Dark Angels collectors, gamers and modelers will probably be wanting to build and paint more than one of those beautiful Dark Angels Deathwing Terminator squads from the new Warhammer 40,000 Dark Vengeance starter set.
If you’re like me (and I know I am) you will also probably want to vary the poses a little bit on some of those models, especially the Assault Cannon. What follows are a few extremely simple ideas for doing just that.The idea here is to gain some variety without spending a lot of time on converting, after all, you’re going to need lots of time just to paint these beautifully detailed models.
First, there’s the simple arm swap where you just switch the Assault Cannon arm and Storm Bolter arm between two models. Try out the Assault Cannon arm on different models in the squad, then see how the Storm Bolters from those models work on the Assault Cannon trooper’s body. Some of those swaps require little or no cutting or sculpting at all.
The following two photographs show just that. The arms are easily interchanged between these two particular models without any need for other types of converting at all. This gives you a highly dynamic shooting pose for the Assault Cannon armed model!
Next there’s the slightly more complex arm exchange where a small amount of converting is required. In this instance I had to cut the arm below the pauldron and also cut the feeder hose for the Assault Cannon to pose it so that it is shooting toward the left. This required a little bit of sculpting using Kneadatite (“Green Stuff”) in order to fill in the missing part of the hose after twisting the Assault Cannon to the left a bit.
The conversion to the former Assault Cannon trooper is much simpler, just glue the Storm Bolter arm directly to his body. This yields yet another different pose for this model.
These models are still in the early stages of being prepared for painting. Some of them are on custom bases from Dragonforge. Others will eventually be on scenic basing I’ve done myself. And the barrels of the Storm Bolters will all be drilled out before priming and painting.
I’m really looking forward to adding these exciting new Dark Vengeance Terminator models to my existing Dark Angels model collection. Painting all the fabulous details on them will be a time consuming pleasure. What ideas have others come up with for these models? Are some of you using them as regular Codex Space Marine Terminators? How about Chaos Terminator conversions? Share your ideas and links to pics in the comments below.
