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Saturday, February 02, 2019

Kroot Tyranid Hunter Killteam - Kitbashember... the rest of the weeks

After making a good start on the first week of the Kitbashember project, real life happened. As a result, I got off my nice tempo, but I still endeavoured to crank out as many Kroot Tyranid Hunters as I could and to keep up my rhythm.

In the end, I cranked out 7 Kroot in total, which I'm happy with, but it still grinds my gears that I didn't make the full 10.

In my last post, you saw the first three members of the team:

The Trooper and The Heavy


The Priest



Kroot Tyranid Hunters - Medic


And I teased the Medic, but here he is in his full glory:







You can see that he's sporting a genestealer skull on his right shoulder, which, in the hierarchy of my killteam, means he's one of the top dogs. I feel like this seniority comes from his skill at pulling apart Tyranids and finding the best parts. You can see that he's got all manner of implements and vials to help him in the harvest.

Kroot Tyranid Hunters - Genestealer Victim


And harvest he will as he's got a rather unfortunate victim on his base:




Though it pained me to do that to such a beautiful genestealer (who am I kidding. I've got a million of them), I am EXTREMELY happy with how he came out. I still need to greenstuff him up, and this is mostly a model sketch, but I feel like he's in a pretty good state right now. He certainly was a HUGE it over on my Instagram.

The medic's cloak also seemed to be a big hit, so here's a look at the wire armature I built underneath it. Once the armature was built, I stretched the greenstuff into a thin sheet and mostly just draped it over the armature.



Kroot Tyranid Hunters - Grenadier

Next up was my grenadier!


And what better Tyranid organism for a Kroot Tyranid hunter to chuck like a grenade than a SPORE MINE?



And he's got plenty more where that came from:


You'll notice that this dude has got only a lowly ripper skull on his shoulder. That's because, when dealing with such volatile Tyranid organisms, Tyranid hunter grenadiers can have a very low life expectancy. Therefore, they give the job to the newest, most inexperienced killteam members as a kind of trial by fire to see if they'll survive!

Kroot Tyranid Hunters - Psycho / Ripper Tamer

For my Psycho, I wanted to pursue the pretty crazy idea of a kroot who straps living rippers to his hands and feet, striding into battle and using them as weapons. In my initial concept, I envisioned the rippers as unwilling subjects, forcefully lashed to the kroot's extremities. However, as I started to put the model together, and to sculpt the ripper tails winding around him, I felt like he'd be more interesting if he's somehow managed to develop a symbiotic relationship with the rippers in question.






 My idea for the background explaining why he'd been so successful at charming the rippers is that he started developing his abilities shortly after he killed and ate the ripper he wears around on his head. It's been hypothesized that he ate a ripper that served as some kind of hive node for the larger swarm, and he took on those abilities. There are some in the hunting cadre who even wonder if his meal had a greater affect on him: causing him to start to see himself as one with the rippers!

As with the rest of these models, this guy is still a model sketch and needs a little more work before he's finished. I particularly want to wrap a spinefist ripper around one of his shoulders so that it will serve as kind of a ranged weapon parrot for him ;)

Kroot Tyranid Hunters - Marksman / Sniper

This is another idea I've had rolling around in my head for a while. Though I equipped my original trooper with a crossbow, I also wanted to equip some of my Kroot Tyranid Hunters with traditional bow and arrows to pick up on the more feral theme. I wanted to make this bows HUGE--like full kroot height. However, for this first run at them, I went for a slightly more modest size:

You can see the return of the Tyranid flesh hook bit as a Tyranid spine/barb that the kroot are using as arrows. You can also see my favourite hobby bit to use on these kroot: super thin copper wire bindings!

For my sniper/marksman, I wanted him to be an extremely sneaky git. But how could a kroot, which is already a master of fieldcraft and camouflage, get even sneakier?

By growing a set of state-of-the-art Tyranid chameleonic scales, of course!

However, that's a bit of a tall order for someone as impatient and feral as a kroot, so he just took the short cut: skinning a young Lictor alive and conspiring with a Haemonculus ally from the fighting pits to devise a way to keep the poor creature's disembodied head alive and attached to the scales!



Their devious fellows, these Kroot Tyranid Hunters!

Though he might not be my favourite model in the killteam, this particular Kroot Tyranid Hunter wins my award for Best Fluff >:)




Kroot Tyranid Hunters - Kroot Hound / Carrier / Pet

Though all the models I've already shown are still very WIP and require more greenstuffing, etc, before they are complete and ready for paint, the two further models I'll share are much more WIP. However, I did the work on them in Kitbashember, so I feel like they count.

Most finished of the two is my scratch build of a Kroot Hound, which was going to play the role of a carrier for the medic. I'd fashion some sort of panier on the hound's back for carrying around all the useful Tyranid gribblies. When creating the hound, I based it on this beautiful 3D drawing I found online:
I didn't quite nail that, but it served as my inspiration for the hound I attempted:

Taking pages out of the books of Brother Hydra and Bocks and Weirdingsway, I recombined pieces in different orientations to cobble together that loose shape.

The legs are obviously from Bloodletter, which is a kit that might as well have sponsored my Kroot Tyranid Hunters for how much I use them as bigger Kroot. The front half of the body is also a Bloodletter torso, angled back with the head attaching to the bloodletter's pelvis. The other, rear part of the body is a genestealer torso that has been flipped backwards.

The head was more of an adventure. The lower mandible/beak is from Ogroid Thaumaturge's staff. (no idea how to spell that: the big evil dude from Silver Tower). The upper mandible, however, is made from the two barbs at the end of the Tyranid Warrior head crest that is kind of reminiscent of earwig pincers. I cut them off then cut them down and glued them together in the rough shape of a beak. The eyes were stolen from a ripper.

Next up, I filled it in a big using greenstuff. I also added a tail, which I think was clipped and cut down from the end of a devourer barrel:
That's as far as I've gotten with the Kroot hound, so you can see there's still a bunch to do on him. However, I'm pretty happy with how he's come along so far.

Kroot Tyranid Hunters - Kroot Ox / Brawler

The other scratchbuild/severe kitbash that I made the most preliminary of starts on was my entry for Brawler, which I thought would be best represented by a Krootox. I warn you, though: I've accomplished very little, so this might be a disappointing tease!

Oh, would you look at that. Seems like he's gonna get a REAL BIG Tyranid head crest as his gladiatorial arm shield :)

Featuring the otherwise useless torso of that ugliest of plaguehulks from the Gellerpox Infected! (I'm irrationally proud of finding an interesting use for that hideous bit)

And with other nurgle contributions from the Maggoth Lord, and some Tyranid hands to round it out.
I swear that I do VERY MUCH want to finish all of these boys (heck, I even feel motivated to PAINT them...can you imagine?), but I also know that I've feeling a bit of burn out on their project at present, so it will be some time before I get back around to them.

Burnout or not, I'm extremely happy that I finally got the chance to circle back around on this idea that'd been sticking in my mind for so long, and I feel like I was able to make a good, honest restart on them :)

So, now that you've seen the FULL squad (so far), which of the Kroot Tyranid Hunters is your favourite? Or do you have a crazy idea of another Kroot Tyranid Hunter who uses a different piece of Tyranid anatomy as a weapon or armour? Let me know if the comments below \/ 

10 comments:

  1. Great stuff! Very interested to see how this squad progresses, especially that poor surgery victim on the medic's base.

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    1. Oh, I assure you that the only "progress" the victim is going to see will come in the form of decomposition! He's less a surgery subject, and more of a harvestable crop from the perspective of the Kroot!

      But, yes, I need to greenstuff in the gaps, particularly around his opened ribcage.

      I'm taking a break from the squad for a bit until my fire for them reignites a bit. I'm very excited to finally finish them!

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  2. The Ripper Tamer is my fave. They're all really cool, but he feels like he's getting the most into the Tyranid mindset of using smaller symbiotic creatures as weapons. Plus, it makes me think of basically the same concept in other contexts, like, say, a Cawdor ganger who fights with hive rats strapped to his hands.

    More like Kitbashuary at this point. Sorry, my mind just wouldn't let that one go.

    Def gonna have to keep that armature trick in mind for doing cloaks. Thanks for the WiP shots there! I'm also going to have to think more about using Bloodletter parts for Kroot. I don't really like the current Bloodletter Models, but I'm going to end up with some from Wrath & Rapture, and that could give me something interesting to do with them.

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    1. Thanks sir! And please take any and all of my ideas and use them to your heart's content. I've learned a lot of tricks from others over the years, so I owe it to the community to inspire some of my own!

      In fact, I got the idea to use the bloodletter models from someone else on Instagram who was using them as Genestealer mutants. You might not like them in their bloodletter configuration, but I assure you that, when you strip off the pimples/bumps, they have some of the most interesting musculature in the citadel line (them and the kaoric acolytes). I've used Bloodletter upper torsoes and arms for Wracks, and as you can see they work really well as Kroot. I've also used their heads for Tyranid gun barrels, as you can see on my gunner/heavy model.

      So, yes, maybe don't use them as bloodletters, but also don't throw them out!

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  3. Absolutely spectacular! Each one tells a little story - Can't wait to see 'em painted up!

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    1. It was absolutely my goal for each to tell its own story, so I'm happy to hear you're feeling that :)

      Though I hate painting, this is one squad that I myself really want to see painted up as well!

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  4. Love the use of Tyranid bits as trophy-armor. Totally going to use some leftover nids(warriors, genestealers and hormagaunts, so far) bits to mark the leader and specialists in my Kill Team. Thanks for the inspiration!

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    1. Glad to hear it! Our current line of Tyranid plastic kits offer so many extras that are not used to build the models that it's a trophy dream for tyranid hunters!

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  5. Hey have you worked on these Kroot since this post.

    ALso where can I find more about the siege of pech, even if the event didn't go off I'd love to see what other things you had tied into that.

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    1. Sure have, Keenan! Got a lot of work done in the lead up to Adepticon, even though it was cancelled. Our plan at this point is to still do the Krootvasion, but it's postponed until whenever Adepticon happens again.

      Here's the post that has my more recent work: http://www.modernsynthesist.com/2020/03/the-siege-of-pech-krootvasion-of.html

      And the best place to follow #SiegeOfPech stuff is by searching the hashtag on Instagram.

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