Ah, Khador. Good choice.

(Still holding out for that army shot, at least!)

Wrong! It's Trollbloods...

Oh my! I'll be back in the morning when i have done studying this blog! It deserves nothing less.

Finally finished reading your blog, fantastic work! Consider it exalted. I love the steampunk look, so much more personality than the boring GW Necrons.

Hope there is more to come!!

Went to put the picture of these into another thread as an example of something, and apparently I never actually took a picture of them. Quad Stalkers I put together a couple months ago for a pBastard Theme Force.

I was given this thing as commission payment I'm not sure how many months ago. I think I got it fair shortly after it came out, but then lookin at the condition of the resin and it's rules kind of killed my desire to build it. Finally getting it together though because I want to actually try the thing out, plus it's still a sweet model.

Cleaned off all the flash and plugs and odd round bumps that were on each tail segment which I think might have supposed to been spikes. Had to boil some water to bend the two thick pipes/wires on the foremost exhaust as they did not actually line up with where they were supposed to connect, at all. Have never had to do that before and it turned out easier than I was afraid of. So easy in fact I went ahead and boiled the tail as well to straighten it out some more and give it a little twist. Super easy to do and stands the wraith up taller.

One big thing for me was the head. I can't leave the normal head on it as a matter of principal. The head swap is just expected of me at this point. The problem I was running into then was just sticking a big Necron head on it made it look too Jack-ish, which the Cryx battle engine kind of suffers from already. Digging thru old bitz and broken models I saw some of my old Necron Destroyers and thought of this. I really like this idea myself as it gives the Wraith Engine the "crew" that it otherwise lacks compared to every other engine. I think of it as being a super bad ass Iron Lich now.

I still need to fix gaps on the pipes and wires on the back of the model, and I think I'm going to change out the engines claws to look more like the Necrons. Also, I need to find where it's base went, thus the CD stand in. Although its not glued to that CD in this picture. It actually balances like that.



P.S. (un)Holy crap! It's an update! I guess I made my We'll Be Back save...

Glad your back!

The model looks boss but i agree that hand swaps might be a good idea.

Thanks! Couple more angles and a closer shot of the "pilot".

Very cool!

Personally, i think the 'pilot' would look awesome if it's arms were cut short at the elbow, aimed back wards and 'wired' into the machine. After all, why carry hand weapons when you can wire yourself into a huge 'body' like that and control it like your own.

I don't know what Warmachine rules are like but a huge Gauss cannon or the arms from the Tomb King Necrosphinx would look great if you can make them work.

I looked at doing the arms back thing. Was actually my original thought on how I wanted to do it even, but he started to look Too into the machine. I went with the arms out to keep him from just ending up a tiny man head on a giant body, but rather keep him visable as a tiny man built into a giant body.

I looked at those sphynx arms a d they're pretty cool but I don't know of anyone I could get a set from, a d there Way too much other stuff I need right now to buy the kit theyre in. I'd like to get a trio of the new Tomb Spyders to rebuild my Spyder Jacks with.

Well that just looks awesome! Glad you're back

Fair call on the arms, i'm sure you've made the right decision.

No need to thank me.

Why am I not in bed?! Because I get obsessive when I start modeling and can't stop... Anyway, found a better body for the pilot when looking for the base (still can't find it) so put him in instead. Also found an unpainted left arm. Also carved off the inner layer of ribs to open up the chest a bit more a d give it a lighter/thinner look. Plus one of the inner ribs was broken so now I do t have to deal with that. Bonus shot of the abysmal way the parts line up on the back. That will be my project for this evening if I can drag myself out of bed with time to spare before work.










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Too damn hot to sleep today. I'll catch a couple hour nap afte the sun goes down before I head into work. In the meantime, the AC in the living room is actually decent, so I decided to find that missing base. My most faithful Sherpa Phillip and I loaded up our packs and set off into the wasteland of trash and unfinished models that is the current state of my desk. Rodriguez and I hiked for hours, from the dark valley of stuff that's fallen behind and below, to the high peaks of the shelves of unfinished shame. Many lost treasure troves of forgotten bitz were rediscovered, some of which prove useful for the current project and thus Fernando was gladly willing to laden his already overloaded pack with them. Some were set aside in spots where I am sure I won't forget them again later, while others were promptly reburied in the shifting piles of trash.

Just as it seemed all hope of finding the goal of our search was lost we came across a hopeful sign, the original box the Wraith Engine came in. It was empty of course, but surely this was a sign that at last the correct pile to dig thru was at hand! I immediately set to work shifting the mass of sprues and boxes, though perhaps a bit too hastily, as I had not noticed the unstableness of the structure. Mikhail was ever vigilant however and pushed me aside when as the avalanche of plastic skulls rained down. The poor soul was impaled thru the spleen by a Chaos spikey bit and died a slow horrible death. It was not in vain however as atop the heap I finally found the lost relic I had been seeking, the Huge Base for the Wraith Engine! As a bonus I even found the card with it, which I had not thought to look for. I will now dedicate this Wraith Engine conversion in memorandum of Bob, my ever faithful Sherpa. I'll never forget you.

Anyways... New arms again for the pilot, he's definitely looking more animated now (ha!). Also out the engine's arms back on, keeping them tucked closer to the body this time to help with the overall more slender look. Not glued anything to the base yet, but this is roughly how it's going to look, and he's pointing to the front center of the base.

May want to recheck the previous post in case you missed the auto appended update.

Just a quick update this morning. The pilot was looking a little bland to me, and in need of a little more Cryx cred. Had this little epiphany overnight, carved up an old pLich torso and stuck his shoulder pads onto the pilot. Look Much better now I think. Nice balance of Cryx and Necron austetics.

Very cool, i really like the way your going with this. Did you see the link i posted? Is it of any use?

I saw it, but I think Im going to stick with the Engines normal claws now that they're not clashing with Wraith claws.

I think that's a good idea, every time I see the pictures they grow on me a little. The most recent incarnation makes them look really good too.

Finally getting around to working on my Cryx some more. So many sweet new Necron models have come out since I first started my Cryx, and I'm wanting to start incorporating more of them into my army and upping the ante as it were from just putting Necron heads on stuff. First victims are my Bane Knights, Tartarus, and Skarlock, who got tossed into the vat of stripper earlier this week. Here's what I've got so far.

First up is my Bane Knight test run. I'll show him first because he nicely displays my planned design/build aesthetics, namely being in that I want to have the Necron heads, torsos and weapons, while keeping the Cryx Shoulders, arms/gauntlets and skirts. Weapon types will try to stay as close to the Cryx armament as possible.

Next is Bane Lord Tartarus. Necrons don't have a giant choppy ax thing I could use, so I made a larger version of the Warscythe modeled off of one of the Tomb Kind Ushobti weapons.He'll get a green airsoft "Resurrection Orb" in that little pocket in the blade after he's painted.

Last up for the moment is the Skarlock. Way shortened the tail from the Necron model, because it's WAY too flimsy in Finecast. One of the little streamer bitz I wanted to keep also broke off and got lost. He'll be getting a green plastic streamer like the old version of him had after painting.

I like the update! I was quietly waiting for the day the new necrons crept into this force!

Nice update, glad your bringing these back into service.

Got a bunch of Bane Knights finished up. I decided I didn't like the look of the Warrior body so I went ahead and used Lich Guard bodies instead. Had used one already to start a different guy, so I only had nine left to make knights with at the moment. Will need to pick up a couple more boxes of the Lich Guard to get the bodies to finish the knights and make the other stuff I want to use their bodies for.

The other main change from the initial prototype is I moved the shoulders from being attached to the arms to being attached to the torso. I think it helps give the whole thing a more unified look and gets rid of the odd floating shoulders thing I think the first one had.

Included The Sauce just for a size/look comparison.

Here's a question. Warjacks. I know I'm going to rebuild my Spyder (crab) jacks to use the new Canoptek Spyder kit, but what about the Slayer Chassis? Right now all I've really done is given them a stylized skull face mask that is similar to the Necron heads. I'm considering making them more Canoptek and utilizing the Canoptek Wraith kit for them.


http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?prodId=prod1570013a

Definitely use the heads. The Spyders come with some extra bitz I can use to make tusks. Replace the fingers on the Necro Claws with the wraith's legs. Maybe then try to replace the smoke stacks on the back and integrate the wraith's back carapace to replace it. Give them some shortened tails. Thoughts?

Reposed the Skarlock to be closer to the original Skarlock's pose. May wrap some bandages around his left arm like the original has as well yet.




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Another random opinion poll... Who gets which/staff spear?

Need spear/staff heads for pAsphyxious, pDenny, eDenny and the Satyrchick Sea Witch.

The ones I'm going to end up having are;








That last one is from a unit box and I'll have a ton of those if that makes a difference.

I've been playing Cryx for some two years and I only just now finally own the Satyrchick Raider module.

Quick shot of a pGoreshade in progress. Needs a new head and upper arms sculpted in, and I may move him back on the base and elevate him then have two/three Bane Thralls rising up out of the ground.

And if I'm working on Goreshade, I should probably get to the Bane Thralls as well. Here's my prototype for them. While I do love the look of the Lychguard bodies for the Bane Knights, trying to use that for my nearly forty Bane Thralls at $35 for five would be prohibitively expensive, so I'm going to stick to the smaller Necron Warrior bodies that I probably have enough of laying around my desk. If not they're pretty cheap to bitz order. The smaller body is shorter and does not fit into the Bane skirt as well, so I threw in the spine to join them.Shoulders are attached to the body again rather than the arms same as the Bane Knights, so all the Thralls shoulders will line up the same way.

Reviving the tradition of modeling at work. Not done that at my current account before tonight but it seemed to work out ok. Not as nice/convenient to do it as it was at my previous account still though. Anyways, got a minimum unit of Bane Thralls finished up that I can use for pGoreshade's Feat. Trickier to do the Bane Thralls than the Bane Knights because they lack the separate arm bitz that the Knights boast, but I'm getting it figured out and learning better ways to work these. Benefit of having nigh 40 Bane Thralls is these first six can be less nice than the rest because they won't see play as often but instead get relegated to bonus models, which is why there's no real specific Leader or model made up yet. Dropped $35 on a bitz order to get the bitz I need to do the rest of my Thralls (and then another $6 to get a Death Ray, because who Doesn't want a Death Ray?). While I wait for that stuff to come in I'll work on painting and I want to get started on a Withershadow Combine. I'll get these six Thralls primed later today, and then there's a painting get together tomorrow and these guys will continue their role as Guinea Pigs to make sure my paint scheme comes together nicely enough.

Shot of the Bane Thralls primed up before before I get them painted up tomorrow. The name/date tag is because I'm using them for my January pledge for Play It Painted.

Played around with colors today and decided to stick with sepia wash on the gold and silver, the red wash did not look good to me at all. Also decided on a single heavy coat of the sepia on the gold as silver as the "bronzed" look got too close to the gold, where the more silver look gives a bit more distinction between the two.

Thought I had decided on a color combo for the skirt and it was generally agreed upon in the group I was with, but when I got home and in different lighting I think I may have changed my mind, so I figure I'll put off the skirts for a day or something and ask some more opinions on which shade of blue you think you like best for the skirts.

Added a black wash over top of the sepia wash on the silver parts. I really like how that worked out, gonna keep that. Instead of waiting for opinions, I went ahead and tried a couple of the blues out on the models...I think what I might do is instead of picking a single blue and doing all the skirts and cloth in that, using a few different shades of blue and putting them on different models in the units, so there's kind of a molted blue across the whole army. Could be cool. We'll see how that looks when I've done it to the six guys I'm working on now. For now I do think these first two guys are done and looking how I want them to. May throw a bit of a gold highlight onto the gold. Threw one of my original banes next to them just for a comparison of the old scheme to the new.

First minimum unit of Bane Thralls all painted up. Final scheme I ended up doing is a gold body and steel secondary color. Both received two coats of sepia wash, except for the sword blades. Then went back and highlighted the edges of the gauntlets, shoulders and chest symbol in steel. Painted the green wires. Painted the robes varying shades of blue. Then the whole thing got a black wash except for the center rod of the swords. Then went back and highlighted steel on the edges of the swords. While I consider them "done", I Might go back and highlight the robes. I need to get a better detail brush for highlighting though.

In the mean time, since I've started painting at work which gives me a lot more hours I can put into it, here's a minimum unit of the Bane Knights primed up and ready to Pledge.

Redid how Goreshade's base and his position on it. No way am I gonna fit three Bane Thralls on there, but I'm pretty sure I can get a pair of em to work still. Two sets of metal shoulders and arms plus that washer should balance it out. Also got his head and upper arms/sleeves sculpted in. Wish I could take credit for sculpting his face, but no, that's made from a press mold of his original face. The hair is me though.

Also redid the blade on The Sauce's weapon. Wanted to make it better fit the Necron weapons the other Banes had. I think this slightly altered blade shape looks a lot cooler too. Start painting those first six Bane Knights tonight, see if I can get them finished if not tomorrow night then Monday night if I keep to painting at work and modeling at home. That would leave me with a couple nights yet to paint up The Sauce and have a nice even 15pts done for the first month of Play It Painted.

Putting some effort into my painting rather than just slapping on a couple coats of drybrush is So Painfully Boring! If I wasn't doing this at work where there's not much else better to do I'd never get this done. Here's how far I am on those Bane Knights after two nights work.

Starting a new thread for this to take advantage of how Dakka's gallery auto sorts images. You can find it at;

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/503725.page