The Smith

Pict capture of 9th Necromunda "Death Blades" F Co. Red Platoon Commanding Officer Lt. Freidrich "The Smith" Adrianus, and attached Command Section.

As a former ganger from Necromunda, The Smith took command of what was to become Red Platoon after challenging and killing the then leader Madcap Stratton during a frenzy of internecine gang fighting that spread through the Death Blades upper echelons upon rumor of their induction into the Imperial Guard. 

A man of action rather than words, The Smith rules Red Platoon with ruthless efficiency. His ranged armament is always a pistol of some sort, the particular type dependent on available parts and munitions, but he is almost always armed with his chainsword, Destroyer, which he has used, and predominantly maintained himself, since recruitment. The Smith's armour is an officers carapace breastplate, helm and pauldrons, but he eschews wearing a full suit of carapace armour, preferring to stay "agile and loose" (in his own words), rather than be fully encumbered. He is also equipped with a refractor field, and a variety of grenades, knives and other concealed weapons, ready to be utilised as the situation arises.

The Smith displays the F company symbol on his left pauldron, which members of F company display almost without exception. The red helmet stripe indicates that he is a member of Red Platoon, which is optional for officer ranks. The Smith has chosen to display his as a mark of solidarity with the men he commands. The red chevron on his right pauldron indicates that he is the commanding officer of Red Platoon.

Here The Smith is holding a fragmentation grenade, indicating that the command squad are about to engage in an assault action, possibly in support of the remainder of red platoon, who have most likely already been committed. This can be further seen by the stance of the other members of the command squad, and the readiness of the assault weaponry of the senior members of the squad.

Like all of Red Platoon, The Smith's command section are equipped for a flexible battlefield role. There is a single heavy weapon team, armed with a lascannon for anti-armour duties, while the Platoon Sergeant and Orderly are armed with laspistols for close-up engagements. The sergeant and orderly are also armoured with carapace breastplates as befits their higher ranking in the platoon, however they are lacking the officers pauldrons worn by The Smith. Note the absence of the platoon standard in this instance, indicating that Adrianus is treating the opponent with contempt, and implies they are not a worthy opponent of the Death Blades. Another noticeable absence in this capture is the platoon medic. Medics in the 9th Necromundan are renowned for their use and distribution of combat drugs to their fellow troopers. The absence of the medic in this case may be due to incapacitation, commissariat intervention, or more mundane reasons such as battlefield injury or other assignment.

The Smith and his command section are circa 1988 Imperial Guard models. The heavy weapons team are metal and plastic troopers, while the lieutennant, sergeant and orderly are from the command section range.

I have put magnets in the arm options for The Smith, meaning that he can be armed with a laspistol, bolt pistol or plasma pistol as desired. This was a pretty simple process, and one that I will be repeating for all of my officer models. For the left arm I chose him to be holding a fragmentation grenade, rather than something like a pair of binoculars that would imply long ranged support, as I pictured red platoon being tasked with mopping up whatever makes it past Green (assault) platoon, and Black (abhuman) platoon, and providing a last line of defence for the company command and support. An assault grenade implied that they would be working up close to the enemy at some stage, and provided a counter to the long ranged lascannon present in the command section. In rogue trader games The Smith takes the standard armament option, while his Green and Black platoon equivalents get more specialised assault weapons as fits their role.

For the command section, I chose it to be made up of models that could be used in both the rogue trader era Compendium list, and current IG list, albeit with a little bit of flexibility in thinking required from my opponent. The 2 man lascannon base would have to count as 2 lascannons in games of rogue trader, and I need to add a medic to the squad (who is currently inbound from planet eBay). The lascannon itself is a plastic one that was available at the time that came with the IG (this is number 10 :D ).

The squad load out seen above is not the most efficient one in the current iteration of the game, with a combination of close combat options (laspistols and close combat weapons on the sergeant and orderly and the inclusion of a somewhat absent platoon banner, which is soon to be inbound from planet eBay) and ranged shooting options in one small squad, but it has character and looks like a platoon command squad to me. Much more so than the current trend of a bare bones officer, and four special weapon troopers that may or may not be in a chimera/vendetta.

So another characterful squad added to the ranks of the Death Blades. They are still a work in progress here, but they pass muster for now.