Kev Adams’ Heartbreaker Orc Warlord (1995)

I’d planned to take new, better group photos of the Iron Warriors for today’s post, but unfortunately I was feeling under the weather yesterday, and am still that way now – so it didn’t happen. With a solid week of work ahead of me, it’ll hopefully happen next weekend!

In the meantime, here’s a model where I already had the photographs ready. This guy is another of my renovated models. Having been painted back some number of years ago, the overall palette I’d used was more than a little too garish and had a few too many colours for my modern, more refined taste. The solution? Repaint parts of the model, tone some of it down, and give it a new base. Ergo! A new lease on life for this previously rather sad model.

Kev Adams' Heartbreaker Orc Warlord (1995)

The slotta dates this model as sculpted back in 1995. It’s a hella-chunky model, and the huge shoulderpads really give him some heft. I think the rather plain helmet could have been a lot nicer, though. As with much of the old-school stuff in my collection, I purchased this model back in the 1990’s. Part of Kev Adams’ post-GW output, I find it odd that someone like RPE hasn’t re-released it alongside the other Heartbreaker stuff that they have.

Kev Adams' Heartbreaker Orc Warlord (1995)

Originally I’d painted him as a Black Orc, which means I started him before the current line of plastics or their predecessors that share the current aesthetic in metal. I rebased him onto a 32mm base, which fits the figure much more betterer. I also lightened up his skin from the near-black that it was and repainted many of the “soft parts”, making his leather and cloth accessories much more appropriate. Purple pouch? Yellow wristbands? Ugh! Much nicer this way…

The Week of Iron: Part Four

Converted Iron Warriors Chaos Space Marines

The cybernetic lens has now been filled in. oops!

And now the final pair of my “Legacy” Iron Warriors. We have the original Aspiring Champion/unit leader, along with the Champion/Lord kitbashed from the original metal Iron Warriors Warsmith model, who is still actually available from GW.

The leader (at present) of the entire motley crew is this guy. As mentioned, the base model is the Iron Warriors Warsmith. The head was removed and replaced with one from the 2nd edition noise marines. The marine’s entire head and visage has become an Iron Skull, reflecting the chapter icon, with the Xenomorph-esque tongue tying in with the copper cabling found across these models. A Fleshmetal Exoskeleton under the current ruleset.

Converted Iron Warriors Chaos Space Marines

The left arm comes from an Assault Marine, capped with the metal 2e Iron Warriors Shoulder pad.

Converted Iron Warriors Chaos Space Marines

The backpack’s trophy spike comes from a 2e-era Chaos Terminator.

Converted Iron Warriors Chaos Space Marines

The right arm of the Warsmith was completely removed. It was replaced with a slightly-dodgy-by-today’s-standards rebuild, made of a Berserker arm and a glove, hand and Hammer from a Chronopia model. The guitar wire cabling was added to help sell it as a powered weapon – a Thunder Hammer of unique fabrication with a rather wicked looking rear spike. In-hand, the hammer and hazard-striped chestplate draw the eye away from the dodgy join. Thankfully, it doesn’t stand out nearly as much in-hand as it does in these photographs.

Converted Iron Warriors Chaos Space Marines

The breastplate and bionic legs on the original Aspiring Champion are from the Iron Hands upgrade pack, an excellent source of “official” bionics for any Astartes, and especially so for heavily-augmented Chapters and Legions such as the Iron Warriors. The rest of the model is pretty much stock, excepting the trophy spike that once again comes from a metal Chaos Terminator and the head, which is a Khorne Berserker head with some bionics cut from a SM helmet grafted onto the side. Damn, I missed that lens. I’ll have to paint that in now.

Converted Iron Warriors Chaos Space Marines

Like I said, the rest of him is pretty much stock. Well, arms, shoulderpads and backpack, anyway.

Converted Iron Warriors Chaos Space Marines

Since taking these photos, I’ve cleaned up the base edging and fixed the odd lens I’ve missed on these and the others in this series. Along with their “red dot” targeters on their weapons. Not that this helps you.

Converted Iron Warriors Chaos Space Marines

I took some group shots the other day alongside these. I might hold off posting them and take some new ones today to post tomorrow, now that I’ve touched these guys up. I also re-black-rimmed their bases and darkened the metallics on the bases slightly to help distinguish the metallic models from their metallic flooring, which was another thing I’d missed in my haste to complete them and excitement to photograph them.

Damn you, Enthusiasm!