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Made in at
Bounding Assault Marine






Austria, Segmentum Solar


UPDATE: Two tactical squads finished! Keep reading below to find out how this project started, or skip ahead to the last post to see some pictures of fully painted and completed stuff







Hello there!

As you can guess from the title, this blog will be dedicated to documenting the progress of converting and painting a custom force of Soul Drinkers Space Marines. Here, I will be posting WIP shots of the minis I am currently converting/kitbashing and then also pictures of the finished models. To build my force of Soul drinkers, I've decided to go for a mix of the current tactical squad boxes as well as some squads from Forge World to allow some kitbashing. I will be starting off with a small force: for now, I have ordered one box of tactical marines and a set of 5 Marines from FW in MkV Heresy armour, as I find this suit type matches some of the artwork very well:



Many Marines in the Soul Drinkers have at least 1 part of their armour covered in molecular bonding studs, so I think the bits from this squad will come in handy. I will be taking the different bits and intersperse them with the regular Tactical Marines to create a bit of a mixed unit look. The Soul Drinkers are, at the time I want to depict them at, cut off from the Imperium and thus a bit short on all manner of supplies, so they will have to use whatever parts they have.

My plan is to create a group of Soul Drinkers from after the incident with the Daemon Prince Abraxes, so I will also add mutations here and there to depict that. I will try to keep the changes subtle however, as I do not want to create yet another force of Chaos Marines with loads of Possessed, but instead only hint at the chaotic taint of this renegade, but not evil chapter. For this purpose I still have some bitz from the Mutation sprue lying around, and I'm sure I can come up with some sculpts myself using a bit of greenstuff.

I will be sticking as closely as possible to the few available artwork images there are of this interesting chapter. My main guides will be the following pictures:



The Marines in the background of this image will serve as reference when I assemble mine. Once I get around to it and find suitable bitz, I will also start an involved conversion of Chapter Master Sarpedon (in arachnoid form), but this will have to wait a little.



This image will be the reference to recreate the very cool character of Luko. I already ordered all the required bitz from various online sellers to be able to recreate him as faithfully as possible.

I am very much looking forward to this project and I hope some of you guys are as psyched about this chapter as I am. I hope I can do our imagination of it justice. Your feedback and input on the stuff in here, as well as on the lore of the chapter in general, would be much appreciated. Also, I would be very grateful for important pointers on the characters appearance, equipment and important details, so I can be as precise as possible in recreating them. I hope some of you will check in here every now and then and help me out if you can! If I have piqued your interest, please subscribe and stop by once in a while to leave me a comment Until then, have a great time hobbying and stay safe!

This message was edited 6 times. Last update was at 2023/09/22 19:43:32


   
Made in gb
Lord of the Fleet






London

Looks like a good project. I'm not familiar with the Soul Drinkers so will be interesting to see the final result
   
Made in at
Bounding Assault Marine






Austria, Segmentum Solar

Thanks for the comment Valkyrie! I hope you will enjoy

While waiting for the bitz for Luko and the tacticals to arrive, I have been trying to figure out how to go about converting Sarpedon. So far, I managed to find a perfect Bolter, as well as some suitable arms and a torso that will serve as a base for the conversion. The head might come from the tactical box. Pics to follow.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2020/12/12 15:40:09


   
Made in gb
Calculating Commissar






Reading, Berks

Oh nice. I did like the Soul Drinker novels

Are you sticking to GW parts for conversions, or are you open to other bits?

   
Made in at
Bounding Assault Marine






Austria, Segmentum Solar

Thanks for the comment endtransmission! Regarding bitz, I am open to pretty much any supplier to achieve the look I am going for! However, I do like GW stuff because I know the common base sizes and that helps me gauge if a specific part will be the right size for the conversion, which can be a little hit and miss with other sellers. Still, I wont rule anything out.

   
Made in gb
Fighter Ace





Edinburgh

It’s the Feisty! This should be good then I really like Mk 5 armour in general, I was pondering a small force but will quite happily watch yours instead.

I didn’t really like the Soul Drinker stories myself but it’s definitely a cool hobby concept!

   
Made in gb
Calculating Commissar






Reading, Berks

I was thinking of the Wargames Atlantic plastic spiders for the legs https://wargamesatlantic.com/collections/classic-fantasy/products/giant-spiders?variant=31822692057186

   
Made in at
Bounding Assault Marine






Austria, Segmentum Solar

Thanks for the comments guys!
Ragsta: Thanks for your faith in my abilities I hope they will turn out good! I am currently reading book 6 (Phalanx) of the Soul Drinkers series and I gotta say, I preferred the first 3 books, but still I wanna see how the story ends. However, I will be basing my collection around some time in the first or second book. If you don’t like Ben Counters writing, may I ask which books you would recommend (40k wise)? I am always on the lookout for some great fluff/lore to read when I can’t hobby

endtransmission Thanks for the heads up! Man, the spiders do look really nice… but a whole squad for 30 bucks…. I dunno. I really only need one, but then again, I might reuse the rest as DND enemies for a campaign with my friends… tough choice. I will have to think about it more!

Also, let me show you some stuff I got coming in the mail! All this stuff will be used to create Sgt Luko. Check out the parts:













I’ve created a photoshop mockup of what I have in mind. Putting all the parts together, he will look something like this:



Keep in mind though, that this is of course not the intended pose. It will hopefully be way more dramatic and dynamic than that Also, some more detail will have to be changed or added on later using greenstuff, e.g. the winged chalice necklace/chain etc. I hope I will manage to make them look right! Anyways, looking forward to your feedback as always! Cheers!





   
Made in at
Bounding Assault Marine






Austria, Segmentum Solar

Hey there! Time to show you guys some progress on the assembly of my Soul Drinkers force!

Let's start with the main man, Sergeant Luko himself! I am very happy with how the bitz came together and I think I captured his character pretty well. Take a look:















I still have to add some detail to him with greenstuff and cabling, but the rough work is done and the pose is final I hope you like him. Next up, let's take a look at the regular dudes in the squad. Well, regular as far as that word applies to a Marine of the Soul Drinkers, right?





This dude has a claw/pincer from the old mutation sprue as left arm.







Tha squads Plasma gunner. The Soul Drinkers use many Plasmaguns in the lore. The MKV legs are so great to break up the tactical squad, especially since they have so many great and varied leg poses.







This guy also has a mutated arm from the mutations sprue, this time a tentacle.











Finally, a running dude with awesome MkV legs. I definately have to get more of these kits. So that's 6 Marines down, which means 9 more to go. And then I'll have to get painting Anyways, i hope you like what I have assembled so far and I'm looking forward to your input, as always! Until next time, take care!




   
Made in gb
Ancient Venerable Dreadnought






The MkV bits really give a unique feel to the Marines. I can’t wait to see them get some paint

Goberts Gubbins - P&M Blog, started with Oldhammer, often Blackstone Fortress and Void Panther Marines, with side projects along the way 
   
Made in at
Bounding Assault Marine






Austria, Segmentum Solar

Thanks gobert!

   
Made in at
Bounding Assault Marine






Austria, Segmentum Solar

Hello guys!

Just wanted to share some progress on the squad so far. Didn't get too much work done, but I think I made a few cool, characterful conversions that I wanna show off Let's jump right into it!



This guy is growing a second head, which means he can't wear his helmet anymore! I really like the mutated head bit and was looking forward to using it. Looks so sick and twisted, and I like the facial expression. Kinda seems like this marine isn't too happy about the "boon" bestowed upon him
I think I achieved a believable pose after some cutting and adjusting. Here's another shot from a different angle:



Alright, moving on to the next guy: another one with a mutated head. He has grown a horn in the middle of his forehead, so no helmet for him anymore. Unless of course, he goes for a Hellboy-style trim



Note that on every Marine, I try to use one part with molecular bonding studs, to give the army a cohesive appearance.



One more Marine, this one without any (immediately obvious) mutations:



Mostly made from the tactical box, except for MKV helmet and Boltgun.



Ok, that's it for the regular dudes. I do have one more WIP mini I really wanna show you though. Check it out:



If you are familiar with the Soul Drinkers novels, I'm sure you'll be able to guess who this fella is supposed to be when he's done If you click to open the image, you can cheat and see his name already
This guy got a huge arm from the mutations set. I carefully cut and bent every finger into shape to make it look like he was holding a huge axe in one hand. I will have to do some cleanup and filling on the fingers especially.
The axe came from some Space Wolf set, probably the Terminators I'm guessing. The arm will be blended in with the armor using greenstuff to make it look as if it had burst out suddenly.



I'll have to order a head for him too. I already have something in mind. One of the SW Grey Slayer heads would be awesome and a perfect fit. Pics to follow. We'll see how it goes.

Alright, that's it for this quick update. Feel free to let me know what you think in the comments! Until next time!



This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2020/12/28 21:11:48


   
Made in at
Bounding Assault Marine






Austria, Segmentum Solar

Ok so I just wanna show you the head I have planned for the mini above. It's this one:



It's from the SW Grey Slayers conversion set from Forge World and I think it's the perfect match for the character I'm trying to build. Unfortunately, I haven't found a site where they sell it separately and I don't think it's worth it to buy the whole kit just for one head. If any of you have this head or know where I could get it, let me know. If you have a spare one and are willing to help me out, PM me

I also made a quick mockup of what he would look like with the head. Please don't judge my photoshop skills, I just hastily slapped this together in 2 minutes with a free online photo editor



Oh well. I guess I'll have to keep my eyes peeled. Maybe I can find a used lot with that head somewhere. Let me know what you think


   
Made in at
Bounding Assault Marine






Austria, Segmentum Solar



Hey there! I’m back with some pictures! While I do have to admit that I didn’t really get any work done on my Soul Drinkers force in the mean time (as I was working on other projects), I still have one miniature to show you that is at least semi-relevant to this thread. Although I didn’t work on any conversions for my army, I nevertheless started to think about a sensible paint recipe to apply to my Soul Drinkers force once they are assembled. I decided that my paint scheme had the following requirements:

- Quick, using relatively few steps to get squads done in a reasonable amount of time
- Simple so as to be easily repeatable across the whole army
- Versatile, so as to allow certain characters to receive additional detail deviating from the standard recipe
- Dark, meaning no overly bright or flashy colours, using a more muted palette
- Grim and somewhat realistic, meaning the option to add detail like blood splatter without it looking goofy
- Lore accurate, which ties into the above points in being a very rich, dark purple colour and kind of gritty paint scheme

With all those requirements in mind, I came up with the following steps:

- Basecoat whole mini in Naggaroth Night
- Add shade using Nuln Oil with pin washing technique in recesses
- Drybrush whole mini with a custom mixed paint which is about 8 parts Xereus Purple to 1 part pure white (non GW)
- Then, block out the metallic parts with Leadbelcher. Important here: as shown in the artwork, Soul Drinkers often leave the fingers of their gauntlets unpainted, so these are also basecoated in Leadbelcher in this step.
- Wash all metallic parts with Nuln Oil
- Paint aquila (and possible details on officers/characters) in Shining Gold
- Wash golden areas with Agrax Earthshade. If I want, I might then go back over them with a slight drybrush to pick up the detail even more.
- Paint the trim of the pauldrons in Ushabti Bone, as stated in the official lore. Also, any details and freehand motif are painted on in this colour during this step. Additionally, any models featuring a “normal” or relatively “healthy” skin tone also have all their skin basecoated with this colour.
- Finally, wash the skin areas with Reikland Fleshshade to add shadows and tint the whole surface a little.
- This step is the end of the basic recipe for standard troops, but also represents the jumping-off point for more involved paintjobs on the more important character models.

I came up with this recipe by test painting a Primaris Space Marine Assault Intercessor, mostly because that was a mini I had lying around from some other conversion project. Now, please keep in mind that this is just a test mini, and the actual army will not include any Primaris Marines, because I’m trying to stay true to the lore and also there are more conversion bitz available for the Firstborn Marines at this time. However, I must admit that I had a lot of fun painting the Assault Intercessor, and I might consider doing some Ultima-founding Soul Drinkers at a later stage that are independent of the rest of the army. But I think I’ve rambled on for long enough, so let me show you the result of the first test paintjob right now:



I gotta say, I’ve really come to like the Assault Intercessor set, because it contains ten awesome, bulky Space Marines in very dynamic poses and it is just a joy to assemble and paint due to its super-neat sprues. However, I just do not like the new helmet style, so I had to swap the head out for a more sinister one on this mini. The head is actually from an older CSM set, with the top knot removed. The use of Chaos Marine parts on the Soul Drinkers is a nice nod to both their look in the official artwork, as well as to the fate that befalls them in the novels, so I’m very happy with the head choice



Oh, please ignore the too small base on this chap. I know he is supposed to go on a 32mm, but I didn’t have any around for some reason and I just needed some form of base to put the mini down or have something to hold on to. I will rebase him as soon as I get the appropriate base size from my home. Also, don’t mind the blank pauldrons. I have bought some 3D printed chapter symbols that will be glued on all the other proper Soul Drinkers I make, but this mini was pretty much just a proof of concept. Here’s a detail shot of the freehand chalice symbol on the Marine’s right knee guard:



The right arm might get some more attention, like picking out the little techy gribbly bitz on his wrist mounted cogitator-thing. Also, I still have to come up with a good way of filling up the right pauldron on all my Marines. Normally, codex-compliant chapters add the squad markings there, but this is something you see very rarely in the official artwork of the Soul Drinkers chapter. Often times, they feature the studded typed of pauldrons on the right side, so this can and will be used for some of the Marines. For the others, I’m considering adding the markings in black instead of bone, so they are much less striking and distracting from a distance. We’ll see I guess.



Note how the Marine’s hand and wrist armour plates are purple, but the finger sections are metallic, as depicted on many of the official artwork images. It’s a little detail I find very cool, and I want to set my army apart from others by paying attention to these subtle differences. Another thing I might consider doing is painting the blade housings of the chainswords in Khorne Red, as this is also sometimes shown in the artwork and might fit the look of my army, though I’m not yet 100% sure about that step yet.



The slightly brightened Xereus Purple paint I mixed is a good highlight for the Naggaroth Night base layer, because it is just a subtle increase in brightness and saturation. This means that the drybrushing will not leave a noticeably dusty surface, but the effect is enough to nicely highlight the edges of the plate armour quickly and easily. It is also very forgiving, so even if I mess up with a bright colour like the bone white, I can easily go over the mistake using pure Naggaroth Night and have it fixed in no time.



Adding in detail like the soft under armour was also very easy, as all it took was blocking it out in Leadbelcher and then adding a heavy wash of Nuln Oil to blend the material back in with the rest of the suit.


And that’s all I have to show you for now! I hope you like this paint experiment and I would love to hear your thoughts and input on this first miniature. I’m looking forward to your comments and feedback! Until next time!













   
Made in fi
Longtime Dakkanaut






The scheme is pretty clean and your paintjob does it justice. Do you intend to keep the white bits bright like that or perhaps tinted more yellow, like in the source material pictures?

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Made in at
Bounding Assault Marine






Austria, Segmentum Solar

Thanks Sherrypie! Actually, I did use an off-white / bone white paint (GW Ushabti Bone) for these areas. However, I see where you're coming from, because in the photos it looks much whiter than in person! It probably because I took the pictures in very bright daylight. Just for reference, the cloth backdrop the Marine is standing on is actualls also tan, even though it seems white in the pics! Might have to retake them I guess. Hope that answers your question, thanks again for commenting!

   
Made in gb
Fighter Ace





Edinburgh


It really is some lovely painting. The finished figure looks really good! The other builds will no doubt come out awesome.

Man, I do love that Mk 5 helmet. If I ever get round to redoing my Brazen Guard I can see studded armour in their future.

   
Made in gb
Ancient Venerable Dreadnought






You’ve created a really cool and effective scheme Feisty. Hopefully the studs don’t make the drybrushing harder. I take it they’ll be metallic?

Goberts Gubbins - P&M Blog, started with Oldhammer, often Blackstone Fortress and Void Panther Marines, with side projects along the way 
   
Made in gb
Fighter Ace





Edinburgh

Re. your dry brushing - consider using make up brushes if you are worried about the consistency and quality of application.

I find they are more forgiving and leave less streaks and splodges than the usual dedicated dry brushes.

   
Made in at
Bounding Assault Marine






Austria, Segmentum Solar

Thanks gobert and Ragsta! Glad you like the paint scheme! Yes, the studs will indeed be metallic. Should be no problem since they will be painted over AFTER ther drybrushing stage, so they should come out relatively clean! regarding the makup brushes, I've heard about that. Depending on the price, i might have to give that technique a try!

Since my last post, a Drider mini I ordered arrived in the mail and I got back to working on this Soul Drinkers project, namely Chapter Master Sarpedon himself! The conversion is coming along nicely, will post pics soon thank you so much for your interest and input in this thread!

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/09/23 19:21:14


   
Made in at
Bounding Assault Marine






Austria, Segmentum Solar


Hello again! As promised, today I will show you a few WIP snapshots of the next and most important character of this Soul Drinkers force I am currently working on: Chapter Master Sarpedon himself. Before I show you the actual mini, let’s take one more look at the amazing and iconic piece of artwork by Adrian Smith that inspired and guided this conversion:



I really love this picture and it is one of the best pieces of 40k artwork for me to this day, because IMHO it really gets across that impression of the Space Marines being superhuman, awe-inspiring warriors as represented in the lore. I’m really having a hard time thinking of any image from the present-day range of 40k artwork that embodies 40k as much as this older one, and I really miss the old style of GW. All nostalgia aside, let’s keep this image in mind as I now show you the miniature I’m currently in the process of creating from it. As with the rest of my army, I decided to depict him post-mutation with his arachnid lower body, but the upper half of the figure is meant to be as close to the artwork as possible. Here’s where I’m at currently:



I went through multiple iterations of spider miniatures to find the ideal one to recreate my vision of this iconic character. I tried anything from fake halloween toy spiders to actual quality tabletop figures, until I finally arrived at this version. For those of you who are interested, the spider body was taken from a Drider miniature from the “Nolzur’s Marvelous Miniatures” line, and it is a damn fine fit, both scale-wise as well as from a quality, detail and appearance perspective. The good thing about this miniature is that, being a Drider, it has an ideal transition from a humanoid torso to an arachnid lower body that I was able to incorporate nicely into my Sarpedon conversion. Although the miniature comes fully preassembled (and even primed!), it was as easy as clipping off the Drider torso to make room for the Space Marine upper body. As you surely have already noticed, I used a Primaris Space Marine body for this conversion. I made this decision for multiple reasons. Firstly, I wanted Chapter Master Sarpedon to be imposing, as described in the lore, so I decided the slightly bigger torso would give him just the edge I needed and also match the scale of the lower body a little better. Secondly, the tassets of the Primaris armor helped a lot in creating a smooth transition from the upper to the lower body, and allowed me to hide any imperfections the conversion process might create on the attachment point. It took me a little while to get the attachment point to just the right shape for the upper body to sit perfectly flush, but in the end, I was very happy with the result. I’m sure that an appropriate paintjob will do the rest of the work hiding the joint. Another thing I should mention is that the left arm on this miniature is magnetized and can be removed:



This was done to allow me to depict Sarpedon with any loadout I want. In the books, he mostly uses an artificer Boltgun as his main ranged weapon, which is why his right arm with the gun is glued firmly in place already. However, his melee weapons vary a bit depending on which novel of the series you’re looking at. In the first few novels, he uses a regular force staff as seen on many other librarians. However, this staff gets broken in one of the later novels, and he replaces it with a force axe taken from Mercaeno, an opposing librarian of the Howling Griffons chapter. Finally, Sarpedon also uses the Soulspear, a rare archeotech artefact weapon with dual vortex blades in a few rare instances. These three weapons are the ones I’m planning to make for this miniature, and they are the reason why I magnetized the left arm. Initially, I had planned to magnetize the hand at the wrist, but I soon noticed that this would cause issues with the pose since all three weapons would kind of require a different arm position in general. Since I’m currently neither short on extra arms, pauldrons or magnets, I decided to take this approach instead.



In this picture you have a better view of the right arm and boltgun. I decided on a Khorne Berzerker arm and gun since they both were very close to the artwork. I had to shave off some of the chaos decorations and iconography, but other than that, the weapon is nearly a perfect match. Another thing I should mention about the pose is that the raised front legs of the Drider lower body caused several issues and interfered with pretty much every sensible pose I could come up for the upper body. For this reason, I had to actually clip off three of the frontal legs, pin them and reattach them to the body at slightly lower angles. This has thankfully given me enough room to create a more natural-looking pose for Sarpedon’s upper body.



This rear view gives you another look at the joint between the upper and lower halves of the body. To further decorate the mini and hide some of the imperfections, additional details will be added to his belt. The lore mentions him having a golden Chalice hanging there, and the cover art confirms this and also shows some additional grenades on his belt.



The left arm shown in the images above will most likely be used for the force axe loadout I mentioned earlier, once I get my hands on a suitable, decent-looking axe for that purpose. Note that at this point, the head (which came from the Primaris Assault Intercessors kit) is not yet glued down. This has been avoided so far in order to allow me to recreate the aegis cowl of his armor without having to fiddle around with the already glued down head and making things more complicated than they need to be.

That’s all for now. I hope you like where this conversion is going and I would love to read your feedback and input on this mini, or any of the previous creations in this thread. Thanks for checking this out, catch you later!
















   
Made in at
Bounding Assault Marine






Austria, Segmentum Solar


Hello guys! Back after a long time with an update on the Soul Drinkers! Since the last post, quite a lot has happened, and I’d like to share some progress with you.
Recently I got back into painting my Soul Drinkers force while simultaneously reading up on their lore in any of the remaining spare time I can muster. I am reading all the books and taking notes on all the relevant information on important characters and squads mentioned. Basically, I’m creating a compendium of data on every major character in the series, which I will then be able to use to create accurate representations of them with the miniatures. I’m currently almost done with book two, after which I will move on to book three. The first three books I consider the most important works influencing this project, since I want my Soul Drinkers force to be post-mutation, but still early enough in the storyline to feature most/all of the important characters before they get killed off (eg Sgt. Givrillian, Sgt. Tellos etc.).
Now, I’m happy to announce that, after a longer break from painting Soul Drinkers, I recently got back to working on them and I just managed to finish the first ten-man squad of this force, namely Tactical Squad Luko. Yay! While I would love to show them to you already, I’m afraid I will first have to take them to my parent’s house, where I have my photo setup, because I really want the pictures to be of a higher quality than the WIP shots. But if you are interested in Soul Drinkers stuff, definitely stay tuned because there will be a picture dump at some point in the near future.

Furthermore, since the completion of this squad has very much reinvigorated my motivation to build, convert and paint more Soul Drinkers, and since the holidays are coming up, I decided to treat myself and so I ordered some more Space Marines for kitbashing and conversions. First off, I bought another set of Tactical Marines and a 5-strong squad of Assault Marines. To make them fit in with the rest of my force that’s already done, I also had to get some more Mk. V Assault Marines from Forge World to provide conversion parts with studs on them. You know, these guys:



I will once again be mixing and matching the suit parts to replicate the armour style often shown in official artwork, with studs on multiple pieces for most Marines.
Another set I ordered for this army was the GW Tactical Marines in Mark IV armour. These will be perfect for my purposes because they already feature random parts with studs attached. Check it out:





Pretty dang awesome. Only thing I will have to worry about here is finding some of the more recent, regular Mk. VII helmets, which should not be a problem considering the other squads I ordered alongside this one. Some Marines - i.e. the more mutated ones - will also be helmetless again, which should also help.
Finally, I also ordered some random mutation parts from an online bitz seller. While not exactly cheap, it is still way cheaper and easier to buy only the bitz you need from certain sets compared to getting all the boxes individually for full retail. I found some very cool and flavourful conversion parts, and I can’t wait to receive them and start converting and kitbashing with them. It will be so much fun!

Alright then, I think I rambled on long enough. Now let’s get to the pictures of some actual progress!
Let’s start off with an important character from the book: Sergeant Graevus. I already showed this guy to you, but I was finally able to source the head I wanted and added it to the mini. Here’s what he looks like now:



I’m very happy with how the head looks. It’s basically exactly how I imagined Graevus, the grizzled veteran, when he was described in the books.





I still need to fill in some runes on the power axe and add some extra equipment to the miniature probably, but other than that he’s mostly completed. Next up, a Marine with flamer. The Soul Drinkers make ample use of special weapons, especially flamers and plasmaguns.





Another Marine, this one with a boltgun. I tried to give him a different, “tacticool” pose if you will, for which I used one of the combat knives from a FW weapon upgrade set I bought a while ago.





Of course, I had to make some Marines with mutations too. Well, actually, all Soul Drinkers are mutating in the lore, it’s just more immediately obvious with some than others. The next guy has a mutated, club-like fist for a right hand. To tie the mutation in with the rest of the figure, I also added some greenstuff horns that started growing from his shoulder until they burst through the shoulder pad. Hope they will come out nice once painted. Keep in mind that all these Marines I’m showing you are tacticals, hence this guy also has a boltgun.







As you can probably tell, I used a Khorne Berzerker Left arm on this guy for the pose and to add some variety. The next Marine also has a mutation from the old mutations sprue, this time a toothed maw for a left hand.







Finally, time for another special character and leader of this tactical squad, Sergeant Givrillian! For those of you who have not read the story, Sgt Givrillian was the leader of a tactical squad and he had a large facial scar from a shrapnel blast which took out half his jaw. During the mutations the chapter underwent, Givrillian’s scar also started to change. It broke open again, and underneath four additional eyes emerged.



I actually went in and tried to model these on the miniature, which was quite fiddly. First I had to chop away most of the chin and then I had to sculpt tiny orbs into the opening.



They didn’t come out amazing, but I’m guessing that with some help from the paintjob, I will be able to make them look decent.



Finally, here’s a closeup of the additional sculpted detail on Givrillian’s face and chest plate. I tried to sculpt on a chalice onto the chest to break up the smooth surface, and I’m satisfied with the result. Again, some paint should help a lot here.



And that’s it for the new stuff! I hope you enjoyed and I hope you will be interested in the upcoming pictures of some fully painted Marines. Thanks for checking this out! As usual, feel free to leave comments and feedback, I’m always excited to read your thoughts on this stuff Until next time!




















   
Made in gb
Ancient Venerable Dreadnought






Great post feisty, hopefully we get to see the painted drinkers soon. The mix of bits on the next squad looks really cool, the MkV stuff works really well, especially the studded helmet. I reckon some paint will sell the sculpting on Givrillian, it sounds a rather grim mutation. The question it raises is whether he can see out of the eyes or whether it’s something else looking through them!?Hopefully you’ve fixed the mould line on the flamer, wouldn’t want that to detract!

Goberts Gubbins - P&M Blog, started with Oldhammer, often Blackstone Fortress and Void Panther Marines, with side projects along the way 
   
Made in at
Bounding Assault Marine






Austria, Segmentum Solar

Hey gobert, thanks for your input! Glad you like the stuff so far! That's an interesting point you raised about the mutated eyes! It's never really dicussed in any detail in the book, but sounds like a pretty sinister mutation to have if it enables some warp entity to secretly see through your eyes.
Oh, and never mind the mould lines, they were all removed right after these pictures were taken

   
Made in at
Bounding Assault Marine






Austria, Segmentum Solar


Hi! As promised, I’m back with pictures! Luckily I was able to squeeze in a quick photo session during a short visit at my parent’s house, so now I can finally show you the first squad in all it’s painted glory Warning, picture dump incoming!





































And a group shot of the first combat squad together:



And the rest of the squad will have to wait until tomorrow as I’m typing this in a bit of a rush…. I do hope you enjoyed today’s stuff and I’m looking forward to reading your comments. If you know anyone who really likes the Soul Drinkers and their lore, consider pointing them to this thread as I’m always interested to hear people’s thoughts and I would love to know how hardcore fans like the miniatures I have created for this chapter. Alright then, see you guys in the next post tomorrow. Until then, thanks for checking this out!





















   
Made in gb
Ancient Venerable Dreadnought






Nice work Feisty! The double face dude is my favourite, he really looks like he’s glitched in the warp of some such.

Goberts Gubbins - P&M Blog, started with Oldhammer, often Blackstone Fortress and Void Panther Marines, with side projects along the way 
   
Made in gb
Fighter Ace





Edinburgh

Gorgeous effort, really really nice painting and modelling results, mate.

   
Made in at
Bounding Assault Marine






Austria, Segmentum Solar

Hi guys! Thanks gobert and Ragsta for your kind words! Glad you liked the Soul Drinkers I showed you so far! Now as promised, today we’ll take a look at the second half of the tactical squad:































Finally, time for the squad leader, Sergeant Luko himself! I tried to stay true to the artwork of him from the cover of the third novel, “Crimson Tears”:











And since no update would be complete without a proper group shot:




So that’s it for now! I hope you liked the rest of the squad as well, and I’m curious to read your impressions of the squad as a whole. Thanks a lot for checking this out! Stay tuned for more Soul Drinkers stuff in the future! Until next time!













This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/12/21 06:47:05


   
Made in at
Bounding Assault Marine






Austria, Segmentum Solar

It' been ages since my last update in this thread. The reason for this is that I shared most of the progress on my Soul Drinkers project on my Instagram profile (grimdark_nostalgic), but not here on Dakka where the project started out. However, I want to adress this issue now and post all the new stuff here as well, for the sake of completion and sharing with any non insta users who are still interested.

First off, let me give you a rough outline of my plan for the army (in spoiler), and which parts are already finished:
Spoiler:
✅ Tactical Squad Luko
10 Marines

✅ Tactical Squad Givrillian
10 Marines

✅ Assault Squad Graevus
10 Marines

❌ Assault Squad Tellos
10 Marines

❌ Scout Squad Eumenes
~5 Scouts

❌ Karraidin's Sternguard Veteran Squad
5 Marines

❌ Dreadnought Daenyathos

Command Squad
✅ Commander Sarpedon
✅ Captain Karraidin
❌ Apothecary Pallas
❌ Techmarine Lygris
❌ Chaplain Iktinos
❌ Librarian Tyrendian

❌ Additional characters: A variety of characters from the novels to give me some list building options and go crazy with conversions

potentially even a Thunderhawk Gunship if I'm feeling crazy nevermind, I checked the price and it's not happening. I am however considering a Stormraven Gunship instead, as kind of a nod to the novels. Seeing as it retails for a tenth of the price of a Thunderhawk, that plan is a lot more realistic.

As you can tell from the army list, I got quite some stuff done. Since sharing the pics of squad Luko with you, I have also finished the second tactical squad for this army, namely tactical squad Givrillian. Additionally, I also finished Assault Squad Graevus recently. I also managed to complete some important characters of the chapter, like Captain Karraidin, Sergeant Tellos and even Commander and Chief Librarian Sarpedon himself. There's still some things to do, but I already have assembled a sizeable force that I am quite proud of. But now let's get to the part you are most likely here for: pictures!

Today I want to start off with the first half of Tactical squad Givrillian, which you have seen before in an unpainted state. Here they are now, in their finished state:



















































Finally, time for a group shot:



And that's it for today! Hope you all like today's update. Stay tuned for more as I will be uploading all of the finished stuff over the next couple of days. I'd love it If you stopped by to check it out. Until then






This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2023/09/22 21:19:52


   
Made in gb
Ancient Venerable Dreadnought






Man, those are sweet! Love the smattering of Mk5 heresy armour and of course the mutations. The bolts on Red Skulls head are really cool. I’ve also been tempted by a thunderhawk, but the cost is eye watering. The Stormraven is still a big ship, bigger than a Land Raider I reckon so still a cool centre piece

Not sure why but I can’t find you on insta, even copying the @feistyrips doesn’t seem to work

Goberts Gubbins - P&M Blog, started with Oldhammer, often Blackstone Fortress and Void Panther Marines, with side projects along the way 
   
 
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