Deadzone: Puppet on a String

 The Asterians are an aloof alien (by that the GCPS mean non-human) life form who are highly advanced and have thus far stopped the continued expansion of GCPS space. They are best known militarily for making widespread use of pilot controlled robots in combat zones. The most basic version of these are termed Marionettes and one pilot can control multiple Marionettes at once. 

The Warpath sourcebook (free at time of publishing) tells us this:

I'd been waiting for the arrival of a new metallic colours paint set from Army Painter in order to start these models off and once it arrived I put them to use. 

Painting was pretty straight forward with two thin(ish) coats of the metallic paint being then covered with a black wash. I then carried out two layers of dry brushing, the first with the original base colour and then the second with the Fairy Dust paint. Army Painter suggest using the Fairy Dust for edge highlighting and dry brushing and also say you can mix it with any acrylic colour to make a metallic version of that colour, something I may need to have a play with.

Prime, front and centre

The Marionette Prime is a Command option fort the Asterians, it's main strength is the low cost of only 20 points and the recently upgraded Splat Linked which allows you a second shot with another Marionette model. The fact you can use this on already activated models is rather handy and should help to make up for the 5+ shooting across most of the Marionette units.

The New Matsudan sub-faction also brought another leader who synergises well with Marionette's, the Toshiyori, it's ability buffs the Marionettes for this turn but means they do not get to activate next turn.

Next up are three Specialists, the hard plastic sprue that the models came on had plenty of options for upgrading the basic model so whilst the Prime got all the extra pieces I gave one upgrade to each of the Specialists. I also went with a general scheme of more red coverage for the Prime / Specialists.

L-R, Grenade Launcher, Phlogistor, Sniper

All of the Specialists shoot on a 5+ and I had the parts for one Phlogistor (Flamer), one Grenade Launcher and one Sniper.

Keeping a couple of normal Marionette's near snipe so he can be activated for a couple of extra shots via the Prime's Splat (if you got lucky on the command dice) would seem to be rather tasty.

Lastly we have six of the Marionette Troop type, at only 10 points each these are a cheap unlock which is very useful in a Matsudan list as they are all Specialists and around the 20-25 point mark so you want a fair few cheap Troop's to get the maximum number of the Matsudan in.

Their stats aren't anything to write home about but they are Constructs so cannot be pinned, which is rather handy, not being knocked over is always good.

So a nice start to the next Deadzone faction, I have a reasonable number of models left to paint including the Spectre which I am really looking forward to getting some paint on. The plan is to play around with variations on the colour scheme with the small models so I can have a guide to what should be done with the big robot at the end.