Army Focus: Dark Angels Third Company

The Dark Angels. I don't really know why, but they were the first of the official GW Chapters to really speak to me. I'm not sure if it was the early 90s "Christmas Marine" painting style, the backstory of monastic knights striving to atone for a heresy that most of them don't know anything about, the three different colour schemes in one army, or maybe I just have a thing for bath robes... But my love for the Emo poster boys of 40k has never wavered.

I mean, come on how bad ass do they look? This classic piece of art by Jim Burns was a huge part of my initial love for the Legion...I mean Chapter...

Back in 2nd edition I built a small Dark Angels force. My high school attention span mixed with limited budget meant in order to explore all the games and armies I wanted to I had to limit myself to small forces. I always dreamed of having a full company of the boys in dark green, and so when I got back into the hobby after my short hiatus in the late 90s one of the first things I did was check in on how the Dark Angels were doing. The third edition codex had been released about a year previously but hadn't changed the army particularly significantly and so I bought a new tactical squad, painted it up and then promptly got distracted by a combination of Warhammer Fantasy Chaos and the new boys of 40k, the Tau. I eventually got back to the Angels for the 4th edition codex, buying the army box when it was released, and then set out on a long, regularly waylaid, journey towards completing that Company I always dreamed of.

  The Third Company, Dark Angels Chapter

When I started Warhammer I was coming out of Historical gaming, and as such was fairly obsessed with matching uniforms to official versions. Looking at the GW publications back then the "official" Dark Angels scheme was 3rd Company, and so I went with that company.

My Ravenwing is really rather small and could really do with being expanded at some point... Mostly I would like to get some Black Knights, a Talonmaster and Sammael

 You've got to love a sea of green power armour...

 My Deathwing grew a lot in 7th edition thanks in large part to cheap Dark Vengeance sets, but given how ineffectual the tend to be in 8th I'm happy with its size now.

Azrael was my first foray into candy armour, using Tamiya Clear Green over Leadbelcher and Iron Breaker armour. I know the model has fallen out of favour over the years - yes he's ridiculously small compared to even new Minimarines let alone Primaris, and yes his pose reeks of 1990s - he is still one of my favourite Dark Angel, nay Warhammer- models of all time. Everytime I look at him I'm transported back to the early 90s

Another golden oldie- Chaplains for me embody a huge part of the Warhammer 40k universe, and none do so quite so perfectly as Asmodai.

 This chap is one of my personal favourite models, he's batted way above his weight more than once.

I really do have a soft spot for Chaplains.... (The bottom two are in their old basing scheme, they've since been rebased.

 Ezekiel always intimidated me, I have no idea why. For a long time it didn't matter as I didn't use Librarians, but with 8th I started using them more, so Zeke got added last year. In the end I loved painting him and find him very fun on the table- why did I wait so long!?

My trio of Ravenwing jets, a Dark Talon, counts as Xiphon and of course a Nephilim. I decided to paint each slightly different to show their different roles.

 My Company Chaplain, this dear fellow is one of my favourite kit bashes

 I decided to paint my Venerable Dreadnaught to show that he was a member of the Deathwatch but also of 3rd Company- he is the interred former Master of the Company who still serves as an advisor to the new Master.

Speaking of whom, this is the Master of the Company, Master Asius "Brokenwing". He's been my go to Master for 4 editions, although he hasn't actually seen battle at all in 8th.

Just a few of my Veterans, I love these guys but haven't used them on the table yet.

The army currently sits at around 8,500 points- far more than I am realistically going to need. So, is the army finished? Of course not- when is an army finished? I would like to add a Land Raider- something I have always put off as I felt they were too expensive points wise- Sammael and a Talonmaster will come when Warhammer Conquest do the Land Speeder- half price modelsmftw. Black Knights also need added to the Ravenwing- I currently have the three Black Knight Characters but no actual squad for them, and a Storm Raven would come in very useful... And then there is Primaris... I'm still not sure if my Primaris will be added direct to this army, create a Dark Angels successor force, or be a completely different Chapter, but at very least I'll need to add some Hellblasters to the Dark Angels!

For the Lion!