Storm Strider: WIP #1
After my recent flurry of model completions I’ve started in on something much larger: a Storm Strider. I actually got this for my birthday in July 2011, but hadn’t assembled it, trying to build up the rest of my force. Now is the time to get this guy on the table. I think there is a lot of potential for this in a game and I’ll be interested to see how it plays.
As for the model itself, this is probably the worst-cast model I’ve assembled. The plastic pieces have gaps, bubbles, missing edges, smushed details, it’s a mess. I contemplated just taking a picture of every plastic piece in the kit and submitting it to the missing parts portal, that’s how bad it is. But I’ve decided to just work with what I have and get this construct on the table. I like to fully assemble models before painting but as with the Stormwall, that wasn’t going to be possible here. Instead I have the legs and the main platform assembled, then the two Stormsmiths, the ball and the coils are all separate.
Assembly is my weakpoint and it was proven here as I struggled to get the legs and platform together. And even after all that I somehow had the legs spread too far apart so they were surrounding the base rather than being on it. I had to break one of them off and retry. I’d like to think the poor plastic molding allowed me to make such a terrible error, but it’s certainly more to do with my assembling skills.
Storm Strider legs and platform metallics
The metallics for the main legs and platform are complete, but there’s much left to do. Once the blues are complete then I have to apply the arcane blues and gold rings for the legs and ball. Not to mention painting the two Stormsmiths. For the golds, being so predominant I decided to really go for some high-contrast from bright golds to a dark brown and I think I it there.
Storm Strider base, sandbag fortification WIP
For the base I want to theme it similar to the Stormwall, that striding across a battlefield, overcoming what are now minor-obstacles that also help give some scale. The Storm Strider doesn’t suffer the same scale problems as the Stormwall, however, as it has two human figures riding on it, so it’s already clear what the scale is. So to tie it I decided it would be crawling over and enemy sandbag fortification with barb-wire. To account for my continued poor assembly, I also need to raise a hill in the back for the back leg to step on to keep the platform level. I think I’ll need to mix up some more green-stuff to help provide a smoother incline on that hill in hopes of making it look less artificial.