Van Saar Starting Gang List

When you don't play a game but you build models from it you can do as you please when it comes to equipping and converting them since all you've got to go by is what looks good to you.  When you then decide to transition to potentially playing the game well now you've got to play by the rules, which means learning the rules and learning how those rules may turn a cool looking model into a waste of time and credits destined to die and boost your opponent's campaign prospects.

After a bit of reading in forums and websites about starting gang lists I decided to go with Genghis Cohen's Serious Business Van Saar list.  A basic, solid list with recommendations for upgrades if they live that long and theoretically a list that even if I turn out to be a savant at playing Necromunda shouldn't earn me jeers and disgust when it appears on the table.

The concept for the gang was to use Mechanicus models instead of the actual Van Saar since I have a lot of Mechanicus models/bits and I've never really connected with the Van Saar gang aesthetics either in the original Necromunda or the 2018 version.

The List:

1. Prime (Trick Shot): Plasma Gun, Mesh Armor, Bodyglove (245)

2. Augmek (Gunfighter): Plasma Pistol, Laspistol, Mesh Armor, Bodyglove (180)

3. Augmek (Hip Shooting): Grav Gun, Mesh Armor, Bodyglove (245)

4. Tek (Specialist): Lasgun, Mech Armor, Body Glove (90)

5. Tek: Lasgun, Bodyglove (75)

6. Tek: Lasgun, Bodyglove (75)

7. Neotek: Laspistol, Photon Flash Grenades, Bodyglove (90)

I hope this will be a project that has a lot of potential for both expanding the gang as it changes through a campaign as well as affording modeling opportunities for cool looking converted models that have little to no place in an actual game like the lascannon leader or an archeotek with a spider rig, an energy shield, plasma pistol and cyberteknika to improve their chances in close combat.  That model would be a few hundred credits to still not be the best close combat model in a given game so enjoy the modeling and maybe running them in one off games will be their destiny but that's okay.

Four of the seven are shown below.  Trying to differentiate leader and champions by giving them non-ranger bodies including Anvil Industries torsos and backpacks.  Need to figure out how to do the hoverboard for the neotek.

2021 Hobby Plans

The 2021 Necromunda roadmap guided my thinking about my hobby plans for the year.  2020 was the most productive hobby year for me so far in in 25 years of 40K and Necromunda buying and modeling.  Still not a lot compared to the properly productive hobbyists out there but much better than my earlier efforts.  Midwinter Minis and Sonic Sledgehammer Studios helped me overcome my aversion to painting while Eric's Hobby Workshop illustrated a practical approach to scratch terrain making that I hope to explore over the course of the coming year.  Hobby inspiration and advice will continue to come from the blogs and videos of many great hobbyists with regular visits to Matakishi's Tea House, Black Magic Craft, Miscast, Pulp Alley and Convert or Die among many others.

The plan is to draft off the roadmap and use it to guide for both Necromunda purchases and hobbying for the year.

• 2021 1st Quarter:  
• Hobby plans: 
• Write a Van Saar gang list for the start of a campaign, model and paint it.
• Use Mechanicus models to run a counts as Van Saar gang.
• Model and paint 2 underhive citizens a month.  Could be vendors, factorum workers, guilders, etc.
• Purchase models, if need be, from smaller manufacturers.
• Terrain:
• Assemble Promethium Forge terrain.
• Build and paint a gang territory terrain piece (Stinger Mold Sprawl, Refuse Drift, etc.) using scratch built techniques combined with mdf and plastic terrain if need be.
• Purchase plans: 
• Cawdor gang
• Cawdor and Escher gang champion FW weapon packs
• Escher Death Maidens and Wyld Runners
• Khainite Shadowstalkers
• 2021 2nd Quarter:
• Hobby plans:
• Write a Cawdor gang list for the start of a campaign, model and paint it.
• Model and paint 2 underhive citizens a month.  Could be vendors, factorum workers, guilders, etc.
• Assemble Promethium Forge terrain.
• Build and paint a gang territory terrain piece (Stinger Mold Sprawl, Refuse Drift, etc.) using scratch built techniques combined with mdf and plastic terrain if need be.
• Purchase plans:
• Book of Faith
• 2021 3rd Quarter:
• Hobby plans:
• Write a Delaque gang list for the start of a campaign, model and paint it.
• Model the gang as an Inquisitor and their retinue.
• Model and paint 2 underhive citizens a month.  Could be vendors, factorum workers, guilders, etc.
• Paint Promethium Forge terrain.
• Build and paint a gang territory terrain piece (Stinger Mold Sprawl, Refuse Drift, etc.) using scratch built techniques combined with mdf and plastic terrain if need be.
• Purchase plans:
• Book of Shadows
• 2021 4th Quarter:
• Hobby plans:
• Model and paint 2 underhive citizens a month.  Could be vendors, factorum workers, guilders, etc.
• Paint Promethium Forge terrain.
• Build and paint a gang territory terrain piece (Stinger Mold Sprawl, Refuse Drift, etc.) using scratch built techniques combined with mdf and plastic terrain if need be.
• Purchase plans:
• ???

Yaktribe's 2021 Finish Your Stuff Challenge will hopefully provide a mechanism to focus some hobby work on my many unfinished hobby projects over the course of the year.  Their quarterly contests will allow for some unplanned modeling opportunities if I get an idea.  Finally, I'll hopefully have a number of episodes of Sump City Radio and Dome Runners to help with my learning of the Necromunda game mechanics while enjoying their creative segments featuring inhabitants of the underhive and the misadventures.