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XV8 Crisis Suit Bodyguard Commander Far Dawn
Bodyguard
Commander Far Dawn (Shas'O
Vas'Quez Tor'kan'Rotaa)
is perhaps the only experienced member of the problematic Vas'Quez
mission. A gruff and worldly battlesuit veteran, Far Dawn fought Orks and
supported commanders before Commander WarmRain was even born. Far
Dawn's knowledge is legendary, but his skills are waning, and age and
injury have slowed him down. Worse, he has become hopelessly addicted
to the drug used in his Battlesuit's stimulant Injector, slipping off
every half an hour "To check his suit". Thanks to political
connections with the stimulant lobby in the Tau capital, he was
to be retired to a particularly luxurious pensionm - one that angered
a long time rival in the upper heirarchy of the Tau Fire Caste who is
opposed to stimulant use.
Unfortunately
for Far Dawn, that disgrultled Fire Caste official held sway with a
politically powerful Etherial, and thus the battlesuit commander
finds himself stop-lossed into an endless tour of duty on Vas'Quez 4.
At
least the heat is good for his aching joints. Or would be, except
that the air conditioning in his Crisis Suit is stuck full on, and
nobody has been able to fix it for good, yet. Brrr.
It
is a cold day in hell for Crisis Suit Commander Far Dawn.
About
the Miniature:
I
was inspired by some images on the internet of what others had done
with their crisis suit modeling, and attempted a more dynamic pose myself.
I wanted to achieve the feeling that Far Dawn could so skillfully
use his thrusters as to effectively lower the weight of his
battlesuit, permitting him to lightly leap and skip over obstacles.
To do this, I drilled a hole in the bottom of the model to permit the
attachment of a translucent 'flying' rod. I also carefully drilled
out the four burst cannon barrels. They just looked bad flat, without
barrel holes.
The
base was made from two flying bases glued together, which I then
topped with bits of shaped styrofoam, real rocks, and celluclay. I
positioned the model so that it would appear as if far Dawn had just
jetted up, with one foot just taking purchase on a rock.
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About
the Army Card:
I choose
to add Vectored Thrusters because the notion of the hit and run rule
seemed very useful to me, and it has been just that, considering how
terribly weak a Tau Crisis Suit actually is in melee combat. One
would think that a mech large enough to house a man would pack a
serious punch, but in hand to hand combat, this hulking battlesuit is
less powerful than a single Space Marine in light power armor.
I
wanted Far Dawn to be accurate, so I added a Targeting Array. The
Multi-Tracker was an obvious choice - more shots, more value for the
points. In actual use, Far Dawn has been fairly helpful; with an
Assault 3, Strength 5 weapon pared with a Strength 6 rapid fire
rifle, within 12 inches on the field, he can lay down up to five
attacks in one shooting phase, and then simply Jet Pack away in the
assault phase. If he gets wounded, there is a 50/50 chance he can
shrug off the hit... provided that the attack is not Instant Death or
from a melee weapon that eliminates saves. I guess that is pretty
nice juice they are injecting him with inside that suit.
Five
attacks at close range, four at long. Not bad.
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