The 2010 Dark Eldar release was possibly one of the most spectacular GW releases ever. After basically fumbling every attempt at handling the Dark Eldar for over a decade, GW managed to entirely redesign an entire army, putting it on the map as one of the most beautiful and visually arresting factions in 40k, while also keeping all that had been cool about the army to begin with. Whatever they pay Jes Goodwin over at GW, it cannot possibly ever be enough…

The release also brought me back to the hobby, albeit in a rather roundabout way — Dark Eldar had been my first 40k army, after all! And even though I eventually settled on revisiting my World Eaters instead, it was the first look at the new Dark Eldar that rekindled my interest in little plastic men — the release was just that good!

All of this makes for a pretty tough act to follow, yet here we are, four years later, with another helping of Dark Eldar. In all fairness, this release doesn’t constitute another dramatic revamp, but rather serves to fill out the existing army with some of the kits yet missing from the lineup. But it is may just be the curse of the Dark Eldar now that any release will always be compared to that legendary offering of ’10.

This release also brings a new Codex — which, by the look of it, already gets hotly debated all over the internet. But instead of shouting over the din, let’s rather focus on the models, because we’re all here for the plastic crack anyway, right? ;)

So, as has become a treasured custom here at Eternal Hunt, allow me to walk you through the various parts of this release and to share my impressions about the models as well as a couple of ideas for possible kitbashes and conversions. Here goes:

Voidraven Bomber

This kit seems to be marketed as the big thing about this release — and indeed, DE players have been without a kit to represent the bigger of their two fliers for the last four years. Here it is now, the Voidraven — quite a beast!

Probably the biggest pitfall for GW’s designers to avoid was the danger of ending up with a model looking like a bigger version of the Razorwing, and they seem to have been very aware of this particular problem. Because, while the Voidraven clearly takes quite a few design cues from its smaller brother, it is still immediately recognisable as its own thing. This is mostly due to its “double cockpit”, and element that manages to give it a very distinct look and silhouette, while also immediately communicating the idea that this is a bomber rather than a quick fighter aircraft. Plus the model’s silhouette also recalls real-world cutting edge bombers, only with a serrated, sinister twist:

In any case, the cockpit not only defines the model’s silhouette, but also serves as one of its key visual features: I really like the idea of the gunner being surrounded by glass panes, the better to see his enemies at all times. The HUD elements molded into the clear plastic canopy have appeared on other (Dark) Eldar vehicles before, but are really taken up to eleven here: I love it as a concept, although I’d probably suffer a heart attack if I actually had to paint these finicky details ;)

The rest of the model basically adheres to the design cues laid down by the Razorwing: This is very obviously a vicious looking, serrated Dark Eldar aircraft — no doubt about it.

The model also comes with the results of GW’s attempt at designing an evil looking bomb — and boy did they succeed with that! By adding a hideous, organic spine to the thing, it really ended up looking quite disturbing: You don’t want that thing anywhere near or army — or, for that matter, yourself:

You better believe that this is one dirty bomb! Just look at the thing!

It’s certainly a great kit, all in all, and if it fails to utterly blow me away, then that is not due to lack of quality, but rather due to my general lack of interest in vehicles. Moving on.

Dark Eldar Wracks

Okay, this is where it gets far more interesting: When the Wracks were first released as during the second wave of the Dark Eldar revamp, GW finally delivered on the torturer archetype they had introduced with the Grotesques over a decade earlier. We all know what came next: The Grotesques were promoted to rather more monstrous creatures, while the newly created Wracks moved into the Grotesque slot — but the important part was that the new Wrack models were truly glorious! The only caveat to these models was that they were only available in Finecast.

Well, no longer, because enterprising sadists and torturers all over thh Webway are now free to field the glorious new plastic Wracks.

Apart from the material, the Wracks‘ design was already pretty much perfect as it was, so Steve Buddle made a good call by basically re-envisioning the existing models as a more versatile plastic kit without changing the overall aesthetics. He also added a ton of customisation options along the way, creating what may just be my new favourite Dark Eldar infantry kit. I mean, just look at these guys:

Maybe my favourite part about the models are the slowly advancig legs: While the Wracks certainly share some of the other Dark Eldar’s elegance, their poses make it clear that they slowly but purposefully stride forward, making them all the more sinister and threatening!

Some of the weapons are also truly something to behold: I really love the hideous, curved twin blades held by the Acothyst in this picture:

Or the creepily sinister scissor hand that also comes with the kit:

Of course, there is a bit of silliness as well: One of the heads in the kit has a little friend:

But even if you – like me – are not a big fan of this particular element, it’s all cool! The kit has so many heads and weapons that you can get rid of whatever you don’t like! Speaking of extra bitz, GW even included some additional bitz to make sure your vehicles could be piloted by Wracks as well:

Although I suppose driving (or hitting anything) with those maks on must be quite a daunting task…

Seriously, though: The kit seems to be a great toybox that allows you to tailor your own wracks to your needs and aesthetic preferences! I only have two minor issues with the kit:

One, the transfer to plastic and modularity of the kit creates a new problem too: The arms of the models can now end up having a slightly tacked-on look. This is only a minor problem, and one that should be easy enough to address by carefully aligning the arms and sanding off a bit of plastic where necessary — and this problem is merely the price of poseability.

The second concern is the amount of models you get: The Wrack kit certainly fills a role similar to that of the Kabalite Warrior and Wych kits, yet it only gives you five models, compared to the ten that come with the other kits. Maybe that’s the price for the amount of options you get, but at the end of the day, it could be seen as a bit less bang for the buck.

But those are really minor quibbles! All things considered, it’s really awesome to have three distinct kinds of foot soldiers for a DE army now, with each of the kits following the same system and being fully compatible.  And the Wracks provide a great kit, chock full of conversion options — definitely the high point of the release for me!

We also get three new plastic HQ models, with each of them serving as one of the Dark Eldar generic HQ options, so let’s take a closer look at those as well:

Dark Eldar Haemonculus

The Haemonculi have always owed a huge debt of inspiration to Clive Barker’s Cenobites, and the new plastic Haemonculus makes the visual connection even more obvious, in some ways (just check out the way his cloak seems to be sewn to his very chest). At the same time, the model also seems to serve as a remix of several elements already seen on earlier models: The sewn on face and weapons seem rather reminsicent of Urien Rakarth, for example.

At the same time, the new Haemonculus seems somewhat more flamboyant, for lack of a better word, than his Finecast predecessor: He has more bare skin on show, for one, and there’s the flowing hair. To be honest, I did prefer the slim, leather-clad form of the Finecast Haemonculus to this new guy, but that may just be a matter of preference. And in any case, the Urien Rakarth model still hews pretty close to that design, while the new plastic model seems to represent a slightly different kind of “artist”. So while I personally prefer the older model, the added variety is still appreciated!

There are still one or two areas about the model I am not completely sold on, however. The way the skin-cloak falls seems a little messy when compared to the overall composition of the model. And the curved dagger seems surprisingly clunky when compared to some of the rather disturbing surgical implements wielded by the Haemonculus.

A look at the sprue reveals that more involved conversions using this kit as a base would be slightly tricky, but certainly not impossible:

All in all, it’s a solid model. If I am sounding slightly disappointed, that is mostly due to the fact that I had high hopes for the concept of a plastic Haemonculus and was looking forward to using it for a particular conversion project. As it stands, the new model is nice enough — but working with the Urien Rakarth model seems like the better way.

Dark Eldar Archon

This guy replaces a model that was arguably one of the more iconic parts of the 2010 revamp: The Archon released along with that wave, with his daemon face helmet and hideously organic husk blade, really encapsulated the Dark Eldar’s visual change to a more baroque (and also more visceral) design.

When it comes to equipment and basic constituent parts, the new Archon model seems to mirror his predecessor pretty closely: We get the same basic armour design, almost the same weapons and also a cloak (although this one is made from tanned skin — nice touch…).

Let me address the elephant in the room right away: I think this new Archon model falls flat when compared to the earlier version, and that is mostly due to the pose. Oh, I certainly see what they were trying to do here — the Archon is shown in full magnificent bastard mode, and those arms are certainly a clever bit of engineering. No doubt about that.

But there are a couple of problems for me: First of all, the pose doesn’t look relaxed and natural, it looks like this guy is trying too hard. And what were they thinking when they added that rock to the base: That element makes the pigeon-toed stance even worse! And then there’s the face:

Again, I get the basic idea: The Archon is supposed to be wearing an arrogant smirk — but this guy just looks like a doofus, trying his darnedest to seem like a tough cookie.

The other problem with this pose and composition is that it gets really awkward once you end up with two of these in the same army or on the same table: Now you’ve got two of those prancing idiots facing off in a posing contest. What a horrible thought! Anyway, I think a generic HQ model might be better served with a slightly more neutral pose!

Now don’t get me wrong: There are parts of the model I really like: The stitched together skin cape, the trophy rack (why does it punch through the cape, though? That doesn’t make sense…) — those are great touches. But the pose and face really ruin the stock model for me — why on earth didn’t they include a helmeted head? The older version had two to choose from, for crying out loud…

The really good news is that all that is horrible about the model should be quite easily remedied by a bit of kitbashing: The Archon is advertised as being fully compatible with the different DE plastic kits, and a closer look at the sprue reveals that this is no understatement:

It looks like the arms could simply be swapped out for basically any DE arm in existence. The head, likewise, would be easy enough to replace (and good riddance!). As a matter of fact, it might even be possible to replace the legs with a regular set of Kabalite Warrior or Wych legs.

So, all’s well that ends well, then? Yes and no: As a stock  model, the Archon is the worst part of the release for me. It’s also a pretty poor replacement for the 2010 Archon. It can be used as a base for a great Archon model, no doubt about that. But one could argue that it’s equally possible to kitbash an awesome Archon without this kit altogether. Just off the top of my head, Picta Mortis’ amazing Archon conversion is far more awesome, and it doesn’t use a single component from the new model.

One last thing that strikes me as slightly odd: This new Archon seems to be designed to look very similar to the guy depicted on the 2010 edition of the codex while the new codex shows a character who is the spitting image of …the 2010 Archon model — is that some kind of hidden message or trolling on GW’s part?

Dark Eldar Succubus

Okay, now we’re talking! Like the Archon, the new plastic Succubus seems to be a re-envisioning of its earlier Finecast version, but the transition ended up beeing a much smoother one with this lady! I love the fact that the model is now pictured in running pose (which seems more apt for a Wych), and several flowing elements about the model support the sense of movement and dynamism.

I have to say I also really like the glaive!

At the same time, the model shares the Archon’s flexibility, so swapping in a new head or alternate arms would be really easy, as a look at the sprue reveals:

All in all, the new plastic Succubus may not be a revolutionary revamp: Rather a re-envisioning of the earlier model that actually manages to improve on the original — at least in my opinion. Good job!

Conversion options:

No review on this blog would be complete without a look at the conversion options that the new kits bring, so let’s get right down to it:

Dark Eldar players are obviously the big winners, because they now have even more highly versatile plastic kits at their disposal: Almost the entire army is available in plastic now, with all of the kits perfectly in line with the current design, and all of them fully compatible and, in some cases, interlocking. Not only does this make the Dark Eldar one of the most stunning armies from a visual standpoint, it also pretty much turns them into a kitbasher’s dream! So yeah, good for you, Dark Eldar players! ;)

Looking beyond this army, however, there are certainly quite a few areas where some of the new kits could become pretty useful as well:

The Wracks are very much the jack-of-all-trades in this respect: For instance, they could be used as a wide variety of different cultists, among them Death cultists (or rather, torture cultists, as it were) Imperial traitors, renegade medics (!), Slaaneshi cultists — the sky is really the limit here! All it takes is some shaving down of the DE-like characteristics and some external bitz, and you’re golden! In fact, these could even become a very interesting base for very sinister Genestealer cultists with a bit of work — just sayin’…

But the forces of the Imperium may also profit from these: Just imagine an added brass etch =][= added on top of the wrack’s facemask, and you have a pretty serviceable Inquisitorial torturer! In fact, I think we can be fairly confident that the enterprising INQ28 scene will come up with all kinds of uses for these bad boys.

One last idea: Imagine a radical Genetor of the Adeptus Mechanicus, having made a name for himself as an expert flesh-crafter. Or even a Heretek of the Dark Mechanicus pursuing a similar career: Maybe some suitably twisted followers of these magi could also be built using the Wrack kit? Interesting thought, isn’t it?

The Haemonculus seems nearly as interesting for conversions: Like the Wracks, he could be turned into a flesh-crafting member of the Dark Mechanicus with a couple of changes. The dangling feet also remind me of a Daemonhost — or a rogue Psyker for a force of Traitor Guard, or as a character in games of INQ28 — once again, I am pretty sure that the INQ28 scene won’t disappoint when it comes to finding creative uses for this guy!

And, finally, the Succubus seems like an interesting base model as well. Maybe she could be turned into a lithe Imperial assassin? A Death Cultist? Or an Inquisitor’s beautiful and deadly operative? Again, due to the models being avaiable in plastic, it should only take a bit of kitbashing and a small cut here and there to truly change their overall look!

So, what’s the verdict about this release? All in all, I am inclined to call it a solid offering. This certainly doesn’t revolutionise the Dark Eldar catalogue like the prior release, but that was never the point. Rather, this release builds on the fantastic foundation laid down by the 2010 redesign and fills out a some of the few remaining gaps in the army’s catalogue.

Speaking of which, some of the gaps that still remain are maybe my biggest gripe with this release: Sure, I would have loved to see an Inccubi/Trueborn combi-kit in glorious plastic — but the Wracks were really the more essential infantry kit to be released. So far so good. But no model for Asdrubael Vect? Or any other of the named characters? That seems like a bit of a missed opportunity, especially since most of these characters have been dropped from the codex altogether! I mean, Dark Eldar players have gone without a model for Keradruakh for more than 15 years — why drop him now?

Even if some (any) of these characters should eventually get patched back into the army via an additional supplement, this does seem like a bit of a dick move on GW’s part. But I guess hobbyists can just never be happy, myself included ;)

Again, this seems like a solid, middle of the road release. But that’s just my take on it: How do you feel about the new Dark Eldar? Any opinions you’d like to share? Any conversion idea? I’d be happy to hear from you in the comments section!

As always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

One very important part of sharing your hobby projects online is learning how to take good pictures of them — and indeed, many, many articles have been published on the subject. As for my own pictures, I am usually reasonably pleased with them — they may not be perfect, but they usually show a pretty “truthful” version of my models ;)

However, there are more ways of showcasing models than just posting “regular” photos: We have all seen excellent pictures where hobbyists have tried to use various filters and effects in order to add another dimension to their work — granted, there are also those cases where Photoshop becomes a quick fix to camouflaging shoddy paintjobs. But those are usually in the minority. I, for one, am often awestruck by the quality of retouched photos online, and I think they are an interesting additional option to breathe life into your creations — unfortunately, my own attempts in this respect haven’t been all that successful so far: While I am reasonably handy with Photoshop, I have somehow never managed to end up with the kind of retouched image that actually looks awesome and brings my models to life.

This changed however, when, at the recommendation of my fellow hobbyist Talarion, I checked out Autodesk’s Pixlr last weekend: Pixlr is a very streamlined and easy to use piece of software that helps you add effects, borders and various filters to your photos. And while the amount of functions is pretty limited, the software is great fun to mess around with and, what’s even more important, it’s exceptionally great at what it does!

So, being a pretty huge Web 2.0 villain myself, I couldn’t help experimenting with some of my hobby photos. It has been great fun so far, and today I’d like to share some of the results with you:

Kill!Maim!Burn!

Well, this one was to be expected, wasn’t it? It won’t surprise you that messing around with some army photos of my World Eaters was one of the first things I did, and I used some flames and a couple of additional effects to create a pretty archetypal, Khornate image.

And once I had started on the World Eaters, it goes without saying that I also had to give one of my favourite models another spin as well:

Engine of Destruction

And why limit myself to Khorne? Giving some of my Nurglite models another layer of grime and neglect turned out to be great fun as well:

Nurgle’s Children

The next stage of my experiments was to actually try and bring out a new quality in certain models and images. One of the first pictures I chose for this was a standoff between one of my Helbrutes/Dreadnoughts, Marax the Fallen, and a downed Space Marine (built as a special objective marker to accompany Marax).

Heroic Last Stand

The original photo of the scene was nothing to write home about, but it certainly seems rather dramatic now, don’t you think?…

The same goes for this scene of a charging Huntmaster Isgarad:

Isgarad attacks

The original photo was pretty terrible, but with the help of some filters, it became a rather more interesting battlefield impression.

Next up, another Helbrute: Khorlen the Lost:

Lost Soul

I liked the result so much that I had another go at this model, focusing on its wonderfully creepy face and thereby creating a  more portrait-like image:

And I must scream

This is maybe one of my favourite pictures, because it really embodies the horror about being interred into a corrupted sarcophagus. This picture also led to further explore the portrait approach, trying to explore the essence of specific characters (or creatures):

Instrument of Wrath

Scarred Hunter

And of course, I did not only deal with my World Eaters, but also tried to create some images showing my various INQ28 characters plying their shadowy trade. First among them, of course, was Inquisitor Antrecht:

Inquisitor Anrecht in the field

The picture showing him and his retinue against the background of a homemade terrain piece was nice enough before, but now it really clicks with me, for some reason.

Some of you may remember the model for Inquisitor Zuul I converted and painted for the 2013 Inqvitational. The old boy remains one of my favourite pieces of work, and so he warranted his own, touched up picture:

Servant of the Emperor

And while I did not participate in the Inqvitational myself, I really love the picture of Zuul being apprehended by some of his more puritan colleagues that Marco Skoll took on the day of the game, so I messed around with that as well:

Game’s up

Like I said, the original photo was kindly provided by Marco Skoll.

And I’ll never tire of showing off my model for Legion, of course:

We are many, we are one

The original photo, taken by Fulgrim, was already a favourite of mine, but I think this touched up version really does an even better job of capturing this unspeakable horror stalking the depths of the Arrke.
In stark contrast to Legion’s creepiness, I also made a more lighthearted piece: It was really fun to make a photo of my Blood Bowl Team, the Orkheim Ultraz, look like the boyz were actually part of a vintage TV broadcast:

Orkheim Ultraz on TV

And, last but definitely not least, this rather moody shot of an Imperial monument:

Know fear

In this case, the original picture was actually pretty terrible, but I simply love the touched up version!

All in all, this was really a great way to discover new aspects about some of my models and bring out a new visual narrative in some pieces. Call me crazy, but working on these pictures and coming up with titles for them really made me think about several of my projects in slightly different ways. And, if nothing else, messing around with the software was just a lot of fun ;)

So, in case you want to try something similar, I would recommend you check out Pixlr yourself. And, of course, I would like to hear any feedback you might have!

As always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

Alright, everyone: There’s quite a bit going on at the moment, so let me give you a rundown of my current projects. Most of these are chaotic in nature — in more than one sense, I suppose ;) Anyway, here goes:

1. The Call of Chaos

In a rather uncharacteristic move, I have decided to join the VIIth Call of Chaos over at The Bolter & Chainsword, vowing to paint four new units for my World Eaters before January 15th. I am using this occasion to force myself to finally get a couple of things that I really want to see finished painted, but make no mistake: I am such a huge hobby butterfly that participating in a vow like this is quite a challenge for me. There’s a very real danger of failing this thing, so if you have any fingers left, keep them crossed for me, okay?

Anyway, which models are part of my Call of Chaos vow, you ask? Well, let me walk you through them. The first two should already be known to you:

First up, I am finally going to complete the Forgefiend I built and undercoated what feels like ages ago:

Since then, the poor thing has remained completely untouched, and it’s definitely time to change that!

The next model is a character I am really looking forward to seeing finished:

“The Doomwall”, my World Eaters Terminator Lord in Mk 1-ish armour. I am still extremely happy with this conversion, and I hope I’ll be able to make the model look even cooler when painted!

But I am not limiting myself to models you already know for this challenge: I will also paint two model’s you haven’t seen yet:

First up is a Chaos Dreadnought/Helbrute that I recently converted, using the AOBR Dreadnought as a base. I wanted another Dread because I’ve built so many different interchangeable weapon arms for my existing Dreadnoughts that it only felt logical to have another model that could make use of them. Plus I really enjoy converting Dreadnoughts for some reason. Anyway, here’s the model:

It actually took me quite a while to wrap up this conversion, because the AOBR Dread is a rather limiting base model to use. I also couldn’t get too crazy with the pose, because the model needed to be flexible enough to be able to use all (or at least most) of the extra weapon arms I had built. I kept messing around with various parts, but the model just refused to come together — as it turned out, what I needed in order to finally make this Dread happen was an idea about him as a character: I needed to figure out what kind of guy he was.

In the end, I decided that he is a former Breacher Sergeant whose calling is still reflected in some elements of his ironform — the Mk. 3-ish helmet, the shield on his left arm recalling a stylised boarding shield and the melta, for example. And that was the spark of inspiration that made the whole thing happen.

One thing I am pretty happy with is the brutal looking siege claw on his left arm: The standard powerfist was just looking so boring, so I just tried adding some spiky bitz from the wheels of the WFB Chaos Chariot — and I think the result really works!

The final part of my Call of Chaos vow will be an old acquaintance, in a way. Take a look:

It should be pretty obvious who this is supposed to be, right? ;) As it happens, the model was actually built for the latest Painting/Converting contest over at Throne of Skulls: The theme of the contest was to take one of the Khornate characters from among the 40k and WFB universes and build a better/updated/reimagined version of them — and what better character to choose for that than dear old Kharn the Betrayer?

Since this is going to be a piece for the contest, above all else, I took the liberty of truescaling Kharn a bit, and I think he wears it well ;)

Oh, the head was, once again, very kindly provided by my fellow hobbyist Belphoebe, by the way. Thanks a lot, mate!

So, like I said, I’ll be trying to get these painted until January 15th. I am slightly scared. Wish me luck, boys and girls! ;)

2. The art of chaos

And while we’re still on the matter of The Bolter & Chainsword, I am supremely happy to announce that I am one of the winners of a recent challenge by fellow hobbyist Greyall. If you don’t know his thread, you should check it out right away: Greyall does incredibly detailed and intricate drawings of (Chaos) Space Marine characters in black and white, and he held a little conversion challenge where all the board members could enter one of their converted models, and Greyall would draw a number of them. I entered my conversion for Lord Captain Lorimar…

…and guess what: I am one of the chosen few. I am so happy! Especially since the competition was absolutely amazing. Definitely make sure to head over there and check out those models! Anyway, I can hardly wait to see Lorimar rendered in Greyall’s trademark style — this will be SO awesome!

3. Creeping Rot

Like I said, I am a hobby butterfly of the first order, so I couldn’t resist opening yet another can of worms…literally: You’ll probably have seen GW’s recently released Putrid Blightkings. Well, one look at the models was enough to decide that I needed a box of these, and I finally picked them up late last week.

So far, I’ve only spent a bit of time with the models due to having been super buys last week, but allow me to share some initial observations:

• the level of detail in this kit has to be seen to be believed! Seriously, those guys are every bit as spectacular as they looked in WD Weekly
• the amount of bitz you get is equally impressive: Even after building five complete models, you should have lots and lots of leftovers for the rest of your Nurglite conversion needs: The amount of heads, rusty weapons and armour plates alone is staggering!
• the kit is pretty flexible, and you’ll be getting quite a few very different looking models out of this one — however, the kit is not as flexible as many “classic” multi part plastic kits (most of the (Chaos) Space Marine range comes to mind), due to the way the models are put together. This is not a problem per se, but it does mean you’ll need to plan ahead in order to convert these guys…
• …speaking of which: (Chaos) Terminator parts will work great on these, from a size perspective.

This last point is pretty important, I think, because many people planning to use these models in 40k seem to be unsure as to their actual size: I’ve seen speculations that the Blightkings are Ogre/Ogryn-sized, and I’ve snapped a quick comparison shot for you:

As you can see, these guys are definitely NOT Ogryn-sized. In fact, they are slightly smaller than Terminators. In my opinion, that makes them useful as stand-ins for Chaos Terminators (probably what I am going to do), true scale Death Guard Marines or something of the sort.

In fact, I have made a few – very early – attempts at “40k-i-fying” the Blightkings:

Nothing huge so far, just messing around with a few 40k parts and seeing what works. A more involved conversion was trying to add a breastplate to the one Blightking in the set that normally HAS to be assembled with a bare belly:

That did take quite a bit of cutting (and the model still needs some serious gap-filling).

But those are just a few brief initial impressions — I guess you may expect a more in-depth writeup about the ins and outs of this kit at some point in the near future ;)

4. Pretty pictures

To wind up this post, let me share one more thing with you: Since messing around with pictures of my models and some image editing software turned out to be so much fun (see my last post), I gave it another try and tackled some more involved photomontages.

First up, a picture of the Hellrazor in action:

I used both Pixlr and Photoshop to create this image, and while there may be a lot of stuff that can be improved, I am still reasonably happy with the outcome.

I also found this very interesting post over at Tyler Mengel’s blog and decided I needed to try something similar. So here’s a composite picture of Khorne’s Eternal Hunt having some fun on the plains of a conquered Hive World:

Once again, both Pixlr and Photoshop were used in the creation of the image. I also found out that Pixlr is great for quickly obscuring rough areas noticeable seams between different parts of a composite picture.

Granted, I still have much to learn, but I definitely like where this is going!

Anyway, so much for my current chaotic projects. I’d love to hear any feedback you might have in the comments section! And, as always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

There I was last week, talking about my ambitious goals for this year’s Call of Chaos — and already, I have been distracted. But worry not: I am still reasonably optimistic about my ability to go through with my vow, and there’s also the fact that the new Putrid Blightkings are the kind of kit you just have to start working on right away — and I would like to show you the results of that work today:

The basic idea with these guys seems to have been to collect all the best elements and details from every cool Nurgle model and piece of artwork so far and mash them into one box of plastic crack, thereby creating a bit of a “Best Of” collection. It works surprisingly well, though, finally giving us a way to emulate the hulking, pustulent characters that have only ever appeared in the artwork so far.

When it comes to actually reviewing the kit itself, Eric Wier of Between the Bolter And Me has put together a very concise and informative piece that I can only recommend. So with the hard work of reviewing the kit already out of the way, I am free to get my hands dirty and dive right in! Before we do that, though, I’d like to add a few observations of my own (in some cases reiterating what I said in my last post):

First up, I already commented on the size of these guys, and if anything, this aspect seems to have become even more relevant since my last post: It looks like many people were planning to use the Blightkings either as Plague Ogres and/or chaos spawn, yet the scale comparison below shows that they are not all that well suited to either function:

Many people seem to be disappointed about this. And, indeed, if you are looking for a way of converting Plague Ogryns, I’d suggest looking elsewhere: It would be far easier to just get a box of Ogres or Ogryns, the mutants from the WFB Warshrine of Chaos or a couple of Blood Island Rat Ogres and convert them accordingly. Some of the weapons and armour plates from the Blightking kit might come in handy for that kind of conversion, but I don’t really see a readily apparent way of making the heads, bodies and most of the arms fit Ogryn scale — unless you’re going for vestigial and/or atrophied limbs, that is…

But in my opinion, the glass is really half full rather than half empty: We really have enough possible conversion fodder of Ogryn/chaos spawn size readily available, as it stands! The Blightkings, however, are interesting in that they provide models that would work well as alternate Plague Terminators or, and this may just be the most interesting option, true scale Plague Marines — and without much need for making them bigger or bulkier. In fact, that’s the route I’ll be taking for my own Blightkings for now.

As people are beginning to work with the new kits, the first conversions are beginning to roll in: The spectacularly talented Jeff Vader has been working on some truly excellent Blightking conversions of his own that have been a huge inspiration for me. PDH has built some equally awesome Blightkings as an addition to his Realms of Chaos Nurgle warband (which, by the way, gets a feature in this month’s Blanchitsu, if the teaser on the GW website is to be believed) — I hope Peter will be showing his models to the general public soon. And I imagine other talented artists, such as JRN, migsula and the Spiky Rats, won’t be too far behind — I think we can look forward to a world of rot ;)

So, allow me to add my own pound of (maggotty) flesh: Let me walk you through my first couple of (mostly) finished Blightking conversions.

It shouldn’t surprise you that my basic approach was to bring the models into the 40k universe. I am not 100% sure what the function of these will be (or whether or not they’ll ever see the gaming table), but for now, simply exploring the kit and trying to bring it into my favourite grimdark universe is very much its own reward. So, without further ado, some pictures:

Here’s my first Blightking model. You already know an earlier incarnation of this guy:

This may still be my favourite of the bunch, although that doesn’t have anything to do with my conversion, but rather with the fact that the champion model is pretty much pitch perfect right out of the box. I chose a helmeted head (easily the coolest head in the kit) over the Plaguebearer face, because I liked the ominous look created by the helmet. Apart from that, the model was mostly assembled according to the instructions that came with the kit. To be honest, I did struggle a bit when it came to making this guy look more like a 40k model, but in the end, I think I came up with a pretty good idea: I added a cracked CSM breastplate to the model, making it look like the armour had burst under some hideous internal pressure. I am really happy with the result, because it adds a 40k element, leaves the hideously wonderful belly completely visible and, if anything, makes the model even more gross!

I also gave this guy a slightly modified backpack from the Dark Vengeance Chosen. I think the slightly twisted look is a great match for the overall Blightking aesthetic, plus the champ now has a bolter:

Several people have suggested using more futuristic weapons — but in the end, I just couldn’t go through with it. There’s just something about the sword and axe combo that I really like, and I just couldn’t bring myself to cut them apart…

The second model started out similar to one of Jeff Vader’s conversions, although I tried to take it into a slightly different direction. Take a look:

The base for this conversion was one of the (almost) fully armoured Blightkings, which made it much easier to turn this guy into a 40k model: The right arm was replaced with a Chaos Terminator arm (which also provided the gun). The left arm is from the Blightkings kit (although I used a bone from the WFB Crypt Ghouls to add a crossguard to the sword).

After quite a bit of deliberation, I chose a WFB chaos warrior head for the model: Not only is this one of my favourite heads, but it also fits Nurgle rather nicely, I think. Several people pointed out that the head was a bit of a missed opportunity, because a more Marine-like head would have helped making the model more futuristic. While I did want to keep the head, I also agreed with their point to some degree, so I added an array of tubes and pipes to the helmet, with some of them feeding into a custom backpack that I spliced together for the model:

It goes without saying that the backpack does have an ominous tank on top — par for the course with Death Guard models, really ;)

I also added some more detail to root the model more firmly in the 40k universe: some grenades and gear as well as a washer screw (painstakingly shaved off an Ork boy weapon). All in all, while the model still retains quite a medieval look and feel, I think it’s definitely futuristic enough to work in the context of 40k!

And finally, my third model so far, and possibly the most involved conversion of the three:

Once again, Jeff Vader provided the inspiration here (I shudder at my derivativeness… ;) ): I wanted to build a Blightking conversion wielding a heavy weapon — but I did want it to look markedly different from Jeff’s approach, rather going for the classic pose of a heavy bolter being held in front of the body. Now let me tell you: The Blightking kit does not exactly lend itself spectacularly well to shenanigans like that, and getting the arms and pose to work out turned out to be a bit of a nightmare. I persevered, however, and after much cutting and gluing, I ended up with this:

The model ist still missing quite a few details, but I think it already gives you a good idea of what the finished model will look like. The arms holding the heavy bolter were painstakingly spliced together, using bitz from no less than four different sources (a WFB Chaos Knights right arm, Space Marine Sternguard heavy bolter, Space Marine Terminator left upper arm and, finally, the actual Blightking’s shield arm. All in all, I am really extremely happy that I went through with this idea, even though it was a lot of work! And even though I only realised it after the fact, the model could even be seen as a small tribute to this illustration by Adrian Smith.

I also think that the clunky heavy bolter backpack does a nice job of bulking out the model. I have begun converting it into a more Nurglite form, with yet more tanks welded on beneath the main body of the pack:

This is certainly the most WIP of the three models at this point, so there’ll be more details to come. But, again, I am really happy with this guy.

All in all, I’d like to quote an excellent point made by Eric in his review of the Blightking kit:

Games Workshop’s new approach  with the Blightkings provides some freedom to the consumer, while also letting the sculptors truly explore and convey their own creative vision.  And while some may argue that it makes conversions more difficult because you cannot simply swap an arm or body, I think it just encourages people to step out of their comfort zone and attempt more elaborate conversions, ones that are more than simply kitbashes.

This is so true! It took me quite a while to get started with these models, because the specific way the models were constructed seemed a bit intimidating. I was also forced to come up with at least a rough idea beforehand, instead of just seeing where the conversion took me. But in the end, this more involved and conscious way of working was a lot of fun, and I am really happy with the models I have managed to produce so far:

You can probably guess my verdict: These guys are excellent, and quite a lot of fun to work with. That said, they demand more work and more planning ahead if you want to make the most of them than, say, a Space Marine kit. They are a very interesting resource for true scale (Chaos) Space Marines. And they’ll give you a huge pile of Nurgle-y bitz (and then some) that you can use on your Death Guard or Chaos Daemons. Oh, and just a word of warning, perhaps: Once you’ve hit your stride, working with them gets quite addictive ;)

As for my own models, so far I’ve managed to come up with three characters that I am thoroughly pleased with. I am not sure whether these will be used as counts as Terminators in a small Death Guard detachment, as villains for INQ28, a Killteam or if I am just going to build an paint them for the heck of it, but when has that ever stopped me from kitbashing and converting, right?

It goes without saying that I would love to hear any feedback you might have in the comments section! And, as always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

Hey everyone, even though I am crazy busy this week, I just wanted to let you know that last week, my dear blog, Eternal Hunt, finally reached 300,000 views last week. While that number may still not qualify as all that impressive, I am still rather proud of this achievement — who would have expected that amount of traffic back when I started this blog with a measly post back in 2012? Certainly not me!

I mean, seriously, 300,000 views: Even after subtracting all the times I’ve hit F5 myself, that’s still quite a lot. And it’s not only the number that I am proud of, but also the amount of great hobby moments that are inextricably linked with this blog!

So to all those who keep reading this stuff, who comment, who follow this blog, who keep sending me bitz and suffer my atrociously punny post titles: Thank you so much! You rock!

And I’m not even the only one who’s happy: Here’s what the members of Khorne’s Eternal Hunt did to celebrate when I told them the news:

Happy hunting, guys! You’ve earned it! Looks like a orbital bombardment may be in order…

So, like I said, I am really busy at the moment, and I regret not having time for a beefier update — but don’t fret, more substantial content is on the way: I am currently preparing a thorough writeup about the ins and outs of the End Times Nurgle release that will go up next week, at the latest. And it goes without saying that I have been tirelessly cutting up little plastic men, so expect some news on that front as well.

Until then, though, thank you so much for frequenting my little corner of the interwebz! And, as always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

Whew, I definitely wanted to put this review up much sooner, but there was just so much to do! And there was also the fact that I really wanted to do the second End Times release justice — because GW really seems to be on a roll with the latest WFB releases. But all in good order:

It seems pretty obvious that the first End Times release has thoroughly renewed interest in the WFB setting — and rightly so: Not only does the End Times scenario present a pretty substantial step forward when it comes to the backstory, but the release was also accompanied by a slew of rather excellent new kits, first and foremost among them the much-lauded new model for Nagash.

It’s a small surprise that GW would try their best to keep people interested in the End Times setting, so the next wave of releases deals with chaos — they had my interest before, but now they have my attention ;)

The End Times: Glottkin and its accompanying models focus on the god Nurgle, which initially seems to have provoked a bit of skepticism among some hobbyists: I’ve been hearing complaints online that, whenever GW puts out a new chaos release, Khorne and Nurgle really get all the love. But I would beg to differ:

When looking at the servants of chaos, especially in WFB, Nurgle has really been the least represented chaos god — at least when it comes to modern plastic kits: Sure, there’s that Nurglite Chaos Lord everyone (myself included) loves to convert. And a couple of heads and mutations hidden away in several kits. But there’s never been a dedicated kit for Nurglite chaos warriors or something similar. What’s more, followers of Nurgle would really profit from their own kits, since Nurgle may be easy to do, but is really rather hard to do well: Sure, you can slap some GS on your models and call them finished, but producing Nurglite models that really do justice to the bloated, festering and rotting image that appears in the backstory has really been quite a bit of work so far.

Enter the End Times: Glottkin release, which gives us three rather substantial new kits as well as an additional clamshell plastic character. Allow me to walk you through the kits and discuss them one by one — and, of course, we’ll also be focusing on some of the possible conversion ideas involving these new kits. Step this way please, and remember to disinfect your hands at regular intervals ;)

Putrid Blightkings

The release managed a very strong start with the Putrid Blightkings box: Fellow hobbyist PDH has called these guys the “definitve chaos warriors”, and I am tempted to agree with him. But I am getting ahead of myself!

Let’s start at the beginning, or rather: At something that really seems like the beginning for this particular kit: The enormous popularity of the plastic Nurgle Chaos Lord cannot have escaped the folks over at GW –maybe this is an explanation for the fact that the Blightking kit gives us five rather massive models that look like they are taking quite a few design cues from the aforementioned model, allowing us to field a unit that effectively consists of five plastic Nurgle Lords.

What’s more, GW’s designers seem to have gone through the last twenty-odd years of artwork and model releases depicting servants of Nurgle in order to include some of the most iconic and popular visual elements in the new kit, creating what amounts to a “Best of” collection of Nurglite design (as Eric Weir posits in his own, highly recommended review of the kit).

In addition to featuring some of the most beloved design cues from two decades of Nurglite models (the antlered, cowled head, the mono-horned facemasks and helmets, the bells and rusted blades,…), the Blightkings are also rather impressive, massive models (although not quite as massive as some people would have liked…). And one thing I particularly like about them is how most of their mutations eschew the often rather cartoony look in favour of something more realistic: The distended, swollen limbs look like something that might really be physiologically possible. Sure, there’s the odd insect leg or tentacle, but they don’t look nearly as hokey as some of the mutation bitz GW has produced in the past.

Each of these guys really looks like a champion, a warlord in their own right. And each model also fits the massive, swollen and distended glory that has been a part of Nurglite artwork for years, but has only rarely been represented in model form. So the Blightking kit will give you a great new unit for your army, but it also seems like the perfect box of conversion fodder when it comes to converting your own Nurglite warlords, champions and characters — both for WFB and 40k.

The best part of the kit, however, has to be the amount of variety: The box comes so chock-full of bitz that it really allows for lots of variations, meaning you’ll be able to get a whole lot of very different looking models out of this kit without even having to resort to more involved conversions — just check out this picture:

Granted, they snuck in Gutrot Spume there, but the picture demonstrates how you can easily construct ten completely different looking Blightkings without even resorting to kitbashing or cutting up the models. And as soon as you take those additional approaches into consideration, your options multiply exponentially.

If all of this sounds like gushing praise to you, that’s because it is: In my opinion, the Putrid Blightkings are an almost compulsory purchase for both WFB and 40k Nurgle players, and a perfect resource for conversion bitz. At the same time, they are also a stellar kit on their own, and easily one of my favourite GW releases this year, as well as one of the strongest parts of this release!

Gutrot Spume

Along with the Putrid Blightkings, GW also released a new clamshell plastic character to lead the hordes of Putrid Blightkings on the field: In some ways, Gutrot Spume almost seems like an “upgrade” to the Blightking models. And sure enough, this guy is certainly massive and imposing enough to look the part. He is also rather hideously mutated, and that element actually makes for my main gripe with the model:

I have mentioned above how I especially like the fact that the Blightkings – mostly – manage to eschew the classic (and really rather tacky) “animal limbs a mutations” shtick. Not so here: The hideous, tentacled mess that makes up Gutrot’s entire left side may be an important part of the model’s backstory, and the tentacles themselves also look suitably disgusting. But one problem is that they don’t strike me as particularly nurgly. I also remember that one line in WD where one of GW’s designers said that tentacles are pretty hard to do, both because you have to avoid going for an obvious octopus look, and because it’s easy to make them seem so debilitating that the model ends up looking weak because of it, and I cannot help feeling like that’s exactly what happened here: This guy would have seemed more impressive with a less “creepy-crawly” look, if you ask me…

Granted, such things always come down to personal preference. And seeing how the model is made from plastic, it should be easy enough to tone down this element (or remove it outright), if one so chooses:

But that’s really where the other problem sets in: The Putrid Blightkings are such an excellent and versatile kit that it seems quite possible to come up with a conversion that looks equally impressive and fitting as a warlord, raising the question why one would even need to purchase the Gutrot Spume model in the first place: In a way, the availablity of the Blightkings turns into Gotrut’s biggest competition here, because he mostly looks like a unit champion when compared to the Blightkings:

When all is said and done, what we have here is a massive and imposing Nurglite warlord with a enormously noticeably mutation that you may or may not like. On his own, he’s a well-designed and impressive centre-piece for your chaos army. When compared to the Blightkings, he seems a bit lacklustre. A nice enough model, but certainly not one of the defining parts of the release.

On a related note, if you want to see some absolutely gorgeous painted Blightkings accompanied by Gutrot Spume, definitely check out ThirdEyeNuke’s models over at the Tale of Painters — spectacular stuff!

Magghot Lords

The End Times: Nagash had the Mortarchs as the Great Necromancer’s very own “quirky miniboss squad”, and the new release follows that formula, giving us a multi-kit that will produce one of the three Lords of Icehorn Peak. So let’s take a look at each of them in turn:

Orghotts Daemonspew

The Nurgle release seems to have a bit of a triptych leitmotif going, with the archetypes of “warrior”, “sorcerer” and “beast” appearing in several of the kits. Orghotts Daemonspew clearly fits the “warrior” archetype, as the model represents a massive, Nurglite chaos warrior mounted on one of the new “pox maggoths”. Looking at his body, Orghotts’ look fits the design introduced by the Blightkings, and he seems believable enough as a champion of Nurgle. His main defining feature is the hideous mutation warping his head and face, however:

It’s a bit of an acquired taste, but in the end, I like it well enough: It’s suitably gross and he’s looking rather tortured. Servants of Nurgle are usually described as being a rather jolly bunch, and I think it’s a nice bit of variety to encounter a model where the blessings of the Grandfather seem to have produced a result that is, at the very least, ambiguous!

The one thing I find legitimately terrible, however, are the model’s twin axes: They just don’t work for me — and on several levels, at that: Reversing the heads just seems gimmicky and impractical. The length of the hafts also seems ill-considered, given the fact that the character is supposed to wield both weapons silmutaneously: If it had to be twin axes, I guess I would have preferred a more vicious, hatchet-like setup. The weapons are really my main complaint here, come to think of it: They just stick out like a sore thumb, in my opinion.

As for Orghotts’ mount, the Pox Maggoth Whippermaw, let us also take a closer look at it:

Generally speaking, I think GW’s designers have done a fine job with the general design of the pox maggoths: Sure, they may seem slightly more conventional than the Mortarchs’ Dread Abyssals, but I like the way the magghots seem to occupy a strange and slightly disturbing niche between a lamprey and a …dinosaur, I guess?! Anyway, their alien look really works rather well. The fact that they are essentially faceless, except for their hideous maws, also helps, of course…

As for Whippermaw itself, the advancing pose nicely complements Orghotts’ warlike look. The tongue almost seems a bit much, but I still like it.

Oh, and the…ahem…Vagina Dentata provides a beautifully Freudian touch, of course. Extra kudos to GW’s designers for getting crap past the radar in this case ;)

Once again, ThirdEyeNuke has produced an excellent paintjob for the model, really bringing it to disgusting life!

Bloab Rotspawned

The second Maggoth Lord cleanly falls into the “sorcerer” category — but with a suitably icky touch: According to the character’s background, Bloab Rotspawned essentially serves as a mostly hollowed-out vessel for all kind of maggots that eventually turn into Nurglite blowflies — ewwww….

Great concept, but it falls a little flat in execution, I think: The idea of a guy basically serving as a vessel for maggots and insects is very icky and disturbing, but Bloab’s actual face really makes him look more like a fat guy who has just puked all over himself — maybe it would have been cooler to have his face less visible: Just a deep and empyt looking cowl with a stream of maggots emerging from it — nothing is scarier, sometimes.

The face is really my main complaint about the model — the rest of it seems rather well realised. The huge warscythe is a classic touch, of course (and will probably become a highly coveted conversion piece), and the idea of some grownup Nurglite flies making up a portion of Bloab’s back banner is really a wonderfully creepy little touch.

Bloab’s mount, the pox magghot Bilespurter, may just be my favourite of the bunch: The rows of tiny eyes are very disturbing, for one, adding to the eerie deep sea creature feel, and there’s also that extremely disgusting stream of puke:

What really sells the creature, though, is the pose: The magghot looks like its body is actually absorbing the recoil from puking…

The fact that the paintjob is rather brilliant helps, of course: The model really looks like it’s fit to burst with vile fluids and bilious acid. The sickly colour of the upper body beautifully complements the effect — thumbs up, ‘Eavy Metal Team!

Morbidex Twiceborn

And finally, the bestial archetype: Morbidex Twiceborn serves as friend and foreman to all Nurglings — which is probably the reason why, depending on your perspective, he looks like a huge Nurgling or a tiny Great Unclean one himself:

From the above picture, it’s also obvious that Morbidex seems to be one of Nurgle’s jollier servants: I can always appreciate a fellow who finds joy in his work!

But regarding the model itself, I guess I’ll call Morbidex the weakest of the three: Sure, the GUO look is a nice idea (and one that harks back to the good old days, no less), but I have to say I prefer a bloated, heavily armoured Nurgle champion over a half-naked Nurgle-expy any day of the weak. The design of his left arm also seems like a bit of a mess and lacks direction — in fact, that’s the feeling I get from the entire model: Morbidex looks like the sculptors had just finished Orghotts and Bloab and were rapidly loosing steam when they got around to him.

Certainly a question of personal preference, but to me, Morbidex seems like a bit of a letdown…

The same also goes for his mount, the pox maggoth Tripletongue, unfortunately: The model looks like GW’s designers wanted to explore the body horror angle some more, but all the good ideas had already been taken: The tongue seems too stylised and strange for its own good, and the gaping stomach wound seems almost crude in its execution:

Looking at the entire kit, there’s light and shadow: I love the fact that, like the Mortarch kit, the Magghot Lord kit gives us the opportunity to build one of three different characters from the same kit — and that’s not even taking into consideration the opportunity of mixing and matching. However, where each character in the Mortarch kit seemed like a very different archetype, bringing something entirely new to the table, the Magghot Lords seem to be loosing steam somewhere along the way. For me, the main attraction in the kit is the option to build a huge and rather disturbing monster from it — there’ll be quite a few uses for the pox maggoths, and I’ll be outlining some of them when we are talking about conversion ideas. The riders, on the other hand, especially Bloab and Morbidex, seem far less impressive to me.

There’s also the fact that the kit seems to be suffering from a similar problem as Gutrot Spume: On their own, the Magghot Lords are a nice enough addition to the catalogue of Nurglite models. However, boxed-in as they are between the excellent Blightkings and the really rather spectacular Glottkin (which we’ll be getting to in a second), they somehow seem like slightly deluted versions of either concept. And as a final factor, let’s not forget that fellow hobbyist and all around great guy PDH already created a pitch perfect mounted Champion of Nurgle quite a while ago, before the new kit was even released.

So, all in all, the Magghot Lord kit seems like a solid part of the release, but unfortunately it gets overshadowed by the release’s more spectacular kits. Oh, and one last thing: Those character names are really ATROCIOUS!

The Glottkin

Let’s not mince words: This kit is certainly the star of the show! GW really managed to knock it out of the park with the new Nagash model, and I am sure everybody was looking forward to finding out whether they would manage to come up with something equally impressive for the Nurglite part of the release — hence the Glottkin.

Well, if you ask me, we can call this particular mission accomplished: The Glottkin are one of those kits that left my mouth hanging open when I first saw them.

Granted, the model is not as elegant and strangely beautiful as Nagash — quite the opposite in fact: The Glottkin embrace everything Nurglite to create what may just be the ultimate centre piece for every Nurgle army. What’s more, the kit actually consists of three characters, the fabled Brothers Glott, who once again fit the three archetypes of warrior, sorcerer and beast, so let us look at each of them in turn:

First up, Otto Glott, the warrior:

The model shares several design cues with both Gutrot Spume and Orghotts Daemonspew: What we have here is a massive, bloated warlord of Nurgle. Actually, Otto looks pretty much exactly like you would imagine a “leveled up” version of the popular clamshell plastic Nurgle Lord!

The distended belly may be a bit much, and I am not a huge fan of the hand clutching the entrails, but I’ll let it slide because the kit provides a separate hand holding a severed head that mostly gets rid of that particular gripe. And while I love the bare head that comes with the kit, there’s something really striking about Otto’s helmet, because it almost looks like a Nurglite crown. The huge warscythe is also an excellent touch — all in all, Otto really looks like the quintessential Nurglite warlord!

Then there’s Ethrac Glott, the sorcerer:

I have often stated my relative dislike for models that are too heavily mutated, but Ethrac is really a perfect example of how to make it work: Sure, there’s the hideous lump of twisted flesh erupting from his back, a mutation so spacious that it gets to house its own brazier. But the shoulder area is at least partially covered by Ethrac’s tattered cowl, which renders the precise form of the mutation ambiguous enough to make it even more disturbing. We also get to see a bit of Ethrac’s face, but again, it’s obscured enough to actually improve the ominous effect. Bloab Rotspawned’s face was too extreme – and to visible – in a way, and that made it look cartoony. With Ethrac, we only get glimpses at his countenance, and what we see is hideous. However, what we don’t see could be even more disturbing — the perfect way of pulling off this effect, really!

I also really like his staff — the severed hand of a follower of Tzeentch is a wonderful little touch! And while the skulls and smoke wafting up from Ethrac’s left hand may seem a bit tacky, the skulls forming Nurgle’s own symbol is a cute little idea!

And, last but definitely not least, there’s Ghurk Glott, who serves as the beast archetype and who is really the main attraction of this package:

What a soulful look for such a hulking monstrosity, don’t you think?

Both Otto and Ethrac are wonderful sculpts, but Ghurk really seals the deal: He’s a hulking, massive monstrosity, covered in boils and signs of decay. The sheer texture of the skin is astounding, with so many little details that are equal parts impressive and disturbing — I imagine this model should be a joy to paint!

A couple of elements still manage to stand out, however:

First up, there’s the tiny Nurgling on the base, mimicking the pose and design of Ghurk Glott himself — I just love stuff like that! Then there’s the hideous, maw like right arm: Once again, the design picks up cues from lampreys and similar, hideous creatures, making for one scary looking orifice…

I also really love the tentacle-like left arm, both for its texture and amount of detail and for its artwork-like, almost surreal quality.

In fact, the whole Glottkin model has something painterly about it: There’s an almost artwork like quality to the model’s composition and silhouette, and the Glottkin really recall some apocalyptic paintings and pieces of art. Several elements (like Otto’s pointed crown and Gurkh’s tentacle arm) underline this effect even further. And there’s something subtly but palpably Blanchian about the whole model, if I am not mistaken: The Glottkin look like a creature from the old Realms of Chaos books, translated into 21st century plastic model form by way of Hieronymus Bosch. In a way, the art and design underlying the whole WFB universe have really come full circle with this piece!

Recalling what I said further up in this review of the Magghot Lords, it’s also interesting to note how each of the brothers seem to present a more realised, better executed version of each of the archetypes also embodied by Orghotts, Bloab and Morbidex: In a way, the Lords of Icehorn Peak almost seem like early demo versions of the characters that would eventually become the Glottkin.

All in all, the model is a triumph, both for GW as a company and manufacturer of plastic tabletop models as well as for Mark Harrison, the designer! He has been working on chaos kits for quite a while now, but this latest creation of his is one for the ages. Congratulations!

One closing word that should illustrate how blown-away I was by this model: I don’t want to pre-empt my own review of the new Tyranid models, and there’s certainly quite a lot to like about them. But when I recently picked up two issues of WD Weekly at my FLGS and saw the Glottkin and new Tyranid Maleceptor/Toxicrene back to back, as it were, they almost seemed like models from different decades at first — that is how good the Glottkin kit is, if you ask me.

Oh, and ThirdEyeNuke has managed to produce a particularly fitting paintjob for this model as well! Check it out here!

Conversion options

What would Nurgle be without conversions? So it shouldn’t surprise you that some parts of this release lend themselves rather beautifully to serious converting and kitbashing. So allow me to share a few conversion ideas of my own — and the one good part about this review going up so late is that I can also incorporate some of the excellent work by fellow hobbyists that has begun to show up online. Let’s take a look:

The Glottkin:

First of all, let’s address the elephant in the room: If you were waiting for a new plastic Great Unclean One, Gurkh Glott is definitely your best bet — at least for now! A very helpful size comparison by the good folks over at the Tales of Painters blog shows that Gurkh’s size rivals that of the FW Great Unclean One, so he should make an excellent replacement for your Apocalypse gaming needs or your Armies on Parade display board.

Granted, the back would probably look very empty without the two other brothers placed there. But who is to stop you from putting some Plague Marines there? Or a couple of Plaguebearers and Nurglings happily cavorting around? In fact, wouldn’t such an addition make the model even more awesome and fitting? as it happens, Lucky No5 has made a Glottkin model that allows for Ghurk to be used as a Greater Daemon on his own, with the other two brothers magnetised for optional use.

Then there’s skrundle87, who has already expressed interest in building a Glottkin/Imperial Knight kitbash — I am really looking forward to seeing the results! And you want to hear something really crazy? Seeing how big this guy is, he could even be used as a Daemon Prince or Greater Daemon at the INQ 54mm scale!

As for the other Brothers Glott: Otto would certainly make a convincing Nurglite warlord on his own! And with a bit of work (and a few additional pieces of armour), he could be made into an excellent Death Guard lord for 40k!

And Ethrac could become a great Nurglite sorcerer in WFB — or a suitably impressive Demagogue in a Nurglite Traitor Guard army!

Whatever happens, I am really looking forward to all the crazy projects involving the Glottkin we will definitely be seeing online. Let me just point you towards TJ over at DFG, who points out some pretty interesting uses for the kit in 40k, along with a rather convincing calculation about all the money you actually save ;)

Magghot Lords

It goes without saying that each of the three Magghot Lords can provide a tidy pile of bitz to provide conversion parts for your own Nurglite characters. However, the truly interesting resource here are the pox magghots: These ugly monsters could be used to convert convincing Greater Daemons or Daemon Princes of Nurgle, of course. They could also be used as Maulerfiends, could be combined with Defiler parts to make alternative Plague Hulks or even be used as giant Chaos Spawn. Just check out TheNickeninja’s particularly disturbing, Magghot-based spawn creature for reference. As it happens, TheNickeninja has also come up with a very interesting alternative use for these guy in WFB: Just put them on a big base, add some Chaos Dwarves (or similar attendants), and you have yourself an excellent (and rather disgusting) Hell Cannon (look here for an excellent example).

And maybe these guys could even be interesting beyond chaos armies? They would make for perfect monsters from the Underhive in Games of Necromunda or INQ28, for one. And maybe they could even be converted into huge mutants or be used as the base for Squiggoth-like beasts of Burden for an Ork army?

Putrid Blightkings

These guys are certainly the most versatile and interesting conversion resource to come out of this release — at least in my book! They share all that was cool about the Plastic Chaos Lord, so they should become similarly popular with converters! But what can we use these guys for?

The obvious answer is to turn them into Plague Marines and Plague Terminators, because they are simply fantastic for such conversions! I myself have tried that approach, and with some success, if I do say so myself. There are also the wonderful conversions by Jeff Vader (the first one’s already painted, too! Check it out here!)

While both of us have gone for true scale Plague Marines, you can take the Blightkings even further, as evidenced by Adam Weir who is currently working on some very promising Blightking conversions, splicing in parts from FW Cataphractii Terminators in a very seamless and ingenious way, in order to actually make Death Guard Terminators — excellent job!

There’s also the option of turning the Blightkings into big mutants for your Necromunda/INQ28 needs: Jeff Vader’s latest Blightking conversion would work really well as an addition to a rough band of twists or a Scavvie gang. And the rather realistic looking mutations on some of the Blightking bitz make them ideal for all kinds of twists and mutants, both of the chaotic and non-chaotic variety.

And the list goes on: Just imagine the nearly naked Blightking with a piece of cloth barely covering his naughty bitz: Wouldn’t he make an excellent eunuch-like Harem Guard character, with a bit of work? Just get rid of some of the open sores with GS, add a curved sword and a Blood Angels Deathmask, and you’re almost there — come to think of it, you could even turn the model into a follower of Slaanesh!

Moving away from the evil and the hideous,consider EdT’s very promising attempt at turning the Blightkings into Thunder Warriors. And WFB/Mordheim fans might find the option of building huge, imposing and slightly sinister Knights/Pitslaves out of these guys interesting — Bruticus is blazing a trail for you here.

And finally, we shouldn’t forget all the leftover bitz that come with the kit: Even after building five fully kitted-out true scale Plague Marines, I still have a pretty huge pile of bitz left: Some of these will be used as decorative parts on different models, some may be used on vehicles. So far so good.

But you can even use the leftover bitz to build more followers of Nurgle! Here’s my attempt at using Blightking bitz to convert a humble AOBR snap fit Terminator into a Death Guard Terminator. Take a look:

As you can see, I haven’t decided on a head yet — but the above pictures should still show you how well the Blightking bitz work with a plastic Terminator: All it took was some cutting and a bit of GS work!

And it goes without saying that most of the ideas outlined above would probably work on Gutrot Spume as well, at least to some degree. Although I’ll say it again: In many ways, the Blightkings just seem like the more versatile version of Gutrot Spume.

While the Glottkin may be the star of the show in this release, the size and scope of the model do somewhat limit its usefulness. The Blightkings, however, will probably become the kit everybody will love to convert — and the one I can easily see hobbyists buying multiples of! I predict a huge wave of Blightking conversions in the near future — just you wait! ;)

So, what’s the verdict? I’ll call this an excellent release, albeit with some small caveats:

Both the Glottkin and the Putrid Blightkings are absolutely fantastic kits, and easily some of GW’s best releases this year! They alone make sure that this release is excellent — and a worthy continuation of the End Times releases so far!

The Magghot Lords are slightly less impressive, but still a fairly strong part of the release. It’s their bad fortune to be released alongside a kit that one-ups just about everything they bring to the table.

This goes double for Gutrot Spume: On his own, he would be an excellent plastic character. Compared to the fantastic Putrid Blightkings, he seems a bit lacklustre.

But it is a spectacular release indeed where even the weakest link in the chain manages to stand strong on its own! I for one cannot wait for the next End Times release — and I am not even a WFB player! This release has been excellent, and it provides us with lots of new toys and almost endless conversion possibilities — what’s not to like?

But what’s your take? Do you love or hate the new models? Or something in between? Have any conversion ideas to share? Did I miss something? I’d be happy to hear from you in the comments!

In any case and as always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

Due to all the Nurgly fun, I totally forgot that I actually have some new painted models to share with you — can you believe that? These have been finished for a while now, and if you are frequenting one of my various threads on the forums, you may already have seen them. But still, let’s take a closer look:

The models in question are the elite soldiers for my Traitor Guard detachment, Urash’s Marauders, that I started working on alll the way back in April, when the Tempestus Scions were released. I used a combination of bitz from that kit, the Vraksian Renegade Militia and a couple of other sources…

I am actually really happy with the way these guys have turned out! So allow me to walk you through the different members of the squad and take a closer look.

Here’s the first painted model:

As you can see, this is basically a Tempestus Scion with some tastefully applied spiky bitz ;) This was my first actual test model for an elite traitor Stormtrooper, and I think it works: The horned helmet may not be to everyone’s taste, but I think the guy really looks like a tough as nails elite trooper in the archenemy forces.

As for the colour scheme, I knew I wanted to use the same general colours as in the rest of my Traitor Guard detachment: Mainly dark grey, crimson and brass (with silver and brown for the medals and leather parts, respectively). All of my traitors are wearing dark grey fatigues in one form or another, so I repeated that here. In order to show that these guys are the cream of the crop, however, and far more heavily armoured than the rank and file troops, I chose to expand the use of red, painting all the armour plates with it. The result is a colour scheme that still looks like it belongs to my Traitor Guard but provides some contrast for these guys.

Next up, a Plasma Gunner:

The model only uses a right arm from the Tempestus Scion kit. The rest of the bitz came from the Vraksian Renegade militia, the Chaos Marauders and Space Marine Scouts, respectively. Oh, and I used a Skaven speartip in order to create a suitably nasty looking sword. My plan is for the models in the squad to use different combinations of bitz from the same four or five kits, with certain elements (such as the paintjob, the use of scion shoulder pads etc.) creating a feeeling of cohesion, even if the models themselves are looking slightly different.

So, not much to say about the guy with the plasma gun, except for the fact that I LOVE painting blue plasma coils and will go out of my way to give as many of those as possible to my models, even if I am not even a huge fan of plasma weapons in games. Oh well…

Now here’s where it gets more interesting: The next model is the squad’s voxcaster guy:

The model basically started out as an attempt to salvage a Vraksian torso (minus the head) that I had left from a different conversion. When messing around with a couple of bitz, I realised that the model would make a reasonably cool radio operator, so that became his role. What I really love about the model is the way it seems to clutch the speaker unit close to its cowled head: You can easily imagine this guy screaming into that mouthpiece at the top of his lungs — or whispering menacingly:

“Can you hear the voices too?”

But then, maybe he’s just making prank calls to the enemy headquarters, demanding to one Commissar I.P.Freely?! ;)

One last detail I really like about the model is how its entire head has basically been painted in the same base colour. The contrast between his mask and skin was created by careful application of different washes:

And finally, the model I am the most happy with (and easily one of the best models I have painted in quite a while): The squad leader:

As I’ve said before, the conversion itself was an attempt at channeling the excellence of PDH’s traitor soldiers (because those are just about the best Traitor Guard conversions in existence, along with Dave Taylor’s Blood Pact). I think I was reasonably successful in my endeavour, and I am really happy with the conversion! Those who remember the model’s unpainted incarnation, however, may notice that I’ve made some last minute changes to the model:

The chaos warrior sword the model wielded in its earlier incarnation was replaced with a nasty, curved Goblin sword for example: I think a vicious, slightly primitive weapon is just a far better fit for a traitor officer. I also added a bundle of Imperial dog tags on the officer’s belt, which makes for a nice bit of visual storytelling, if you ask me.

Oh, and I also added a slightly shaved down chaos warrior helmet to the belt. A beautiful little touch I picked up from one of PDH’s wonderful models — the idea was just too good, so I had to nab it:

This model was actually the first member of the squad I painted. And I really only started on the rest of the models because I was so happy with him: In a way, he perfectly embodies what I think Traitor Guard should look like, and if I were to completely re-do Urash’s Marauders today, I suppose he would become my template for the entire project.

At four models, the squad isn’t all that big at the moment, but I am confident that will change soon: Another “Chaos Scion” has already been built and is ready for painting. And I will definitely have to add a suitably imposing icon bearer to the squad. For now, though, I’ll happily consider these first four guys a successful forage into the world of elite traitors ;)

I’d love to hear any feedback you might have in the comments section! And, as always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

Actually the first army to be overhauled in 2014, the Tyranids have received a second wave of releases. Because nothing says Christmas quite as succinctly as a boatload of vicious, slimy alien dinosaurs, right? ;) So let us take a look at this latest bunch of kits and talk about the ups, the downs, the ins and the outs — and, as always, let’s also consider the conversion options.

One thing that seems noticeable right off the bat is how each of the three new kits serves as a multi-kit, allowing for two distinct kinds of assembly, thereby multiplying the different types of creatures you can get out of this release. It might be argued that Tyranids lend themselves to this treatment particularly well, but in any case, this is really a nice bit of synergy! But are the kits themselves any good? Let’s find out?
Toxicrene/Maleceptor

First up, another big creature: The first kit in line will produce two kinds of hulking beasts, and the first of those is the Toxicrene, obviously the oversized lovechild of a Lictor and a Carnifex. Now even after having taken some time to grow familar with the creature, it still feels slightly awkward to me for some reason — I think it has something to do with the combination of the massive body and those many thin tentacles?

Speaking of which, the Toxicrene unfortunately shares one of my main points of criticism with the Haruspex kit: Once again, the tentacles on both sides of the model seem strangely symmetrical.

Now while this may have something to do with visual balance, you still have to ask yourselves: What are the odds…?

One of my other gripes has been addressed, though: The creature’s head isn’t yet another tired rehash of the Carnifex look, but rather a tentacled abomination closer to the Lictor or Yrmgarl Genestealer:

It’s an interesting concept, to be sure, although I cannot help feeling that the Cthulhu effect loses some of its effectiveness at this size.

I really like the foreclaw resting on the downed Terminator, though:

All in all, I am not quite sure what to make of this creature: It somehow seems like the designers were cycling through a collection of the various Tyranid design elements and at random and came up with a rather peculiar combination, then said “Oh, what the heck?” and sent the result off to be produced. There are some cool touches to the model, but it does seem strange and ungainly, and I may just have to call it one of the less successful big Tyranid creatures.

But there’s also the option of assembling the model as a Maleceptor:

I like this guy quite a bit better than the Toxicrene for some reason — maybe it’s due to the fact that I really have a thing for eyeless heads on Tyranid models?!

Anyway, once again, the model seems like a recombination of existing visual elements — and actual Tyranid creatures: The Maleceptor resembles nothing so much as a missing link between a Carnifex and Zoanthrope, if you ask me, and it seems like that is a pretty apt description of its battlefield role as well.

Like I said, the head is really my favourite part of the model, because it’s so sinister and Gigeresque:

The bits of Tyranid brain matter are also a pretty nice touch, of course. Then there’s the fact that the model does have a rather striking silhouette if seen from the side.

But some of the awkwardness remains, to be honest: The Maleceptor may look quite a bit better than the Toxicrene, but once again, the whole kit has the slight feel of a randomly generated creature with some odd elements sticking out at awkward angles. A big creature like this should possibly be the high point of a release — but that’s not the case here, at least not for me…

Sporocyst/Tyrannocite

Okay, this is where it gets more interesting! First things first: Both the Tyrannocite and Sporocyst variants of the kit are proof that an alien creature can be truly disgusting and disturbing even without any kind of head or face — kudos for that, GW!

As for the actual variants of the kit, let’s start with the Tyrannocite: This thing is basically a Space Marine drop pod by way of the Hive Mind’s hyper-evolution, and it perfectly embodies that look:

I think it only really takes one look at this thing to instinctively understand that this is a drop pod, and that’s quite an achievement on the sculptors’ part! The thing is also brilliantly hideous, with tentacles and chitinous armour in all the right (or should that be: wonderfully wrong) places. And of course there’s that hideous lamprey mouth on top:

The option to assemble the outer “limbs” of the Tyrannocyte in various poses is a nice bonus as well:

I am usually not at all excited in transport vehicles since, let’s face it, they tend to be some of the more boring kits (Rhino, anyone?). But the Tyrannocyte easily wins the award for the most exciting transport vehicle in quite a while! I really like this thing!

As with the other kits in this release, there’s also a second variant of the kit that will give you the Sporocyst and Mucolid Spore:

The Sporocyst mostly looks like a Tyrannocyte that has become a little more familiar with its surroundings. Most that was cool and disgusting about the Tyrannocyte remains, so this thing is looking pretty cool as well! I really like those “questing” tentacles at the bottom!

The really interesting part is the Mucolid Spore, though:

First of all, the creature looks as though its lower body was made from the same parts that also form the lower parts of the Tyrannocyte — that is some nifty sprue engineering right there! But the spore itself is also very cool, with its hideous, fleshy head and lazily dangling tendrils:

By all means, this should have been a pretty dull part of the release, but it ends up as one of the best parts for me! Certainly more interesting than the Toxicrene/Maleceptor, at least! And I also think that this kit will give you quite a bit of bang for the buck when it comes to the conversion options — but we’ll be getting to that…

Zoanthropes/Venomthropes

Yet another multi-kit, and one that gives us two reasonably different squads to boot. First up, the Zoanthropes:

I’ll have to admit right up front that I haven’t been a huge fan of the last two incarnations of the Zoanthrope. Call me crazy, but I somehow preferred the old 2nd edition version that was basically an upgrade for a Tyranid warrior. The modern version with its huge cranium and atrophied, vestigial body seemed like a nice idea, but the sculpt itself just wasn’t quite there — especially in the case of the more recent version, where the creature’s tail was balancing awkwardly on some Tyranid growth emerging from the floor (compare Adam Wier’s very insightful look at the various Zoanthrope models)

However, with this third and latest iteration of the concept, GW have finally managed to sell me on the design: Not only have they strengthened the neck portion to make it more believable…

…but the whole creature looks more balanced now. And I particularly like the added option for building a Neurothrope, both because it perfectly channels the look of the Doom of Malan’tai and because the resulting model looks like one creepy, hideous beast in his own right:

Just look at that disgusting extra spine. Ewwww:

I also think that the Neurothrope provides perfect villain material — I mean he/it just looks like an evil alien pupeteer, right?

All in all, the redesign/upgrade of the Zoanthropes in plastic form is quite successful. Good job!

As has been the case with the Hive Guad/Tyrant Guard, however, there’s a price to pay: You get some and you lose some, as we can see when we proceed to the kit’s other variant, the Venomthrope:

Now, to be fair, that creature was always a bit of an acquired taste. Here’s the original version:

Kind of like a Lictor who watched too much tentacle hentai, if you ask me (ugh, there you go, Google, another tag to add to my blog…).

Erm, anyway, the one thing the new Venomthropes have over the old model is that they look a bit more balanced in their composition:

But at the same time, there’s just an inherent goofiness to the model that’s just hard to ignore. Sure, many Tyranid creatures straddle a very fine line between the disturbing and the downright silly (some more successfully than others), but the Venomthrope just seems off to me. And the fact that the faces just seem somewhat…dorky doesn’t help of course:

You know what: I think the original concept for the creature was pretty flawed, and maybe it shouldn’t have received a plastic upgrade in the first place but rather been quietly pushed in front of a bus while no one was looking. I, for one, would have preferred a plastic Lictor to these strange creatures…

All in all, the kit seems like a bit of a mixed bag: If you’re going for the Zoanthropes, it’s great. The Venomthropes, not so much. But no one’s forcing you to build them, I guess…

Bonus Content: The Spawn of Cryptus

Okay, this guy is actually only available as part of the (probably already sold out) Shield of Baal boxed kit, but while we are talking about new Tyranid models anyway, we might as well throw him in, right?

Now you certainly don’t have to be a brain surgeon to realise that the model is a slightly dolled-up Space Hulk Broodlord — that much is blantantly obvious. And since the Broodlord was absolutely fantastic, the Spawn of Cryptus also has quite a lot going for it.

Here’s the thing, though: I actually think the changes to the model aren’t necessarily for the better. Take a look at the Space Hulk Broodlord:

In many ways, this is the quintessential Tyranid/Genestealer model: Sure, the Giger influence is plain to see, but the design goes beyond that and created an original piece. I have read in WD back in the day that this Broodlord was expressly designed as a kind of “end boss” for Space Hulk — and that’s precisely what he looks like: A vicious end boss, lurking at the heart of the derelict spacecraft.

The Spawn of Cryptus makes some minor changes to the formula, and it feels to me like they actually detract from the original vision: the smaller pair of arms was wonderful on the Space Hulk version, but on the Spawn of Cryptus, its posing gives the creature an “Ohhh, what have we here?” kind of look that’s really hard to unsee once you’ve noticed it. I also think the tech-y base with the pile of skulls was a much better way of basing the creature than some lame organic growth — even though it may have been more clichéd, of course.

All in all, the Spawn of Cryptus is still an amazing model and an excellent leader for the Tyranid detachment in Shield of Baal — but it does feel like a slightly inferior retread of an even better piece. In any case, however, it’s much better than the Blood Angels Captain that comes with the kit — that is one messy fusion of far superior Space Hulk models if ever there was one…

Conversion options

What I said in my last Tyranid review also holds true here: The anatomy of the Tyranids is very firmly defined by a set of design guidelines, which is very much a part of their appeal. But at the same time, those guidelines also make all the bitz very recognisably Tyranid. In spite of this, there may be some use for these new toys, even if you don’t have an actual Tyranid army:

• I think the Mucolid Spore would make for an absolutely excellent alien creature that doesn’t neccessarily have to be Tyranid in nature: My instinctive reaction to the model was “Enslaver!”, for instance. In any case, such a creature would be a very interesting addition to every INQ28 (and even INQ54) collection, if you ask me.
• By the same token, the rest of the Tyrannocyte/Sporocyst kit looks like it would be an interesting source for conversion material when it comes to building alien terrain and Gigeresque organic architecture — and maybe, just maybe, there’d be a use for some of these parts on Slaaneshi Daemon Princes and Greater Daemons as well?
• Like I said earlier, the Neurothrope would work very well as the monster pulling the strings of a Xenos/Genestealer Cult — granted, it’s not a Genestealer Patriarch, but it does look like the hideous pupeteer behind an alien infestation and, as such, would make an excellent “boss monster” for INQ28 or Necromunda.
• And while we’re talking of Genestealer cults, the Spawn of Cryptus would be just as great as the monster at the heart of a cult as the Space Hulk Broodlord, of course…
• And finally, an idea that may seem a bit out there: The Maleceptor’s body could maybe be used as the base for a huge daemon beast/Maulerfiend, with quite a bit of work?! There’s something peculiar and almost statuesque in its profile that might warrant further exploration, if you’re feeling adventurous… ;)

Like the first 2014 Tyrandid wave, I’ll call this a fairly solid – if mostly unsurprising – release. The big creature is a bit of a disappointment, and the Venomthropes are, frankly, pretty terrible. On the other hand, we get what may be one of the most interesting transport vehicles in the entirety of 40k as well as a very viable and interesting redesign of the Zoanthrope. If seen together with the first wave release, this actually becomes quite a competent package of new kits — still no Genestealer Cult, though, what a crying shame…

But seriously, I am not a Tyranid fan, so that may explain my relative lack of enthusiams. On the whole, though, I think Tyranid players were treated pretty fairly in 2014. And some of the kits are even legitmately interesting beyond their army of origin.

But what do you think? Do you like the new kits or do you find them disappointing? Or do you have any additional conversion ideas to share? I’d love to hear your feedback in the comments section?

And, as always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

What a funny coincidence: I’ve just finished working on a rather involved conversion to represent everyone’s favourite teamkiller, Khârn the Betrayer, and now there are suddenly rumours floating around about some kind of release surrounding the character as part of GW’s Advent Calendar — what’s up with that?

So while the holiday season rapdily approaches, why not take a closer look at everyone’s favourite man in red, right? Allow me to walk you through a ridiculously wordy post about Khârn the Betrayer, ladies and gentlemen (don’t worry, there’ll be pictures somewhere down the line ;) ):

The Character

When it comes down to fluff, Khârn is a rather interesting case: Back when the character was introduced (along with the release of the 2nd edition Chaos Codex), there wasn’t much to go on beyond his background in the book — and even that painted a picture of a somewhat…imbalanced individual.

Beyond that, there was only William King’s seminal short story “The Wrath of Khârn”, which was published both in Inferno! and WD back in the day. But it quickly became obvious that Khârn’s basic approach of being ALWAYS ANGRY ALL THE TIME didn’t exactly turn him into a narrative goldmine: He was frankly a bit of a one trick pony when it came to his character, even though some swear that Khârn harboured some hidden qualities.

The HH series has made Khârn quite a bit more interesting, because it has managed to add more facets to his character: During battle, he loses his mind with the best of them, being entirely at the control of his Butcher’s Nails implants. But what makes Khârn interesting is that he seems like a reasonable and calm person off the battlefield, even serving as a voice of reason to his Primarch in the role of equerry. What’s more, by the time the Heresy rolls around, some very visible cracks have begun to show in the XII legion’s foundations, both in regards to Angron’s continuing mental and physical  degradation and the growing toll of the Nails on his legionaries.

WARNING: Spoilers for Betrayer follow!

In Betrayer, Khârn seems very aware of both problems, yet he remains loyal to his Primarch and is one of the cornerstones of the legion’s nobility and brotherhood — easily the most important thing to him, it seems, both when it comes to his dealings with his brethren and his blood brother, Argel Tal of the Word Bearers. It’s especially striking, then, how the death of the latter seemingly sends Khârn on the first steps of his development into the utterly bloodthirsty and psychotic character we know from the 40k universe: There’s a battle scene at the tail end of Betrayer that shows a different Khârn to the one we have encountered before — an utterly indifferent killing machine. And for now, we can only guess at the implications of Angron’s “ascension”, both for the legion in general and Khârn in particular — we do know what he has become 10,000 years later, though…

End Spoilers

In any case, it’ll be interesting to see what the writers at GW and BL have in store for Khârn — but I, for one, hope that it’ll be more along the lines of Aaron Dembski-Bowden’s rather nuanced treament of the character, and less like the one-note soundbites we have grown accustomed to from Khârn’s 40k background.

The Art

It’s really impossible to discuss any part of the 30k/40k lore without considering the accompanying artwork — the art is arguably just as important for the setting as the models and the baclground narration, especially since it often provides the designers with the actual inspiration for the design of new models or the redesign of existing characters.

So let’s take a look at some of the artwork depicting Khârn the Betrayer over the years — interestingly enough, the artwork for the character has a track record that can seem just as spotty as his narrative background.

But let’s cut to the chase: One of the first pieces of artwork I ever saw – and still one of the best images depicting Khârn, if you ask me – is this piece, created by Kev Walker:

This illustration really has it all! It was used to accompany William King’s aforementioned “The Wrath of Khârn” in WD, and I still love it just as much as I did back when I first saw it — the one element that does seem slightly distracting is the collection of piercings on Khârn’s left bicep — such a slightly kinky touch would somehow seem more fitting on a follower of Slaanesh. But then, the accompanying story nicely toys with that scenario, so maybe that was the whole point?

When it comes to classic Khârn, one really need not look any further than Jes Goodwin’s own concept sketches for the character:

I think one can safely suspect that this is the oldest piece of art depicting Khârn, and it is also the one that is the most faithful to the actual miniature — for very obvious reasons… It also remains one of the best drawings of Khârn, along with the one by Kev Walker, in my opinion, but then that’s Jes Goodwin for you…

Interestingly enough, some of the other artwork depiciting Khârn doesn’t fare quite as well: For instance, Adrian Smith is easily one of my favourite artists when it comes to depicting (Chaos) Space Marines, but his treatment of Khârn is not up to his usual standard, if you ask me:

Sure, there’s a lot to like about the piece, but the entire left arm and the axe just fall apart completely when you look at them too closely — the perspective of that part is just sooo wonkey, don’t you think? And for some strange reason, Khârn suddenly seems to have both arms uncovered in this piece.

What’s more, most of the even more recent pieces really don’t capture the essence of the character for me, be it because it looks like Khârn is wearing an armoured bodysuit…

…or because they make him look like a clueless idiot when fighting against loyalists:

At least the art from Khârn’s latest codex entry is pretty competent, if a little uninspired:

Do yourself a favour and don’t look at the pictured of his wargear that are part of his Dataslate, though: While the art itself works well enough, the added explanations for his wargear’s various features read like the worst kind of fan fiction imaginable…

And what of Heresy era Khârn? Interestingly enough, once again, the oldest piece of artwork may just be the best:

Wayne England’s iconic piece of art from the original HH trading card game may no longer be an accurate representation of the recent fluff (the legion colours have ended up noticeably different in the interim, for one), but it’s still one of those classic images I hold dear  — but then, I’ve always had a thing for Wayne England’s chaos artwork, so that may have something to do with it as well.

At the same time, the updated depiction of heresy era Khârn in the Black Library publications is also pretty cool:

There’s just something menacing and implacable about the above piece that I really like! It also seems like this was either designed to more or less accurately depict FW’s Khârn model or even serve as a design template for it? But we’ll be getting to the models in a second…

Before we talk about Khârn in miniature form, allow me to bring up two pieces of fanmade artwork that I really like.

First up, heresy era Khârn, as rendered in Greyall’s trademark style:

Khârn the Bloody by Greyall

As per Greyall’s usual standard, the piece is incredibly detailed and ornate — you just have to love that axe design, don’t you?

The other illustration I would like to show you is this fantastic piece by slaine69, showing Khârn at Amartura:

Khârn at Armatura by slaine69

This probably couldn’t be any more different in style and direction from Greyall’s piece, but I love it just as much: slaine69 is an insanely talented artist, and what I like about this – slightly unconventional – depiction of Khârn is how it manages to humanise him as a character and bring his berserk tendencies to the fore at the same moment — excellent stuff!

The models

So we have looked at the art — but what about the actual models? Do they do the character justice? And what about the hobbyists’ take on Khârn? Let’s find out!

As far as official releases are concerned, there have been two models for Khârn so far:

The first one is Jes Goodwin’s original 40k version of the character:

Khârn the Betrayer by Jes Goodwin

The model is still available from GW today, and in my opinion, it’s not only a true classic, but it also still holds up beautifully. The model was released along with Abbadon, Ahriman and Fabius Bile, back when the 2nd edition Codex Chaos hit, and he has arguably managed to age pretty gracefully. I realise that the model has been getting some flak over the years for its rather static pose, but come on, people: This guy has so many elements that became iconic and seminal for the whole look of the World Eaters: The baroque and pitted power armour, the bunny-eared helmet (that is almost impossible to replace or approximate by mere kitbashing or converting), the chains — and, of course, the bare arm, which may be a more common sight in (Chaos) Marine armies today, but was something quite original back then.

I remember first seeing Khârn among a collection of models and thinking: “I wonder what this guy’s story is!” — the model just has a way of drawing you in! As it happens, Jes Goodwin is possibly responsible for the two most iconic World Eaters models: Khârn is one of them, and the other one is the iconic 1991 metal World Eater — and if I have one complaint, it’s that the best World Eaters models were released over twenty years ago, with precious little having happened in the interim (Forgeworld notwithstanding). Anyway, what can I say: I am still a huge fan of this guy!

There’s also the much more recent FW model for heresy era Khârn by Edgar Skomorowski:

Khârn the Bloody, by Edgar Skomorowski

The model seems to have been designed with the main criticism against the Jes Goodwin version firmly in mind, because this guy is *very* dynamic — almost overly so, in fact, but we’ll be getting to that. The armour design is really cool, adding a gladiatorial flair to Khârn’s wargear that is a great fit for his legion’s background. The crested centurion helmet is also a great touch — although I would argue that the original helmet’s faceplate seems slightly more balanced.

In spite of all the good aspects, I am not a huge fan of the model, to be honest: The running pose seems slightly oddly balanced to me, making it look like Khârn is almost falling forward — this has always been a problem with running models, however, and maybe it was actually an intentional choice, in order to illustrate his uncontrolled rage? I also think the choice to extend the unarmoured/partially armoured look to his other arm as well somewhat lessens the visual punch of this element. And I really hate the model’s bare head: It may be a cool enough face, certainly, but it’s not Khârn’s face:

Such things always come down to personal choice, of course, but it is stated outright in the background that Khârn’s face is actually unscarred. The integration of the Butcher’s Nails also seems a bit random — but in any case, the head is an optional bit, so it’s not like you have to use it. All in all, I think it’s a nice, if slightly underwhelming, model.

It goes without saying that many, many hobbyists have come up with their own versions of the character, kitbashing or converting their own model to represent Khârn. Some of these improve on the existing models quite a bit, so I would like to share with you my favourites — and the interpretations I have drawn inspiration from for my own conversion. I’ll be limiting myself to those models who represent a substantial change to the stock models, by the way, although it has to be said that merely reposing the existing models can lead to rather stunning results as well. Anyway, here goes!

Let’s start with different versions of (Pre) Heresy Khârn:

Pre Heresy Khârn by Sebastien Lavigne

This – Golden Demon winning – version of 30k Khârn by Sebastien Lavigne remains one of my favourite versions of the character: I just love the dynamism of the model, as well as the added legion standard! The model becomes even more impressive when you consider the fact that, back in 2008, the Horus Heresy wasn’t the massively detailed and codified setting it is today. In spite of that Sebastien still managed to create a tiny slice of the setting without much to work from, and the result still manages to hold up today. Marvelous!

There’s also the ever-inspirational Mr. Poom, who is responsible for the other two heresy era Khârns I would like to share with you:

This piece was clearly inspired by Wayne England’s art shown further in this post, and I simply love how closely the model represents the illustration (and how it dares to deviate from it in all the right places). I am aware that Mr. Poom is no longer all that fond of the model, but it does remain one of my favourites.

His more recent version of the character uses the Forgeworld version as a base:

Khârn the Bloody by Mr. Poom

The horsehair crest brings the model more in line with the character’s depiction in Betrayer, which is a nice touch. And Mr. Poom’s paintjob is as gorgeous as ever — I still prefer his earlier version of the character, to be perfectly honest, but out of all the FW Khârns, this one is probably my favourite!

So what about the 40k versions of the character?

Khârn the Betrayer by kitbasher

Wow, this Khârn conversion by kitbasher may just be the perfect Khârn model! It’s also a rare case of a model actually improving on the artwork it has been based on: The model clearly takes lots of inspiration from the Adrian Smith illustration further up in this post, but it works out all the kinks of the piece, creating something better in the process — perfect!

Then there’s this Khârn by Lil’Loser Studio:

Khârn the Betrayer by Lil’Loser Studios

The model uses parts from both official Khârn models, combining them to great effect and creating an excellent model!

AMaximus, who, it has to be said, is one of my main inspirations for World Eaters conversions and kitbashes, chose a similar approach, coming up with this awesome Khârn:

Khârn the Betrayer by AMaximus

I can hardly wait for him to slap some paint on this model!

I also really like this very clean and seamless conversion by mf_Greg:

Khârn the Betrayer by mf_Greg

The excellent paintjob helps, of course ;)

The Vanus Temple is responsible for two stunning versions of the character: First up, his earlier conversion, based on a WFB champion of Khorne:

Khârn the Betrayer by the Vanus Temple

This one became popular enough that multiple models have been produced as commission pieces, if I recall correctly.

Khârn the Betrayer by the Vanus Temple

A more recent version by the same artist uses the FW Khârn model and creates an equally stunning piece:

Khârn the Betrayer by the Vanus Temple

And finally, some guys who really know how to go for shock and awe tactics:

An unbelievably huge (and spiky) Khârn by Rumplemaster:

Khârn the Betrayer by Rumplemaster

And two equally huge models by Machinator…

Khârn the Betrayer by Machinator

…and Reanimator, respectively:

Khârn the Betrayer by Reanimator

I’ve taken quite a bit of inspiration from these last two for my own, updated Khârn the Betrayer, as you’ll be seeing in a minute.

And there’s this utterly unbelievable, mostly sculpted from scratch, Khârn by Master of the Forge:

Khârn the Betrayer by Master of the Forge

I could never imagine creating a model like this, which just makes it even more impressive — the greatest true scale Khârn in existence? Very likely…

All of these last models are massive — as befits the Blood God’s most exalted champion. But there’s one last piece that approaches the issue from a wholly different angle. Just check out this model by WilhelMiniatures:

Khârn by Wilhelminiatures

Khârn by WilhelMiniatures

Wow, just…wow!

My own approach

All of these illustrations and models were floating around my head, when the theme for the 15th Painting/Converting contest over at ThroneofSkulls.com was announced: Build a better character, that is: improve on one of the Khornate characters from either 40k or WFB. It was clear to me that I wanted to build an updated Khârn, and I tried to incorporate as many awesome ideas from my various sources of inspiration as I could. It took me some time to hammer out a build, but this was what I ended up with:

My main goal was to make Khârn bigger. Plus I wanted to try and use mostly plastic parts, since it’s the material I am most comfortable with. Both led to the decision of basing the model on the legs from my beloved plastic Terminator Lord kit, combined with the upper body from a WFB Skullcrusher. Beyond that, I tried to incorporate as many visual elements of the original Jes Goodwin model as I could.

I have learned from the great Ron Saikowski that the important part in trying to make a model resemble a piece of art (or an earlier version of the miniature) is to try and get some of the key parts right: Those will make the model look believable, and close enough to its source that you can afford a little leeway with the smaller details.

On my own model, the parts I definitely wanted to keep were the bare left arm, the huge axe, the chains and the general design of the armour and helmet. Some of the detail was easy enough to recreate with plastic bitz: The big air outlet on Khârn’s chest was originally a part of an IG voxcaster, but it now looks reasonably close to the original. The chains were reasonably easy to approximate by using some of the spiked chains from the Skullcrusher kit. And in a bit of a happy coincidence, one of the axes from the FW Cataphractii Terminators looked reasonably similar to Jes Goodwin’s original design for Gorechild, while also fitting the slightly bigger scale of my model.

Other details were a bit harder to get right: I spent quite some time looking for a suitable bare arm, finally settling on an arm from the WFB Warhshrine of Chaos priest. Getting the arm into a working position did take some time, however, and even then, it ended up ever so slightly anatomically dubious — I’ll have to live with that, I suppose.

I also realised that there was no getting around using the original head and backpack: The backpack with its skulls was just too iconic (interestingly enough, the backpack I did end up using wasn’t the one from Khârn, though, but a virtually identical one from an old 90s metal Chaos Lord). And the helmet turned out to be the element that really sold the model as Khârn, instead of just some true scale berzerker — fortunately enough, fellow hobbyist Belphoebe was kind enough to provide me with a leftover Khârn head — thanks, mate!

I do realise that there are some deviations from the original model, and I did take some shortcuts during the truescaling process — but I hope the paintjob manages to pull everything together into a cohesive whole. So, without much further ado, here’s my painted model for Khârn the Betrayer:

Of course I also tried to come up with a suitably impressive base for the model, in order to support the model’s size and pose:

Granted, the pose is just as static as the one on Jes Goodwin’s original model — but, like I said: I am a fan! ;) Plus I think that Khârn lends himself really well to the whole “bellowing at the sky in rage” thing…

Oh, and here’s a scale comparison picture, by the way, showing the new model next to my orginal, stock Khârn from way back when:

All in all, in spite of a hundred small things that could probably be better, I have to say that I am really rather happy with my new version of the character — I think Jes Goodwin’s version is still really awesome, so making Khârn bigger and more intimidating was really the best possible route, if you ask me.

I won’t lie to you: I hope my version holds up to some of the excellent conversions I’ve shown you in today’s post — and I can only say thank you to all the hobbyists whose work on Khârn has inspired me to tackle my own conversion! Thanks for letting me …borrow a few ideas from your excellent models, chaps!

So, whatever may be in store for our favourite, red-armoured lunatic this Christmas, I hope you’ve found this post inspiring! And I would love to hear any feedback you might have in the comments section!

So go convert some World Eaters now, and always remember: Khorne cares not from whence the blood flows, only that it flows!
As always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

Right, before Christmas is finally upon us next week, let’s fit in one last review for this year, shall we?

Linked together with the Tyranid release by way of the Shield of Baal:Deathstorm boxed set, we get another round of Blood Angels models before the year is out. Now the Blood Angels are one of the chapters that have already seen a rather substantial (and very good) dedicated release at an earlier point, providing us, among other things, with rather gorgeous kits for the Death Company and Sanguinary Guard, respectively, plus a very versatile Dreadnought kit. The new release, therefore, serves to nicely round out the Blood Angels’ catalogue — but does it stack up to the quality of the earlier release? Let’s find out! And let us also look at all the delightful conversion options — for the last time this year! ;)

The first thing that quickly becomes obvious with this release is that the various new kits make pretty heavy use of existing resources, such as the Tactical Marine kit, the Sternguard and even the Space Hulk BA Terminators, recombining and changing around elements from either to create some new toys for our Blood Angels. This “recycling” of existing assets is neither difficult to spot, nor – I would argue – such a big secret to begin with. And it doesn’t have to be a bad thing either. But while GW have been content to release slightly touched up single characters so far, this is one of the first time this happens on such a scale — with both good and bad consequences, but we’ll be getting to that in a minute. Let’s take a closer look at each of the kits in turn:

Blood Angels Sanguinary Priest

Alright, this is an interesting piece, both because it’s the most original (as in “freshly sculpted”) part of this release and because it’s also the first time that we get a plastic version of the Blood Angels’ very own brand of priests/apothecaries. So what do we have here?

The model clearly takes some cues from the vintage Brother Corbulo, with certain elements (such as the face and the skull chalice) clearly resembling that character. At the same time, the design of the armour clearly calls back to the Sanguinary Guard (and, by extension, to the vintage models for Commander Dante and Captain Tycho). The addition of flowing robes (an element mostly seen on Dark Angels models so far) provides a nice and individual touch to the model, and the many trinkets dangling from his armour serve as a great reminder of his status.

One thing I really love about the model is the highly ostentatious chain sword — such a beautiful, yet menacing weapon! And though it’s hard to make out in the official pictures, the face is also a bit more interesting than your standard, unhelmeted Blood Angels head (more on those later…).

A look at the sprue reveals that it should really be easy enough to swap in all kinds of Marine parts for smaller or bigger conversions. And using the arms, the backpack or the head on different models should also be really easy:

Space Marines seem to make for pretty good clamshell characters, since the way their armour goes together makes the resulting model stay pretty versatile, in spite of being single pose.

All in all, this guy is basically one of the high points of the release for me — and definitely the most interesting of the new kits from a converter’s perspective! Very nice!

Blood Angels Librarian in Terminator armour

This model clearly takes some cues from the Librarian that came with Space Hulk (the double headed psy-axe is a dead giveaway), although I like the new model’s dynamic pose better than the really statuesque Space Hulk Librarian. The model also seems to resemble GW’s older metal/Finecast Terminator Librarian — to the point that it was initially pretty hard to decide whether this was a new model or a kitbash when the first, fuzzy pictures of this release emerged.

And again, this is an excellent character, continuing the trend of strong clamshell plastic characters for the Space Marines! It should also be reasonably easy to convert this guy with an influx of external bitz, and for all the same reasons I mentioned above:

I only have two minor gripes with the model: One, the position of the head seems ever so slightly strange, even though it makes sense in context. But the way the model goes together means that the head is basically locked at that precise angle, unless you invest more time and create a more involved conversion.

By the same token, I realise that this guy is part of the Blood Angels release, but wouldn’t a generic Librarian have made more sense? Sure, the two or three BA icons should be easy enough to get rid of, but this makes it all the more strange that GW didn’t just release this guy as a vanilla model — he would have been quite a bit more useful that way…

All in all, it’s a pretty strong model, though.

Blood Angels Tactical Squad

Okay, here’s where the “recycling” process I mentioned above hits full swing, because the Blood Angels Tactical Squad is basically a mashup of the recent “vanilla” tactical kit, the Sternguard kit and some Death Company and Sanguinary Guard bitz thrown in for flavour. It’s easy enough to spot a multitude of familiar bitz, so this is really pretty obvious.

Among the new parts are a few pretty nice head variants, by the look of it. I really like the helmet of the Marine on the right, for example:

Interestingly enough, the “BA-ification” really falls flat on some of the parts. For instance, the rebreather head was possibly one of the coolest bitz from the tactical kit, but looks pretty silly with an added BA hairdo added on top:

In fact, can I just say that I am really not a big fan of the one Blood Angels hairstyle we get? Seriously, I see what they were going for, but that kind of hairstyle just ends up looking pretty daft when combined with a Marine’s somewhat exaggerated features — and it’s the only type of hair we get for our Blood Angels, for crying out loud. Instead of making them look like classical statures, they just seem like pampered children with that stupid hair — but maybe that’s just me.

Beyond such nitpicking, however, I think this is a rock-solid kit. Does it bring something new to the table? No, because it’s mostly a mashup of pre-existing assets. But that is actually its strong suit: It gives Blood Angels players an updated troop box with all the recent weapon options and some nice bitz thrown in for flavour and decoration. Certainly a nonessential purchase if you already have 3,000 points of Marines knocking about, but a very useful resource for starting a new army!

So, great for (new) BA players, everyone else may pass.

Blood Angels Assault Terminators

As with the “vanilla” Assault Terminators, these guys come in two flavours and can be armed with either twin lightning claws or thunder hammers and storm shields. Let’s look at both variants in turn:

I am a huge fan of Lightning Claws, but the LC Termies get the short end of the stick, if you ask me: Maybe I’ve just never realised this before, but loyalist lightning claws seem to have a way of jutting out of their gauntlets at a slightly strange angle, taking away some of the dynamism. This is especially obvious on the more dynamically posed models:

Just look at the model on the left: It looks like the claws should really be curved inwards, in order to better underline the model’s composition, but there they are, straight and clunky — has this been as noticeable on the generic assault Terminators as well, I wonder?

The Terminators with thunder hammer fare far better, at least in my opinion:

There’s just something wonderfully massive and threatening about Terminators armed with the old hammer/shield combo. Plus I really like the champion, with his added armour plates and robe:

Both variants profit from beautifully detailed armour and lots and lots of BA trinkets that really make them look like the chapter’s elite first company. It’s also very obvious that huge parts of this kit have been heavily inspired by (and reused from) the Space Hulk Terminators — just look at the small armour plates on the thunder hammer sergeant, for example. But that in itself is really a good thing, because it allows players to field Terminators that are visually on par with the truly excellent Space Hulk models without having to pay over-inflated ebay prices for the original models.

There is one substantial problem however: You pay for this opportunity by way of a serious reduction in modeling flexibility! A look at the sprue reveals that the bodies are constructed pretty much like those of snap-fit Terminators: Each Terminator’s legs and torso are one piece, with the chestplate and head also fused together. The arms and shoulder pads are separate parts — but the fact remains that these Terminators are a huge step back from the versatility we know!

Granted, if you like to build your models by the book, this shouldn’t even be such a big problem to begin with, but if you’re an avid converter and kitbasher, like me, this seems somewhat worrying, because we end up with a multi part kit that is severely less flexible than some of the kits we know and love. If this is only limited to one kit, it becomes a bit of a non-issue, since you are free to get the regular, more flexible Terminators. But one has to wonder what ramifications this may have for future releases…

Bonus Content: First Captain Karlaen

During my release of the Tyranid second wave, I threw in a look at the Spawn of Cryptus, seeing how Shield of Baal: Deathstorm was basically released back to back with the new kits. So let’s do the same for the Blood Angels character from the same kit, Captain Karlaen.

At first glance, what we have here is a massive Blood Angels Captain wearing suitably ornate Terminator armour, purposefully striding forward — so far so good, right?

The problem is that Karlaen suffers from exactly the same problem as the Spawn af Cryptus, although it’s even more pronounced here:
Where the Spawn of Cryptus was a more or less straightforward “remix” of the Space Hulk Broodlord (with most of the strengths of the original model being kept intact),  Karlaen tries something a little more adventurous in that the model seemingly attempts to incorporate elements from two different sources. Just compare the picture above with this…

…and this:

It looks like the model for Karlaen is a hybrid between these two Space Hulk models — and the bad news is: It’s decidedly less interesting and imposing than either of them. Now this wouldn’t be much of a problem if Karlaen were any old Termie, but he is supposed to be the Blood Angels’ first captain — their most accomplished warrior and commander,  second only to Lord Commander Dante — and he ends up looking like an okay-ish kitbash made from two superior Space Hulk models. And again with the stupid hair — sorry GW, not nearly good enough!

Conversion options:

It goes without saying that this release has really been tailored towards Blood Angels players first and foremost, with the amount of BA iconograpgy present really making conversions and kitbashes  beyond Blood Angels and their successor chapters slightly more complicated. That said, I still have a few simple ideas for conversions using the new kits.

• The most obvious point is that many bitz from this release should make very nice additions to BA players’ bitzbox, allowing them to introduce even more flavour and ornamentation into their armies — and that’s always a good thing!
• By the same token, some of the bitz should be equally useful in other Space Marine armies — I am especially thinking of stuff like heads, armour plates or cool weapons. Come to think of it, some of those swords should look pretty cool on INQ28 characters as well.
• It should be easy enough to convert the Terminator Librarian to represent a Librarian from a different chapter — just shave off some of the iconography and you’re there. But then again, that’s why the model should have come in vanilla flavour in the first place ;)
• The ostentatiousness of BA armour makes these kits a really good source for bitz when it comes to something as eccentric as, say, kitbashing a Legio Custodes army: So far, I’ve made ample use of BA bitz for that project, and I imagine some of the new bitz will come in handy as well, sooner or later.
• Finally, the Sanguinary Priest has to be the most interesting part of this release when it comes to conversions: He could be used as a great base for a suitably impressive BA character — or even for a plastic Mephisto conversion? And I think he would make a pretty awesome Inquisitor with a bit of work — in fact, I’ve recently purchased the model in pursuit of exactly such a conversion, so watch this space… ;)

All in all, this is certainly a solid  release, even if it’s mostly useful for BA players. Where most of the other releases this year tried to bring something new to the table, this release wave for the Blood Angels mainly focuses on refining and rounding out the existing catalogue — which is an equally viable approach, I might add! But the models are looking great and the amount of bitz we can get out of the new kits should be a pretty big help to those with BA and BA successor armies.

The general direction of the release does outline one thing that does have possible ramifications for the future that are both good and a little worrying:

In the age of digital sculpting, it is obviously possible to re-use assets and, what’s more, to recombine them with other kits in order to quickly generate custom kits for different chapters — and that is certainly a great option, because it opens up the possibility for all kinds of conversions and customisations: We are already pretty close to having dedicated troop boxes for most of the first founding legions, but this becomes even more interesting when you think about Traitor Legions, Eldar Craftworlds or what have you.

On the other hand, a possible pitfall of such a way of design seems to be the threat of kits that are far less flexible: The clamshell characters are an example of this, albeit not an egregious one — it’s still fairly easy to use them for kitbashing and converting. At the same time, however, the multi part Space Marine kits have always been among the most flexible and versatile kits produced by GW, and seeing a Terminator kit that gets rid of a substantial chunk of flexibility like that does seem a little worrying — at least to a passionate kitbasher like me…

It’ll be interesting to see where we go from here, to say the least!

So, what’s your take on the new models? And do you have any conversion ideas of your own to share? I’d love to hear from you in the comments section!

As always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

A very merry Christmas to all the readers of this blog, to all commenters and to all my hobby buddies out there! I hope you’re having a great time with your families, friends and loved ones! Don’t forget to sneak in some hobby time, though! ;)

Oh, and don’t forget: I’ll be seeing you soon for this year’s Eternal Hunt Awards, so stay tuned!

Alright, everyone, it is that time of year again! So on the last day of 2014, let us commence a look back at the year and talk about this year’s Eternal Hunt Awards! And what better way to start than to talk about 2014’s outstanding archievements by fellow hobbyists, right?

Hobby blog of the year

Interestingly enough, choosing winners for this category really becomes harder and harder as we go along, mostly because most of last year’s winners just keep on producing outstanding content (yes, Jeff Vader, I am looking at you — among others ;) ). That said, in the interest of keeping things fresh. I’ve limited my choice to blogs that have not yet been among the winners. So, with that out of the way, whose blog was the most awesome this year? Let’s find out!

1st place: Le blog dé Kouzes

Confession time: My French has become horribly rusty over the last few years, which is really a shame. But every once in a while, something makes me want to brush up on the language, and this year’s winner is very much a reason to learn French:

The four Kouzes provide a relentless stream of quality content, ranging from extremely helpful tutorials to absolutely breathtaking army projects. And every once in a while, they’ll run competitions that invariably draw the most talented hobbyists from the French speaking hobby community (and well beyond).

Meanwhile, their own projects really remain the star of the show here: Be it Morbäck’s absolutely stunning Plaguebones (or his equally wonderful Gretchin Army), Théo’agonie’s unbelievably creepy Dark Eldar or what have you: These guys are so insanely talented that I always feel the need to read through their every post — albeit at a glacially slow pace, more often than not ;)

So whether or not you know any French, make sure to head over to this fantastic blog as soon as possible — if all else fails, there’s always Google Translate, you know ;)

2nd place: thenickeninja’s blog

There are many things to love about the blog of swedish hobbyist thenickeninja, but let me just point out two of them: His absolutely amazing work for Blood Bowl – just check out his gorgeous Voodorcs – and his stunning underhive terrain — the latter one may just be the best tabletop terrain in existence, period.

Looking at these terrain projects always leaves me equal parts inspired and dejected at the fact that I’ll never be able to come up with something nearly as ingenious as this.

So definitely check out thenickeninja’s blog at your earliest convenience — I promise you’ll hunger for Necromunda and INQ28 afterwards, and that’s always a good thing!

3rd place: Between the Bolter and Me

Another confession: I am as guilty as anyone at regularly falling victim to the “pretty picture syndrome”, scrolling past carefully written paragraphs of excellent text in order to get at the delicious pictures of models. This is a terrible habit, to be sure, and it is therefore all the more astounding that this year’s third place has managed to capture me with a combination of things to look at and things to read through. time and time again:

The Brothers Wier maintain an excellent balance between showcasing cool conversions and kitbashes, providing helpful tutorials and taking detailed and insightful looks at new releases as well as certain developments in this hobby of ours. Their articles never disappoint and manage to be rewarding — with or without any pictures. A very well put together blog, and another hearty recommendation — make sure to check out Between the Bolter And Me!

Best models of the year

The level of quality when it comes to hobbyists’ creations is really quite off the charts by now — it’s almost unbelievable how many quality projects, logs, blogs and galleries can be found online! But even in this Golden Age of creativity, there are some that rise above the crowd. So let me present you some of the best pieces of 2014:

Red Corsairs by Kari Hernesniemi

Red Corsairs by Kari Hernesniemi

Kari and Okki, the Spiky Rat Pack, are common household names whenever I talk about my favourite blogs and hobbyists — and for a good reason, because their creations just tend to blow me away. This year, Kari does it yet again with some wonderful, true scale Red Corsairs that are a perfect embodiment of what Chaos Space Marines should be.

Truth be told, the Red Corsairs have often felt a little gimmicky to me – a strange mésalliance of traitors lacking the flair of the “true” Traitor Legions. Well, no longer, because Kari’s wonderful models are Blanchian and pirate-y and utterly badass at the same time, showing a chapter that has managed to become as corrupted in a mere century when others needed ten millennia for the same feat. Those models are just perfect — amazing job!

Check out Kari’s post about his Red Corsairs here.

Red Corsair by Kari Hernesniemi

Inquisitor De Lorme by Steifer

Inquisitor De Lorme by Steifer

A simply wonderful piece, marrying Blanchian design sensibilities with a dash of the Venetian Carnival: De Lorme is just pitch perfect in execution, a character that is equal parts majestic and ostentatious on the one hand, and sinister and more than a little deranged on the other. The whole achievement becomes even more stunning when you consider that Steifer sculpted huge parts of the model from scratch — all in all, this may just be my favourite Inquisitor this year!

Read more about Inquisitor De Lorme on Steifer’s blog here: The model is further enriched by seeing all the thought and care that went into its creation!

Inquisitor De Lorme by Steifer

Death Cult Assassin by MonkeyBallistic

Death Cult Assassin by MomkeyBallistic

The sheer elegance and perfection of this model leaves me almost speechless — suffice to say that this may just be the definite Death Cultist model, period. Based on a Witch Elf, this model is a perfectly realised interpretation of the archetype created by such characters as Severina and Sevora Devout (of INQ54 fame) — yet it even manages to improve upon those models: absolutely marvelous work!

Check out MonkeyBallistic’s blog here.
Mounted Champion of Nurgle by PDH

Nurglite Campion by PDH

Hugely talented hobbyist and all around great guy PDH absolutely delivers once again with a Champion of Nurgle on his daemonic steed, perfectly nailing down the diseased, festering look we would expect of a chosen of the grandfather — while totally blowing the official Magghot Lords out of the water at the same time! Seriously, GW should just have cast this model and be done with it, if you ask me!

Peter’s paintjob on this piece is also truly something to behold — especially the way he managed to capture the look and texture of a slug on the daemonic steed’s body. Is it any wonder this bad boy made it into a recent issue of Warhammer:Visions?

What finally elevates this amazing piece to legendary status is that the template for it was created by employing the highly arcane and eclectic random tables in the old Realm of Chaos books. Thumbs up, Peter: job’s a good ‘un ;)

Check out PDH’s excellent RoC log here.

Nurglite Campion by PDH

Nurglite Maulerfiend by Morbäck

Nurglite Maulerfiend by Morbäck

Ah, there I was just mouthing off about not being all too fond of the new magghot models, and along comes Morbäck and shuts me right up with his absolutely stellar magghot-based Maulerfiend conversion: an excellent creation that is being copied in Nurglite armies around the globe as we speak ;)

I have already stated my love for Morbäck’s Plaguebones earlier in this article, and I am all too happy to reiterate this point: This army is definitely and unmistakably Nurglite at first glance, yet quite unlike every other Nurgle army out there. And it really has it all: The brilliant kitbashes as well as the flawless (and especially disgusting) paintjobs. Morbäck’s Maulerfiend really serves as an avatar of the whole army project in a nutshell, and so it definitely belongs on this list!

Check out Morbäck’s excellent Plaguebones here.

Honorary mention: skrundle87 and John Stiening

This list just wouldn’t be complete without a shoutout to skrundle87’s and John Stiening’s excellent Imperial Knight models. While both models couldn’t be any more different from one another, they were truly invaluable to me when I converted my own Imperial Knight earlier this year:

Skrundle’s Daemon Knight provided me with so many excellent ideas to …erm borrow, and it stands as one of the best chaotic Knight conversions I have seen so far.

Daemon Knight by skrundle87

And John’s absolutely stunning Knight interiors provided the kick in the behind I needed to step up my game and create a cockpit for my own Knight instead of just glueing that carapace shut. The rest of the model is absolutely fabulous as well, of course!

Imperial Knight by John Stiening

So a huge thank you to both of you guys! I can only recommend visiting skrundle’s and John’s respective blogs and be amazed!

But wait, there’s more!

There’s so much more to tell you, but precious little time left tonight. So let’s take some time off, celebrating the advent of the new year, and I’ll be seeing you soon with the next installment of the 2014 Eternal Hunt Awards, talking about my favourite armies and hobbyists of 2014. Until then, party on!

And, as always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

A happy new year to you, dear readers, and welcome back to the 2014 Eternal Hunt Awards! Today’s instalment will once again deal with the achievements of fellow hobbyists, both because there was just so much cool stuff to show off and because I was just too lazy to write it all down in one go last time ;)

Army/warband of the year

Single models are all well and good, but it’s the creation of entire armies or warbands that gobbles up so many of our hobby hours — and by the same token, seeing an excellently realised army, a gorgeous Killteam or an awesome Inquisitorial retinue can probably inspire us like few things can. So which creations were the best in 2014? Allow me to share my findings with you:

1st place: Navigatorial Household by weirdingway

Navigator household by weirdingway

Even though all entries in this category are breathtaking works of art in their own right, there is little discussion about which army stood a head above the crowd this year: weirdingway’s Navigatorial household explores a woefully underdeveloped part of the 40k background in the most stunning way imaginable, taking cues from David Lynch’s version of Dune and producing a collection of models that is equal parts eclectic, wholly original and balls to the wall amazing. It also perfectly embodies what Warhammer 40k is about: the grimdarkness, the eclecticism, the madness and the opulence, all rolled into one fantastic project!

It’s hard to pick favourites from a collection this inspired, yet I instantly remember weirdingway’s model for the head of his navigatorial household — and quite a head it is, if you’ll excuse the pun:

Novator bei weirdingway

By all accounts, this idea shouldn’t work: It should come across as goofy and ridiculous — but while it may even be both of these things, weirdingway’s work transforms the concept into a fantastic model that looks like it has stepped right out of the 41st millennium. Amazing!

But standout pieces like this are not the only thing that make weirdingway’s project so great. In fact, the lowly retainers and footmen of the Navigators are just as stunning:

Navigator Household by weirdingway

Navigator Household by weirdingway

Each of them is a perfect little island of 40k: They are elegant and ostentatious, yet also frayed around the edges and quite unhinged. Is it any wonder that these guys have inspired me to build my own Navigator warband right away?

There were many amazing projects in 2014, but weirdingway just takes the cake! A veritable triumph!

Check out weirdingway’s spectacular ongoing WIP thread here.

2nd place: Mr. Poom’s Heresy era World Eaters

Heresy era World Eaters by Mr. Poom

Well, you didn’t think we’d get through this without at least one World Eaters army, did you? ;) In all fairness, I did choose one of the most spectacular specimens for you, and certainly the best Heresy era World Eaters in existence: Mr. Poom’s version of the World Eaters’ 8th company.

Many feel drawn to the XII legion in its Heresy era incarnation, yet there are quite a few pitfalls along the way: The legion’s trademark colours of white and blue are hard to do well, and so most hobbyists end up covering their World Eaters in so much gore and battle damage that it almost overwhelms the senses (and certainly overpowers the miniatures in question). Mr. Poom’s army, by contrast, maintains a perfect balance between lush painting and gritty weathering — all while being full of excellent kitbashes and conversions that are completely organic and seamless.

Just take a look at this picture featuring  some of our favourite protagonist’s from Aaron Dembski-Bowden’s excellent book Betrayer, such as a wonderful, converted Khargos Bloodspitter, the ill-fated Librarian Esca, and of course: Eight Captain Kharn himself:

Heresy era World Eaters by Mr. Poom

All in all, this is a marvelous army — and it’s also the best reason for never starting a Heresy era World Eaters force, because Mr. Poom has basically accomplished perfection in this field. Little point in trying to one-up that ;)

Check out Mr. Poom’s ongoing army log here or his wonderful Flickr gallery.

Pre Heresy World Eaters by Mr. Poom

3rd place: McGibs’ Bloody Beasties of Khorne

Chaos Bull by McGibs

I have only discovered this army fairly recently, but it shot straight to the top echelon of my favourite Khornate armies: McGibs has created a collection of unbelievably original and inspired kitbashes and provides wonderfully lush and visceral paintjobs to match. Case in point: That Chaos Bull above is very possibly the best Khornate Maulerfiend I have seen so far (I want one!). Or we could talk about what may just be the best conversion of GW’s fairly recent plastic Ogryns in existence, his Obliterators:

Chaos Obliterators by McGibs

Do you need any more reasons to check out this army and instantly fall in love with it? How about the fact that some of the models were inspired by creatures from Diablo and the original Doom? The videogame nerd in me rejoices!

But seriously, this is an amazing collection, and a very original one at that! Do yourself a favour and check out McGibs’ highly inspirational army log here!

Hobbyist of the year

Gorgeous armies and warbands are not the most important thing in our hobby: The hobbyists are. They are keeping the hobby alive. They are forming a community that manages to inspire and captivate. Sure, they also produce a lot of noise about pricing shenanigans and torunament level play — but it’s easy enough to tune that out, whenever it gest overwhelming ;)

Meanwhile, there are those who deserve a moment of recognition for their contribution to the hobby in general and my personal hobby life in particular. So here’s to them:

1st place: DexterKong

Who could I put in first place but my good buddy Dexter? We’ve been shooting e-mails back and forth all year, discussing Khornate conversion projects or even fleshing out our own sector of imperial space for INQ28. Throwing ideas at Dexter and getting them back in a much improved form is never dull, plus the guy can also draw up some mean character illustrations! And that’s not even talking about his usually stellar contributions to the various painting and converting contests at Throneofskulls.com. So cheers, buddy! You really deserve this small award! And let’s keep doing this, alright?

Unfortunately, Dexter has been a little lax with his blogging for a while — so your best chance to actually catch a glimpse of this reclusive guy would probably be the Contest section over at Throneofskulls.com, where he regularly works his magic ;)

2nd place: Flint13

Ah yes, everyone’s favourite riot grrrl ;) Flint’s contributions are certainly one reason why The Bolter & Chainsword is such an egaging and fun forum right now: Be it her staggering output of steadily improving, excellent models, her equally impressive background vignettes, her unwavering motivation and good cheer or her role in starting a rather active and rewarding thread of World Eaters aficionados, Flint is very much the heart and soul of the place right now, at least for me. She also called me warlord once, and that has to count for something, right? So yeah, congrats Flint! Here’s to another frantic year, eh?

Like I said, Flint is *VERY* active over at The Bolter & Chainsword, and all of her stuff is usually very interesting and also quite amusing. I recommend checking out her ongoing WIP thread to get started ;)

3rd place: Legatho

Another very well deserved award, not only because Legatho managed to rebound from a hobby tragedy that I do not think I could have survived (read the full story here), but because he also stayed (relatively) cheerful and productive through the whole ordeal and went right back to producing some wicked kitbashes and conversions. Plus I was genuinely moved when he painted a model I had converted as a small tribute to my World Eaters. Cheers, for that, mon ami ;)

Check out Legatho’s WIP thread over at the Ammobunker and don’t forget to pay your respects to the excellent models that were lost in the deluge — it still hurts to actually think about that…

Honorary mention: Jeff Tibbetts

Those of you who already know Jeff may think of him as “the guy with the amazing Imperial Knight log”. And those who do not yet know Jeff, should check out his blog or his ongoing thread on The Bolter & Chainsword as soon as possible, because Jeff’s work on his Imperial Knight is truly something to behold: His work shows an attention to detail and a dedication that we should all strive to emulate — if only to fail miserably. Speaking of which, I will certainly try to adapt some of Jeff’s excellent recipes when finally painting my own Knight. Will I be as perfectionis about it as Jeff? Heck no, I’ll be cutting all kinds of corners, like I always do. But even then, I’ll only be able to get it just so because Jeff blazed the trail!

Thanks to all these excellent people for their army projects, their blogs and plogs — and their being an inspiration to people like me, who sometimes just need a pretty picture to look at and a kick in the butt to finally rekindle their motivation. Cheers, guys! You rock!

So the hobbyists definitely pulled their weight in 2014 — but what about the industry? What were the best releases and the biggest disappointments? Which developments were great or not so great? Let’s find out in the third part of the 2014 Eternal Hunt Awards — coming your way soon ;)

Until then, as always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

A short announcement for those of you who may be waiting for the next installment of the Eternal Hunt Awards: I am currently hard at work painting a rather tall order of World Eaters (tall for me, at least) as part of my Call of Chaos vow, and time’s running short — so please sit tight for another few days, while I sort this out first: I promise I’ll at least have lots of neat new stuff to show you afterwards ;)

And fortunately enough, other people are picking up the slack: You may already have heard this elsewhere, but migsula (formerly of Legion of Plastic), Mikko Luoma and Kari Hernesniemi (formerly of the Spiky Rat Pack) have teamed up in a new endeavour and have started a blog that will probably knock your socks of, seeing how those three are some of the most talented people in the hobby. So head over there and subscribe right away — I am convinced that good things are coming our way ;)

– IRON SLEET –

As always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

Sorry for taking a while with the next update — completing my painting vow for The Bolter & Chainsword has left me pretty drained — if happy, because I managed to finish all of the models I had pledged (more on them soon). That said, I have certainly kept you waiting long enough, as evidenced by the dip in daily visits over the last few days ;) So here goes:

As we’ve seen, the hobbyists definitely put out some amazing stuff, but what about GW? How doe the 2014 releases stack up? Was it a good year? What were the highlights and the disappointments? Let’s find out!

I. Best release of 2014:

I think we can all agree that GW has managed to maintain quite the relentless barrage of new releases all through 2014, and most of it was of astonishing quality as well. But to me, there were some kits that stood out, models that really wowed me and turned me into a small boy again, as I wondered at them. And there were models that turned out to be absolutely invaluable for conversions and kitbashes. So, what are my favourites of 2014?

1st place: Imperial Knight

Last year, GW brought over the design of the good old Epic 40,000 warmachines into 40k proper, introducing the Lord of Skulls — and people were divided, to say the least: Maybe the original design of the Khornate daemon engines in Epic was too goofy to begin with, maybe there were too many skulls — whatever the reason, many thought the Lord of Skulls was a ridiculous kit. I have gone on record as being a fan of the model, but overall reception of the “Skulldozer” was mixed, at best.

But one year later, it seems like the Lord of Skulls was merely GW’s tracer bullet, and the Imperial Knight was the heartshot to follow, if you’ll excuse the somewhat militaristic, albeit very fitting, simile:

Where the Lord of Skulls was maybe too reliant on personal taste, the Imperial Knight has managed to win fans all across the board: Even people without a 40k army or without any lover for games at the Apocalypse scale felt they had to get one of these bad boys — and many hobbyists actually completed several of them. Unbelievable, right?

In this case, the model really justifies the hype, though: It’s a wonderfully designed piece, giving us a giant Mecha with all the right touches to tie it into the 40k universe. It also actually manages to look like a knight, although you could never mistake it for anything other than a machine of (pre) Imperial manufacture. And it is a terrifically well planned kit that is a joy to assemble and convert! I was really scared of the model, when I started work on my own Knight, but I was pleasantly surprised by how well it all went together.

All of those qualities certainly speak in the Knight’s favour, but its biggest achievement may be the way it manages to straddle the fine line between modern design sensibilities and nostalgia for the Rogue Trader and Adeptus Titanicus days: Where the Lord of Skulls may have tried the same thing with mixed success, the Imperial Knight really nails it: It recreates the look of Knight Titans, not as they actually looked twenty years ago, but as you wish they would have looked. It’s basically your idealised memories of 80s GW artwork given form, and that is a towering achievemt indeed!

I’ll go out on a limb here and say that the original plastic Imperial Knight kit still surpasses the later Forgeworld variants. I know I may be in the absolute minority with this opinion, but there you have it. In closing, I think the Imperial Knight is a perfectly balanced, excellently designed piece, and it is easily my favourite release to come out of 2014.

Read my original review of the Imperial Knight here.

2nd place: Almost the entire End Times release for Warhammer Fantasy Battles

Well, this may seem like a gigantic cop-out on my part, but the longer I thought about it, the more obvious it became that the entire release was worthy of this award (and the Imperial Knight only came out on top due to personal sympathy and the fact that I think the scale of the model really did pave the way for some of the End Times kits in the first place).

So yeah, I think I don’t need to explain to you how the various End Times kits have generated all kinds of excitement and buzz — and rightly so! Some of the finest plastic kits released by GW so far have appeared under this label, and it’s a testament to the quality of their design that 40k players feel just as drawn towards these kits as the WFB folks.

Even in a release as consistently great as this one, however, there have to be some favourites:

Nagash, obviously, for not only kicking off the slew of awesome kits, but for also thoroughly revitalising one of the most evil characters in the entire WFB lore with a spectacular new model that still calls back to its earlier incarnation in many ways! Read my original thoughts here.

The Glottkin, for truly being a model for the ages: An excellent, almost painterly and utterly apocalyptic work of art that is truly Mark Harrison’s masterpiece! Read my original review here.

And of course, last but definitely not least…

The Putrid Blightkings, for being just about the best “Nurgle all stars” showcase imaginable: So many people have already had so much fun with this kit (including yours truly), and the importance of this kit for all things Nurgle really cannot be overstated!

What’s even better, the first pictures of the coming Skaven release show that the quality just keeps coming with the End Times stuff — marvelous work, GW!

3rd place: Tempestus Scions

It certainly says something about the quality of the 2014 releases that my third place almost looks a bit pedestrian next to the End Times kits listed above. Even so, the Tempestus Scions provided 40k players and INQ28 aficionados with a fantastic toolbox that can fulfill all kinds of functions beyond merely working as the Astra Militarum elite: The amount of options and versatility in this kit is truly staggering, and the models themselve strike a perfect balance between armed to the teeth spec-ops soldiers and baroque and grimdark individuals. The Tempestus Scions may lack the flashiness of some of the other kits on this list, but their sheer usefulness and versatility could mean that they have the potential to outshine far more spectacular kits in the long run. I, for one, have already had tons of fun with the kit and would basically consider it a compulsory pickup for almost every 40k and INQ28 player — it really is that simple.

Read my original thoughts about the kit here and take a look at my experiments here.

II. Worst release/biggest disappointment

When it comes to release, it’s a testament to the quality of 2014’s releases that there were almost no bad or truly horrible models: Event the kits I don’t feel particularly fond of either come with a second assembly variant to soften the blow, or they are well designed models in their own right that just don’t tickle my particular fancy. In fact, in can only remember a single instance last year where I was truly disappointed in a release: GW’s Realm of Battles: Sector Imperialis game board:

I was really excited when I heard GW were going to release a cityfight themed Realm of Battles board, but the eventual result left me entirely cold: It just seems like an overdesigned, overpriced piece of terrain that is not nearly versatile or flexible enough. I appreciate the fact that it has been designed to fit together seamlessly with all those very beautiful cityfight ruins. But seriously, hobbyists have had a long time to come up with their own cityfight and underhive tables, and with people like thenickeninja in this world, this stuff just doesn’t cut it. Sorry, GW, but you either have to step up your game with this terrain stuff or stick to what you know…

So almost all of the kits were great. But does this mean everything was peaches and cream? Unfortunately, no: I do have some gripes with GW’s releases over the last year, and here are the things that I found most disappointing:

• new naming conventions: This probably flew below the radar for all native English speakers in our hobby, but maybe some of those whose native language isn’t English can sympathise with me here: As of the spring of 2014, all of GW’s publications use the English names – and only the English names – for any given unit type or character in all of their game systems. “So what?”, you might say, “most of those names are in English anyway.” Well, yes and no. Unfortunately, this creates Codices and publications with lots and lots of gibberish, where plain text is suddenly and rather violently broken apart by seemingly wanton insertion of English terms, even when a perfectly serviceable and well established translation for these terms exists in-universe. What’s more, those armies that have yet to receive their updated books retain their translated names, so a text about, say, the different factions of the elves in WFB happily mixes English and translated names. For the record: I love English. I am also, I believe, reasonably fluent in it. But GW had a pretty solid track record when it came to translating their books into other languages, and I think it’s really sad that a decision like this basically destroys all the good work they have done so far in this respect. Sure, using universal naming conventions may be an excellent idea from a marketing and retail standpoint. But it renders all the non-English versions much less enjoyable to read (if not downright unreadable), and that’s the reason why I am now buying all my rulebooks in English. Which is a pretty good solution, but I’ll still always be playing the game in German, so it does create a rather iffy situation.
• Where are my Sisters, dammit? I feel like a broken record here, because I believe I’ve said the same thing in 2012 and 2013 as well — but please, please, can we get some decent, upated Sisters of Battle, GW? That would be sweet! Thank you very much!

III. Still on the fence about…

• all those rules in 40k: I get it, I get it: You want to give hobbyists more options, which is great. You also want to make more money, which may not be great but is quite alright with me. But seriously, folks, this is getting out of hand: The constant barrage of dataslates, formations and DLC has created an environment where it’s almost impossible to understand all that is going on. To wit, they even had to patch their own game (because that’s what 7th edition is: a patch) in order for it to accept all the new supplementary content. I have heard people say that all of this is not a big problem, because hobbyists get to choose the way they want to play, and that is certainly an excellent point. But here’s the catch: I have this problem where an overabundance of options will paralyse me rather than empower my decision making. So in the end, I end up taking no choice at all. In terms of 40k, this means that the sheer difficulty of keeping up with the rules and current state of play has basically led to me abandoning the gaming angle altogether — at least for now.
• Instant awesome? Just add Forgeworld! Now this may sound a bit cantankerous, but hear me out: With the Horus Heresy releases having become such a smash hit, Forgeworld stuff has become far more widespread, where it used to be a rare but exquisite seasoning on top of an army, so to speak. And that’s okay, of course: More power to them, because they are performing some outstanding work. But it sometimes seems to me like the growing prevalence of Forgeworld materials can hurt both hobbyists’ creativity as well as the FW design team itself: All of their stuff used to be pretty much perfect all the time, but now that they need to crank out huge amounts of stuff at a higher rate, the amount of lacklustre kits has definitely grown. And on the hobbyist side, for every 1000heathens, Mr. Poom or, Flint13, there seems to be at least one guy (or girl) who’s content enough to just throw together a cookie cutter army made from expensive Forgeworld crack. So my issue doesn’t lie with Forgeworld, but rather with those hobbyists who think the way to make your army awesome is to just throw resin at it — really, people, show a bit more dedication ;)

IV. Also pretty cool

• Warhammer: Visions: I do realise of course that I may be fairly alone with this assessment, but bear with me: Visions gets so much flak for basically being a coffee table book of miniatures to browse through. But therein lies its strength! There are lots and lots of ideas hidden in those pages! There’s a – usually excellent – army of the month feature. There’s Blanchitsu, for crying out loud! Some of my earlier gripes with Visions remain, and I realise that it may have an uncertain future. But when all is said and done, I might pick up the odd WD Weekly every now and then, mainly out of habit –but Warhammer:Visions is the GW puclication I am actually looking forward to each month!

All in all, 2014 has been a terrific year when it comes to model releases, and at the very least a very busy one for GW’s game systems. It’ll be interesting to see where we go from here, and not all seems like it will make us happy (seriously, have you seen those 9th edition WFB rumours — what the heck?). For me, however, it has always been about the models and the lore, first and foremost, and if the first pictures of 2015s releases are any indication, we need not worry on that account.

So what were your highlights and low points when it comes to 2014s releases? And do you agree or disagree with my own assessment? I would love to hear from you in the comments section!

In any case, I will see you soon with the fourth and last installment of the 2014 Eternal Hunt Awards: a look back at my personal hobby year. Until then, as always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

One last look backwards, at 2014, and then we’re off to a productive new year — at least that’s what I hope! But as our last installment in 2014’s Eternal Hunt Awards, allow me to walk you through my personal hobby year and present both the models as well as the events that were especially noteworthy for me:

I. My hobby projects

2014 was a pretty busy year, but I still tried to stay as productive as I could. I managed to paint about 40 models (which is only very slightly less than my 2013 result). Not a breathtaking amount of work, certainly, but then I am still happy enough with the stuff I actually did manage to paint. What gives me pause, however, is the fact that I doubtlessly kitbashed and converted many, many more models than I actually painted — I’ll have to keep working on that ratio, I guess…

But what do those 40 models mean if seen in the context of my various bigger and smaller projects? Allow me to elaborate:

1. Khorne’s Eternal Hunt

My World Eaters army certainly remains my most important project, and 2014 was very much a World Eaters year for me! The absolute majority of my newly completed models ended up in the 4th assault company.

All these new additions certainly call for some new army pictures in the near future! However, I suppose it’ll be quite some time before the weather allows me to set it all up outside and take some dapper new photos. Until then, I have this picture (taken this last December for the “We Are Legion!” contest over at Le blog dé Kouzes) showing a pretty big part of the army to tide you over:

It’s not the entire army (it’s missing the twenty odd “old” berzerkers from before my hobby hiatus during the 2000s, for instance, and a couple of other models), but it’s a fairly accurate depiction of Khorne’s Eternal Hunt in its current incarnation.

And here are some 2014 additions to my World Eaters that I am especially happy with:

World Eaters Gladiatorii squad

This project started as a spontaneous kitbash and then grew into something bigger when I decided to convert a gladiatorial Khornate champion along with his coterie of grimdark gladiators. Though these would probably be counted as bog standard Khorne Berzerkers when used in a game, building a squad of distinctly gladiatorial World Eaters has been a great way to explore that particular part of the legion’s background — plus it was lots of fun to come up with different types of gladiators that call back to actual historical sources while also seeming believable in the 41st millennium.

If you’re interested, check out the full story of the gladiatorii here, here and here.

Lord Valkar, the Scarred One

This was a model that I had wanted to complete for a long time, and as has been the case so often, the ongoing Painting and Converting Contest over at Throne of Skulls provided the perfect excuse to finally get my act together! I am really happy with both the resulting model and the fact that I now own one of the truly effective Khornate unit choices: A Chaos Lord on juggernaut — what could be more Khornate than that, right?

Check out Lord Valkar in more detail here.

Thamier-pattern Obliterator

This is a model I am especially happy with for several reasons: It marks the first Obliterator in my army, for one, because it took me so freaking long to finally settle on an interpretation of this unit type I was happy with. I was insanely fortunate enough to procure some wonderful, custom sculpted parts from fellow hobbyist thamier (whose “Balefire Legion” you should definitely check out ASAP) for this project, and the result is a model I am really proud of. And maybe the best thing is that I still have enough parts for a second Obliterator. Yay!

Find out what went into building this guy here.

Brother Khorlen the Lost

Finishing this model was one of the rare instances where I actually managed to surprise myself: I had just seen the newly released multipart Helbrute (which I really liked a lot), but instead of buying it right away (my usual reflex), I rather painted the Dark Vengeance Helbrute I still had lying around ever since the boxed set was released. And boy am I happy about that decision in hindsight! The model was pretty challenging to paint, make no mistake, but finally managing to finish what may be my favourite Dark Vengeance model really felt good — and I am actually rather happy with the result, too!

Find out more about this one instance where I actually showed some discipline here.

And, of course, my re-imagined Kharn the Betrayer: This model was, once again, built for a contest over at Throne of Skulls, but at the same time, it also kicked off a sizeable painting project of mine that saw me paint more than 500 points for my World Eaters over the Christmas holiday — we’ll be talking about those models in more detail really soon, I promise you.

Learn more about Kharn the Betrayer and my interpretation of him here.

Chaos Knight Titan

Last and very definitely not least: My Chaos Knight conversion. Though this model yet remains unpainted, it is probably the one 2014 hobby project I am most happy with: Working at such a scale was a first for me, and I was really intimidated by the project, to be honest — so much so, in fact, that it took me several months to actually get started on the model.

In the end, however, I am more than happy with the result so far: The Imperial Knight is a wonderful kit in its own right, and I think that I have managed to make sure this conversion will be a suitable centre point for Khorne’s Eternal Hunt! I even built a full interior for the model — something I wouldn’t really have considered beforehand.

I hope that finally getting this big guy painted will turn into a successful hobby project of mine in 2015 — I am still working up the courage for it, to be honest…

Until then, why not check out my posts on the creation of my Chaos Knight Titan here and here?

2. The world of INQ28

The wonderful world of Inquisitor and the battle for the Emperor’s soul continues to be a fascinating subject and an endless source of inspiration to me. Even so, I am painfully aware that I have only managed to paint a measly four models for INQ28 in 2014:

And while I am really rather happy with each of them – and do in fact think that they make for a wonderfully eclectic little group in the above picture – I really want to make sure to produce more finished pieces for INQ28 this year!

In fact, I have kitbashed lots and lots of characters I am really happy with so far, such as my first real true scale Marine, Brother Janus Auriga…

…among many others, so it looks like I have my work cut out for me — let’s see if I can manage to get this show on the road again!

3. Legio Custodes

Alas, my beloved Custodians received even less attention from me than my INQ28 models. However, I did at least manage to build some models that I am really happy with for this project: A rather convincing (if I do say so myself) version of Chief Custodian Constantin Valdor and a really badass looking Custodian in Pre-Heresy style Astartes battle plate:

As with my INQ28 collection, I will endeavour to get more of these guys finished in 2015. After all, it’s only a matter of time until Forgeworld’s own Custodes are released, making my kitbashes entirely obsolete — at least in the eye of the public ;)

Find out more about my kitbashed Custodes here.

4. Urash’s Marauders

And finally, my Traitor Guard. To be honest, it took me a while to get back to this project, but I did so with an addition that has thoroughly revitalised my interest in this army: After long deliberation and multiple test builds, I have finally come up with the beginnings of a squad of elite traitors, shown above, mostly based on GW’s excellent Tempestus Scions. And though it has taken me quite a while to get these guys finished, I am now really happy with them, especially with the unit champion:

I think I’ve mentioned this before, but it really does bear repeating: This guy takes much inspiration from PDH’s excellent renegade troopers, and is also the first time that I have come (reasonably) close to reproducing the excellence of those models. In fact, the guy above may just be the Traitor Guard model I am most happy with to date, so expect to see more additions to Urash’s Marauders sooner rather than later.

Until then, read more about the squad here.

II. My favourite hobby moments

So much for my own hobby projects, but what else was cool? Once again, there were several moments in 2014 that really served as “milestones of awesome”, so to speak,  making my hobby year truly special:

First among those moments – and by a long shot – was being featured in Warhammer:Visions — in Blanchitsu, no less!

Seriously, this really took the cake! It also had me running around with a huge grin for at least a couple of days. And it is an achievement that I am pretty sure I won’t be able to reproduce anytime soon, which really makes it even more awesome. Being featured in this column along with extremely talented guys like PDH and Mikko Luoma was the icing on the cake, of course.

I have talked at length about Legion, the model that finally made the pages of Warhammer:Visions, and I promise I won’t put you through it all again — unless you want to, of course, in which case you can find the whole story here.

The various interactions with other hobbyists online were almost as good as my stint in Visions: The friendly and constructive way people in our hobby can interact via the power of the interwebz is one thing that never ceases to astound me, the other is the unending generosity of so many of my fellow hobbyists. Therefore, it’s really hard to pick that one favourite moment from among all the pleasant interactions I have had in 2014. Rather, it’s a collection of warm and fuzzy memories: being sent amazing bitz drops and unique models by PDH, Drone21c and Steifer, sharing friendly banter and thoughts about the hobby with Flint13, Augustus b’Raass and others over at The Bolter & Chainsword, trying my best to produce cool models for the contests at Throne of Skulls and getting my ass kicked time and time again by DexterKong, hammering out the backstory for a whole Imperial sector in cooperation with that same DexterKong, having hobbyists build models that share my name as a shout out (and trying to repay that particular kindness),…the list goes on and on.

Let me maybe show you one small thing to illustrate my point: Here’s a map showing you all the people I’ve done bitz swaps with so far. Without any money involved, I might add — just for the sake of helping each other out:

I think this is ample proof of the amount of generosity present in our hobby! Thank you all, guys and girls! You rock!

I was also really blown away when I received a very special gift for my birthday last year:

my colleague Annie converted and painted a wonderful fan troll for my Blood Bowl team, the “Orkheim Ultraz”, which really left me speechless. I know you are not supposed to feed the troll, but I really want to ;) Thanks again, Annie — you’re awesome! :)

Read the whole story here.

And one last thing that I am really happy with: As I’ve mentioned above, I really managed to get my act together over the holidays, painting a pretty chunk of new World Eaters models for Khorne’s Eternal Hunt. This all happened as part of The Bolter & Chainsword’s 2014 Call of Chaos event, which not only gave me a deadline to meet, but also provided lots and lots of motivation via the friendly competition among board members. I’ll be showing off the completed models in more detail very soon — I hope you like red and bronze! ;)

III. Blogging

Providing a constant stream of content for this blog remained a fun – albeit challenging – endeavour during 2014: I managed 63 posts and attracted 170,000 views from 138 countries — numbers that may not be all that spectacular in the larger order of things but still feel pretty unreal to me, seeing how this is just my small, uninteresting corner of the internet ;) I also managed to reach the mark of 300,000 views overall, which I think is pretty cool!

For those of you interested in this kind of stuff, here’s a link to the annual report WordPress has kindly provided.

All in all, it has been a busy year. A productive year. A fun year. Yet also a year full of unpainted plastic — but what else is new? Thank you all for joining me on this ride. This concludes our little retrospective, and we’ll be strictly focusing on new stuff from now on: Here’s to 2015!

As always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

While everyone was busy settling into the beginning of the new year and getting back into the swing of things, GW has been hard at work bringing us the next End Times release: This time, it’s the Skaven’s turn, and although I have never owned a Skaven army (or even a haphazard collection of Skaven models, for that matter), I find myself strangely fond of these filthy, backstabby guys for some reason. But how does this release compare to the rest of the – amazing – End Times output? And do converters get their money’s worth out of this latest batch of plastic crack? Let’s find out!

I first encountered the Skaven when I bought a used copy of Advanced HeroQuest at a jumble sale many years ago: A pile of plastic Skaven formed the entire villain faction of the set, which seemed slightly disappointing at first, given the fact that the original HeroQuest had contained so many different types of monsters and villainous creatures. Then again, I didn’t even make the HeroQuest connection back then, at least not at first, because Advanced HeroQuest was marketed as “Herr des Schwertes” in Germany, with no HeroQuest connection whatsoever on the box (apart from a strangely similar piece of cover artwork).

Anyway, my disappointment quickly turned into interest as I delved into the sourcebook, because the somewhat samey plastic Skaven models were imbued with a very interesting background, offering glimpses at the various Skaven clans, their devotion to the Horned Rat and also at some of the (pretty excellent) early late 80s/early 90s Skaven metal models — so while it would yet take a couple of years for me to discover the role of the Skaven in the bigger Warhammer universe, my fondness for the race started back then.

Ever since, the Skaven have been a pretty fascinating faction to follow, with their culture based on entropy, backstabbing, plague and body horror, and their steampunk-ish technology that wouldn’t look out of place in the 40k setting. Meanwhile, some of the more recent Skaven releases are some of the coolest and most characterful WFB plastic models, in my opinion (there’s a reason why so many people use those Blood Island Rat Ogres as conversion fodder, for instance) — and now everybody’s favourite entropic Ratmen get the End Times treatment — what’s not to love? So let us take a closer look at the new kits and at all the fun we could have with them. Quick-quick! This way!

Skaven Verminlords

Every End Times model release so far has featured some kind of huge model, and the Skaven don’t disappoint in this respect, providing us with a kit that can be used to assemble one of four different, towering avatars of the Horned Rat, including the special character Skreech Verminking (as seen above). Let’s look at these one by one:

Skreech Verminking actually seems like a modernised version of the original metal Verminlord. Just check out this picture:

It’s all there: the glaive, the patches of mangy fur, the half-skeletal face — even the pose, albeit mirrored:

I like that kind of shout out, and it’s certainly performed admirably here. A nice bit of continuity between the old model and the new interpretation!

The other variants of the kit, interestingly enough, each seem to embody one of the leitmotifs of the Skaven, with some of them also closely fitting the design paradigm of a specific the Skaven clan. It’s interesting to see how subtle changes to the same body create a set where each model has a rather different feel:

The Verminlord Warpseer is closest in design to Skreech Verminking, sharing the same set of horns, the same glaive and the same pose. This seems to be the Verminlord most attuned to magic, and it shows in the magic orb he holds aloft.

What I love about both Skreech Verminking and the Warpseer is the extremely complex set of horns, because it’s a nice callback to the appearance of horns on the Grey Seers, for one, but also because the design seems quite unlike most of the horns we’ve seen so far in WFB (and we’ve seen quite a few), lending the model a fairly unique and recognisable silhouette.

The Verminlord Warbringer embodies the warlike quality of the Skaven, which is immediately obvious due to the heavily armoured head and the sinister looking punching dagger. There’s quite a resemblance with the various Skaven warlord models and the Stormvermin, and the less ornate looking horns also underline the blunt, more openly aggressive feeling of the model.

The Verminlord Corruptor is slightly more interesting in that he deviates from the Skreech Verminking model a bit more, with a different set of weapons and different resting place for his right foot, making for a pretty different look overall. I also like the signs of rot and decay, such as the broken horns and the diseased face. And the sickle weapon almost gives him a bit of a druid feel, if you ask me…

And finally, the Verminlord Deceiver, who is basically….an enormous ninja rat (probably in keeping with the Skaven’s predilection for subterfuge in general and Clan Eshin’s antics in particular). This version of the model comes with all the hallmarks of a Skaven assassin: a vicious looking dagger, an equally sinister throwing star and, of course, a bad ass ninja cowl. So far so good, right?

It’s a cool model, make no mistake, but there’s actually something undeniably ridiculous about the thought of a rat ninja the size of a house…

All in all, it’s a cool and fairly flexible kit that should provide a great centrepiece for your Skaven army. There are, however, some issues with the kit that extend to all the various Verminlord characters: The pose of the right leg seems very precariously balanced — especially on those versions of the model where the Verminlord actually has one of his feet on his own glaive (which, let’s face it, seems like a pretty dumb thing to do). The version with the rock is better, but still looks a bit hokey — it would probably have looked better if the rock had been more massive, with the foot firmly placed on its surface. As it is, the Verminlord looks as though a strong gust of wind might knock him over.
The multi-pronged tail may just be a tad too much for my taste. Granted, he adds a pretty flashy element to the model, but I am wondering whether it was really needed.

What really stands out to me is that the new Verminlord kit seems very different in design to Forgeworld’s Exalted Verminlord: The new plastic model is very slender, very flashy and quite busy, while FWs treatment of the character looks more pudgy and closer in proportion to an actual rat. While the somewhat “videogamey” look of the plastic model appeals to me (being a videogame nerd, and all), it’s quite interesting to see GW’s and FW’s approaches differ so significantly.

Ultimately, it’s an interesting kit that very much goes for visual shock and awe tactics. It’s not without its issues, though…

Thanquol and Boneripper

Another shout out to a classic Skaven character, this modernised version of Thanquol and his personal killing machine has probably been long awaited! It is also where the release really hits its stride, if you ask me!

The huge, malformed monstrosity that is Boneripper really steals the show here, especially given the fact that you actually get different weapon options and heads out of the deal, potentially leading to two fairly different models:

At first, I was slightly unhappy with how Boneripper’s upper set of arms have been implemented, because they look like they really shouldn’t be there… this became a bit of fridge brilliance, however, when I realised that this may have been the entire point: The ill-fitting and ill-muscled way his extra pair of arms has been grafted on underlines what a strange and malformed creation he is — pretty cool!

The model is also exquisitely detailed, with lots and lots of fine detail to be discovered (such as the stitching on Boneripper’s torso or the very cool bionic leg). Where the older incarnations of Boneripper always felt a bit ridiculous to me, I really love this guy! Excellent job!

Thanquol himself ends up playing second fiddle to Boneripper, but ist still a cool model in his own right: What seems interesting is that this version of Thanquol lacks the terrible dignity of his earlier, cleaner and more collected 90s’ style incarnation, looking rather frantic and unhinged instead:

But then, this is probably a good fit for a fanatic, slightly mad Grey Seer. The one thing that I am not sure about are the warpstone horns: Once again, they are just a bit much, overcluttering the model’s head portion — maybe it’s the colour, but it’s warpstone after all, it has to be glowy, right?

All in all, I really love this model! There’s something excellent about the concept of a spindly, highly dynamic model riding on the back of a huge, hulking brute “Master-Blaster-style”, and the concept is really pulled off wonderfully here — probably my hight point in this release!

Stormfiends

What do you do when you have a perfect idea, like the design for Boneripper above, on your hands — easy, you make more of them! The Stormfiends very obviously share many of Boneripper’s visual traits, making for a unit of hulking, partly bionic monster rats — which ends up every bit as awesome as it sounds!

The old Rat Ogres were some of the first GW models to have been designed digitally, if I remember correctly, and they are some of the most terrible sculpts still around today, making them stick out like a sore thumb when placed to their more recent kin. These new Stormfiends, by comparison, take lots of visual cues from the more recent Rat Ogres designed for the Blood Island boxed set and the adding more than a pinch of Dark Eldar Talos on top for seasoning.

The resulting models are huge, heavily armoured, hideous, and covered in totally over the top and fully insane Skaven gadgetry. Just take a look at this guy:

This leads to a pack of very impressive and highly detailed models with almost too many tech-y gubbinz: They look every bit like the mad, crudely stitched together Skaven experiments that they are supposed to be:

I think the fun the designers had while creating these guys is clearly evident in the over the top nature of the weapons. Almost too much so, in some cases:

The chest mounted gatling is just too much, as is the warpstone-based alternative:

That said, the amount of weapon options you get with the kit seems to be pretty staggering, so there’s nothing to stop you from coming up with a combination that suits your preferences. And these guys just look totally badass, don’t they?

One beautiful little detail that I only discovered due to the comment of a fellow hobbyist over at Faeit212 pointed out: Each of the Stormfiends seem tso have a tiny, atrophied Skaven embryo plugged into sockets on their backs: Ewww!

When all is said and done, what we end up with is a teriffic kit full of options and details that will allow us to build three huge, monstrous and completely whacky brutes. Maybe you’ll have to get used to these as a Skaven player, but I think it’s safe to say that this is the one kit to come out of this release that has converters and kitbashers foaming at the mouth in anticipation — but we’ll be getting to that! I really like these guys. I can easily see myself picking them up. The only really bad thing about them is how the old Rat Ogres will now look even more terrible…

Skaven Grey Seer

As one of two clamshell characters and as one of the Skaven’s well established HQ models, this guy really forms the bread and butter part of the release — and it shows, to be honest. After the zaniness of the Thanquol/Boneripper combo and the Stormfiends, the Grey Seer seems almost pedestrian by comparison.
It is a nice enough model, though, nicely detailed and with the depth and threedimensionality we have come to expect from the plastic clamshell characters. The standout element about this guy is the little rat perched atop his staff, reminding me of Terry Pratchett’s Death of Rats, for some reason…

A look at the sprue reveals that it should be easy enough to swap in a new head, leave off the tail or make some other adjustment to the model, also making it interesting for conversion purposes.

All in all, this is a nice model. Not particularly spectacular, but we have learned that the clamshell characters’ strength is in their versatility and staying power!

Skaven Warlord

Another clamshell character, and the one I personally prefer: The Skaven Warlord really looks the part, managing to seem suitably imposing for a warlord and suitably cowardly for a Skaven at the same time — no mean feat! I also like how the pose and base make him look like he’s surveying and commanding his army — because that’s the right place for any ambitious Skaven warlord, right? Not at the front lines, but safely behind them, sending his skittering underlings to their doom!

There’s also something about the combination of Skaven armour and tattered robes that really works for me, for some reason.
Once again, a look at the sprue reveals the model’s usefulness: It should be really easy to freely customise this guy:

This is a very nice addition to the clamshell range, and I can easily see myself picking this guy up for a conversion sooner rather than later — good job!

Conversion options:

This release provides Skaven players with quite a few new and amazing new toys. But the true value of the release, at least for me, lies in the conversion options, because some of these new kits could really be a converter’s dream come true: My cup runneth over with conversion options! Let’s take a look:

Verminlords:
The first idea that came to me when looking at the blurry, leaked pictures of the Verminlords was: This kit would make for an amazing Greater Daemon of Slaanesh: And it’s really not hard to imagine, isn’t it? The pose is there, as is the lithe build. The ostentatious pair of horns would be perfect! Add a second pair of arms (complete with Tyranid pincers), a different face (something bull-like from the Beastman range? Or a golden mask made from the human head of the Necrosphinx?), lose the silly tail, and you’re almost there! Sure, you’ll have to get rid of the Skaven runes and maybe the fur, but I think this might be a very promising conversion endeavour. It’s also one of the ideas I’ve seen crop up online fairly often, so I imagine it won’t be long before we’ll be seeing results.

So the Verminlords would make for excellent Greater Daemons (or Daemon Princes, for that matter) of Slaanesh. But what about the other chaos gods? Nurgle’s association with filth, decay and plague is no secret, so a giant rat could have its uses in his legions — maybe the Verminlord Corruptor could have a place in a Nurglite army as a very different Daemon Prince? Once again, with even more work, I think one could make a very cool Daemon Prince out of this kit — or maybe even a base for a Mortarion Daemon Primarch conversion?

The  build of the kit would even make a Lord of Change conversion imaginable: Maybe the Verminlord body could be coupled with the head and wings from the High Elf Flamespyre Phoenix kit? Just sayin’…

All in all, the only chaos god I cannot see profiting from this is Khorne: The Verminlord body looks far too gangly for the Blood God — we prefer our warriors heavily muscled, thank you very much! ;)

Boneripper and Stormfiends:
Now this is where it gets interesting, because both kits offer some crazy conversion potential. To wit:

• both Boneripper and the Stormfiends would make perfect base models for Dark Eldar Grotesques! Just add some Talos facemasks, and you’re golden! They’ll even look great next to those Blood Island Rat Ogre-based grotesques you converted last year! ;)
• If you’ve been looking for an interesting alternative to the existing Chaos Space Marine Obliterators and Mutilators, look no further! The Stormfiends could work as either, right out of the box! And if you’re feeling a bit more adventurous, it should be easy enough to swap in suitably chaotic heads, add more armour, replace the Stormfiend weapons with actual CSM weapons or what have you.
• If the teeming hordes of the Lost and the Damned are more to your liking, well, you’re in luch too, because Boneripper and the Stormfiends would work brilliantly as Renegade Ogryns, Ogryn Berserkers, big mutants or simply alternate Ogryns or Bullgryns, if you’re still using the Astra Militarum Codex: The crudely stitched-together and mutated look would be a perfect fit! You could even replace the head of that atrophied rat fetus on the model’s back with a crypt ghoul head (or the gas mask of a DV cultist) for a super creepy surprise, once your opponent sees the back of your model ;)
• This should be obvious, but the models would also work beautifully as Chaos Spawn — although they are almost too awesome for that.
• And, of course, (Dark) Mechanicus Flesh constructs, weapon servitors or what have you: The crude augmetic implants, stitches and highly experimental looking weapons make this one of the best possible conversion uses. Just writing about it almost makes me want to build a warband consisting of a rogue Magos Genetor and his warped creations — MUST.RESIST…
• It goes without saying that almost all of the above options would also work for the wonderful world of INQ28, where crude, monstrous brutes are the rule rather than the exception.

Grey Seer, Warlord and Thanquol himself:
These would basically be perfect for any kind of unhinged, frayed-around-the-edges character you can think of: rogue psykers, heretics, (Nurglite) cultists or Scavvies — basically anything that might crawl from the underhive at some point. The Skaven Warlord is pretty much the perfect Scavvy king (even the similar names are a dead-giveaway ;) ).

So, all in all, I really like the Skaven End Times release — but I believe that I am clearly biased here, due to all the lovely conversion potential. Taking back a step and taking a more even-handed approach, I have to point out that, while I personally love the design of the new models, I do realise that they are fairly flashy and stylised, almost cartoony or, as I’ve said above, videogamey. If that is your cup of tea, you will love these guys, just like me. But I can easily imagine that many people will not appreciate the look quite as much, and in all fairness: This kind of design can be a bit of an acquired taste. One need not look any farther than the difference between the GW and FW Verminlords I outlined above to see what I mean, and not everyone will be happy with this visual direction.

From a purely technical standpoint, these new kits certainly continue the trend of astonishing kits we have seen so far under the End Times label — and I can only repeat myself here: I am really excited at all the conversion potential in these new kits!

So, how do you feel about this release? Any thoughts you’d like to share or conversion options I have overlooked? I’d be happy to hear from you in the comments section!

And, as always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

“There are rumours that Brother Garron hasn’t uttered a single word since the beginning of the Long War, and there may be some truth to that. But tell me: After being felled and left for dead by those he considered brothers on the blasted plains of Istvaan, after the shame of Terra and after the sundering of our once glorious legions during the hellish night of madness on Skalathrax, what is there left to say?”
Huntmaster Deracin

Alright, everyone, I promised you red and brass, and I intend to make good on that promise! So let’s kick of a mini-series focusing on my World Eaters in order to show you the models I have managed to complete over the Christmas holiday, as part of my Call of Chaos vow over at The Bolter & Chainsword! You may already have seen the first model that was part of the vow, my custom Khârn the Betrayer. Today, let’s continue with a model I am particularly proud of.

I am talking about the Doomwall, a Chaos Lord named for his massive suit of ancient Terminator armour. The armour is the most important thing here, because this project originally began as an attempt to build a (plastic) model incorporating visual elements from GW’s elusive Mk 1 Tactical Dreadnought armour, as seen in this plan view:

Or in this concept sketch for Terminators in the original Space Hulk by Jes Goodwin:

If you want the full story, the project originally started here and then massively improved thanks to a fantastic piece of advice by fellow hobbyist Carnosaur93 regarding the placement of the shoulder pads. More inspiration for the actual conversion was drawn from two excellent pieces of art by Greyall for his characters Pramus Kholosk (of the Imperial Fists) and Mjuron Vvharkhor (of the World Eaters). Greyall’s art was especially helpful for this project, because it moves beyond the somewhat clunky and outdated original design and explores what a modern interpretation of the Mk 1 armour might look like, were Forgeworld to explore the idea today.

So after much to and fro, I settled on this final version of the Doomwall:

I do realise of course that this is not a perfectly accurate rendition of Mk 1 armour: There are far more faithful renditions of the original designs around — just check out Dark Rage’s excellent Mk 1 Terminators, for example. There’s also the fact that I have incorporated a number of visual cues from different armour variants on the model: The crest of hair came from the original artwork in the Horus Heresy trading card game depicting Cataphractii armour, while the reactor section was inspired by the actual Forgeworld Cataphractii models. The legs have remained unchanged, representing the chaos version of Indomitus armour, rather than the actual Mk 1 design — you could probably say that this model is my attempt at a “best of” collection of pre-heresy Terminator armour design cues, with a noticeable Mk 1 bend.

Oh, and I’ve explained it before, but just in case: The Space Wolves thunder hammer was chosen because the wolf head on it could also be interpreted as a representation of the War Hounds’ original legion badge, before they were reborn as the World Eaters.

So the conversion had been finished for a while, but I was still waiting for the right moment to paint it (which basically translates to: I was too afraid and/or lazy to actually start painting in my case). But the Call of Chaos provided the perfect incentive! And so, a short while later, the Doomwall was finished (this was actually the last model I painted in 2014, finished on December 31st):

There’s not that much to say about the paintjob, really: I basically gave the Doomwall my usual World Eaters treatment, and he really does look pretty sexy in red and bronze, don’t you think? I also added a bit of a visual flourish to the base, in the form of an unfortunate, long dead loyalist Astartes.

And here’s the Doomwall together with the other members of Lord Captain Lorimar’s retinue that have been finished so far. Behold the beginnings of Lorimar’s Fist:

The objective I am trying to accomplish for these guys is to come up with a squad of Terminators where every model is quite unique, with their own individual set of weapons and customised armour (which is a bit ironic, really, when you consider that most of the models so far are based on the same Chaos Lord in Terminator armour…;) Anyway, I am really happy with the way these guys are coming along, because they look very much like World Eaters (at least to me), without merely aping the look of the FW World Eaters Terminators. Alright, yes, one of them actually is a FW World Eaters Terminator, but that’s besides the point ;)

All in all, I am very happy with the Doomwall: The model looks massive and intimidating, yet there is also something almost contemplative about this guy, don’t you think?

The massive armour and closed helmet also makes him seem somewhat mysterious, if you ask me, and it was this quality that I wanted to expand upon for the character’s background:

Brother Garron, “The Doomwall”

In battle, the hulking figure of Brother Garron is a sight to be feared, a towering, utterly silent warrior, smashing all opposition with mighty swings of his enormous thunder hammer, his baroque suit of artificer warplate seemingly impervious to damage. This has earned him the epithet Doomwall, and it is a name spoken with a certain tenseness by the legionaries of the 4th, for so much about this silent Behemoth is shrouded in mystery: Why does his weapon still bear the heraldic device of the War Hounds? And while his heavily modified suit of prototype Tactical Dreadnought Armour stands as a testament to Huntmaster Deracin’s ingenuity, what remains of the man within?

Some whisper that Garron actually fought in the first wave at Istvaan III, as part of the loyalist remnants of the legion that were to be purged by their own brethren. Yet how he survived that ordeal and why he now serves as a silent enforcer to Lord Captain Lorimar remains an enigma. Only the Master of the Hunt himself and his most trusted lieutenants could divulge more of the Doomwall’s history, yet they seem reluctant to do so.

And in any case, the only mind holding the absolute truth of the matter would be that of Brother Garron himself — and he remains ever silent…

As always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

Welcome to the second instalment of this mini-series about my latest additions to the ranks of Khorne’s Eternal Hunt, in which we meet yet another friendly face from the 4th assault company. And while the Doomwall was already pretty heavily armoured, we’ll be cranking up the heavy metal factor a notch for this guy — that’s right, we’re talking about another Dreadnought/Helbrute for my World Eaters!

Everything started when I bought myself a Dreadnought sprue from the Black Reach boxed set a while ago. Since working on my earlier Dreadnoughts had also resulted in a rather sizeable collection of different Dreadnought weapons, I felt that building another customisable Dread would be the best way to make the most out of all those weapon options. And since I wanted to keep things easy and cheap, using the AOBR Dread as a base model seemed to be the sensible way to go here.

When the model arrived, I found myself messing around with a couple of bitz to find out which approach I was going to take for the Dread. Here’s a very early version of the model from that time:

But while some of the characteristics of the early WIP above did indeed carry through to the final version, I just couldn’t really seem to get a grip on figuring out what kind of model I wanted. Once more, the Call of Chaos event was a nice occasion to finally force myself into action and get my act together, so I pledged a Dreadnought/Helbrute as part of my vow. With that, I had set myself a firm deadline, and even for a lazy slacker like me, there’s nothing quite as conductive to creativity as a bit of well applied pressure ;)

One of the main problems was that the AOBR Dread comes in only seven pieces, and the entire body is basically made up of two pieces — an excellent piece of economical design, to be sure, but it makes converting the model slightly more difficult. There was also the fact that I couldn’t get too adventurous with the arms, seeing how I wanted to keep them detachable.

In the end, thinking about what kind of character I wanted this Dread to be really turned out to be the breakthrough. I already have a frenzied berserker Dread (Marax the Fallen), a noble ancient of the company (Khoron the Undying) and a tragic, malformed monster (Khorlen the Lost), so I wanted this newest Dreadnought to fill yet another character archetype: the stoic line soldier.

In the end, I decided that he is a former Breacher Sergeant, and from there on out, it was pretty easy to design the Dreadnought around that concept and include some visual touches that would underline that background idea: A chaos knight shield was attached to his left shoulder as a kind of stylised boarding shield, for one. I also souped up the (really boaring) standard power fist by adding some spiky bitz from the WFB chaos chariot, in order to make it look like a miniature version of the siege claws wielded by the Chaos Decimator. And I found out that one of the Skullcrusher helmets – minus the Khornate “bunny ears” – made for a pretty convincing Mk III helmet.

And, like I said, what really made this model happen was the pressure of having to get my act together for the Call of Chaos vow ;) Here’s the finished conversion again:

Painting the Dread was a relatively straightforward affair, but then it has to be said that I really like painting Dreads to begin with: There’s just something to their scale and angularity that makes them really enjoyable to paint. The one thing that was slightly more difficult on this model was that the torso and legs came in one big piece, so I had to paint it all in one go. Apart from that, however, it was smooth sailing all the way.

Before I show you the whole model, I’d like to share a small detail that I am quite happy with: I have wanted to feature a mostly destroyed Necron warrior on one of my bases for a long time — as a shout out to the iconic ending of the original Terminator movie, and now I finally went for it:

t’s certainly just a small thing, but there’s a nice irony about two dead guys who both inhabit machine bodies sharing one base like this, don’t you think?

Anyway, without further ado, here’s the finished Dread:

And the remains of that poor Necron again, leaking oily fluid onto the ground…

One thing I really wanted to do this time around was to use some decals on the Dreadnought’s armour, in order to give him a slightly more businesslike, soldierly feel. I chose one of the excellent legion symbols from the Forgeworld World Eaters decal sheet for the armour panel on the Dread’s right side. For the other panel, I wanted to include his legion number — but it was actually pretty difficult to find a numeral XII in white that would fit the fairly limited space! The solution was to use a decal from the Cadian shock troops and cut it down to size. It’s a small detail, to be sure, but one that I really think adds to the model as a whole:

In fact, I like the effect so much that I am seriously considering going back to my earlier Dreads and adding some decals to them as well..

And since I’ve kept the arms detachable, the model can now be used with all the different extra Dreadnought weapons I have built so far. Here’s an example of a more “shooty” loadout:

It seems pretty shocking to me in hindsight, but this is indeed my fourth Dreadnought! But like I said, there’s just something about these guys that appeals to me, rules be damned! ;)
In fact, I think I may have one more Dreadnought in me at a later date. The only thing to decide is whether I want it to be a Dread for my fallen Space Wolves (who are allies to my World Eaters) or a huge, warp-infused beast. Or both?

For now, however, the only thing left to do was to come up with a bit of background for this latest ancient of the 4th assault company and then call it a day. Enjoy:

Brother Damokk, “The Breacher”

Originally a member of the fabled Triarii, Brother Damokk quickly found his true calling as a Breacher Sergeant and member of the 4th assault company during the turbulent days after the purging of Nuceria. He excelled as a warrior in shipboard actions and when it came to breaching fortified positions, and his prowess was so great that, upon suffering fatal injuries during a boarding action, it was decided to grant him the honour of serving the 4th as a Dreadnought.

Damokk’s ironform still bears many cues of his former station, such as his stylised boarding shield or the visor of his primary visual interface unit, shaped like an Mk 3 helmet. And his favourite armament, a combination of Multimelta – complete with underslung chainblade –  and siege claw, serves as yet another reminder of his time in the World Eaters’ Breacher squads.

On the battlefield, Damokk implacably dismantles enemy fortifications with a surgical precision not often seen in a World Eater. In fact, Huntmaster Deracin has been known to jest that, if not for the numeral “XII” emblazoned on his ironform, Damokk would probably forget the fact that he is not an Iron Warrior…

I would love to hear any feedback you might have in the comments section! And, as always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

Welcome to the third part of this mini-series, in which I walk you through the latest additions to my World Eaters army. Today I have another new model to show you — and this time it’s a pretty big addition. So, what is this about?

I already mentioned that I wanted to use the Call of Chaos event in order to force myself to finally finish some models that I had kept on the backburner. And one of those models was a Forgefiend for Khorne’s Eternal Hunt. When I went through my cupboard of shame in order to determine which models to include in my vow, it was with a rather guilty feeling that I realised I bought, built and undercoated this model almost two years ago, then let it sit in its box unattended for a long time — what better way to finally revisit the poor dear than to make it a part of my vow for the event, right?

Just to remind you, here’s what the undercoated model looked like:

I realise that the fiend models get quite a bad rap from many hobbyists – they are not referred to as “Dinobots” for nothing – but I think the model is a rather good fit for a World Eaters army! As you can see, I didn’t even perform any heavy surgery on the model, seeing how it was already looking like a bigger juggernaut of Khorne straight out of the box, electing instead to only make some small additions here and there: A couple of decorative skulls were added to the Forgefiend’s shoulders, a suitable collar of Khorne was put around the beast’s neck, and a Stonehorn tail lend a bit more visual balance to the rather stubby hind section.

When it came to painting the model, I jumped in at the deep end, choosing to paint the body and hind legs first. This is what it looked like after most of this step had been finished:

And then everything just …stopped. It just wasn’t happening, for some reason. It was hair-pullingly frustrating, but I just couldn’t go on. So the model stayed that way while I painted first my custom Kharn the Betrayer, then the Doomwall and finally my new Dreadnought. In the end, with the model less than half-finished and less than a week left until the deadline for the Call of Chaos event, I was basically resigned to giving up on my vow.

But then the strangest thing happened: Looking at all the fantastic stuff completed by other participants, I felt the spark of motivation returning: Be it Chaeron’s unbelievable amount of completed models or Augustus b’Raass’ utterly stunning Khornate daemon engine, I just felt I had to give it my all to complete this vow, and so I returned to the painting table — cheers for the help, guys!

The task remained a problematic one, however: I really didn’t like painting the Forgefiend, and I swear it was hating me right back: In true daemon engine fashion, it kept fighting me every step of the way. But since this was so very fitting after all, I decided to actually incorporate the model’s struggle against being painted into the daemon engine’s name:

So here, then, is the daemon engine Gorespite — I like it when a model’s character becomes apparent even during its construction and painting:

Even though painting this model was such a hassle, I am really rather happy with the result: This was a veritable battle of attrition, and finally having managed to complete this piece gives me a feeling of achievement! There are also some areas that I am really rather proud of — especially the glowing areas in the Forgefiend’s torso and the eyes, for instance.

What made this even better was that the completion of this model also marked the completion of my entire Call of Chaos vow, consisting of:

• 1 custom Kharn the Betrayer
• 1 Chaos Lord in Terminator armour with Thunder Hammer and Lightning Claw (Brother Garron the Doomwall)
• 1 Chaos Dreadnought/Helbrute with Multimelta and Power Fist (Brother Damokk the Breacher)
• 1 Forgefiend with twin Hades Autocannons (Gorespite)

With this post, you’ve seen all these models. Here they are again, in a picture showing my entire Call of Chaos vow:

That’s a sweet additional 500 points or so for Khorne’s Eternal Hunt! Yay! :)

This was the first time I ever participated in an event like this, which makes me all the happier to actually have finished my vow! I can also safely say that events like these are a perfect way of putting a certain amount of constructive pressure on yourself for finally getting stuff finished — if not for the event, I might have let that Forgefiend sit in its box for another year or two, after all…

Speaking of which, not only did I whip up yet another photo montage to celebrate the occasion, but I also created a piece of background to accompany the model. Enjoy:

“Engine of Spite”

The freight elevator ground home with a deafening metallic clank, and the blast doors opened to near full darkness. The lumen strips on the high ceiling had been dimmed down so much that the corridor ahead was only barely visible to the human eye. This did not slow down the two figures now stepping from the elevator, however, since neither of them would have qualified as human any longer.

One of them was stooped and rake thin, clothed in the cowled robes of a Forge Adept. The other was massive in the way only those of the legion could be, but its huge frame was more impressive still, clad in a bulky suit of warplate and a harness from which four multijointed servo limbs emerged. The figures continued down the corridor in silence, the metallic pounding of their footsteps the only sound. This deep in the belly of the ship, not even the slow, regular heartbeat of the Great Forge was audible any longer.

“Has everything been prepared?”, the giant asked?
“Yes, lord. The bindings are in place. Every result so far has been within the expected parameters,” came the adept’s reply in a blurt of binary cant.
“How long until planetfall?”
“One hour, lord.”
“That will suffice. Leave me now.”
The adept’s remaining organic eye showed the apprehension he felt, but he knew better than to voice his concern. The spindly figure bowed stiffly and turned around, advancing back the way it had come.

Huntmaster Deracin turned to the blast door now. He drew himself up to his full height and pressed the activator rune. The door slid open, and Deracin entered the room beyond.

The room was vast, but even its dimensions did not offer an explanation for the kind of darkness that had gathered towards the far wall. Deracin could hear the sound now, wet and low, like a huge beast drawing breath.
Deracin stapped into the light and brought the haft of his two-handed war axe down onto the deck with a clank.
“Awaken, servant!”, he called.
The breathing turned louder and became something else. A snarl. A growl. Something more dangerous. Tendrils of warpfrost stretched towards Deracin on every surface.
He could see it now, wrapped in murky shadows, its bulky form a strange amalgamation of beast and machine, straining in vein against the rune inscribed chains. Its blunt snout turned towards him, lips peeled back from wet fangs. The daemon engine’s blue eyes were glowing like ice. Deracin grinned:“Oh, aye, you hate me with every fibre of your being, do you not, creature? With every beat of your furnace heart?”

The growling grew in volume, as if in affirmation of Deracin’s words. And the daemon engine’s straining against its bindings grew more fierce. A mind impulse was enough to move the arms emerging from Deracin’s servo-harness in front of him in protection, bringing into view a melta and the diamond teeth of a massive chainaxe. Deracin nodded as he noticed the creature flinch ever so slightly.

“Good, stand down. I made you, and I can unmake you just the same. And what’s more, this is not a time for anatgonism, creature: After all, I have come to offer you a gift…” Deracin paused, noticing how the growl had turned into a low purr. Then he continued:
“Not your freedom, of course, but something you will appreciate nonetheless.“ Deracin grinned. “I will give you somewhere to vent your anger.”

It was 45 minutes to planetfall.

Let me know what you think! And, as always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!