# what is a cool basic space marine conversion



## PathogEN

being new to miniatures in general, and having only built 5 and painted 3 (waiting for the weather to be a little warmer before spraying the other 2)

can somone point me towards a webstire or guide that shows some cool conversions for a space marine, or can someone actually tell me one or show me?

thanks in advance


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## The Son of Horus

Reading White Dwarf is a great place to start. Surf the Space Marine sections on both the GW US site and the GW UK site for some ideas. Most conversions just use parts from different plastic kits. The Command Squad sprue in particular seems to be popular, since there's a lot of stuff that comes on it, and Command Squads seem to come in every battleforce now.


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## torealis

i do alot of arm and leg movements on my grey knights, check out my WIP blog.


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## FrozenOrb

On the net you're spoilt for choice, plus you can Google for it, and then offline you have White Dwarf.

Visit any 40k site (our ever-growing Links page) and really you have an overload of ideas. On this forum for instance you have this current thread, with lots of cool conversions you could try.


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## PathogEN

ah yes, i saw that thread right after i posted this one, i really liked the "fear of plasma gun overheating one" very well done.

thanks for the advice


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## =DAEMON=

I think this guy is cool:










Editamn, how do I make him smaller so there's no blur?


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## PathogEN

i have no idea whats on that picture, as for making it smaller, resize it in paint or photoshop.


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## torealis

is the blur not part of the photo? stand further away with a higher zoom, use lots of light and a white background.


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## FrozenOrb

=DAEMON= said:


> Editamn, how do I make him smaller so there's no blur?


Making it smaller would not remove the blur. Besides the image is already small.

All you could do to this image is enhance it, ideally with Unsharp Mask, in a photo manipulation package; which would do little to help it, it being a small image.

Better than that though is to have a digital camera with optical zoom, not to be confused with digital zoom which is just some farcical crappy gimmick. Alternatively switch on macro, or use both. In both cases I highly recommend using a tripod and the self-timer.


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## Galahad

Command squads (and commanders) are bits gold.

Kneeling legs make any heavy weapon look awesome. 
Pointing arm is great for sarges.
Bannerpole arm is cool for holding a gun straight out (like my plasma guy).

The missile launcher 'flat' hand is also popular, though mainly wiht characters (librarian usng a power, apothecary steadying an injured marine, etc)

Though with the basic tactical sprue, there's still some things you can do. 

Cut the magazine off a bolter (and build the end up a little with some green stuff, or even a shaved down bit of sprue if you have;t got anythign else), place the magazine in the open 'under' hand and stick the bolter arm on with a gap between the bolter and the mag. Qucik and easy 'reloading pose'

There's also the popular 'bracing against trcoil' pose. Chop the 'under hand' at the wrist, flip it pver and stick it on top of the bolter, like the marine is holding the gun down to fight the guns tendancy to ride up with recoil.

If you have multiple squads to assemble, you could try to make them uniform. This squad is all eagle chests and beakie helmets, while this squad is all skull chests and skull forehead helms, etc. Makes it easy to tell the squads apart and makes a nice uniform look.

You could also have a marien firing sa bolter with one hand and holding a combat knife in the open hand (or an auspex for a sarge)

Grenades are goode too. I can;t remember if the tac squad comes with a grenade throwing arm, but the assautl squad does.

I like to use bits from all my squads. I like to take all my bits off the sprue and put them in the bits box and assemble from there. you;ll see tacticals with running legs, a scout sarge with a commander's chainsword arm, etc. With the exception of bolter arms, whch I leave on the sprue til I need them (the arms line up best in pairs, if you pull them off the sprue its harder top tell whatt goes with what)


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## PathogEN

woh thanks, i just got some ideas! i really liked the reloading one too, ill be sure to give it a try


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## The Son of Horus

I wouldn't take the banner pole arm for holding out a gun. I'd just use a chainsword arm and cut the chainsword and the hilt from it. 

A bolter in one hand and a knife in the other is a common way to portray True Grit. If your Marines don't have it, I'd shy away from doing that to avoid confusion on your opponent's part. Remind me to post pictures of my Lions Rampant, who all are modelled with True Grit and Counterattack in mind.

All Space Marine squads come with grenade arms now. There's one for every five marines. The basic Space Marine sprue is uniform between all the squads now, you know.


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## darklightknight448

I get White Dwarf whenever I get the chance to buy the latest issue. I have also signed up for the e-mail version. The conversions are usually themed on whatever is featured that issue but are quite good inspiration. In fact the first bits I usually read are the conversions. Hope this helps, sorry if it doesnt.

P.S. the best bit about the e-mail version is that it is 100% free and you dont need to get it from the store! I still get the magazine version, though.:biggrin:


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## zenfarr

Good luck on that


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## Ezekial Lightning

Even though i am just beginning to convert i use tips from Heresy cuz if i dont understand i can ask the people.


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## Logain_85

Just as small one and might be obvious but i'll say it anyway. If youve got a sarge without a helmet on, use one of your spare heads cut off the bottom and stick it on the back of his belt, so it looks like hes taken of his helmet so he can see better, very common with assualt marines, and space wolves.

Also when you use an arm thats holding a grenade or something make him either hold the the bolter in the other hand or if hes and assault marine put his pistol on his belt.

You can cu the grenade packs in half and have the stuck on a jump pack harness or on some suits of power amour there are convenient external power cables that can also be used for sticking grenades to.

The one that i think is really useful for tactical squads game wise, is instead of glueing the Flammer/Meltagun/Plasmagun in the guys hand, remove the grip drill it out and mount a pin in the trigger hand of the model so you can just slot on a new special weapon depending on who your up against.

Without going into any serious conversions i think that that is about it for me, good luck.


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## Bloodhound

I remodel the legs into a kneeling position alot. I really don't like the look of the heavy weapons kneeling legs.


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