“I watched them flee from my advance, through the hunters auspex. Seeing men scream, the fear writ clear on their faces. I relished the moment of realisation, the understanding that they were facing their death and that there was no escape.

Then I lowered my foot on them”

Princeps Solaria Tannin, Warlord Titan Nuncio Mortis “Messenger of Death”

Background Narrative:

Certificate Number: 000870
Titan Name: Nuncio Mortis “Messenger of Death”
Pattern: Mars-Pattern Warlord Titan
Head Unit: Mars Beta-Pattern Head
Primary Armament: Arioch Power Claw w/Titan Mega Bolters, Bellicosa Volcano Cannon, Laser Destroyers/Apocalypse Launchers
Princeps: Solaria Tannin
Titan Legio: Legio Fureans (Finis Mundos “Enders of Worlds” Maniple).
Battle Maniple Composition: Mars-Pattern Warhound 5491

Nuncio Mortis “Messenger of Death” is the principal Titan of the Legio Fureans Maniple Finis Mundos “Enders of Worlds”. The Maniple commander, Solaria Tannin, became permanently bonded to her Titan with her crew during the events of Beta-Garmon in the Horus Heresy.

Devoted to Khorne, the crew were slowly subsumed into the Titan itself. Whilst not physically marked out as a Banelord class Titan, the devotion to Khorne is clearly visible in the Maniples tactics. The Maniple modus operandi is influenced by the manner in which it has served the Traitor forces.

Finis Mundos has deployed repeatedly alongside the Night Lords and Dark Mechanicum Legio Cybernetica and Ordo Reductor forces. The maniple has a full contingent of Secutarii, lead by Axiarch Stroiker-72. The Titan Guard comprises of 20 Hoplites and 20 Peltasts, providing ranged kinetic, melee and blind support to the Maniple. Somewhat unusually, the Titan Guard are equipped with a large cohort of Myrmidon – these are used to scour the battlefield and annihilate any survivors.

Solaria chooses to send supporting Warhound Titans to push forwards and abuse the enemies unprotected areas, drawing fire whilst Nuncio Mortis advances on the hapless victim unobserved.

Once close in, Solaria Tannin uses the Sunfury at almost point blank range through the rear of the enemy Warlord, crippling its Enginarium before using the Arioch power claw to remove the head and crush it, and its helpless crew in its closing talons. Whilst this act was ongoing, the Warhounds scout for their next victim, feeding the information back to Solaria for target prosecution.

There have been several instances where the Maniple has been directed by the Warmaster to support the Night Lords on missions to secure worlds or fortress-hives. When conducting missions such as these, it is noted that the Titans generally drop close in to their target and remain static for a significant period of time using their mere presence to sow fear and threat in the defenders.

The Maniple is known to sound its war-horns as Night Lords Storm Eagles and Night Raptors scream down through the skies, as if heralding the arrival of dark times for the world. This display of static threat is then brutally ended with the discharging of Nuncio Mortis’ Primary Weapon and the Maniple advancing to destroy any enemy in their path.

Repainting and Refitting a Towering Monstrosity:

The heavy weathered look of Nuncio Mortis had begun to look a little tired and out of place, especially with the recent repainting of Warhound Titan Umbra Mortalis. To that end, I simply had to repaint the Warlord.

For this iteration, it was my intent to go through a full refit in addition to repaint as I’d never quite gotten around to purchasing a Sunfury Plasma Annihilator and finishing the Multi Launchers.

The Sunfury Plasma Annihilator isn’t cheap. However, £92 buys you a very complicated geometry weapon, so I would recommend opening the box in store and checking over the rear assemblies in particular. However, the cast was perfect, with very little flash and the gates are in a position that doesn’t particularly require careful removal. At close to 15” long with a stub nose it’s suitably imposing to look at. If you have all of the right tools to hand, you’re looking at around an hour to clean, assemble and magnetise this weapon.

With regards to rules, the Sunfury seems a little strange. Primary Weapon 4, Apocalyptic Barrage, Plasma Wave at Strength 9, AP2 with a 72” range doesn’t seem particularly good. Then you see the template.

It’s a dinner plate. So how this works is simple. Place and rotate the template above the target to include the maximum amount of enemy models you can, then roll your dice for scatter as you normally would. Primary Weapon 4 effectively means you fire 4 globs of Plasma into the template. The template has numbers etched onto it that correspond to your dice roll, so you assign hits into those areas. Then, because of Primary Weapon, you’re rolling 2D6 for armour penetration, choosing the highest result. Now, flare shields can still cause you problems, but in the most part, that’s pretty good. Add in the Barrage rule means that you don’t even need to see the target (suffering full scatter) to aim for it and that due to plasma wave the enemy are rerolling successful saves it becomes quite nasty. If it were any stronger than Strength 9 it’d be utterly broken. It’s a nice balance.

When it comes to painting, I started from the inside out. What I mean by this is that the chassis was the first to be stripped and repainted, with the armour panels being refitted when they were completed. This gives a visual cue to how much has been done and a nice way of avoiding feeling drained during painting such a large model.

The chassis was primed using Vallejo Mecha Black, as was the entirety of the armour panels post stripping. The chassis and weapon components were then treated to Vallejo Model Colour Burnt Iron. It’s a lovely rich, dark metallic that looks amazing in the flesh. Finally, a wash of Nuln oil was applied via airbrush. The airbrush application gives it a different finish than brushing it on, more pocked and matte. Finally, a gentle dry brush of Vallejo Silver was applied to catch and pop the edges.

When it came to starting the armour panels, I chose this time around to add highlighting to a greater degree. This meant a slight revision to the painting scheme of old.

For the yellows I used Citadel Averland Sunset, with a layer of Citadel Flash Gits Yellow. I still believe this is the best choice for the base colours of Legio Fureans – flat yellow just looks plain.

For the whites of the head and Arioch I chose to use Citadel Ulthran Grey layered with Citadel White Scar, this gives a very subtle effect. If you are wanting to go for a more bold contrast then you could quite feasibly use Mechanicus Standard Grey as the base and Vallejo Dead White.

Plasma or powered weapons are getting a layer of Citadel Ulthran Grey with Citadel White Scar where the coils or elements would be hottest. Then, I’m using Vallejo Blue Ink to layer on. This is applied in multiple strokes and layers to add depth to the colour. I’m potentially going to add a white to the coils, but I’m undecided, I like the unadorned look.

The blacks of the remaining panels use my favourite combination of Citadel Abaddon black, Vallejo Sombre Grey, Vallejo Pale Blue Grey. Those that require it will have Vallejo Arctic Blue Metallic applied in a hazard stripe pattern.

For trim, I am using Vallejo Rust Metallic, with a wash of Agrax Earthshade, followed by a highlight of Vallejo Copper, with a final touch of Vallejo Gold. You’ll note the change in tense – I’m at this stage now.

At this point, I’m now a week in from when I started. It’s been a savage 7 days of work, returning around 6hrs each night of effort.

Weathering is the next step, this time, going lightly. I’ll be mostly focussing on the feet and lower armour sections, adding a dusting of red to simulate the Titan walking on the Martian surface. After all the Dark Mechanicum Legio Cybernetica and Ordo Reductor forces I have are based on Martian Ironcrust Texture paint.

I’m going to look at using AK Interactive streaking grime on the panels to add a bit of a wet filth effect, pulling the grime down with a cotton tip and white spirit, but it’s safe to say I’ll be practicing on another model before I go in hard on the Warlord. That aside, I’ll look to create a bit of damage and chipping here and there, but the “walking through atomics” look is definitely not making a reappearance.

To round this out, I’ll leave the current WIP photos at the 7 day point!