Heartbreaker Ratman Champion with Mechanical Hand (Tim Prow) (Mechanismo March ’19)

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Heartbreaker Ratman Champion with Mechanical Hand Tim Prow

Today I start showing the models I finished this month(!) with one of the off-brand Skaven I kinda previewed during my review of the AK Interactive Spray Primers recently. Sculpted by Tim Prow many years ago for Heartbreaker, the model is still available today from RPE (Ral Partha Europe – who confusingly, apparently have no current connection to Ral Partha). I’m also counting this one towards Mechanismo March as the Mechanical Arm/Not-Powerfist is a pretty integral part of the model.

Heartbreaker Ratman Champion with Mechanical Hand Tim Prow

I was a little stuck originally about the colours to use on his clothing, as I really haven’t come up with an “army colour” for my Skaven (let’s face it – it’ll probably overall be a melange of earthy, muddy greens and browns) but I did want to use a more interesting colour on this guy – and what better to use than yellow as a nod to Wudugast, who has been chipping away at his yellow-themed Skaven army for the last couple of years and sharing them on his blog. which helped serve as an inspiration to me actually managing to finish my Plague Censer Bearers recently, and now, along with Alex’s AoS challenge this one and his fellows (one still very WIP).

34 thoughts on “Heartbreaker Ratman Champion with Mechanical Hand (Tim Prow) (Mechanismo March ’19)”

    • GW and others often slipped bits of Sci-fi/steampunk into their skaven, long before Mantic. They merely took the next, obvious step that GW never did with the Hrud. Even today, just check out the Stormfiends who would look right at home in a game of 40k! 🙂

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  4. Cheers for the shout out, you’ve done a lovely job on him too (plus, as everyone knows, yellow really is the finest colour for Skaven!). In a nicely symmetrical example of mutual inspiration, when you mentioned you were working on him it made me decide to dig out Ikit Claw and get him painted up for Mechanismo May. Just got him finished so I’ll post him soon.

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    • Ooooh.. Ikit Claw. I’ve got him around somewhere as well. Though I’m keeping the skaven to a small “side project” – meaning that I’ll tend to keep no more than 5-10 in WIP to ensure I finish them before selecting any others, and I’ve still got the Chaz Elliot Wererat Champion and two of the WHQ:ST Assassin to get done before I choose any new ones…
      But yeah, looking forward to seeing your Ikit Claw! 🙂

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  5. Suddenly, Bucky Barnes feels much better about his weight of body:weight of mechanical arm ratio 😉

    Looks good! As mentioned, yellow really is a good colour for Skaven, and it’s also one that’s difficult to do this well in general. I also really like the way the fur and flesh colours you used go together.

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    • Thank you – oddly, the fur and flesh on this model were much easier (a nicer experience? more pleasant?) to paint in their respective colours than on those Pestilens ones recently. I couldn’t say why, either since it makes no sense.
      The yellow is just practice for my eventual Imperial Fists. 😉 Well, maybe not, but it’s good to get more practise in getting yellows done in different ways, and looking a little more realistic.

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      • Yeah, the explicit fur is smoother and less defined which you’d think would make it not as nice to paint, but actually works out much nicer to work with, even if you need to be a bit more careful with it.

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    • Well, Tim Prow was originally a painter for GW, and later a sculptor for them in their “Oldhammer” late-’80’s/early-’90’s era salad days, but he eventually moved on, as did a lot of their other sculptors of those classic days, and ended up doing some work for Heartbreaker Hobbies.
      Kev Adams did the same, as did Chaz Elliot, Phil Lewis and probably a few others I can’t recall off the top of my head.
      Many of the ranges put out at this time by Heartbreaker were the first real “Not-Warhammer” models of a properly high quality, helped immensely by the fact that the sculptors were ex-GW staff who had in many cases worked on the same or similar ranges. For example, Kev Adams doing a range of Orcs & Goblins, for example – as he’d done for GW for many of the preceding years.

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      • Ah that makes sense – the name was familiar, people do say if you can paint you can sculpt… I know GW did shed a lot of their staff from that period. Mark Copplestone being one who set up his own company. Several did end up working for Foundry I believe, the Perrys have their own company now too.

        Cheers,

        Pete.

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      • Yep, Mark also did a lot of work for Grenadier – most notably the “Future Warriors” series, the models from which seem to be scattered across a few different companies – before setting up Copplestone Castings, and obviously Perry Miniatures. And yeah, a lot of them did pitstops working for Foundry as well. Kev Adams has been working with Bryan Ansell on a sub-label of Foundry based around his greenskins. The name of which, I naturally can’t recall right now…

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      • Had to look for it, but found ’em – Warmonger Miniatures:
        https://www.warmongerminiatures.com/
        I can paint, and I “feel” like I can (or should be able to) sculpt, but my rare and limited efforts have been …underwhelming. I’ve got some ProCreate somewhere, so maybe one day I’ll try to do something again in a medium more n00b-friendly than kneadatite…
        My Future Warriors are all still unpainted, in storage. Actually. I *do* have a couple that are close to finished in that Necromunda model case I just found. Maybe Neglected June?

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  13. Well done! as for RPE, Here is he info from Lost Minis Wiki:

    RPE was established in 2000 as Ral Partha Europe in order to manufacture and supply Classic Battletech and Ral Partha Fantasy miniatures directly to European markets. They survived the demise of Ral Partha in 2001 and now trade as RPE Miniatures & Games. The Battletech range of models and some of the original Ral Partha figures are produced under license from Iron Wind Metals. RPE also produce figures for DSA (Das Schwarze Auge), DemonWorld, FASA’s 1879 game, Blighthaven and others. Many notable sculptors have produced models for RPE over the years including Kev Adams.

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    • Yep, I’ve been buying from them, backing their KS campaigns and generally interacting with them on occasion for a few years now. They’re a 2 or 3-man shop, with the current owner being in the US as I understand it. The interesting thing is that they prefer not to be called “Ral Partha Europe” but “RPE” as they’re not so keen on the whole “Ral Partha” thing for some reason.

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