Honour of Skalathrax, World Eaters Land Raider

So, as promised, here's my new Land Raider. As you can see, it's definitely had several suicidally reckless owners. The idea of the model is that it's a World Eaters Legion tank that was crippled and abandoned after the Battle of Skalathrax, before later being salvaged by the Warband of the Warpsmith, Dactylus Crux. Rather than fully repair the tank, the Warband has simply fixed the engine and hull, and ripped out the destroyed weapon systems, replacing them with man-portable ones.

The hull of the tank was actually built with parts from a bitz seller, since I didn't need about half the kit. This meant I could splash out on the World Eaters doors. I also got the track set, but I wasn't happy with it. (Note to others- the Forge World track set for Chaos Land Raiders is not only a bit too small, but also doesn't contain the two long sections that go under the tank!) I forgot to get headlights and the optic for the front of the hull- these were replaced with lights from the Valkyrie kit, and some gnashing teeth taken from the Chaos Vehicle sprue.

The crew are mostly a hybrid of Chaos Marine and Chaos Marauder parts. The heavy cannons are a cut-and-shut of the standard Chaos Heavy Bolter at the back, then a Sisters of Battle Immolator Heavy Bolter for the front, adding the nice fat drum magazines, and then the barrel from the Autocannon of a Predator. The port (that's left, landlubber) gunner was more involved since he's technically holding his cannon backwards so it's not pinned against the tank. I used parts of various Marauder weapons to make the replacement gun handles, and then carefully cut off the firing lever from the discarded handle and added it. To get the poses, there are some seriously ropey shoulder joins, which were reinforced with small slivers of sprue and then covered with the shoulder pads. The gunners stand on left-over sponson parts from another project, accessorised with some suitable spikes.

The Champion, who acts as the Destroyer Blades upgrade, has a nice meaty chain-axe donated by an Ork Boy. His banner is from the Space Marine Command set, extended with more pole and topped with the standard Icon of Khorne. It was distressed with a drill, a knife, and at the bottom, by chewing it a bit. The resourceful modeller uses all his tools.

Part of the point of this model is to make the tank easy to transport. I needed the hull to sit side-on in a standard KR case, so all four crew and the trophy racks are removable. The sponsons are held on by magnets, with the ones on the tank mounted inside of it, to make the join a little less aggressive and prevent them being pulled off the model. The Heavy Bolter gunner sits in the cupola of an Immolator, which fits nicely in the front weapon bay. The Champion simply lifts out, and is counterweighted by a couple of 5p coins, for which I had to slightly widen the receiving hole. The trophy racks are held in place by two brass pins each, using the usual 0.4mm rods.

You might notice the profusion of skulls on the model. My skull-replicating experiment was a success, and a mini-tutorial is up next.

Painting used the new Mephiston Red spray, over a black base-coat with the tracks and engine masked off. I applied a lot of Leadbelcher as a drybrush to add chipping and worn paint, and layered up to Evil Sunz Scarlet in places. The bronze was painted Balthasar Gold, blackwashed with the rest of the model, and then glazed green to add verdigris before highlighting. The planets in the World Eaters designs were given a few little flecks of blue and green to make it look like the original paint has worn off. In contrast, the Berserker crew have brighter, cleaner armour and no wear to make them stand out from the tank.

The banner represents a World Eaters Legion Banner, which to the Berzerkers is now a bit of cloth on a stick. I painted on a simple World Eaters design, then heavily drybrushed the whole thing black to make it look scorched and faded- this banner clearly felt the touch of Khârn's flamer.

Photography by me, all original miniatures (c) Games Workshop.