AoS Kharadron Overlord Frigate Conversion

Description

Here is the Drukharidron Frigate nearly complete. This is what I was able to achieve for our narrative event at Adepticon. There is still more detail I want to add, but if I never went any farther, my vision would have been accomplished. Nearly a year and a half of chewing on this idea and the first major milestone has been reached.

Pictures

Build & Paint

When conceiving of this army, the Frigate was an absolute ‘must work’ to make the army conversion work. I had to make something that felt like it filled the space like the massive balloons and hull of the Kharadron model using the scrawny Drukhari model. I tried to do this with large sails and brighter colors to make it feel comparable in utility even if they weren’t ever going to be the same in pure mass.

I wanted to portray hard-working aelves that don’t shy away from using their equipment to its fullest and obviously enjoy what they do. To reflect that, the hull is brightly painted to emulate their favorite prey, the gigasails of Ghur. But there is tons of artistic license, iconography, etc. and then it is heavily worn and scratched, repainted and worn and scratched. Some of the additional work I want to add includes more crew hanging on either as ship crew or corresponding to which units are embarked.

I want to model ribbons tied to different ropes to show some of their beliefs/superstition/traditions as well as being able to show motion. Definitely more functional straps and netting, including a big sky shark that they captured to use as chum for the gigasails. This is the kind of project that’s been fun to come back to after short breaks.

BUILD: MAST

The curvy design of the Drukhari ships didn’t accomodate a traditional vertical mast. It simply breaks the motion of the curved hull and sleek design. Plus, an Aethership doesn’t work like a windsail ship in my head, so a strong, stiff mast can be ditched in favor of something flexible and ornate.

So I went with a curved mast with a split that could clamp around a cross beam to hold up a sail. It certainly gives you a sense of aerodynamics and motion. Being able to slide the booms up and down the mast, lever them and tie them down. The physics falls off a cliff here, but so far no Aether-Sail shipwright has corrected my design. This very much ties with my conversion philosophy, anchor it just enough in reality that people make the leap that it works. I’ve gotten very positive feedback that this was accomplished here and I’m thrilled.

BUILD: SAILS

This design of the sails themselves is quite different to what I had started with. Previously a more ‘Disney Treasure Island’ design, the new design lets me layer multiple smaller sails giving it a layered, fuller feel. I wish i’d done more to curve some of the veins to give them a more organic feel. They are going to be painted as if they are a blue ivory. The sails themselves are harvested from the giant sailfish that they hunt, so I wanted to keep them very organic with rips and holes across them.

I ended up adding another sail to the keel of the ship as a way to add height to its presence and add to the exotic-ness of the design. Where water vessels have to push all their sails upwards, a flying vessel has more room below it, as long as it doesn’t need to land I guess.

I’m hoping I can iterate on this design for the other frigates and Ironclad I plan to make. I’m very excited to show off the painting which I think really accentuate the sails and silhouette of this vessel.

Build: Rigging

I hemmed and hawed on how to finalize this. Initially I thought I might use model shipbuilding rope material to string it and give it tension and the most believability. I had used twisted floral wire for loops of rope hanging of the Kingfisher’s belts which helped them feel more fantasy. In the end, the floral wire gave me consistency and was a tad easier to glue in place. My fear is that I’m going to bend it so that it starts revealing the lie that there’s no real tension. The blocks and locations for the tie-downs had more to do with aesthetics than realism, cuz again, I have no clue how to rig a real ship. But giving them space, anchoring them opposite the sail itself, and varying the distance they span all adds to the balance of the design and believing the lie.

BUILD: Materials

Drukhari Raider Kit - The body mostly.
Drukhari Bomber Kit - A couple missles that looked great on the front.
Expanded PVC Sheet - cut and shaped for the mast and booms.
Plastic Rod - for the sail veins, whittled to a point at the end to feel like fishbone.
Plasti-card - for the sails and some of the ship’s hull. I used clear plasticard thinking I could make them semi-transparent, but that wasn’t the case.
Aluminum Rod - for pinning and mounting to the rock.
Floral wire - twisted with a drill to make rope which I used everywhere to really sell the fantasy and sailing aspect of the piece. This ended up being my favorite discovery of this project.
Green Stuff - here and there; jewels, eyes, gap filler.