Squatting or Forming the Guard

Due to my items arriving I continued work on my regular and veteran guardsmen. These models were what I started out with and were always meant to be the core of my Imperial Guard army. Now finally all are assembled so no more empty bases on my table as reminders where models still need to be added.
Each and every Squad has its own Vox Caster as well as a Special Weapon trooper carrying a Plasma gun. My reasoning behind having a Vox Caster is that I might not need them but if I do there is no need to scrounge for bits when that time arrives, the Plasma gun is based around the Squats being generally more technologically advanced than their human counterparts (with my luck this means my Squats melt a lot!).

Platoon Command Squad; two Plasma Guns, Vox and a Banner.

Infantry Squad 1; Heavy Weapon Team, Vox, Plasma Gun

Infantry Squad 2; Heavy Weapon Team, Vox, Plasma Gun

Infantry Squad 3; Heavy Weapon Team, Vox, Plasma Gun

Heavy Weapon Squad; Mortar Teams

I actually messed up during assembly and ended up with one regular Squat trooper less than I needed so I demoted the model originally converted as the Platoon Command Officer to the unit Sergeant for Infantry Squad 3 (behind him if you look carefully you can see a model I was going to make the unit sergeant at first). I do realize that the names of the Squads are not very imaginative and they will most likely get proper names in time.

Veteran Squad; Vox, three Plasma guns

All the models in my Veteran Squad are wearing capes which I might try to paint up with a camouflage team so they can serve properly as Camo Cloaks. At the moment this unit is the only one I am sure of that I want to run as Veterans. I do have twelve B'dass models as well but I am still not sure as to what their purpose is going to be, at the moment it is either Veterans or regular Infantry. Something similar about the Warmachine models, though they are definately Veterans and possibly Stormtroopers.

Hammerfall High Shield Gun Corpse with a regular Squat for size Reference

I did assemble my unit of Hammerfall High Shield Gun Corpse, though I am leaving off their shields until after I get them painted up, attaching the shield now will make it a lot harder to paint it properly. Also the Squat in the image above belongs to Infantry Squad 1, which is why there are only nine models in the unit as I forgot to put it back for the group picture (Oops).

Iron Hand Straken, and two spare Plasma Gunners

With the arrival of my bits I also finished my version of Iron Hand Straken and I equipped two Squats with my last metal plasma guns in order to potentially field a Command Squad with all plasma weapons equipped.

Possible Ogryns, with an actual Ogryn for scale

So I came across the model on the left on Tabletop Fix (damn you Falk!) and just loved the Bioshock vibe the model has. It is called a Hardsuit and is available from Recreational Conflict. I do like the model but I still need to toy around with it's posture and the arms and legs seem to be a bit too thin for my liking. The model on the right is a Grizzly Exosuit from the Starship Troopers range, which I envision as actually being operated from a Squat seated inside the bulk of the machine. Problem with the Grizzly is that I would love to get my hands on some more models but they are now Out of Production and Out of Stock at Mongoose (where I purchased the five that I own now). So if anyone can point me to finding some, id be appreciative.

Hardsuit

Grizzly Exosuit

In my eyes both are viable options, so if anyone out there has an opinion feel free to share and enlighten me.

I did paint up my first Squat model as a test to see if my color scheme works alright as well as to test some of the Army Painter stuff I got in. I went with a brown and gray color scheme, I figured Earth and Rock tones would work for them, I did the metals in Dwarf Bronze as opposed to the usual Boltgun Metal. At the time of writing the model is still drying from paint and me 'splashing on' the Quick Shade - Dark Tone, so once it has dried properly I'll dose it with anti gloss and take a picture.

So far so good.