The Iron Winds

[IronWinds]

So with the exception of some tanks, a few HQs, and super heavies I painted most of my army a long time ago... and my painting skills were not the greatest. Not to long ago I redid my custom demon prince, and have started on new CSMs squads for my infantry. They aren't exactly eavy metal quality but they are a huge improvement over the minis I use to have. This will be a somewhat slow process. I just spent $200 on new troops and bits to customize them so I have a lot of painting to do over the next few weeks.

First off. My custom demon prince. The old model was a marine mounted on top of a necron destroyer body with tomb spyder legs. Everyone loved him, but I did get the occasional 'that looks like a necron' or that is to small to be a demon prince. So I decided to use plasticard to square off the body making it look less necron, and used guides I've found on making things true-scale to make the marine part of the body significantly bigger.

The result....

I didn't see the hair on his base till later, that is not part of the model.

My goal was a fusion of marine, demon, and machine. For the armies fluff he was mortally wounded, and instead of mounting him in a dreadnought they fashioned this for him. Its a mechanical body powered by a demon. He has a mark of tzeench on an easy to remove piece of plasticard so I can change his mark at will. When its not tzeench(a shield generator), its Slaanesh(improved sensors).

Opinions? Most importantly... does he look like a Necron? I already know size wise he is as big as the actual DP model so no one can complain about that again.

[BrotherAtrox]

Goal achieved. I don't think it looks like a Necron at all. The plasticard/GS work fixes that just fine.

 

A big fan of this conversion as it retains the Marine-ness. The stock DP model is outlandishly overdone, theres more Demon - less Marine. Does that make sense?

[IronWinds]

A big fan of this conversion as it retains the Marine-ness. The stock DP model is outlandishly overdone, theres more Demon - less Marine. Does that make sense?

 

A lot of sense. In my armies fluff he isn't actually a prince though. He is more a very fast very big demon infused cyborg, just so happens a demon prince's statline shows that great.

 

Oh and the demonic gun thing is that while he doesn't have it now I would like to be able to put doombolt, bolt of change, or wind of chaos on him if I wanted.

[IronWinds]

Finished the first 5 chaos marines. I'm trying to make each marine as if he is the only model in the world at that moment. My goal is to have them all look VERY different from one another. They are chaos of course so in a way each marine is looking out for himself and will take whatever equipment best suits him.

Results so far. And I would love feedback on painting tips, and what you guys think of the bases.

First pic came out a little blurry.

He can out of ammo, so he quickly pulled out a knife.

He stole his bolter off a dead ultramarine, and instead of repainting it thought it would be a nice trophy weapon.

For some reason I just really love his bolter.

Feedback appreciated :wallbash: .

Edit: Forgot the last guy.

[mitchell93]

i think smurfs have red or black bolters but it looks cool anyway

 

the battle damage on the chain swords is great and the dp thingys arm looks gross (aka very good for chaos!)

 

the painting on the iron warriors is great so all round very good

[Prot]

Good for you Iron Winds. It's a labour of love and it shows.

 

I have gone back to my early Iron Warriors as well and I usually last about.... 5 models before I cave. I think part of the problem is the IW themselves aren't as fleshed out anymore...kind of a footnote in the current codex.

 

But it's a huge undertaking and I applaud you for giving it a shot. I'll be watching. :rolleyes:

[IronWinds]

Thanks for the input, I just finished #6 and all my SM bits came in so the rest will be a lot more chaos/SM mixed.

 

One question. Considering having a melta gunner holding 2 melta pistols instead of a meltagun. Anyone think that would be a WYSIWYG issue? If it is I'll just have a meltagun in one hand and a melta pistol in the other.

[mitchell93]

most people generally accept 2 pistol variants as the gun variant e.g. bolt pistols and boltgun

[IronWinds]

The next set of marines. I just started the first CombatSmith(champion) as well.

The other side of the sword says 'Blood' and has tallies for the IFs he has killed with the sword. The sword belonged to a IF sergeant that he killed and he keeps it as a trophy with trophy marks on it.

My melta gunner. I accidentaly created a visual illusion on his base. There are raised squares and I highlighted them all on the same side... well from above it made it look like they were actually lowered gratings as opposed to raised squares.

Has an imperial eagle chest that has been since desecrated, and a rather large bionic arm.

My other melta gunner.

I am going to do a guy with dual meltas, he will be in the following squad.

[BrotherAtrox]

Looking quite good. I especially like the claw arm on the 2nd-to-last Marine. How are you liking the pens?

 

Edit: Also - keep with the theme of making your battle trophies in a bright color. Your marines are sort of dark and gritty and the bright blues/yellows of the scavenged equipment makes them stand out more.

[Myxx]

I really like the knife wielding pose, very dynamic pose, definately looks like he grabbed the blade rather than a fresh mag. Also, the mechanical claw is a very nice, chaos-y conversion.

[IronWinds]

Looking quite good. I especially like the claw arm on the 2nd-to-last Marine. How are you liking the pens?

 

Edit: Also - keep with the theme of making your battle trophies in a bright color. Your marines are sort of dark and gritty and the bright blues/yellows of the scavenged equipment makes them stand out more.

 

 

I'm actually not using the pens as much as I thought I would. The smallest one stopped working. I have used the second smallest one to clean up hazard stripes. But for outlining the edge of the armor I just used a brush.

 

And in making them darker and grittier... I knew I would need to brighten them up. I hadn't intended the stolen weapons to to brighten them but it is working. Its also why I'm doing a lot more hazard stripes than I use to because from a distance the hazard stripes draw attention in a way rusty silver does not. The good thing is that in fluff the IWs have fought the IFs and the ultras more than any other loyal chapters so it gives me plenty of bright yellows and blues to throw in.

 

Just to increase the color pallet I'm considering throwing in a BA item or two, not just because you(Atrox) play BAs but because it gives me some red. I'm going to avoid salies or deathguard because I don't think green would fit.

 

I'm also thinking of getting a single sonic blaster(it will be in a bolter squad.. so I shouldn't have issues with it being another bolter) to throw in their somewhere to say they got it off an EC, and then a WE chainaxe but I don't think it will stand out at all since I'll also have zerkers in my list.

 

And thanks for the comments on the mechanical arm. I was going to do it with him holding it down, but decided it would look better if it looked like he was reaching up to grab my opposing player's neck... or even a carnifex. One of my older minis, the one squad I'm going to keep playing with actually has a marine with that arm using it to hold a guardsmen's head and the poor guardsmen is clawing at the arm with his hands trying to get free. So yea.. I really love that claw.

 

Thanks for the feedback.

[chaplain belisarius]

nice-makes me want to do an iron warriors army!

[IronWinds]

Thanks, you should start an IW army then ;) .

As promised, here is the CombatSmith(champion). Has a combi melta, power fist, and in my army servo arms are count as Icon of Chaos Glory... since IWs aren't all that religious.

And it will probably be a little while before my next new mini post. I might do a couple rhinos before more marines.

Edit: Got rid of the pictures of the old minis for comparisons. I honestly can't stand looking at them.

[RagingGriffon]

Which bionic arm did you use for the "rather large bionic arm" figure? All of your stuff looks great.

[IronWinds]

The one off the Warsmith model. The warsmith model holds is down, but it is easy to fit to any marine as an arm.

[Walter Payton]

How do you do your silver and yellow?

 

Great models.

[IronWinds]

Silver: Base black, then drybrush on boltgun metal thick enough that they are silver but still showing some black. Then drybrush on tin bitz just enough to give a dark rusty look. Highlight with myrthil silver.

 

 

Hazard stripes: Start black. Using skull white paint I outline where I want my hazard stripes. If there is anything I don't like about them this is the time to fix them. Once I like them I fill in the white lines with more white. So basically I do white hazard stripes first. This is also the time to go back with black and fill in corners/edges so you still have a clean line around the edges. Then I go over the white very lightly with yellow. Yellow shows up very well on white but almost not at all on black as long as you keep it light so even if you go out of the lines it is very easy to fix. Then I highlight one side of the yellow stripe with a thin white line. I also normally highlight the other side of the yellow line with codex grey but I ran out of paint and just got more.

 

 

Thanks for all the replies.

 

Maybe with the next champion I'll do a step by step.

[IronWinds]

Sorry took a break from painting. But as promised I did my second combatsmith bit by bit to show how I paint my IWs.

Base black then drybrush on boltgun metal.

Drybrush on tin bitz.

Highlight with silver.

Apply gold and gold highlights.

Filled in a couple spots with black and laid the white foundation for my hazard stripes.

Finished product!

Well not completely finished. I painted the power cable to the servo arm, and there are a few minor touch ups I plan to do later.

Hope you like it.