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INTRODUCTION
After recently listening to the 40k audio novel ‘The Dark King’ which tells the tale of Konrad Curze Primarch of the Night Lords’ imprisonment after attacking and nearly killing Rogal Dorn of the Imperial Fists, and how he escaped and destroyed his homeworld of Nostramo. After which I searched through my old White Dwarf collection to find the Index Astartes article about the Night Lords.

And it’s gotta be said they are by far the best chapter ever; here are a few examples of the Night Lord interesting background…

While other Primarchs were raised by the leaders of local tribes of their homeworlds Curze raised himself and worked his way up the food chain. Before becoming what can be easily described as a super-human batman that killed the guilty in such a brutal fashion that they were beyond recognition.

The Night Lord’s methods of war during the great crusade were vicious and while the other chapters would avoid killing civilians, the Night Lords would often virus bomb a whole continent to destroy a rebellion or uprising.

They were the first chapter to turn evil. After destroying their homeworld the Night Lords went on a mad killing spree wiping out planets that they deemed sinful, all the time stating that in was in service to the Emperor.

If any of you have seen my other projects you’ll know I often like to invent my own armies often using ‘count as’ rules. But for once I think it would be a good idea to build an army that already exists in the 40k universe, and the Night Lords are by far the most interesting chapter for me to build.

WHY BLOOD ANGELS?
I choose to use the Blood Angel codex because I’m want to have an army with a different play style to the ones I currently play; my mech guard and Tzzentch Daemons are shooting based so it would be nice to have an fast moving army that does it’s best in close quarters. The entire army will be equipped with jump backs so it will be very elite and thanks to the FNP bubbles the army won’t suffer due to low numbers which will allow me to put more time into each model.

Now for my conversion concepts…



UNIT CONCEPTS
The appearance of this army will be based on the time when the Night Lords were performing their purge of the galaxy before the Horus Heresy began. So I plan to make them look dark but not too chaos based.

Librarian
For my HQ I plan to build an improved version of Arch-Heretic Korell an old conversion from a previous army project. I’ll also use the chaos possessed wings as his jump pack.

Assault Marines
This will be a simple conversion using the Khrone Beserkers because their armour is halfway between loyalist and chaos. Replacing their heads with a cool skull helmet I found on the web which you’ll see later and of course adding a night lord shoulder pad and per-heresy jump pack. I’ll use the different skull shoulder pads from the berserker kit for squad markings.

Honor Guard
I’ll will use chaos marine armour for these guys but removing the 8 pointed stars and adding a few purity seals. Also I hope to use the pre-heresy weapons from forgeworld.

Sanguinary Priests
I’m going to give these guys a sinister appearance similar to Fabius Bile using Dark Angels robes and the old raptor jump backs. I’ll also use the marauder arms with the medical device surgically attracted to the right arm.

Sanguinary Guard
Convert them from angels to daemons, changing the helmets to this possessed head (as a helmet design, not a mutation) and replace the angel wings with the harpy wings.

Vanguard
Simple; a squad of the Heresy Armoured Marines from forge world, however I’m not looking forward to having to paint the Night Lords symbol on the blank shoulder pad.

Devastators
A recent idea after coming across a variant list when you field 3 full devastator squad to back up assault marines and since I’ll have pre-heresy missile launchers kicking around why not.

Well those are the ideas, please tell me what you think as I always appreciate feedback.



WHAT TO USE FOR THE BASES!?!
The decision on what bases to use for this army has plagued me since I first began thinking about it. I’ve learned from pervious projects that the best bases are those that contrast the models rather then blending with them, so with this in mind I’m torn between two types.

First off is a ruined city with brown mud and grey stone contrasting the Night Lords paint scheme.

However I’ve recently played Chaos Rising and I’m tempted to do ice world bases, they would contrast the Night Lords brilliantly. Using a variety of cheap resin bases and adding snow over certain areas like the sand on this one painting the cracks as ice, and the moss on these bases and adding an ice effect to the water.
The only problem is the risk cause it’s rare for snow bases to look good and the fact there are very few snow boards out their so they’d look out of place on some boards.

Which do you think I should go for, or can you recommend another type of resin base for the army?

I cant wait to see your progress, please post pics. An excellent choice to use the BA codex. The idea of San Guard in the night lords is awesome, plus they have the potential to fit perfectly, with brooding red wings on their back.....should be awesome!

With the colors of the night lords, I would think a med grey base would look nice, like rubble or street/urban...and tie it all together with some sporadic patches of green grass to compliment the blue and red on their armor.

The icy field bases look like the better way to go.

3 Dev squads doesnt seem like a bad idea

Since you are running this army with the BA codex what about a Furi-Libie D-naught with the Wings power. This would give you a solid reasont to add jump packs to a dread. Ok that idea is just my hopes you do something like that, but Im sure you cant fit that into the army plans and tactically its probally not the best investment for you.

for the bases you could use dark moss and black gravel with bits of debris everywhere

All the ideas sound good!

What about doing a few test models with different base styles before committing?

This is an awesome idea. I still have some spare chirugeon parts from my fallen conversions (I bought the set entirely for the DA Fallen backpacks), namely the two evil looking mechanical arms (I used the backpack without the add ons) which would be perfect for a Night Lords Sanguinary Priest. I'd be happy to give them to you in order to help you with this project.

Looking forwards to seeing some of the first WiP shots.

Subscribed!

Same here!

Very much looking forward to this!

very interesting! (Just so you know, in the title of your blog you spelt pre-heresy, per heresy but you probably already noticed!) I will enjoy seeing how this progresses.

I always saw the Night Lords as Batman gone super human and insane XD

Very curious how this will work out! Did you also read Soul Hunter and Lord of the Night?

Great ideas! I know it may be out of place on some boards but i think the snow bases would look sweet!

Sounds awesome, I really want to see the outcome.

I m going to say your going to have to work hard to outdo yourself since "Viva La Grot"

Dude, for the snow bases, check this out.

sounds like a good plan, i've played night lords for almost 10 years and i've started using the blood angels codex, it works well. not got around to any prpoer conversions yet though.

The san gaurd idea had ocured to me, but i've had trouble deciding how to go about it. i like the possed head swap idea, though i'm a big fan of thier winged helms.

I'm watching this!

Cant wait for some models, always love your stuff.

It must be really annoying to play you however tho, I not keen on using a different codex for an army that has a codex.

Not ment as a flame, looking forward to your efforts.

Interesting plans I'm with Tortured-Robot on the idea of using a different codex when they technically have one already but hey they are pre-heresy so if any codex fits the fluff it's the blood angels. I'll be watching with great interest as I'm planning my new year project to be a Night Lords army (fingers crossed Santa thinks I've been good boy) and I might get some inspiration from your work

So here's my first attempt at a snow base; I used a 40mm base from an old conversion and with the help of my local GW manager tried out a snow basing technique. I choose to use Water Effects and bicarbonate mainly because it had a more frozen feel to it than modelling snow, plus I could sculpt the snow easier. when it dried it did seem a bright enough so the next mixture will have some white paint thrown in, I do like how the frost came out on the posters.



I think these will contrast the Night Lords perfectly but will see later as I'm now going to try out some blending technqiues on a standard marine model, afterwards I'll place him on the base and see how he looks.

These look fantastic...

I usually don't like snow bases at all, but yours are great!

A more detailed step by step would be GREATLY appreciated!

OMG

You sir.. ARE NUTS.

I love it. After finishing that awsome Grot army you move onto this?

So looking forward to seeing where you take this.

Cheers.

Oh.

TEST MINI! NAO!

Proteius, I see your name, click, and always love what I see.

How about a tutorial of your snowbase style!?

I actually think the brightness is spot on. Melting snow against dark terrain would look like that. That is a fantastic base. Would you mind PM me the materials you used for the snow or posting them on this thread? I have never heard of biocarbonate

He might mean "Sodium bicarbonate" (Baking Soda) but who knows for sure?

There sure are a lot of requests for a tutorial though!

Gotta be sodium bicarbonate... i.e baking soda -


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Damn you Alphy! How dare you steal the chemistry spotlight!

Those look really really good.

Alpharius wrote:A more detailed step by step would be GREATLY appreciated!

Add a mix of biocarbonate and water effect to tub,
mix till you get a nice icing sugar like texture,
Apply to base with modelling knife,
finally leave to dry.

Simples Or visit this article for all snow effect techniques > http://40kforums.com/vb/entry.php/12-New-pics-of-old-stuff

great! thanks for the steps to your snow!

welcome to the cause! see my signature to understand what i'm talking about