 40K were designed to allow a new player to enter the hobby with relative ease, at a relatively cheap price.


You got all the essentials that would let you experience the different aspects of the game. (I'm trying to pretend that I know all about the history of 40K starter sets, when in fact I started as a noob when 5th came out!)



Note: You may want to skip a couple of hundred words if you feel bored)


Enter this edition's starter boxed set. The glorious Assault on Black Reach (AOBR).

Featuring a whopping 10 tactical marines, a captain, a dreadnought and 5 terminators for the Space Marines, as well as 20 Ork boyz, 5 nobz, 3 deffkoptaz and a warboss this truly was a groundbreaking starter box set. For all the newer players out there, this is truly one of the best ways to start out cheap on 40K (as well as veterans looking to bolster their forces). 

But, for all the quantity you get, GW preferred to tone down the quality. Let's face it, AOBR has some great detail and really unique models, but the poses of the models are boring...I meant BORING!

Sure they look pretty sweet. But what happens when you get a whole army of these guys?

Yeah...see what I mean? Ok, it's a little exaggerated but in reality, the poses are similar and you don't get very much variation in your army. This has been one of the major turnoffs for me, because these AOBR marines simply do not look good when standing next to the multipart marines. 

So what is a fussy nerd like me to do? Conversions. How do you do it? Well I'm about to tell you so sit back and enjoy...

What you will need:

• The offending marine
• A saw
• Gloves
• A vice if you have one
• Spare SM bits (weapons+arms, shoulder pads, etc.)

Method:

1. So here is our marine. Looking at us in his deadly mono-pose. We're going to be making a couple of changes to his anatomy....hehehe...

2. Put the gloves on, clamp the marine in a vice if you have one (insert his legs), and grab your saw. Hold your marine so that you're looking at the top of his helmet. There should be a tiny gap between your marines body and the shoulder pads. That's where you're going to start making your cut. Like so...

Completely saw his arm off. No mercy!

                                                       Done. Now for the other arm.

                                              

Done. (oops this is a different AOBR marine. But the same idea applies)

3. This time cut the head off, using the groove between his head and body as a guide.

4. Saw his legs off, making sure that you cut below the belt. 

Now we have all the components:

A head 

A torso

Legs

As for the bits you cut off the poor man, do whatever you want with them. 

5. It's time for re-assembly. Cut off the bits that were attached to both the torso and the legs, such as ammo pouches and grenades, because they would look weird after re-assembly. Assemble as you would on a multi-part kit. So that's the arms, shoulder pads, weapons and even the head. You can do some filing and sanding if you find difficulty putting the marine in the pose you want. 

The arms are a little trickier. Go and compare this armless fellow with a multi part SM. Grab some modelling putty like greenstuff (I used Milliputt because it's cheap!) and try to mimic the shape of the multi-part SM torso. The sawing process should have left your AOBR torso slightly skinnier than what is normal, so go ahead and bulk it up. Don't worry too much about making his torso pretty, much of it will be covered up later. 

Complete:

As you can see, I've used some Blood Angel Death Company bits, but kept the original head and backpack. You can customise them however you want, and that is the greatest thing about this. AOBR marines that are painted in the Dark Angels scheme no longer look smurfy. Black Templars? Done. Space Wolves? Done. AOBR is your oyster. Exploit it as much as you can for a cheap, cheap price!

Hopefully your Space Marines are now looking ready to kick some ass!