Skip's Astra Militarum Armoured Company- Beginnings of a Tournament Army Part I

I am always attempting to complete different hobby projects with 40k, but unfortunately while this has led me to complete different neat projects- it does not usually leave me with fully completed armies. Which is a problem when I want to attend local events, play in campaigns and participate tournaments with a completed army. To start off this year, I figured that I would focus on my ongoing Imperial Guard tank army, as it has been something I have been having a lot of fun with lately (converting and painting the command tank).

1850 point- Friendly Event List Headquarters- Company Command Leman Russ Vanquisher Tank- with Co-Ax heavy stubber/ Beast-slayer shells/ artificer armor Troops- 2x Armoured Fist Squadrons- 2x Chimeras with Heavy Bolter & Autocannon/ 2x Infantry squads with 2x Autocannons Battle Tank Squadron- 2x Leman Russ Battle Tanks with Heavy Bolters Siege Tank Squadron- 2x Thunder Tanks with Dozer Blades Fast Attack- Imperial Navy Support- Vulture Gunship with Heavy Bolter & Punisher Gatling Cannons Scout Sentinel with an Autocannon Heavy Support- Imperial Navy Support- Avenger Strike Fighter with Avenger Bolt Cannon & 2x Lascannons Imperial Knight Household detachment- Cerastus Knight- Atrapos 1850/1850 However, we will see how well I do with succeeding with this project this year, when this is about how much work/ grading I have to get done every weekend:

Tournaments & List Building: This will be my friendly tournament lists that I intend to go to events with a well painted and extensively converted army that many players are simply not used to playing against in the modern Warhammer 40,000 game. The list will perform incredibly poorly against the majority of armies out there- especially the ever present Death Star armies. As far as competitively goes- the list is a lower tier army, that will catch a few players off guard. I know in my test games, it was durable against our resident Eldar player- only because he lacked enough dedicated anti-tank and had to wait for his spiders and other units to deep strike in and finish me off. In my second game against a Khorne Demonkin player- I was able to do well only because he had no dedicated anti-tank and my Knight was able to hold up his big close combat units. Goals: My big goal with this army is simply to do well with the soft scores at the the moment. I want to have the army fully painted to a high quality, to hopefully win and keep winning the best painted awards at the different events that I attend. This is why I have the Knight Atrapos in the second larger list- (yes it does very well against super heavies)- but it is a huge striking looking model. When painted to match the rest of the force, it'll be a striking center piece to the army (one that people are not used to seeing and will have fun playing against). This will hopefully help me with dominating sportsmanship and painting scores, versus the battle points. However, I was personally thinking of maybe taking a Lancer instead- as I like the model just as much as the Atrapos and I feel that it may even fit with the army's theme better. However, when I playtested the model a few weeks ago, it was brought to my attention that the lance it holds is a dual profile weapon. Thus, meaning that I can only ever fire and then not use it in CC, or use it in CC and not fire. That seems to somewhat mitigate the entire strength of the concussive shots and the ability of the Knight to successfully take down other Knights and Wraith Knights without getting itself blown up... if anyone has information that counters this- I am all ears lol Strategy: My current aim is to complete the Avenger Strike Fighter first, then work on the two Russ tanks as I build up my display board. As I make the conversions on the Thunderers and the Vulture gunship I'll order the Knight Titan and hopefully have a finished friendly army done around the time the summer break kicks off. Once this is all done, maybe just focus on a few more guard units for the narrative games locally (?) or I'll start to work on my Mechanicus (or maybe Orks?). Current Projects:

I wanted to post a few pictures of my Command Vanquisher that I had finished, as this will give you an idea where the rest of the army is headed concerning paint scheme/ detail work:

I named the tank "Ol' Warhorse II" after a A Sherman Tank that I saw at the Yuma Proving Grounds tank museum- and I tried to add additional details and uparmored the sides and other little details that I had seen from various Allied tanks from books and images. I am really proud of how this model came out and I know that I will doing two more Leman Russ tanks along the same lines/ style as this one- and two Tank Destroyers (based on Chimera bodies). I have a quick shot of what I'm looking to do with my Display board as well:

Below are two pictures from the campaign game that I had played with Jholt & Loopy from last weekend:

As always, thank you for your time and I will have some additional pictures of the undercoated Russ tanks and Avenger once I get an opportunity to use my airbrush. -Skip