Back in the 1990s, the Imperial Guard introduced us all to the Catachan Jungle Fighters, who have been duking it out against the galaxy’s predators ever since.
It was the middle of 2nd Edition and a growing Games Workshop was expanding the all new Imperial Guard. Out was the old Rogue Trader Imperial Army and in was the set of famous Regimants that are with us to this day. Each month was full of new minis and the universe was expanding before the player’s eyes.
Back in December 1994, White Dwarf 180 came out with the first Catachans, both minis and rules.
The Rules & Background
Here is the original background on Catachan, it’s death world environs, and the alpha predator culture that evolved to survive on it. You get the link and call-back to the Catachan Devil, one of the original beasts from the Rogue Trader hardback, now given context and a home.
You get the awesome tale of Orks painting red bandanas on their Gargants as a measure of respect for fighting against Catachans, and the humble origins of the IG heavy weapons teams. These would evolve into the later IG plastic teams, but first appears here with rules to cover the 2-model missile launcher team seen below.The Minis
Catachans ain’t got to to bleed, nor shave.
Fast Forward to 2020
Over the last few months we’ve seen GW kick out a handful of new Limited Edition minis and if you reach back a year to include Sly Marbo, you can see a pattern forming.
Let’s hope this means the Catachans are getting some love in a future Astra Militarum release. 
When GW gets around to redoing the Lictor in plastic, they should put all these together in a special set.
~ If it bleeds, we can kill it.
