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I decided to build an Imperial Warlord Titan recently after having been inspired by the forgeworld release of the Reaver Earlier this year. What a challenge it would be. I am starting this thread to chronicle the project!

First I made some assumptions:

(1) Contstruct a "Modern" Warlord based on the current EPIC design (Not an imperator, Emperor or some other fiction)
(2) Construct the Warlord at a scale compatible with the forgeworld and 40k miniature/model lines
(3) Construct the Warlord from sturdy materials (not plasticard substructure, NO FOAMCORE, no Foam, no cardboard; Steel and Wood!)
(4) Design the piece with the following criteria
Sturdy Design (to withstand handling and or shipping and play)
Detail (Compatible/comparable to forgeworld pieces)
Configurable (weapon options change out)
Fixed Pose (not a poseable figure, no working joints)
Sectional (comes apart for painting/storage)
Movable weapons (moveable weapons if possible)
(5) Paint the model black, for any paintjob at projects end
(6) Keep a journal of the project for future reference and possible reproduction of the piece
(7) Base the models scale on something Empirical, not on a book descriptions or by feel.

With these set of criteria in mind I started a journal to do my work in and tried to answer the first questions of scale. How big should a 40k scale warlord be? My idea was to scale the warlord up from the proportions of the EPIC model, so if say, a 40k space marine was 6 times the size of the Epic equivalent, I would make the 40k warlord 6 times the size of the Epic Model.

I had seen a lot of warlords online and been very disapointed in the scales not apearing true, with some being the size of dining room chairs (way to big), or collections of plasticard about a foot high (way to small). I set out to try and scale the images I had seen of other titans. My initial impression was that typically I would manufacture a 5 up of an EPic Titan piece by piece because the scales of EPIC and 40K are typically known as 6mm and 28mm or 30mm respectively yielding a scale ratio of about 5, 6mmx5=30mm. For model scale.

I did some research on existing Titan sizes and got some surprising results:

Dimensions on the forgeworld titans were hard to come by from their images because they seldomn add anything else in the pics for scale. ? Therefore I had to make some educated calculations (guesses) on the size based on some results I extrapolated from the images I found at forgeworld of the warhound cockpit.



I used a baseline imagining what a 1 inch base would look like in proportion to the pilot, which let me do an entire comparisson scaling to get a number for the titan's height!



A warhound titan is ONLY about a foot tall? (Pretty rough for $600 USD and shipping IMO). I had always asumed that the forgewrold model was bigger than that. ? I wanted my titan to match with the Forgeowrld examples, especially if they were ever fielded together, so I decided to make sure my Warlord was taller than that regardless of the scale factor! Not hard for such a little Warhound, at the time I was thinking maybe 18 inches would look right. This brought me to the next point. How much taller was a Warlord than a Warhound anyway? I went looking on the web for more answers and found this:



1/3 taller? That would make my titan only about 12+4 inches or 16 inches. That just didnt seem right, so I did some other comparissons to see if the scale was actually 1:5 with some Leman Russes:




This analysis confirmed the 5 up theory I had. I eventually bought an EPIC Titan and decided to scale it up by a factor of 6 from the Epic Model just to make it a little bigger and ensure it was larger than the Warhound but not ridiculously so!

The Ratio was set at 1:6, Or every schematic I would do would be a caliper measurement multiplied by 6 and reproduced for the big warlord.

More to come!

While I applaud your efforts, there's been a variety of discussions on the difficulties of scaling Epic to 40k - I think most recently in discussions about building a Capitol Imperialis. Just sort of a "be wary".

You have put a lot of work into this

didn't FW classify their titans height in the catalogue / at photos in WD / maybe homepage?

Warhounds were told to be 10.5" / 250 mm.

Here are some scale photos, hope they help;











I included that last picture to illustrate my Warhound is modeled in a crouch/sprint....so the leg positioning definitely affects the height. The only other Warhound I've had him next to was taller by an inch or so...adjust accordingly.

WOW, thanks for the scale photos! Unbelievable, looks like my calculations were a little generous.

So am I correct in seeing that Titan is almost exactly 10 inches high?

Thanks again Age of Egos! Looks good also, good job!

Augustus wrote:WOW, thanks for the scale photos! Unbelievable, looks like my calculations were a little generous.

So am I correct in seeing that Titan is almost exactly 10 inches high?

Thanks again Age of Egos! Looks good also, good job!

Almost exactly 10, again however he's slightly crouching...so I would add an inch. You can see by the picture a majority of the Titan is legs (Cue the 'do those legs go all the way up' and 'should have painted him blonde' jokes)....the top chasis actually isn't very 'tall'. When I see homemade titans on forums...it always looks like people get caught up in the 'big everywhere' syndrome. That is to say, since the model is big all the parts must be as well. Warhound toes, the head, leg width, etc are all pieces that usually look too large to me (When comparing homemades to the FW item)

No problem on the pics, I had him out to adjust one of his feet anyways. Good luck!

AgeOfEgos wrote:...When I see homemade titans on forums...it always looks like people get caught up in the 'big everywhere' syndrome. That is to say, since the model is big all the parts must be as well. Warhound toes, the head, leg width, etc are all pieces that usually look too large to me (When comparing homemades to the FW item)

I hope to avoid such errors by directly scaling the dimensions and angles off of the EPIC model, and not guessing or re inventing the pieces. I am going to pretty much reproduce each piece of the leadt titan at 6 up, in exactly the same proportions.

One problem I have is I want to do more weapons for the titan and I don't know what they look like. If I recall then the default warlord has shoulder mounted turbo lasers, a Volcano CAnnons and a Gattling Blaster? I think I want to make a Plasma destroyer, a chainfist and shoulder mounted Multi Launchers.

By the way this is the Titan image I am using for the 6 up:

Have you got Apocalypse? The Warlord silhouette has a Warhound for scale, and the posts above have given you the dimensions for the Warhound. I think the Reaver is around 14 inches to the top of the missile launcher.

...I've just looked at the book, and if the Warhound is around 10-11 inches, the Warlord should be around 26-28 inches!!!

About time someone properly scaled their warlord. Most of them end up Imperator size, and often far bigger.

Now you want to make a Mk3 warlord, the current version.

It is in fact somewhat bigger than a Mk2 and a Mk1 Beetleback.

If you want to run your Titan with Armorcast titans I suggest building a Mk2, a Mk3 if you want to use Forgeworld titans.

This guy has got the scale incorrect at 32" height for a Mk3:

http://www.heresy-online.net/forums/showthread.php?t=2155

a warlord is twice not three times a Warhounds height, going by the miniatures, whuich is the ONLY consistent scale. I would be looking at approx 24".

The Apoc book has the Forgeworld Warhound matched to a Warlord - I'd say that's pretty consistent.
According to that, the Warlord is a bit over double height (26-28").

Ilmarinen wrote:The Apoc book has the Forgeworld Warhound matched to a Warlord - I'd say that's pretty consistent.
According to that, the Warlord is a bit over double height (26-28").

I would hazard that is pretty damn near the mark. Once again, just make sure the other items on the Titan are scaled, as with the size of the model...portions that are scaled incorrectly will be painfully obvious. Another pitfall I would mention is to make sure you measure the height with bends in the legs (however slight on a Warlord) in mind.

Any other pics for scale you might need let me know. As long as it doesn't involve deconstructing it, I won't mind measuring for you .

There's an article from Tim Dupertuis about the scale of Titans that was in an Inquisitor magazine a long time ago. He recommends 16" for a Warlord.

Death By Monkeys wrote:There's an article from Tim Dupertuis about the scale of Titans that was in an Inquisitor magazine a long time ago. He recommends 16" for a Warlord.

Is that to the carapace of a beetleback. The top of a Mk3 is much higher up.

Most of you have already done way more work on this than GW or FW has done, apparently.

Sad, isn't it?

Yes, Im starting construction soon. I will work from the ground up.

Feet first, I think building from the bottom up will work well as I will have the standy frame to set the rest on as I get it built!

*EDIT for image to huge, link is
http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b73/dgauxiliary/Jourmnal2.jpg

I also liked this artwork I found for misile launchers on the web:

the current FW reaver is about 16" high so about 24" sounds good (half as big again). I agree, to many of these end up way too big.


I just checked my reaver and its 16" to the top of its launcher and my 'hound is 10".

I'll sort a pic of the two titans stood side my side.

man ya titan looks sweet as, now i want one.

BDA

Planning is looking top nothc. Please save all your measurements!

Wait a second, I was always told that size wasn't really an issue, as long as the recharge rate of the weapon systems was minimal......





I know, I know, BAD JediRaptor

Orlanth wrote:

Death By Monkeys wrote:There's an article from Tim Dupertuis about the scale of Titans that was in an Inquisitor magazine a long time ago. He recommends 16" for a Warlord.

Is that to the carapace of a beetleback. The top of a Mk3 is much higher up.

That's to the top of the carapace weapon on a beetleback. The original text of the article is as follows (from the files section of BWC Archives):

SO YOU WANT TO BUILD A TITAN: SCALE IN WARHAMMER 40,000

Just suppose we wanted to build a Warlord Titan in full 40K scale instead of

Epic scale. How tall would we make it? 10 inches? 15 inches? 20 inches? larger?



The scales in Space Marine run from about 1/250 for vehicles to about 1/350 for

Titans giving an average of 1/300, about the same scale as GHQ MicroArmor.



So what scale shall we make our Titan? The original Adeptus Titanicus rulebook

says Battle Titans (Reaver, Warlord) stand 60 to 80 feet tall. Where does this

80 feet measure to? top of the carapace? top of the carapace mounted weapons?

Assuming that 80 feet is the maximum height we will assume that the 80 feet

measures to the top of the carapace mounted weapons. A Warlord measures about

66mm to the top of its carapace mounted weapons. 80 divided by 66 is about 1.2

giving a scale for Epic Titans of 1mm =1.2 feet (Titans only, not vehicles).

Now let's see if we can figure out a scale for a Warlord.







The 40K ground scale of 1"= 2 Meters won't work because it is much foreshortened

to keep the shooting ranges workable on an average tabletop. This scale is a

little smaller than HO model railroad scale (1/87), making our 80 foot Titan

about 11" tall, obviously much too small.



Next we try the vehicle scale. The Rhino is essentially a modern U.S. M113

armored personnel carrier, running possibly a little larger because of the

hull-high track configuration. The Rhino scales out to very close to 1/48 scale

(1/4" = 1'-0"), a typical scale for model aircraft and some model vehicles. A

6' human figure in 1 /48th scale would be 1 1/2" high, considerably taller than

a Marine figure in Warhammer 40K. Our 80 foot Titan in 1/48th scale is 20" tall

with a carapace 14" wide-perhaps a little too large.



Next we try scaling to a Marine figure. Assuming a Marine to be 6'-3" tall (out

of his power armor) we get a scale of 1/60 (1"=5'-0"), making our Titan

approximately 16 inches tall. This looks pretty good and is our suggestion for a

Titan scale. I realize that some of the Titanicus artwork seems to indicate that

Titans are much larger than this, appearing in some drawings to be at least

2-300 feet high, but I think that this is artistic license or artists not

knowing exactly how big Titans are.



In 1/60th scale, 1 inch equals 5'-0", giving the following heights for various

Titans. To convert Titans from Epic to 40K scale, multiply the Epic measurement

times 6.1. For vehicles multiply the Epic measurement by 5.25.



Another way to do this is to measure the Titan part in millimeters, multiply by

1.2 to get the actual measurement in feet, then divide by 5 to get the

measurement in inches for 40K.



Warlord Top of carapace weapon 16"

Carapace 13"

Reaver Top of carapace weapon 13"

Carapace 11"

Warhound Carapace 9 1/8"

Eldar Phantom Head 17 1/4"

Fins 22 1/4"

Eldar Knights Top of head 7 1/2 - 9"

(standing)

Gargant Top of head 13 1/2"

Stomper Top of head 6"



Sixteen inches may not seem very big, but check out the picture of Mike Biasi's

40K scale Reaver, (built to 1/60th scale, 13" overall height) on the cover of

Inquisitor #2.



PS. We use 1/43-1/48th scale as our vehicle scale because 1/60 scale vehicles

just LOOK too small. Using the figure height scale of 1/60 (1" = 5'-0") the Land

Raider is over 16 feet high.In 1/48th scale the Land Raider is 13 feet high.

Compare these heights to the heights of a WWII Sherman and Panther at roughly 9

feet and an M1 Abrams at about the same height. That's an extra 4 - 7 feet of

target sticking up in the air, waiting to be shot at-not a very good design.



1/35th scale models make good heavy vehicles though!

The article calculates incorrectly.

1. You should NEVER base scale on the fluff or artwork as GW come out with figures without thinking. Marines are 8' tall - no they are not. For minis you have to take a mini first atitude. Warlord titans from some artwork are grossly overscale, especially the cover of Armageddon and some artwork in the comic titan. Some shots of titans make them appear hundreds of metres tall. IIRC there is some artwork of a warhound with rhinos in its wake. some of the rhinos are charging between its legs and barely
measure up to its toes.

2. If you use a man for scale youshould use a guardsman = 6' and not the highly disputed marine sizes.

3. Rhino s are underscaled compared to an M113, or any other APC for that matter.

4. If you calcultate by miniature scale then you need consistency with other titans above all. It is far easier to match titan to titan than titan to tank. Tank scales varied from edition to edition more widely than titans. It is also far easier to form a visual fererence for a titan by comparing to other titans. The trick is to match to the titans of the style depicted. i.e. Bettlebacks against Armorcast and Mk3's against Forgeworld.

Armorcast Mk1 Warhound c8-9" tall
Forgeworld Mk2 Warhound c10" tall
Armorcast Mk1 Reaver c14" tall
Forgeworld Mk2 Reaver c16" tall

16" to the top of the carapace of a beetleback would put the titan out of scale with an Armorcast Reaver, which is the same model titan. In effect it would be too small. If
you compare to Forgeworld models then the beetleback titan would be the same height as the Forgeworld Reaver.

Now 14" to top of carapace for a battleback is about right. Then the carapace will clear the carapace weapon of an Armorcast Reaver titan. add another four inches for the titans full height.

Total height of Mk1 'Beetleback' Warlord = c18"
Mk2 or Mk3 Warlord = c24"


There is a LOT of artistic licence in 40k, so if you want a massive titan go ahead, this is why many people make their 5' tall titans (or bigger!). But it wont really be a
consistent scale to the rest of 40k.

Why not just make a Warlord that is possible to use in a game of 40k. A 5' titan may be cool, but its not at all usable in a game...

My scratch built Warhound is just over 11", it's not that crouched. And the Revenant I'm currently building is gonna be 13" to the top of the fins. Great centerpieces, but not overly large or impractical to play with.

Azmo

I did a few days of work over the holiday weekend! I am pleased with the results. As I said before I decided to construct a 6 up of all the pieces in the curent EPIC Titan. (I think it is a mark 3?) I decided to start with the feet and legs and basically work up the titan!

Here are the feet and toes so far:

*Edit for image to huge, removed. Link is http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b73/dgauxiliary/Feet.jpg



Here are the beginings of the legs I did after that:





Coming along well! I expect the hip chunk to be a significant challenge because of the angle involved, and I still have more details to do on the feet and legs, but the big structure is completed!

lookin good mat, gunna keep track of this.

still love the imperator though

Thanks I'll have more work coming soon, I'm getting energized with good results on a ferw pieces, I can't wait to make the weapons!

nice work using wood and metal will make sure if some knocks it over it wont blow up.

My scratch built Warhound is just over 11", it's not that crouched. And the Revenant I'm currently building is gonna be 13" to the top of the fins. Great centerpieces, but not overly large or impractical to play with.

Azmo

That is a great point, as long as it looks good on the table, can actually fit on the table, and is large enough to give the impression that it could step on texas with one foot, is all you really need for a warlord.

Please note that the use of texas in the previous comment was in no way a slight to the lone star state...just a good state to use for scale purposes.

And Augustus, it is looking seriously SHARP man, the pics of the legs make me quake that others will follow in your footsteps, and they will be EVERYWHERE!!!

Course, given half a chance I will too!