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I think there's a pretty fair amount of it and it's tasteful. I bet the Iron hands will have a big upgrade kit with all kinds of arms

Racerguy180 wrote:
Servitors, Servo-skulls, cherubs, etc are kinda the definition of body horror. Hell, Marines have a decent amount of body mods. Black carapace, all the extra organs, superduper muscles & just the creation process of them is body horror enuff.

They really need to do a better job projecting the body horror aspect of the Imperium in the miniatures. It's very evident in the art & lore of 40k, so naturally those of us horror fans would like more modeling opportunities and plastic to warp.

About John Blanche, according to the voxcast where he went over his creative process, his thing is broad strokes that the sculptors take and refine into a specific aesthetic. Apparently there is a tome of his drawings in Nottingham that the development team can reference when looking for inspiration.

It seems like they're still using a lot of Blanche's basic ideas. But that gritty medieval feel in his concept sketches rarely seems to make it all the way to the final product these days. Especially with the vibrant digital art style they use in the codexes and the super clean paint jobs on the box art. All the rough edges, that 90s edginess/grittiness, got sanded away.

I feel like they do throw us grimdark fans a bone every once in a while though, with stuff like the Unmade in Warcry or the Infernal Enrapturess.

this is one of those things where there already exists bits for it... they just are usually of the you need to have a 3d printer or knwo somebody who has them variety.

just search around thingiverse

Martel732 wrote:
Get rid of the horror. Its impractical and very 90s.

Oh look, Martel hating every aspect of what makes 40k what it is. Must be a day ending in a Y...

Crispy78 wrote:
I loved the description of the tech-magos in the Word Bearers novels, talking about having a selection of secondary brains stored in fluid tanks on his back... *shudder*

Thats the forge world magus dominus model, I have him!

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Bring back the horror. Make it easy for anyone to have an army that paint scheme not included, is a visual riot of oddness and ‘but why’.

Isn't the Rogue Trader box full of body horror? On both sides?

This is why I shown little interest in getting it, a lot of it is too disgusting for me, thanks but no thanks.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
But background wise, they’ve missed a trick. What if some spark of self survived apotheosis? Strong enough to survive, but too weak to express itself?

What would happen to us if, over hundreds of thousands of years, that spark could be blown away, only for the host body to be reformed or repaired or reinstalled, and there’s not a damned thing we could about it?

What if the relatively humble Necron warrior has passed beyond insanity, but still remains conscious of what it’s become? Literally, what exists being abject terror and irrevocable insanity? That one last shred, the merest, dimmest spark, something technology can not overcome, continues?

I....I genuinely have no wish to find out. It could be absolute peace. It could be Horror genuinely beyond imaging.

Hundreds. Of. Thousands. Of. Years. Of. It.

Did they miss, really?

Just look at 5th edition Necron book, the one that some immature children whine about purely on the basis who wrote it. It all but spells out the creation of Necron warriors - children, women, elderly, crippled, anyone deemed insufficient or unimportant was fed into machine that slowly feeds the flesh into a meat grinder, rips out soul so that hungry god might devour it, and feeds screaming, bloody remains into nearly indestructible body... That was made as cheaply as possible, stripping out any freedom of movement, making you eternally tortured slave that can't move, can't speak, can't even really process what is happening, can only suffer.

And not even for hundreds of thousands of years, but tens of millions.

Then you have Necron nobles, who were actually given free will and better bodies... Only to realize what happened to them and what they lost, after it was too late to reverse it. And they now have eternity to contemplate it, and unlike their slaves, can actually realize what they had done and what is happening, and that they can never end of fix it, no matter what they do.

I don't know which fate is worse, unless you were a borderline psychopath before being fed into the process. No wonder so many Necrons go crazy and starts destroying everything.

Then you have that crazy Necron doctor, trying to make new body for his race. You'd think that would be trivial given Necron science and mastery of genetics - but what he is trying to do is effectively trying to recreate soul of an individual lost eons ago - which is why he is continuously failing. It's like blind painter was trying to create while not being even able to imagine what colors or paints are - all he can do is trying to bruteforce it, by making random movements with brush, trying billions of times in hopes that finally one day he will create a passable portrait... while not even being sure if canvas is there at all.

It's one thing I really liked about Ward fluff - it was really subtle in places. For example, in Farsight Enclaves fluff there were some really chilling passages on the Ethereals that make you wonder not why Farsight turned traitor, but why it didn't happened much sooner. Passages that indicated that despite its shiny exterior Tau are even worse in some aspects than the Imperium, as they try to control mind, not body, often in horrible ways - alas, then Phil Kelly got the job of writing Tau and the fluff was completely ruined by childish, wacky amount of mustache twirling evil that was less scary and creative than worst My Little Pony episodes...

Ad mech have a fair amount. The first chicken walker of theirs that I put together took me a minute to realize that the second dude had his legs cut off and was essentially being used as a human computer. That kind of subtle horror is a core part of 40k.

Somwthing worth looking at is the Dark Mechanicus who tske all the lawful.of thr Ad Mech and crank that to 11


Plus great comversion fodder: https://www.warhammer-community.com/2019/02/20/20th-feb-thomas-fordals-dark-mechanicum-and-renegade-knightsgw-homepage-post-3/

I do like how the cognis part of any weapon made by the admech is basically a hardwired servitor.

The hopefully eventual release of actual Dark Mechanicum models should bring the body horror. Deathguard are an excellent example of how they should do it, just replace gross burgle bits with hyper mechanical daemon engines and bam, we should have body horror a plenty.

Negavolt cultists.
Actually a plastic decimator.

Rust stalkers on mechanical spoder legs.

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Rust stalkers on mechanical spoder legs.

that would be dope.

 Grimtuff wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Get rid of the horror. Its impractical and very 90s.

Oh look, Martel hating every aspect of what makes 40k what it is. Must be a day ending in a Y...

I dont hate the slavishly devoted fan boys. I feel kinda bad for them. Because thats 40k, not anything gw publishes.

Martel732 wrote:

 Grimtuff wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Get rid of the horror. Its impractical and very 90s.

Oh look, Martel hating every aspect of what makes 40k what it is. Must be a day ending in a Y...

I dont hate the slavishly devoted fan boys. I feel kinda bad for them. Because thats 40k, not anything gw publishes.

A large portion of what makes 40k it's own thing is how horribly and horrifying the whole setting is. I mean the use human brains as computational engines because humanity nearly got wiped out by AIs is a common feature for the Imperium but in only gets worse from there.

Heck we even have a Warhammer Horror line that delves even further into that part lf the setting (Perdition's Flame is a great story that gives Poxwalkers a real threat and has some great lines in it). Taking that away loses the grit that really colors the setting.

Yeah, they did that in Dune, too. Except the difference is that they got over it in Dune. In fact, 40K ripped this straight out of Dune, along with the huge feudal-style space empire.

Martel732 wrote:
Yeah, they did that in Dune, too. Except the difference is that they got over it in Dune. In fact, 40K ripped this straight out of Dune, along with the huge feudal-style space empire.

So Dune got watered down while 40k has kept the horror? Gotcha.

I completely agree on this. I think the biggest missed opportunity is chaos, especially Nurgle. The new PM sculpts are decent but they are way too clean, the mutations are too generic, the armour is nowhere near pitted enough. The paint jobs they do don't help when they are very, very clean. Need more maggots, more rot, more filth. The original chaos marines had some fantastic mutations. In fact some really exotic mutation sprues would be wonderful, to add to CSM as you chose. Closest are the Nurgle Blight Kings for AoS.

Aren't DG units already asymetrical and ugly enough already? Why make more army look ugly, there is already enough fo them in the game. All the demon and chaos demon ones. Same with orcs and every models having a different looking gun.

They are in a few models, you just have to look a bit more:

The Strider has a guy wired in pretty much as the mentioned "nugget", even his eyes are hard wired into the thing:

Just look under the seat.

Cherubs are nasty enough when you look close:


Warhound reactor:


Stormraven turret Gunner:

Isengard wrote:
I completely agree on this. I think the biggest missed opportunity is chaos, especially Nurgle.

I take your point, but I think they've done some fun stuff in models with teeth, tusks, pustules, guys growing into their gas masks or plugging tubes into their own bodies etc. And Lords of Silence is just great, in terms of fluff to underline it - these characters bodies either breaking down into a kind of miscellaneous body slurry, or ossifying into something useless, and they like it, either way. It's well done.

But to me both Tzeentch and Slaanesh are where all the money is on the table in terms of what's possible with body horror. Tzeentch, you could go full bore bananas with what somebody's been changed into. The only limit is your imagination and what's available in your country in terms of mind altering substances.

Slaanesh goes without saying, but I find most of it very tame, if not straight up disappointingly unimaginative given what the premise allows for. Although I absolutely LOVED the Enchanteress (I think) with the harp dude.

The greater possessed,oblits, Venomcrawler from shadowspear have a decent amount of tongues, teeth, eyes etc where they shouldnt be. The Discolord's mount is badass & messed up in the best way.

More please, need Dark Mechanicum....

unpopular opinion probably, but if you look at the art and story (and models of course) trajectory, the "de-gribblification", especially for Imperium (tau, eldar etc. never had much in the first place) coincides with shift in depicting Imperium as just as bad as the rest, but "human", to "they are the good guys and all they do is justified by the horrors of 40k galaxy". Of course you will not portray your Good Guys with the same gribblyness as the Evil Empire.

Now, if it's a purposeful marketing move or just result of hiring Imperium fans for art/direction positions, I don't know. Somewhere along the line GW and fans forgot that we're supposed to be horrified at the Imperium, not cheering them on.

Thats a feature, not a bug. People burn out when they cant relate to anyone in the genre. "Everything sucks" was popular with flannel and ended sometime ago.

Except GW haven't toned down any other aspect of the Imperium, so now you have the same old genocidal, goose-stepping xenophobic wall-licker Imperium, but less icky, and some misguided souls think they're the Good Guys for reals.

I personnaly don't miss them, I prefer mankind in flesh, per opposition to the mechanicus and their insane technology or chaos and their mutations. I prefer the contrast between what they look like (like good cool guys in shiny armours packing courage and honour) and what they really are (behind that genocidal/fascist/insane/ lobotomised/ indoctrinated maniacs). I'm mostly thinking about guards who them look absurdly weak and fragile in front of what's coming to get them making them even braver and their actions even senseless. I anyway think it's more like iconography and so a matter of tastes.

There can still be more.

Consider the Thallaxi and Tech-Thralls of the Mechanicum during the Crusade/Heresy era.

The Thallaxi add described as a divergent development of Power Armour. And a horrifying one.



You’re literally Robocop’d, without needing to be shot up by Clarence Boddicker and co.

Tech-Thralls? Grab some foundry workers. Stick the helmet on them. PRESTO BONGO! Remote control foot soldiers full aware of what’s going on, but unable to direct their own actions.

And that’s all fully sanctioned and approved within that organisation, and presumably its descendant, the Adeptus Mechanicus.

So why is the current Ad-Mech line somewhat sanitised? Sure, Skitarii of all stripes are willingly mutilated. And some are even former criminals, heretics and deserters repurposed with a mindwipe. But they’re still, in the end, willing.

I want them to play up to that more. Show exactly how far a Forgeworld is willing to go in order to defend itself, or acquire New Things.

And that’s before we get to the Dark Mechanicum. One of my main disappointments with the Heresy game is we’ve still precious little DM stuff.

That is awesome. So grim. So dark. Thanks for sharing.

And that’s before we get to the Dark Mechanicum. One of my main disappointments with the Heresy game is we’ve still precious little DM stuff.

40k has more dark mechanicum stuff.
Form servitor upgrades for your renegade and heretics militia for 6+FNP (your little helmets or lobotomisation? Never got explained)
To selfaware decimator Pirate daemonengines.
The lore behind helldrakes is also rather nice, Pilot gets possesed by the inevitable creation of the weapons spirit through kills and connecting with the fighter he flew.

I want fully articulated Daemonculaba models with a datasheet and everything. Give them the Iron Warriors keyword.

 ArcaneHorror wrote:
I want fully articulated Daemonculaba models with a datasheet and everything. Give them the Iron Warriors keyword.

Rolls 2D and gets that many iron warriors per turn until you have a Pasch?