Ordo Hereticus Inquisitor.

Here is the fruit of my christmas holiday from work. And my first real attempt at a non kitbash conversion and first time using greenstuff for anything more than filling the odd gap (and it shows). I had bought a dkok commissar from forge world ages ago, but never ended up painting or including it in my guard because I thought he looked a bit diminutive compared to the metal commissars. I wouldnt normally have the courage to chop up an expensive forgeworld mini on a whim, but he had been sitting in my bits box for years without any hope of a posting in a guard regiment so I didnt feel as bad as I should of considering how much he cost.

I carefully mananaged to cut off his head and hat but left the gas mask and its thin hose intact. Unfortunately the brim of the commissars hat comes down over the collar of his stormcoat, so I was left with a gaping hole where the back of his collar should be ( cue loss of greenstuff virginity ) I ended up using a bare head from the cadian command sprue as it reminded me a bit of the haughty face of the old metal cadian company commander (sans monicle). I also cut off his sword arm and replaced it with the power fist from the cadian command sprue.

The gauntlet mounted inferno pistol was cobbled together from the barrel of a meltagun, a cut down scope from a space marine bolter and several Bits of feed from the barrel-less melta and a flamer. Lastly I cut the chamber/magazine off the meltagun in a thin slice and attached it to his back, I think it blends quite well with the rebreather backpack that was already there.

I added a space marine double purity seal to the bottom inner lining of his coat (inspired by the old necromunda bounty hunter) and a rubbush homemade greenstuff purity seal on his belt buckle ( you can just...just about make out the inquisitorial I its supposed to have on it) I had a few 40mm scenic bases knocking around from the blisters of black cat bases I had bought for my astral claws, and nothing to use them for so I decided to use one on this. I know he's meant to be on a small base, but as the inquisitor is usually the centerpiece of the warband; I dont think it matters too much.

The staff/pole behind him is another conglomeration of bits thats meant to be his Inquisitoral mandate on display, the bottom is a space marine combat blade, the haft is part of a chimeras antennae array, the main boss and tassels are the top of the plastic banner from (yet again) the cadian command sprue, with the decoration on the top cut off and repaced with a skull from a space marine back banner. The mandate itself is a fairly common space marine decorative bit.

On the stone floor of the base itself I painted in the edge of a khornate mosaic, the idea being for it to look like he's standing in the smoking wreckage of a very recently destroyed cult hideout. Overall im reasonably pleased with the end result, but not 100% by a long stretch. For example im pleased with the 'flow' of it, how the purity seals and tassels are all gusting in approximately the right direction, but I think its a bit unbalanced with all the action on his right side (prehaps I should have mounted the mandate pole on his left to compensate for the oversized fist/gun combo) Secondly, the paint job doesn't really do justice to the crisply detailed forgeworld base model, I really need to invest in a wider range of colours, im fine muddling through on basic infantry, but when it comes to more individual, less regimented and uniform models, my palette is definatly lacking. After downloading the inquisitor rulebook free from gw and reading some truly great stuff on the conclave forum and the tears of isstvan blog, Im thinking I could use this guy as a basis for a warband that could be used in both 40k and inq28 (seperate to my ordo malleus warband of standard gw minis) and ive been inspired to try and come up with a background for my inquisitor, im starting to put a backstory and motivation together and will post it up at a later date.

Ordo Malleus Cherubaum servitor.

This was another really characterfull, but challenging mini to paint. These are some great old sculpts from gw. They've got a very dark flavour to them I thinks been a bit lacking recently.

I thought I'd paint over the eye holes, to make it more of a 'death mask' I thought having no visible means of seeing was more sinister.

Ordo Malleus Servo Skull.

The world's quickest mini to paint. Striking whilst the iron of enthusiasm was hot, I pressed on with painting inquisitoral henchmen. I'm not sure if a servo skull is really a henchman? Probably more like wargear. Here he is.

I love the concept of servo skulls. Inquisitive little things buzzing around... this chap is from the cadian command sprue and appears to have found an old plastic goliath gangers head on his travels

Ordo Malleus Interrogator.

I got the chance to do a bit of painting today; I was a bit sick of painting astral claws, my (already low) standard of painting definitely drops as I get towards the tail end of a lot of similar minis ( ie my legion cohort ) so I thought I'd paint something different that I had a bit of enthusiasm for. I've enjoyed reading eisenhorn and ravanor (got into them quite late!) And I'm looking forward to reading pariah over Christmas and I've had a few minis knocking around to form the basis of a couple of inquisitorial warbands for ages. I've just never gotten round to them. I'm sure many of you know how it is! The first miniature I've tacked is this henchman I bought off eBay very cheaply. He's a really characterfull chap. Really quite a hefty metal mini for a non character. And absolutley packed with details, if you're an expert painter this is one model you can really go to town with, but if your like me, and more used to painting with a limited colour palette to a basic tabletop standard, he's really quite difficult. I had to really think about what colours I was using and where they would be repeated to avoid him looking like a complete mess. I didn't want his to look overtly religious. Despite the big staff and brazier, so I ended up painting his robes to look like my Commissar's leather stormcoats, which I think gives him a more grizzled feel. All in all I'm really pleased with him, but I might go back and redo the blue highlights especially on the chest gem/lens thingy.

Tyrants legion Astral Claws Legion Cohort update, two thirds complete!

I thought I had better put in a quick update as I don't think I'm going to get much painting done in the run up to Christmas. I have thirteen of the fifteen squad assembled. And have run out of bits! I'm not going to buy another tac/combat squad box for two marines so I'll have to see what washes up on eBay I can salvage. Here are the ten astral claws I have painted so far. Apologies for the photo quality, I'm at work during weekday daylight. After reading the advice from readers comments making myself a better setup is definitely on the cards in the new year.First up then. Five veteran Astral claws including the sergeant with combi melta, and battle brother with heavy bolter.

Next five neophytes, including missile launcher.

A few closer shots...

I've been thinking about the twenty auxillia I need to take as a compulsory troops choice. The default option would be to use twenty of my imperial guardsmen. But I'd quite like to do a proper tyrants legion unit. I really don't want to use the plastic cadian or catachans, I've already painted a shedload of these for my imperial guard armies. And also there's a question of scale, stood next to a cadian plastic your average space marine doesn't really look imposing. I've looked at a few options. Including the dystopian legions fsa infantry (again probably too large and quite pricy as metal) another option are the pig iron kolony militia, with are nice miniatures. However, warlord sell a box of 25 multipart plastic Germans in true 28mm for 25 quid. With is a bit of a bargain compared to a box of ten cadians. Having read up on it it seems the general consensus is that the bolt action range is too diminutive to work with 40k, but then I saw this photo on t'web.

Now to my eyes, that doesn't look half bad, the space marine is about a head taller, which seems fine considering he's supposed to be a genetically modified power armoured angel of death. The best bit is... looking at the sprue, the arms are all separate from the weapons, I've got loads of plastic Lasrifles and metal necromunda autoguns/lasguns so I reckon I could give them a 40k flavour. It's just a case of taking the plunge, any comments and suggestions much appreciated!

Astral Claws tyrants legion minor update.

Just a quick update on the slow progress of my astral claws. Following comments I decided to repaint the tabard on my retaliator sergeant in brown.I'm not too sure. I might rip it off and replace it with a blue loincloth

And a couple more members of the legion cohort. I've finished eight including the sarge and two heavy weapons. Only another seven to go!