Showing posts with label The Kodiak. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Kodiak. Show all posts

Monday 1 July 2019

Titan Owner's Club UK Walk 2019 event

Having spent months in preparation, I finally got to attend the Titan Owner's Club UK Walk 2019 over the weekend and it was amazing!

There were 60+ Titan class engines and a similar number of knights in play over the weekend and it all took place over an absolutely massive 52 foot map crammed with amazing terrain built by the ToC organisers!

I didn't take a huge amount of pictures as I was too busy trying to survive against the Traitor legions and their heretical Knightly allies!  The photos I did take are below, to give you a flavour of my weekend experience.  I'll post some more detailed images of my Warhound Titans once I've applied the finishing touches.

The ToC hired a professional photographer who took literally hundreds of photos on the day, so if you want to see more (and why wouldn't you?!), keep an eye on the Titan Owner's Club website (http://titanownersclub.blogspot.com/) over the next couple of weeks!


Part of the amazing battlefield before deployment
There was a photo op before the battle began...
...and it was a magnificent sight to behold!
My Legio Metalica engines supported by a trio of knights ready for war!
Warhounds Fulgur Manus and Excidium Rex stride out to flank the Legio Fureans engines
While Ferrum Dominus takes up a strong central position in our quadrant to provide supporting fire
  
Lyden's Fureans Reavers smash their way through tank sized containers with scant regard for the Emperor's cargo!


Lyden's beautiful (and absolutely deadly) Warbringer ready to blast us to smithereens!

My view of the rest of the field...
The loyalist engines surged forward to overwhelm the traitor Legions, eventually carrying the day; but at great cost...

I just couldn't let the weekend pass without pretending to be Godzilla! :)


Thanks again to the ToC organisers for a spectacular event!  Helpful, friendly and really accommodating, they really were the stars of the weekend!  I can't wait for next year...

Thursday 28 June 2018

Go-Knights!


Robots Undisguised!

As if finishing a Reaver Titan wasn’t enough, I’ve ploughed on with yet more Imperial Knights this week!

I’ve broken down my Imperial Knights into several themed factions.  The most straight forward one is my House Raven Knights which is unsurprising given that they are undeniably linked to the Legio of my Reaver Titan (and eventually my two Warhounds once they’re built and painted!); Metalica.
Metalica and House Raven have an unbroken bond dating back to before the Horus Heresy, giving a rich background for me to draw on and cross-pollinate.

So, to start with, I want to do a quick rundown of the Knights and Support units which I own and their current build status.  I do intend to try and add progress to my Blog as and when I complete a unit from the Force:

House Raven
Unit
Name
Battle Readiness
Questoris Class: Knight Errant
Arbiter
[Build Status: Complete]
[House Colours: Complete]
=!= Arbiter Ready to Walk =!=
Questoris Class: Knight Paladin
Cognis
[Build Status: Complete]
[House Colours: Not yet applied]
Questoris Class: Knight Gallant
Furien
[Build Status: Complete]
[House Colours: Not yet applied]
Questoris Class: Knight Warden
Crucius
[Build Status: Complete]
[House Colours: Not yet applied]
Questoris Class: Knight Crusader
Indomitus
[Build Status: Complete]
[House Colours: Not yet applied]
Questoris Class: Knight Preceptor
Rygan
[Build Status: Incomplete: processing STC plans]
Questoris Class: Knight Gallant
Furore
[Build Status: Incomplete: processing STC plans]
Questoris Class: Knight Castellan
Invigillus
[Build Status: Incomplete: processing STC plans]
Questoris Class: Knight Valiant
Ahabius
[Build Status: Incomplete: processing STC plans]
Questoris Class: Knight Mageara
Violatus
[Build Status: Incomplete: processing STC plans]
Armiger Class: Knight Warglaive
Infernus
[Build Status: Complete]
[House Colours: Not yet applied]
Armiger Class: Knight Warglaive
Sythax
[Build Status: Complete]
[House Colours: Not yet applied]
Armiger Class: Knight Helverin
Mordent
[Build Status: Incomplete: processing STC plans]
Armiger Class: Knight Helverin
Hastus
[Build Status: Incomplete: processing STC plans]
3 Armoured Sentinels
The Huntsmen
[Build Status: Complete]
[House Colours: Complete]
=!= Huntsmen  Ready to Walk =!=
3 Armoured Sentinels
The Outriders
[Build Status: Complete]
[House Colours: Not yet applied]
Baneblade Super Heavy Tank
Impregnable
[Build Status: Complete]
[House Colours: Not yet applied]
Sacristan Techpriest
Regulus
[Build Status: Complete]
[House Colours: Not yet applied]

The elements of the force which I’ve completed so far are the Huntsmen, 3 Lascannon equipped armoured Sentinels and Arbiter, my one finished Knight Raven Questoris suit.

The Huntsmen


Below is a picture of the Huntsmen and some shots of an objective token I made from spare parts to go along with my Knights:

Ranging ahead, these Sentinels risk it all for the honour of House Raven!

I loved the idea of smaller machines crewed by House Serfs, lowborn residents of Kolossi who are given the opportunity to emulate their masters, riding out ahead of the more heavily armed knights as a scouting force.
This is probably an extremely hazardous profession, hence them being given the honour of wearing the House colours.  One even sports the House symbol on his hull – he must have made a good impression on the battlefield!
Life as a Servo-skull radar walker must be... fun?
What better way to observe the enemy than with a scuttling radar dish?

Arbiter

Arbiter was built shortly after the original Imperial Knight kit was released.  I loved the old Epic Imperial Knights and decided that I would build Arbiter to emulate the old Epic model with a gigantic smashy fist.  On reflection, there are few goofier red robots out there than the original Epic Errant…



Only this guy springs to mind….
 
In case you’re unfamiliar with Scooter, he’s one of the Go-bots.  A shameless 80’s cartoon rip-off of Transformers produced with epic levels of laziness to sell some of the worst toys ever made…
Seriously. How did they make him look more like a mobility scooter than a vesper?!
 
A toy so tragically bad, it resorts to cheering for itself in the box:
 


There was always something a little off about Scooter in the cartoons…


To be honest, Scooter wasn’t the only Go-bot that seemed to enjoy exposing himself to children on the telly either…


Anyway!  Back on subject! Arbiter was given a scratch built power fist of epic proportions to match the scale of the original epic model– I worried that it would look ridiculous, but I think it worked out really well!  Even though he’s recently had a refit to include a carapace Autocannon array and some extra base detailing, I’ve never even considered replacing his fist with a newer Thunderstrike gauntlet – I think it makes him wonderfully unique and can easily be used to represent a relic weapon from the new Codex; The Paragon Gauntlet! J








 

Freeblades

Next up are my Freeblades which are organised into 3 distinct factions that are each centred around a single Legendary Knight.
Each one has a really strong theme as I see them as named characters, travelling the galaxy with their own select retinues...
The first up is the mysterious Faded Remnant which are centred around the legendary Knight The Spectre who you can see in the images below.

The Faded Remnant
Unit
Name
Battle Readiness
Questoris Class: Knight Paladin
The Spectre
[Build Status: Complete]
[Remnant Colours: Complete]
=!= Spectre Ready to Walk =!=
Secutarii Hoplite Squad

The Spectral Guard
[Build Status: Incomplete: processing STC plans]
Sacristan Techpriest
Mortan
[Build Status: Complete]
[Remnant Colours: Not yet applied]
2 Kastellan Robots
The Haunt
[Build Status: Complete]
[Remnant Colours: Not yet applied]

 







I’ll feature my two remaining Freeblade factions, The Banner of the Bear and The Court of the Fisher King in a future post.  I’ve already shown the Kodiak in a previous post, but he’s getting some friends to make sure that he doesn’t get lonely!  As for the Fisher King… well. He’s nearly ready to walk…

Wednesday 20 June 2018

Imperial Knight Freeblade - The Kodiak

Out with the old!

With the recent release of the new 8th edition Imperial Knights Codex, I decided that I would revisit one of my Imperial Knight Freeblades: The Kodiak.

My original vision for this model was that it was piloted by a grizzled old mercenary.  His heraldry and the look of his knight were bear themed, so I painted it in shades of brown.

I was never happy with how he turned out; the browns and brass trim all seemed to meld into one another and the model also didn't stand out from his (brown) base.  All in all, he just looked like a big shiny turd...


The Refit

Although I still love the buzz-saw blade which I originally equipped him with, it just never really fit with the Kodiak's theme.  As such, I decided to replace it with a more bear-like Thunderstrike Gauntlet with extended ursine claws.

The faceplate also needed a swap-out.  When he was originally built, it was with the original knight kit which had a limited selection of helms to choose from.  The subsequent release of the Warden kit included alternative face plates and the one with the 'snout' seemed like a perfect replacement!

I also came to the conclusion that a hoary old bear would happily pound the enemy with whatever weapons he could lay his grubby sell-sword mits on.  So I also decided to up-gun him with an Ironstorm missile pod for when you absolutely, positively have to kill every single mother hubbard holed up behind cover...

As I would be adding a carapace weapon option, I had to move his totem.  This didn't present much of an issue as I wasn't a fan of the carapace badge I'd used the first time round.  Some trimming and sanding ensued with me accidently snapping off his tilt shield during the process (which turned out to be rather fortuitous as I could then repaint it more easily!) - and his new symbol was in place.

I decided that I would try and save the tilt shield freehand bear symbol as I was rather fond of it.  As I was going to repaint the hull of the knight in black, I made the decision to repaint the edges of the tilt shield in a white spot colour and use white in other key areas to break up larger areas of plate.

I secretly also wanted to try out some new weathering techniques which I had devised and I think they worked in spectacular fashion! :)

Let loose the dogs bear of war...

And so, without further ado, I give you the Kodiak reborn!


 
 



Please let me know whether you think the overhaul was a success - I certainly prefer his new look!

Thanks for visiting!

Goddenzilla