Tuesday 30 April 2024

Corswain, The Lion's Seneschal, Horus Heresy Dark Angels Legion.

 

Corswain was the Paladin-Captain of the 9th Order of the Dark Angels Legion, the Legion Champion and a member of Primarch Lion El'Jonson's personal honour guard during the Great Crusade and Horus Heresy.

During the Siege of Terra, Corswain arrived at the edge of the Sol System with a Dark Angels fleet to rendezvous with the Imperial Fists' Phalanx where he proclaimed his forces were ready to fight for the Emperor.

Corswain survived the Horus Heresy to return to Caliban with the rest of the Legion. 

*****

One of the great things about 30k/40k are the models... obviously.
But especially with the character series for the Horus Heresy, Forge World seemed to get it right again and again and again*. 
Couple that with a character released for my favourite of 40k chapters, but in their 30k Legion form and we're onto a winner.

Corswain of the Dark Angels (it also helps that he is a beast of a commander in the novels), here is his miniature:


So, are we onto another "winner"??

Well...mostly...i like the mini, but not the £36 pricetag for a Forge World resin model which will probably be of sub-par quality overall.

What to do?

Well a while ago I picked up a "Master Balthazar" mini from the 6th/7th edition starter set from Mirfield Miniatures for a few pounds and had got him started, but not finished.

Not having had much spare time to hobby recently, I decided to focus down on Corswain who was about 75% complete and then work to finish him.

As mentioned he is the Balthazar mini, but I gave him a head swap with one from the old Dark Angels upgrade sprue for the feathered helmet:

The original sword from the model suited "The Blade" which Corswain wields, a Terranic Greatsword of renown.
I worked up the black armour, and then used Baneblade Brown as the base for his robes, as I wanted a darker look rather than the light bone of modern 40k Dark Angels have.
The red was then used as the bright spot colour, one thing I do dislike is that I didn't have anywhere to add any of the checkers which seems to albe a staple of 30k Dark Angels**, but overall it looks great:

There are, of course, a few niggles with the paint job.
Several of the highlights seem awfully chunky, and some are wobbly to the point that a spider with Parkinson's could have done a better job, but these are brutally close up photos.
From my normal method of "looks great at three feet away" the model "looks great at three feet away"!

So again, we have a 30k model which was built using a 40k model and repurposed, something the hardcore purest's would hate***, but in the interested of sanity (and my bank balance) I think work well, and because it's my model bit anyone else's, I don't actually care.

I have a box of the old "Dark Angels Veterans" plastics to build up, and I'm thinking with a few weapon swaps and a couple of spare mk.3 helmets, I can make a fairly decent Deathwing Companion squad, as again those models.are gorgeous, but the Forge World pricetag and quality turns me off.

Chalk up another model done and onto the next one...



Until next time, have nice day...




* We'll leave Rogal Dorn, Corax and Lorgar at the door, those models are not great in my opinion.

**And some sources say that the Orks copied them from the Legion.

***Looking at you Outer Circle.

2 comments:

  1. Looking cool! I mean - originally all Heresy models were repurposed from 40k miniatures and getting creative surely is one of the points of this hobby! I like him!

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  2. Thank you.
    Yes I remember the days of the fully converted 30k armies on DakkaDakka or B&C. A lot of creativity went into those armies, and it's something I want to try to bring back a little with my own project.
    The joke about Outer Circle was that he always seems to moan about either people not using heresy miniatures or the price of FW heresy miniatures...which may be a reason people try to use more readily available models!

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