Honor Guard Tutorial

The 5^th edition codex opened up the formally Ultramarine only Honor Guard unit to all space marines. It is an interesting unit somewhere between close combat veterans and terminators. They cost the same as a vanguard veteran with a power weapon but come with artificer armor and a bolter in addition to the power weapon and bolt pistol. They are slightly cheaper than normal terminators but are not as survivable without the Inv saves, but they can ride in a Rhino.

If you are like me and want to be able to field every unit in the codex so you have options for your list, you will need to build an Honor Guard unit. While the current metal kit is really nice and not horrible in cost, the minis are covered in Ultramarine U’s. Another problem is that they are so ornate if you want a cohesive look to your unit you will need to buy more of them from bit traders to get a good size unit but do you want 8 guys with the same 2 poses. This leaves plastic parts as the best bet to make your own unit. Luckily space marine players are just loaded with great plastic parts. There are so many plastic parts that you might not be able to visualize them all to decide how to start the project.

The first question before starting the unit is what the look you are going for is. Does your army have a very cohesive and regimented look? Are your veterans distinguished strongly from normal marines with banners, shoulder badges, etc? You will want to continue these themes with your honor guard. My personal army neither of these things are true. Veterans are mainly distinguished by a change in edge color on the shoulder pads. My look is essentially very random with a few old metal bodied marines, mixed in with beakies, helmets, no helmets, even some scattered repainted chaos components salvaged from slain enemies. This allowed me a great deal of freedom in modeling my honor guard which I really enjoyed. Every model is unique and interesting and could probably be built on as a theme if you wanted a whole honor guard of a similar look.

What are the options for overall look? I can think of a few basic choices. Dark Angels veterans are a nice starting point. They have the robes to set them apart from the rest of the army. They are also a complete kit which comes with some power weapons and the cost would not be horrible.


Another option is the crusaders of the Black Templars. The upgrade kit has great bits and the unit could be very cohesive but might look to out of place in a normal army. Watch out since this kit has no legs, torso backs, and only 2 backpacks.


Using metal veterans as a base is also possible since they often have nice tabards if you are willing to work at removing hands and arms. These tabards also mesh nicely with those available from the black templars box. You can also use normal marine torsos and legs then try to set them apart with additional components like helmets, shoulder guards, purity seals, etc.


Another issue is the power weapons. Almost every member of the unit needs a power weapon. Given that at most you get 2 power weapons in any kit you will need either to stock up or go to the bit traders. Again you have to make a choice about the look. Do you want everyone to have the same power weapon (sword, axe, mace)? Do you want to go beyond that with not just swords but very similar hilts and guards? Next consider how the arms will be holding the swords will be posed. The power weapons are almost always either pointing the weapon out or carrying it in a bent arm. If you want 6 identical power weapons you will need to look at hand swapping them onto other arms to open up more options.

The last issue is accessories. This is where you can again work to create cohesion from varied members if desire. Subtle things here might work best. Every member has purity seals on the weapon. All the backpacks are exactly the same. Helmets, shoulder pads, scrolls, etc. You can also go another way and pick accessories to pick out small thing on each model. For example some backpack parts can match certain shoulder pads. Tons of options are available to bring you unit to the forefront of your army.

Now I will show the different Honor guard members generate from these different sources as examples of what is possible. My armies theme for its Honor Guard is that the members do not just get a new set a fancy armor when they move into the guard. They were what they have with minor improvements from their many years with the chapter. The look is very random but that is how my army is. Now I am not claiming that these items are the end all be all of model for space marines on their way toward slayer swords once painted. These are all simple things which can be made without green stuff or substantial scratch building. The most challenging thing is usually removing chapter specific items from the plastic bits with a hobby knife.

Metal Veteran Bannerman
Metal Veteran Relic Blade
Metal Master of the Chapter Honor Guard
Dark Angel Robes
Black Templar Tabard
Black Templar Mk IV
SM Commander/Command Squad Grenade Launcher
Composite Plastics (Commander, Space Wolves, Dark Angels)
Mk VI Plastic Beakie
Plastic Chapter Champion

Relic Blade Honor Guard

This mini makes a great relic blade honor guard. That is one big axe with a significant length of handle to represent the relic blade. The metal mini is from the older veteran set. Simply replace the bolt pistol with a bolter. I then added a commander bolt pistol on the back.


This is pretty all very easy with no real work.

Last Honor Guard

This is hardly even worth posting. Picked up main body of the master of recruits model as my last honor guard. I toned him down compared to the normal model by using a normal bolter and shoulder pad. The backpack is also standard. I used an almost normal helmet. It just has a few rivets along the brow. This is from the Black Templar box. Now that all the 10 members are done I am going to recompile the posts into a bigger and more cohesive series.

Another Honor Guard

This is the crusader Honor guard member. I kept some of the smaller black templar crosses but removed the big ones from the shoulder pads. I am not totally happy with the sword mounting angle. I changed it up some since I already had 2 Honor guards holding there power weapons out at like eye level with their left hands. This is trying to be more of a rallying pose. "After me lads."

Here is a shot of the backpack. It is dark angels with the dagger holding the skull removed and the logo removed from the back. I forgot to replace it with something else so I will get to that tommorrow. I cannot have that much empty space on the center of the backpack.

Mk IV Honor Guard

Here is the first Honor Guard made from the bits in my new black templar upgrade box. He is significantly less embleshed than the other honor guards but he makes up for it with his unique armor. I have one more head and chest like this which I think will be going to my Vulkan conversion. I noticed in the close ups he needs a little more clean up. Giving credit where credit is due the pose was stolen from WD310 from an Angels of Absolution conversion by John Shaffer.

Side View showing the shealth power weapon.

Shroud of the Dead Honor Guard

Here is the seventh member of my Honor guard unit. He is clearly made up of dark angel veteran parts with a few extras thrown in. In the Sons of Twilight Chapter, full robes are award to sole survivors of units to honor those lost in battle. Survivor guilt of those who have these generally leads them to heroic actions in an attempt to join their fallen comrades. This either leads to a quick end or rapid advance into veteran units. While marines who wear the shrouds of the dead may earn terminator honors they are almost never put into command roles like veteran sergeants or captain lest they lead whole units on suicide missions.

Here you can see that the shoulder pad matches the backpack topper and the holstered bolter for WYSIWYG. The metal power sword is from the veterans MKII box.

A little shrine in the back to close it off.

I just got my black templar upgrade box to make at least 2 more honor guards and probably finish of the master of the deathwing.

You can see more of my assortment of honor guard members on the right the labels section under honor guard. I think each one has its own character.

Honor Guard Grenade Launcher

Here is the Honor Guard with Grenade Launcher. Champion head, space wolves powersword(taken off a partial painted model who got moved into the Sternguard and a Lightening Claw instead), commander tabard and shoulder pad.
Grenade Launcher was made with a standard bolter. I moved the barrel up and did the side ammo feed. I then used another barrel taken out of a flamer(any cylinder of the same size will work) mounted underneath. I then cut off the normal clip and replaced it with 3 shells on band together cut from longer piece from the new scout biker.
I made sure I drilled out the two barrels to different diameters to make sure they appear different.
One more guy is pretty much done but I need to get a holstered bolter like I used on my Banner man. Anyone got a spare one. It is in the attack bike kit and actually make the bike not WYSIWYG if you use it.

The Honor Guard Goes On and On

Here is the next mini in my Honor guard series. He has a commander chest, space wolves power axe, and dark angels skull backpack and covered pad. Originally he had a crusader helm but I thought this made him look to busy so I broke it off and replaced it with a more standard helm. The crusader helm is going to go on my grenade launcher honor guard which I hope to finish tomorrow during the BCS title game. This guy probably needs a little more needle file work and some clean up.

Mk 6 Honor Guard

Here is the close up of the beaky honor guard. I got the idea of giving him a classic bolter from the consecrator captain in the dark angels book. Tabard from commander, powersword from assault marines.

Here you can see the studded shoulder pad from the dark angels veterans with the dark angels medallion replaced.

Other side with a shoulder pad probably from the commander kit.

Honor Roll

Here are the mini's I have assembled for my Honor Guard Unit. From left to right we have an Honor guard with Relic Blade, Chapter Champion, Chapter Banner, and 2 normal Honor Guards. I have one more guy to build using dark angels robes for the first batch of 6 to fit nicely in a Razorback if used. Pedro rides with some vanguard in a Rhino.

The metal Honor Guard unit from GW do look really great but there are just to many Ultramarine U's to make them practical for home brew chapter. I also did not want such a uniform look since it did not fit my back story of a chapter on the brink of failure. I wanted each member to look unique as they have built their armor up as they moved through the ranks and not just had it bestowed on them when they joined the Honor Guard. I think that any of them would make a reasonable captain model for an army which was what I was going for.

This is the chapter champion. He has company champion front and shoulder pads, commander head and back, and a powermace from the dark angels veterans box. I just cut off the dark angels medallion and replaced it with a crux termius type one. A great thing about using the mace is that it is different enough from the other power weapons to call it a thunderhammer. While adding a thunderhammer makes the unit even more expensive, it helps against dreadnoughts and other big nasties.

If anyone is interested I will post some close up pics of the other 2 plastic ones.

Chapter Banner Man

Here is the first member of my new Honor Guard Unit. The Chapter Bannerman. He started life as the dual lightening claw vet in the previous set of veterans. Those claws are off to my Shrike model so I decided to use him for this. He has a great pose and nice details. I added the command squad banner pole, commander powersword, pistol, and attack bike holstered bolter. Even drilled out the holstered bolter on the back.


Also made a custom armor pad by cutting of the Ultramarines U from a commander one. This leaves a small skull which matches nicely all the other small skulls including the one on his knee.



I am thinking I might also elevate the vet with power axe from the same vet squad to the honorguard. Much smaller change of removing pistol for bolter and adding holstered pistol.