Once you go on the Fenrypian Forge Facebook page, kiss goodbye to the rest of your afternoon. It’s a wonderful place full of madcap conversions, wonderfully detailed kitbashes and some outrageous use of parts. The characters he crafts are works of art, and it was with some delight I painted one of his pieces in 2018; Remus Ventaus, the Saviour of Calth.
The opportunity came at the end of 2020 to buy a piece of his. and how on earth could I refuse?
James was kind enough to send over his thoughts on the project as I draft up a design board for potential colour schemes. Let’s read what he has to say:
I see you’re looking into starting on the WE chap, so thought I should give you my two cents in case it helps with deciding how you approach painting him (which I’m still very excited to witness!)
Because of the ‘victim’ and the process of tearing him in two with the chainaxe, I imagine the Praetor’s armour would have a large amount of spray/splatter across some portion of him. Because of this, I wonder if making him a red or white/red WE might detract from the blood splashed across him? So a well-weathered white/blue would probably be my suggestion, though I have no doubt you could make whatever you chose work (e.g. by heavily weathering the red so it is relatively muted etc.). Maybe some weathered brass for some of the detailing of the armour, such as the studs and details? Here is my spiel for the pdf, if you still wanted to include it, which I can alter or add to as you wish. The last paragraph is my personal headcanon as I say, so feel free to not include if you feel it doesn’t fit or whatever.
I thought it might help with finalising a scheme via the narrative though.
“I wanted to create a son of Angron whose loyalty was deliberately ambiguous and could feasibly represent the leader of a World Eater force fighting as Loyalists, as Traitors, or solely for themselves. Equally as important was to showcase the rising levels of brutality on all sides of the civil war as it progressed, something that can often be difficult to do on a standalone infantry-sized model. To this end, there is no identifying iconography or details bar that of his own Legion, with the primary focus of the model intended to be the ‘victim’ raised aloft.
I hoped this, alongside the disdainful sneer of the Praetor’s head and the similarly gory base, would convey the intent and story behind the brutality and violence. In terms of converting, the armour is built up with additional plates in an effort to make it look like a relatively old suit had been repurposed, repaired and up-armoured in the style of the XIIth, devolving alongside their deterioration and the changing circumstances in the galaxy. The chainaxe was inspired by the Saw Cleaver from the videogame Bloodborne and is something that should still be wieldable using the enhanced strength provided by Cataphractii Terminator armour. My personal headcanon was that this particular Praetor leads a force of World Eaters who have become known as ‘The Maw’. Fighting as a specialised assault cadre of the XIIth Legion during the Great Crusade, they now take great satisfaction in succumbing to their implants whilst hunting down other World Eater forces who oppose whichever faction they belong to, punishing their once brothers-in-arms for their betrayal.”
You can find more of James work on the Fenrypian Forge.