Hocus Locus

I’ve had a few difficult months – successive family emergencies, jury service, a new job, and (touch wood) soon I’ll be moving house. So there hasn’t been much hobby time recently, and the thought of sitting down and writing has filled me with existential dread. I did, however, have a productive couple of months in December and January, focused entirely on my genestealer coven, Tertii Imperatoris Cultus.

This is an unusual post, in that all of the miniatures are currently in production. My friend Fred keeps inviting me round to his place for games, and I (erroneously) thought that I might make shorter work of painting new plastic (and be a bit less precious about transport). This proved incorrect for a number of reasons:

• Modern plastic is expensive – maybe not quite as expensive as really rare lead, but hardly something I can bring myself to just bulk-buy and slap some paint on.
• Modern sculpts are very highly detailed, and somehow more ‘three dimensional’ than older miniatures. I’ve found myself having to paint around some quite tricky corners. Maybe it’s time to take sub-assemblies more seriously.
• Some of the current genestealer cult models are really lovely. Case in point…

Locus

Curis at Ninjabread described this as an ‘instant classic‘, an assessment I thoroughly agree with. It’s sinister (I get similar vibes from the old ‘magus advisor‘ miniature), and – pun intended – iconic, carrying as it does a huge icon. I may also be a little biased as I regularly called my dog, Loki, ‘Locust’ as a nickname when he misbehaved.

I’ve used mostly the same colour scheme as for my other genestealers, the only difference being that this is the first with a deep purple robe. I thought that would look better than burgundy, green, orange, or any of the other colours that I’ve been using for clothing. I think it’s turned out well, somewhat unique while still in keeping with the rest of the cult.

Aberrant and Abominant

I picked up the ‘abominant’ at the same time as the locus, because I enjoy variety and painting an endless wave of human-sized cultists dressed in futuristic mining gear doesn’t sound like a lot of fun to me. I’d read previously that this miniature isn’t as big as one might expect, but even so I was surprised that this is in fact another human-sized cultist, albeit dressed more for building a railroad than mining. I regret attaching his left arm prior to painting – I have no idea whether the inside of his left hand is really painted or not. Overall I am happy with the result.

My wife gifted me the ‘aberrants’ for Christmas. I think my favourite variant is the tentacle-mouthed ‘ymgarl’ head, and as my wife’s also something of a fan of H. P. Lovecraft’s Cthulhu mythos this seemed like a good place to start. Again though… why on earth did I glue his left arm in place before painting it?

Biophagus

Another Christmas gift, this time from my dear friend Fred. I’d been stuck in a bit of a rut in the months leading up to Christmas, so receiving a fully painted ‘biophagus’ was just what the doctor ordered – pun intended once again. Fred painted these more in-line with another mutual friend’s tyranid colours, but I think they fit very nicely with mine. And as he left them unbased, a bit of silver paint, hazard tape, and rust effects was all it took to pull them together with the rest of the cult.

I will close with the traditional ‘family photo’, showing all my painted, modern, official genestealers. There are many more in the queue, which I hope to make a start on next month. Until then, I’ve got a few posts lined up to show off some more old lead and third-party hybrids.