Surgical excision

I finally got around to finishing off the two units of Wracks that will form the initial vanguard of my force in the form of the scalpel squadron formation from the haemonculus covens book.

Consisting of two units of five wracks, each including an Ossefactor and Hexrifle armed Acothyst, mounted in Venoms (armed with the additional splinter cannon, because, well why wouldn't you?)

I was quite excited when I read about this formation for the first time, it's ability to potentially reap additional victory points is obviously very useful if you can pull it off, and I think that alone can help leverage any difficulty you might come across because of your limited choice in units.

Of course, I could ally in some dark eldar or Eldar stuff, but I've never really been big into allies, I much prefer the look of a coherent force, but one idea I had was to ally in units and make them look as Covenite as possible, I thought a unit of wracks entirely armed with hexrifles could make a good unit of eldar Rangers, and a unit of wracks with additional armour and wielding klaives could be used as Incubi and represent some kind of elite unit in the covens quite well.

The other thing I really want to do is convert a shaven Hellpit abomination into a Covenite monster of hideous proportions, but it would be cool

If I could use it to represent another unit in the game.

I'm interested to see if these guys can pull their weight as they are, I'm now working on a talos and a chronos which will take me up to 1000 points in total!

After that, I'm thinking twenty scarlet epicureans will be next!

Ancient Evil

Aaah, Urien Rakarth. 

I love how utterly removed and uncaring he is.  Having become a truly supernatural being over the aeons and carrying this air of vampiric nobility despite having his face tied on.

I googled around for a bit to look at different paint jobs on this model and I saw one pic that really inspired me where he had been painted in a heavy black scheme where the black was accented pretty much with super pale skin and red detailing.  

I wanted to riff off of this colour scheme whilst tieing him into the rest of my force, and maintaining a highly individual look.   Not always easy to do, the green pipes and detailing are subtle in their positioning on the model, and I really like how the haemovores under his feet really clash with the greens of the pipes suspended over his head, a very pleasing model to paint and look at.

Urien will obviously form a stag party with the unit of Grotesques in a raider most of the time, at least until I get a few more painted, I don't really know what to do with him though, he doesn't scream out as being particularly incredible in game terms yet as far as being specialised towards a particular role.

But that hardly matters when your model is that cool does it?

Flesh Berzerkers

The limited pool of units available when playing a Covenite army in 40k isn't something that has bothered me so far, conversely, it has served a purpose as becoming a sort of "check list" for what to paint.

And one of my favourite units on that check list, and a unit I have wanted to convert and paint for a long time is the Grotesques.

Ever since the Warhammer fantasy battle Vargeists/Crypt horrors box came out I thought "well those are some rad models, how can I get them into 40k? 

Also, there seems to be a shocking lack of source material on the Internet in terms of pictures of other people's attempts at this conversion, despite the box coming up regularly in forum discussion on the subject of converting them.

I quite like the "break dancing" official Grotesque available from Games Workshop, but at some point, I plan to run a unit of nine of these beauties and there was no way I was going to have nine of the same model in the unit.

Strangely enough, people seem to convert them out of Rat Ogres, which look great, but I personally find the additional hair on the models a bit too "un dark eldar", I like the idea of them being just big wracks, hairless and pumped full of steroids with a mask welded to their face.

The other option people go for is the Everblight Warspears which, although lovely models, I feel make a poor conversion piece as the bodies are too small for the heads, and the overall aesthetic of the models, while close, doesn't really convey the mindless nature of a grotesque. 

This first unit was essentially a test run to see if my idea would ever work, I should've really waited until I had purchased a couple more Talos (which I since have.) so that I would have more than enough spare bits available, for example the bio mechanical hands from the Talos kit are obviously perfect to represent the flesh gauntlets, but once I make a few more of these guys, these ones will provide some variation in the unit.

There is actually a moderate amount of green stuff on these models, though none of it particularly skilfully done I would add.  I thought it was important to build up the biceps and neck muscles of the models as they felt too lean originally. I also sculpted little rolls around the ankles and waist (as well as cutting off all the groinal hair of the original models.) to create the trousers which are a recurrent part of the official look for Grotesques.  I also sculpted on the wrist vembraces to again get them closer looking to the Wracks in the army, and to bulk up the arms and round off the outline.

I'm quite happy with them now, but can't help but think any ones I make in future will be better next time round.  I didn't even like the paint job until I applied a super thinned down layer of Cadian fleshtone over the pallid wych flesh highlights, that seemed to mottle them and give the large flat areas of the muscles a bit more detail.

Now to chuck them in a Raider and twist off some Space Marine heads...

Poisonblood

Work continues on the new Coven, the new haemonculus model is real lovely, not quite as convertible as I might like in terms of pose, but the overall mood of the model more than makes up for that.  I was unsure how to paint the eyes at first as they looked really boring in plain white and didn't stand out in black, in the end I

Hit on the idea of watering down pink as a layer over the White and then adding a tin pupil for the really blood shot look, I'm really happy with how it turned out!

The new plastic Wracks are incredible models, I'm loving the store of spare bits I'm building up the more boxes I open, I've got ten painted so far, and I'm working on the next five, I'm planning to run a scalpel squadron with an Acothyst with hexrifle and Ossefactor in each Venom (dual splinter cannons of course.)

Initially I was planning on a squad of ten with three liquifiers to accompany a we way portal haemonculi, but I'm leaning more towards a squad of nine in a raider now, the Dark Artisan seems more fit for deep striking shinanigans.  The army Is shaping up well so far, and I've almost finished my Crypt Horror Grotesques so they will be posted very soon!

Fleshcraft

Back at the painting desk, after a short break away, I've got a battle report that I've been meaning to post for ages as well, my first game of 7th against a friend's Grey Knights with the Marines Exemplar.

With the release of the new Dark Eldar book I'm finally free to resume work on a Haemonculus Coven army for 40k, with plastic Wracks and a new Haemonculus as well as Wrack crew for the ships, the army will be a lot closer to what I was hoping first time round!

I've already got ten new Wracks painted as well as two haemonculi and a Venom, with my Grotesque squad that I recently converted from Crypt Horrors waiting patiently to be finished off, pictures to follow!