Assassin's Creed: 40k Ed Part 2: the Bad and the Ugly....

Honestly, I'll probably never have a Chaos army, as much as I like the pre-Heresy Death Guard and some of the models, like the Forgefiend, so this is pretty much as close as we're going to get to anything like Chaos, ever. Also, the fluff text talks about the boss as a sorcerer, so I decided to go Thousand Sons with these guys because I didn't see Khorne worshippers staying calm long enough to get any serious sorcery accomplished. With that detail out of the way, the entire adversary war band just sort of fell into place. 

That said, working on these was a treat, especially Zehket-Ka the Inscrutably (and some might say unnecessarily) Obtuse. Word to the wise: never ask this guy for directions to the can. As I was futzing with the parts to assemble him, I almost said "fuck it" and made a better Abaddon, but the lure of the Changer of Ways is strong. 

How is he supposed to go plundering space hulks and outlet malls with that wildly impractical helmet? Only Tzeentch knows. Maybe all the little eyeballs adorning his armor give him 360 degree sight, or he has magic rearview mirrors or something. 

I'm very satisfied with the way his blue crystal Chaos spike came out. I suppose it's a hellish torture to inflict on your followers to make their chiefs be perpetually climbing slightly uphill. I imagine they all have calf muscles like steam pistons. 

Instead of using the stock Chaos familiar from the box set (man, how boring is that little robed guy compared to the old models from the RT days?) I opted instead to use this rather sinister cat mascot from the Raging Heroes Toughest Girls of the Galaxy Kickstarter. He's covered in weird jewelry, and suitably Egyptian enough to be little Tzeentch fiend. 

A big thanks to the prolific Joel of Mordian 7th fame for the Thousand Sons bits that adorn Aknot, Akenet, and Aknehmet. While the catastrophe mentioned last post killed their sapphire paint jobs a bit, I think they held up rather well. They still need to some shoulder iconography, though. When I have time, I suppose. 

GW could have hit one out of the park by making this game more modular (like Space Hulk) and introducing more missions, and more of a weird mix, but they didn't. I guess they felt like they were floating a trial balloon, or that it wasn't worth the effort to begin with, or something, but despite that the art direction is very good and everything is generally very well-produced. The whole business is a bit confusing. Maybe they plan to expand with an Inquisition tack, or something? A series of games along the lines of a campaign might be a great way to revive, say, Necromunda. 

Or do they think that far? I wish we knew. Anyway, more models.

As cultists go, the Order of the Azure Shroud is your run of the mill bunch of fanatics who don't see sunlight very often, and just watch The Mummy and the first half of The Ten Commandments in their basements non-stop. I imagined climbing the hierarchy in the cult meant wearing more blue as you went on, and picking up more things like gold masks and shrouds. In more practical terms, this meant introducing variation so I didn't get bored. 

These guys turned out to be a treat, particularly the chief cultist with his flaming head. Tzeentch is pretty much the king of dubious boons. Hey! Your head's a plume of blue fire now! Here's a kickin' rad hat! Thanks for worshipping!

I feel I didn't do the crow guys proper justice. I wish I'd been able to find some kind of wide-brimmed hats to make them look more plague doctor-ish, but oh well. I did try to make the one on the far left look more chaos-y by giving him a glowy mutant eye under that mask. 

I wish they had conical cultist hoods like the Mordheim ones. These hooded guys are actually kinda boring. 

And, of course the gimps. Under those masks are three perfectly normal guys who thought this was a cosplay club, and now they just want to go home because there are no girls. 

Happy Friday, gang.