Minotaurs Space Marines – Captain (or Lieutenant)

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Minotaurs Space Marine Captain

Providing us with a short respite from the torrent of Nurgle Daemons is this guy – a hero model for the Minotaurs Space Marines that I haven’t done much with for the past few months. He was actually started alongside the second squad of Minotaurs, but I found him a bit hard to finish, mostly due to indecision on his loadout, his backpack, and his cloak.

Minotaurs Space Marine Captain

I knew that I wanted to use this particular figure (torso, legs and left axe arm) as the core of the figure, and I knew that I wanted to top it with a Puppetswar head, but that’s where things got tricky. We’d used him armed with a Storm Shield, so that was fine. The shield came from my little stash of Scibor Spartan bits, and I eventually found an appropriate Space Marine hand was in the current Devastators box, so I had to buy one of those to get the hand. (Don’t worry, I’ve got plenty of use for the rest of the box – so much so that I bought two!)

Minotaurs Space Marine Captain

But I wanted to give him the option for a ranged weapon. Probably a Storm Bolter. Then of course, the Space Marine Codex for 8th edition was released, and The Primarch’s Wrath was (re)introduced to the game. (I dunno, I wasn’t playing 40k during the dumpster fire of 6th/7th). Now I had a suitable weapon for Mon Capitan, but how to represent it? He looked kinda-okay with a storm bolter in the Storm Shield slot, but anything larger just looked ridonculous. Luckily the Intercessors boxed set came to my aid, and I stole a fancy-pants bolter from them and attached the straps to a backpack that I’d pilfered from my DeathWatch marines, since it was a little more fancy than the one I’d been working with to that point.

Minotaurs Space Marine Captain

You’ll now also see one of the other issues that held this guy up for so long. The cloak. It was a real “what to do?” problem. I kinda wanted to do a Greek Key pattern, but those are a massive pain in the arse to freehand, especially since you want them to be both straight and consistent. I also considered a giant Lambda in the centre of the cloak. In the end, I decided to do the key because I knew that’s what I really preferred. It took until last week after literally months and months of procrastinating. Because of course, February is about completing neglected models.

Minotaurs Space Marine Captain

The shield looks better in hand than it does here. The red on it is actually Citadel’s “Gemstone” paint, Spiritstone Red over the top of gold. It’s got that nice shiny, translucent effect in hand wheras in the photograph is just looks very flat.

Minotaurs Space Marine Captain

Remember when I was talking about weapon options? This is why I was talking about swapping in a Storm Bolter for the shield. I did this before the Codex came out, when weapon loadouts were a bit more limited. The wrist and shield hand are magnetised, and the initial plan was to also magnetise any ranged weapons. I left it magnetised for the completed model rather than gluing, because I liked the work I did on all of the parts of the model that would otherwise be obscured by that shield, and didn’t want them covered forever. I can of course also add other options to the wrist should the fancy strike me in the future.

So now – finally – the Minotaurs have a leader. I may leave him as a Captain, or he might well be replaced by someone in bigger, nastier Terminator armour down the line, and be demoted to Lieutenant.

48 thoughts on “Minotaurs Space Marines – Captain (or Lieutenant)”

  6. Stellar paint job! My first question was going to be what you used for the red/orange on the shield, as it doesn’t look like a standard color. Thanks for letting us know!

    I didn’t know that people refer to that pattern as the “Greek Key” pattern. In a Greek History class, the Prof called it “meander” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meander_(art). Googling, looks like you can reference it either way. Really nice work on getting that on the cloak!

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    • The shield was originally base coated silver, then two washes of Citadel Seraphim Sepia gives it that brassy bronze look that I use for their armour (ancient bronze more than modern bronze, as I read somewhere that ancient bronze often looked/looks more like brass because of the different alloys used back then). Then a light drybrush of Vallejo Model Air Gold for depth, and then finally the Spiritstone Red for a laquered effect.
      I hadn’t heard the term “meander” (that I remember, anyway), though my study of Greek History is self taught and spotty. I’ve got a partially Italian background, so I’ve read up much more on Rome, instead! 😉

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      • I had already wondered what that pattern was, having seen it repeatedly in Greek designs. “Meander” sounds weird, but I guess it comes from the Greek “Meandros”. Just one of those things that stuck in my head from class. At any rate the mini looks amazing, and thanks for sharing info on the paints again. I might have to add some VMA Gold and look into the Spiritstone. The latter especially for some gems I’m going to have to work on sometime soon.

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      • No, it makes perfect sense. I didn’t know what it was called either so looked it up a few years ago and found “Greek Key”, so I’ve been using the term ever since. VMA Godl is very good, and the full trio of GW’s Gemstone paints are very good and a worthwhile addition to your paint collection, even if you only use them occasionally (as I do). There’s Red, Blue and a Green as well.
        If you find you *really* like them, Warcolours in Cypress has a slightly larger range that might be useful as well.
        http://www.warcolours.com/index.php?route=product/product&path=66&product_id=115

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  7. Holy cow man he’s magnificent. I can see you’ve put the hard yards in here. The key pattern looks awesome. I’m glad you went with it as it really suits. The pose is great. He looks regal. Well done. One of my favourites I’d say.

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  10. Man, I love that Captain! The base model is already very cool, and your additions make it even more awesome! Love the classical greek look created by the helmet and shield, and the paintjob is top notch, too!

    If I have one small suggestion, it would be to maybe take another look at the sybol on his shield: The white seems to be bleeding into the surrounding red in one or two tiny areas.

    Apart from that, though: Brilliant job! 🙂

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    • Thanks. It’s a pretty simple kitbash. Literally only using different parts for the three components that you’d otherwise glue onto the base figure. I double-checked the shield – a bleed like that up front and centre would surely have triggered my OCD if I’d noticed it, and how could I miss something like that?
      The good news – nope, it’s fine.
      It’s an effect of the light and reflection of the photos hitting the slightly imperfect resin cast detail of the thin line around the Lambda which I have painted gold. Plus being blown up by the photos. Thanks for pointing it out, though. I sometimes spot little things via the final photos that I then *have to* go back and fix up.

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  11. This is absolutely stonking! I think you’ve done the definitive Minotaur there – the blending of standard power armour components with exciting Greek accessories works beautifully. Most people doing Greek marines end up with a jarring conversions, but yours is so integrated I thought it was a standard Forge World model at first.

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    • Cheers Curtis. It’s more credit to places like Scibor, Puppetswar, Anvil et al providing quality conversion bits made for integration with Marine kits, so we don’t have to pillage our boxes of Warlord nee Immortal Miniatures’s Greeks for bits! Well, that plus careful selection. I’ve noticed over the course of viewing many internet images that judicious use of 3rd party not-marine parts enhances official models nicely, while using too many does stop them from actually looking like “proper” Space Marines.

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  14. I’ve been following your blog for a good while, and that’s one of the best pieces you’ve posted. Considering that your output is already very high quality, this is just awesome. I tend to be bored by most space marines, but this one just ticks all the right boxes.

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