Renegade Knight Household WIP: Knight Despoiler

[I Am Forsaken]

I put a skull cannon barrel on a knight conversion years ago now, but I was never really happy with it as it came out far shorter than the battle cannon. I think they may be better suited to be the laser destructor from the chaos knight kit now, but I'd be keen to see what you come up with if you go that route. All your knights look awesome btw, keep up the great work.

[Bjorn Firewalker]

Excellent work on the Knights of Khorne.

[Sagentus]

Khorne will be most pleased with this with the skulls reaped by this household ... absolutely amazing work all round, from the conversion to the painting!! 

[Sgt. Blank]

I put a skull cannon barrel on a knight conversion years ago now, but I was never really happy with it as it came out far shorter than the battle cannon. I think they may be better suited to be the laser destructor from the chaos knight kit now, but I'd be keen to see what you come up with if you go that route. All your knights look awesome btw, keep up the great work.

 

Thanks for the feedback about the skull cannon bit - I'd be curious to see how it looks if you have a photo - I figured someone had done this before but can't find a picture. Honestly, from looking at pictures of the kit, I was a bit nervous it might be too big, so the insight into the scale is really helpful.

 

 

Excellent work on the Knights of Khorne.

 

Thanks Bjorn!

 

 

Khorne will be most pleased with this with the skulls reaped by this household ... absolutely amazing work all round, from the conversion to the painting!! 

 

Thanks Sagentus! That was the first time I'd seen them all together myself and I'm pretty pleased myself.

[I Am Forsaken]

Dug it out for you and snapped a quick one, turns out it is not as much shorter as I remembered it being. Also forget my thought about the laser destructor as it is actually bigger than both of them...., I also included a pre built thermal cannon I had laying around for scale if that helps.

 

Edited September 3, 2019 by I Am Forsaken

[Sgt. Blank]

Thanks, Forsaken, that's a really helpful photo.

 

I'm not quite sure what I am going to do yet, but I think the way you cut it, the scale concern looks good; the difference pretty negligible. I guess the standard cannon may look longer since its narrow and less crowded with details.

[Sgt. Blank]

It's been a little while since the last post here - part of that was just relaxing a bit after the ETL but part was due to working on some Khorne Berzerkers - or as my daughter calls them, the evil robot's minions.

 

Since the actual Berzerker kit is old enough to be a Veteran of the Long War itself, I converted and kitbashed from the Shadowspear CSM and the AoS Bloodbound starter set to get more chain axe - chain sword models. I've finished six so far with another six to go - here they are. The main notable conversion is the lower legs on the Bloodbound, since I used green stuff to make solid power armor greaves over the original boots. These six are finished and i've color blocked another six.

 

 

I have started work on the next Knight Despoiler as well - part of the delay since the last post was waiting on shipping for parts. Thanks to Forsaken's post, I pulled the trigger and bought two Skull Cannons - one job lot of a partial kit that I'm tearing down for parts (more on that later, probably) and one just the cannon itself. 

 

After getting my hands on the part, I decided it needed to look more like a battle cannon so I started cutting

 

 

 

to make this:

Yes, I cut up two Skull Cannons and Rapid Fire Battle Cannon gun barrels and only briefly regretted it. With the proper application of various tools, the battle cannon barrel can be made to fit inside the skull cannon (except for the Chaos star end, which I left off).

 

The Skull Cannon pictured was from the job lot and was already assembled when I got it off ebay while the other not yet glued. I tried this two ways - cutting in from the end on the assembled one and gutting the interior of the unassembled. I had more success with the end-on approach, since there's a lot of material to remove and I could use a power drill to do it faster SAFETY NOTE: drills will melt plastic if not used sparingly - aside from ruining your parts, it's not good to breath in the fumes.

 

I also tried rotating it 90 degrees so that the sloping part faces outward instead of top-ward

 

Nothing is glued yet, but I'm leaning toward that configuration since you can see more of the details that way and, as tall as it is compared to most other units, it ought to be more protected from that angle than from above. I'd appreciate some feedback though before I slap green stuff on and try to blend the parts in a bit.

 

I'm also subbiing in the Venomcrawler cannons for the stubbers on the weapon mounts.

 

Lastly, I also started on the upper carapace. I figured I'd play up the hunchback shape of the model by adding a different missile system - I had a 2nd ed. Whirlwind launcher sitting in my bitz box so it got a visit from the hacksaw and the launchers are now part of the Knight.

 

 

This is far from finished - I'm planning to cover launcher tubes with green stuff but hopefully you get the idea. The Venomcrawler spine bit is held on with poster tack but approximates what I'm intending once the launcher GS is done.

 

Thanks for looking - comments and critiques are very welcome.

Edited October 10, 2019 by Sgt. Blank

[I Am Forsaken]

battle cannon came out pretty good, i like what you've done with the normal barrell coming out the end better than what i did for it

[DuskRaider]

That cannon is the cat's meow. I LOVE the idea of using the Venomcrawler's back spine on a Knight carapace... hmmm... I may nick that idea, lol. Not too sure on the Missile Rack though. IMO it makes the carapace a little too busy. I'm sure you'll make it work.

[ElDuderino]

I love the latest finished knight! Very nice detailing on the front of the top carapace. The AoS shields works great on the thigh armor too.

 

And adding the smooth barrel to the skull cannon was a good move, looks more like a battle cannon that way

[Sgt. Blank]

battle cannon came out pretty good, i like what you've done with the normal barrell coming out the end better than what i did for it

 

Thanks - don't be too hard on your version though, it looks pretty good. Your comment about it looking short is kind of what gave me the idea - I think the width of the skull cannon may make it look shorter than it is so I figured i'd lengthen it somehow to compensate.

 

 

That cannon is the cat's meow. I LOVE the idea of using the Venomcrawler's back spine on a Knight carapace... hmmm... I may nick that idea, lol. Not too sure on the Missile Rack though. IMO it makes the carapace a little too busy. I'm sure you'll make it work.

 

Thanks  Dusk! Initially I'd thought of doing only one along the central spine with the Venomcrawler spine on top but after staring at the parts awhile I decided I liked this better. I do have a spare upper carapace if I didn't use on the knight on the first page, so worst case scenario I go with that. Honestly. your conversions are part of what pushed me in the direction of adding to the upper carapace, so I appreciate the feedback.

 

I love the latest finished knight! Very nice detailing on the front of the top carapace. The AoS shields works great on the thigh armor too.

 

And adding the smooth barrel to the skull cannon was a good move, looks more like a battle cannon that way

 

Thanks! It's a mix of green stuff and bitz on the front of the other one - I'm try something similar on this one but need to sort out the missile rack first I think. The AoS bits on the legs are actually the punch dagger type weapons from the bloodbound warriors kit. I had a lot spare from the Berzerker conversions.

[ElDuderino]

Oh, I thought those were just spiky shields. Which makes no sense since they're so small, now that I think about it:D I have a bunch in the bitz box too, they're great for spicing up flat areas on vehicles and such.

[Sgt. Blank]

Well, almost a month since my last post - I've been more distracted than usual with other things but I do have a bit of progress to share on the Despoiler.

 

As with the last one, I've been working on the exterior armor, since that's a lion's share of what will be visible on the completed model and a lot of what I've got in mind will involve several layers of green stuff. I've got several things on the go to make the most of the putty i'm mixing and the curing times.

 

Here's a shot of the very WIP upper armor. I've started adding the missile racks and begun altering the shoulder pad armor. Long ways to go yet but this gives an idea of the sort of shape I'm after. Basically, I'm trying to break up the lines of the original model to clearly demonstrate it's not an Imperial Knight.

 

 

Here are the shoulders from a side on view - I'm not very far along with these honestly - still filling gaps left from cutting but I'm planning to try to blend in the extra bits a lot better.

 

 

The greaves are the farthest along - nearly finished except some peripheral work on the original trim. With the extended armor, I don't think I'll add the knee pads.

 

 

And the Rapid-fire battle cannon with heavy stubber

 

Lastly, while I've got the green stuff mixed, I've been converting up a new Chaos Lord

 

I'd welcome any feedback on either of these projects. I'm hoping to pick up some steam now that the World Series is over and I've finally gotten a chance to catch up on sleep.

[Kolgrim DeathHowl]

Amazing conversions and sculpting, they look great!

[ElDuderino]

Knight looks good, a bit early to tell how it'll turn out, but I guess it'll be amazing as usual:)

 

Cool to see a WE too! I'd personally change the axe, never liked those chunky daemon weapons. The rest looks great! Where is the helm from, DV mace chosen? Can't quite place it.

[Sgt. Blank]

Thanks for the comments - I agree there's still plenty of room to make the knight look good (or not...)

 

Cool to see a WE too! I'd personally change the axe, never liked those chunky daemon weapons. The rest looks great! Where is the helm from, DV mace chosen? Can't quite place it.

 

I will probably leave the axe, in part cause it's consistent with a couple others in my army already but also because I kind of like the aesthetic and am holding out a small amount of hope that some day there will be a relic worth using.

 

The head is from the helbrute kit - number 13 below.

 

 

I've got a few models with the blood warrior masks and it's right on the border of what fits for 40k in my view. It's fine for rank and file but wanted to do something more for the new Lord. Originally, I'd intended to replace the nose and mouth with a grill to make it more sci-fi but realized I had this bit left over from another conversion and decided to see if I could cut it down to fit. 

 

Honestly pretty straightforward to do and easier than just doing the mouth/nose. I spliced a blood warror head to a DV chosen previously and that was tricky than this. In this case,the face piece of the base model was relatively easy to get at without damaging other parts.

That said, I'd recommend either a razor saw or jeweler's saw to make the main cuts for control and minimal material loss.

[Kolgrim DeathHowl]

Those heads look pretty cool

[Sgt. Blank]

Back for 2020!

 

November and December were not my most productive months in terms of hobby stuff....so the lack of posts is due primarily to the lack of stuff worth sharing.. I managed to get rolling again late in December after getting settled into a new hobby space in the house.

 

I finished several projects - including a couple that have been languishing for months or years.

 

First up, Axe and Sword Berzerkers plus the Chaos Lord that was WIP in my last post.

 

 

These were a top priority for gaming - the troops bulk out an existing unit with the preferred load out and the lord gives me the units needed to run a Berzerker battalion (replaces Dark Apostle, who is less helpful and more expensive to my force in Codex 2.0)

 

Next up, Bloodthirster!

 

 

Nothing converted here but I've had the big fella in pieces for at least a year and wanted to knock him out before getting too far into another project. Fun model to paint and with the recent point reduction, maybe he'll lead my Daemons when they ally with Chaos Knights - the Knights are a tough enough threat that he may actually get in assault before dying.

 

I bet you're thinking - hey, wasn't this thread about Chaos Knights? You're right. I've been working on the Knight Despoiler again as well. The planned load-out is 2 battle cannons and rockets. Honestly, I got really stuck on how to proceed for at least a month, both on the shoulder pads and the carapace - I wasn't sure about the way the rockets were shaping up but was having a hard time figuring out what to fix. I finally did some rummaging in my bitz box, I think I'm back on track.

 

Here's the carapace:

 

 

 

This is still largely WIP. The right-hand missile pod is a lot further along but still needs some green stuff to integrate the wires and maybe alter the area where the pod joins to the carapace. The left is intended to look like the right, more or less, although it's at least two passes with Green Stuff behind. Bits used: 2nd ed Whirlwind missiles, Defiler leg armor, spikes from CSM rhino, spikey teeth/jaws from Bloodthrone, armor plates from Venomcrawler.

 

I'm now thinking Duskraider was right - the rockets plus the Venomcrawler spikes is too much, so I'll save the spikes for a later project.

 

Work on the shoulder pads is limping along as well:

 

 

It requires some imagination, but the right-hand pad is further along - the basic idea is to carry the eight-pointed star from the Venomcrawler pad to the bigger surface - and yes, cheating with plasticard to get a hard point on the end more easily. 

 

I'd appreciate any feedback - comments or criticisms - there's plenty of time for changes before this is finished. Realistically, these sections will probably get done some time in the next month and I'll start trying to reposition the legs soon.

[PeteySödes]

Great stuff! Though I resent idea that shaping plasticard is in anyway cheating! :D

[Sgt. Blank]

Great stuff! Though I resent idea that shaping plasticard is in anyway cheating!

 

It's only cheating insofar as I get a lot better results for hard edges with a lot less work. 

[PeteySödes]

Tangent I know, but if you really do prefer sculpting vs plasticard you can get really nice edges with miliput or magic sculpt instead of GS!

[Sgt. Blank]

Always appreciate advice and new things to try - I like plasticard but aspire to be better with Greenstuff.

[PeteySödes]

Always appreciate advice and new things to try - I like plasticard but aspire to be better with Greenstuff.

For everything a tool!

[Mechanist]

Looking good there. Great unit of berzerkers and the bloodthirster should look cracking alongside the Knights.

Looking forward to seeing the next stages on the knight bits to.

You can also mix greenstuff and miliput a 50/50 mix gives nice results but the behaviour of the mix is a little different and take some getting used to as can be a bit messy until it's had some time to start curing.

Still it works well for Sharper edges and also good for sanding and filing once fully hardened.

[Sgt. Blank]

Trying to build some moment here, both with the project and posting.

 

1. Getting close to finishing the upper carapace - let me know what you think, is it missing something? Khorne rune? Not that dramatic from the last post, but several passes with GreenStuff to fill gaps and tie in bits

 

 

2. Making progress on the shoulder pads - added more plasticard and cannibalized some armor from the Venom crawler

 

 

3. Lastly, started on the legs

 

 

In this case, progress is destructive so far - I'm planning to repose the legs so the model has a different stance than my other two converted Knights, so the first step was to cut and fill the knees.

 

I followed JeffTibbetts approach (http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/topic/287347-queen-bee-knight-thank-you-please-read-the-new-post/ - awesome build if you haven't seen it) and put some sprue inside the hollow cavities before filling in with Green Stuff - I'm expecting to pin these one I work out a pose. Currently thinking the models right leg will be bent at the knee and the left will be straight - we'll see, though.

 

As always, thanks for looking - comments and criticisms are always appreciated!

Edited January 26, 2020 by Sgt. Blank