Sons of Sek - Company and Platoon Banners

In order to break up the monotony of the painting and also the overall appearance of 167 infantry, I would want several banners in the army. I decided that I wanted a company banner and a banner for each infantry platoon.

I decided early on that my army would be the 1st Company of the Sons of Sek 3rd Regiment ("The Magister's Fist"). So above is there Company banner, which says just that. As the 1st Company, their role is often as a spearhead or assault element (hence the "drop trooper" doctrine). The little stylized lightning bolts in the lower left corner represent that.

It was made from 2 Chaos Warrior banner poles. I cut part of one in half and glued it on to an intact one to add a little length. The flag itself is plasticard warped with a heat gun.

Back of Company Banner

A lot of the inspiration for this banner came from Ursarker Creed's banner. I wanted the front to be a little cleaner and less "chaotic" than an average Chaos banner, in order to reflect the drilled and disciplined nature of the Sons of Sek. I think the back of the banner makes up a little for the "chaotic" look with the script.

I knew I wanted to incorporate some kind of cross or St. Andrew's Cross into the design. I sketched and doodles for a while and came up with the top half of the Khorne symbol.

Picking the Colors

I knew it was going to be Black, Red and Ochre, I just couldn't decide on how those colors would be combined, so I made some quick flags using my paints on index cards. I never toyed with the idea of the "Khornate Cross" being black, only red or ocher. After seeing my examples I decided that the Khornate Cross should probably be red, and then eventually decided on the ochre border.

Background

Since the background would be black I began painting the entire banner black, working up progressive highlights of Vallejo German Grey, Dark Grey and Neutral Grey. Then I gave it a Chaos Black wash to smooth the transitions and take out some of the brightness.

Khornate Cross

Originally the cross was painted all the way to the edges using Mechrite. The top bars were originally solid, then I cut in with the black. I then added a black border, so there would be a black line between the red and the ocher border.


I then added the ocher border and highlighted up the red and ocher using my normal progressions. All of the symbols and writing were then painted on. I got a little eager in my painting, that I forgot to take pictures to document the progress.

Platoon Banners

The inspiration for these banners were taken from RonSaikowski's Banner Project: Imperial Guard, from From the Warp. Specifically the one below on the left:
The circled "3/1" on my banners denoted that they belong to the Sons of Sek 3rd, 1st Company. Nothing too complex with these banners, since they're essentially the normal Chaos warriors banners.

So that's all for now. 21 models done, 148 to go. I'm currently 2 days behind on my schedule, which is better because I was almost a full week behind last week. However I have to finish up the remnants for the Easterlings and Anthony's Uruk-Hai for the GT this weekend. So I imagine that I will start next week behind again. Oh well, can't be helped.
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Skorne Army Showcase

Here's a quick break from all of the Sons of Sek business (I just put together the 4 standard bearers and will be painting them tonight). I went to a Hordes tournament last Saturday. This was my first game in almost 2 years. It was pretty easy to get the hang of it back again.

The tournament had a small turnout, only 4 of us, so we only played 2 rounds. I won my first game (vs. Circle) on points 8-2. My second game was against the Trolls, and I was on the erge of wiping the entire army off the table when he charged his Warlock into my unit of Cataphract Arcuarii, who had the Death March spell on them (when one of them dies they get a free move and can make one attack with a boosted melee and damage rolls). He killed two of them who struck back in their death throes and finished him off, giving me the win.

In the end, I was the only person who went 2-0 so I won the tourney. Not bad for my first time out in almost 2 years! The Press Ganger running the tournament also let me know about a league that had just started that week at another shop just down the road. I went down right after the tournament, joined the league and got 2 games in (2 losses, but good games). I also got to meet a lot of players, which I've had a diffuclt time with since I moved down here a year ago.

I'll be going back Thursday to get some more league games in, but until then, back to work!

Lord Tyrant Hexeris

Titan Gladiator

Cyclops Savages

Cataphract Arcuarii

Praetorian Swordsmen

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Sons of Sek - Veterans Painted

Here are my 3 Veteran Squads. One with trip-flamers, two with trip-meltas.


Here's a closer look at the Vets. Any thoughts on the eyes? I decided to do pure white, with no pupils to give them a haunted look. Is it effective or distracting... possibly something else altogether?



In the Gaunt's Ghost books their armor is described as "ochre." For my interpretation of Ochre, I did the following:

• Calthan Brown base coat
• Tau Sept Ochre - overbrushed on the raised areas and lightly stippled in the crevasses
• Desert Yellow highlight
  
• Bleached Bone hardline
  

My squad marking system is somewhat simple, and is partially based off of the Cadian system. The command platoon is designated by "00." The Heroic Senior Officer's squad will be "000". I've envisioned that my Veterans are attached to the command platoon, working closely with the colonel (need to go back and find the appropriate rank designations for the SoS). As such, these squads are designated "003", "004" and "005". "001" and "002" are reserved for the special weapons squads.


Overall, I'm pretty happy with these guys, though they took longer than I had anticipated. I imagine that the bulk of the basic troopers who are cadian-based models will go a little quicker as there are some short-cuts I can take with them.

I have 17 models done, only 152 to go before September. I've moved some things around with my schedule in an effort to get caught up. So next up will be the 4 standard bearers (3 Platoons and 1 Company standards). I'm hoping to get these guys done by Sunday night. If I can do that, I'll be back on schedule.
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Sons of Sek - Converted Veterans

So I'm still a little behind on my schedule. But I think I can get caught up this week, and possibly ahead next week. I'm working currently on my 3 Veteran Squads. The bulk of my infantry we'll be Cadian-based with conversion. The Vets, Officers and officer Bodyguards will all be based on the WHFB Chaos Warriors.

I had to make 3 Lasgun Vets, 6 Melta Vets, 3 Flamer Vets and 3 Sgt.'s.

CSM Nub Arm

The Chaos Warrior body is two pieces, that includes the upper arms and sockets for the lower arms. I used CSM arms, cutting off the shoulder and upper arm, creating nubs to fit in the Chaos Warrior sockets.

Stock Lasgun

The standard lasgun posed a slight problem. The stock doesn't fit in the crook of the warriors arm, so I had to shorten the stock.

Modified Lasgun

Now its a little more compact, but still doesn't fit like it would on a normal guardsman. Notice the dirty aquila is gone.

Finished Lasgun Vets

Here you can see that even with the shortened stock, I still had to position the gun one handed, and I gave them a combat knife in the other hand (from the CSM sprue). Hopefully, this won't be too confusing with the Sgt.

Finished Flamer Vet

Same basic principles as before, except the flamer and melta make a better fit. Both the flamer and melta come from the CSM Raptor Assault Weapon Sprue. I think I bought the last 17 from GW when you could still bitz order them. They came with a melta, plasma and flamer on each sprue for $1.50 I think.

Sgt. Sword Inspiration

As always, I come back to this drawing for inspiration. I want all of the Sgt.'s in the army to have a sword that looks similar to the one above. I could only find metal ones that would be too difficult to get a hold of now, what with GW bitz services not being the same. By chance I came across the perfect plastic piece.

Sgt. Sword

I just happened to have 3 boxes of berzerkers laying around (that's what happens when you're devoted to Chaos). I found several sword in scabbards on the sprue that were the same basic shape (lower sword). I simply shaved off some of the detail and formed a sharpened blade. Looking at the picture now, I may go back and create the notch of the blade edge near the hilt.

Finished Sgt.'s

All of the Sgt's in the army will have horned heads like the figure in the drawing. This head was from the chaos Warrior box, and needed a rebreather mask. For the Sgt's, all of their rebreather masks will be in the shape of a hand (again like the drawing). This one actually came out the worst of the 3, but some creative shading during painting should clean it up a bit.

Well, that's it for now. I really like how these guys came out, and can't wait to get them fully painted up. I have the 3 flamers vets painted, and should hopefully get the 6 melta vets done tonight.
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Sons of Sek - Sentinels Painted

It's very late (or early depending how you look at it) so I'll make this quick. Here are my two "sentinels" for my Sons of Sek Traitor Guard Army. These guys took much longer to paint than I had estimated, and I'm a couple of days behind schedule. This week I'm supposed to be working on my 15 Veterans, and I think I can make up the time.

With these sentinels, I tried some different things with washes to avoid the standard drybrushed metal. It basically amounted to a 1:2:9 mix of Brown Ink:Chaos Black:Water with a drop of dish detergent to make the wash more viscous. Afterwards, I applied to subsequent Chaos Black washes, and then did a careful overbrushing with Mithril Silver on the edges and raised portions, and then decided to go back and do a Mithril hardline on certain conspicuous areas.

The bloodletter was painted going in progressive steps from Mechrite Red to Blood Red to Blazing Orange.




I had some issues matte varnishing these guys. I've been using the Armory Matte Varnish (I finished my last last can of the old formula of the good GW varnish on the Uruks), and its been tending to frost the models. I think it might be due to holding the can too close. I'll have to do some experimenting.



Note the banners. The Hand emblem is going to be the symbol of the Sons of Sek. There's a running theme with the Sons of Sek, where hands cover the mouth. It has something to do with the liturgy of the followers of Sek. Whenever he is named, everyone says, "Whose voice drowns out all others." Note the hand incorporated into the rebreather mask below.

The "3/1" signifies that my army is part of the Sons of Sek 3rd (The Fists of the Magister), 1st Company. The "1S" and "2S" signify that they are scout detachments of the 1st and Second platoons, respectively.

I've started building the Veterans tonight. Hopefully by tomorrow night I can have them fully built and converted, and maybe I can paint the 3 sergeants. We'll see.
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