Forward men of the Imperium! Let the guns of the enemy bite you! Let their blades taste you! Let us face their foul hunger and choke them with our righteousness! Onwards! Onwards until the last of us has fallen! Onwards until we stand before the Emperor himself, and when we do let us hold our heads high for we have carried the enemy before us into Hell!
I’m trying to decide if he’s done or not but either way I’ve been looking at him so long I’m starting to go in circles. Going to work on the rest of his squad for a bit then come back to him with what will hopefully be fresh eyes. In the meantime feedback is more than welcome.
Convert or Die 
November 6th, 2017 at 9:47 am
Very nice mate – muted and no-nonsense is perfect for this guy. One suggestion if I may mate – the fluff you mentioned is very much around the anonymity afforded by the helm, and the elevated brutality that this enables… If you’re aiming for the brutal butcher archetype then you could gunge/blood him up a little to really sell the idea… (he looks a bit squeaky clean atm)
November 6th, 2017 at 12:31 pm
Seconded, a little blood/guts on the boots or the sword could help. Without overdoing it of course. Tough trade blood and guts, I often fine the “gore” effects unconvincing when I try them because they are too obvious.
Anyway, I guess I understand why you wonder if he is done or not, but anyway he looks very good. Painting the other ones and going back to him afterwards seems the right strategy for this imo.
November 6th, 2017 at 10:39 pm
Cheers both – I agree on a bit more grunge and dirt, he is a little too clean at the moment. I’m wary of adding blood spatter however, and I did think about it a lot. The fact is I actually really dislike films or books which portray battle as clean. Whenever I see someone come out of a fight smartly dressed, with their hair impeccable and not a spot of blood on them I want to scream (unless it’s Lucius the Eternal obviously). That said I’m cautious of going overboard with miniatures. Really every warrior in the 40k universe should be spattered with copious amounts of claret (apart from the Tau who’re too busy hiding at the back). World Eaters should just be dipped in a pot of Blood for the Blood God and declared painted at that. Hence why I feel the need to tone it back a little when I can get away with it, it gives me somewhere to go when I get to the models that really do need some gore on them.
Hopefully some dirt and scratches will do the business here, he might be brutal in a fight but he’s not a berserker, he’s willing to take a moment to hand his chainsword to an underling and demand they clean it before he gets back to the killing.
November 6th, 2017 at 10:45 pm
A wise man (owner of my local miniatures shop of yore) told me once: “when I buy a new pair of pants and walk a day wearing them in the city, they are dirty at the end of the day, so how could a warrior in power armour stay clean in the heat of battle?”.
But I totally agree with you about the “over gore”. As I said, I am usually disappointed when I had blood to a mini and I think undertoning it is keep in that area. Dirt and mud may be the right way out.
Keep us posted, love to watch your great project unfold!
November 6th, 2017 at 2:16 pm
Great piece of writing and painting there. Just one thought: “let their blades taste you!… is this guy ordering them to get hit by the enemy or did he jumble up his words a bit? Let the scum taste your blades!, perhaps?
November 6th, 2017 at 10:45 pm
Thank you! And yes, I deliberately chose to write it that way – he’s actually ordering his men to get shot and stabbed. Or perhaps more generally he’s telling them they will get shot and stabbed, they should expect no quarter, but equally they should offer none, they need to give as good as they get. He’s not sugar-coating anything, he’s telling his men they’re going forward to die, they’ll stand before their Emperor (i.e. after they’ve been killed they’ll be judged by the God-Emperor) but He will find them worthy because the enemy will all be dead too. Only in death does duty end and all that. 🙂
November 7th, 2017 at 12:12 am
O god emperror, preserve my blasphemy… great writup there mate
November 6th, 2017 at 10:40 pm
Really nicely done. Love the helmet in particular – I hadn’t thought to use those for Guard.
November 6th, 2017 at 10:48 pm
Thanks – I know what you mean about the helmet, my first thought was to use that head for a traitor guardsman but as soon as I tried it on him it just clicked!
November 7th, 2017 at 11:03 am
I do love me some blood but in this case I think he’s done.
November 7th, 2017 at 6:30 pm
I thought you’d be rooting for more blood – I’ll take the fact that you’re not as confirmation that I’ve made the right call 🙂
November 7th, 2017 at 9:58 pm
Haha.
November 9th, 2017 at 1:32 am
He looks great. Of course with the attitude he seems to have towards his men, I’d wonder what the (ahem) turnover rate is like for these commanders in that particular regiment. 😉
November 9th, 2017 at 11:23 pm
I think there’s a reason my guys keep shooting their commanders and throwing in their lot with chaos 😀
November 17th, 2017 at 11:28 am
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