Chaos Sorcerer from box + extra bits

In the GW tradition, the Chaos Lord/Sorcerer in terminator armor box contains almost enough parts to construct two models. I figured I'd convert one up from the parts left over after building the Lord using bits I had lying around.

What you'll need:

• Sorcerer parts from Chaos Lord/Sorcerer in terminator armor
• Black Reach Terminator Sergeant body 
• Chaos Spawn bits

Specifically in this case, the Black Reach Terminator Sergeant is in the middle, with the imperial doodad removed. The spawn bits are off to the left and the chaos termie lord/sorc bits I used are off to the right.

First off, cutt off the veteran symbol on the sergeant's' left knee and the purity seal from his right leg. You'll need to mask those areas a little, so choose bits to go there. In my case I picked the little arrow with skull to cover the knee and just cut the leg to be not too unsightly. 

In an act of kindness, the front of the sorcerer termie armor fits perfectly into the black reach termie armor, so no conversion needed there. The chain loin cloth thing needed a bit of carving down on the inside to fit halfway decently in front of the leather straps that were there, and the skull from the belt buckle needed to be shaved off. Using different bits to chaos-it-up I don't see why you couldn't leave those as they were.

The big challenge here is that the Lord/Sorcerer box contains two left arm shoulder pads but only one right arm should pad, which the Lord got. To compensate for the missing shoulder pad, we'll be using spawn bits to create a warped and mutated (a.k.a. "The Chaos Crutch") right arm holding that book bit. Just for fun, I decided to add these very useful looking wings as well.

You can see here that I carved the spawn spikes down shorter so they would add some bulk to that area while not impeding on the wings too much. I used styrene glue to mush everything together, and then reshaped the joins to look better. Before I paint I will putty some to smooth transitions.

The wings are pinned into the back corners of the square on top of the termie armor. Save yourself heartache and pin things like this. PIN EVERYTHING. REGRET NOTHING. Especially in plastic, it takes almost no effort.

The book was adhered with a tiny spot of super glue in the hand and tentacle to keep it in place. 

So there you have it. Other than a bad case of "loyalist legs" he's perfectly passable.

Space Marine Casualty for Daemon Prince Base

This poor fellow is destined for the base of my Nurgle Daemon Prince (an Ultraforge Lord of Pestilence.) His legs are from a ... ready for this? ... Battle for Macragge marine. I had one that I had lost the gun for, so he was the lucky candidate. All the rest of the pieces are basic multi-part marines. I really don't remember where that skull is from. Hollowing out the receptacle for the bolter magazine was fun.  

I'm not sleeping. I'm just resting my eyes.

 And here he is placed on the base. I will likely paint him separately and place him after the fact.

Under the boardwalk...out of the suuunnnn.

The Burning Brand of Skalathrax

I am more and more interested in this Chaos Artefact, probably because (as far as I can tell) it's the only ranged weapon a Daemon Prince can take. Am I wrong? The uillustration shows him with a big ol' boltgun, but I sure can't find any way to give him anything from the wargear section.

Woot for ap3 and torrent. This thing can lay a template of hurt pretty much where you want it and kills half the loyalists under it dead. Add sould blaze for the change of another kill or two. Admittedly, at its absolute highest number of hits, soul blaze only has a 25% chance of killing one marine (0.5 burn out x 3 hits * 0.5 to wound * 0.33 armor, right?) I suppose it might be a little worrisome if you stick it on a lightly armored IC. 

So here's the more epic version of the BBoS. It's just a dragon head and hook from the chaos vehicle sprue, along with the igniter from the original flamer muzzle. Looking at the photo I can see gaps, so I'm guessing I'll be filling or filing/re-gluing soon. Ah, bleary eyes and late night hobbying.

rawr. I flame at you.

I spent most of the weekend writing PHP for work in prep for a dog & pony on Monday, so any hobbying I did was distinctly jeopardizing my deadlines. Poor, poor me.

Nurgle Jump Pack Throttle Bio-Control

No need to elucidate on this one.

The Lord of Pestilence continues. Like most sculpting I do the underlying volume is aluminum foil. I used colour shapers (oh, hey! pictured unintentionally in the top pic) to shape the green stuff more organically. A regular GW sculpting tool was used for the sphincters. I just pushed it straight into the center with the blade pointing in different directions. After that I used a colour shaper to compress the outside diameter a little. I also pinned a chaos space marine flamer to his left arm to represent the Burning Brand of Skalathrax, a chaos artefact. It's supposed to be an uber flamer, and as far as I can tell the only ranged weapon a daemon prince can purchase, but the flamer I used looks a little weedy. I might find something a bit beefier or sculpt one myself. I was trying to avoid using GW parts as much as possible, but I don't really know why. I'm using this as a 40k model, and that's all I plan on doing with it. Mixing some GW IP will tie it into the rest of the army.

Next item is a large bladder to act as fuel, sitting in the middle of the thrusters and some hoses and tubes to duct the ... whatever is going on there to wherever it needs to be.

Posted Progress and Secret Projects

The Nurgle Demon Prince continues to get work. Tonight I did the basic work to build his jump pack to make him a flying monstrous creature. Swooping with S6 AP3 vector strikes plus the Burning Brand of Skalathrax will be an interesting combination. 

The basic construction is the protection tubes that my W&N brushes were mailed in. I cut the tubes down and left the caps on for structural support. I then glued styrene bars to form a frame. Getting the isosceles triangle wasn't as has as I had imagined it would be. I cut the long leg first to fit where I wanted the thrusters to sit on the shoulders. I then positioned the third thruster roughly where I wanted it, cut a length of bar the distance between the third thruster and one of the others, then cut another bar that same size. I also used some thin styrene to wrap the open ends, but I'm not convinced that step did much for me. 

 Once the basic structure was build, I placed milliput domes on the top of each. I drilled the holes out in the classic nurgle pattern once the milliput was getting firm but wasn't yet cured. I will go over it and sand them smooth later. I imagine this to be the air intake for the jump pack, but in a world of disease demon princes I don't suppose any sort of rationale is necessary.

I smeared a thin coat of Vallejo black lava over the jump pack and a good part of the base. I love the semi-random texture it adds. Hopefully it will turn out as I am envisioning.

The first half of the DV cultists is built, bringing my assembled total to 58. That includes the 30 plague zombies.

I would say that brings me significantly close to having my army ready to roll, except I acquired 25 Flagellants in trade, and I'm sure they will see table time as cultists. I'd like to come up with some sort of autopistol for them to have. hmmm.

Lastly, we have the secret project. It's not that big a deal really, but my kids and I came up with this idea so I'm acting on it. I'd tell you what it is but you'd laugh, then realize I'm serious, then laugh some more.

Yes, I'm sculpting cat heads. They are definitely "heroic" scale  compared to normal cars, but they're still pretty darn small. This is pass #1 at them, and I'll go over with watered down milliput after they cure to smooth things out. Maybe I should have just done one and instamold reproduced it. Hmmm. I still can, I guess, if one turns out far superior to the rest.

Nurgle Demon Prince (Ultraforge)

Another hobby night comes and goes and I didn't do what I had planned. I did however do something with which I am pleased.

As I experienced in the past, Ultraforge makes some quality yuckiness. Now that I have my own CSM army, I thought I'd give this fellow another go as a Demon Prince. I've never been a big fan of GW's demon prince models, and this fellow looks like he could be an exalted plague marine just fine. 

I constructed the base from styrene, with a thick brass rod used to add structural integrity to the platform. The diagonal support beams are just for aesthetic. The goal was to suspend as much of the model over negative space as possible, and there is definitely a strange visual flow to the piece when you look at it. I think once the base is more muted and the mini more prominent it will be more like how I envisioned. I still intend to scratch build a large jump pack to act as "wings" for him. I'm thinking  1/2" tube, cut and arranged as three thrusters in the general nurgle trio shape. The outer two would be more or less in line with his shoulder joins, and the third centered on him and a bit more away from him. Jimmy suggested I grab some Ork Stormboy packs and use those, but I'd have to see how they size up. 

So the tally comes to about 70 playable models (painted or just assembled) and I have my first 2k game arranged soon vs. Blood Angels. This guy likes plasma cannons, but I think I can minimize damage if I keep distance between the models. Killing two or three 4-point models per plasma cannon shot will not wear this army down terrible fast. Unless he brings 15 of them. Then I have some problems. 

Ideas or suggestions for the jump pack or the base?

Forge World Chaos Sorcerer of Nurgle

This is the first thing I've submitted to CMON in over two years. It doesn't seem that long.

If you like it, please go vote on it!
http://www.coolminiornot.com/317008

If you don't like it.... well just look at it longer, I guess. Maybe it will grow on you. Heh. Nurgle will grow on you. Ewww.

Chaos Cultists: Wargames Factory Style

I'm all in on Chaos Space Marines after putting the Rat Flail Cultist conversion together. Chaos is like crazy, crazy, crazy in your face, all the time. I traded a bunch of unassembled vanilla Marines for a bunch of painted Chaos Space Marines, so I have ready to.. um... repaint. They are good, but I just have something else in mind. But back to Cultists... DV comes with a paltry 20 Cultists, organized as two units of 10. Considering Cultist units can have 35 models in them these units don't seem very survivable. Enter the box of Wargames Factory Shock Troops I bought many moons ago. I didn't know what I wanted to do with them, but they seemed pretty cool and it was a pseudo-impulse-buy at the model shop I frequent. After a little time and energy, all of which was today oddly enough, here is an 18 model Cultist squad with autoguns.

These guys are normally built with their kaiser helmet / gas mask heads that make them look like DKoK. (They are pictured on the box that way, fwiw.) For Cultists, I went with the head I had the least interest in when I first got them..., the bug eyed mask (gas mask maybe?) with open back. For Cultists, it just seemed perfect, and I'm pleased with the result.

Oh, and did I mention that a box of 18 of these guys is $20? That's list price, not street price. 18 minis for $20. I am unaccustomed to that level of value. The squat little boxes they come in have six stacks of identical sprues with three figures and lots of options on each.

So the Cultists were built with almost completely stock parts, but I did throw a few knives on as bayonets. There are a few I used GW parts on to give them more of a Chaos flavor or switched parts around a little differently, and I'll show them isolated.

These four are the only models I did any real conversion work on, and even then it's barely conversion. The guy on the far left got the barrel of his gun extended by attaching the end of the flamethrower barrel to it. Since all six sprues have a flamethrower (and a grenade launcher, and the most uninspiring pistol in miniature wargaming history) there were plenty to chop up. The guy on the far right merely has a little chain from the Chaos Space Marine command sprue hanging from his gun. The third guy is nearly stock, but I glued the leftover axe blade from the Rat Flail conversion. The only real conversion work was on the second guy, who I will be using as Cultist Champion in the unit. The icon and spike are from the same command sprue as the chain from #4. The outstretched arm is the same pointing arm that #3 has (you can see him pointing better in the first pic) with the normal gun cradling hand glued in place of the pointing hand and the thumb re-sculpted the Space Marine helmet. The helmet is hollowed out, and after a rough cut getting a lot of material removed, I put some very thin Flex-I-File Plast-I-Weld (for the Touch-N-Flow application system... someone kill me Ple-A-Se.) and let it soften the plastic inside the helmet to a much smoother surface when it dried. The head is one of the regular shock troop heads with the top knot shape cut down. It looks like he's about to mic-drop that helmet. BMM-- wheeeeee.....

So now that I have almost doubled the number of Cultists I own by adding these, let's talk about Cultists in a Typhus army that are plague zombies! PZ's are fearless and have feel no pain, but you can't buy them upgrades and they can't use their guns. GW recently FAQ'd that you can add zombies beyond the starting count of 10 models. (Yes, there were some people arguing that adding models counted as an upgrades. Sigh.)

Here are the six I have assembled so far.

Unlike the Shock Troops, I feel like I'm missing something with these guys. Five of the six models on each spue have separate torso/legs, and one has combined torso/legs.  Hold on a second.... I need to get this out of the way...

Did I mention that a box of 30 of these guys is $20? Yeah, <$1 per zombie.

Okay, I feel better. Anyway I've only built 6/30 of these models but I don't feel like I'm doing it quite right. Some of the bodies didn't fit with the legs all that well, and I suspect there are combos that work better than others. I have plenty more to get the hang of them. As my previous post showed, they are a little less heroic scaled than GW models, but an empty Cadian helmet is going to fit one of them nicely. 

So between a starter box, $40 of Wargames Factory minis and a few dozen models acquired in trade I have better than 2k points, ready to be assembled. Let the Galaxy Burn, one insufficiently terrain covered table at a time.

Hobby Tip: Use Satin Floss for Straps

A recent post on From The Warp discussed straps for bolters, so I figured I'd share my favorite non-hobby hobby item for this. Oral-B (a common dental manufacturer in the U.S.) makes a type of dental floss branded "Satin" that is a wide tape instead of a twisted cord like most other floss.

Yup. Looks like dental floss.

I've been using it for a few years for any leather strap or cloth wrap that I need to create. It's already the right size to represent am approximately 4" wide strap, and it's thin and durable. It takes superglue beautifully, and I typically glue the end to what I'm working on, then wrap the floss around after the glue has set and cut/glue the other side in place. This saves me a lot of trouble cutting putty sheets or styrene to shape/size. Plus, at 25m per container there's something like 1.5km of scale material. I'm thinking about buying a second box just in case they stop making it before I run out.

It's about the right size for a rifle strap.

Here I've used it for leather reins for a wolf, more to justify the crazy outstretched hand of the goblin shaman I wanted as rider than anything. The execution is a little clumsy, but you can see how the floss looks used as leather strap.

For my Skaven Giant, I wanted to attach some dwarf shields that  were painted in the scheme of a friend's army to replace the Empire shields that are normally on the giant's left arm. I cut holes in the shields and threaded floss through them to wrap around the arm, then painted it to blend in with the cloth straps that were already sculpted there.

Does anyone have a similar material they use out of the box for these sorts of tasks?

Chaos Sorcerer, Plague Zombie and a Rat Flail

So after purchasing a Dark Vengeance set and a CSM codex, I find myself wanting to put something together to field. Another army. Even I am surprised. I had bought Nurgle Lord Typhus a while ago, and between a unit of plague marines I traded for, the Hellbrute, HQ, Chosen and cultists in DV I figured I am most of the way to a fieldable army. I like the fact that Typhus can turn any unit of cultists into plague zombies. The only issue I had was the idea of giving up the cultists shooting for the sake of zombification. Enter FLGS and a box of Wargames Factory zombies. For a meager $20 you get 30 modern looking zombies with lots of permutation options, with 5 sprues of six zombies in each box. When I first opened them I was a little worried about scale, but seeing them next to a cultist leader from DV and alongside lots of other 40k models I am not so worried now. 

Size comparison shot ... Space Marine, Eldar Guardian, Imperial guardsman,
Wargames Factory Zombie, Chaos Cultist, Nurgle Chaos Sorcerer, Blood Bowl Dwarf

Sure, they look smaller than a Space Marine, but not appreciable smaller than an Imperial Guardsman. They will make excellent civilian zombies.

A few weeks ago during hobby night, Mike made me a "rat flail" for one of my cultists to wield. It goes well with the pose of the model. Original rat flail inspiration here.

Here's a little closer pic of the DV cultist and the WGF zombie. On a regular GW base they don't look too out of place.

Lastly we have the completed Nurgle Sorcerer. The fly on the banner turned out quite a bit more cartoony than I had hoped. Oh, well. He's off to his owner as soon as I can get over there. I will likely face him on the field of simulated battle one day. Considering I have played maybe 5 games of 40k in the last two years, it may be a while. Despite infrequent play, I still like to think of myself as a player of the game. Evidence says otherwise.

Carnivean Hates Vassal of Menoth

RAWR

I suspect it's just paint envy though.

40k Nurgle Sorcerer WIP 2

I put some more work in on Mr. Nurgle here. He's looking about how I had expected, even if the Nurglings are a little low-contrast for my taste Once the backpack and banner are on I think he'll look more complete

The dark green bubbles on the base are liquid green stuff. This is the first time I've used it, and it was goopier than I expected. I ended up thinning a little with water before using it, much like I do with milliput. Once thinned it took a pretty nice hemisphere shape. I should have held it upside down a little while to let it set better.

The base is cork layers, Vallejo black lava for texture and little metal bits (grating and a gear) from the GW 40k basing set. I ended up carving down some spots for his feet to avoid the ever popular "floating on the base" look. I hate that, but it's really hard to avoid if you are making bases with any kind of complexity.

Oh, and tonight's secret sauce? Vallejo Model Color "black glaze" (70855.) I used it like crazy tonight, sometimes straight and sometimes mixed with a little brown glaze (70854.) I know shading with black has problems, but it just worked for me tonight. It certainly has a a different quality of color than VMC black (70950) does.   

Busy Hobby Shelf Update

The busy hobby shelf tells its unwavering tale of projects started, projects finished and projects left idle. The Blood Bowl Skaven and Dwarf teams sit proudly by my NAF dice, but in nearly the same state they were in last update. Forgeworld Nurgle Sorcerer has had some progress, although I broke his weapon end off and had to pin it back on. A figure from Munchkin Quest sits barely started. The most recent addition is the Vassal of Menoth on the far right. He's for our little Steamroller tournament at work (only 2 people, and only 15 points, but hey... we're playing.) My opponent Brian painted the Gunboar on the shelf for my not-quite-started Pigs 'n' Gators army. I can't quite remember why Gunboar migrated from the WM/H model storage to the hobby shelf.

Last night was a fun hobby night with Mike, Mark, Andrew and Kyle all showing up. Mark showed off his Ork flyer while Mike struggled assembling a Khador mortar. Apparently the fit of the model is a frustration.

I may have successfully kicked my Kickstarter habit for the time being. As much as I was enjoy buying stuff on "preBay" I managed to let some pass without contributing. Some were more painful than others, but it's getting easier. Just takin' it a day at a time...

Lunchtime Painting - A Lesson In Insufficient Light

I have a few regularly scheduled painting times per week. Monday and Wednesday on my lunch hour and Wednesday night. The work lunch hour schedule is a new one set up for painting with a friend who is on-campus two days a week. He bought a Pandora "Legion of Sorrows" box (along with other Neverborn models) and plans on painting the box during his 15 week classes. I have been taking the opportunity to teach him what I can about technique. One lesson I was reminded of today is "don't skimp on lighting." Bill is actively seeking to become a better painter, and his Sorrow (middle) is coming along nicely. My Belles show the sorts of mistakes and ham-handed highlighting that is common with basic room lighting. I have a goose-neck lamp with a CF bulb in my office, which I let Bill use. I actually have a fluorescent strip light that I can use on the other part of my desk, but did not remember it until long after vandalizing the Belles as I did.

Tonight I will get the good lamp out and the magnifying headset and try to fix the highlights on the purple Belle's dress. I will also endeavor to make Blondie's eyes look less..... wrong. Sure, she's a zombie but those eyes just don't look intentional. It really is my #1 rule of painting... whatever you do must look intentional.

In other news, after the figs shown I have only 5 unpainted Malifaux models for my Rezzer army. Time to get out that credit card! I could probably use a couple more Macaw Vultures.....

Oh, and I have found that the purple background makes photography with the crappy phone camera (HTC Evo 4G) so much easier.  Here it is for your download and printing pleasure. Put the miniatures at the bottom and incline the rest no more than about 30 degrees to avoid light reflecting from overhead.

Opportunity For Improvement

Steve brought in his Nikon again today. I knew the Belle needed some fixin' up, but ... wow. We created a custom backdrop, since all the cool kids on CMON are using purple in the top 10. Dramatic as it is, I don't think it would elevate the Belle's score at all.

I decided to point out the flaws, so that in future posts you can critique my improvement. They are many and varied. Well, not that varied. The base is also a custom job that was meant to resemble my resin bases from Secret Weapon. Justin is in no danger of losing business from my homemade bases, that's for sure.

For reference, here is the same model from my HTC Evo 4G phone camera.

EDIT: It's also pretty clear from looking at the model that she must be wearing some sort of corset. Two -thirds of the breast volume is above the material, so my choosing to paint the material sheer was ill considered.

Weekly Poor Photography Update - Nurgle!

If you don't like the blurry photo, just pretend
Papa Nurgle gave you some seeping eye disease.

Jimmy stopped by tonight to work on Kroot-a-saurus, which got some armor updates.

I worked on Angelos's Forge World Nurgle Chaos Sorcerer. I've been working on this guy on and off since Sunday, and I'm very fond of how he's coming along. I need to paint all the bony spikes coming out of him, and give some love to the Nurglings on the model. I wanted some positive texture on the spearhead, so I applied some watered down Vallejo Black Lava selectively. I really liked the result.

An observation about FW resin... dip a bent spearhead into some heated water and it will immediately straighten from just gravity. Seriously, this stuff gets soft with heat.

Oh, I was supposed to ship Tristan's Harlequin tomorrow, but he's not packed to go. Curse my meandering thought process!

Weekly Hobby Group: Kroot-a-saurus Coming Together

 Kroot-a-saurus looks nearly done to me, which probably means that he only looks 60% done to Jimmy (aka "King Kitbash.") Tonight he magnetized the top turret and attached both... sponsons? I dunno, what would you call the little booms with Kroot gunners on them?

 I managed getting quite a bit done on a Malifaux Punk Zombie and Crooked Man. Jimmy, Seth and I spent a lot of time just gabbing yesterday, so I'm surprised I got as much done as I did. All that's left to paint in my Malifaux crew are the three belles (one is WIP below) another Punk Zombie and Crooked Man, half a nurse and two more Canine Remains. Well, not counting the Nightmare Teddy, Dead Justice and Miss Demeanor I picked up GenCon weekend. I really want to sculpt a second Teddy to use the alternate head supplied, but multiple Teddies implies I'm starting a Dreamer list, doesn't it? (Resist, Mike. Resist.)

Seth mostly worked on some wood (shields?) on Harry the Hammer's base. I don't know if I mentioned it previously, but he got some Forge World Chaos Dwarfs that he's been painting and the models are fantastic.

I finished the back of Tristan's Harlequin. One more good inspection for mistakes and I think he's as good as in the mail. The polyurethane coating (Minwax Polycrylic clear gloss) seemed to have worked, since I haven't knocked any more paint off the model despite quite a bit of handling. A little Testors DullCote takes the shine form the polyurethane off nicely.

Making Terrain ... with Fire!

My wife and I tried a little terrain making using cheap styrofoam and a blow torch. The result was interesting, but not exactly what I had hoped.

All the same, I got to play with fire.

New Skaven Models!

From the GW email newsletter:

In January 2011, following the epic release of The Island of Blood, the Skaven will be receiving reinforcements, including new models - visit the website tomorrow for more information from the Studio. And with these new additions gathering on the horizon, there is no better time to start up or expand your very own Skaven army

Yes!  I'm really interested in seeing what new models are released.  The Night Runners are clearly a candidate, as they are similar to the last edition of clan rat.  I'd love to see a better Thanquol model too.  What I'd really like to see, beyond all reasonable hope, is a box of giant rats and packmasters.  Currently the only way to get 18 points of giant rats is to buy them with 80 points of rat ogres in a $40 box.  I was personally hoping that the new rulebook would give rat ogres/giant rats a mixed unit rule like kroxigors/skinks get based on the way they are sold, but hey.... no biggie.  So, like I said, if you want to field any reasonable number of giant rats you are forced to buy a lot of $40 boxes, even if you use all the other smallish rats that come with plague monks, doomwheel, etc.

So what other Skaven units are old..... gutter runners?  I still like those.  The warlord?  Yeah, I'd love to see a multi-option warlord box.  Same with warlock engineer.  And, oh!  Plague priest!  I'd love to see a good model for him!  I guess I'll just wait for tomorrow and see what's in store.

In the words of the immortal General Vorg... Squeeks!

EDIT:  Apparently the "more information" on the web site is that we can look forward to more information.  Oh, well.

The Perplexing Box

On an ordinary Tuesday, a box arrives in the mail...

My wife has determine that having daughters has corrupted my sense of awesome. I thought "corrupted" seemed a bit negative, so she downgraded it to "tainted." My daughters both squeeeeed when they saw the box, so now I have the choice of buying each of them their own box or giving mine to them. No way I'm giving up my precious mousies, so it looks like I better go get the credit card...