#shadowkeepers

Finally getting some of my minis done and of the pile again!

My Shadowkeepers warden of the Dark Cells!

So I asked my local Warhammer store manager what he thinks the best starter Kill Team to give someone who knows nothing is. He very quickly grabbed a box of Custodian Guards and said "If you don't want think then these are your boys." So my wife will be fighting for the Imperium. I feel like if she got into the lore she would pick something different, but if this gets her into the game then I'll step away from Chaos for a bit.

What would it have felt like? What would it have been to endure? To be dragged by golden chains into colorless cells, to be thrown down those stones, to feel the cold of the bars and the aurum and the shackles coiled around your limbs, around your mind. What would it have felt like to be forgotten, encased beneath the dark where shadows rust and old kings decay? What would it have felt like to drown in the Dark Cells, without even iron to reflect your cry, without even a single soul to remember you?

Atarine Hestia by Orniris Terensi

Knight Abyssal

Here’s my first little group of red boys. Bloodletters are super fun to paint, consisting of maybe four or five paints, and being able to do a couple coats of base paint then slap Carroburg Crimson on the model and call it a day has been a great break from the relatively more complex painting projects that Astartes are.

I’m also particularly proud of the bases I made for them. Astrogranite Technical, an industrial amount of Blood for the Blood God, and a bit of drybrushing makes for cool little Khorne-realm adjacent environments for these dudes. It’s also a relatively easily replicable process, so it’s good for a horde army.

The one thing I’m not a huge fan of is their blades. I’d love to have bright, glowing, fiery Hellblades like in Total War: Warhammer 3, but the standard steel looks grimy enough that it works, and it was done using paints I had already on hand. I’ll probably experiment a bit with various fire effects in the future, likely giving fancy Hellblades to HQs and more expensive models like Bloodcrushers while keeping stock Bloodletters basic like this.

Moving on, marines! I’ve decided on a different color palette and heraldry, although these are such minor differences that they don’t matter a whole lot in the long run. I’ve swapped from Mechanicus Standard Gray to Skavenblight Dinge, and the gold kneepads now go on the left. I gotta figure out how to get my models less shiny, dude.

Here’s a closeup of a little auspex-esque doodad that I thought I did a good job on. Tiny little details, but they add a lot of character to the model. The base is also particularly high effort, especially in comparison to the flat brownish orange planes that my Astartes stood on prior. I’m excited to see my dudes all painted up, but that won’t be for a long while.

Especially not if I keep buying new shit. Welcome the first Thunderbearers Aggressors, Squad Terastrael. Aggressors are a fun unit and the kit is awesome, not to mention how grotesquely meta they are now (which definitely didn’t encourage this purchase, trust me).

Sergeant Terastrael comes with a trusty censer and a personal servoskull for better murder capabilities. His model is simple but distinct, especially in comparison to the other two.

The brother on the left is pretty standard save for his massive aquila icon and some excessive purity seals, which has come to be a common practice in my Chapter. The brother on the right differentiates himself with a sort of ceremonial or official side cape, which is a visual motif that I plan on standardizing in my army, since side and shoulder capes are raw as fuck. Similarly to Eradicator Squad Kellam, the army’s only other Gravis unit, they all come equipped with MKIII helmets for that proper Centurion adjacent look.

And last but not least, I finished painting a Shadowkeeper. Finalizing the color scheme was pretty fun, and the light highlights on this model were also quite fun. I still haven’t decided on bases for these dudes so I’m yet to really dig into finishing the models, but besides the fucking trim, they’re nice to paint.

Captain-General Tethys Mimas of the Shadowkeepers Shield Company.

A stray strike from one the unimaginable horrors that dwell in the Dark Cells beneath the Imperial Palace removed the sight in her left eye and permanently scarred her face. The denizen's attempted escape did not succeed as injury was not sufficient for it to gain the upper hand.

However, due to the Cicatrix Maledictum's appearance and the inexplicable disappearance of a few of the inhabitants of the Dark Cells. Captain-General Tethys Mimas and her Shadowkeepers Shield Company head into the stars to find the prisoners and bring them back before they can wreak unimaginable horrors throughout the Imperium.

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Here is the final HQ choice for my Custodes, she'll use the rules for the Captain-General in the codex but I wanted to make my own character that suited the rest of the force.