Mandragola’s Legio Astorum (and Mortis and stuff)

[RipOffProductions]

 

 

 

 

Titans should be individuals.

Preach it.

 

 

Of Course they´re. Each of mine has his own heraldic!

 

indeed, hell building my Homebrew Titan Legion stalled when I realized I wasn't investing enough into kit-bashing and converting each individual(as well as "but what if GW releases something later that's an even better fit for that role")... though admittedly I sort of set myself up for that "failure" when I made the homebrew lore for Legio Arcana as nomadic city-states wondering the post-apocalyptic wastes of their homeworld prior to re-discovery during The Great Crusade.

[Mandragola]

My schemes have been influenced by a set of designs from the Vraks book (which I can't link to here, but which can be found online). It has several hounds organised into squadrons, often with matching (or near-matching) schemes.

 

I haven't copied any of these but it's been quite useful to see them. There's a lot of variation - for example stripes can be blue, black, white or yellow. But all heads yellow. This was before GW came up with the astronomical symbols for Astorum though. Those might have got phased out over 10k years, I guess. I imagine they got bored of the hassle.

 

I do think my two matching hounds are too similar though, so I'll amend that. I want them to look like a pair, but not identical.

[Sherrypie]

Looking sharp, diamonds look nice on Mortis engines. And yeah, while gatekeeping is bad... if you're not making individualistic titans, you're doing it wrong :)

[Mandragola]

Don't think I did a guide. One thing is that the head should always be level. If you look at predators like cats, dogs and birds of prey they'll always keep their heads level even though their bodies lean. Then just look at a lot of pictures of people and animals, because titans are weirdly somewhere between the two. 

 

Oh and bend the toes down. You'll have to cut them, which can be fiddly. Simple enough to cut Warhound toes at the back of the armour plate but bigger titans are going to need work with a fine-bladed saw in the joints themselves.

[Fajita Fan]

That’s excellent advice on the heads.

[schoon]

Very nice work on the diamonds.

 

...and thanks for the "head pointer" Mandragola. That's something that always felt correct, but I never thought about why...

[Mandragola]

Did some work on the warbringer last night. Some of the armour plates are going on. I dry fitted the shin plates and found that they barely go on, even with the incredibly basic pose I’ve given mine. Curses! Made it all fit in the end by shaving a bit off the back of a couple of plates.

 

I realise I’m simultaneously working on 7 titans:

 

- Penumbral Reaper - just a bit of detail to be done.

- three Mortis hounds - basecoated but no guns.

- an Astorum hound - started on base coat

- Astorum Warbringer- skeleton zone and started on panels

- Psi-Titan. Occasionally mucking about with green stuff

 

I think I remember what it’s like to finish a project. To be fair there’s nothing stopping me doing that with any of these. Wonder which I’ll do.

[noigrim]

Good thing about being poor is that you can only afford one project at a time :( Edited March 21, 2020 by noigrim

[Mandragola]

Hmm. Sorry, now I feel like a bit of a bastard.

[noigrim]

Chill that way you've got plenty to do during quarantine

[Mandragola]

Yeah that shouldn't be an issue, unless I run out of paint!

 

More work on the warbringer tonight, but nothing worth photographing. I feel like these models mostly look rubbish right up until the point when they're done, when they start to look decent.

 

Oh and I got my delivery of trees. I ordered some narrow plastic channels that I'm going to try and make into trenches. Problem there is they'll look like they should have people in, and I have none. I might make them really ruined so it's clear everyone fled when the titan showed up - as you would.

[Mandragola]

Been painting my Warbringer up a bit. For this guy I’m doing the armour plates and will then paint the edging in. My preferred approach of doing edging first doesn’t tend to survive painting flames and astronomical symbols. Means it looks messier than usual. As ever, it starts to look real once the armour plates go on.

 

 

Also had a play with its base, where I’ve added a trench line made out of plastic section. I think this could end up looking quite cool – though I’ll need loads more of it if I’m going to do this to many other titans. I don’t think it’ll be done on all of them but I think my bases would be improved by having a bit more going on.

 

 

 

This is sunk below the base, so the bottom of the plastic section meets the table top. I’ve glued bits of sprue into the joint on the underside to give it some strength… or any strength. The base is intact under the titan’s foot – I think it would be a lot weaker if I’d made a groove all the way through.

 

Edit: Ugh the colours look so bad before they're shaded. Oh well, more reason to get it finished.

Edited March 22, 2020 by Mandragola

[Dark Bjoern]

Exellent! I love the trench! My Warbringer is also nearly done. Decals and the base, that´s it!

[Mendi Warrior]

Very nice! Love the trench as well. I think you'll need to add bodies in there, both dead and half-dead, all the others fled as you said 

[Fajita Fan]

Wow you cut up the base for the trench? Looks cool.

[Mandragola]

Very nice! Love the trench as well. I think you'll need to add bodies in there, both dead and half-dead, all the others fled as you said 

 

I think I agree. This is a clear sign of human habitation, which suggests strongly that there ought to be people around. If I do some it'll be the last thing I add. There aren't really any models currently available that I like, but it might be easy enough to sculpt on some bodies in GS. Doing marines would be harder than normal people.

[Interrogator Stobz]

Nice base!!!

[Mandragola]

A bit more progress to report on the Warbringer. Flame patterns are done and I’ve made a bit of progress on the edging (very carefully around the yellow - not so much around the blue), so I’ve been able to stick on the leg armour. It fits!

 

 

Note: if like me you have an ankle joint tilted forward, even a little bit, the lower leg armour plates can clash with the piston. I got away with it this time but the tolerances there are incredibly fine.

 

Otherwise I think this guy will look quite good when he’s done.

 

Meanwhile I basecoated this warhound. He’s going to have some lines and circles, and maybe the odd transfer here and there, since I managed to get some of them. Painting warhounds feels so easy after working on a Warlord and Warbringer.

 

 

 

[Fajita Fan]

I love how 30k Warp Runners look like hot rods. 

[Mandragola]

Here’s my Warbringer, done.

 

 

I’ve used some Astorum transfers from the sheet. Not completely happy with the one on the shield and I don’t know if I’ll keep the astronomical things under the gun. It’s a shame the Warbringer’s own transfer sheet doesn’t give you stuff for its shields. There are various things that would work, like the crossbow symbol, but none that look like a titan’s personal heraldry.

 

 

I enjoy messing about with mud splatter. Possible I might have overdone it here. You can see into the trench, which could probably do with a bit of detail.

 

[Bjorn Firewalker]

Excellent work on the Titan. I'm impressed with your efforts, e.g., the mud staining the god-machine's feet, and the trench on its base.

[Fajita Fan]

The mud's not overdone at all.  As far as the base maybe just stipple a few brighter highlights on the lip of the trench to emphasize it (although maybe that's photography vs real life lighting). 

[Rabenga]

Yes! Excellent dirt work...pigments?

[Mandragola]

Glad you like it. I use AK terrain splatter effects for the feet. Dry mud first and then wet mud on top, to show stuck on mud drying over time. Then I stick some of the basing mud on the parts where the feet will have been on the ground.

 

The splatter stuff is tricky to direct and you want really fine droplets. I’ve been putting some paint on a metal ruler and flicking it off with a drybrush.

[Sherrypie]

Trench looks nice, negative height is done well. Little details like sandbags on the parapets or discarded munition boxes could liven it up if you don't want to put soldiers in there.