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Hi there, I'm relatively new here and I think I never posted before. But in the last weeks I dug up many threads here to learn on how to build some Samurai-themed Space Marines.

So. In the next days I'm starting to actively return to the hobby (the time spent on the hobby in the last 4 years was 4 days maximum, in all that time :( ).
My Black Legion is as WIP as ever (since my first comeback to the hobby 11 years agp)...next week I hope at least the Land Raider gets it's final touch.
But in the coming days (or weeks, depending on how long some bits need to arrive per mail) I will start a project I wanted to make for several years now: MANTIS WARRIORS!!!
I try to stick to Forgeworld Badab War Fluff as good as I can. But Mantis Warriors to me were always: White Scar originated Samurai-Space Marines. Expect: lots of infantry in customized armor (time to re-learn sculpting again, time to learn molding [for the armor decoration), expect drop pod / bike army lists, with bikers riding armed with naginata and long spears...expect some Sternguard / Tranquility Vets with ultra custom armor (if my sculpting skills will improve that is)

So with today I completed my first wave of necessary bits for that task:
MAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANY Wargames Factory Samurai und Ashiguru sprues ([sheathed] Katanas, Naginatas, Wakizashi, Spears, Armor parts, back flags), some anvil pieces (praetorian torsos, renaissance torsos and shoulder pads: because they already are similiar to Samurai armor), some Forgeworld MK 2 and 3 Legs arms and blank MK3 armors (similar to samurai armor of course too ^^), several Kromlech (Legionaires Leg kits, Katana, helmets, backpacks), puppet war (samurai style power armor helmets) and other company bits and weapons...and a lot of blank GW powerarmor torsos

so that leaves me with:
75 sheathed Katanas, (wargames factory)
30+ nagae-yari (long spears) (wargames factory)
48 Original Samurai shoulder plates (wargames factory)
20+ sheathed wakizashi (wargames factory)
10 to 20 drawn wakizashi (wargames factory)
10 to 20 drawn katana (wargames factory)
12+ Nodachi (assault squad?! Vets? ) (Kromlech Cyber Katana)
40 Samurai style helmets: 20 Kromlech, 10 oni masks (anvil?), 10 Puppet War
10 kromlech flagged samurai style power armor packs
75+ back flags (wargames factory)
5 big banners (wargames factory)
2 MK4 FW Torso (the one from the cc-weapons kit)
20 chaos space marine torso (they were the cheapest I could get my fingers on...the will be cut down anyways...)
10 RT-era Bolters
several RT-era backpacks
50 Samurai helmets and headgear (wargames factory)
5 MK 3 arm pairs (the version with the extra wrist/hand guard)
4 blank MK3 FW torsos
1 FW lightning torso (maybe sergeant/hero body...lightning referring to EMPRAH and White Scars )
2 MK 2 FW torso
6 kromlech legionaires legs (running and standing...3 kneeing positions are on its way)
6 Praetorian Torso (Anvil Industry)
4 Renaissance Torso (Anvil Industry)
4 Medieval Torso (Anvil Industry)
4 pairs of Renaissance shoulder pads
2 pais of Medieaval shoulder pads (Anvil Industry)
1 MK2 FW Helmet
12 Samurai Torso (wargames factory) for studying the sculpt, using it as mold giver etc. ...

I always kept my eyes open for samurai bits to convert and in the last 4 weeks I was really digging deep through the internet to find what I had in mind...
I know I could have started to build much stuff myself (katana for example), but time is limited, my skills are too...so I took an "easy" entrance back into the hobby. and scratch-build will come along I hope.

hmm... I'm short on legs... 10 so far... (without all those spare Black Legion / Chaos / Rogue Trader bits lying around...)

with this list I want to help fellow peops to get an orientation which bits are good or okay to use to samurize your space marines (emperor loving or hating)
comments and ideas are welcome.

My plans are to customise the minis' armors heavily, as the fluff states that. I thought: Hey, they've been on penal crusade for a hundred years, lacking recruits and support, relying heavily on skirmish and guerilla tactics...
so why didn't they dig deeper in their own past and came up with some additions to or replacements of the armor. So to protect the holy power armour more from the battle, they placed layered armor plates of inferior quality atop of it, styling it like the armor their old old old old old old old ancestors wore = samurai style.
nearly every mantis warrior has adopted this, to honour those that died or survived the penal crusade.
I'm still thinking about the motives on the armor... chinese / japanese dragons and mongolian horses on the front plate of the torso? Lightningbolts, oni faces, and so on too...matins heads, mantis talons for obvious reasons (But no weapons or armor parts really styled like parts of a mantis)
nearly every marine has his own banner and iconography (like the Samurai) paired with the overall chapter heraldry (mantis head, or mantis arms etc.)
I want to sculpt some frontplat prototypes and recast them in insta-mould to copy them on several torsos (green stuff or pro create? Or something else, what do you think?)
lots of layered armor atop the shoulder pads, lower legs and lower arms...

so what do you think?
do you have something to add / change / comment or criticise?

Pictures of the bits will follow as they arrive / as my little time allows
then hopefully after the weekend next week I will have at least one prototype assembled.

I hope in the progress my ideas will work out...and if not your ideas might enlighten my take on the subject.

1st shipment arrived today...

sample of the torsos



Legs (the four legs on the left are FW MK 2 Crusade armor legs, for comparison and later use on character models)



these legs are very nice I think. The already have a layered armor style. I'm thinking about redoing the upper legs...similar to real samurai armor (upper legs were not covered directly in armor but some pads were tied on top of the upper leg), which means sculpting cloth...but I'm not sure how far I want to take the original look of samurai armor...


Backpack


shoulder pads (anvil industry)


first katanas arrived. the axe on the left is inquisitor scale. on the right you can see a deathwing bit


Arm sets (FW MK 3):


these arms are beautiful! they have these nice wrist guard (correct me of this word is wrong) on the lower arm section, which helps to create the outlook similar to original samurai armor...

40 samurai heads arrived today (20 Kromlech heads, 10 Puppet War, 10 Anvil Oni masks(?) )

next weekend I'm gonna make some test minis, when more shipments arrive (I need some gs to start...)

thank you.

yeah these Kromlech legs look nice. they are quite similar to those FW MK 2 legs (shown on the left in picture 3 and 4) I think their layered style make them a good choice for samurai-styled armor

So I'm back. I was visiting a friend for two days. During set time I wanted to set up one test mini, as most of the bits are still en route. But after we started we couldn't stop painting and assembling (not only Mantis Warriors) and somehow we got impatient...

but this was only the first go. These guys will get a 2nd go after the wargames bits have arrived...and the colours...and the glue...and the modelling tools... -_-



please excuse the pictures, I will look to get a better one, as soon as these guys are really finished.

This is the first mini on its way:

Sergeant

the backpack is a metal 2nd edition techmarine backpack (the one with 3 exhausts), arms are sanguinary guard, legs & torso Kromlech


the first sqaud assembled


2nd squad assembled


Sergeant 2
he is WIP as all the minis. They need lot of touch up and cleaning... we rushed it too much.


Sergeant 1

tactical marines:











as you can see by all the mistakes, I have to relearn almost anything.

thx guys.
More will be coming, as soon as the packages arrive...every marine needs his wakizashi and katana and a finishing paint job.

@Ilove40k:
was thinking about that, but it would have been too much. Made this one time, with my first chaos army. Was a real pain to paint and the overall look wasn't satisfying.
I stick to this mantis warriors colour scheme. BUT the armor will be individualized more, by individual backbanners and colour markings, armor modifications. *edit* The minis you can see here are way far from finished. I want to give every marine a katana and wakizashi, a custom mon (banner) maybe, bikers will get long spears (nagaeriy yuri or something like that) similar to the White Scars character on bike. Currently I'm thinking about how to "decorate" the vehicles, I want some reference to history, some to white scars and some part creativity. I'm thinking about chopped off heads to scare off the enemy. It's similar to the Demon/Oni masks samurai wear, maybe some horse reliefs on the sides of a rhino or land raider (a cut in half wargames factory horse maybe), big flowing mon or banners and other funky stuff like that. *edit*
I think that each squad follows a sergeant, a seasoned Samurai, with his own stylised iconography taken from the mantis legion's symbol. So each member of said squad will get an individualized sqad logo and his name or a painting on the banner...
I need to give it some more thought. As I am still relearning all the painting. Boy do I s**** at painting right now. I can't see a thing. I think I'll need some glasses in my face. I'm gonna check on that as soon as I have left some time over. But the expenses will slow my project down I think.

right now I think, I will continue with kromlech / fw legs and only some selected legbits of the current loyalists.
Each marine will get some sort of layered or lamellar armor to make him more Samurai. Except maybe one Squad of Tranquility vets. MK VI in yellow camo is a must. ^^
Some vets will get at least one armor part painted in that camo, IF they are T-Vets...or maybe it will be on the banner. it depends on my painting skill, time and money I can afford.

@gitsplitta: Hello. I must thank you, because in the years I looked for MW Samurai armies online, you were and are a great source of inspiration.

I am open to ideas and comments on how to customize armor more or how to ornate vehicles like bikes, rhinos, land raider and drop pods...
I try to make them all look unique, but at the same time keep it quite uniform, so it's easy to make out characters, sergeants etc.

yeah thought about that too... dragons!
One thing I will definetely try will be sculpting small asian dragons on SM armor and duplicate it with instant mold to put them on several guys. Maybe one gets a dragon on his chest plate, another one gets a dragon around one leg piece and so on. nearly every armor will definetely get the FW-style void armor chestplate green stuffed on his torso (as I will be using lots of unused chaos torsos. at least 20 lie here waiting to be freed of their chaotic touch.) I fear from thinking about the terminators and their look. Right now my idea is to use the FW - Deathshroud legs, as they would quite nicely fit into the overall look I'm aiming at. But it will be expensive. ^^ Still need to think about the front torso and arms. For the helmets I want to make use of the standard head as it reminds me a teeny tiny bit of a mantis (will use some chaos termi-heads with horns too, to get the "mantis head" look on them)

maybe I can get hold of some chimera, deathclaw, manticore, dragon and other WHFB heads to put them on the vehicle sides as reliefs or on the bikes as mud guards. and some dark eldar raider banners and poles, some horns from the chaos chariot (if I am really too lazy to sculpt some)

another idea is that the bikes will get quivers and bows attached to them as a reference to the white scars, to the mongolians and samurai cavalry archers

another part of the shipment has arrived. the wargames samurai and ashiguru bits. They are small compared to 40k, but the more "realistic" scaled bits add a nice emphasis on the size of an space marine.

@Gitsplitta:

@Rayvon: Thx.

Following are some pictures with included 40k Scale bits for size comparison.
on the top left of following picture you can see some CSM Torso fronts compared to two different Samurai torsos




Katanas in comparison. The wargames katana will be ritual "combat knifes"


Heads in comparison to a kromlech head (which will probably be used for the captain)



I will put these things on several types of GW SM helmets




I hope that in the next week my next shipment will arrive. More FW MK2 arm bits, the WE Rampager legs, 2 drop pods,some FWbits: MK6 heads and legs and some MK5 helmets.

Some guys waiting to get their ritual combat knifes (sheathed Katana and/or wakizashi)

nice looking termie. Was playing with the ork helmet as an idea too, but I wasn't sure if I can fit a head inside...
hmm I think I try this idea on a bike.

three new Mantis Warrior are being assembled.

They are regular sized.

So, after 3 marines now I finished another two.


Here he is still missing his renaissance shoulder pad (anvil industry).


He uses a spear as CC-weapon. ^^



And the second one:

I put a Lunar Wolf next to him for size comparison. The Lunar Wolf was a birthday present.



the banner was broken in sprue, I tried to repair it. I think I have to look for a thin piece of copper or metal to proper pin it back in place.



the first *edit* fifteen *edit* Mantis Warrior waiting for more bits, paint and tools to arrive.


So I hope next week more needed bits will arrive. Today I noticed that somehow, most of my arm bits (mostly chaos) seem to have disappeared. Combining that with a lot of work to do, means that the next update will have to wait until April. Until then guys enjoy building, painting, reading, writing and playing. I hope that I will at least find some time to read in the forum and to look at some of your great projects.

some life-signs by me. ^^

didn't happen much the last weeks, 40k-wise.

I made 2 Tranquility-Vets. But I am not sure if I should give them backflags as well. Your advice is needed guys.
They will be painted in the yellow camo and I drew heavily on gitsplitta's ontake for inspiration.
My vets will mostly be MK6 and MK5 with samurai bits here and there and some armour customisation.
this two dudes make heavy use of FW-bits, old '92 bits, chaos bits (backpack and katana hand) and of course the wargames samurai bits.
The scopes are anvil industry I think.

the quality of the pictures is rather poor, as I switched computers and this one here is yet without photoshop or something else to work on the contrast and so.

Veteran No. 1






both guys:


Vet No. 2

Thx GS

5 new WIP:

3 Tranquility Vets

2 Tactical Marines

most are missing backpacks and all are missing the right shoulder pads.









as you can see here some of the FW MK VI and WE rampager legs were badly casted. Somehow the mould halfs seemed to have moved during the casting process... I tried to cut those "mega" moldlines away, put I have to give it another go with green stuff to hide those shifts in casting.












I think this month won't see me working much on my MW...sadly, work leaves no time for it.

I noticed that I fixed the scopes facing the wrong direction... I had to cut them off and reglue the scope ends to switch direction.

*edit* Thank you guys! *edit*

I am not dead, not yet. ^^

Forgive me the big gap in the updating schedule, but here I am back again. With a little update.

I bought a tactical and a devastator box...and started building some more Infantry.

Now I have two tactical squads, 1 Devastator and 1 Sternguard squad waiting to be painted...

and one Korso Khan Stand In with wound markers.

Some more pictures from what I'm working on.

Build my first drop pod and failed. I was careful but still two doors won't shut completely. -_-

I just ordered a Ravenwing Battleforce, an old White Scars bike box and some bits from different companies.
When all has arrived I finally can start building my HQ on bikes...
I hope I finish painting before the stuff arrives.

Most of the shipments arrived (pictures will follow)

I couldn't wait and started to build the commander on bike.

Here is just a quick look:

many parts are still in delivery...
but I started another painting technique, because my pre-shaded minis were too colourless in my opinion. Another problem is/was that I highlighted my infantry too much so there isn't any shadow left.

So now I start with a caliban undercoat and work up to almost moot green. The first try went too far to moot green. The colour was veeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeery diluted and...take a look yourselves. ^^

further down below you will also see the WIP Apothecary on bike (without his torso, as many bits are still on the way to me :( ) and the WIP Special Weapon Vet and some bike bases.

Can't wait for the bits to arrive so I can finish my commander (did you notice that he is missing his banner tops? ^^ ) and the other bikers.

Hey there. I'm still alive and this project is too.

It's been a long time, I know, but I was busy with other projects (X-Wing (all factions), rebuilding my Black Legion, moving etc.) I finally got my hands on another Ravenwing Battleforce.So I reached the 1500 points mark.
I am so slow I know, but I have problems obtaining the bits I need/want. Some have not been made for a long time now...like the Renaissance Shoulder Pads. I can't find them anywhere...
So right now am building and painting 15 bikes, 2 trikes and 2 Landspeeder, 40 Marines, (HQ, Elite, Standard, Support), 2 Drop Pods... phew...

There will be more posts following and this time I willtry to explain the current state of this army and hopefully show off some finished models.
But now some pictures:

Hey. I am alive! Yay! Loooooooooooooooooooooooooooong time no update. But I was computerless for a year so to speak.
In all that time, I took some time to work on my Mantis Warriors Scarblade Strikeforce: lots of Bikes and Razorbacks for my Infantry.


enjoy:

still WIP as I am a slow and lazy painter...