Horus Heresy plastics: MKIV Armor Impressions

Plastic Space Marines have come a long way from their humble beginning. 

For the past few months there have been several rumors going about the possible release of plastic Horus Heresy miniatures. I had done my best to pay them little mind, sure it would be exciting, casting aside that hateful resin, and giving a good reason to give 30k a chance, but why get ones hopes up for something that might not happen? You can imagine my shock to find pictures leaked all across the internet, revealing what appears to be the current tactical squad box redesigned to feature all Mark IV ‘Maximus’ armor. I wanted to take some time to talk a little about why this upcoming release excites me.

Updating the Space Marine Tactical Squad

Truly the crux of all Space Marine armies, the venerable Tactical Marine.

Now that Adam and I are working on assembling a small force of Alpha Legion Space Marines, I have been thinking a lot more about Space Marines in power armor (it has been years since I have worked with anything other than Terminators, he he).  And in a quest to find parts to make unique looking Astartes, I decided I should really take a look at the new Tactical Squad that was released with the 6th edition Space Marine Codex.  And while one might be quick to point out that the lowly Tactical Marine has been around for ages and therefore the kit is probably not the place to look for “unique” parts, from glancing at pictures online it was clear that the kit received a major overhaul and was more than simply a reorganization of the same parts on sprues.  As luck would have it, a friend of mine recently gave me one of the new boxes, so I thought I would give my impressions of it and how it changes and improves upon a classic.