Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Looks really awesome, but can i just ask: what the hell? since when do priests have Genestealer heads?

WOW! STUNNING CONVERSIONS, NICE PAINTSCHEME AND CAPS-LOCK...AMAZINGGG!!!

Bramnero wrote:Looks really awesome, but can i just ask: what the hell? since when do priests have Genestealer heads?

It's because they're Hybrids. Hybrid Acolytes are canon...the tendril heads aren't. Still, I wanted to do something to make them stand out. I think I talked about it the article I made for the army.

And thanks everyone. The pic quality is bothering me...I feel like they really aren't doing any justice to the minis. My camera used to take good mini pics, but lately...bleh. Not sure what's going on, but I think a new camera should see some improvement.

So anyway, we're moving on to the Battlewagon prototype. The plan is to use a Chimera as the base. I'll add a Predator turret to give it a little more size and bulk, and armor up the hull and track sections. In fact, I'm going to try using plasticard to build track armor similar to the FW kit. Also, I'm going to open up the top a little more (to represent it being opentopped, imagine that).

So here's the upper hull in progress. I've widened the opening. You might be able to see that I've shaved down the lips around the rear two gun ports on each side. That's because I'm going to cover those holes with plasticard and other detailing.



Since the top will open and wider, I'm going to add interior detail. And although it ain't cheap, the FW Chimera interior is probably the easiest and best way to do that. Here's the interior resting on the lower hull so you can see what I'm talking about. The interior bench seating isn't built yet, in case you were wondering.

More to come soon...

Nice work! Looking forward to future updates.

Wow great work honestly. I love the truck conversion ideas you had their, as well as the models paint jobs themselvs.

Okay, back to work. So here's the Chimera body with the open top cleaned up with some plasticard. I'll add details (rivets, etc.) to those side strips later.



And here you can see the FW interior now fixed in place.



So with the body starting to come together, it was time to work on the turret. As I said, I'm going to use a Predator turret to bulk out the vehicle and give it a meaner look. Having never done this conversion before, I spent a lot of time dry fitting parts. And what was immediately apparent was that the Predator turret *almost* fits the turret ring on the Chimera shell. So I took my hobby knife and ran it around the interior of the turret mount a couple times, and that was all I needed to get a nice fit! That was a lot easier than I anticipated.

I also added a post to fit the hole in the Chimera turret ring. I just added some plastic rod and reinforced the join with some greenstuff. Voila...a swiveling Chimera turret on a Chimera body that stays in place.





Alright. I'm starting to make some progress now. The next steps are adding details to the basic body and turret frames. So I added a cupola hatch, a new front armor plate (more work to come there), and a bell.

Why a bell? Well, if you remember waaaay back earlier in the thread, I explained that I'm theming my Hybrid/Boyz units to add some differentiation. Since this is the Battlewagon that's going to cart around the bell-themed unit, it's going to get the same bell theme. IIRC, the bell I used on the turret is from the VC Corpse Cart.

Now I'd like to track down some miniature bells to use elsewhere on the vehicle. I have some GW bitz I can use...the issue there is that they're plastic bitz lacking undercuts and therefore aren't hollow. They'll still do in a pinch, but I'd like to find an alternative. If anyone has any ideas, shoot me a PM.

In the meantime, I'm going to start work on the ram.

a bit silly, but if your on the lookout for bells, the zombie regiment comes with like 5 bells? on chains. ill lo0ok for a pic

ok here it is

Amazing models! Im really impressed with the concept and have always liked the GS Cults you could always try to make the bells out of greenstuff or look out in craft shops this time of year for reduced price christmas decorations, or try and rob some plauge monks!

Beautiful stuff. Have to admit that when I wanted better Civilian style trucks I used Ramshackle Games a far easier far less cool version than your works of Plasticard art. For the bells I'd have to reiterate the recommendation of the Zombie and Plague Monk regiments especially the Plague Monks. Also for a Warlord Wagon how about using the Screaming Bell/Plague Furnace kit?

Gorgon:

I'm a big fan of speeder/buggy conversions, and just wanted to say "Thanks!" for including your descriptions and shots of the undercarriage you built. I have some speeder/buggy conversions of my own that are built on ork fenders merged with the speeder frame, but I'm not thrilled with the back end. Your addition of the suspension frame really makes a big difference. I may have to borrow some of that thought for a future one, and if it comes out well, make a mold of it so I can produce dupes easily. Thanks again for sharing the work!

Keith

gorgon wrote:
Automatically Appended Next Post:
So now it's vehicle time. The mechanized army I've planned will require the following new items:

Rocket (Rokkit) Buggy

But first up is a new Buggy to complete my squadron of three. My Buggies are built from Space Marine Land Speeders. The first step after doing the usual prep work on the two hull sections is to trim off the wings and any Imperial iconography. I also shortened the bumper to give it more of a land vehicle look, and added plasticard covering the vents over the cockpit (this will become more apparent after the top and bottom are glued together).



The driver and gunner will be painted separately and added later after the Buggy is painted. Note that I don't do any major work on the riders' legs, other than some trimming down of the knee area. That's because the legs won't be visible after I build the rest of the cockpit and add the torsos and arms with controls and targeting mechanisms.

The next step is to add the chassis stuff underneath. I just build up some support structure using square plastic rod and plasticard. For now, I won't add much in terms of realistic detail like fuel tanks, etc., although I have an itch to go back and add some of that stuff to all three buggies later.





I'm definitely just a ham-and-egger when it comes to plasticard work, but hopefully will illustrate that you don't have to be a plastics expert or do anything complicated to get a good result in your converting. The nice thing about this army is that if something looks a little crude, it kind of fits the theme.

Great conversions!!

*Rubbing eyes* What the heck? I lie down for a short nap and I wake up looking like Grizzly Adams. How long have I been out?

ALMOST TWO YEARS? Great googly-moogly. I had this weird, long dream about green Tyranids and gourds, but I didn't think I was out that long. Oh well. Since I'm up now, I might as well get back to work on my GCult and this blog. As soon as I shake off 20+ months of muscle atrophy, that is.

Here's where I left off. I'll have more soon.






Automatically Appended Next Post:
*Stretching* Well, I'm getting gross motor functions back, and have made quite a bit of progress on my battlewagons. I took pics along the way, but they're not quite as step-by-step as my previous entries. So I'll try to talk things through a little.

My goal with the ram was to have something that looks nasty enough to count as a Deffrolla in a pinch. I started with the standard dozer blade and added metal beams to the blade from one of the old plastic tank trap pieces. I think the end result looks dangerous enough.



To mount the ram-rolla, I added three magnets to the dozer blade frame and flush-mounted three more magnets under the Chimera hull. Obviously it's best to do this before you glue the track sections to the hull.

On a side note, notice that I added more front armor in the form of some grid plasticard on top of the plain plasticard. As you'll soon see, I used grid stuff in various places...including homemade side armor.

Looking Good. Great to see you back.

Real nice stuff here... nice to see a freshness the antiquated (but brilliant) Genestealer Cult idea.

FTL

*Thanks, folks. I'm hoping blogging -- even if a bit erratically -- helps keep me on schedule.

So I dunno why anyone should pay FW rates for their side armor when it's so easy to make from plasticard. To wit:



Okay, so this idea was technically borrowed from a Warseer poster. Still, there's no rocket (rokkit?) science at work here. You need two sheets of plasticard -- one heavier and plain, one with the grid pattern -- some small round plastic rod for rivets, large square "rod" for the mount on the back side, and a logo from the Chimera kit.

It's just measuring, cutting and gluing from there...I really don't have any great insights about the assembly of the outward faces. My main advice is to figure out a size that works for your vehicle and create a pattern for the main armor piece. Then thanks to the gridlines, it's easy keeping the top pieces a consistent size...just cut them to be 7 squares by 10 squares or whatever works for you. Note that the three grooves separating each armor section are just that...grooves I cut using a straightedge saw. One or two gentle passes is all it takes.

I should address the mount on the back side, though. First I placed two magnets underneath the bumped-out section on the Chimera tracks (for the prototype these were glued to the hull...for the later versions I wised up and flush-mounted them).



Next, I added the large square plastic rod to the back of the side armor piece. This piece will fit under the track bumpout and also add some strength and rigidity down the armor piece. I drilled out holes to flush-mount two magnets and voila...snugly-fitting, detachable side armor for a fraction of the FW price.





I built three sets of side armor from the plasticard I purchased and still have enough to make more. Now that's stretching your dollar in a weak economy!

Hmm...side armor would also be good for that Vostroyan project I have percolating... *slaps self* Darn it gorgon, I need some focus outta you! Listen to Gold Five and STAY ON TARGET!

Okay, fine. So the Chimera is finally starting to look like it has something approaching Battlewagon-level armor. Which is good, I'm getting there.

Lookin good! Always nice to see some fellow cultists

Thanks Tom. It's nice to be back to work on this army.


Here's where my step-by-step pics peter out. So let's skip ahead to the final product.



That looks a bit different, huh? I added Typhoon missile pods to the turret to represent two rokkits. A bit of a bold move, but I think they make the tank unique and break up the Predator/Chimera profile. I also added a third, hull-mounted rokkit (Sentinel missile pod bit) in place of the hull heavy bolter/flamer. Various areas got more of the grid plasticard to represent added armor and to tie things in visually with the side armor.

Speaking of side armor, I added chains from the CSM vehicle sprue and hung various bell bits from them. I bent the chains to help give a sense of forward motion.

Oh, and I also finished two other Battlewagons. Here's a look at the final results of assembly. Overall, I'm pretty pleased.



You can see that I changed the formula on the ram-rollas to differentiate them a little. To refresh everyone's memory, the wagon with the bells will transport the bell-themed Hybrid/Boyz unit. Another battlewagon (the one in the rear) will transport the scroll/parchment-themed unit, and the third will transport a unit of Tankbustas (replacing Burnas for now). The parchment wagon looks a little bare at the moment since paper, writing, etc. will be added to the hull post-painting. The commander of the parchment wagon is one of my patented Acolytes. It isn't glued in place yet. I'll paint it separately, then mount him in the finished wagon.

For the third Battlewagon, I stuck with a "fire" theme even with the change from Burnas to Tankbustas. I think fire has a nice, culty, primal edge that will fit the army regardless. Besides, Tankbustas "bring the fire", right? The brazier bits are from the VC Corpse Cart (boy, that really is a great kit for bits). I'll add "fire" to the large brazier mounted on the front hull later, probably after painting.



I'll basecoat these at the same time as the trucks and third buggy, using an airbrush. I find painting already-mounted tracks to be a bit of a PITA, so I'll paint the tracks and track guards separately and glue them on to the finished wagon. While the finished vehicles may look radically different from the base Chimera kit, remember that the ram, turret and side armor are removable. So if at some point down the road I decide to make this army count as IG, I just need some turrets to swap out and voila, I'll have IG Chimeras. Assuming people will overlook the hole in the roof. And the hull rokkit is an issue that'll need a fix...I glued it down to keep things moving. Still, those aren't big hurdles and would beat buying, building and painting new kits.

These look brilliant for a start. The rams are great the weapons fit brilliantly and the extra armour works wonderfully. Personally I'm slightly worried that they are a bit small for Battlewagons and need something to make them bigger, large enough to carry twenty boyz.

Great scratch build. It looks very nice, and well put together.

Thanks for the comments. I was a little concerned about the size myself. Note that I originally started these back before the Battlewagon kit was released. But the addition of the Predator turret, missile pods and side armor bulk them out more than you'd think...it's not nearly as low as the Chimera profile now. Still, it's obviously not the same, so in tournament situations, I just plan to be very generous with my opponents' LOS to them. Regarding scale and fitting models inside, 40K vehicles aren't to scale in most instances and can't realistically carry their listed passenger max. And since this is open-topped, I imagine Hybrids crawling all over the thing and not strictly huddling in the passenger bay.

So that does it for the battlewagons for now. I'm hoping to have the army completely revamped for next year's tournament season (targeting the Colonial GT in particular). In addition to all the vehicle painting, other stuff I have to do includes:

-Build and paint Tankbustas
-Build and paint new Magus with claw
-Build and paint extra Brood Brother/Grot and another Runtherd
-Build and paint a display board "enhancement"

I'm gonna stay mum on that last one for now. Heh.

Overall, that's not too bad of a workload, but the six vehicles will take a lot of time to do right. Plus I need to get my GCult technique down again for my infantry after painting Tyranids for the past 18 months or so. Especially with faces and flesh tones. FYI, we have a nice DSLR camera now, so pic quality should be better from here on out...at least after I get the hang of the thing. They shouldn't be as dark and muddy as the ones earlier in this blog, at least.

Next step will be building infantry. After that I'll start painting vehicles.

So good! Working on my own genestealer cult (link in my sig ) at the moment, this blog has been a large source of inspiration! Keep it up brother.

Thanks, I'll keep on keepin' on.

Tankbusta time.

I'm gonna use three bits for "rokkits" -- the RPG-style Steel Legion missile launcher, Cadian IG bazooka-style missile launchers, and the old-school hard-to-find GCult/Chaos missile launcher. And of course, they'll be borne by more metal Hybrids. Bet you're wondering when I'm gonna run outta those, huh? Well, not yet. Perhaps soon though, lol.

You might remember that I used those RPG bits in my original army as part as the motley mix of weapons representing deffguns for my "Lootas". Going forward, this will be better sorted out. The RPGs will be strictly rokkits, while the more dakka-looking guns become strictly deffguns. So while I already have some of the RPGs painted up, I need to paint more since this army formulation uses a lot more rokkits.

Here are some Hybrids with holes already drilled for pinning arms. I always pin when affixing plastic to metal.



And here's a look at the aforementioned old-school ML...doesn't it have a weird, archaic look? Love those things. You can also see the plastic genestealer arms, which I'll talk about in a later post.



Oh, and of course Tankbustas need some proper Tankbusta bombs, so I'll add some plastic meltabomb bitz.

With a "bell" themed squad and a "book" themed squad, the third squad should definitely be "candle" themed!

Brilliant work, and very inspiring.

R.

Thanks for the kind words!


Got all the infantry assembled...here are some examples.



Might be good to take a moment to discuss little plastic arms and some GW model history.

*dons smoking jacket, leans back in a big plush chair by the fireplace, and pulls out a pipe*

The old Genestealer Cult arm sprue (pic in the previous post) is an interesting case. If you bought armless Genestealer Hybrids after the mid-90s or so, you probably got the GCult arm sprue with them. But those arms fit the metal Hybrids poorly because they were intended to be used with the larger, *plastic* Hybrid models, which had a much larger shoulder join area. The metal Hybrid models were designed to use the RT-era IG plastic arms, which I believe they discontinued at about the time the old RT IG models were discontinued (so 1994 or 1995?). You can see one of the old IG arms on the second hybrid from the right in the pic above, and how it fits the model nicely.

My solution is to use a straightedged saw to cut some of the GCult arms just below the shoulder. You can see an example of this on the first hybrid on the right. The angle of my cut determines the angle at which the arm is raised when mounted. A side benefit of this approach is that I can squeeze more arms out of a sprue.

Looks like I'm in good shape with infantry. Everything I need for the army sans the special project is now assembled and playable. I'm gonna take a short break -- not two years, I promise -- to work on a few other projects. After that, I'll get to work painting the wagons trying some new approaches, including filters, oil weathering and the use of an airbrush.

Wow, those are simply amazing! The battlewagons look like a US vehicle called a Bradley fighting vehicle!

So much win! I can't wait to see more!

I'm back! Told you it wouldn't be another two years, but you were all skeptical, weren't you?

Here's a pic of some of the infantry I painted up in the time since my last post. I picked some of the same models as in the earlier post so you can see the before and after. I'm starting to get a better hang of the new camera and Photoshop, so hopefully the pic quality will be a little better going forward. Anyhoo, these models aren't Golden Daemon quality, but then this is an army project and not a GD entry.



And with my target date fast approaching, I've moved on to the vehicles. Remember these guys? Painting has begun! The khaki basecoat is being applied...next steps will be drybrushing, filters and washes.

Your conversions are top notch! I especially like how you've turned the chimera spotlights into headlights on those buggies.

And those tanks, well they just plain rule!

What will this army count as on the table when you play?

Thanks!

The army counts as Orks. You can get the full explanation in my article.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/wiki/en/Gorgon's%20Genestealer%20Cult