Red Corsairs Master of the Maelstrom - Varn Bloodrider - Biker Lord complete

[TrawlingCleaner]

"Empire's End terminator squad. Named after their decades of burning the Ultrmar system in the wake of the Eye of Terror opening. Crushing the enemy's morale in devasting strikes before decapitation strikes"

 

Currently unnamed Chaos Lord:

 

 

Empire's End Terminator squad:

 

 

Mad Max esque Vindicator, not sure on it's name yet

 

 

A bit of a busy Easter weekend painting wise

Edited April 2 by TrawlingCleaner

[abaumann]

Both the weapons and the bone color make these models really pop! Nice work on the subtle highlights too

[gaurdian31]

Terminators look great and love the name of the squad! Also love the guy in the vindicator, has "Bring me closer so I can hit them with my sword!" vibes in a good way.

[TrawlingCleaner]

Thank you both! The Vindicator was an aim at a mild Madmax kind of vibe, like a suped up vehicle with a deranged person on top yelling about hitting someone with a sword and divine judgement. You know, the usual Chaos stuff

 

I've been working on a biker lord on and off for a good while now and it's gone through several iterations, in fact many moons ago it had started to be painted and the rider has completely changed, so far I have:

 

My idea is that the bike is sliding on it's side and he's stepping up to challenge someone, if I go this route I'll have cork on the base that I'll scratch up to make it look like the spikes are digging in. Or I'll make it so that the bike is upright which will need a good amount of GS work to make the feet line up with where they need to be.

 

We'll see how I go!

[gaurdian31]

Love this, looks like he went to the Doom Rider school for bike riding! 

[TrawlingCleaner]

19 hours ago, gaurdian31 said:

Love this, looks like he went to the Doom Rider school for bike riding! 

 

Live Fast, Die after a few Centries of War. That famous Doom Rider saying

 

 

I tried making the bike upright but couldn't get it to look how I wanted it to so I decided to plow on with the handbrake turn look. I think with the basing it makes way more sense now too:

 

 

First layers of paint going down:

 

 

[TrawlingCleaner]

Washes down:

 

New Formula Nuln Oil is interesting, I'm finding it more of a grey wash than a black wash so it doesn't pop as much in the reccesses of the red but it does let the metallics shine still.

 

I also played another crusade game vs Eldar and got smashed again! Sorcerer Nalek and his squad did work with Nalek surviving as my last model and beelining for the enemy objective before taking a Shining Spear in the side and disappearing in a pillar of fire. These smaller point games (500) has been rough so far! My poor Venomcrawler always dies first turn

With my 0-0-4 record, I'm obvioulsy taking my role as the Campaign Heel very seriously but the luck will swing my way at some point and I'll get some wins for team Raider

[gaurdian31]

Yeah, 500 can be rough depending on what you are up against. As long as you're having fun though that is all that matters. Also biker lord is coming along nicely, I like the "Akira" slide now that the base is showing it off.

[TrawlingCleaner]

We're getting there! The weapons are popping now, it's just everything else that needs doing

 

 

[gaurdian31]

The lord is coming together rather nicely!

[TrawlingCleaner]

A busy couple of weeks for me as I got married on Monday! I did complete the Biker Lord (obvioulsy very important to do ) last week but didn't have the time to post about it

 

"Varn the Bloodrider, one of three Marshalls of the Hounds of Huron. Varn is an expert duelist, taking trophies from each of the targets Huron gives to him. A Shield from an Ultramarine, armour from a Blood Angels, Klaw of a Warboss, the bones of saints and skin of a witch. Even his title is the trophy from his previous dark master"

 

 

Varn is done! I think with the extra sand build up around the back tyre the Akira-slide effect I was going for worked out great.

I'm not too sure what's next as I'm currently getting through my Slaves to Darkness backlog with the imminent arrival of AoS 4th edtion. The Chaos Codex is right around the corner too! I've got the Helldrake with a red basecoat down that I'd like to get done to tick it off as well as the old metal dread and some more basic marines too

[gaurdian31]

Congrats on the marriage! Varn came out really well! Love how serious he looks and the little trophy details came out great! Great job!

[TrawlingCleaner]

Thank you gaurdian! I figured with the Hounds being Huron's version of the Master of the Hunt from the White Scars, it would make sense to have one of the leaders covered in trophies from all those marks that he's been ordered to kill. It also helps explain why I didn't scrape the Blood Angels details off his leg

 

Yesterday's points changes make me very happy indeed as they've dropped points for the core of every list I make; Marines, Bikes, Raptors and Venomcrawlers. My usual 1500pt list and crusade list has just gained another 80 points all of sudden which was impressive. I definitely won't complain!

They've also dropped points on Maulerfiends too which has given me some more ideas on how I could convert one up as well as Possessed and even Havocs! The juices are flowing

[Kaiju Soze]

80 points spare? Moar bikers?

 

Great work on the Lord, and congrats on the wedding.

[TrawlingCleaner]

38 minutes ago, Kaiju Soze said:

80 points spare? Moar bikers?

 

Great work on the Lord, and congrats on the wedding.

Thanks Kaiju!

More Bikes, More Good. Honestly 75 points is a steal for them!

[Volgon]

Have been quietly following (and seeing you post on Reddit as well), just wanted to say what a great army you have! I didn't notice before but I love the little streaks of grey in Varn's hair. Probably hard to notice at arm's length but very cool little detail to include.

[TrawlingCleaner]

Thanks Volgon! I was trying to figure out who you were from your Reddit comment!

I think it's the little details that give models character like streaks of colour in their hair, not a perfect skin tone, scars, odd bits of equipment or old chapter's iconography etc gives them a bit more story and imperfect-ness? Whilst they're super soldiers and gene-enhanced they're still human, kinda. Seems a bit of a silly detail for small dollies of future spacemen

 

 

After saying I wasn't sure what to paint next I decided to self-flagellate have fun and paint the Heldrake that's been sat on my desk for nearly 2 years:

 

It was an eBay rescue as you can see from the missing leg parts, wings and the covered up hole in the belly but I think it's scrubbed up pretty well. I had a though that the Heldrake could be a Smaug type vibe. Gold hoarding dragon with a hole in it's underside, fated to be killed by a lucky shot from a mortal

 

All the Engines so far:

 

Re-looking at the Heldrake datasheet now that I've painted it up, I'm considering taking one to try some things out? It's stats aren't awful as my local meta tends to have a good amount of flying and a lot of C'Tan too. I actuallly think it might be a pretty good Anti-C'tan piece to finish it off if it's reasonably dented? It gets +1 to hit vs Fly and anti-fly 2+ with Devastating wounds. You could Tank shock before hand do some mortal wounds and then hopefully finish it with the claws? Something to test!

 

I've got another Venomcrawler I've got some paint on whilst bits of the Heldrake were drying and also have the Lord Discordant  conversion I've gotten a couple of layers of paint on too. With the new points and looming codex I'm looking at trying to pick a couple of armiger/wardogs up second hand I can canablise to make a couple of Maulerfiends. I had an idea to kitbash Lucius the Eternal from the Sons of Horus Tybalt Marr model and a Fabius Bile out of something else, however, EC are moving out of the Codex and into their own Index so I think I'll hold fire for now

[gaurdian31]

That is a dang great looking Heldrake! Great use of the terrain to act as the flying stand. It looks like it is pouncing on some unlucky prey off screen as it were.

[Brother Nathan]

Gotta say love it all! Great work on the heldrake! Am so inspired that ive lifted some bikers outta my bloodangels box that will be joining the IV.

[TrawlingCleaner]

15 hours ago, gaurdian31 said:

That is a dang great looking Heldrake! Great use of the terrain to act as the flying stand. It looks like it is pouncing on some unlucky prey off screen as it were.

 

Thanks gaurdian! I think it was a bit of double whammy as the actual flight stand wouldn't fit back in the hole they'd left in it's underside so the terrain looks better and it doesn't actually fall over

 

14 hours ago, Brother Nathan said:

Gotta say love it all! Great work on the heldrake! Am so inspired that ive lifted some bikers outta my bloodangels box that will be joining the IV.

 

Thanks Nathan! More bikes is more good honestly. I'm glad to see more people pick them up now, I think they're really cheap for the stats they bring and utility too

[Dr_Ruminahui]

I may have to break mine out after shelving them in 8th, where I fielded them a lot at the beginning but they were just too vulnerable to necron destroyers for their points, which was (and still is) one of my most commonly faced units.  Now, at 3 wounds, they are in a much better place of needing 2 wounding shots to kill them

Edited yesterday at 04:18 PM by Dr_Ruminahui