Dark Angels: Landraider Excelsior Build

Hi folks,

One of the unexpected products of the past couple of weeks has been a loss of sentimentality when it comes to my models. In particular, my Dark Angels tank paint scheme and overwhelming need to put plasma weapons on everything have withered under harsh scrutiny.

Back in the hazy days of 2nd Ed., put a bit of energy into painting an Unforgiven Crusade army, featuring the four paint schemes of the Dark Angels and their successors (Angels of Retribution, Absolution and Vengeance). My Predator Annihilator was the only model with an Angels of Retribution scheme, but it was so big compared to everything else that it seemed like an adequate representative to me.

When I  repainted everything to have the Dark Angels Chapter scheme, I left the Predator as it was because I had worked so damn hard to get the bone colour right. Every tank after that I have painted in the same scheme, or undercoated in preparation for that scheme. It has become a bit of a barrier for progress, however, as a plain green scheme is so much faster to paint (I have that stuff in a can). Additionally, the old paintjob is now getting on 15 years old. A lot has happened since then...

...so, last week I grabbed my tanks and dropped them all into a plastic box of Simple Green and just walked away. After a test scrub, I could see that the Simple Green was doing its job.

After it was stripped as much as possible, I dug through my bits box and converted it into a Landraider Excelsior command tank. It only has one detail left for me to add: the Data Augurs (though arguably, the antenna will do). If I can kitbash anything interesting you'll see it in the next post.

Grav and amp.

The Aquila Aegis Field generator is a set of angel decorations from the Ravenwing Command sprue, as well as a Dark Angels icon of the style I would usually discard in favour of a decal. I'm planning on painting that icon with a glow effect, similar to a power weapon. Any similarities to Dan Abnett's chaos glyph concept in the Gaunt's Ghosts series is completely coincidental (voi shet, Magir?).

The open portal is for the Data Augurs. I haven't decided what that will look like yet.

Of course, with a Landraider Excelsior you also have to take a Rhino Primaris, which will be my next kitbashing project. I am also tinkering with my Dark Angels quite a bit to get a better balance of weapons, with the plan of jumping back into gaming when the next edition hits.

See you across the table,

Marc