"Will we ever see the Squats again? " Topic

Just musing and thinking about the old days when the Space Dwarves were part of the fluff of 40K. Yes there were rumors a few years ago that the Demiurge as a race featured only in Battle Fleet Gothic were in fact the Squats and an economic ally of the Tau. But nothing came of that and really it is time for a new faction/power/race to be added to the 40K pantheon. Why not bring back a re-vamped version of the short but stout lads that look like ZZ Top clones scrunched down. I miss those guys. And screw the Jervis Johnson claim they were eaten by the Nids!

Yep. They're due out with the release of the plastic Sisters of Battle kits, an entire update of both lines.

Seriously?????

You have to be pulling both my legs.

In all honesty, I'm thinking never.

Reminding GW of even the successful parts of their history is unwise in the present climate ( EG, metal miniatures ) so reminding them of the wildly conflicting forms the Squats took in one army will not fly.

Not even the Emperor can plumb the mind of GW leadership, but I'm guessing never.

I thought the Mantic Forge Fathers were the current unofficial proxy.

I will see them again, but that's only because I'm converting my own from IG parts. Cutting down legs and sculpting that iconic padded armor chest has been tricky, but I think I got it sorted enough to make it work. Putting beards and that huge visor on the IG helmet has been easier than I thought.They kind of look like space Amish…

heh – 'Space Amish'

"Is that a Emperor-blessed Power Rake, Brother Jebediah?"

It draws on the power of the Emperor to shun their enemies.

K-man, my response was a joke. Both events are as likely to happen.

YouTube link

Enjoy

I'm thinking not-going-to-happen.

I'm slowly painting through my large-ish collection of squats, and the idea of more is appealing, but I know that if they did come back (not going to happen) they'd probably be incompatible in size and style to my RT beauties, so it's a moot point for me.

If you want some space dwarves I've actually been fairly impressed with Mantic's "ForgeFather" line. Pretty good figs and while they don't have the parka padded armor aesthetic, they have a nice armored look. They seem to be slowly ticking off all the squat boxes (Thud guns, Exo armor, etc) while adding some neat additions of their own like dreadnaught-ish walkers in a space dwarf style.

Here is my first effort at converting IG parts.

My putty skills need some work. I ended up scrapping this one and working up a few new pieces. The legs and chest will be one piece. I cut the IG leg off just below the bottom of the shirt, then cut off the feet and reattach them after cutting the boot down, then glue on the chest after trimming the waist to fit, then putty the chest piece pattern. Also, the helmet needs the visor added.

Not from GW you won't.

Squats are still played here regularly, but you'll have to up your game and play Epic Armageddon. Bigger battles with old friends.

I won't hold my breath. Unless a whole new group takes over, who don't cling to that "I would rather be fed slowly, feet first through a chipper-shredder than give all these whining, formerly loyal customers what they want" attitude.

But I still stand by my promise that if the ever do, I will return to the fold, and try and keep my grumbling about post-2nd edition rules to a minimum.

I really like the look of the Forge Fathers, but absolutely hated Mantic's Dreadball plastic, so I never bothered.

Either way, after two dozen years, I still need to finish off my stunties. If anything could bind me to the earthly realm as a restless spirit, it would be that! Seriously.

Kieth that is a fantastic conversion!

Thanks! We'll see how far I get on the project while I'm working on my Orks. I plan to work up a set of 5 bodies and heads and cast them, then use regular IG arms and other parts to build my army.

I've got a large Squat Force in Epic scale … link link And Exodus Wars 6mm Khazari range makes pretty good Squat kinfolk too … link

I don't think GW will ever bring back Squats in their original form… they had no real direction. They were a miss-match of fantasy, sci-fi and were also just an off-shoot of the Imperial Guard. There was nothing that defined them.

I've taken to converting my own as well:

Lots of work to make them from the old Imperial Guard plastics:

link

The original plastic ones are still out there and if you try and get the badly painted ones, you can get them relatively cheaply. I have over a hundred and they cost me less than £1.00 GBP each :).

Bob Olley is still sculpting & selling 'em.
He just calls 'em 'Scrunts' now.
link

Very cool Insomniac! Love the classic Guard look. Nice work!

Woof :) :

Gawd I hope not. I had hoped that I had erased them from my conciousness. THEY DON'T EXIST. (Never did).

Hell, they were my favorite non-Ork line back then.

Wonderful work, Insomniac!

I can take or leave Olley's dwarves (like I could back than). And I don't really understand why he sells off parts of ranges he is still building onto.

Cheers :)

I'm not a fan of Olley's Scrunts either… in fact, his sculpting style in general has never been my favourite… but he is a very nice chap and I know that there are many, MANY people who love his work.

I can't grasp his business model either ????

I use Hasslefree Miniatures Weird War Dwarfs. I really like my Dwarf Rough Riders.

They are Scrunts by a different name, aren't they (an old Olley line that he sold off)?

Well to each their own but the original Squats had character as did all the early 40K models. I mean heck you had punk rocker looking space elves, i.e Eldar. I disagree that the Squats did not have direction. In the original RT fluff they were another "ab-human" race that was part of the Imperial Guard forces just as there used to be Ratling (Hobbits/Halflings) snipers, Ogrin (Ogres) and even Beastmen that could be fielded as part of an IG army. Then the Squats went away as did the Beastmen, yet GW kept the Ogrin and Ratlings and of course the Eldar are still around. So why not keep the other iconic race of fantasy as part of the 40K universe. The Squats provided a tough professional unit for the Imperial Guard but also had plenty of back story written for them.

Now I know that the real reason was money and probably as Jervis stated long ago that there was not anyone on the design team at the time that wanted to work on the Squats. I have a hard time believing that there was not someone at GW that was not willing to work on that.

I will add that given the popularity of the Olley Scrunts and the Hasslefree Grim plus a few others out there that clearly there is support for the stout fellows to engage in their own space opera.

But the Squats as an army, in their own right, didn't have direction.

As a part of the Imperial Guard, yes, they were good units but they were also a miss-match of ideas.

Standard Squat guardsmen on one hand, fantasy style Hearthguards and exo-armoured lords (even riding trikes)… but no 40k vehicles.

It would have been so much better for them to have had the Epic treatment and be given an identity as an army in their own right, rather than being special units in an Imperial Guard force.

Whatever the reason for getting rid of them was, it wasn't something unexpected.

But the Squats as an army, in their own right, didn't have direction.

Gee, and do any of the current armies have direction other than different overpriced large models?

Oh and they did have a direction back 20 years ago.

Firepower and lots of it.

Does it matter? We're talking about Squats not other races.

The basics are foot troops, leaders, APCs of some description, support of some description and maybe a few special units.

The Squats had no APCs and very little in the way of support. The special units (bikes/Exo-squats) were very limited.

Bearing in mind that Squats had massive homeworlds and were master builders/mechanics… you would have thought they would have a transport option of some sort, especially seeing as they are small and slow.

Hence, that is why I said the Epic route was more apt for them (even though some of the larger vehicles would be completely impractical on a 40K scale tabeltop… but I guess no more than a Warlord titan).

Adding them, like Ratlings, to the Imperial Guard wasn't good enough. They had far more history and depth and deserved much better. I think some of those on the design team realised this and with the lack of interest decided to put them out of their misery rather than allow them to remain as a bit of a 'joke race'.

Thing is no one wanted to design them.

But if you want them go to Mantic Games they have models.

No. Games Workshop cut them because they were too silly, and they aren't coming back. Now they only focus on serious things now, like Murderfang and the Lord of Skulls.

The Squats had transports. IIRC they rode in Rhinos just like the Space Marines AND the Guard back then. There are a few good Paul Bonner illustrations with them dismounting from one. As I understood it back then, they had access to all the stuff the Guard had access to, and then some.

Keith has the right of it the Squats had use of Rhinos and other Space Marine and Imperial Guard kit. In fact they even had access to Land Raiders. And the trikes with the melta gun mounted on it was priceless in my mind. I recall those fantastic Paul Bonner illustrations.

So Keith,…Pizzagrenadier???

I suppose I cannot say much having changed my moniker from whitemanticore to kallman.

I loved the template for the trikes to do their 180 degree maneuver and shoot with those Multi Meltas. Always a good time, no matter what happened :)

Yeah, I got bored with the moniker, so changed it to an old FPS online shooter tag. I always got a chuckle out of the idea of the name.

When I get around to working on the Squats I started converting, I really want to get them some Deimos Rhinos to ride around in.

Oh yes the good old days of the turning template. Some really good times with that. You had the same thing for the Ork buggies and such. It was never a dull moment.

I realised that the Squats were given boring Imperial vehicles… but it makes sense for them to have their own style of vehicles (seeing as they are master engineers/mechanics).

But I guess if they were just another arm of the Imperail army then what can I expect, I guess. It just lacks a lot of flavour :(.

I guess that depends on how much dwarf you want in your Squat. In the early fluff they were just abhumans. Humans genetically, just…short. They also suggested that the Squat homeworlds had been one of the few places to maintain the STC technology of the past. So while they may have been master engineers, it was still STC tech and would have a human design origin. So, being guardians of the STC, it stands to reason they would have the original STC weapons and vehicles. In that case, Rhinos make sense. As abhumans and protectors of the STC, I have no problem with the Squats being short people with Imperial weapons.

But…the early days of 40k being what they were, the Squats were released with the name "Space Dwarfs" on their first plastic box.

So…were they dwarves, with all of the aesthetic that race suggests, or were they Squats?

Seems the problem was that the GW design team never answered this question from the beginning. Early on, they were Squats (stunties with Imperial tech and look), and then when Epic came out they became full fledged dwarves with airships, land ships, and dwarf iconography everywhere. Since Epic and 40k were separate systems and ranges of minis, the two never fully merged until the whole thing was dropped (err sorry, eaten by Tyranids). Jervis Johnson said as much when he issued a statement on the Squats when the issue would not go away.

Seems to me you can have it however you like, you just won't have GW doing it for you.

For me, I like the original Squat, abhuman style. Enough dwarf flavor in the Hearthguard and the background and here and there to hint at the dwarf style, but with mostly an Imperial look and equipment to keep the abhuman element in the foreground.

But that's just me.

My Squat project will be focused on making the models based on new Guard parts but with the old Squat plastic look (quilted vests, gloves, visors on the helmets). I don't have the skill to make the Squat bikers (nor do I care for the idea). My Squats will be abhumans in Guard service with a Commissar behind them, pistol in hand riding into battle in Rhinos that don't break down because…Squats.

But the universe is a big place…

I use Hasslefree Miniatures for my Rough Riders

As Pizzagrenadier said, no one in GW wanted to model Squats so they killed them off. But they still have a following by the old timers that still play 40k, like myself. Right now, I use my Squats as my Imperial Guard, but I don't use my bikers at all. I even converted my Sentinels to have Squats crews in them.

I've tried to look for some online Squat codexes for 40k, but I never feel good trying to use an unsanctioned Codex verses my friends in our games.

I don't think GW will ever bring them back into 40k.