Chaos Army Blog - the Krypt Keepers

[Necros]

So, it's time to start a new army. This time I'm going with Chaos. I like the new models and I also like the new direction that the current codex has taken the army, despite what a lot of chaos vets seemed to be complaining about :p

My first idea for the army was to go Iron Warriors, but I figured I'd want a bunch of tanks and I already did that with my guard, so I decided to make my own warband. The first idea for colors was to use more modern "army" colors, olive greens or maybe a desert armor kind of color, and have the armor and tanks all beat up and rusted out. I thought on it more and I really just want to go with a color scheme I've never really done before. Everything I do is always dark and mostly black, so i decided on Bleached Bone as the primary color in the army, black trim, kind of like the Deathmongers in the new codex. I'll also have red parts and I think black power weapons with green highlighting. It's been a long time since I had to use white primer...!

I want to try and get the power armor to look like actual bone, not bones attached to it, but more like the chaos gods have turned the thick metal armor into a thick exoskeleton. I'm thinking bone as the main color, highlighted with white, and shaded with brown lines, like the way folks paint the bottom parts of horns, etc. So with that bone look I need a fitting name, something dead sounding.. Undertakers seemed a bit too cliche, then I thought of "Krypt Keepers" .. so I think I'm gonna go with that.. or does anyone have any other ideas? :)

I did a recent army trade at my local game store and have a lot of store credit to use up. So the first thing I picked up was their last remaining Chaos army box set. Out of this box I intend to make 1 Terminaor lord, 10 marines, 8 Khorne Zerkers, 5 Chosen, 5 Terminators, 5 Posessed, 2 Spawn and 1 Defiler. I'm still on the fence about what to expand with to get to 2000 pts, but I'm thinking probably a box of death guard, 3 obliterators and a second defiler cuz I really like that model. I'm planning to convert it with a WFB hellcannon as the battle cannon :)

So, here's a few pics so far. I have the lord and the 10 marines mostly done. After that I will prime them and start painting a couple marines for test schemes.




If anyone has any ideas feel free to share ;)

[warflag]

Well, I`d say the name Krypt Keepers is a very cool name, but as for the choice of colours pretty much an own goal since there is no choice anymore You must paint them green and black in a cheesy, halloweenish way. It will look great

[del-patch]

orange faces! please oh please! add too the cheesy scheme warflag says! alter the lords head so hes looking down on him men...

[Necros]

Sorry, I was posting this blog on another board too and forgot to update this one

Anyway, here is my first test model. I still have a few more metalic spots to paint but he's mostly done. I was going to paint lines along the edges of the bone color like the way folks paint nid shells and stuff like that, but I got lazy, and also I liked the shading as is. I made a wash out of Dark Flesh using the same water & matte medium mix I used for my Baneblade.



After a lot of thought though, I decided I didn't like the black trim. So, I got rid of it. Now it's just all bone color. Kinda reminds me of plague marines now, only boneish instead of greenish. I still have a few details to paint on but he's more or less done now. And it will be easy to paint up the whole unit now since I don't have to spend so much time painting all the trim, but I will be doing some blacklining to get it to stand out better

Here's a before & after pic..



Wadaya think?

[warflag]

I actually lied the black trims better. It now looks kind of unfinished. But the bone colour looks very good, nevertheless. Keep it up.

[Sideros Peltarion]

I agree with Warflag. They look good, but not as good as before imo.
Are you having them dedicated to a specific god or worked out any other fluff?

[Vasteye]

perhaps not a fully black trim, but i do think something a tad darker is needed, to act as a contrast. That said, i'm blown away by the bone, looks really ornate and chaosy

Now you just need to build a krypt for them to keep

[Necros]

I just didn't like the black trim .. dunno why. I'm thinking for some I may do a dark red trim, that might work better for me.

As far as fluff, my idea is their a semi-recently turned undivided warband. Their loyalist armor was a bright polished bone sort of like the deathwing guys or whoever those dark angel terminators are.. They turned to chaos but kept their same basic colors, and the farther along in your chaosdom, the more your armor becomes less like something you wear and more like a shell made of bone. Normal marines, terminators and the terminator lord will be in this scheme, they haven't given themselves fully to chaos yet. The chosen, obliterators, demon prince, etc will be a lot more mutated. I'll be doing a lot of sculpting and throwing in some left over tallon and shell bitz from tyranids and maybe some tomb kings bitz too if I can find a good way to fit em in.

So, I just want to get the normal marines out of the way and done quicker, since the other things will take me much longer to finish.

[Necros]

Little update.. First unit is coming along good. I have the first 4 done (minus those missing guns, doing them last) and expect to have the champ done later tonight. Goal is to have the whole unit done by the end of the week. The bases will take a while, I'm planning to decorate them a lot. I have a lot of resin base bitz from GW's basing kits and also a lot of rocks and rubble that I can add too.

That bone wash color that I made kind of makes the models look like they're dipped, but they aren't :) Though, I did consider it. I dipped my tomb kings and the bone color on them came out great with the brownish stain. Using a wash gives a similar effect, but I have more control over where it goes and if I wanna add more for depth or less for brightness, I can :)



You may notice heads on toothpics in the background. That's how I like to do marine heads, a pet peeve of mine is not being able to fit a brush behind a head to get paint in there, so I do the heads separately.. I drill a teeny hole in the bottom and then stick em on a toothpick, so I can just hold that while I paint em :)

I do guns separately too so that I can paint the chest areas. I messed up this time though, I usually attach the gun to the right arm, so the body just has the left arm attached, then I glue the whole right arm & gun on at the same time.. but I got ahead of myself and wasn't paying attention. It's been a pain trying to get paint under those right fists :( But I'm pretty much just getting bone paint in there and then the wash, don't need any further detail where no one is going to see...

[Necros]

Finally finished my first unit. I wish I had the kind of spare time I used to have, dumb careers always interfering.

Anyway, here they are :)



And here's some closeup shots





Wadaya think?

[Meticulous]

Every time I feel good about one of my armies, I see an excellent log and feel not good at all.

But then again, that unit took ten-odd days to paint, wheras I want to do the same number in like an hour. So it's a trade-off.

I like how the bone doesn't get too boring. There's different sorts of bone in there, which is awesome. Can't wait to see what you do with the rest!

[Khorghan]

i think itll look alot better with the black trim

[AbyssRaven]

I actually really like the finsihed look. i think the black, whilst it looked good was abit tio "hard" looking compared to the rest. if that makes sense.

have you considered maybe a brown? make the edgings look like aged leather, or old dried dead skin thats till clings to the bone exo skeletons?

amazing though keep it up!

[Jester Boy]

Awesome work. I love light schemes for chaos armies. Can't wait to see more.

[NightLord]

SWEET! I am so jealous... My chaos look no where as good as yours do! What all are you planning on putting into the army after all this is done?

[Necros]

I already bought everything for the army since I had a ton of store credit to burn For 2000 pts I expect to have...

This unit of 10 marines
7 plague marines
8 khorne berzerkers (or just 8 more normal marines, havn't decided)
8 chosen (will be marines mixed with posessed)
1 terminator lord
1 demon prince
2 obliterators (using spawns and lots of spare heavy weapon bitz)
1 land raider
1 defiler

and since I have about $45 credit left over I might get one of those new Vindicators, or maybe I'll just put it toward some army transport trays since I'll need more for these guys anyway...

[Necros]

Been busy, didn't have much time to get a lot done, but I did finish my terminator lord and I'm half done my Khorne berzerkers.

Here's the lord:




Only thing left to do is add the decals that I have yet to print out, same goes for my first marine unit.. The army emblem will go on that empty shoulder pad and I may see if I can do a bigger one for the back of his cloak

[Necros]

And here's my Khorne berzerkers so far. I decided to keep them the same color as the rest of the army, but give them the signature khorne heads. When I do my death guard, it will be the same deal but I may go with a greenish shoulder pad w/ nurgle emblem on em. ANyway, I just gotta get the weapons and black & iron parts finished.. hopefully this weekend.



After these are done, I'm going to lay off painting for a bit and just build everything. I have all the models now and I'd like to start playing em soon But next after them I'll be doing my chosen, who are gonna have bitz from normal marines and posessed models all mixed together.

[Meticulous]

That bone color really fits a great deal of models. It looks just as perfect on the berserkers as it does on the marines (and I don't doubt the plague marines will look just as good in it).

[Jester Boy]

Awesome Termi Lord! And i love KB's too. Great log to watch. Keep up the posts.

Jester