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I've received many requests to attempt an Emperor Titan so right now this is just a concept study, I already have 'way too many projects in various stages of incompleteness.

I am not sure I can differentiate between an Emperor Titan and an Imperator which I thought was just a type of Emperor, anyone that can clear that up or provide a link to a site that defines the difference it would be appreciated. At any rate if I undertake the project I have some definite ideas on how to proceed regarding the belligerent aspect of the construct. I am given to understand that the greaves actually house a company or two of grunts and the titan itself is just a glorified troop transport. I would base my version on the height of the Warlord albeit with an enhanced superstructure to increase the height to about 33 to 36 inches, about 90 CM. The problem is while I lean towards the Lucius pattern the Imperator seems to cry out for a Mars pattern appearance so perhaps I'll make two versions of hull and carapace, one as a quick change with my basic Warlord body and the other as a straightforward ambulatory castle complete with legs. That should satisfy all contingents. One thing I definitely won't be doing is making the damned thing pose-able, that entails too much effort and time.

In before the awesome

lexicanum. You are correct, Imperator is one of the two types of Emperor Titans.

"An Imperator-class Titan is one of the two classes of super-heavy Titans known as Emperor Titans that also includes the even more rarely deployed Warmonger-class Titan." -wikia

Images from first link:
Imperator.


Warmonger


Edit: People liked the look of the Imperator more, so the Warmonger fell from favour.
Edit2: More general Titan info from wikia

Go for the Imperator and play games of cityfight on its carapace!

I've decided to attempt to try to make both a Lucius and a Mars Imperator which I believe is the smaller of the Emperor Titans. I will be just adding switchable components to make my Warlord an Imperator at my whim by just switching out the parts.

Something like this:



IPB Image

The Mars pattern will be a total build but again the parts that make it a Mars will be detachable so the Lucius parts will also fit, again at my whim. That way I can have a Lucius Warlord and a Lucius or Mars Imperator or I can have a Lucius and a Mars Imperator. How 'bout that?






As for the size my rule of thumb is each progressively larger Titan is 1.5 times taller than the previous so a FW Warhound is 10.5 inches and a FW Reaver is 16.5 inches actually so ballparking that I came up with 25 -26 inches for my scratch Warlord unfortunately the scale of the few bitz I used required the Warlord to be slightly larger so it ultimately came in at 28 inches. That would put the figures you quoted right in my average for the Emperor class titan of 42 inches where the Imperator would be around 36 and the Emperor around 48 inches tall. Lots of fudge factoring going on there but I do not want my Warlord too outclassed.

And no; I categorically, absolutely, positively will not! not! not! be making the big Emperor titan..........

probably.........

Now I only have to figure how to live for another century so I can finish all these projects.

Whoops I should have posted these on this thread not the Reaver thread...............so can I get an auto append interrupt for this thread as well? Please.

Walking Cathedrals, Some Thoughts on the Construction:

Never having taken any courses in art or design I probably have no business making this compilation of what I perceive to be construction errors that seem prevalent in many of the Emperor Titans 'Imperators'.

First of all regarding size there is a limit of practicality where while a two meter tall Emperor Titan may be impressive it is hardly a playable piece unless the titan itself is the game board. Rather it will be relegated to the store window of your local Gamesworkshop where when that one is closed will subsequently be consigned to the dumpster behind the soon to be renovated store.

Because who has the room for such an out-sized monstrosity?

So I set my limit at 33 to 36 inches (0,83820 to 0,91440 meters).

Next problem is the slab sided blockiness of the greaves, hull, carapace, and cathedral appurtenances; with out being specific by showing images of others work I will demonstrate with a minor area of my own construction.

Back in the days of my initial Warlord build I happened to make the rear bulkhead of my Engineering compartment too square.

http://i.imgur.com/nZH84.jpg


http://i.imgur.com/hN7XM.jpg


http://i.imgur.com/o9kIR.jpg


The subtle tapering of the lower rear panel and the angling of the lower edge of the carapace rear differs from the square lower edge and panel of DS's exceptionally fine 'miniature' and to me is much more aesthetically pleasing.

Next post please............

I am a big fan of your warlord titan, so naturally I'm looking forward to this as well. Can't wait to see some work done.

Thanks for the reply and the bump (D***ed Auto append)

I am still formulating a plan of execution so I'm getting the preliminaries out of the way. I should start work early next week but I have some resolutions still to abuse..........

Materials:

I've seen styrene foam, cardboard, Foam filled posterboard, wood, plastic paneling, & etc. used and I made the mistake of using foam filled posterboard on two of my constructs; the Warhound Lucie and the Thunderhawk and I have to relate I have always regretted not using styrene sheets throughout the construction.

The problem is getting everything to hold together, the different materials require different glues which usually are incompatible with the other surfaces. You spend more time, effort, cost of resins and epoxies plus hours of drying time and sticky residue on everything including fingers, clothing, furniture, computer keyboards, and whatnot than it would be to just bite the bullet, and spend a few more bucks and go full styrene for the whole project. I purchase my sheet styrene from commercial plastic wholesalers usually found in most industrial parks. I buy small 3 foot X 6 foot sheets for about 16 bucks each in 3 thicknesses 0.020, 0.030 and 0.040 because that's what my local supply stocks and they're only a half hour round trip from me. I purchase about three sheets a year give or take.

I find it more economical to not use thicker styrene 0.060 and 0.080 except in special areas where excessive strength is required because it's too hard to cut with your standard utility knife and it's about 3 times more expensive than 2 sheets of thinner styrene sandwiched together but that's your choice.

As a point of fact I only used 2,0 MM sheet styrene on the soles of my Warlord's foot pads and nowhere else in the entire construction.

I do have quite a collection of 'Evergreen styrene strips, tubes, and rods, and i spend about $20 bucks a month on it including glue and paint which when you think about it is pretty cheap for the amount of recreational fun you get from scratch-building. Granted the initial outlay is daunting, probably two to three hundred dollars for everything you need as far as materials but if you keep up with maintaining your inventory that is the only major outlay you will have to make.

In closing a couple of images of my plastic stock mounted with push pins on corrugated cardboard.

http://i.imgur.com/xfbZKCN.jpg


http://i.imgur.com/A0MYFTk.jpg


Someday I'll find some cubicle wall dividers and do the set up properly. It saves a lot of time mounting your stock like this instead of rummaging through a couple hundred bags for the strip you need.

Next; Tools of the Trade...............


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Okay so there's about 72 bags there in all at about $3.50 a bag

That about $240 worth of strip styrene and you should be set to build anything if you don't count the need for the Wholesale sheet styrene and the glue.

In for the AAA post... And looking forward as ever to your build log

Just a few more preliminaries before we begin the basic construction. I want to get this out of the way so I can refer queries to the beginning of the thread on basic construction techniques, not that I think I have all the answers but I do know what works for me and that I am willing to share so bear with me the construction is coming forthwith............

Tools of the Trade:

There has been a few questions regarding the amount of tools necessary to build my projects. I do have a lot of special tools that I need for work. I have been a mechanic all my adult life but to work on styrene models the material being so soft and malleable I find the most basic hand tools are sufficient to perform any of the work you see here.

Aside from the tools pictured here I would add an X-acto razor saw and the small diameter X-acto knife with a goodly supply of the # 11 blades.

When I get into the fine detail work I will break out my Jeweler's files as well but aside from that this is all I have used so far on the Thunderhawk.



You can see that:

A good quality combination square is essential.

A good quality utility knife with a supply of sharp blades.

A medium sized X-acto knife handle with #18 X-acto chisel blade. chisel.

A wooden cutting board is essential as opposed to one of those plastic self healing cutting mats. That's just my preference but I'm a creature of habit.

A 8" sized single cut file.

Home made sanding blocks with coarse and 80 grit sandpaper adhered with double back tape

A 6" scale graded in 1/64th inch and millimeters.

A calculator

Sharp Pencils

I use Ambroid ProWeld thin plastic cement but as the brush is so clunky and thick and the bottle so easy to tip over I refill the Tamiya thin plastic cement bottle; it has a much more stable bottle and a very fine tipped brush. When the fluid level in the bottle gets too low I drop in a few glass marbles to raise the level.

Okay so now the preliminaries are out of the way it's time to get down to the nitty gritty.

I was impressed by the overall Krakow exhibit which had easily over a hundred pieces of various stages of complexity and skill. The most outstanding was of middling size but every one of the dozens of figures had it's own link to the clockwork mechanism and moved to some degree or other.

What really inspired me was when I returned home I found on ebay a GW model of the 'Fortress of Redemption' which I bid on and won.



It's the first time I ever saw this model and it fairly screamed 'Warmonger Titan' and is what I will be basing my initial Warmonger work on. The octagonal bastions with their feather-like armour plating seems tailor made to be replicated as greaves and the large center tower the radar dish mount although I will probably be scratch-building all these components instead of using the kit parts.

http://i.imgur.com/4Gi1rGx.jpg


Later I shall be making the more conventional Imperator Titan based on the Krakow exhibit as a companion piece.

As always, I can't wait to see this!

If you actually get around to making one, then you're madder than I thought.
.
I've also put thought towards designs for an imperator in the past, and at one point had what I thought was a pretty good 3d model for one, however I can't find it. I think that I modified a fair bit of the imperator design, in particular the leg work. The main problem for that is that you need the base of the foot to appear articulated, and yet have the capacity to hold a 'company' of soldiers. If it doesn't have the articulated foot, then it would be like walking with two casts for broken ankles. I think my plan was to have the troop part within the leg, but raised up inside the structure whilst in motion, but which for an attach/disembarkation lowered in the foot. This basically means that it has to lock into position for the assault. Once the inner platform of troops is lowered a part of the armour opens to allow troops to move out.

One other adjustment was not to just have a big door that opens to reveal the inside, which I don't think makes loads of sense because it would be easy to shoot into, but instead to have a section of armour just move outwards, so that two gaps are made at the side where soldiers can leave safely under covering fire. For a full on attack though the part of armour could still just be moved upwards to give a massive rush of troops though.

My favourite inspiration was always mark mondragons original leviathan titans, which I'm sure you're aware of already. http://www.coolminiornot.com/forums/showthread.php?8866 I think that the lower leg needs a bit of work, but that the linkages are great and I also really like that the cathedral on the back (which is definitely not city sized) is not just a building on a flat platform, but actually made of a few different levels. It has the rear part lowest, rising to mid height shoulders, and an upper balcony/from area. Were I to do an imperator I would want to do something similar for the back, but likely would make it much larger than the leviathans and include at least some platformed area. Kind of a combination of the two. http://apocalypse40k.blogspot.co.uk/2011/04/industry-interview-marc-mondragon.html That third picture, of the back, in particular is just so imperator.

I'm really intrigued to see what you can come up with. Good luck, I feel like you'll need it.

Imperator Greave Articulation:

 fiorehellheart wrote:
If you actually get around to making one, then you're madder than I thought.

Well you had to do it didn't you, waved a red flag in front of a crazy person. I was perfectly content making a static pose couple of Emperors.
.

I've also put thought towards designs for an imperator in the past, and at one point had what I thought was a pretty good 3d model for one, however I can't find it. I think that I modified a fair bit of the imperator design, in particular the leg work. The main problem for that is that you need the base of the foot to appear articulated, and yet have the capacity to hold a 'company' of soldiers. If it doesn't have the articulated foot, then it would be like walking with two casts for broken ankles. I think my plan was to have the troop part within the leg, but raised up inside the structure whilst in motion, but which for an attach/disembarkation lowered in the foot. This basically means that it has to lock into position for the assault. Once the inner platform of troops is lowered a part of the armour opens to allow troops to move out.

and you pose the challenge of the impossibility of making the articulation for a troop carrying greave. It's not nice to tease the clinically insane.........

One other adjustment was not to just have a big door that opens to reveal the inside, which I don't think makes loads of sense because it would be easy to shoot into, but instead to have a section of armour just move outwards, so that two gaps are made at the side where soldiers can leave safely under covering fire. For a full on attack though the part of armour could still just be moved upwards to give a massive rush of troops though.

The big doors would be too easy and too weak on a battle field no the troops must file out two by two shoulder to should like the Emperor god has intended.

My favourite inspiration was always mark mondragons original leviathan titans, which I'm sure you're aware of already. http://www.coolminiornot.com/forums/showthread.php?8866 I think that the lower leg needs a bit of work, but that the linkages are great and I also really like that the cathedral on the back (which is definitely not city sized) is not just a building on a flat platform, but actually made of a few different levels. It has the rear part lowest, rising to mid height shoulders, and an upper balcony/from area. Were I to do an imperator I would want to do something similar for the back, but likely would make it much larger than the leviathans and include at least some platformed area. Kind of a combination of the two. http://apocalypse40k.blogspot.co.uk/2011/04/industry-interview-marc-mondragon.html That third picture, of the back, in particular is just so imperator.

GW/FW had no business shutting down the Mark Mondragon project especially since they had/have no intention of making large scale Imperial titans of their own. Competition is healthy for the industry as it stimulates renewed interest. Proprietary rights do not and should not apply to art especially unproduced art otherwise it would stifle the entire war game industry because there is very little difference between any of the various wargame's hardware models.

BTW Regarding:

If you actually get around to making one,

What's the status on your own Mars Warlord, it seems I haven't seen an update in quite some time..............

Your crazy but the good kind, titans are pretty awesome

"I can't decide whether to build a Mars pattern or Lucius pattern Emperor, better build both!"

God bless you, you magnificent lunatic.

Haha, sorry, but you're one of very few people who might be crazier than me. I had to say something about what I'd looked at.

I've had more of a think, and I might have a go at a few mock up 3d models to demonstrate what I mean about the troop compartment.
I'm doing it as much to satisfy my own curiosity, but I could send you some stuff that I figure out, might be useful to you.

Regarding my own warlord titan, it's on an indefinite hiatus unfortunately. I'm still at uni, 3/4 of the years done so the soonest I'm likely to start working in full is the summer after next. Apart from lacking time, I have neither the workspace, tools, or money to continue to tackle my own titan again. The best I can do is to work on the 3d model here and there, and make a paper mock up. I only found this thread because I felt a bit nostalgic after returning home for christmas and seeing my half completed titan, a quick trawl on here gave me a nice surprise with this thread.

When I decided to think about trying to make an Emperor Titan(s) your's was one of the first I looked up on how to proceed. You have some good construction ideas that I would like to try. I was disappointed it has lain fallow for over a year.

Once I come up with a solution to the problem you posed I'll compare with you, until then I'd like to try on my own.

In all my googling I seem to have failed to find what the ankle-door foot-steps problem is (probably because I'm not very bright and I must have misunderstood).

This clasic image Imperator vs Mega gargant shows troops disembarking, and I'd imagine that if the titan was walking and someone wanted to get off it might be a case of them just leaping down to the step-toes (which I imagine are bendable so the whole thing can stand upright)

....ah, here is an image of a titan with a foot lifted up/in motion & this thread has more foot stuff,.. and I managed to find your wargamerAU warhound thread, which the piston work is great, but for an upscaled to titan class I always imagined that there was a central elevator piston in the centre/core of the leg, with the functioning parts being built from it to the back of the leg and down into the toe-stairs themselves and that the entire front armour section was hollow to fit the troops.

If I've missed the point entirely let me know and I'll have the mods delete this post (clearly I've not had enough coffee yet/ever).

Video may help with scale




Check these guys out

https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Titan-Manufactorum/180410805366781

Awesome start can't wait to see it completed.

 trollmeat wrote:
In all my googling I seem to have failed to find what the ankle-door foot-steps problem is (probably because I'm not very bright and I must have misunderstood).

This clasic image Imperator vs Mega gargant shows troops disembarking, and I'd imagine that if the titan was walking and someone wanted to get off it might be a case of them just leaping down to the step-toes (which I imagine are bendable so the whole thing can stand upright)

....ah, here is an image of a titan with a foot lifted up/in motion & this thread has more foot stuff,.. and I managed to find your wargamerAU warhound thread, which the piston work is great, but for an upscaled to titan class I always imagined that there was a central elevator piston in the centre/core of the leg, with the functioning parts being built from it to the back of the leg and down into the toe-stairs themselves and that the entire front armour section was hollow to fit the troops.

If I've missed the point entirely let me know and I'll have the mods delete this post (clearly I've not had enough coffee yet/ever).

At the risk of derailing the thread, I'll try to keep this short.

Basically our legs have 4 points of articulation, at the start of the toes, the ankle, knee and hip. Our walking consists of parts of motion with our weight on the whole foot which is flat, and a bit right at the end on the toes. This is due to the articulation of the ankle which allows for a large range of angles between the ground and your calf whilst still having all the foot on the ground. If you only have the knee and hip, like in almost every imperator drawing/model, then the walking motion will be kind of like walking with short stilt, or with both ankles in casts. You can about do this with stilts because they have a small footprint, In a foot cast it's really awkward, and the footprint of an imperator is even bigger compared to it's size.

Because of that fixed foot length and angle, the motion of the calf in a step, from / to | to \ is going to change from pivoting at the back of the foot to the front of the foot, which isnt going to give a smooth motion at all. The pivoting of the toe like sections may provide a bit more smoothing to this effect, but I don't think it's nearly as good as an ankle. That would allow the foot to rest flat through most of the motion, which is a good idea for something so huge and likely ponderous. Once it seems like you need an ankle it becomes obvious that it's hard to fit an ankle into the same space as all the troops. My rough solution is so that an internal floor within the leg lowers when the legs are locked into a specific position, the classic imperator pose. This puts the troops down and in front of the doors to disembark.

The point about the doors themselves is relatively non important. I just always figured that a massive door into the titan at ground level is a bad design. It's practically asking for an easy grenade or rocket to sail into the compacted men, or close workings of the titan. An Achilles heel if you will... Also in most of the art they have steps from the legs. I always thought too that a step is just asking to have a comical pile up of troops at the bottom of them, that were a bit too eager to get out.

Hijacking complete! :-D

I still see no real issue. Internal ankle, toe-steps. I imagine the doors from the ankles (front-facing Achilles Heel) would not lead directly to the internal workings, could even be multiple chambers/airlocks before you even get close to hitting something vital (think the structure of the Titanic where the hull had multiple small compartments), think bell bottoms / 70's flares, this image kinda shows what I mean, but if one was wearing Flares and Thermal Leggins, or even with Tutu structure between the calf muscle and the armour "skin"...

Then again, Bipedalism isn't such a great way to move about when you start building things larger than a building, ignoring maximum size due to lung capacity/food sources, even the Tyrannosaurus was only 15 to 20 feet (4.6 to 6 meters) tall. Titans would be more likely gather a few more legs or another method of propulsion (looking at you mega-gargant), so for this current issue we should blame the emperor for wanting to make a robot in his image (little known fact about the emperor - he liked to keep his pet ants on his back and that is why the larger titans have spires protruding from their shoulders) :-D

I always thought it silly to the extreme to have infantry being carried around in the feet/legs of a titan... when that machine finally comes to a halt to deploy the troops, they will be drowned in their own vomit from being swung around like a live chicken on the way to the food market. I can only imagine there is a kind of slide from the torso through the legs, ending in a drop compartment with door.
(Well, it takes a certain degree of nerdiness to in ernest discuss the functionality of an Emperor titan, but it's okay, we are all friends here... )

 Hruotland wrote:
. I can only imagine there is a kind of slide from the torso through the legs, ending in a drop compartment with door.

Follow me, men! For the Emper-WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

Hey Blackadder,

any more progress on this? I was looking forward to seeing what you could come up with?
I was going to post some of the thoughts I had about the imperator design, over on my warlord thread, but thought I should see if you'd come up with anything before I did so.

Thanks, I just packed the Monger up for lack of interest, just goes to show dark forces are at work. Anyhow I may have to take a week off and catch up on family ties.

GD I hate Famties.......drive to Florida.......Tea Totalers........... No interest in 40K........... & etc......

Oh, BTW My first sentence in this thread:

I've received many requests to attempt an Emperor Titan so right now this is just a concept study, I already have 'way too many projects in various stages of incompleteness.

But, I'll be Back........