Today we have the Narik Dreygur Iron Warriors model from Forge World. Nominally for 30k/HH, Narik, the “Gravewalker” was a renowned Iron Warriors commander during the Horus Heresy who eventually turned from the Traitors and became a loyalist and close confidant to the Salamanders – specifically, Cassian Dracos, the “Iron Dragon”. While my grand plan for my Iron Warriors force does include creating a decent element that will be 30k/40k compatible, I’m also realistic to know that my chances of ever playing 30k aren’t huge, so the main focus will be the 40k aspects.

With that in mind, I’ve painted him following the same scheme as my 40k Iron Warriors. They’re pretty much the same between 30 and 40k, but perhaps a little more in terms of Hazard striping and in some cases copper/brass trim. I considered going brass with his right shoulder, but felt it looked good in iron – and would probably look less good if I changed it, so it remained. My 40k IW retain the heraldry of the IV Legion, so Dreygur’s power fist seemed an appropriate place to stamp that firm.

I gave him a not-Iron Warriors shoulder pad from Puppetswar, in Poland. They have some amazingly great designs, but when I ordered from them they were slow as molasses and the casting quality was nightmarishly bad to the point where they ended up having to replace most of my order – but only after I kicked up a huge public stink with the photos to the extent that they stopped posting on Dakka for a couple of years. I’ve not ordered from them since, so I don’t know if their casting quality and QA have improved, and I’m not that desperate to try again. I know they do occasionally send out freebies for review, and those models would obviously be lovely, cherry-picked casts.

The backpack under his feet is painted in the dark green of my Dark Angels. I considered Minotaurs, but I felt that the brass of their armour would be too much metallic to add to the model, and not distinct enough from either Dreygur or his base, while their traditional foes, the Imperial Fists wouldn’t work well since I plan to eventually have only 1-2 squads of them, as opposed to the scores of Dark Angels I’ll eventually have painted up.

While Dreygur is a named character in 30k, in my 40k force he’ll be used as an Exalted Champion, to run up alongside assaulters to help inflict those important close combat wounds (rerolling 1s to wound!) I might well keep the moniker of Nârik Dreygur, as I’m sure the IW would appreciate that kind of dark irony.