Ku’Gath the Plaguefather conversion, Custom Greath Unclean One

Greetings fellow wargamers!  Let it be said that if at first you don't succeed, try try again.  Ku'Gath is a figure I have long wanted to give another go at converting.  My first attempt had my heart in the right place, but met with mixed results. Check it out if you dare here

Let me just say I have never taken so much s&%t over a model.  I got hate email.  I had guys sending me links to forum posts on Papa Nurgle that were basically pages of haters bashing the model, and then bashing other models I'd done to add insult to injury.  It was a real eye opening experience about the power of the internet and the age of the consumer. 


The entire experience gave me pause.  How could something I built in my living room bring so much animosity from so many people?  It took me a while, but eventually the answer I came up with was this:  don't kick another man's puppy.  Let me break it down.

You're a gamer.  You discover 40k (or warhammer, etc).  Glorious 40k.  You like 40k.  You love 40k.  You dive in head over heels.  You soak it up, the fluff, the culture, the models, the whole nine yards.  You give it a special place in your heart, give it a shrine, keep the baby 40k warm on cold nights.  You love your 40k, yes you do . . . your precious . . .

Then someone comes around and F&^%$ with it.  Doesn't matter who, or how.  Could be me, building a model out of old star wars toys.  It could be Ward of Kelly or Crudace designing a new codex.  Could be anything.  Bottom line is SOMEONE has mucked with something YOU LOVE.  Like a puppy.  And while you can kick your puppy, they can't kick your puppy!  They can't mess with it, they can't change it, they can't modify the status quo.  They've come along and rocked the boat, distorted your world, and all is not as it was.  It'll be mass pandemonium, fire and brimstone! The dead rising from the grave! Dogs and cats, living together, mass hysteria!"In a word, total anarchy! 

All because someone took something you loved and changed it.  It's no different in baseball, movies, comic books, whatever.  You love something and someone (as you perceive) did it wrong.  THE WRONG DOER MUST DIE!  But you can't kill them . . . so you do the next best thing and slander them to death on line.  And you feel a little better about yourself . . . . or do you .
  .




 The problem is this, much like baseball, this is a SHARED hobby, so we have to learn to play nice.  Maybe the way you see Ku'Gath isn't they way I see Ku'Gath.  Or maybe the way you read the fluff about Space Wolves isn't the way I read the same fluff.  Maybe we got different things out of it  I mean, I have people pronounce 'Khorne' differently all the time.  Just because I hear it pronounced one way, does that mean it's the exact 'right' way to pronounce it.  And if so, what makes you so sure?  

 That's what always frustrates me about all these 40k novels that are being published.  If you just read them to enjoy the experience, I think it's perfectly fine.  But folks read them for canon and them when the author changes anything from the existing canon, they get riled up like it's time for a good ole' fashion hanging! 

Anyway, that's a long way of saying that folks didn't like what I did with the old Ku'Gath, and I noticed!  The internet was made to hate, and I love the internet, so I guess it was only inevitable I sooner or later find myself in the crosshairs, but I didn't expect to end up in a shooting gallery over that particular model.  These days my conversions are a bit more by the book.  I want to attract clients, not alienate them, so I try to stick to the all loving 'tournament friendly' conversion rule, which is 51% or greater GW bits.  And for the most part I nail it every time.  Case in point, Ku'Gath!



Anyway, back to the matter (or model) at hand.

When I saw the new Chaos Warshrine I new I desperately wanted to convert it up into the Plaguefather.  That mobile platform made the perfect platform for the characters mobile laboratory.  I didn't want to change it that much, I really liked the basic model, but I knew I'd need to do a few things to differentiate it from similar warshrines.
 
I always have a hodgepodge of what I call dungeon decor.  Just odds and ends like tables, chairs, cauldrons, bottles, candelabras, etc.  They're great for dioramas, terrain, and you never know what you're going to need, after all.  For Ku'Gath himself, I wanted a figure that would fit on top of the dais and I could feel like would be able to mill about, doing his work.  I really wanted one of the older GUO, back from 3rd edition.  When Daemon Princes still fit on 40mm bases.
The problem was finding this figure on ebay for less than $40 bucks proved challenging.  I'd already blown $$$ on the shrine and nurglings, so I  didn't want to drop another $40ish on a model like that.  What to do, what to do . . . fortunately the warshrine kit itself provided the answer in the form of the rear chaos mutant.  It his short stubby legs, rolls of bell fat, and 40mmish wide physique I felt like he was the perfect template to work from . . . at least under the circumstance (IE, a budget)


To modify the mutant, I swapped out it's head with the head of a daemon prince, added a few jowls under his chin, clipped off his third leg (this is not a euphamism =) ), stowed some junk in the trunk so we wasn't all buns of steel, threw in a few patches of rotting pustules for good measure and finally swapped out his arms.

The issue with the arms was the mutant has 2 entirely different arms.  The tentacle had to go for sure (sit that aside for another conversion, some other time), but the other arms wasn't awful.  However, matching it closely would be a challenge.  Easier just to clip them both off and find a matching set.  Since we're operating in the 40mm range, it opens up TONS of possibilities, including Chaos Spawn.  The spawn kit comes with so many varied extras I find myself dipping into it time and time again.  Just check out this most recent conversion of some other poor man's chaos spawn we did here. 



That covered big daddy nurgle.  For the palaquin I added a box of nurglings to the base.  I used some gobs of grey stuff underneath the palanquin to give the nurglings something to grab onto, so to speak.  I used the spare nurglings to good effect also, spread them around the lab, puking into a cauldron, holding open a spellbook for Ku'Gath.  I even have one hanging off the tusk, probably not for long!  I imagine those nurglings must not excel at keeping the lab nice and even during transit. 


So that's about it . . . pretty easy when you get down to it.  Not a terribly cheap conversion, but not break the bank either.  Speaking of bank, if you've got a little $$$ to burn, this model is currently for sale on ebay.  Check it out here! 

For those just tuning into this blog, my name is Caleb and I am the owner of White Metal Games, a miniature conversion and painting service in Raleigh NC.  If you are interested in commissioning a model through us, contact us at calebfilm@yahoo.com.  We have a dedicated staff of painters on hand to handle your project needs.  We also offer terrain building services, consignment, and dioramas.  We are your one stop modeling shop.  Our prices are competitive with many services, but our customer service is certainly our strongest aspect.  Give us a shot, you won’t be disappointed!
Be sure to check out our youtube channel listings here, and be sure to subscribe to see all of our updates!

And until then, remember to PUT YOUR MINIS WHERE YOUR MOUTH IS!  Happy wargaming!
Caleb, WMG