Death Guard WIP: Pandemic (updated Jan 21 - fully painted Obliterator unit)

[Svartmetall]

I'm a complete noob - it's my first army, my first attempt at Green Stuff, and my first attempt at 40K figure-painting*.
So be nice

A Plague Champion:


My Icon Bearer for the unit of Chosen - these guys are really skinny out of the box, for some reason; I had to bulk him up big-time with Green Stuff to make him fit in with the rest of the Plague Marines:

And, while he's not yet even dry-brushed, I like the hanging Green Stuff guts I've added on this guy:

...hopefully he should look really unpleasant when finished.



*many thanks to my sickeningly-talented friend for all her help and advice about the painting...

[Norsehawk]

I use photobucket instead of flickr since iirc flickr has rules against linking images.

I looked at them, the 2nd one looks really good, the first and third since they are a uniform dark green its a bit hard to make out specific details but they look very promising as well, I can't wait to see them finished.

[Svartmetall]

Yep, I had to move them to Photobucket because of Flickr being weird...

[NeoHunter]

Argh...that is gross...really Nurgle there...

Good job!

If you are planning on painting up a whole army of Death Guard, that would be great! I'm sure it will look impressive on the table.

[Keb]

I'm a fan of how those are turning out, it will be nice to see some bigger models such as vehicles and Lords. Keep it up!

[Sir Clausel]

Iuu! those are infected with awsomeness! jaw dropping!

[NeoHunter]

I know! Get the Plaguereaper!!!

http://us.games-workshop.com/games/4...aguereaper.htm

[Svartmetall]

Glad people seem to like them I think the Plaguereaper is awesome, but wouldn't want to to just duplicate that...but it's certainly got me thinking a little more out-of-the box when it comes to converting the Nurgle Vindicator I have planned...

[shaper Tain]

this is disgusting, i love it.For your first army ever it seems to be really promising.

[ernest101]

omfg the first and 2nd one is real sick man... wicked sick!! so nurgle like!! ugh!! for a nurgle scale is very nice

[Andyslegion]

Very nice!!!! And your first time too!?!?! Brilliant!

[Ghudra]

Welcome to your new hobby!

They look great and I can't wait to see the group after you get more paint on it.

[_'Ginger' Matt_]

OMG first time with green stuff! my gosh you work it like a pro...seriously i took me *ages* to get as good as that!

And the painting is great too although i have a deep standing hatred for drybrushing i think this model pulls it off fairly well.

keep going with it all i wanna see more pics

[SilverTabby]

So when are we going to see pics of your work-in-progress Lord then?

[Svartmetall]

When I start work on him ...he's going to be one tough conversion, I'm seriously contemplating making a sort of stand-in Lord (either a Terminator or Obliterator Nurgle conversion, most likely) to use while I work out how the hell to do what I really would like, which is to convert this FW Ogryn Berserker:

...into a Death Guard Lord, heavily inspired by this picture:

...I reckon it could look damn cool, but will be very hard to do right. Hence the possibility of the stand-in Lord plan. As soon as I saw that Ogryn on the FW website, the tubes and stuff just screamed 'Nurgle!' at me, and I had the idea of using him to make a really distinctive Plague Lord...

BTW all the comments here have been a useful boost to my confidence at this embryonic stage of my modelling, thanks everyone . I'm currently dealing with some RL issues that have gotten in the way of making progress on the army, but hopefully I'll have some more pics soon.

[_'Ginger' Matt_]

Heya nice idea for the lord conversion! i agree with the tough comment. seems to me like youve set your sights quite high (conversion wise). for some tips im gna say this:

1)keep it simple small tweaks can be the best
2)avoid cutting/hacking the model away too much as a mistake will be hard to undo.
3) its resin, so be gentle also watch out for resing dust wehn filling.

also the picture youve picked as inspiration is cool and all but to me it doesnt seem very nurgle lord esque (you know, wading thru guardsmen with giant manreaper)

well good luck on it hope my tips help somewhat and keep us posted i wanna se how this turns out!

[Svartmetall]

2 quick shots to show where I'm at with these at the moment:


...my camera appera to have died, or something, so the close-up shots I had planned of Guts-Hanging-Out Guy and a couple of nifty Green-Stuff-bedecked Chosen will have to wait...*sigh*...

[eumenes]

Well wow.... great painting, already a sculptor, and you already have a ton of ideas for conversions... were you born gifted? How much has your friend been helping you out?

Either way, nice looking marines. Though I'm disappointed that you can sculpt an intestinal tract but aren't basing your models.

[Svartmetall]

Basing is on my to-do list ...really finding it hard to decide what to go for, as it feels as though whatever base I do will end up being wrong for most gaming tables I play them on - I base them on sand, I'll end up playing them in a cityfight, I base them on paving stones, I'll end up playing them in a snowy waste etc etc. So I'm still trying to work out what to do basing-wise...

[IvanMcK]

as above, excellent models, whough my only nit-pick is that PM's are better off with a p fist over p wep, due to thier low init. Besides that, I love everything about them. Maybe a splash of color on the backbacks to help make them pop, but beyond that, they are beautiful(...in a nurgle-y sotra way...)

[Svartmetall]

Ye olde camera has stopped being temperamental, so here are the pics I'd hoped to include on that last update.
Standard Bearer Guy:

Guts-Hanging-Out Guy:

And here are two of the Chosen I'm working on - I'm putting a significantly higher amount of conversion into these, figuring that as Chosen they'd have received a lot more of Nurgle's 'gifts' than the rank-and-file Marines. The cabling/tubing is a .042 gauge guitar string...nice to finally have a use for my strings when I break them...


...and yes, that's the Typhus model on the left. I'm figuring by the time I'm done with them, you won't be able to tell .

[Andyslegion]

They are brilliant, i'd love to see you do a Veichle thats been "Nurglised".

[_'Ginger' Matt_]

EEEEEEEEEEEW! is all that can be said about your models (this is a good comment!) really nice method you got going there for your mouldy patches perhaps a few stage-by-stage pictures please??

Also on the basing front, getting a base right is really hard, do some test ones of different types and post em up here so people can give your their oppinions.

altoghether some really really good work there and keep it up!.

[dregor]

Some fantastic sculpting there withe the green stuff. I think you could add a bit of colour to the minis to help points of interest stand out, right now it seems to be just very dark green with some drybrushing. Some reds/browns in the exposed guts for example would help, maybe pick out the eyes in a sickly yellow.

[Warboss Antoni]

Your sculpting makes me cry... I , after 2 years, cannot sculpt even a purity seal, and you are going and making plaugemarines . Your painting is tp notch too - although it isn't my favorite style ( bright greens and browns are ) is nevertheless beats most experianced players. Try and enter painting comps with these

My only beef is the plauge marines with a resperator - he could use some grey or khaki skin

Also, try and sculpt your own heads for the chosen. I know it may be hard, but the same 7 heads in all of your sqauds kinda looks boring for an entire army. You can star by maybe adding horns and tubing and going on to entirely custom heads.

[[MaGiC]]

the guts out guy could use some more colors for the guts and the skin hehe.. otherwise really cool

[Svartmetall]

Hehe...once again, thanks for the positive feedback and constructive criticism guys, it's making this here noob feel much better about his first efforts .

IvanMcK, Dregor, Warboss Antoni and [MaGiC] - you're absolutely right when you say they could use some more colour and highlighting, both of which are on my to-do list; I wanted to get the basic colouration of the army consistent before I start messing about too much, though, because I want it to look like a fairly unified fighting force. Certainly I intend for the Terminators and Chosen to have their own slightly different colour schemes to make them stand out as somewhat separate from the normal line troops, albeit still fitting in with the army as a whole. The pics I've posted are purely WIP, not meant to be anything like finished yet...guts, eyes, heads and any exposed skin will be attended to in due course. I intend for G.H.O.G. in particular to look really nauseating...

IvanMcK - as for power fists over power weapons, you may well be right, but I'll go for aesthetics over anything else most of the time when it comes to miniatures...I'm a firm graduate of the 'if it looks cool, do it' school of thought, and I just flat out prefer the look of a power weapon to a power fist, especially a rusted, pitted Nurgle-blade of corrupted ghastliness .

Andyslegion - I'm working on ideas for a Nurglified Vindicator and Defiler at the moment; one problem is that the Plaguereaper is so nice that I want to keep the look of my vehicles distinct from that so people don't think I'm just ripping off that.

_'Ginger' Matt_ - I'm very flattered that you'd ask me to show how I do the green stuff Nurgly bits, but I'm horribly aware of being a total noob and don't think I could presume to show anyone here how to do stuff yet - especially given the incredible talent some of the people on this forum have. Also I have no real idea what I'm doing; I work out where I want Nurglification to occur, apply what seems to me to be the right amount of green stuff and kind of go with my instincts on how to work it into the area. I try to integrate it into the model so you don't get a big 'here is the green stuff' bit sticking out like a sore thumb, I think it should appear homogenous with the rest of the model as far as possible. I'm actually using a spike from the Chaos vehicle sprue to shape the GS once it's applied , largely improvising and going by feel until it does what I want it to...

[SocietySoldier]

you have mad GS skills

[dregor]

An idea for your vehicles to try and come up with something nurgly but different from the plaguereaper is to perhaps build on the idea of the Destroyer Hive that Typhus carries around. "Smokestacks" to represent a hive, built up on a Vindicator -- especially on the back end of it -- could be cool, with some "guts" running from it into the cannon itself.

[_'Ginger' Matt_]

Well i must say for a GS job done on the run its looks absolutley brilliant. What tools are you working with for sculpting at the moment? if its the games workshop one might i reccoment a better more extensive toolkit. I got one about 3 years ago when my GS work started getting decent and believe me they help no-end!

Anyway enough of complementing your GS skills for now (it seems t be a running thing ) regarding a vindicator here are afew nice ideas you could use. 1) the desroyer hive idea posted by dregor is priceless dont pass that oppourtunity up! 2) i know you dislike the idea of ripping off stuff from other models but imagine what the demolisher cannon would look like if it was done int he method of the plagureaper cannon barrel!

Defilers i personally dislike, for death guard they seem to 'agile', a more dreadnaughty theme for one would look ace. the one from this thread by "keb" is a perfect example! http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=169093 use it for inspiration if nothing else.

Well theres my suggestions, hope they help and keep up the good work...again!

[Svartmetall]

My theory on 40K vehicles is that most Chaos tanks/APCs/whatever are essentially the same hunks of metal as Loyalist ones, just crewed by very bad people. Accordingly, it's always felt to me like trying to make a Rhino or something into a moving avatar of [insert Chaos God here] was kind of ice-skating uphill from the start, aesthetically-speaking. I'm not the biggest fan of Daemonic possession for 'normal' vehicles, as a result; but the Defiler is different from other vehicles, seeing as how it's basically a custom-made metal shell for a Daemon, so right off the bat I reckon you can go ape with Defiler conversions aimed at whatever Ruinous Power you cleave to. I'd already seen that 'dreadnaught' take on the Defiler, and while I think it's interesting it's not how I want to go with mine.

Rest assured, I have a cunning plan for a Nurgle Defiler...actually I have two. But one would be weird + difficult while the other would be expensive + difficult. And possibly weird too. I need to bounce ideas off a couple of people I know here and do some conceptual sketching (I really, really suck at drawing) before I commit myself either way; but trust me, neither will look capable of agility by the time I'm finished with them. Corpulent, lumbering and plague-ridden will be the order of the day, no matter what.

As for the Vindicator, once you have the 'dozer blade and the spaced armour on there they're kind of tubby bitches anyway, so we're already off to a good start Nurgle-wise . The Destroyer-hive idea is an interesting one, though I'd been going for more of a rust-and-chains-and-mouldy-patches look so far - see the first paragraph in this post for why. I was kind of planning on making the Defiler the really outside-the-box Nurgle-conversion one, and keeping the other vehicles(s) more 'normal'; what I may well do is grade the conversion level according to the hierarchy of the vehicles involved, similar to how I'm doing with my troops.

For my troops, I'm going:
Troops + Havocs - Nurgly
Chosen + Terminators - very Nurgly
Lord + Sorceror - piles of goo with a weapon sticking out

...so for vehicles, it would be kind of logical to go:
Rhino - Nurgly
Vindicator - very Nurgly
Defiler - huge pile of goo with some legs and a weapon sticking out

[Xenith]

Defiler - huge pile of goo with some legs and a weapon sticking out

Schweet - how about buying 3 tubs of silly putty and sticking a battlecannon and some claws in it?

[dregor]

Schweet - how about buying 3 tubs of silly putty and sticking a battlecannon and some claws in it?

And the added benefit of being able to make an impression of the Sunday Funnies on it.

[Svartmetall]

Aaaand now some shots of the first of my Chosen, green stuff work finally finished on them (up to 5 separate stages of GS on some):

I really like the compound curves created by the guitar-string cabling and the chainsword gunky bits on this one...



More guts...you can never have too many guts...


And the beginnings of a decent-looking Chosen squad, hopefully

[[MaGiC]]

you're GStastic my friend hehe

looking good.. can't wait to see the whole army

[BFeeder]

your skills with GS are commendable, I'm sure Papa Nurgle would be proud

[Andyslegion]

Lol his GS skills are more than Commendable, There *Beeping* Awesome!!!!!

[SilverTabby]

The photos really don't do them full justice (having just held them to have a proper look ). That's some real good work you've got going there...

[Svartmetall]

Woah, thanks...having you compliment my modelling work is a bit like having Steve Vai turn up and say "Hey, that was a pretty good guitar solo"...

[Dr.Know]

Can you make a tutorial on how you did the greenstuffing? I cant imagine you doing this for an entire army. And thank God you just have to drybrush this instead of painting it all. That would be a pain in the @$$

[NeoHunter]

Papa Nurgle wants to hug you.

The GS is nicely done. Giving your miniatures a rather messy, rotting and disgusting look. Will you be adding things like pus flowing out from festering wounds? Also, I am not sure if you added it in but I failed to notice sores and boils too. These will really enhance the disgusting look and feel.

Okay. Enough talk. Start priming.

[Tinweasel]

Just have to chime in that I love the overall look of these guys so far - doesn't really matter how much experience you have with GS or sculpting or painting or anything in my book, it's the end result that counts... you've got some solid-looking Nurgle troops. I've always been a fan of Nurgle-esque stuff, ever since I saw all the Plaguebearers cavorting and Nurglings nuzzling in the White Dwarf previous of The Realms of Chaos books some 16 years ago or so. That's probably why all my GS and conversions have a Nurglish bent, too, come to think of it.

I think your base scheme is pretty solid, you could probably keep chugging along with it for the sake of getting an army out. If it were me, then what I would do would be to go back and touch up and add color through straight brushing. (I just can't bring myself to drybrush rank 'n' file troops, however much faster it is, which is probably why most folks have healthy starting armies and I have a handful of figures done.)

So far as your opinion on rank 'n' file vehicles, I'd beg to differ. I would actually say that these are the ones that have seen more use than the big daddy Defiler 'n' such, and as a result have had more interaction/tainting by the troops and Nurgle, especially what with regular wear 'n' tear, battle damage, and the need to swap out parts when all your supply stocks are (**mysteriously**) warped and twisted and rife with corruption. (That being said, I'm not planning on going all out on my Rhinos and such either with my Warband... but that could change at any moment!)

[Svartmetall]

"Will you be adding things like pus flowing out from festering wounds?"
Quite possibly, though if I do it'll be painted on rather than green stuffed.
"Also, I am not sure if you added it in but I failed to notice sores and boils too. These will really enhance the disgusting look and feel."
I'm kind of avoiding those, mainly because every Nurgle thing you see has them. I went specifically for a bloated and tumorous feel, very much inspired by Gothmog's deformities from Return Of The King...

Yum!
"Okay. Enough talk. Start priming."
I'm on it

[Svartmetall]

"...perhaps a few stage-by-stage pictures please??"
"Can you make a tutorial on how you did the greenstuffing?"
Gentlemen, your wish is my command

http://forums.relicnews.com/showthread.php?t=172615

[Svartmetall]

A few pics of these first few Chosen in their basic paint scheme - I went quite a bit lighter than the line troops and Havocs, because:
A) I wanted them to be visually distinct straight away from the more common troops, and
B) I wanted all the extra green stuff work I put into these guys to be clearer

Really pleased with how this guy's starting to look:


Note this guy's Chaos Colostomy Tube(TM):

Also pleased with how all the GS work on the standard bearer is finally looking with some paint on him - there are about 7 separate applications of GS on him...he looks kind of Cthulhu-esque to me...

The Chosen ensemble so far:

[SocietySoldier]

some damn fine painting so far
i know theyre only WIP's but something about the silver for the weapons bothers me
are you going for the traditional light metal with the red stocks?
as seen here:
http://us.games-workshop.com/games/4...ue_marines.htm

[Svartmetall]

"...something about the silver for the weapons bothers me"

They need black ink washes to start with, then I want to rust them up...currently experimenting on bits of sprue to find a rust technique that looks right to me. You'd be hard-pressed to find someone who loves their Nurgly bits more than me, but I think there's a tendency with Plague Marines to over-do the rusting and decay of the metal stuff that needs to work - i.e. you end up with weapons that look like a ball of rust and goo, that if you pull the trigger they'd sort of go *coughing-up-hairball noise* and spit out a bit of rust on the floor and that'd be it.
I wanted my Death Guard to look like they were still part of a bona fide fighting force, despite the corruption of their bodies. The weapons will be corroded and rusted, and in some cases have the tumorous Nurgly green bits on them, but I want them still to look as though they'd credibly work.

[SocietySoldier]

sounds like a plan to me
im lovin the greens by the way
they look fantastic

[[MaGiC]]

give them a brown ink wash mate and then drybrush it with silver again.. or you could paint it brazen brass with a mix of dark flesh and then drybrush it silver on top.. I think the wash technique is the best... I use loads of washes for my minis

[Ghost_Maker]

wow, these are great! You're making me want to go Nurgle!
The lighter wash is better than your standard dark troops. It brings out the GS more, I say you should do 'em all like this.
Well done. Do they still sell the plague marine standard bearer in shops, or did you get it on-line?