Destroyed knight Titan as scenery

[Lord Kallozar]

I’m thinking of painting a destroyed knight Titan as part of scenery for a gaming board. But I need advice on how to paint it/decorate it?

 

If a knight Titan got destroyed in battle and left to essentially rot where it fell for hundreds of years, how would it decompose? Would it go rusty or something else? Thanks.

[Gederas]

It'd rust, according to the Knights codex, Knights are primarily metal.

 

Though the real question: Does adamantium in 40k rust outside of Nurgle shenanigans? Because that's what Knight armour (possibly chassis) are made of.

[Jukkiz]

You could apply rust, scrapes and chipping effects all over.

[mel_danes]

Work in environmental factors. The damage from what killed it obviously should be center stage. But debris drifted up against it, or organic growth, like trees or bushes coming out of it.

The paint facing up should be sun bleached.

Maybe the local populace have begun using it as shelter, and have built additions on it, like a shanty town, using the Knights reactor for power?

[NovemberIX]

More than just rust, it would acquire a patina of dust, dirt and debris, if there is plant life it would certainly be growing on, in, and under. The paint would be faded, in places that get the most sun light it would be cracking and peeling. Metal fatigue could see parts falling to the ground, or hanging precariously. If there are scavengers in the area parts of value and decoration would be missing or damaged. You could also make small scatter terrain pieces of the debris field from its destruction. The weapons damage on the knight titan itself will depend on what killed it, was it a directed energy weapon that would melt through, was it an explosive munition, a giant CCW style weapon? Decide that, and you have the basis of where the damage starts.

[Exilyth]

The placement of holes & other damage in the armour would greatly influence where water can get into the machine and at the internals. E.g. a titan which got killed by an energy weapon might have a hole entering the front and exiting the back - if said titan falls and lands on its front or back, rain would get in through the hole on the top, but most likely wouldn't get out on the bottom (depending on what the titan fell on). The titan would fill with water, most likely causing secondary/tertiary explosions. It would rust from inside to outside. Eventually, one of the escape/maintenance hatches (probably weakest point) would rust through, letting water seep out.

 

If that titan fell and ended up in a sitting position (e.g. leaning on a cliff or building), a lot less water would get into the holes and accumulate inside. The titan would then rust from bottom to top. Either way, once the structural integrity of a part is compromised enough, the armour of that part will cave in.

 

Holes and damage will make the internals visible: joint actuators, generators, machinery, troop barracks, storage,  liquid and gas tanks, pistons, cogs, e.t.c. ...

 

Weapon damage will bent the armour inward where it hits and outward where it leaves on the other side. Internal explosions (reactors, ammunition) will bent armour outwards and tend to go through the path of least resistance, e.g. hatches & joints (but rule of cool dictates having the biggest armour plate burst open). Heat based weapons could instead cause armour to melt, making it run downward in streams and fall off in drops of liquid metal.

 

Paint will fade with exposure to sunlight and will fall off in chips, especially where rust spreads.

 

Dust, sand, dirt and other particles will accumulate all over and near the titan. Particles will mostly cling to horizontal surfaces, but e.g. oil leaking out could cause particles to stick to vertical surfaces (and cause some really ugly grime).

 

Chemicals stored on the titan would eventually start to leak out, causing further damage. Some chemicals might react and start a fire or explosion (or even create poisonous fumes which protect the wreck from the local fauna and flora for some time).

 

Something else to note is that fire tends to spread primarily upwards, then outwards, so the lower sections would be less affected by it, depending on how long the wreck burned (if at all).

 

The local population could take interest in the wreck, using it for shelter or scavenging resources. People could try and weld holes into the armour - to access the inside, as windows or just to scavenge the armour. Different groups of the local population could fight over the wreck, causing further damage to it. The winners will most likely spray their colors and/or signs all over the wreck to signal their claim. Maybe even some cult uses the wreck as their ritual site, revering the big metal god from the sky (or whatever dark deities they pray to). If the rations stored on board didn't turn bad (or the tins rusted away), they'll be one of the parts most likely to get plundered.

 

If neither people nor chemical substances keep it at bay, nature will take its hold. Plants will grow next to and inside the titan. All it takes is one seed blown by the wind. Eventually, some plants will have grown enough to be visibly recognizable as trees. Animals could settle in, using part of the titan as a hideout.

 

Of course, what planet the titan has fallen on affects how much it will be disturbed - e.g. a lifeless moon will neither have plants nor people, a deathworld will have much much more plants than people and the underhive on a hiveworld will have people but almost no plants. A planet with high spore conventration in the atmosphere would probably see the titan taken over by mushrooms and so on.

 

Organic substances (e.g. the crew, the leather used for the seats, most paper on board, cotton sheets in the crew quarters) will be the first to rot away, so there will most likely not be corpses, just uniforms & bones lying around (if they didn't get taken & repurposed). Ofc, local population and animals might cause an accumulation of non-crew corpses instead.

 

 

edit: oops, overlooked the "knight" part in the title - but most things which apply to titans should apply to knights too.