Battle Damaged Berserker

This miniature began life as a test for modelling battle damage. Somehow it seemed appropriate that it become a Berserker - you can imagine them continuing to fight, being at the forefront of an assault as the enemy desperately blaze away! I've tried to model him in a fairly relaxed pose; The battle is over, he's got his prize and his neural implants have deactivated. Are his wounds finally catching up with him, or is it instead a moment of reflection?




I've attempted to model a mix of different types of damage: There is projectile damage, which was done by drilling a small hole and then shaving outwards from the rim with a craft knife, and I also carved some runnels to represent glancing shots or even melee damage. Finally, I added some GS to his chest plate and left knee to make it look like the armour had been hit by some kind of energy or heat weapon and melted! Iacton over at the Greatcrusade offered some great advice on painting armour damage, starting with a darker grey colour and then using lighter shades on the bottom of the hollow to make it look like its catching the light, and I've attempted to use that here.

I added a single arterial blood splatter accross his chest, perhaps from the final and killing blow on the poor unfortunate who's head he now carries in his hand! The head is from the WFB zombie sprue (which has a great selection of gormless looking heads for things like this!) with GS used for the hair.

WIP Assault troopers

I've previously posted pictures of a completed assault trooper utilising the new pre-heresy components from Maxmini, but I thought that it might be beneficial to post pictures of how they look unpainted, and with their components labelled:



Both models are comprised of Chaos Berserker torsos (with iconography removed) standard marine assault troop legs, and a mix of loyalist and traitor weaponry. Both of the shoulder pads have had studs added (see the mk5 armour tutorial), and I have greenstuffed the chainmail. I think this adds a slightly more archaic/barbaric look to the marines, which combined with the mk3 helmet and giant turbofans of the Maxmini jump pack makes their equipment to be longstanding issue of the legion since the earlier days of the Crusade, and contrasts with the more recent recruits into the legion who sport mk4 armour and a more streamlined jump pack.

The small sticks on the back of jump packs are just their for the convenience of painting!

Terminator Squad Wavranka

On the wide open, wind swept and irradiated deserts of Konos III the few terminator suits of the 591st expedition had little direct application. Originally built several centuries earlier as the 'Cobra' designation exo-suits, designed for use in high pressure atmospheres, and then later partly modified with the latest 'Cataphracti' reactive armour design, the Terminators under Sergeant Wavranka took part in few actions during the compliance of Konos III; Their one notable involvement was their teleporting within the command headquarters of the Southern Confederacy during the final assault of that campaign. Sergeant Wavranka later received some condemnation from elements of the Imperial Army and expedition for failing to leave any survivors from amongst the ruling legislature during the assault, although notably there was no official reprimand from within the Legion itself nor from Commander of the Fleet Borya.





These miniatures are comprised of both loyalist and chaos terminators, although for the most part most of the chaos iconography has been removed - I did however leave a little bit on to represent both the more 'barbaric' look of some of the terminators in Collected Visions and perhaps to create the slight allusion that these marines are not quite so squeaky clean as they might once have been.

The shoulder pads are resin casts from a website called Wookiehole* with some extra studs added, and the storm bolters of the marines have been modified to a magazine fed rather than belt fed weapon, (along with a single barrel) to differentiate them from later weapon developments. The sergeant, perhaps due to his position, wields a prototype storm bolter.

The chainmail is greenstuff, and I've added a slight amount of weapon damage to represent the few shots which hit home during the assault in the campaign named above! Finally, the helmets are shaved down berserker helms, which are markedly similar to the 'Cobra' pattern helmets found on some of the early Rogue Trader-era terminator miniature seen below:



This is not only a reference to the Rogue Trader influence running through Collected Visions, but also helps mark the suits as being a direct descendant of the exo-armour suits from which terminator armour was originally derived.

*Sadly Wookiehole doesn't seem to be offering it services at the time of writing, although this could be something to do with its owner being in the process of opening a new Bricks and Mortar store in Aldershot, UK (Click here to be taken to that website). They are a great addition for pre-heresy modellers however, and hopefully they will become available again at some point in the future!
++EDIT++ I've just heard that the website above will be stocking the above parts at the end of August, so great news!