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Hey everyone,

I was looking at making a custom bike librarian and possibly a techmarine for my slowly growing Ravenwing list. What are some of the best bitz to use to make a convincing and stylish RW bike librarian? I was thinking that just any ol' bike would do, but the torso and legs would have to be something else. I was considering using RW sergeant robed legs and torso from the Ravenwing battle box with possibly a few extra little bits, but that might be too boring. Anyone have any other suggestions? I am looking to keep the model as cheap as possible as well, probably constructed from various bitz sites.

Weapon/ Gear load out to include on model is probably:
- bolt pistol
- Power sword or maul/stave (thinking maybe a pole-hammer or glaive to count as both?)
- Psychic hood of some kind. Whether it be a hood, something mounted on backpack, or special helmet etc.
- Some sort of special iconography or shoulder pad / banner to distinguish him from other bikers.
- Possible Force Field Generator

For the Techmarine, things are probably more complicated. The bike could hopefully look a little enhanced, possibly even having the claw/wrench backpack thing on the bike itself as opposed to on the tech marine. Wargear would be standard and he would probably have the PFG if I decide to use him in the army. I know that they have the finecast techmarines but I really cannot be spending that amount of money just for a torso and one claw. Any other suggestions?

Feel free to post any pics for suggestions as it will help me get a good idea of what I am looking for. Thanks for your help

- VardenV2

For rhe Libby, bitz from the Black Knight kit such as helmets, icons and decorations would look great. The typically codex sign for a Librarian is a skull with 2 goat-like horns curving down towards the teeth, so if you find a skull shoulder pad you could sculpt the horns using GS.

For the psychic hood, try to get a hold of the backpiece torse (wear the back pack attaches to) from the PA grey knight Justicar, as it has a psychic hood like all PA GK but is bigger and more Librarian like.

I second using Grey knights torso bit, then green stuff the hood and rest of the robe onto a raven wing bike. for the lib

Shoulder pads i think grey knights have one with a book on it which could be used for a lib.

For the tech marine considering you seem to be playing raven wing/dark angel.

just use a normal torso from a land raider/gunner and his shoulder pad, then just robe him. maybe have some cables coming out linking into the console, but otherwise have him painted red.

There's a shoulder pad on the chaos vehicle upgrade sprue that pretty much matches the imperial librarian shoulder pad

Ok cool thanks for the advice. I will check out the Grey Knights bitz where I can find them. thewarstore shut down its 40k bitz stuff so I am having to scour the Internet to find stuff. Any suggestions on bitz sites in general is greatly appreciated.

- VardenV2

Hoard o' Bits on ebay is one of the few I've done business with that is still in the game. He's got some Grey Knight torsos and other parts that could be useful.

Use the sgt base like you suggested, or go with the champion base from the rw kit.

Take the libby from the dv kit (you can get them cheap) chop him up at the torso, and use him. Or take another libby (or a gk torso, like suggested) and put on the bike with the cooler legs.

For the tech marine, I would mount the big arms on the back of the bike, where the ravenwing part normally goes. Bulk it up some with a few extra bits.

let us know how it turns out!

 martian_jo wrote:
Hoard o' Bits on ebay is one of the few I've done business with that is still in the game. He's got some Grey Knight torsos and other parts that could be useful.

I noticed that seller the other day. I will be sure to check it out. I'm probably going to be grabbing another big box o' Ravenwing with the speeder sometime this summer so that should round out the bike count for me. It's just those pesky HQs. I will definitely look into the Grey Knight stuff, but I don't want to have to buy 5 bodies to use with one model -__-. Damn GW making me buy their overpriced sets without the options they allow me to have...

- VardenV2

I tried to go real simple on mine when i did my converions. I started with black knights and then used bits from here and there from Dark Vengence, Dark Angels upgrade sprues and a few space marines bits here and there. I tried not to go to ostentaious because i wanted them to be unique but not stick out too much from the rest of my army. They are simple, they were cheap and they still fit the them of the army. I have only done my techmarine and my chaplain but i still have to do my libby. The biggest pain about using the black knights bikes is that the front fairings that they come with are made for the plasma talons and not bolters.

This is my Techmarine maybe it will help
http://www.dakkadakka.com/gallery/508337-Ravenwing%20Techmarine.html?m=2
http://www.dakkadakka.com/gallery/508338-Ravenwing%20Techmarine.html?m=2

my chaplain
http://www.dakkadakka.com/gallery/508344-Ravenwing%20Chaplain%20.html?m=2
http://www.dakkadakka.com/gallery/508336-Ravenwing%20Chaplain%20.html?m=2

I hope it helps and look forward to seeing your finished models

Thanks gamerguy84, those definitely did help. Did you use the Dark Vengeance bikes+legs and then use the torsos from other models and just sort of green stuff/glue them and conceal that they don't fit together perfectly? I am thinking of using the Dark Vengeance sergeat bike, removing the wing standards and placing a sort of Librarian book shirne on the back (to also count as the PFG if used). Then I would use the robed body of the Ravenwing Sergeant from the standard box with a power staff or maul or something. Perhaps I will make a tiny one-handed Thor hammer from the Thunder hammer instead?

Thoughts?

- VardenV2

What i did was start out with the black knights kit. I wanted all my higher ranking guys to have all the same bike fairings (like the ones that are on the Dark Vengence/Black Knights) and my basic bikers would have the fairings that come on the original ravenwing bikes.

For the Techmarine i used the BK legs, the techmarine torso from a vehicle upgrade kit, BK arms, BK backpack, Techmarine head from the RW/DA upgrade sprue, a servo arm from a techmarine (i cut off one of the vents of the side and mounted the arm there, one techmarine shoulder pad and one BK shoulder pad. It was all a really simple build and didn't require any green stuff work at all.

For the chaplain i started with a BK bike, arms, robed body, robed legs, shoulder pads, and the head and crozius from the DV box set. It was really simple too and didn't require and greenstuff work either.

I tried to stay consistant on the bits that i used so that there would be continuity with the army and that they would all fit in well and there wouldn't be any sore thumbs so to speak.