The Death Guard - All Hail the NEW LIFE!

The Day of Resurrection is upon us!  The smallest and meekest among us, the humble single cell organisms, the bacteria and the virus, they are the INHERITORS!  Let them rise and multiply!  WOE unto he who interferes with them!  WOE!

I have been working on a 40k Death Guard army.  Given the wide range of models and opportunities for kit bashing, I wanted to try to do an army where each model was unique.  I haven't quite managed it in terms of sculpts - some of the Poxwalkers and chaos cultists are duplicate sculpts - but where there have been dupe sculpts I've done my best to ensure the paintjob distinguishes them from each other.

I am not a great painter and I am absolute SHIT at sculpting.  But much of mini painting is more about learning technique rather than being a talented artist.  I am always amazed when I see truly good work, and it makes me wish I was that good - but I will also say that knowing a few simple techniques like washing, drybrushing, and highlighting can go a long way towards making models look passable, and the more you do something, the better you get at it, even if you don't have a ton of natural talent (which, clearly, I don't).  I think it's enough to just enjoy the process.  Mini painting is one of those things that induces flow state in me - the world just drops away, I forget how anxious everything makes me when I think about things at the macro level, and all I am focused on is this one little model, right here and right now.  That alone makes the practice worthwhile for me.

RISE FROM YOUR GRAVE

First up, the Poxwalkers.  Dark Imperium came with two sprues of 15 that are duped, so I had to distinguish them with paint.  I also grabbed a box of the old Warhammer fantasy battle Zombies and did my best to convert some of those for a total of 40 walkers.

YE SHALL KNOW THEM BY THE BUZZING OF THEIR WINGS ... 

Two Foetid Bloat-drones.  I'll probably do one more of these and a Greater Blight Drone before I am done.

A Mephitic Blighthauler - I want three of these guys.  There is only a single sculpt, so I am going to do some conversion work, replacing the circles and tri-arrow design with a different Nurgle symbol from the Blightkings kit on one of them, and using a faceplate from the Bloat-drones for another.

SEETHING WITH LIFE, TEEMING WITH DEATH

A Daemon Prince.  It's hard to get this guy to look anything except goofy.  I think he turned out OK.

HULK SMASH

A Helbrute, the first of at least a pair.

HEAVY METAL

A Plagueburst Crawler, hopefully I'll do one more of these and then a Land Raider or a Spartan.

ASK NOT FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS...

Two Noxious Blightbringers, another conversion using the Blightkings and some Chaos Space Marine bits if I remember right.

LORDS OF THE UNDEAD

Leaders - a Lord of Contagion and below him, Typhus, Captain of the Terminus Est

DEATH COMES IN MANY FORMS

Various support units.  From top to bottom: Malignant Plaguecaster, Plague Surgeon, Tallyman, Foul Blightspawn, Biologis Putrifier

THE CRAWLING HORDE

Many, many Plague Marines.  Each one of these guys is a unique sculpt.  I did a lot of conversion using the Putrid Blightkings set - the Death Guard armor is so unique that you can get away with more medieval looking plate mail as power armor.

The dude below with the fly head and flanked by the two icon bearers is definitely Chosen of Nurgle.  Maybe at some point he will be elevated by Grandfather Ruin to Daemon Princehood and challenge the current master of the warband for supremacy.

I am in love with the cheeky Nurgling wearing a helmet below.

WARDENS OF THE GRAVE

Deathshroud Terminators

Blightlord Terminators

THE UNMADE

Works in progress - some additional Blightlord Terminators and a converted Lord of Virulence (the dude with the fly head).  A second Mephitic Blighthauler - I have a couple of Nurgle symbols from various kits and I am planning on scraping off the one that is on him and replacing it with a shield from the Putrid Blightkings set to make it unique.  Last, a humble Rhino that is in the painting stage.

The chaos cultists are not pictured - I also have a Mortarion to build (or possibly cannibalize for a converted Daemon Prince using Vashtorr - an idea I rather like) and a few other models that don't quite qualify for even WIP photos, but the rest of the army is captured in photos below.

That's it for now - I'll post more of these guys once I finish the second wave, whenever that is!