I Wanted to Build an Empire to House the Machine to Kick His Ass - Astral Claws Armenneus Valthex

So, I decided not to let it stop me that Valthex has one of the dumpiest and most static character models that Forge World has ever produced.

(Next time, I'll tell you what I really think ;) )

I think the original model is just... really weak design.

The backpack is rather clunky for what's supposed to be an incredibly elaborate bit of tech, and his whips are... I don't know, ugly and poorly conceived. It doesn't help that his arms are too short and his paint job has no attention to detail. Basically, unlike Huron who I think they nearly nailed, I thought Valthex was not at all impressive, certainly not enough to match his fluff as some sort of tech wizard genius who, before his defection, was one of the most impressive Masters of the Forge around.*

I decided to modify mine in a few ways:

-I dropped his arms and masked them with his shoulders, so they'd be longer.

-I moved his Indynabula Array** lashes from snaking into his hands, to coming out of wrist mounts, closer to mechadendrites might (I considered snaking them out of the backpack or behind his shoulders, but the reach was too short then). This allowed me to actually represent his bolt pistol. I was going to swap his hand, but I lost the teeny-tiny bit :,(

-I replaced his shoulder with Huron's lion heraldry. (The other side would have fit the fluff a little better, but I didn't like the composition).

-I mounted him on a base that made him not on the short side for Marines.

-I actually painted him like I cared at all, which revealed a lot of neat details, like his bionic left hand, some layered armor, and all the detail on his helmet. It also made him look like a techmarine despite missing the iconic axe.

I'm still not in love with his unmodified phased conversion beamer, but it was hard enough to get an actual copy of this old model; I couldn't get a replacement for its badly warped coils (the outside/left side at least didn't slip its mold). I'm honestly not sure what the right side's supposed to be, but I felt like trimming off the cylinder would make the model look like he was tipping. I've seen some cool conversions of him carrying the beamer, but decided to keep the old school devastator shoulder-mounted look.


* For those who aren't familiar, among other things, he solved his crazy tech, built Huron's first signature weapon, rebuilt Huron himself, was a siege master, and was an authority on Marine tech in general.

** Say that five times fast... Actually, say it one time without slowing down and I might still be impressed.