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Hello! Welcome to PARAGONS, a thread that intends to follow my attempts to build 28mm models of Superheroes (and villains!) and then give them the opportunity to bash seven bells out of each other! This is a project that's been on my mind for a long time. Indeed, it's been stalled for almost a year as I've attended to other things. Initially this blog will serve as a retrospective, gathering up all the models I've worked on, but it will slowly showcase newer work.

I've spent a great deal of time creating characters and setting up scenarios that may or may not see the light of day. I'll make it clear in advance that in some instances, I've stolen wholesale from other, existing characters by Marvel, DC and others. In part that's because I like this being a little cheesy. it's also because Marvel, DC and others have neatly sewn up the market!

I've decided on a setting - the New York-esque metropolis of Patriot City. The main characters will be the Paragons, an Avengers-esque group of heroes. At times they might do their own thing, follow their own storylines, but otherwise they'll join together to fight for Truth, Justice and soforth.

Here's the first character I created: Thunderbolt.
I've always intended for Thunderbolt to be one of the central characters of my narrative. As an Iron Man-esque character, he's a wealthy industrialist akin to Bruce Wayne or Tony Stark, fighting crime but also having a good time with the ladies.



The model was created from Games Workshop pieces as that's what I have; specifically, the body and arms were from Eldar Guardians whilst the head was from a Space Marine Scout. In order to make his suit seem capable of propelling him around, I made a "jetpack" from four Space Marine backpack intakes cut up and rearranged.




After receiving comments that his proportions seemed a little "top heavy", I tried to counter by giving him that Superhero essential - the utility belt!




Even after Thunderbolt was painted, I added a slight upgrade to his armour in the form of a micromissile launcher on the shoulder that can stun and entrap enemies. It's made from a Battlefleet Gothic Cruiser turret.




Stay tuned and I'll try to update this quite a bit!

Thanks for looking.

My pleasure.

The second character I began work on was "X-Ray".





X-Ray was intended to be the "geek" of the team, physically frail but mentally powerful. He's a renowned scientist who was called in by the Government to examine a crashed space vessel. In the process of the examination he tripped some sort of mechanism, flooding his body with radiation and turning him into (to use his words) "a shadow at Hiroshima."

Based a little on Beast from the X-Men, and a little on Doctor Manhattan from Watchmen, as a result I planned on painting his skeleton entirely blue, as though his flesh had been completely stripped away, replaced with some sort of alien substance.

I wanted to give him a labcoat with my relatively limited green-stuffing skills, and my friend Tiberius and I did a bit of photoshopping to get an idea:




After a bit of green-stuffing and a lick of paint, I had X-Ray:




The staff he's leaning on is intended to be a relic from the vessel he was asked to investigate.

This thread is full of win! I love it! Are there rules for this game? Are you just going to modify inq/necro for it?

We've fiddled with various rules-sets for this. I spent a night hastily writing a radical mish-mash of Inquisitor, Necromunda and Mordheim into something... super. Realising that my efforts were somewhat lacking, My friends and I went online and sought out a number of rules-sets. The one we eventually settled for was Supersystem, which offered us a nice amount of flexibility.

Here's something else I was working on before my Hiatus - The Atlantean, who filled a role somewhere between the Martian Manhunter and Aquaman.

Anyway, here you go:






Here's the Atlantean next to another Atlantean - his brother and a General in the Atlantean armies.


The shaft will be turned into a trident as soon as I can source a decent one. I'm also going to be resculpting the hands. The brother is much older than the Atlantean, and has a number of differences. I had thought that he was perhaps a different caste - I've explored ideas of the Atlanteans being a caste race. Anyway, he was made with a Termagaunt head rather than a Genestealer head so his head is a little sleeker and narrower, with a number of armoured plates.







I realise he needs a lot more work but it showcases some of my ideas.

This is great, they're all turning out rather nicely.

I am really liking the outcome

I am absolutely in love with this idea and its supporting thread. I can't wait to see more!

Somehow, Molotov, I only now noticed that this was your doing. If I can trick my wife into moving to the UK, can I game with you guys?

Thanks for the responses, guys - they're really appreciated. Especially you, Shane! I'm glad to know you're enjoying these two projects.

I do at some stage want to do another model for X-Ray that's somewhat closer to how I envisage him, but I haven't really been able to get around to it.


Now... what else to add...

Here's Goliath:


(This guy is made from Hasslefree's Wolf.

I attempted to turn him from a Barbarian into a superhero, which due to the skintight nature of spandex was relatively easy. I removed the sword and drilled out his hands, so that he could wield a street-sign or lamp-post; all the better to clobber villains with!







The yellow in this picture is simply several thinned coats of Iyanden Darksun.

Also, Shield Maiden (I've never been 100% on the name, but I've never been able to come up with anything better)



She's Hasslefree's Jo.I sculpted a cuff on her boots to make them a bit more superhero-esque. I then took the feather out of her hair and resculpted to cover it up:











I'm not entirely happy with how she turned out, in honesty, but I've never really been able to pinpoint quite why I'm unhappy with her.

I like the guy in yellow, but the female throws me off too.

Its like she just isnt good enough as a whole.

Maybe put something on the shield, it looks really boring imo. Nice work thus far though!

With Shield Maiden, I think part of it might be the pose. I've been looking over her for a bit, and I think it just looks a little bit unnatural. Her weight is clearly on her back leg, but the angle and position of her shield doesn't suggest to me that she's been forced onto it, and the way her sword is cocked back also doesn't seem to communicate that it's in preparation for a coming offensive. Maybe I'm reading too much into it, or misreading it entirely, but that posture just doesn't seem like a natural one to me. It should be stressed, however, that I'm an expert neither in swordsmanship nor modeling.

Also, a bit of extra detail on the sword or shield may not hurt, to be sure.

thunderbolts head is too big, and shield maiden is just kinda boring, mostly because of the shield and sword combo...
makes her just like a regular warrior...
but over all, im impressed with the models here

This thread is excellent!

You should add the images to the Dakka Gallery as well, that way you can get more feedback.

this is SWEET man. Great conversion work.

Might have tried Shield Maiden with her braced behind the shield with the sword pointing forward. But this is awesome. Have you considered mutants and masterminds as a game system as well?

There's also Supersystem, a dedicated superhero mini game. I have it but never tried it but it always looked decent.

http://www.fourcolorfigs.com/supersystem.html

Kid_Kyoto wrote:There's also Supersystem, a dedicated superhero mini game. I have it but never tried it but it always looked decent.

http://www.fourcolorfigs.com/supersystem.html

Molotov wrote:The one we eventually settled for was Supersystem, which offered us a nice amount of flexibility.

Lol.

Meh that's what I get for just looking at the pretty pictures.