Dark Vengeance …again

You have to hand it to GW: That Dark Vengeance boxed set is quite a lot of bang for the buck: I’ve been happily cutting away on those models ever since the box was released last summer, and I still didn’t get all the way through its contents.

Case in point: The Chosen. The box comes with six exquisitely detailed plastic Chosen. The models are so good that any chaos player should be happy enough to draft them into his forces, right?

Image appears courtesy of Games Workshop

So why haven’t I done any work on these? They are, without a doubt, some of the finest CSM models ever released, yet they have sat untouched in their box so far — what the heck is wrong with me?

Well, there may be a couple of reasons, actually: First of all, I already converted some Chosen for my army before Dark Vengeance came along. And while they may not look nearly as cool as these guys, they fit the look of my army. They also decidedly look like World Eaters, while the Dark Vengeance Chosen were designed to represent Chaos on a more global scale — and rightly so!

What this means, though, is that it is actually rather hard to find a place for these in my army. Plus I felt slightly reluctant to cut apart the beautiful models.
But as is so often the case, something happened that set things in motion. It all began with this guy:

Image appears courtesy of Games Workshop

He may actually be my least favourite Chosen model: While he is nicely detailed, the model has a slightly squat look to it when seen firsthand. He did have a very nice power axe, though, so I used this guy as a donor when the time came to re-arm Lord Captain Lorimar. After that, things didn’t look to good for the poor Chosen: Without a CC weapon left, it didn’t really look like this guy was being fast-tracked for promotion in the World Eaters’ 4th assault company.

But for some reason, I picked up the model recently and started to work on it: After all, the new challenge rules in Codex Chaos Space Marines meant I was in dire need of a skull champion or two wielding power weapons. And there was no reason why I shouldn’t use this guy for that, right?

So a short while later, this is what he looks like:

A pretty straightforward conversion, as you can see: I added some Khornate bunny ears which succeeded in making the model look decidedly more like a World Eater and also managed to balance out the somewhat squat-looking helmet. And of course, the model needed a new axe, courtesy of the WFB Chaos Knights:

Coincidentally, this is an axe blade identical to the ones I used to build the first version of the axe wielded by Lorimar (later replaced by the Chosen’s power axe) — that’s Karma for you…

Anyway, while this was a fairly simply conversion, I still think the model now makes for a rather imposing skull champion!

Motivated by my unexpected success, I then turned to this guy:

Image appears courtesy of Games Workshop

Again, a nice model, but he really doesn’t look like a World Eater. The fact that he’s armed with a Bolter doesn’t really help either. And due to the fact that there are actually two models of this particular design in the box, I could actually try a more involved conversion without destroying a unique model.

So I was feeling a little more adventurous this time around. Still, I got a bit carried away at some point, hacking and slashing and kitbashing away, until I finally came to and this guy was standing before me:

Quite a transformation, if I do say so myself…
As you can see, this is a far more involved conversion, only keeping the base model’s legs. I mostly added parts from the WFB Chaos Knights and the new Skullcrusher kit to build a pretty bad-ass looking Khornate champion:

What I especially like about this conversion is that it really developed quite organically without much of an overarching plan in place. It also looks quite different from the original model (and, again, much more like a servant of Khorne) now.

So it looks like I have found a place for the first two Chosen at last. I don’t doubt that their buddies will also find their calling in due time. In any case, I love the fact that the Dark Vengeance starter box is still fun to work with, even months after its release.

Any thoughts on these conversions? Just drop me a comment! And, as always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!