Chaos Predator Tank

Here's another model repainted and repaired from a long time ago. In ages past, I was given a Predator tank by a friend. It was in an odd state, having been Nurgleised with candle wax, and the side guns were a mess. This was a long time ago, to there won't be any WIP pictures.

I put new sponsons on, taken from an old Leman Russ model. I never liked the weedy-looking dangling sponsons on the Predator (and the Land Raider, for that matter), which look as if they'd snap off like wing mirrors. I used green stuff to make weld lines to disguise the meeting of sponson and tank. Also, I replaced the turret with a Leman Russ turret, largely because I'd lost the one that it came with.

The turret guns (nominally, twin lascannons) came from ancient conversion beamers, of which I seem to have quite a few. I gave them dragon's head barrels. I don't really go for very ornate chaos tanks, but I needed to make the guns look impressive. They now look rather like something from an Ian Miller painting, so that's fine with me.

The last part was the square of plasticard covering the front panel of the tank. That was added late on. I used green stuff to add a welded chaos star, probably added by a zealous crewman. It looks a bit excessive to me, but compared to other tanks I've seen (and built!) it's pretty mild.

Then it needed painting. This was largely dark grey followed by a lot of weathering, including some powder on the tracks and rust and scratches on the upper body. It looks rather battered, but after 10,000 years in the warp, that happens.

Now I just need to work out what to do with what's left of the Leman Russ...

Probably My Favourite Miniature

This time, I've repainted one of my favourite models ever. I first bought this miniature when I was about 15. I would have picked it out of a red Citadel catalogue when I was at school, and my friend Mark - or, more likely, his parents - would have added the serial number to a list of things to order by fax.

Anyhow, my point is that this model is brilliant. The sculpting is excellent, the concept is absolutely cool - its a demon wearing armour made of the bones of a goat, for goodness' sake - and aptly, it's completely metal. Actually, that's not quite right, as the shield is from a modern plastic chaos knight. Even the spindly legs make him look like something out of a medieval manuscript (well. the last level of Doom 2, at least). I imagine that he'd make a good Master of Executions for the Chaos Marine army - or maybe Lord of Duels, given his armament. That kind of thing.

The next two lowlifes are old metal Goliath gangers, whom I intend to use as Chaos Cultists, should the need ever arise. The chap with the small flamer is a "normal" ganger, and the man with the chainsword is a gang leader. As with the other Goliaths, I don't really like the style all that much (although the sculpting is fine, especially on Flamer Boy), and I painted them fairly quickly. I used a red undercoat on the skin, for a slightly raw feel, and the trousers were painted in contrast paint, as per their comrades. That's the whole gang painted, ready to soak up some bullets for their chaos overlords on the battlefield!

I've always felt that Chaos cults wouldn't just include robed worshippers of Khorne, Tzeentch and the other chaps. My feeling is that both Chaos and Imperial crusades would draw all sorts of loonies: soldiers of fortune, criminal gangs, crackpot militias, lasgun nuts and similar deranged types, tagging along in the hope of impressing the Chaos Marines enough to join their ranks - or just for the chance to nick a load of stuff.

So, I painted up a few renegade crazies as well. In truth, I've had these models knocking around for ages and I wanted shot of them. The woman (the slightly smaller model with the gasmask) is from a Kickstarter that Bad Squiddo did ages ago, although I cut her hair down a bit. I'm not sure where the two men are from.

So that's it for now. Another tiny dent in the huge pile of lead.

The Sea Dragon

Here's another thing that I've had lying on my desk for a very long time.

Ages ago, I bought a skaven abomination. With the help of a lot of DAS clay and a Tyranid head, I made the lower half into a dragon. I was never totally happy with it, and I decided to give it a sprucing-up and repaint to match my pirate ogres. It would make a good sea monster, that they had induced to help them.

I added fins to its body, neck and tail. The body fin came from a high elf dragon, and the other two were left over from some river trolls (which also joined the ogre army). The head received some "ears" from (I think) an ancient plastic dragon kit, and the crest was elongated with plasticard and green stuff. The barnacles on its back were just blobs of sculpted green stuff.

I made the base out of coffee stirrers and a small stick of dowell. There's something weird about painting wood to look like wood, but it works far better that way. I don't have a work in progress picture, but for comparison, here's the GW skaven abomination:

And here's another picture of the sea monster. I gave it quite a dark paint scheme, to suggest something that lives deep underwater. I'm not sure why it's got all those stitches all over it (perhaps a helpful ogre repaired it after a big battle) but it looks mean enough to join the ranks of the pirates. Arrrgh!

A Friendly Robot and a Big Green Chap

A couple more things from the huge pile of unpainted things.

First up, we've got a Privateer Press trollblood model. The trollbloods are very much Privateer Press' invention (they're basically heroic orc-type creatures), and tend to have either a Scottish or an early 20th century soldier-type look. I quite like the models, although they're inevitably rather cartoony (I've got a whole load of them somewhere...).

This particular model is a mercenary called Bull. While he's not exactly right, he reminds me a bit of Suruk the Slayer from Space Captain Smith. I painted his skin in the same way I did my orks and goblins: Russian Uniform washed with Dark Angels Green (or whatever it's called at the moment) and highlighted up with pink flesh. I'm rather pleased with him.

The other model is based on an old Ramshackle Games tracked lower body that I've had lying on my desk for about a year. I gave it a head made out of half of a smoke grenade launcher and some plasticard. I wondered about making it into Wall-E, but I couldn't get the arms to work (or stick to the rest of the model), so I just gave him big antennae made from the handles of a storm bolter instead. I expect he's a friendly robot, who rolls around helping out.

And that's it for the moment. Except for the sea monster.

Mantic Characters

It feels like ages since I posted here. It actually isn't - it's been ten days or so - but time is currently passing rather weirdly, and we seem to be in about the 120th day of February. Once again I've been dipping into the huge pile of unpainted models, and this time round it's Mantic.

Last year, or maybe the year before that, I got a load of Dreadball models cheaply. Most were the cyborg "Revenant" team, and a few were referees or fans. As ever, the concepts are fine, the sculpts are okay, and the casting isn't great.

Here are two cyborg orcs (or orks, or orx). I think they're the best models in the team. The detail is a little soft, but they've come out ok.

And here are two people who I think are either coaches or civilians. They were made out of less rubbery plastic than the orcs, and the detail was a good deal sharper. I made them bases out of plasticard and bits of wire. I really enjoyed painting them both. They'll make good underworld figures or "normal people" for the futuristic town.

Disco Sue is an important and extroverted local leader, noted for her large hair and dogged refusal to get with the times and dress like a post-apocalyptic cyberpunk.

Willy the Fish is a short-tempered fishman, who inherited an empire of crime after the tragic filleting of his former boss, Piscine Bob. He we see him shouting in outrage at an allegation that his enemies "sleep with the fishes".

Finally - and I'm saving the most exciting stuff till last - here are two concrete posts! Amazing! They're TT Combat MDF models, with the joins at least partly obscured by DAS clay. The posters were printed out from ones on the GW site.

After complaining about Mantic's stuff (which isn't actually all that bad) I went off and bought the All Out War Walking Dead game. The models in it are really nice: sharply-detailed one-piece sculpts. I might even get round to painting them one day.

The Last (Four) Samurai

So, I've finally come to the last four of the Warlord Games samurai heroes.

First up, we've got a ninja and a female samurai. The ninja is assembled as per usual. For the female samurai, I cut off the banner she was holding and replaced it with a blade from a skaven. It's the right shape, but a bit hefty. Never mind. Apparently, such weapons were standard among female samurai, owing to the longer reach. I also cut her head off and turned it to a better angle. Then I ordered another of the same miniature off Ebay.

Next up were the last two: an archer and the unconverted version of the lady holding a banner. I'm pleased with the heraldic design on the banner, which is the same as the design on the samurai with the blue coat.

And finally, here's a group shot of them all, about to have an adventure. To begin with, I had thought that they weren't great miniatures, but I've really warmed to them in the course of the project. I'm quite tempted to get some of Warlord's ninjas, but I've got far too much to paint already.

Chaos Terminator Lord

I've had the pieces of this model knocking around for ages, and this week I thought I'd take the opportunity to finally put it together.

The basis of this model was a chaos terminator torso and space wolf legs and arms. As the commander of the army, he needed to be sufficiently huge. I felt that assembling the model as usual made him feel a little bit stumpy, especially with his cloak heaped onto his back.

I've never really liked space marines, power fists or making space marines even bigger, so I decided, logically, to give my space marine a power fist and make him bigger. In fairness, I gave him my favourite power fist, which I took from an old metal chaos marine champion. It's hard to see the details here, but they come out better later. I was pleased that it fitted his plastic arm so well.

The legs were "chaosified" a little with green stuff. I still haven't got the hang of this and my additions feel rather blobby to me, but they'll do.

To make him less stumpy, I added thin bits of plasticard under his soles. I also cut the ball-joint at the top of his legs and put another piece of plasticard under it, to raise it slightly and lengthen his torso for a bit of extra height (being big is clearly an important sign of status in the 40k world, along with wearing no helmet or wearing a really fancy hat).

The left arm was surprisingly fiddly, as it was supposed to hold a shield. He got a space wolf axe and a fist from an old orc big 'un. It looks suitably clunky. I added spikes to the left shoulder pad to balance out the cloak a bit and sculpted green stuff so it looked as if they'd burst through his armour. His head came from the space wolf terminators.

Now time for some paint. I painted him pretty much as I've done the rest of the chaos marines, except that I made his face a little more human than the other marines, by mixing in some blue-grey with the skin colour. I found an Imperial eagle to go on his base. I'm not sure about the freehand on his cloak, but it's the best I can do.

Wulfrid Hammerssen was once a loyal captain of the Space Wolves. After winning his spurs at the Purging of Scapulon, he joined the war-host that Logan Grimnar sent to assist the Imperium during the First War For Armageddon. Here, Wulfrid and his squad led PDF soldiers and guardsmen against the chaos cult known as the Red Arterial Spray, routing the enemy completely.

At the end of the war, however, the Inquisition decided that too much of the population had been exposed to the corruption of chaos. The people of Armageddon, including those who had fought alongside the Space Wolves, were to be deported and killed, and the Wolves themselves were to be mind-wiped.

Enraged by this betrayal, Wulfrid gathered four ships, filled them with as many citizens as he could manage, and set a course away from the planet. Cursing the Inquisition, the Administratum and the whole Imperium, Wulfrid headed into the depths of space.

Since then, he has found new allies. His ships, along with smaller vessels captured over the decades, continue to haunt the space lanes, preying on Imperial and renegade craft alike. The descendants of those he rescued still fight alongside him. Any he captures are offered the choice of freedom from the diktats of the Imperium, or a swift trip out of the airlock. Inevitably, Wulfrid's war against the servants of the Emperor has drawn the interest of the Chaos gods, and he has found himself with some powerful, but dangerous, additions to his horde.

Wulfrid the Turncoat, as he is now known, continues to plague the forces of order. For a long while, he was content to be one of many small thorns in the Imperium's side - but now that chaos is resurgent, he has found new opportunities to spread his own savage brand of freedom far and wide.