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Author Topic: Using Kabalite Warriors for Fire Dragons  (Read 4414 times)

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Offline flatworldsedge

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Using Kabalite Warriors for Fire Dragons
« on: June 27, 2017, 03:03:45 PM »
Hey all!  Hope you're having a great week.

For both practical (I love plastic, do not love resin) and fluff (a dark, once ravaged Craftworld, with sinister reworkings of the few aspect shrines it hosts) reasons I'm looking at using Kabalite Warriors for my Fire Dragons.

I'd be using the "dark lance" to make a fire pike exarch, then hunting the internet for the "blaster rifle", which looks like a serviceable fusion gun.  I'd use a consistent helmeted head for them - one of the saner, less tribal ones.

The loin cloths look a little too feral, so I'd be looking to smooth off the teeth/talismans on them and use green stuff to smooth out and complete the more ragged areas. 

It all feels so simple that I should just get to work, yet with the "blaster rifle" component being somewhat troublesome to hunt down online, I thought I'd quickly check in with the community before pulling the trigger, in case there was any "gotchas" that were obvious to those who'd worked with these models before - e.g. perhaps the blaster rifle only fits with a certain torso, or the loin cloths were insanely thin and shaving detail from them would be a living nightmare, or...

Any thoughts hugely appreciated before I get to work!
 

Offline Saim-Dann

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Re: Using Kabalite Warriors for Fire Dragons
« Reply #1 on: June 27, 2017, 09:18:30 PM »
G'day Flatworldsedge!
Have never worked with the modelling bits your talking about, so can't give any advise. Can't wait to see them though. Good luck with the blaster rifle hunt.

Offline flatworldsedge

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Re: Using Kabalite Warriors for Fire Dragons
« Reply #2 on: June 28, 2017, 04:57:18 AM »
Thank you!  That hunt is proving harder than imagined - the "bitz" market seems to have taken a hit since I last did this kind of conversion a couple of years back.  I'll likely be using "shredders" rather than "blasters", which still look suitably esoteric, just a little more different again from the fusion guns.

Offline Saim-Dann

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Re: Using Kabalite Warriors for Fire Dragons
« Reply #3 on: June 28, 2017, 08:43:59 AM »
You can blame Cavalier for the bitz drought, Flatworldsedge. He has inspired a lot of folk to go down the conversion path.
If you pucker up to one of the admin of this forum, they might start a bitz swap meet... some how... maybe. 

Offline Cavalier

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Re: Using Kabalite Warriors for Fire Dragons
« Reply #4 on: July 5, 2017, 08:50:48 AM »
I've done a ton of DE-CW-Corsair conversions and find the bits mix really well. You check my project log if you are looking for some easy bit combinations. I've found their are a number of good legs without the loin cloths that you could use for dark Craftworlders. Luckily those bits are easy to find on ebay. Also Wych legs are great too... I use them extensivley because I love the look of all my guys running.

However trying to buy blasters has ALWAYS been tough on Ebay. I've saved mine up over the years and only have like 6 of them.

Honestly your best bet may be trying to buy some old Eldar fusion guns from the 2nd edition Storm Guardian kit.

I used a mix of Storm Guardian fusion guns, 2nd ed fusion guns and Corsair fusion guns to make up my Corsair Dragons and the look is fairly seamless IMO.

Anyway sorry I didn't see this earlier hope I'm not too late to help!


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Offline flatworldsedge

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Re: Using Kabalite Warriors for Fire Dragons
« Reply #5 on: July 5, 2017, 04:32:17 PM »
Hi Cavalier - many thanks for the details, and the image.  Really like what you've done there - the paint just glows too.

In the end it was impossible to find blasters, so I've gone ahead with the much easier to source "shredders".  I figure the shredders can be re-imagining as some kind of super intense lightning cannon.  So these will be some bearing some gloriously incongruous name like Storm Kraken, Blitzen Lynx, or...  we'll see, but they'll be Fire Dragons as far as the stats/rules/points are concerned.

As intended, I went to work on the loin cloths with a scalpel to get rid of the more tribal elements.  An early stage version held together with bluetac looked like this;

AKA Fire Dragons – Craftworld Nelequë.

The one main change is that loin cloth, which I attacked again, as follows to get a harder line which I'm hoping to get consistent across the squad;


Loin Cloth Sculpting – Craftworld Nelequë

Happy with how they're progressing, there's clearly still an awful lot to do!

Offline Saim-Dann

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Re: Using Kabalite Warriors for Fire Dragons
« Reply #6 on: July 5, 2017, 05:13:12 PM »
Niiiiice!
Lot of skill and patience there, Flatworldsedge. Am betting your a natural with green stuff. Aaah; blue tac! The modellers mate... Be well! 

Offline magenb

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Re: Using Kabalite Warriors for Fire Dragons
« Reply #7 on: July 5, 2017, 06:39:08 PM »
Very nice work on the loin cloths.

I used the Shredders for my exodite Fire Dragons as well, trying to grab a couple of blaster/fusion guns from one place and some from another just made it insane price wise as I'm on the bottom of the world ;).

Check out Cav's project Thread, soooooo many good idea's for mixing Craftworld and Dark Eldar bits in there. Ynneadswraith's project thread insane too. Lots of great ideas in the projects section :)

If you are hunting for colour schemes, both Eldar and Dark Eldar have a thread to show off your army, good place to have a flip through those too.


Can't wait to see how you paint them up :)

Offline dog_of_war

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Re: Using Kabalite Warriors for Fire Dragons
« Reply #8 on: July 6, 2017, 08:04:17 AM »
As mage said, check out Cav's thread. He's used the shredders to simulate warp spider death spinners by clipping one of the guns barrel blades. You may get them more like a blaster/melta by trimming both of those blades off.

Love the fix on the lion cloth. You did a superb job there.

Offline flatworldsedge

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Re: Using Kabalite Warriors for Fire Dragons
« Reply #9 on: July 7, 2017, 03:24:12 AM »
Thanks all!  Appreciate the kind words and suggestions! 

Definitely lots of inspiration in al the links shared.  In rambling through the forums seeing so much amazing work from people and just concerned of getting ahead of myself with every idea I'd love to borrow.

Hope everyone is having an amazing week, and thanks again for all the help and advice.

Offline Cavalier

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Re: Using Kabalite Warriors for Fire Dragons
« Reply #10 on: July 7, 2017, 07:47:17 AM »
Sick work on those tabards... I'm super jealous! Those are filing skills!

If I was to give any advice... I'd trim off the fins on the end of the blaster to make it unique looking. Its actually quite sinister when you do... Other than that looking killer.

I think an orange or red paint job will be sufficient to make these guys feel like Fire Dragons after that (perhaps with classic yellow helms). Anyway great stuff cant wait to see some paint on them!
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Offline Galef

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Re: Using Kabalite Warriors for Fire Dragons
« Reply #11 on: August 4, 2017, 05:11:10 PM »
I used guardians with Dire Avenger plums and Wraithlord flamers as the fusion gun


I am positive that using Kabalite + whatever gun option you think looks best, then painted orange/red/yellow will look great.

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Re: Using Kabalite Warriors for Fire Dragons
« Reply #12 on: August 8, 2017, 06:59:42 PM »
You can buy the Storm Guardian upgrade sprue separately for fusion guns.

Biggest problem with the Kabalite models is getting rid of the diapers, you've done a nice job trimming them.
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Offline flatworldsedge

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Re: Using Kabalite Warriors for Fire Dragons
« Reply #13 on: August 9, 2017, 03:03:17 AM »
Thanks guys.  Love the DA/Guardian/Flamer combo - works superbly.  Also very useful to know about the Storm Guardian sprue - will have a look for them in future for other aspects.  Right now I'm somewhat committed to the Kabalite/Shredder route.  They're just on hold whilst I finish cleaning up my Guardians.  That's taking forever, but I'd like them and a unit of Wraiths finished and painted in Craftworld colors (purple/white) so I can see my scheme and start to position the aspect colour schemes around it.  Cleaning off mould lines is just taking forever...  Can't wait to get back to these, even if next step is a little more intense - creation matching loin cloths for the two without Kabalite equivalents to sculpt.  Then the Exarch too.

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Re: Using Kabalite Warriors for Fire Dragons
« Reply #14 on: August 16, 2017, 04:58:04 AM »
Hey flatworldsedge, great idea about conversion and hope it works out well!

There's one more advanced bit of modelling technique that I've been playing with recently - Blue Stuff. It's a thermo-plastic that, when warmed up, allows you to imprint a part onto it, and then use it as a "mould" to replicate that part using any kind of sculpting putty. Just google "Blue Stuff" and you'll get a bunch of articles and even instructional videos. It does take 2-3 attempts to get it right, but once you do, it works reasonably well.

If you feel interested in trying out this trick, what I'd do is get one fusion gun - separate fusion guns are available in Storm Guardian kit as well as in the autarch skyrunner kit and (i think) in one of the old foot autarch kits. Wraithlord flamer might work too (although I'd cut off the pointy tip to make it look more like a fusion gun's stubby head. Then just replicate that gun using blue stuff and sculpting putty. Even easier, you can replicate just the head of a fusion gun (even a Fire Dragon model will work for that) and then stick it onto shortened blasters/shredders/splinter rifles etc.

I used this technique to get extra reaper launchers for my Reaper Exarchs, and it worked decently.

Hope this helps :)
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Offline flatworldsedge

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Re: Using Kabalite Warriors for Fire Dragons
« Reply #15 on: August 19, 2017, 04:18:34 PM »
Thanks - that's really interesting.  In terms of weaponary, I'm pretty happy with the Shredders (and some attendant fluff) now, but getting consistent loin cloths would be much easier with a mould.  Will definitely pick some up and try to turn the carved loin cloths into moulds to produce similar designs for the other styles of Kabalite legs. 

 


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