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Thanks for the positive feedback, guys!

@ Draconian: btldoomhammer is right (cheers, mate! ): the pauldrons on that terminator are from the Heldrake kit. I didn't even know what they were originally for, to be honest: After my rather...substantial conversion of the kit, I was left with many parts that look horrible on a Heldrake, but utterly fantastic on any kitbashed model I use them for

@ Biohazard: Ha, that's what I wanted to hear Seriously, though, buddy: As always, you're far too kind!

 Igandris wrote:
Like an imposing island of sanity in a sea of bloodcrazed lunacy.

Well spotted, mate! That detail will actually play a huge part in the character's background: Look forward to it

Deracin is coming along nicely, but since I am such an insufferable tease, you'll have to wait a while yet before I show you the finished model Until then, a small update that nevertheless makes me rather happy:

The last squad of models I built before abandoning the hobby for a while during the mid-2000s was a squad of kitbashed Possessed. As you may recall, these were also among the first of my new World Eaters to be painted when I got back into the hobby (as a matter of fact, they were also among the first models posted on this thread!). I use them as The Lost Brethren, those members of the 4th assault company too far gone and too mutated to be used as anything else than a Kamikaze unit.

Anyway, Almost three years ago, I built an icon bearer for the squad. Yesterday, I finally got around to painting him:





This guy probably isn't much to write home about, since he was built when my bitzbox was still far smaller than it is today. He shares his squadmates' muscular arms (I actually used an Orc spear arm for the icon). Still, after almost a decade, not only did the squad finally receive its icon bearer, it also finally numbers eight members. Yay!





Like I said, nothing spectacular, but I am happy that I can finally call this squad done -- apart from the bases, though, I'll have to redo those at some point

Thanks for looking!

Looks fierce. I like the skin tones on these guys, and the way it fits into the World Eaters' color scheme.

Ooh, they look a little possessed. i like the skin tones though.


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oh boy i have been doing some catching up and this puts me in the mood to paint some myself! awesome stuff!

Thanks a lot, guys!

The skin was painted using my regular recipe for my World Eaters, and it couldn't be any easier: Just basecoat with GW Rakarth Flesh, wash with Nuln Oil (or Army Painter Dark Tone Ink) and add some final accents with the original Rakarth Flesh -- DONE!

I realise that these Possessed look rather tame, compared to the more recent plastic kit. That's a pretty good sign of how old they actually are That said, the less mutated look is a better fit more my army's background, and it also means I can just use them as regular berzerkers, if push comes to shove.

Right, it's finally time for an update that I am really proud of: Let's take a look at the finished model for Huntmaster Deracin.

Here's where we left off last time:









Keeping the model in several sub-assemblies turned out to be a very good decision. That way, I could work on one part of the model after another, assembling the model piece by piece, whenever a sub-assembly was completed. Fortunately enough, everything fit together rather well, so the assembly only took some minimal tweaking.

And then came the servo-harness…

Due to the complexity of this element, it was practically a model of its own. It was painted in one, frantic session, and I used quite a lot of black wash to make the metal parts look suitably used and well-oiled. Here’s the mostly finished backpack:



As you can see, I basically stuck to using red, silver and bronze as the three main colours here as well. The one departure from the usual recipe was that I added some light blue effects to the reactor on the back of the harness, and on the energy conduits leading to the different arms. As a matter of fact, that little detail was one of the reasons I had chosen the GK backpack in the first place.

With both the model and servo-harness almost completely painted, I took a deep breath and finally attached the harness to the model’s back. This took some doing, and the funny thing is that the backpack is attached to the model’s shoulderpads rather than to its actual back. It took some fumbling and frantic repositioning for everything to not only work out but stay in place.

In the end, everything worked out, though! Some final detail work was added at this stage: A fine accent of Mithril Silver was added to the metal parts. The flamer’s and meltagun’s muzzles were painted with a mix of Army Painter Strong Tone Ink and Vallejo Smoke Ink, to make them look dark and soot-stained. And I tidied up the last rough edges.

And with that, Huntmaster Deracin was complete. Take a look:







As you can see, I chose a spot of turquoise for the axe’s casing. That colour appears as a spot colour across my whole army, so I used it here for some visual continuity.





The view from the back nicely shows the light blue reactor core, and the power conduits leading away from it.





I am really, really happy with how Deracin turned out! He may have been just about the most involved kitbashed character I have completed so far, but the paintjob really turned out as well as I had hoped. I also like that he is quite bulky, similar to the “official” Warpsmith model — I think his imposing frame rather nicely represents the 2+ armour save granted to Warpsmiths due to their “Fleshmetal”. Let me also take this opportunity to point out that the model is almost ridiculously WYSIWYG, at least when you compare it to my usual standard: The only liberties I took with the model were using a combi-melta, chosen for its cool look, and a chainaxe instead of a power axe. Apart from that, though, the model is a very faithful representation of the Warpsmith ruleset.

Deracin is also very tall. Here’s a scale shot with both a regular World Eater and a Terminator Lord:



And here is Deracin, next to my converted Dark Apostle:



Even though both models use the same legs, I still think I managed to make them look remarkably different!

All in all, Deracin really looks like a World Eater. But he is also clearly an engineer and Warpsmith to his company:



So, did I do this just to build a semi-useful selection from the HQ section of the codex? Of course not! While it’s nice to have the option of fielding a Warpsmith now, and while I get a bit of a kick out of already having built several custom models for selections from the book, this was really all about creating a character. So who is this Huntmaster Deracin? Let’s get to know him a bit better, shall we?



Huntmaster Deracin, Keeper of the Forge

During the time of the Great Crusade, when the XIIth Astartes Legion was still known as the War Hounds, brother Deracin was a brilliant and ferocious warrior who could be found at the forefront of every battle. This zeal cost him dearly when he sustained horrific injuries during the Nove Shendak campaign, requiring extensive augmentic reconstruction work to be saved. Worse still than the lost limbs was the heavy nerve damage Deracin incurred, damage that necessiated complex cranial implants to keep him combat-worthy. A lesser man might have been interred into the sarcophagus of a dreadnought due to such injuries, but Deracin trained relentlessly to overcome his injuries and push the artificial parts of his body to the limit, trying to prove to his brethren that his “reconstruction” hadn’t dulled his edge one bit.

All of this should be for naught, however, once the legion had been reunited with its Primarch and renamed the “World Eaters”: Angron ordered his Apothecaries and Techmarines to outfit the whole legion with the Butcher’s Nails, implants patterned after those he had received as a gladiator on the world of Nyceria.

The nails implanted into the Primarch’s skull were artifacts from the Dark Age of Technology, and the Techmarines’ dabbling in archaeotech was far from an exact science, producing all kinds of unforeseen incidents. As a consequence, the implants Deracin had received earlier to mend his injuries interfered with the nails, preventing him from utilising his full potential on the battlefield. For Angron, a legionnaire that couldn’t unlock the nails’ full power could only be considered a failure. So Deracin found himself relegated to the rear guard in more and more battles, sidelined and tasked with petty battle logistics and mundane assignments, and growing ever more frustrated.

It was Lord Captain Lorimar who discovered that, deprived of a chance to prove himself in battle, Deracin had begun to apply himself to the maintenance of the legions’ wargear and weaponry, demonstrating a brilliant grasp of technology and an intuitive understanding of even the most complex mechanisms. So Lorimar requested Deracin for his company and let him be trained as a Techmarine. And it was then that brother Deracin found his true calling:

He may have been a brilliant fighter, but as a Techmarine, Deracin became a marvel. His brilliant, analytical mind allowed him to construct mechanisms on par with the most advanced work of the Mechanicus. His work earned him the envy of numerous Techmarines from different companies and, indeed, other Legiones Astartes. In time, even Angron himself began to display a sort of grudging respect for the son he had despised. And through fateful irony, the implants that prevented Deracin from tapping into the Butcher’s Nails’ full potential actually kept his brilliant mind intact, even as the rest of the legion descended into frenzy and insanity.

Ever since the Horus Heresy, during the millennia of the Long War, Deracin’s knowledge has grown far beyond the petty boundaries of Imperial orthodoxy: He has learned to forge flesh and steel, and to imbue his creations with the raw powers of the warp through the incantations and pacts of daemoncraft. The towering daemon engines deployed by the 4th assault company are a chilling testament to his skill. The Great Forge aboard the company’s capital ship never sleeps, and Deracin is its undisputed master. And during his long life, he has retained two features nearly unheard of among the members of the XIIth legion: A surgically analytical mind as well as a wry sense of humour.

On the battlefield, Deracin is a giant even among Astartes: His augmented frame towers above even his tallest brethren. Encased in a baroque suit of artificer armour of his own design and equipped with all kinds of arcane weapons and warp-infused tools, the Keeper of the Forge is every bit the warrior he was during the days of the Great Crusade.


So, what do you think? Was I successful in my attempt to build a worthy warpsmith? I would love to hear your feedback on this model!

As always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

This is fething awesome. very well done! the paint job is fantastic and your conversion is just plain outstanding. Congrats brother, you should be proud of this one.

At the first look I thought the axe he was holding looked rather plain, but after looking at the painted pictures my opinion of it changed totally. It looks really good!

Brilliant concept and exceptional execution. Arguably your best marine to date.

This guy is awesome is what a Warpsmith should be like. Great job

He came out great! You really nailed the "Khornate intellectual" look. Great work!
The piece of fluff is really cool too.
How did you do the turquoise. I really like the shade of it.

Even I am impressed and I hate marines but this is just several kinds of awesome, plus the bionics actually look like they are working and in use unlike most you see.

They almost seem like they are partially organic living extensions of him, great job really impressive.

Thanks a lot for the kind words, guys! I am really proud of the model, to tell you the truth, and it's good to know that I am not the only one who likes the conversion

@ Igandris: All the different shades of Turquoise I use are usually a mix of Vallejo Halcon Turquoise (virtually indistinguishable from the old GW Hawk Turquoise) and either black or white. In this particular case, I wanted the axe's casing to be turquoise, but not quite as vibrant as the daemon swords carried by some of my lords, so I added a generous drop of black to the colour.

Oh Goodie, didnt see this model, I agree you nailed the khornate techy look, and fluff is always nice. Would he be counts as Warpsmith?

Cheers, wolfmerc! Yes, I believe Deracin will mostly be used as a Warpsmith, seeing how he really seems to look the part As a matter of fact, I don't even see him as a "counts as" model, to tell you the truth: To me, "counts as" means that the model in question is significantly different in concept from the stock model. A reinterpretation of the character concept, if you will. And while Deracin is not based on the stock warpsmith model, he really looks similar enough to be fairly easy to recognise as one.

Hey guys,

work on my World Eaters continues, as I am feeling rather inspired right now. And I know myself well enough to make the most of this particular spell of inspiration as long as it lasts

First of all, I realised that, while I posted the new icon bearer and the group picture of that finished Possessed squads, the remaining models are still only represented in this thread by those horrible, blurry pictures on the first page.
So, for the sake of completeness, here's the rest of the squad in more detail:

















Granted, these may be some of my older models, but I am still rather fond of them for some reason...


I also managed to pick up an older Chaos Lord in Terminator armour from fellow hobbyist Carnak:







The model was originally released alongside the Cities of Death supplement and the Medusa V summer campaign, if I recall correctly. As a matter of fact, it was even used to represent Abaddon’s right hand man, Chaos Sorcerer Ygethmor the Deceiver, during a WD battle report — a rather dubious (and downright lazy) choice, if you ask me: This guy is no sorcerer, he’s a warrior! A true veteran of the Long War!

In fact, that’s precisely the reason why this is one of my favourite GW chaos models ever! I love how massive and imposing the model looks and how it manages to exude an air of quiet menace. My favourite parts of the model have to be the tabard (an element I would like to see used far more often on Chaos Terminators) and the dangling skull trophies, making this guy an excellent servant of Khorne as well!

Another great thing about the model is that it comes with several weapon options, featuring one long range weapon and CC option for each hand:



From left to right: a power sword, a weapon probably supposed to be a Kai Bolter (from the 3.5 edition book’s wargear section), a power claw and a combi-melta. All of the options look great, although I suppose I’ll go with the combination of sword and claw you can see above — from a visual standpoint, it’s just the coolest option by far, in my opinion!

The model’s only shortcoming is that it seems just a little short when compared to the (more recent) plastic Terminators. But the problem is nowhere as egregious as with Abaddon the Despoiler, and this guy still clearly reads as a Terminator, even if seen next to some of the newer models.

As a matter of fact, I’ve been wanting to add this model to my force for quite some time, and being able to pick it up for a song was quite a nice coincidence. I guess that this guy will remain largely unconverted, too — I just like the stock model that much!


And finally…oh, wait, we’re just receiving an important transmission: It seems like one of our enterprising pict-drones has made it to the bowels of the 4th assault company’s great forge. Here’s the final image it managed to transmit before being destroyed:



Now what on earth could this be. Any ideas?

In any case, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

can't wait!

Do you want a night lord commander?

YES! Khorne knight is go!

Huntmaster Deracin is just simply perfect

I'm looking forward to seeing what you do with the metal Chaos Terminator Lord

Cheers, people!

@ Miss Dee: Do you have one going spare?

Let me use today’s update for a spell of pointless rambling. Bear with me though, there might be something worthwile hidden along the way

Anyway, last week I bought a huge pile of Ogre Kingdoms bitz from fellow hobbyist Kar Tharog. When I got home from work yesterday, the parcel had arrived, and so I spent most of the evening with my very individual kind of R&R: sorting a huge pile of bitz into many smaller piles

While doing that, I realised that buying “surprise piles” of bitz may be one of the most delicious hobby activities for me, but more on that in a minute. You may ask yourself why I went for Ogre bitz in the first place.

While I am very unlikely to start an Ogre Kingdoms army (or any WFB army, for that matter) anytime soon, I have had my eyes on bitz from the various Ogre Kingdoms kits for quite a while now. Visually speaking, the Ogres are heavily based on a culture of hunters, for one. That means that the kits usually come with lots of trophies like skulls, hides, etc. — a perfect fit for Khorne’s Eternal Hunt.

Then there’s the fact that the recurring symbol of the Great Maw is fairly similar to the World Eaters’ legion badge: For instance, I am already using a certain Ogre Kingdoms gut plate as a legion symbol for my army. The newer bitz continue this trend, featuring stylised jaws and maws — once again, perfect for my World Eaters.

And even beyond the scope of my main army, Ogre Kingdoms models have a darkly funny and eclectic bend, which may not help with my World Eaters, but is sure to yield some really cool and interesting bitz.

So that was basically my reasoning behind this purchase, and I certainly wasn’t disappointed when I opened the parcel yesterday. Here’s a look at what I got out of the deal:



This is what I would call the really interesting part of the bitz haul: All the “regular” Ogre bull parts (heads, arms, weapons, accessories) have already been neatly sorted away. They will come in handy, too, but they are certainly not the meat of the purchase. So what you see above is the part that really sealed the deal for me, because I would have had to pick up some really expensive (and ultimately useless) kits in order to get my hands on some of this stuff.



So let me point out a couple of highlights. First up, I was thrilled to find an entire Stonehorn head among the bitz:



I had originally planned to simply use the skull-like “faceplate” as decoration on one of the army’s vehicles, a daemon engine or something similar. Yet that head is so brilliantly angry and detailed that I will probably hold on to it for a while yet: Maybe it could be used on a kitbashed Greater Daemon or something similar? One can always dream…

As a matter of fact, there was a complete Thundertusk head as well — two bitz I would never have gotten hold of normally.

I also got some really nice Mournfang cavalry weapons:



I imagine these will be really useful if I ever decide to add some more Forsaken to the existing three models. Note how the blades also seem to be emulating the great maw motif (and, once again, the World Eaters’ symbol).

I was also fortunate enough to receive this brilliant head:



Normally a part of a dead Imperial soldier kept as a “snack” by the Ogres, the head is just perfect for a twisted servant of the dark gods, don’t you think? Expect this part to make an appearance in my small Traitor Guard detachment (or my INQ28 collection) at some point…

I have already started playing around with some of the bitz. Here’s an early prototype: A World Eaters Terminator using a particularly cool Ogre gut plate as a pauldron:



So, did I post this just to gloat? No way! What I really want to talk about is that this kind of purchase is usually one of the high points of the hobby for me. Strange, huh?

I guess it’s the fact that there’s a certain thrill of the hunt, if you will: Taking a look at the – often fuzzy – photos online. Deciding if you’ll get enough useful bitz out of the deal, then ultimately taking the plunge. Waiting impatiently for the parcel to arrive, the immediately tearing it open and sifting through the contents and thinking of new conversions — sometimes coming up with ideas you would never have considered when buying your bitz the “conventional” way. Don’t get me wrong: Methodically hunting for a certain bit via ebay or one of the bitz sites can be pretty gratifiying as well. But “buying in bulk” like this just feels great every now and then!

Granted, it’s something we usually cannot indulge in too often: You have to be lucky to find a pile of bitz that warrants the purchase. You have to balance “wild card” purchases like this against more sensible additions to your army. But for a fanatical kitbasher like myself, digging through a huge pile of plastic crack and dreaming up some new conversions is really as good as it gets!

Oh, and by the way, I wasn’t disappointed on the “darkly funny and eclectic” front either: There where lots of grisly (but rather funny) trophies, some Ogre snacks (like steaks and plucked chickens) and lots and lots of very strange stuff — I am very confident that most of this will be useful in the end, though: If not for my World Eaters, then in one of my other hobby projects. The Orkheim Ultraz and my planned Mordheim Orc warband can always use some more silliness ;-)

So yeah, taking a plunge and getting a huge pile of random bitz like this was really fun! What about you? Do you agree, or do you prefer your purchase of new bitz to me more restrained and, shall we say, surgical in nature?

Oh, and before I forget, I have yet another little teaser for you...



Thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!

Sweet haul! That head(snack) will be absolutely perfect for a crazed cultist. Termi mock-up with the added pauldron really works. Suitably beefs him up.

Knight is looking great!
I usually know what I need when buying bits, (also low on cash so I can't just randomly buy stuff) so I don't really have any experience with mixed bags. I can see the attraction to buying a pile of random bits though.

Mixed bags are great, love looking through them for the first time. They're also great for giving you ideas that you'd never have thought of if it weren't for that bit.

Yes i do have one up for grabs. Yours if ya want him

I think for the giant tusked head, some poster used it on the muzzle of a vindicator cannon for his word bearers. The teaser oddly looks like a dreadknight equivalent. I recognize smoke launchers. I see through your veil of trickery and kelly green!


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Oh missed the obvious picture of a dreadknight teaser earlier... heh heh. I havent had the opportunity to buy bits in bulk, or bits in general that is, i just find myself with a large supply from trading and the odd kit with extras. Its cool that you got a nice bounty from a bulk buy like that.

A mixed lot of Epic stuff on Ebay began my Chaos army. It's my preferred method now. It also works out cheaper than buying the individual units for some reason

KrautScientist wrote:
I was also fortunate enough to receive this brilliant head:



Normally a part of a dead Imperial soldier kept as a “snack” by the Ogres, the head is just perfect for a twisted servant of the dark gods, don’t you think? Expect this part to make an appearance in my small Traitor Guard detachment (or my INQ28 collection) at some point…

Wow, that head is awesome indeed ! I totally need to find a few for me... Do you know which specific kit it comes from ? The regular, plain Ogres box, or another one ?

Also, nice use of the "Maw" symbol to figure a more "savage" - if such can be possible when World Eaters are involved - that's a great idea indeed !

Keep it up !

Huntmaster Deracin is wicked mate.

The pic drone shots look like we're in for a nice surprise.

Got to agree with Peter, Deracin is terrific.
My favorite mini on this project of yours.
Making him tall and rather slender, does a great deal to lend him a flair of realism and thus makes him a whole lot more threatening.
Although I like him more without his backpack, which is appropriate for what he is, but takes away some of his dash.
Another plus is that your blueish touch on the face made me realize there is some resemblance to the lord marshall, which makes him even cooler:

Thanks a lot for the abundant feedback, people!

When it comes to buying bitz, the ideal approach is probably a mix of buying via "surgical strikes" on ebay or one of the bitz sites and buying bulk every once in a while: The first one will give you exactly the bit you need, hopefully at a manageable cost, while the second one can give you lots of ideas you wouldn't have had otherwise -- and it simply feels great, too

@ Miss Dee: Cool! Will PM you shortly

@ Yggdrasil: That head belongs to a dead Imperial soldier that comes as decoration with the Stonehorn/Thundertusk combi-kit.

@ PDH: Cheers, mate!

@ Baiyuan: Hey there, mate! Great to hear from you! Thanks for the kind words. And you're quite right regarding the resemblance to the Lord Marshal - although it wasn't intentional. As a matter of fact, the Lord Marshal had quite a traitor legion-vibe going on, if you ask me. And his demeanor fits what I imagine the officers of the 4th assault company to be like when they are not busy tearing apart enemies on the battlefield. Also, the one good point about an otherwise pretty lacklustre movie, if you ask me...


Right, no more teaser shots: Some of you have already recognised the model in question, and to tell you the truth, ever since I built my converted Dreadknight / counts as Decimator (inspired by Chris’ fantastic conversion over at A Host of Word Bearers), I’ve been itching to get this big boy painted. While painting the model seemed like a rather daunting task at first, painting my various Chaos Dreadnoughts has taught me that models at a slightly bigger scale can be real fun to paint, if only because the actual painting can be less fiddly due to the increased size.

In any case, there was really only one way to find out…

So, how did it go? Just to remind you, here’s where we left off last time:



Before breaking out the paints, I used the last possible opportunity to add some final bitz: A chaos smoke launcher was cut in half, with both halves added to the cowling behind the model’s head. A chain with dangling skulls was also added to the reactor on the model’s back.

The next step was to break down the model into the different sub assemblies and get everything undercoated in chaos black. Thankfully, this was pretty fast work. Here’s most of the model undercoated and tacked together (again):



I then started painting the different sub assemblies, starting with the legs. Fortunately enough, my predicition proved correct: Painting the model turned out to be quite a lot of fun!

While larger models take much more paint to be completed, you can also cover much more ground and work with larger brushes, without having to worry about all the small nooks and crannies — at least at first…

So a short while later, the legs were basically finished:



At this point, I really liked where this was going and I was basically hooked. So I pressed on, painting the torso next…



As you can see, the amount of cables and metal doodads on the torso front meant that I could use a healthy dose of washes to make the metal look suitably dark and oily. I was also happy to finally see the head painted (but we’ll take a closer look at that in a minute). The last parts for the torso to be painted were the armour plates for the model’s chest. I quickly finished these, then tacked together what I had so far:













I am actually pretty pleased with the WIP model so far. The paintjob already does a fairly good job of blending together the different parts used in the conversion.

On a related note, I realise that the use of a head from an 80s’ toy was a point of contention for some. So my hope was that the paintjob would go a ways towards making it look like an actual part of the model. Take a look:



While I am pretty sure that this particular choice of head will never make everybody happy, I am pretty pleased with the result: I don’t think it looks that much like an action figure any more. As you can see, I also added a simple blending effect on the model's visor, trying to ride the cylon motif for all that it’s worth

A brass etched symbol of Khorne (kindly sponsored by PDH — cheers, mate!) was added to the armour plate on the model’s shoulders:



You may say that it looks like it’s the wrong way around: a result of the plate originally being positioned slightly differently. In any case, it fits much better this way around anyway, so there is little to be done.

Again, I am really pretty happy with the model so far, even though it’s not yet complete: The next step, obviously, is to paint the model’s arms. And, of course, a suitably impressive base will have to be designed and painted at some point. Expect the next update pretty soon, though, because I am rather stoked for finishing this model.

Until then, I would love to hear any C&C you might have! And, as always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!