What do you think would look better?

[Darrell]

As I near completion on some fluff for a DIY Chapter, I've been thinking about how I will model them. I'm not a great painter nor modeller, however I would like to try to model them in such a way that they look like they are on a battlefield. Good poses, some basic scenery if I can accomplish it, but one way I'd really like to accomplish this is by posing enemy units/trophies on the base with them. Like a traitorous Guard on his knees with my HQ preparing to execute him, or the fragile body of a struggling Tau caught in the grasp of a Powerfist. That kind of thing.

 

My problem is, I am not sure whether I should show them fighting an array of opponents (I wouldn't like them to make them Anti-Ork/Tau/Nid/Chaos specifically), or one opponent in particular. Showing them all fighting one type of opponent would probably be a more unifying theme for the army as a whole, but would it be overly disrupting if I showed them fighting different opponents? Like squad per squad, perhaps? One shown fighting Tyranids, one shown fighting Orks, another Tau, that kind of thing.

 

I'm a bit far off from being able to purchase some enemy models to practice with, but I was hoping I could maybe get some feedback from someone who has seen it done or tried it themselves.

[syne]

If you were looking to spend a fair amount of time on each of your models' bases, perhaps an array of different armies' body parts and gear half/ mostly buried in rubble and mud would be a good idea (think WWI)!

Hustle up your friends and scour ebay for spare parts from a bunch of different armies and arange them in gruesome piles/ poses, then add sand/ debris, prime, paint and flock!

The 4th Edition rulebook has some good pictures of necrons and snipers based to look like they are coming up out of the ground/ rubble... working on this prinicple as illustrated you could achieve some very intense and graphic effects, as well as clearly demonstrate how battle weary your chapter and/ or it's planet is.

Come to think of it... I may do this myself! :D

Thanks for the inspirations and good luck with whatever you decide upon.

 

-syne

[Darrell]

Hehe, you're welcome for the inspiration. ;)

 

I'm just a fan of dynamic poses and bases that make the army look like it's actually storming the battlefield. I'd had the idea of showing each unit (At least infantry unit, perhaps bikes) at a certain important point of the Chapter's history. Fighting back the Tyranids on DT-9, holding off an Ork horde outside the Brilian Spaceport so the last ships could leave the planet, executing a traitorous planetary governor of Ghafifia after a four day siege of the Planetary Capitol City. That sort of thing. But I was afraid it would all look too jumbled, you know? Trying to hard to express too many ideas at once.