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I've had a Black Templars army for ages which has been sitting in storage for the last 7-8 years. With the Fall of Cadia release I figured it'd be a good time to dig it back out and give it some love with some new conversions and updated paint. Before things were put into stasis I'd been working on a bike build which I wanted to resurrect, I wanted the force led by Chaplains and a bike HQ so that's where I decided to start converting. Here's the current models converted from a mix of standard marine bikes, Ravenwing and Black Templar parts. Several of the parts have been recast in resin for helping with the ease of converting and also because I'll be using a lot of certain bits that I had in short supply.

Additional pics are posted in my gallery.



Chaplain #1 WIP












Chaplain #2 WIP














Techmarine WIP












Command Bike WIP

Welcome to Dakka!

Nice lot of bikes you have there. Looking forward to seeing your army grow.

Those look fantastic.

Nice !

I've now completed converting 10 command bikes that are awaiting their riders, I've also built 12 regular bikes that have riders but are waiting on their special weapons. I'm still trying to figure out what the final list will be. More than likely I'll use magnets that way I can alter the weapons later if needed. I'll try and take a group shot shortly.

I commissioned a sword brethren shoulder pad from a friend which I'll be duplicating in resin and using for the command squad riders.

I picked up Celestine and her guardians on ebay as I didn't have much need of the other two models. When she was initially previewed I didn't care much for her model based on the pics but when I saw one firsthand at the store it changed my opinion as it looks so much better in person. I'm not sure if it's the studio paint job or the angles they chose for pics but it wasn't overly flattering. However viewing it in person it's really beautiful model and I knew it was something I needed to pick up. It looks like she'll be good in game as she can be a pretty effective tar pit unit. I doubt I'll be playing many games large enough to make use of the formations in fall of Cadia (although I certainly have enough models to).

Building her was a bit tricky as there's some wickedly small parts, there's a lot of very fine parts compared to other 40k stuff and it took a lot of extra care to get her assembled. I dropped the shoulder pad for one of the Germinaes and literally spent 30 minutes crawling around on the floor before I found it. A lot of the recent GW kits have been very dynamic and look amazing when they are done but they have gotten quite complex in assembly and you have to do it in order or you can't get certain parts to fit later. The heads on these are in a fixed position and they have a funky way of attaching to a strand of hair that is molded as part of the front torso which isn't illustrated very well in the directions. So make sure you fit the head to the front piece before adding it to the rear body or you'll never get the head into proper place. Being mounted on the flowing ribbons looks amazing for display but it's also very springy and I'm a bit concerned about how it'll hold up to game play and transport, the iron halo is also held on by an incredibly thin piece which I have concerns about. Awesome display model, just not sure how it'll do on durability.






I also picked up a 2nd Stormhawk/Stormtalon kit for some air support. I'm not certain which build I should go with. I currently have one Stormhawk built, which I built simply because I liked the look but for gameplay does either build work better or are they roughly the same? One of my friends typically uses a Helldrake and Nephilim in a 1k point list so I'll need a counter to air units. I also have a stalker available but not sure if I'd be better off with my own air units. I can always buy additional hawks/talons or more stalkers if it'll help. I'm a couple editions out of the loop and air units weren't really a factor before so I'm not sure what I should expect to deal with in an average list. 1k/1200/1500/1850

Very cool indeed. Loving the funky bike conversions.

EDC

awesome stuff so far! Keen to see where this blog goes. Consider me subbed!

Cool shoulderpad.

Celestine and her bodyguards do look quite awesome. I do agree that they look like a bear to transport. How easy do you think it would be to do some sort of alternate base for them? Like leaping off of ruins or something a bit more solid then the ribbons?

I picked up a stormhawk last December and just built it. Giving it some thought compared to my talon. The hawk is better for air superiority. It’s a bit tougher, with more Dakka, for just a few more points. The talon is better at ground attack. Strafing run for extra BS, the TLAsC in the chin turret and hover let it shoot more things, longer. So while you have fewer guns, you are able to shoot them all game, and not fly off and have to return. If I could only have one, I’d take a talon. (Note: this assumes you are not using Death From the Skies rules, which changes a lot of things about flyers) If you already have a hawk, the talon is an easy choice IMHO. If you were going the other way, and already had a talon, things would be murkier. Having 2 talons is needed for a couple of formations. I plan on using my hawk as a counts-as talon if I ever want to use them.

I've decided that I'll go with the Stormtalon, although I might use the armored canopy normally used for the hawk. I'll be converting the chin turret as it's simply too big, I'm planning on using some spare assault cannons from a landspeeder to reduce the profile.


The Brethren style shoulder pad that I commissioned showed up today and I did some test fitting with sticky-tac. Next step will be to mold it and make some casts in resin. Once I have it in resin I can heat them up in hot water and bend them to make a tighter fit, currently there's just enough of a gap that I could add capes underneath to match the style of the official models. Sean does great work and I'm really happy with how the sculpt came out

Looking forward to seeing how you paint these guys! Really spirited conversions so far. I dig that custom shoulderpad too.

Those custom shoulder pads are pretty funky!

EDC

Test fitting the lances and different arms.

Oh my! Where did those lances come from they look awesome!

EDC

 evildrcheese wrote:
Oh my! Where did those lances come from they look awesome!

The lances are taken from the old chaos warrior banner poles, with hand grips added from deathwatch power maces.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
It took the better part of 3 weeks but the pair of command squads are finally ready to start getting some paint. Each model has one arm set up with a magnet so that I'll be able to swap between Grav guns and Power Weapons. It'll take me about a week before I'm done casting enough copies of those parts and the Brethren pads but in the meantime I can start painting the bikes and riders.

To round out the rest of the force I have another 12 troop bikes together awaiting their rider arms and 3-4 attack bikes that are currently unbuilt.

Squad 1



Squad 2



Group

Years ago I'd converted a Marshall from BT bits and the marine commander kit. It wasn't a bad model but looking over some of the new Sternguard bits I realized I could do better so I ripped him apart this evening and rebuilt him, better, faster, stronger. I'm still debating about which of the two should pad options to use. The Brethren pad would help tie it together with any other Brethren models I use in command squads or honor guard but I also like the super detailed eagle pad as it gives both shoulders the raised stud lip.


Old Version





New version w Brethren pad




New version w Eagle pad



Rear view

Great work so far, can't wait to see them with paint!

I'm toying around with some different base sizes, Since the bikes are older models they have the narrow old bike bases. (far left in the pics) I ordered a couple of resin bases from Dragonforge to see how their wider base stack against both the old and newer style. It's very close in size to GW new bike base the GW base is about 1-2 mm wider and it's slightly more tapered at the end but otherwise they are the same. Vs the old base it's considerably wider (by almost 30%)

In game play that means I can fit 3 old style bases into the same space as just 2 of the newer ones which might have a slight impact on close combat as the models can't pack in together quite as tightly. But for shooting it shouldn't have any significant impact.

In terms of presentation I do think the larger bases may come off as slightly more imposing. Any thoughts on which option you'd prefer?

I also picked up one of the large attack bike style bases from Dragonforge. Empty it looks absolutely gigantic next to the other bases but much better once the attack bike is in place. My only thought is maybe it's just a bit too long? Would it be worth the additional time and effort to shorten it by about 10mm?











Old narrow bike base



Wider Dragonforge base



Attack Bike

looks great brother! What are you using to cast your minis?

For casting I use resin from Smooth-On.

while back I did some 3d for a sword and an axe. I finally got off my lazy butt and modeled some hands for them, then printed them out last night. I mirrored [font=inherit]the prints so that I'd have versions for both the right or left hand. Total print time was about 5.5 hours.[/font]

The Emperor's Champion is pretty much the centerpiece of a Black Templars force and while I love the original sculpt he's quite old and a bit small and undersized compared to standard marines and especially next to the Primaris models. So I thought to myself why not make a Primaris Emperors Champion?
Here's a couple different options I'm currently toying with.
Pointy hand with sword or axe
Sword with bolt pistol
Sword or Axe with Shield
Head with or without the Mohawk

I'm also considering ordering a set of FW Templar heads to give him a more knight-like helmet that includes the laurels.
 

Sword and Shield Brother... All day Everyday. Looks fantastic

I do really like the FW shield but I decided to go with with a bolt pistol so he'd match the profile, I'll save the shield for a Marshall. I removed the skull on the forehead and started trimming back part the face so that I can greenstuff a new face plate to match the original EC model more closely.






The next items I've been working on are some 3d lances, exhausts and saddles bags. The test print came out good but the hand is a bit too large so I'll be re-scaling it and then doing another print.

I'm trying to figure out a game plan on how to group the weapon sprues. I can probably fit 6 of each weapon to a sprue, should I include both right and left handed versions maybe 3 of each? I can do the sprue with all one type of weapon (6 axes for example)or I could do a combo pack that has 2 of each weapon 2 axes, 2 swords, 2 hammers which would be one right hand and one left hand of each. Any thoughts on how you'd like them packaged?

Because the lances are so much longer than the other weapons it's better to do those grouped by themselves so they wouldn't be part of a combo pack.

I still need to do the test prints for the hammer, but in the meantime I made these small shields which I guess would be something like a crusade badge or icon. There's two sizes a small/medium and one version is plain with a pair of studs while the other has a cross and studs on it. I can probably fit 8-12 of these on a sprue. They'd fit well on both the bikes and infantry here's a couple shots of both sizes being used. These prints were rushed so they came out a bit grainy but the final production ones would be very smooth.

Any thoughts on the shields?

Your CAD stuff is really impressive. Nice work!

My Templar bike force is slowly coming together, I splurged on ebay and picked three Ravenwing battleforces which will round out everything I need for the list. Lots of converting and painting ahead of me. I'll likely be playing them as Ravenwing or Deathwatch as they have better weapon options than standard bikes.

While looking over the statlines I noticed that Samael's sword profile was similar to the Black Sword and that gave me inspiration for making a jet bike mounted Emperor's Champion. (counts as Master of the Ravenwing) While I like working with resin the quality of finecast is pretty bad so I tracked down a metal version. It's been a long while since I built a large metal kit and it was a bit of a pain since it needed a lot of filing and some or the larger parts were slightly warped and needed to be carefully bent to fit. I'm still making some final tweaks and grinding off the last few DA icons but I'm liking the mock up so far.

Another WIP Primaris Captain







Saddle bags and heavy gardbrace armor pads that were 3d printed then cast in resin.

It's been a while, Nov-Dec is pretty much a two month hobby disaster for me. Between work and all the extra family obligations I usually don't even get to look at my hobby stuff until after new years. I've also been tinkering around with the printer, the surface on the resin vat needed replacement and I thought I'd see if I could refinish it myself vs buying a new one. It seems like it's ready to go, but I won't know until I try my next set of prints. If it works well it'll cut my material costs significantly and should hopefully speed up how often I can get models done.

With last weeks release of the DA codex it gave me some extra incentive to do some more work on my Templars counts as Ravenwing bike list so I fired up maya and got to work.


I've needed some plasma talons to kit out some black knights. While I could simply recast some the stock parts only fit the winged cowl for the command bikes and the wings don't quite fit the look I wanted with the Templars build so I opted to 3d print some. I've had the reference pictures sitting on my desktop for a solid month and half but finally felt motivate enough last night to get to work on them.

I have a ton of plasma guns left over from my old Templar conversion sprues but they are a bit long and it's tricky cutting the body at just the right angle to pair it with the bike cowl. Plasma pistols are a bit short and the command talons need a dedicated socket for their rear portion so I took some photos for scale references and made a version that'd fit with the existing dimensions of the cowl's weapon slots and also pair up with the handle bars the way the stock bolters do.

Once I had the 3d completed I crammed as many copies as I could fit on the build table and ran off a set of 16 test prints which all came out quite well. Size and fit is spot on but I lost some of the rivets which I apparently didn't attach correctly to the mesh. They looked like they were part of the model but weren't connected and were free-floating right next to the surface. Not a huge deal and it'll be corrected on the next batch of prints.

I also tested out a large banner to see how the details translated. Overall it looks good although for the final print I need to make the cross and the border a touch more shallow as they stick out a bit far for my taste atm. It's currently completely straight so it'll also need some wind movement added to it, but I'm happy with the look and size. The final version will likely be on a hand held pole but I left that off for now in order to keep the print time shorter.

Light grey parts are all ones that I modeled and 3d printed with the exception of the base which is from Dragon Forge.












Fresh new-born parts prior to cleaning.

Just catching this project, impressive work all around - smart bits use but also sweet combination of DIY technologies new and old. I'm always impressed when people breath new life into the old tired marine bike Also happy you seem to have gone with the bigger bases, definitely showcase the models better.

- Salvage

I was pretty hyped when I saw the preview of the Custodes jet bikes and knew I wanted to get a squad to convert into Talon Masters, the box I pre-ordered came in yesterday and I tore into it. The Custode rider was a lot bigger than a regular marine so the original conversion I had planned wasn't going to work. Not to be defeated, I swapped out the rider for a primaris marine. It's not a perfect match to the stats as it only has a single assault cannon instead of a dual but I couldn't figure out a way to mount two without it looking goofy. So I'll treat it as special assault cannon that just fires twice as fast The front wings were moved to the rear so it'd look more like Sammael's bike. It still needs some greenstuff work and clean up on the rider's legs but overall I think it'll do nicely.

Once that's done of course it'll be getting a healthy blessing of Templar-fication.













65x110mm attack bike sized base it'll be getting when finished and a scale shot of it next to standard sized bike.