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There I am unpacking my delivery of mould making rubber and two part resin, ready to begin work on my custom roughriders and my friend bursts in with his new copy of the Nid codex yelling something about a trevo..torvi...tervigon? Apparenantly as a Nid player this is one of the fun new toys they get to play with, and as it has no model for the unit and he has zero modelling skills he was willing to get down on his knees to beg me to build one for him ( I may have taken a small amount of artistic licence when recounting this). Happily for me the Tervigon provides a lot of modelling possibilites and a chance to use my new mould making products! After a bit of design talk with my friend we decided on a "classic" Tervigon (if one exists yet) with scything talons from the fex kits for legs a fex head and carapace and the rest resin and modelling putty. The real concession I dragged out of him was a chance to do something pretty cool by cutting up a guant and remodelling into a faetal position and casting several copies of it in resin, I will then paint them and encase them in clear resin globes. I will then hang them all from the underside of the tervigon carapace and drape them in strings of liquid epoxy which will hopefully droop and drip down like a gruesome form of amniotic fluid, thats the plan anyway....

So I began by modelling a clay form for the main body of the Tervi' (which I forgot to take a pic of) I then poured a two part rubber called "Pinkysil" over it to make a mould ( which I can take a pic of if you want but doesn't look very interesting).

I then poured a two part resin called "Easycast" into the mould to form the carapace and body of the Tervi'



and here it is next to a marine for size comparison,



and with a fex head but no carapace,



I immediately regretted putting grooves into the carapace, I thought it might add some detail to what was going to be large blank areas but I then realised that with the usual chimney/vent I need to add then the whole thing would look too busy so I have decided to greenstuff them away.

Since I am going to need so much room on the underside of the Tervi' to hang the "egg sacs" I decided to mount to scy talons onto the bottom edge of the carapace rather then build a body under the carapce set the sockets into. The next few pics show the Tervi' with the first two sets of legs attached.







Sorry about the pic quality they taken at night under a lamp and the white resin the carapace was made of picked up the light in a nasty way.
This next set of pics is with all three sets of scy talons attached and beside a fex for size comparison.





I think I have gotten enough height to hang the "eggsacs" and not scrape the ground but I am not sure I have enough bulk to the main body to match the rules and the picture of the Tervi' in the codex.

So this is where I have got to so far, any C&C is welcome!

cheers,
BLACKHAND

Its like a black widow spider ... need some egg sack hanging below.

*shudders

Looking good so far but it really needs a tail, and probably some kind of central ribcage (with the eggs inbetween that and the upper carapace). How do you plan on making the 'Birthing apparatus'?

Looking good so far but it really needs a tail, and probably some kind of central ribcage (with the eggs inbetween that and the upper carapace). How do you plan on making the 'Birthing apparatus'?

A central ribcage with half a gaunt coming out would be sweet too.

Very nice start!

I'm look forward to seeing where you end up...

Ah the rib cage and tail suggestions.

Make a tail that is able to curve towards the rib cage.
So they can turn into some sort of egg carriage.

Im a genius!

Thanks for the feedback guys

My plan is to shape a four toed "claw" into the top of the eggsac, as my incredibly poorly drawn example shows



My theory is that the sac grows with a fairly leathery skin and when the Tervi' is ready to spawn the claws spasm together and tear the sac open spilling amniotic fluid and newborn gaunt all over the place.

I think having 7 or 8 of these sacs will totally fill the thorax of the Tervi' and not leave much room for a ribcage but who knows ?

cheers
BLACKHAND

And then when they hatch, they eat the shell like snakes do, right?

On Topic: It looks good so far.

A few pics of the work I've gotten done this weekend, mostly rough greenstuff and putty work , extending the edge of the carapace and adding a vestigal tail.













and here is pic of the faetal gaunt for the eggsacs



C&C welcome!

cheers
BLACKHAND

You, my friend, are quite simply disturbed.

cosmic pixie wrote:You, my friend, are quite simply disturbed.

Yea, but in a very, very, very good way

Could we get another picture of the foetal gaunt? It lloks good so far, but it's hard to make out what is happening towards the rear half If that tail is still straight wouldn't it be better to curl it up around the body?

Awesome, I love it.

Very interesting. I'm looking forward to see this continued.

I never was a big fan of Tyranids walking on their scything talons though. But it makes sense considering your plans for the creature.

Very cool. Personally, I would smoothen up the edges of the carapace, because they are supposed to be bone. Whatever works for you though, could be battle damage

Thanks for the feedback!

@cosmic pixie - Yes, yes I am

@Morgrim - Sure, I will put up some more pics after my game today. The tail of the gaunt will probably stay straight so that I can use it to suspend the gaunt in the clear resin "eggsac"

@anung un rama - I am liking the idea of a very spider-like nid but as I add more and more resin putty and the weight of the carapace goes up I am getting worried about the strength of the scytalon tips. I may end up having to add bulk to the tips to keep them snapping off.

@ DarkangelsRK - The edges will get cleaned up to only leave the typical Nid cracks you find in a normal carapace but I am still trying to decide where the "chimneys" will go. Plus in the last 2 days I have added about a 1/2 cm to the edges of the carace so the cleanup stage is still a while off.

Thanks again for the comments, compared to my other blog this one has been really busy, Tervigons must be a hot topic at the moment.

Cheers
BLACKHAND

I wasn't even talking about the weight. I just think it looks stupid most of the time. Why would 'Nids even bother with something like that if they could just grow a pair of good legs onto the creature?

I was looking through the codex, and both Tervigons and Tyrannofexes have proper hind-legs. However, the walking-on-scything-talons thing is pretty awesome.

Yeah I talked it over with my friend when he first asked me to start the project and even offered to build a couple of hind legs out of crushing claws but he specifically wanted all scytalons. I'm pretty sold on them now as it looks more and more spider-like and gives me the space beneath it to hang the "eggsacs". Considering some of the tervigons I have seen so far ( aduro's monitor lizard inspired tervi' for instance) I think we are still pretty close to the pic in the codex.

Cheers
BLACKHAND

Simply cool...

Yet creepy at the same time.

BLACKHAND wrote:

Wow, That is awesome!
I would love to know how you did that lil guy!

Your work here puts my Scratchbuilds to shame sir.

I don't suppose it needs saying that that's a Hormaguant...? Not that I really care, it's awesome anyway.

So im guessing that what you wanna achieve is a kind of like the Gonarch from Half Life 1?


Do not post pics with profanity in them.
Disciplinary action taken.
Waaagh_Gonads

I like it. For the tail, can I suggest that the small tail you've got so far become a back 'spine' for an egg laying tube? And a swollen egg-laden belly would be great.

Re the 'delicate' talon feet, I've had success in 'blunting' them for a stockier look more suitable for walking on. Of course, if you have an egg-laying tube that touches the ground, that will take a lot of stress off the talons.

Ah yes, the Gonarch. Half-life is the only game where you can kill a giant half crab, half scrotum alien creature with a ghostbuster gun.

On topic, the tervi is looking metal so far mate. The spider legs are just rad.

alexwars1 wrote:Ah yes, the Gonarch. Half-life is the only game where you can kill a giant half crab, half scrotum alien creature with a ghostbuster gun.

40k perhaps Necrons firing at Pyrovores fit that description pretty well too!

If you're worried about the legs being too thin from both a practical and aesthetic view, why not add some of the smaller gaunt scything talons on the side just at the base, a sort of tripod arrangement. I think you could get it looking like they're movable, sort of like toes. If that makes any sense.

You know that the Gaunt is supposed to be a Termangaunt. Yet I see scything talons.

Thanks again guys for the comments,

@tedcase - That little guy was not not fun to slice up and build, in order to get the legs to fold up the way I wanted I had to replace whole sections with greenstuff. To get it ready for a rubber mould I then had to fill in all the voids so that it was all one peice with relatively shallow overhangs (hopefully to get as few bubbles in the mould as possible)
Having never played half life I wasn't exactly going for the look of the creature you are talking about but it's kinda like what i'm building, except my Tervi' is going to have several of the sacs hanging under it not just one big one.

@clang - Thanks for the thoughts, I'm not thinking of a base at the moment as I like the though of a score od gaunts running underfoot like baby chicks so I will have to look at strengthing and/or bluntening the scytalons

@Alexwars - cheers!

@Morgrim - Thanks for the suggestions, I'm gonna run them and a few other ideas past my mate and see what we can hash out as a solution.

@Andilus & Anun un rama - You just had to point out my biggest dissatisfaction with the gaunt didn't you! Yes its a hormagaunt not a termigaunt. That was the only model I could get off my mate to slice up for the faetal model and it has bugged me that it's not the right one, that said it has a great sillouette which will be instantly recognizable as a guant when encased in the clear resin "sac"

I guess the big question is, is this the kind of detail which will ruin what could otherwise be a cool model or is it not such a big deal?
I could try and blag a termie gun off someone else at our gaming club and graft it onto the model if i need to.

Cheers again for all the comments, I can't believe the blog has reached nearly 400 views in 2 days!

BLACKHAND

I would get some fake grapes to use for the sacs. You can get them in a variety of sizes and colors...