A few outlandish conversions and yet more HQ's

Righto, it's been quite a while since I've posted anything but hey, I've been busy. Get off my back already!

*tumbleweed*

Anyway, here's a few of the things that I've been working on recently, and a few in progress shots too.

Firstly, a Khornate Lord on Juggernaut, with the (pretty scary game-wise) Axe of Blind Fury. To the extent of the latter, he is in fact actually blind, which I thought was a nice image.

As you can see, I've kept the overall colour scheme of the rest of the army, with a red helm and right shoulder-pad to match the Khorne Berserkers that I've already got painted up.

The axe does actually have teeth, it's a rather large chainaxe stolen from an Ork Nob from the Assault on Black Reach box-set.  The legs are from an old metal Chaos Knight. 

I'm yet to try him out in a game, but I reckon he'll be pretty deadly when run with a squad of bikes (or maybe spawn, anything that can keep up really). The juggernaut finally being a cavalry model (that took what, 3 editions?) coupled with 7+D6 Str 5 AP2 attacks on the charge makes him a scary one!

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Next up is my Dark Apostle, who needs a couple of bits finished off that I didn't notice until after I took the picture. You might recognise him as previously being equipped differently from a previous post (he used to have a plasma pistol and power sword, being initially put together prior to the new codex). A quick arm and hand swap made better use of the model.

I still need to decorate his crozius properly and highlight his face.  

It's good having a cheap, well equipped HQ that grants fearless but I really like that Ld bubble he gives to surrounding units. Very handy, especially given the across-the-board drop in Ld the new codex took.

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HELDRAKE!!!

Made of Trees!!!!

Because I can!!!!!!!

The fire is polystyrene in case you wondered, apparently someone did. 

A better shot of the wingspan. It's pretty much the same size as an actual heldrake, which is surprising as I eyeballed the whole thing. 

The fire comes out, for both storage/transport and, well, moving around the board. 

The body/wings/neck/tail are all made out of  the Citadel Wood kit (which I love, and need to buy another one of!). The claws are dryad legs attached to some spare defiler legs and the rest is just spare armour plates from the soulgrinder/defiler kits. And those prominent spines from the old Dark Eldar raider.

I'm pretty proud of the model to be honest, I think it's come out really well.

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Speaking of flyers... Here's a hell blade. I've made another, near identical one. They're both built on a foamboard frame, covered in superglue/tissue papier maché. The engine block/undercarriage is made of parts of a toy gun from the pound-shop.

I've painted a few reddish patches, to sort of look like it's burning from the inside.

Those air-intakes are simply super-glue pot lids. The Autocannons are kebab skewers and plastic tubing. The cockpit is a dryad body with a lot of the spare plant parts. I intend to find some kind of translucent canopy in near future. 

Close up of the gun barrel that's become an undercarriage. 

Unfortunately, due to the incredibly scratch-built nature of this product, I don't think it'll go down too well at the local GW. However, if I ever start playing at a club, I'll probably be fielding these as counts-as Heldrakes with a Hades autocannon, as I don't yet have the book with the 6ed flyer rules from Forge world.
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WiP: 

Here's a couple of HQ choices.

This guy stands considerably taller than your average marine, as his legs and waist have been lengthened. I thought I'd equip him with a very basic power weapon and plasma pistol loadout.

Basecoated Lord based on the Kranon model with Lightning Claw and the awesome Burning Brand.

To the left is a close up of the Burning Brand of Skegness... or whatever. As you can see, it's an amalgamation of a plastic Cadian flamer and the Cultist flamer from Dark Vengeance. Kranon's sword has been removed and his hand kept in place. The whole thing has been topped off with a flame made from a top-knot, something I've done previously on flamers in one of my Havoc squads.




Also WiP, a mutilator.
As the official models are ugly as sin, I thought I'd go for a different look.

The Cthulu-esque mouth tentacles are echoed in my warp-talons. They'll be along next time!

An ogre, a tau gun drone and some hormagaunts all contributed to this one!
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The BIG WiP: Forgefiend

Here's something I took a few hours this weekend to put together. It's entirely made of spare parts. Well. And wood.

I'll be sticking some green glowy parts not only for some eyes but also on the ends of the autocannon barrels, as I can't really drill them without splitting the skewers!!

The head and neck are removable revealing a hollow chest cavity in which I will be putting a green LED, which will give a daemonic glow through the slits in the shoulders

I haven't copied the shape of the forgefiend exactly but it's pretty close!

I've magnetised the autocannons and of course there's a space in the mouth, so I have the option of making a triple EctoPlasma 'fiend too. I'm excited to see how he does on the tabletop.


That's all for this time... Warp Talons and cultists next time I think...

LED challenge marine!

So, I was recently challenged by the local GW staffer, and some regulars, to put an LED inside a regular marine.

So I did. 

The light is orange, I would have preferred green but I only remembered to do it the night before the challenge was due!

The extra tall base (I may put some Tyranids/zombies climbing up it for that classic DOOM feel) hides the wiring, and to be fair, is a lot taller than it needs to be, mainly as I was on a time constraint, but also as my soldering skills are a little sub-par (well, and my soldering iron is pretty much broken).

I took one of those 4-for-£1 electric tea lights (poundland has them), which not only contained a power source and LED, but circuitry to make the LED flicker in a 'fiery' way, which really adds to the effect. I then snipped the LED away from its original wiring and re-soldered it to wires that passed up through the Chaos Space Marines legs. That means that there is no wiring on the outside of the model, which is excellent, the LED itself being housed in the chest/neck area, which was all hollowed out with a drill. The base has that strange gap in it to allow access for the battery cover slide.

As an aside, I would love to make the muzzle-flash bits light up, but this was the first time I'd attempted any, and I think they turned out O.K. as they are. I made them by whittling down bits of sprue, and then shaping them further with a dremel.

More light up madness to follow no doubt!

Dreadnoughts! Or Helbrutes, whatever.

Most people really, really seem to hate the chaos dreadnought. Just because he might go crazy and kill your own men! I however have a soft spot for them, and the conversion opportunities they present!

First up is my first chaos dread, he's a space crusade dreadnought (from 1989 I believe), with a good deal of cannibalised parts, mostly from other walkers.

A defiler 'mask' was a good substitute for the goofy original face he had. I have two spare cowlings from space crusade dreads (the smaller ones though, not this one), they might find their way onto a traitor sentinel squadron...

The tube things are his missile launcher, honest.

 All the arms/guns are magnetised, though I've never bothered to equip him with anything else. The beauty of the missile launcher means if he does flip out and decide to fire at his own side, I can elect to use frag and bounce it harmlessly from a nearby Rhino.

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Next up there's this amalgamation of various parts. He's got the legs of a space crusade dread (and the lower torso), the metal sarcophagi from an actual chaos dreadnought and err... well the rest is trees and dryads. I've only just made this one (just before Dark Vengeance came out), and I'm fully aware that CC dreads aren't all that fantastic in 6th due to the proliferation of krak grenades among most enemies. But it seemed like a good idea! And who knows, he's cheap enough to field without really caring if he does anything terribly effective.

I drilled out the... crotch things. Those are his two twinlinked bolters.

I'm pretty pleased how the dryads-for-arms thing worked out. Didn't end up looking like Megazord, which was my main worry. 

I think the blending on the claws came out pretty well! 

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Right, last dread. Obviously the most recent, being none other than the helbrute. Now the helbrute is a fantastic model, and probably my favourite part of the Dark Vengeance box. But even a kit that well sculpted isn't safe from tree-ification!!

Perspective!!!

 I left out the face and front plate and magnetised his weapon barrels so I can have other, more useful weapons. I've only made the multimelta he came with and the TL lascannon so far.

 Now, astute readers will notice that he has a very tall base. This isn't just to make him more impressive/imposing (he's only just taller than the other two dreads I have, the helbrute is a very short model). Nope. He's on a big base because I am a cheapskate, and that was the size of the battery pack that powers his internal lighting!!

Behold! Lighty-up chaosy death! Oh, and his multimelta back on. 

The base actually contains a solar panel, revealed when the stone slab between his legs is removed, so I didn't have to faff about changing batteries etc. The switch is concealed in the grass behind him, so he won't use up the charge unnecessarily.

Shot showing some of the 'green glow' bits I made in his back. 

Inside the hollow cavity of the upper body sits a regular, white LED, wired up through the legs into the base. Shone through some carved/melted necron rod sprue (or template sprues, I'm not sure where it came from) it gives off a nice glow! Obviously it's subtle at best in a well lit room, hence the dodgy photography.

That's all for today. Defilers can wait until I make the second one up and convert my original one to have a decent weapon loadout (a million CC arms isn't always best apparently!).

A Sample of CSM and the Daemonic Contingient

Righto, as promised, this time there's a few shots of one of the squads of my Chaos Marines.

Champion, two plasma gunners and normal marines in the back

Standard Bearer and Champion. I've been using that banner top to represent an Icon of Chaos Undivided - I think it's from a beastmen set? 

Just another angle of the squad.

So yeah, that's what my regular marines look like! I'm really pleased with how the branches-for-horns thing has worked out, even if it does make them a little difficult to store! The Aspiring Champion is equipped with a power fist - even though it's a grassy bit from the dryad sprue it's sufficiently obvious and I've never had any complaints (Most AC's have one, though this looks to change with 6th so any future squads may have power swords or nothing particularly special at all). All the AC's in the army have that head (or the eyepiece variant), and those on foot and have a larger branch piece mounted on their backpack as opposed to on their helm, in addition to the chainmail loincloth. I find it helps tie them together.

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Raptors - I've not heard of many other chaos players advocating their use, but I really like them! They're certainly useful for getting an icon into place quickly and for melta delivery, as well as being O.K. assault troops. Anyway, here are mine so far:

First thing that people notice is the contrails, which I'm pretty pleased with. It's all made of melted sprue, once again, ventilation is a good idea!! In the back you can see the AC for the unit, he's an oddball in the army as he's equipped with lightning claws. I think originally he had the rending upgrade thing from the 3.5 codex, hence the hands!

More Raptors. They all have pennies glued to the underside of their bases, they fell over alot before I did that!

And one more. I know the lines in the jump packs aren't right, I did these a while ago O.K.! The heads for all my raptors (including some metal ones I'm in the process of converting up) are the Khorne Bezerker skulls with the 'ears' filed off.  

I've had this squad of 6 for as long as I can remember, but I'll be adding a few more, as mentioned metal (urgh) to the pool. Here's hoping they get some fun rules soon! Either way I'll keep using them, no-one expects them.

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Possessed! - In order to ease into the Daemonic side of things I figure I'd show some of the possessed. They're one of the rare units who feature exposed skin (except havocs who are all bald, I'll post them up at some point). Ghoul and Kroot parts are a big feature with them, as well as more green sprue and of course dryads!

This guy to the foreground is one of my favourite possessed. He just looks... gnarly.

Check out the guy in the background, his upper thigh and arm (between shoulder to wrist) are green melty stuff!

And of course the obligatory 'aaargh' pose. I'm working on another one who is actually being split in half by the green glow. It's going to be tough to pull off, I tell you!

So yeah, possessed. They don't achieve much really! But they're fun to make so that's enough of an excuse to have some! One day they'll be useful.

Though not quite a possessed marine, this <-- is Geoff. He doesn't get used very much, he's an aspiring champion with no upgrades who exists solely to be possessed by greater daemons. I like the wood parts I've used on him though so I might make him some kind of funky possessed champion. Who knows!










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In a similarly not-quite-Daemonic vein, here are two Obliterators. They're made of Treeman models, one of which is veerrrrrrrrry old I think!

This guy needs a smaller base, I'm not sure why I put him on that one. The blue bit is meant to be his helmet/glass dome head thing, but it looks kind of like he's wearing a hat. Oh well.

Both of these guys have their green glow stuff magnetised on. Mostly because at the time I'd just got some magnets and hey, why not!?

 If I get any more Obliterators I'm not really sure where to start. On a side note, I knew I had a power scourge dreadnought arm somewhere, now looking at that last picture I finally know where it went! What it takes to notice....

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Daemonic Incursion!!

Not much to say about them really, they're lesser Daemons, though from now on (given the allies system) they'll mostly be Plague Bearers.

I've only finished painting 8 of them, I have 30. :(

In an equally dryad-tastic style, here's my take on epidemus. I couldn't think of a way to represent him so he's a hollow cloak, which echoes the hollow helms or bare skulls my marine HQ's have.

I wasn't sure whether to keep it completely tree-based but once I'd settled on making him a cloak with hands, I figured he'd also have scrolls etc.! The Empire flagellant and bretonnian men at arms sprues are full of useful bits like these. 

You can see how I've replaced an arm each (and used that back slot thing Dryads have) as branches to support Epidemus' platform. And how branches for the legs for his 'desk'.

A recent convert to Nurgle is up next, previously he's been my summoned greater daemon. Now he'll just be a Daemon Prince (of the Chaos Daemon variety) with Gaze and not a great deal else - dedicated to getting that tally up!

Except his head, he's entirely custom sculpted from melted sprue. It worked pretty well I think. 

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As they've served me so faithfully in recent years (what, with those delicious 20pt wings!), and I neglected to put them in my last post about HQs, here are my daemon princes. One is a tree with Orion, king in the woods emerging from it, one is a huge mishmash of ork, tyranids, uruk hai, ogres, tank parts and green stuff. That's all there there is to it really!! 

A lot of people actually mistake him for a tree in some games. Which is hilarious when they forget how dangerous this tree is. Camouflage is fantastic.

Yeah, I can't name all the parts on this guy. I know this legs are mostly some shoddy greenstuffing around a tyranid warrior, and that his body might be mad-dok grotsnik bulked up. This is his 2nd army, previously I collected alpha legion   - this guy and my land raider survived only to be tree-ified!

Also, the second guy has magnetised wings. Now he can double up as a Chaos daemons prince, without costing an arm and a leg! 

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That's about it for this post, I think I've covered all my daemonic things so far! Well, except the tzeentch element, but they'll get their own thing soon enough.

Of course, honorary mention goes out to the most useless unit in the codex, who once, once, did something useful by charging 24" in a turn (to the surprise of everyone) and wiping out some guardsmen. 

If my memory serves correctly, the original purpose I bought this model (there's a mordheim possessed under all that dryad) was as a daemon prince. His wings kept falling off and he was just too short. How the mighty have fallen to the ruinous powers!

Next time I might post something other than chaos. A Likely Story...