Sunday 16 November 2014

Grimdark Lego

Holy Throne, I'm going to have to buy several of these.  

Air brakes deployed

Not necessarily because of their usefulness on the tabletop; I've got plenty of proxies I could use.  No, I need to get lots of them because the possibilities are endless.  The Tyrannocyte is a sweet piece of kit.  Its like a Kinder Suprise with tentacles and horrid, carnivorous toys inside.  Its grimdark Lego at its best.  I spent most of Saturday just playing with the parts and fitting them together in strange combinations with blu-tac.  I've not even assembled the Spore Mines yet.  I think this might be better than the Mawloc/Trygon kit and I've put together some weird and wonderful conversions with that one in the past.

I couldn't figure out how to magnetise the carapace 'air brakes' so that they can be used both open and closed.  I actually destroyed part of the body trying to make them 'retractable' and had to glue them shut to cover my mistake.  Thats ok, I'll just get another one and try again.

Air brakes retracted.  Which looks best? I can't decide!

I did muck around with the tentacles and the Sarlacc Pit maw at the top.  I've finally found a use for my Dark Vengeance cultists.  As food.

Chewie! Gimme the gun!   Hold still Lando...

In fact was about to order my second one when I saw the new Venomthrope/Zoanthrope/Neurothrope kit in White Dwarf.  Bugger me, its not even like the last sculpts were bad but these are almost too good to be true.

This Kinder Surprise contains chilled monkey brains

New hats for everyone!

Fear the Scrotinator!

What the hell is going on? First a new dual kit is released out of the blue, then our prayers are answered and Niddy drop pods launch a major offensive on my bank balance. White Dwarf starts printing useful content, then the Doom is resurrected along with freakishly wonderful Cthulhuthropes and now there is a full campaign book coming out with new Warlord traits and Formations.  The Tyranids might even win some real battles in it (gasp!). The front cover is better than our codex and simply awesome.  Could it be yet another new model?  Dare I hope that the Broodlord has been resculpted?  Shut up and take my money.

5 comments:

  1. This is my first good look at this kit, thanks! I've two on order along with the new MC and the zoan/venom kit. Was wondering if I was going to build them with the plates in or out, and still can't decide. Looks like it's going to need a ton of greenstuffing in the seems, yeah?

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    1. Probably. I've been a bit lazy but you'll want to make it seamless. Modelling the carapace air brakes 'retracted' will hide a multitude of sins though.

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  2. how are the tentacles that connect it to the base? they seem awfully flimsy to support the rest of the model, given its size.

    have you turned the upper tentacles upwards and cheated the mount? every pic I've seen shows them going out or down.

    considered turning the whole thing upside down? the mouth where the riders would be expelled would be at the bottom anyway, yeah? maybe use an clear acrylic rod to float it? hmmm...

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    1. the 'basing' tentacles are fine imho as long as you use plastic glue to 'weld' everything firmly in place. I think it will be fine for games and transportation but I always pack my stuff in foam.

      I filled some of the sockets for the 'upper' tentacles with grey stuff, shaved off the 'ball joints' to fit snugly and glued them at different heights and angles. One tentacle is extended with a brass rod and grey stuff.

      I think the Sarlacc Pit mouth is the most interesting part of the model. I want it on top where everyone can see it. But there are loads of possibilities, so go nuts if you want to. I'm curious to see what you do with the model :)

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    2. I've got two coming in the mail. it's cool that they are now moving MCs, but I miss the idea that these things slamming into the ground and disgorging a horde of terrible beasts. the whole "floaty balloon thing" isn't really that scary.

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