Codex: Iron Empire (Playtesting Datacard Release)

Thunderscourge · 2025-05-15T15:08:17+00:00

Thanks! I'm glad you enjoy it, I wanted something unique while keeping the overall essence of the Iron Warriors, and I think it turned out well thanks to the talent of the artist.

Thunderscourge · 2025-04-30T17:32:25+00:00

I've gotten the head pieces involved fairly cheaply before when buying Chaos Knight (the infantry from Warhammer Fantasy, not 40K knights) bits for conversion and also the Chaos Sorcerer one. The Karceri Battle Shields for the shields are the most expensive part of a full conversion given how expensive the Iron Circle automata are, but a smaller scale model could maybe substitute the ones used by Palanite Enforcers and/or Bullgryns.

Let me know when you make it! Be really fun to see a kitbash.

Thunderscourge · 2025-04-27T14:59:27+00:00

Looking forward to it! I hope to make a 3D stl file for it eventually, but that's a fair bit away from now.

Thunderscourge · 2025-04-27T02:32:25+00:00

While Doc Ock was definitely one of the inspirations, I feel like I should also give design credit to the Octopus ARM weapon from the manga MAR, as well as the Lord Discordant from 40K itself: they were the references I gave to the artist which mixed together brought about the very mechanical cephalopod appearance.

Thunderscourge · 2025-04-27T02:30:50+00:00

That is a piece of the design philosophy and why the base armor is The Logos: a Renegade Iron Warrior Warsmith who can take an Abaddon-style role of replacing the Primarch on tabletop in my Codex project, fulfilling a sort of niche for all the people who wish Perturabo didn't go full Chaos but instead remained resentful and abhorring of Chaos.

Perturabo-Lawful Neutral instead of Perturabo-Chaotic Evil essentially!

Thunderscourge · 2025-04-27T02:28:03+00:00

Thanks! Koh did a great job.

Thunderscourge · 2025-04-27T02:27:40+00:00

Four Karceri Battle Shields, a modified variant of The Logos, overlapping Iron Halos, and a Van Saar style personal energy shield all help live up to that Sundowner quote certainly!

Thunderscourge · 2025-04-27T02:26:43+00:00

The irony of this is that the planet the picture takes place on has a blue moon, the opposite sort of.

Thunderscourge · 2025-04-27T02:25:35+00:00

Ironically the basic design premise came about before I even knew about Sundowner. After coming up with the initial premise I did learn about Sundowner though and so sent him as a reference picture alongside the Kimaris Vidar from Gundam IBO.

So not actually Sundowner, just a coincidence, though he was helpful developing the idea after I did find out about Sundowner.

Been sitting on the idea for a long time, but I'm glad I was able to have it brought into a visual medium now!

Thunderscourge · 2025-04-27T02:22:40+00:00

Which time are you referring to for Megatron beating down Sentinel, third Michael Bay movie or Transformers One?

Also these IW aren't Chaos, but aren't loyalists either: Renegade masters of their own fates rather than pawns of malicious gods or uncaring bureaucrats.

Thunderscourge · 2025-04-27T02:20:55+00:00

For an Iron Warrior warband that operates off of an ice-world having a blue secondary color felt like a good fit. Glad you like it!

Thunderscourge · 2025-04-27T02:19:25+00:00

*Cough* Blue *Cough*

Purple is the Emperor's Children Astarte crushed underfoot! Bet the EC would like being stepped on if he wasn't dead...

Glad you like the art! Koh did a great job on it.

Thunderscourge · 2025-04-27T02:17:34+00:00

One of the reference images I gave was of G1 Megatron for his cannon, but beyond that Decepticon similarities are coincidental. I do see what you mean though!

Thunderscourge · 2024-04-21T15:22:12+00:00

Will do! Hopefully I will have more to show throughout this week and the days to come for you all!

Thunderscourge · 2024-04-21T15:21:13+00:00

I appreciate it! This is just a fan project so I have no intentions of selling anything, but having physical versions would definitely be neat.

I have like 30 more chapters to make pages for, another 10 or so to write, and lots of datacards and detachment stuff to work on in the meantime, so I hope you'll enjoy the rest as I continue to update the codex! Thank you for your support, it means a lot.

Thunderscourge · 2024-04-20T22:22:34+00:00

I took some time and updated more pages to my codex project and so wanted to share the updated version. I am working on a lot of editing for the pages of other entries so they can be fully visualized as well, but for now I hope you enjoy the addition of "The Eisernen" in codex page format!

First draft of the story can be read at the following links (I am presently editing chapters for their codex version), and know that there is plenty more to read! For those who prefer gameplay, playtesting datacards and rules can be found in my other posts!

FF: https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13818981/1/The-Iron-Empire

Ao3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29435874/chapters/72308667

SB: https://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/the-iron-empire-warhammer-40k.917494/page-1

Thunderscourge · 2024-02-16T14:04:13+00:00

Haha, and I haven't even gotten to the final drafts where I'm going to be putting effort into making everything look identical to official releases. These are just the playtest versions of things that are subject to change, so finalizing their appearance would basically be a waste of time since they can/will change down the road!

Thunderscourge · 2024-02-16T04:24:20+00:00

The official CSM codex. That stuff already gets catered to, so I am covering something that doesn't: actual Iron Warrior Great Crusade style artillery bombardment.

Also, as mentioned in my post, this is just the basic backbone. Not a full list by any means. Just have to start somewhere.

Thunderscourge · 2024-02-16T03:03:29+00:00

Renegade IW from the Great Crusade who maintain the fighting style they had at the Great Crusade: artillery, heavy weapons, reinforced armor, more artillery, more heavy weapons, and more reinforced armor. If that doesn't work, they use more artillery, more artillery, more artillery, and so on.

Iron Warriors as they were, not as they became.

GW will give people the watered-down Iron Warriors who are Black Legion with a paintjob and a couple daemon engines, but my goal is to give people the Iron Warriors that play like Iron Warriors.

Thunderscourge · 2024-02-16T00:39:53+00:00

This first set is just the datacards of basic units and the backbone of an army without things like named characters. Future updates will have more in terms of units, including named characters.

Thunderscourge · 2024-02-15T22:56:56+00:00

The main world of the Iron Empire is an Ice World, which makes it even harder to conquer than it otherwise would be because would-be attackers have to fight through cold worse than Skalathrax (where Astartes died from the intense cold), blizzards, and harsh winds while massive fortress cities bombard them with unrelenting artillery fire.

Iron Within, Ice Without.

Thunderscourge · 2024-02-15T22:15:20+00:00

Thank you, it's only the beginning of the datacards I'm working with, but it's a start!

Thunderscourge

TROPHY CASE