Kabal of the Nightsworn Project Log

I like the look of your Archon. He certainly looks arrogant with that pose. No Mon-keigh are going to scare him!

The Stuff You did With the talos and cronos are just wicked sweet.

Mini update and Christmas Special

So last week I made a Void dreamer and I forgot to upload it to you guys so I'll do that now, but I've also made a gift for my friend who got me into Warhammer who is going on his mission (Mormon) so I won't see him for 2 years (Even if he did play Tau I'm gonna miss him /cry ) and I've made him a model to say goodbye.

Anyway!

Voiddreamer


Funny thing is I've never bought a wych kit. I bought some used Wyches and I've snipped the torso off of one of them and put some high elf bits I bought from a bit box... I overall like him.

Razhad the Lord of Tides


So I'll go into the backstory for this conversion below but this is the FIRST time I've actually tried sculpting anything with Greenstuff and I'm decently happy with it (It looked better before I tried to put him on the base -.-) but this has inspired me to try more sculpting so you'll see more in the future! (I was previously too scared to do it)

As for bits used I used the Cold One Knight Shield (I wanted to save them but it's a gift come on!), some High Elf head I assume is from the dragon rider, Black Ark Corsair sword, greenstuff, and the Kabalite warrior from the raider kit.

There's some story behind this guy you see last month my friends and I were doing a narrative campaign and one of my venoms with a generic warrior squad was shot down by his riptide. Well he shot down the venom and every member of his squad but him, but what was fantastic is a few turns later the riptide was down to 1 wound left and this 1 kabalite warrior charged out of cover to get within rapid fire range to shoot the riptide... and he killed him. This 1 little kabalite had gotten vengeance for his squad and it basically turned the campaign to my favor.

My friend insisted on naming him and we bounced ideas back and forth and decided to call him Razhad and we jokingly added Lord of Tides as his title because well...Riptide...

My friend will be leaving on the 28th and I thought since he got me into Warhammer I thought it was the perfect present to give as a going away gift. Not to mention if anyone tries to mug him on his mission he has the Nightsworn at his back  Sorry for bringing real life into the log but it's a sad time for me as I'm losing a close friend and I thought he deserved this little spotlight in my project log, I'll keep RL seperate from now on.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Oooh nice, gogo greenstuff!

The imperfections on the back of the cape are really easy to smooth out if you put a small extra piece on, dip your finger in water and run it over the surface to smooth it out.

Sculpting is just like painting, the more you do it the better you'll be. The dexterity you'll already have from painting helps a lot and the rest is just practice. Also good tools. I use the point of a compass, the blade of a penknife and an old airbrush needle almost exclusively. Very expensive barrier to entry! Just remember to always keep the end of the tool wet and you'll be fine Good job taking the plunge, the first step is the hardest - I hope your friend enjoys your hard work.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas dude! Great models there, full of character love the backstory behind the Lord of Tides. For me, that's what's best about 40k. Fluff driving battles, and battles driving fluff

Oh, and you're already exceeded my skill with GS

Well I was going to get some Warhammer models for Christmas (Conversion fodder) unforunatley they are late. Freaking Christmas Shopping

Upside is my friend who's leaving got me a haemmy along with some Dark Elf bits so... I may work on my sculpting more and rework my haemmy conversion from earlier. Think I should get rid of the Spirit hair?

@Korona Thanks for the advice! I'm not going into a whole new world where before I leap into it further I'm going to look at online guides... Any reccomendations?

@Ynneadwraith Yeah I really do love the fluff driving battles (and vice versa) it's why I really enjoy narrative campaigns

So I've found a use for my Old Kabalites... test subjects.

I'm giving my hand at painting and I have expressed I've never painted before, and I'm going to reiterate that. I have never painted before. Needless to say my first results are horrid.

I've been playing with ideas and have been stuck on a dilema of Dark Grey for the Armor or a Black. I would like to have Gold and Silver for Detailing, Purple for Cloth, and Glowing Blue eyes. But the armor colour is difficult to decide.

Without further ado behold my Dark Muse awful test subjects
(I hated the chick with the hair defying gravity but painting it as a mask makes it look better...(Not that that is difficult considering how bad it is)



Painting and Colour scheme advice and suggestions are encouraged (greatly.. please help!). I'd love to know tips and tricks for painting our true kin.

EDIT: What I have
I have a start painting kit, which gives me red,blue,yellow,white,black,silver, gold, clear gloss, and some brushes
From what I have with GW is one of their small brushes, Xereus Purple, Gahenna Gold, Lorthorn Blue, Abbadon Black, Runefang Steel, and Nuln Oil (Gloss)

Alright so after failing at painting I thought I wanted to somehow improve my Talos and Cronos. Try to make them more Dark Eldar (Aeldari) as it were. So I decided to do the obvious give them horns.

Cronos: Unfortunatley my Cronos has given me troubles in Transport, As well as never feeling quite right to me, I still want to tweak it (get rid of the bone tentacles) but I'm not really sure what to add. (I've had a thought though of converting a Coven Throne as a Cronos) but I've replaced one tentacle with a knife, and the other with a shield.




Talos: So I've decided to give my Talo(i) horns. unfortunately I botched up the Leaping Talos's horns so you only get the Crawling one.




Finally I know pretty much everyone (including myself) were unhappy with my Haemonculus... Well after fiddling around with it a bit and replacing the arms, legs, and chopping bits off the head. I think I'm pretty happy with him.



These guys I'll have primed tomorrow so you'll be able to see them without Greenstuff soon

So what do you guys think of the horns? I'd also like everyone's opinion on the Haemonculus. and as stated in my previous post I need help painting so any tips are appreciated

Managed to miss the painting update somehow! Definitely don't be disheartened, that's a solid effort for your first 3 models. I'll say that you've already got the accuracy required for painting down nicely I'll grab a pic of my first ever model tomorrow just so you can see how far ahead of me you are on the 'first model' stakes

One thing you could try to get a bit of practice (and test out what it looks like) is to try and run a thin line of silver over the edges of the black/grey armour plates (and maybe the spikes on the middle kabalite's thighs). Running a little of a bright colour along a sharp edge is a really simple way of making something pop against its background

Might not work as well on these older models, but I guarantee it will look kickass on the newer Kabalites with their overlapping armour plates

Another technique you could try out is giving the hair of Mr Middle-Kabalite a fairly liberal application of Nuln Oil. That stuff is bottled-magic when it comes to shading hair and fur and other such things

I like the horns too, and your Haemi looks terrifying! Definitely like the screaming skull head choice

Quick Note: I'm going to be saving up Cash for the new Eldar Triumvirate (and a Start Collecting Death Skeleton Horde for some converting the above with the Mortarchs that happen to conveniently come in that set for only 5$ more...) So my focus has gone from getting models and converting them to kitbashing what I have currently, and painting! woo! (I'm terrified xD )

So if you guys haven't already guessed my army is totally going Ynnari and with this new Revenant discipline I'm thinking of making Rhivan (my Archon not me ) into Ycarne. Sooooo Converting! (Either Arkhan the Black's Torso or the Visarch's Torso (If Visarch I'll be replacing all the faces with skulls), and face wise I'm thinking Sigvald the Magnificent face with a Kabalite Warrior Mask or a Necron skull on it. Although I'm open to suggestions headwise as I have no idea what I'll use!)

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Managed to miss the painting update somehow! Definitely don't be disheartened, that's a solid effort for your first 3 models. I'll say that you've already got the accuracy required for painting down nicely Smile I'll grab a pic of my first ever model tomorrow just so you can see how far ahead of me you are on the 'first model' stakes Wink

I have the accuracy? Because I was just dabbing the paint around and fumbling with techniques that I googled and probably did wrong
I really need to see this first model now @Ynneadwraith

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One thing you could try to get a bit of practice (and test out what it looks like) is to try and run a thin line of silver over the edges of the black/grey armour plates (and maybe the spikes on the middle kabalite's thighs). Running a little of a bright colour along a sharp edge is a really simple way of making something pop against its background Smile

Noted, I was planning on making Silver the dominant trim colour after playing with it. Gold I'd like to do for the runes on the helmets etc. but I don't like my current gold Gahenna Gold seems almost too orange, I'd like a more dull metallic yellow.

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Might not work as well on these older models, but I guarantee it will look kickass on the newer Kabalites with their overlapping armour plates Smile

Speaking of which I've been looking at painting guides for the new Kabalites and they have given me ideas (Granted how well I execute those ideas will be seen this week)

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Another technique you could try out is giving the hair of Mr Middle-Kabalite a fairly liberal application of Nuln Oil. That stuff is bottled-magic when it comes to shading hair and fur and other such things Smile

Duly noted I plan on using my Nuln Oil quite a bit.

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I like the horns too, and your Haemi looks terrifying! Definitely like the screaming skull head choice Smile

Definatley better then his first incarnation (You can see it on page 1...) The horns I rather like and I was playing with the idea of a collar but scrapped it.

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So all of my models are primed black (except the leaping Talos I need to give him horns!) and man does the Crawling Talos look good. He looks much more intimidating without all the greenstuff.

For the raiders I'm thinking of painting the sails on my raiders Purple, (Xereus as that's the only shade I have currently, and possibly put some nuln oil on there?) and I'm thinking of freehanding some swirls or something on the sails, would you guys reccomend anything as having it a flat purple doesn't seem that good.

Finally! I'd like to know what everyone's tips for OSL/Glow Effects are for painting as I'd like to learn how to do a ghostly blue for the undead spirits I have, some of my guns, eyes, and if I plan on greenstuffing it possibly exhaust from my raiders (Eye of error style)

And with that my wall of text update is complete. You'll be getting pictures by the end of the week (if not sooner)

Neat! Yeah there really is something that helps give you the bigger picture of how something will look when you've got it undercoated looking forward to seeing some paint on them!

Nuln Oil's best use is for hair and stuff where there's lots of little ridges, or selectively placing along joins where it can settle and add depth haven't tried it washed across a large area yet but it's worth a go to give it a little satin sheen (it is semi-gloss after all).

Alas I haven't the foggiest when it comes to OSL! Hopefully someone else can give you some pointers

Oh, and Mr 8-layers-of-unthinned-paint is coming, don't you worry

You sure have some great conversions in here, your talks and Cronos are especially creative. Good job, keep it up, looking forward to seeing more.

Text Update

Just letting you guys know my progress. So I've been slowly saving up for a giant pile of bits that way I can start getting my conversions going but while I've been doing that I've been helping out my friend who is an Ork player get into 40k and conversions. Upside is he wants to do a themed army like mine (specifically a Dragon themed one) and he has gotten some bits that have been quite nice and will save me money (and may make me rush my giant shipment of bits)

The bits I've gained are Dreadlord/Sorceress on Black Dragon bits (If it isn't the Dragon I have it, which includes the armor for it as he wants his Dragon unarmored) and I now have more Cold One Knight bits (all but the raptors as he is gonna convert them to be his Warbikes)

I'm going to make a page on the Dark City in distractions with some of the conversions we work on so you guys can see what I've been up to.

Sorry for not having any progress in so long, and thanks for the understanding

Sweet! And don't feel under any pressure at all to get stuff done it saves you a ton of cash if you buy stuff in bulk rather than a little bit at a time. Postage on 12 different orders stacks up fast!

Looking forward to the distractions too

Rhivan looked at the mangled Dracon in front of him, he and his trueborn had been crucial in a previous raid destroying the Warp Tainted human's warmachine layed low in order to win the battle but at great cost, the officer's body shred to pieces, limbs severed, and soul grasping onto life, and he then.... Rhivan went to work.

After cutting ties with the haemonculi the Nightsworn had been experimenting with ways to bring back their men, the first trials had been "successful."... to a point anyway for the resurrection had taken a toll on the mind and the body.

The newly ressurected were mangled shells of their former selves, simmilar to that of a Haemonculi's Grotesque if he was perfectly honest, with the bulging skn, unnatural strength, and less intelligent then an Ork, being no better then a beast

But... Beasts can be used, and experimentation continued to refine ways to reanimate his fallen men but their minds intact, the failures being put onto the frontlines to wreak havoc upon their foes lines, after all what could go wrong?

Looking to one of his Flesh-shapers the Archon simply ordered "Don't let this be like the last batch"


Pain...

Agony...

but amongst these feelings Valanar felt something else surge through his veins... Power.


He and his men were changing, he could feel it... But they could still serve.


His people were not done with them yet, nor was his Master.


Our opponents will know terror, they will flee from our rage! We have tasted death countless times! Each time growing only stronger, what can your Gods do to stop us?



So guys I'm sorry about the wait (I hope that my Grotesques were worth it) and the writing, i'm playing with writing for the first time in years and have never been very good.

So what do you guys think of my Grotesques? The ones with Wings and Armor are what I envisioned when I was thinking to myself "I want Grotesques with Armor" and the "failures" are what is leftover from the Varghesit kit after I made my Vampiric Grotesques xD

If you want to see how I made do without a torso for the failures here you go

(Clearly a work of desperation and greenstuff )

If your wondering the kits I used to create them it was the Stormcast Vanguard Raptors, Vargheist, Talos, and Morghast kits (Arguably greenstuff as well with the amount I used) and I've finally gotten something to look exactly as I want it and am content

(On a side note my GW store is doing a path to glory AoS so I may be running them as Vargheists too)

Dude these look really cool! I love the vampiric grots. They look like Strigoi ported into 40k as Dark Eldar very nice!

The failed experiments are excellent too. Very creative to manufacture another batch of torsos often you get very nearly a whole dude left over from spare bits, but missing a torso or legs. Nice work!

I like the fluff too the idea of an Archon cutting ties with haemonculi and striking out on his own for fleshcraft is a really neat one

That venom conversion that you have picy=tures of looks beautiful. Makes me want to make one for my archon/trueborn.

So I'm finally working again on my army and I started painting today. Originally it was a Kabalite but I decided I'd like a little more practice before I started working on them.

Prior warning though I have never actually painted a model before (or much of anything), and I was limited to 3 brushes and 4 paints (Abbadon Black, Leadbelcher, Runefang Steel, and Xereus Purple) so I couldn't exactly do anything with overlapping colours.

Quick note the model is mostly done I know I need to tidy it up a bit more but I'd like everyone's thoughts, suggestions etc before I do more work. Sorry for the terrible quality of pics in advance.




EDIT: The sail looks WAY better in the pic then it does IRL (Just the right light to make it look like I did more then put a layer and a wash-esque layer on it) without good lighting it looks like a flat purple.

Good to see you back in action
I really like your conversions, especially the grotesque with the wings which look like a cape but all of them look great!
For the skeletal horses, how about draping a horse skeleton, most importantly the skull about a Reaver Jetbike?
A bit Motörhead/West Coast Choppers style, not exactly cheap, but could look awesome.
About the Raider i'd definately clean it up, and maybe get more colours for highlights, depending on the standard you want to achieve, also maybe use 2 thin layers for the basecoat, to not get as patchy as the leadbelcher on your rudder for example.

ty man I'm glad you like it (and I'm a fan of your log too )

Yeah the Grotesques conversions are the ones I'm proudest of. (Thinking about running them as Clawed Fiends in 8th though)

I haven't thought of that... I'll  have to play with that when I get my Black Knight kits.


Thanks for the suggestions on the raider man, for cleaning it up yeah I can see it's not in the best condition (I've been giving it minor touchups here and there while trying out some kabalite schemes that I'll post later) The extra coats of leadbelcher have been added, but I've been having a problem painting fine lines and tiny details. (You can see it on the raider those lines are awful)

As for the standard I'd like to achieve I don't have high hopes for my army (Since I have no painting ability/experience) but I'd like to get as good as I can get and as I improve go back and fix everything

As for colors in general I like having a base of black and leadbelcher I think it looks really cool and I like the more monochrome (and metallic) feeling that it has (although admittedly help would be nice with getting shades and the right paints, but I'd have no clue how to use them anyways xD) as for more colors in general I'd like to expand the purples on the sails a bit, and I plan on adding in a light sky blue to the scheme (but since I don't have the paints I can't experiment with it yet)

So I'm playing with 2 different Kabalite Schemes. Neither of which is the finished product (lack of blue being a problem) but they are the general idea of the theme going forward.

(Yes I realize the 2nd looks undeniably worse, I'm awful at detail work)

Seems like a great start to me I like the grittyness of the colour palette, definitely something I've developed a penchant for (especially in Dark Eldar).

Also, I think I prefer the dude on the right. Certainly the metals look really good. Less block silver, and more drybrushed over dark black so you get gradation between the armour plates definitely suits Dark Eldar

Where is the blue going to go? Something electric-blue for the helmet eye-lenses?

Thanks man

I guess I'll have to start playing with drybrushing and detail work more if I go with the right (I was unsure about the drybrushing silver on him I thought it almost clashed with the black) (And would you be willing to PM me how you'd recommend I go about doing that?)

Do you think the silver would look better if I nuln oiled it to a darker hue? Because I've seen some pretty cool schemes with darkened metal that look black and it'd probably mix better

Example:

As for the electric blue I'm thinking of it going on the blades (that way they aren't silver), perhaps the middle of the guns (where I have silver right now), the cannisters/grenades on the Kabalite's belt, and the eyes

Ideal Look:

Yeah no problem it'd probably be best to do a quick explanation here in case anyone else stumbles here thinking the same thing

I tend to find that blacks work really nicely as base colours for silvers (and browns for golds). For Kabalites, because their armour plates are overlapping it makes drybrushing the edges quite simple compared to other stuff (although, as ever there's a learning curve, but you can get it looking good with much less effort).

Not sure how much of the technique you've picked up so far, but for the drybrushed silver idea you start with the armour plates in black. Get some silver on your brush (it helps if it's a slightly larger brush, so not a fine detail one), and then brush most of it off on a piece of kitchen roll or something similar. Then, you brush that over the length of the overlapping armour plates. It'll only lay down a little bit at any one time, so you'll need to repeat that a few times at various points on the armour to get it looking silvery all across it.

Once you've got that basic technique (or, rather, while you're playing around with it) you'll find that you can vary how the colour looks loads just by how many times you go over with the silver.

Also, what this basically does is apply more of the paint to the raised sections (so the edges of the armour plates in this case), and less to the recesses so it tends to highlight as you go. You can also use the exact same technique with a brighter silver over the top of the original silver layer to give it an even shinier edge.

Personally, I find that technique a hell of a lot easier than edge-highlighting (which is usually a really thin bead of paint along a sharp edge). I also prefer it more as it sort of gradates the brightness in streaks towards the edge, which gives metal a really nice texture.

Nuln Oil works really nicely shading silvers as well I've tried it a few times, but ultimately ended up preferring my drybrushing technique. However, it's all about working out the way that you enjoy painting, and what sort of look you like most What I have found about Nuln Oil is that one coat of it is usually about right to shade silvers nicely. If you start piling up more than that then you can start to lose a bit of the detail.

The other thing about washes is that they're literally magic when it comes to shading stuff quickly and easily I do use them quite extensively on a whole host of stuff, and they work really nicely if I wasn't painting one dude at a time in an INQ28-style method, I'd be washes 100% of the way! Much less time consuming

There's also some neat ways that drybrushing and washes interact. One dead quick way for getting nicely shaded stuff is base-coat, then a dark wash, and then do the drybrush highlight thing using the original basecoat over the raised sections.

The other neat interaction they have is that drybrushing leaves a streaky texture (which I love for things like bone and weathered metal), but washes tend to blend together your layers. If you want something to have a smooth colour gradient then drybrush with a wash over the top works really nicely

Ooh, one thing that I've just thought. What you could do is paint each and every Kabalite you've got so far using a slightly different technique for doing silver. In my mind, Kabalite's armour is their own property (I doubt they share at any rate), so having them all look slightly individual while still staying within the 'uniform' would look dead cool. Plus, it would give you a ton of experience and free reign to experiment and find out what sort of methods you like when painting silvers. Plus plus, it means that no one experiment looks out of place. If you settle for a single method of doing silver, then you'd have to go and repeat that on all of your other previous attempts. However, if they're all designed to look slightly different, then you can keep experimenting the whole time you go along and everyone will look like they belong

Hey guys merry christmas , It's been awhile and during this time I've been dabbling with painting and brainstorming ideas for my army (as well as starting admech) so I'm sorry for the lack of updates I actually have plenty planned for the next few months.

So without further today's teaser photo my Incubi.

I'll take more tomorrow and I may have another teaser for everyone by then as well. Hope you guys enjoy and tell me what you think.