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So, this project isn't really an active thing but rather me digging up figures I made years ago and showing them off because they're kinda amusing. I mean, I do kinda want to pick up new/proper glue and paints and finish off some things maybe, but that's a bit ways off for now. (question: do stores like Micheal's sell materials suitable for minis? No hobby stores around...)

Anyways, as the title implies these are Chaos Space Pirates, renegade Marines that opted to plunder the universe instead of conquering it. It was greatly inspired by the Pirates of the Caribbean movies, particularly Davy Jones and his crew. As they are drawn from multiple chapters, they don't share a proper uniform but instead they have something (typically the shoulder armors) painted gold and something else with a Jolly Roger (skull on a black and red field). Wasn't ever much of a player, so this is largely a fluff/"because it's cool" army.


Bosun, Mantis, Intimidating Lava Guy, Doc, Plasbad

A bit hard to see, but Doc's Jolly Roger has a stereotypical doctor head mirror!
Plasbad was achieved by actually burning the plastic model, something I would NOT recommend repeating if mostly because it softens the surrounding detail.


Maccus, Eely Mouth, Noose Necktie, TETSUOOO!, Hugh Mann

First two are lifted from Davy Jones' crew, "Hugh Mann" was basically just recycling scrap parts...


Beergut, Pinky, Fhtagn, Guns Akimbo, Zebesian

Being a Metroid fan, I just HAD to work in one of those Space Pirates. I think he's my favorite of the bunch!


Mother, Rootbeard, ...Larry, THIEVESESES!

No band of pirates would be complete without a "Larry"!
The thieves (carrying a statue, btw) would probably have to be an objective marker instead of actual playing units, I suppose.


More to share, eventually.

Random bit of fluff: The Pirates are a terribly superstitious bunch, regularly jettisoning a large chunk of their hauls anytime they travel the Warp in order to appease the gods. Naturally, this doesn't work.

Lovely stuff, a lot of creativity here.

Interesting stuff. My fav is the dude who's had half his body burned off (from some kind of Melta weapons?) and is still standing.

EDC

Thanks guys!


Some more. Unfortunately nothing else I got is painted. Too busy individualizing them I suppose.


A lot of these guys are less mutated than the first batch, the idea being these are newer recruits. The Pirates don't worship any of the Chaos gods (not counting superstitious rituals), but since they hide out in the Warp and because they often open up things they really shouldn't, crewmates inevitably become warped and twisted.


For some reason when I made these years ago I was against tanks. Too expensive or somehow not "piratey" enough? I dunno. What I did do, however, was loot a Dark Eldar thing. I think it reminded me of something out or the Metroid Prime games or maybe even of Jabba the Hutt's pirate-esque sail barges. Didn't at ALL fit the rulebooks, but eh, "they're more like guidelines" and all that.

Now IIRC this set came with 2 Dark Elders. One got kidnapped by the "turtleneck" pirate at the beginning of this post, no clue where the 2nd ended up...

 evildrcheese wrote:
Interesting stuff. My fav is the dude who's had half his body burned off (from some kind of Melta weapons?) and is still standing.

EDC

He had a malfunctioning plasma pistol. Then realizing he was somehow still alive, he picked up a second one and went right back shooting!

The current Captain, largely held together by sticky tack.

The idea behind the eye is that his helmet got shot open in the vacuum of space, and the rapid depressurization wrenched his eye out of his socket. Yowch!

The familiar makes for a great monkey stand-in, although it's a bit big.



The former Captain. Instead of tossing him on a deserted asteroid or some such, the mutinous crew stuffed their fearless leader into a salvaged Dreadnought!

Whenever I get around to painted this, those little signs will have to say "Kick Me"

I had the sense to NOT permanently glue the arms on, so the ex-Captain can swap in the missile launcher arm and this extra crushy arm:

The Pirates weren't quite sure what they found rotting on the beach at New Tortuga, just that it looked powerful (and thus valuable) and probably daemon-infested (though Pirates think anything even vaguely threatening is daemon-infested). Their greed overcame their paranoia and so they took the robotic crab thing for their own -- worst come to worst they could always chuck it out the airlock.

So, a Defiler, filled with barnacles and bullet holes. The plan for painting will be to make it look like a beach relict, bleached white and rusted top while the bottom's darker, greener, and looking like the start of a reef.

And something made of leftover parts:



Also tried out painting again. My Citadel paints have long since dried out, so I had to make do with the random assortment of art/craft acrylic paints. Don't have a primer spray paint anymore either (not that I can use them now anyways, what with all the snow), so instead I simply painted the minis black with the regular paints.
First attempt:

Inspired by a certain deceptive, conniving robot...


Pretty rough, but had to figure out the paints and how to physically paint these tiny things.


Second attempt:

Went much more smoothly, though I think I overdid the black paint wash at the end. Needed to tone down the primary-ness of the colors but went a little too far with it.

Still, not entirely off from what I was doing.

More Painting! Got a large set of acrylic paints ("Artist Loft" brand), which seems to be going well. Using black as a base layer kills some of the fun of picking a random color, though. May have to look into a neutral primer...

Rusty:

Dusty:

Fisty....... Cups:


How people manage highlights and shading in the teeny little eye lenses I'll never know.

 Rootbeard wrote:
How people manage highlights and shading in the teeny little eye lenses I'll never know.

Patience and practice! :(

Painting's slow work, especially with these shorter winter days...
Grenadier:

Bull Bros:

These two weren't originally 'related', but now it's hard not to see them as a pair.


Still a whole lot of grey and green to cover...

I like these mustard colour pirates.

^Thank you!

Painted the duo hauling the (broken) statue:

(boy I never realized how uneven the bases where until seeing that last pic as I'm posting it now)

Since I already did a patina effect for one of the other pirates, I thought I'd give the statue a cleaner look.

The purity seals are a bit shinier than the rest. Imperial citizens rub it for luck -- or at least they used to.

Digging thru all my leftover parts to see what exactly I have. Lessee....

~50 heads, 5 backpacks, 6 torso fronts (no backs), and 1 pair of legs -- biker legs at that. Not very helpful.


Also dug up these things:

I'm flummoxed as to what yester-me intended to use these for. Surely I had to have SOME kind of goal, why else would I even glue them?

Paint, paint, paint....




I tried giving this guy an "inner fire" effect using washes, turned out making the armor sun-damaged instead, which I liked enough to keep.
On the flip side, the washes on the 'bone' turned out way better than I could've hoped for -- maybe too good. The freehand crossbones and greenstuffed whip are especially bad looking compared to the skull helmet.

Rootbeard's flower is based upon the Rafflesia, meaning he'd smell awful. The teeny tiny dots were achieved by taking a single bristle from one of those horrible plastic wire beginners paintbrushes I've somehow not gotten rid of. Turned out to be useful for painting afterall.

Haven't updated this thread in a while, and I don't quite remember where I left off here vs other sites I've been sharing these, so forgive me for posting some of the same images again.

Crew:


Captain Meathook:


Cabin boy/monkey/whatever little guy (he turned out really adorable here):


And a group shot of everyone:

 Rootbeard wrote:
Digging thru all my leftover parts to see what exactly I have. Lessee....

~50 heads, 5 backpacks, 6 torso fronts (no backs), and 1 pair of legs -- biker legs at that. Not very helpful.

Green stuff slug or tentacle bodies?

Fun army, thanks for sharing!

I do have a crazy idea for a small squad that's all technically just an unseen squid monster "puppeting" a bunch of bodies about. Wouldn't need legs, but would still need torso backs. Guess I'll either have to buy spares or maybe try casting a few (though that seems like it may end up being more trouble than it's worth).

On the other hand, a half-torso would be great for something like that guy from Pirates of the Caribbean that was literally part of the ship.


But before I can get to that, I really ought to work on the Raptors and Spawn and vehicles and loads of other things I got...

I should probably be painting my already-assembled Raptors and Dreadnaught, but instead I've been assembling... I dunno what these are. Gribbly weirdness.


Snailly Snailson. Guess he could just be another Marine, goodness knows I've made some weird ones.


Gun robot things. Or at least that's the plan, at the moment they wouldn't look out of place on top of a Rhino. They'll eventually get some form of legs.

Probably not those legs...

Had to remake the trophy racks, which turned out to be lots of fun!


If I were the type to actually play the game, I guess I'd count these funky robots along with the "Octobot" as Obliterators or Havocs.

Love the weirdness gribs, especially the spine gun thing.

EDC

Fiddling around with legs/bodies for the guns. Which is kinda hard given how they really aren't designed for anything other than vehicles.


Organ things!

And more futzing around; a Sorcerer (also, a snowman):

Nothing glued, just had an idea I wanted to see. Turned out a bit... heroic, angelic even. Not quite the freakish sinister mutant I was shooting for.

Trophy-bot's finally gotten his legs -- had to carve out a hole for every one of his limbs, oof!

Admittedly Tyranid limbs are overdone with Chaos, but I wanted a vaguely crab-like beast and none of the Spawn/CSM bits I had really fit the bill.

Hashing out a slug-like body for the spidly-cannon (just a basic skeleton now):

Although it's kinda adorable as a wee li'l gun-toting tick:


Found a use for one of the floating block things:

I initially wanted the console-block-whatever to be a visible part of the robot drone, but it just ended up being too restrictive; the bot would either have to be really small, or really off-centered from the stand.

Cyclopean Sorcerer getting glued together


Not sure what to do with the arms yet. He needs a weapon, but nothing in my bits boxes is screaming "do something with me!"

Also... should probably cover up those suggestive orifices (it was either that or suggestive tentacles!). Or maybe just leave leave and claim "he" is dedicated to Slaanesh...

A whirling dervish of teeth and pain and noodley elbows!

I'm really starting to hate Space Marine arms. I go thru so much trouble finding the right ones, cutting and re-gluing to get the right pose I want, then I put the pauldrons on and it's like it completely undoes all my effort. Bah.

Anyways, finally decided upon arms on the Sorcerer:

Got caught up trying to find a right-handed weapon that looked sorcery/distinctive/cool enough because I wanted to use that palm-out/missile-launcher-supporting left hand, but I'm infinitely more pleased with this solution!

A more traditional (space) pirate; temporary beard made of kneaded eraser:

(didn't see that Khorne icon on the gun until posting, hrnn...)
Spent a good deal of time on getting a 'reaching for his sword' arm pose, but then that pauldron happened. Feh.
Didn't have a plan going in with that robotic leg, just winged it with whatever nifty leftover bits I had.

A good use for all those Tyranid heads (maybe a bit redundant with my earlier Metroid Space Pirate?):

Really though, it's like the Tyranid Warrior heads were designed to be used as arm-mounted combination shields/blades. I mean, not really, because I had to do a lot of carving to get it to work, but still. And the Tyranid set even has 3 leftover heads with no other applicable use...

Proof-of-concept time!

Biker legs lend themselves nicely to "just hit by something' poses, if at the expense of giving the victim a rather wide codpiece. (was tempted to have daemons tearing out of him, but my Pirates don't really do that sort of thing)

Awesome. I love the Sorcerer and the Nid head on the arm guy.

Great work.

EDC

Built the crazed leaper guy, didn't realize how much dynamism he lost until posting this against the prototype. Might have to rework him...




Meanwhile, I also built a couple other guys.

Sgt Smithereens - decorates his armor with the debris from his missile attacks



Purity seal toupee!


What started as goofing around with battle damage on an extra helmet ended up becoming my interpretation on the Cleaved. He's all goo now, the loss of a hand or forehead doesn't bother him anymore.

Also because I was goofing around with battle damage...

partially skeletonized marine -- maybe for a stereotypical 'dead body draped over a pirate's chest' objective marker or something. Got some Lego chests that're about the right size.

Years ago Kroot Mercenaries had their own army list, and I had the idea to maybe mix in a few units with my Chaos Marines... if just fluff-wise (like I did any actual gaming). The background idea here being that since the two sides have completely different desires (Kroot wanting corpses, Marines wanting valuables) there's very little chance of in-fitting, while at the same time they both truly believe they've somehow duped the other! So I bought a box of the Carnivores, and went to town:


(it's a double Ash-Williams-style chainsaw-hand)


Unfortunately, for the other 13 Kroots I went with really boring, basic builds. So I've been chopping them up and re-gluing everything to make them look more like actual individuals.













Much better.

Tyranids were my first army, but despite obsessively following the likes of Hive Fleet Moloch and Hydra, I didn't really do anything interesting with them (much less successfully). So, naturally, I dug them up and decided to do a little kitbashing.

Tyrant Guard -- more along the lines of the 3rd Edition design... and a number of other people's kitbashes.

Maybe need to bulk out the back? Granted it's back would always be turned towards the Hive Tyrant, anyways, so maybe not.

A handy use for those spare Carnifex noggins, at least.


They're a nice size with the old "Alien Queen" Hive Tyrant (who I *really* need to finish one of these days... years).

Unfortunately, the Tyrant I was building with them in mind ended up a lot bigger. oops

Speaking of:

The Hive Tyrant's made out of a Carnifex with a reversed torso, which is kind of a pain to assemble. Even more so when the back part didn't want to align with anything.
And yes, that's another Carnifex cranium as armor there. That's 7 heads sacrificed yet I still have, like, 2 and a half full sets left.


The arms that 'feed' the Tyranid guns make for cool bio-targeter dealies. Initially, I was going to put one on the Tyrant's head, but this way looks more interesting, less like a monocle, plug up the big holes on the guns, and more importantly justifies the Tyrant's atrocious aim. Seriously, the thing didn't lend itself to any decent, intelligent aiming poses...

And finally, some Dual-Devourer Warriors.

Mostly, I just like the vestigial claws here.



Thanks for viewing!

There so much to love in this thread so far. This is why i'm all about crazy conversion. And sane ones too, of course. But mostly the crazy ones.

Minor update to the Tyrant, added shoulder armor and strips of GS'd muscle on the neck:


Next build is a Carnifex based off of the old Old One Eye model:


credit for the claw design goes to Bahz

Big nasty wound on the shoulder/back area. (pardon the odd mix of primer and bare plastic)


Should probably start painting one of these days... meh.

Thanks for looking!

Love the Trophy-Bot!