Tor Megiddo: Oil & Blood, Part 1

The Purebred

Roughly a month ago, Saul (aka Warboss Kurgan) suggested we play a campaign as a sequel to the Tor Megiddo event game to which he contributed last year. Needless to say, we were all extremely hyped at the idea of following up on the footsteps of such a great project. The challenge, of course, is to come up with models and a story that, while being our own, fit in the setting and athmosphere created by Alexander Winberg and brought to life by everybody involved in the original event.
For me, this meant binging on the whole Mad Max series and poring over all the pictures of the gangs participating in the game. I quickly realised that, as much as I liked the various mutants and twisted cyber-altered loons featuring in the original cast, my heart realy beats for the more human barbarians scraping a living on Tor Megiddo. At the same time, I was drawn to the aestethic of Wez and the Humungus' pack from the Road Warrior.

This quickly evolved in the idea of one of the Yaike Yaike tribes being able to avoid mutations by following the teachings of a tech-wytche expert in biology. The wytche preaches that the tribe can achieve salvation by purifying their flesh. This requires sacrificing newborn muties to a twisted version of the God Emperor, keeping females under lock in a fortified rad-shelter and, if mutations occur later in life, amputation and crude cyber replacements. The wytche also sanctions who can mate within the tribe, ensuring that only the stronger and healthier of its members carry any offspring. With this basic outline for my tribe in mind, I got some Khorne Bloodbound models, Genestealer Cults upgrades and assorted bits from our box and started converting. Here are the first members of the Purebred.

The Warleader

As the spiritual leader and keeper of the flesh of the Purebred, the tech-wytche is too precious to be risked on raids out in the wasteland. This is why he (or she, I haven't decided yet!) leaves such matters to the alpha male of the tribe. The Exalted Deathbringer with Impaling Spear was the perfect model to represent the peak of careful human breeding. The only actual conversions on him are the removal of all obvious Chaos iconography from the armour and the replacement of the spear head with the chainblade from a Sentinel and of the orc skull dangling from it with a scrap-tech fetish made out of a Space Marine Auspex. Then, instead of the khornate gut plate, I placed a holster, a canteen (both from Cadian kits), a pouch with grenade (Genestealer Cult Upgrades) and stick grenades (Goliath) around his waist. I also attached a holstered shotgun (from the old Space Marine Scout Bikers) to his back.

For painting, I kept to a palette of black, mustard, beige and dull metal, with some touches of red on the armour plates. The skin was painted in a darker tone than the one I normally use since I've reasoned that, when spending your life in an irradiated desert, even if you can avoid mutation, you will at least be sunbeaten.

The Tribesman

I decided to use the Bloodreavers as bases for all my tribesmen, giving them heads from the Genestealer Cult Upgrades with sculpted hair. The first one I did has a shotgun (again from the old Scout Marine Bikers) and a combat knife (Tactical Marines). Finally, I sculpted fur to cover the khornate symbols on the model and added pouches, grenades and a canteen (Cadian again).

The colour scheme follows exactly the same pattern used for the warleader.

I'm also really pleased that the Cadian accessories include an empty knife sheath. It sits so well with the combat knife carried in the tribesman's hand!

The Rider

This model was originally not planned, but as I rummaged through the bits box the head and tail of the classic Necromunda Ash Wastes mutant horse jumped at me, together with a horse body from the Chaos Marauder Raiders and a baggage/backpack from some Gorkamorka model. Too good bits to pass them by!

Legs from an Empire Knight, grenades from the Genestealer cult upgrades, the Vox Operator torso and an autogun from the Forgeworld Renegade Militia completed the model, which was again painted in the same palette as the others, although with almost no black. The horse scales gave me the opportunity to add some drab green as a spot colour.

The Rider fits perfectly with the Tor Megiddo aestethic, but obviously not with that of the Purebred. That's why I am developing his story as a wandering mercenary, a kind of twisted, cruel version of Max Rockatansky.

The Sandhound

This was yet another unplanned model that screamed to be included. I had a headless Chaos Warhound after converting a Chaos Spawn and in the bits box I found a Drakespawn head. A touch of greenstuff to reconstruct the missing fur on the breastbone and I had a mutant dog to act as the companion of one of the tribesmen.

I applied the same colours I used for the Rider's mount and kept the fur black so that the model fits with all the others.

The fluff for all of them is still pretty basic, as I am developing it slowly, while we flash out the storyline for our upcoming campaing. By the time I finish the four tribesmen currently on my desk, it will be much more developed.