An'ggrath the Unbound

The FW Bloodthirster model has long been one of my favourite Citadel miniatures. I've coveted it as long as I can remember, so I'm extremely pleased to be able to now make this post. I finally picked one up and have built and painted it, and damn, am I pleased with it!

I wasn't really feeling the whip in the model's left hand, for a couple of reasons. 1) things like that are a real hassle to build and paint, and 2) Any sort of dangly bit on a model is fairly likely to break off (as I have experienced in the past). The last thing I want is to spend a week fixing the whip on, only to have it snap off during a battle. So I sought something to put in the left hand. I thought about another axe, but the right-hand axe has quite a unique style, and unless I found another identical one, it would always look weird. I didn't fancy a sword, so I thought of making some kind of clubbing weapon - perhaps a maul or other similar weapon. Then I found the piece you see in the picture, from the Ogre Thundertusk model. The top 'prong' was taken from another part of the kit and glued on top. I also changed the left shoulder guard for another part from the Thundertusk kit.

Building the rest of the model wasn't easy - the torso wouldn't seat well in the legs and needed a lot of work, the wings needed heating to fit into place and I had to pin every single talon on the wings! But after many months, it was finally finished and ready to paint. Painting was fun. As I said on the hive tyrant post, I love painting big models, and washing and drybrushing bloodthirster skin is particularly enjoyable. 

I kept the base quite simple. I didn't want to make a huge scenic base as the model is very heavy and felt better when pinned directly to the MDF base. So a couple of dead space wolves seems just enough to represent the carnage that would litter the battlefield around An'ggrath the Unbound.

 And here he is with the Cohort of Blood - six other bloodthirsters, with one more on its way!