Tankbusta Nob: Da Sarge

A couple of years (I can't believe how the time flies) after working up one of my favorite units I have ever done, my techno-savage tankbustas, I have finally built and painted their nob.

Known as "Da Sarge", he is one of Filgakk Skullsplitta's most veteran and grizzled nobz. He was recently put in charge of the World Wrecka tankbustas to give them a leader with detailed knowledge of Imperial vehicles... and most importantly to keep them in line and ensure their loyalty to da boss. Da Sarge started life as a Blood Axe and even fought as part of an ork mercenary company for desperate Imperial commanders on the Eastern Fringe. Fighting alongside Imperial vehicles gave him a deep understanding of their strengths and weaknesses that make him a very efficient tankbusta now. And it is where he picked up the extremely strange habit (to orks) of smoking cigars. Now, older even than Filgakk himself, Da Sarge commands a lot of respect from da boyz and acts as a "big boss" commanding a number of nearby lesser nobz and their units when the warboss is leading the main charge.

His boss pole is covered in trophies from destroyed tanks and their crew. His face is lined and creased, his skin tone brownish with age. And he is never seen without his trademark "seegar".

Tankbustas of the World Wrecka tribe

Here is the entire mob of seven. They are very diverse, but I hope the color scheme ties them together sufficiently to pass as a single unit. You can click the pictures to make them bigger.

This photo is with the flash on so everything looks a bit bright.

No flash for a more accurate representation of the colors.

These mean gitz have joined up with my Blitzdreg Boyz and they are ready to do some big game hunting!

Tankbusta 7: Boom

The last of my first batch of seven tankbustas is Boom, the demolition expert. He is the youngest of the mob and also has a touch of mek blood, which makes him excellent at improvising devastating explosives from salvaged and looted materials. He loves nothing better than building tankbusta bombz for his mates and exploding the biggest targets he can find. Unfortunately, he probably has a very short life expectancy, but there is no other way he would rather go out than in the midst of a giant tank erupting.

I was going for a pose of an all-out throw while running since that thing looks damn heavy.

I always use shoulder pads to cover ugly gaps where I attach arms to a bare torso since you don't have the natural break point of the shirt-to-skin contact. I also try to add straps so it doesn't look like the shoulder pads are just floating on the arms. I think these (made from thin plastic strips) turned out pretty well!

In case you are wondering about the realism of that giant bundle of stikkbombz, it is based on the Geballte Ladung ("baled charge") used by the Germans in WWII as an improvised anti-tank charge. It consisted of six stick grenades bound around a center one and I just tried to replicate it. I found it while googling how stick grenades work and instantly knew I had to make one for my tankbustas! I think that thing could take out a tank if you hit it in the right place.

I like that the face has pins hanging from his teeth and horns from all the stikkbombz he is chucking!

And that is it for my tankbustas. I will start working on their bases while I plan out my next project. With the baby coming, I'm sure my pace will slow down quite a bit for a while. But I had a ton of fun making these tankbustas and I am happy with the amount of flavor and individuality the mob ended up with. I hope when I paint the bases that they will look OK (cohesive enough) together to call them a single unit. I don't know if seven is effective in game terms, but it is a start. As fun as they were to model, I will probably add some more eventually.

Tankbusta 6: Beast

The Orks of the World Wrecka tribe believe that the environment in which a spore implants and germinates will affect the physiology and attitude of the Ork that grows from it. The most prized and respected location for a spore to develop is under a heap of dung from a ferocious wild beast. And all of the Orks of the tribe believe that must be what happened to the spore that Beast sprouted from.

Besides being large and mean, even for an Ork, Beast has some of the largest teeth and one of the strongest bites in the tribe. As Orks prize large, heavy teeth much more highly than small, runty ones, Beast has been able to afford one of the best rokkit launchas in the tribe. It is made from salvaged Imperial parts and is highly reliable and accurate, at least compared to the average Ork weapon. He has also been able to acquire a large batch of rokkits so he can fire continuously and cause the most destruction of any of his mates, something he greatly prides himself on.

Beast is typically found at the forefront of his mob, displaying his intimidating collection of massive teeth on his belts and his face tattoos, while bellowing out his mighty roar and unleashing a non-stop torrent of rokkits.

Beast is known for being one of the loudest, fiercest and richest Orks in the tribe. 

He carries the most spare ammo of anyone in the mob because he can afford to never stop firing.

I love the bellowing faces from the Savage Orc kit. 

He traded a few teef for the face tattoos to show how dangerous he is. 

The Savage Orc head looks borderline too big on a regular Ork body, but it works. I also had to do my first real sculpting out of green stuff for him. Up until now, I have mostly just filled gaps. The Savage Orc models have the neck and tongue on the body and the heads have open mouths so I had to sculpt him a tongue. I think it turned out good enough.

Tankbusta 5: Rip

This one looks a little less feral than most of the others. I wanted a few that looked like they had rokkit launchas capable of a bit longer range than the spear-throwers.

This seems like the type of helmet you would wear if you were going to be blowing up vehicles at point-blank range.

A nice fur to help stay camouflaged in the hills. And you can see the red button that means "boom"! 

The running pose came from chopping up and re-positioning Stormboy legs. I love the underslung rokkit launcha!

The hook is visceral and could be useful for climbing or helping to pry open hatches on vehicles to get to the good stuff. 

Five tankbustas done; two left to paint. I've been keeping a pretty good pace. At this rate, I should have the whole mob finished and based in another couple of weeks.

Tankbusta 4: Bones

One more savage tankbusta joins the growing mob: Bones. He is so fierce, he goes into battle almost naked with only a bit of scaly animal hide and some lucky bones to protect him.

He uses a hunting spear with the addition of a little warhead to help pierce the steel hide on those metal squigs.

Ork ass! 

There's nothing like a good, solid lead pipe for crackin' skulls!

Tankbusta 3: Gutz

I call this one Gutz. It is hard to see in the pictures, but he has a big scar across the lower left part of his abdomen. While hunting a tusked beast, he was gored and his innards spilled out. With his weapon lost and the beast's tusks pressing into him, Gutz wrapped a loop of intestine around the beast's neck and strangled it. Now he displays the ragged scar proudly and uses the animal's tusk as a weapon so that everyone knows who he is. He has earned a reputation as one of the toughest orks in the tribe.

Savage enough for ya, Pete?

You can just see the famous scar right above the belt. And he has a tooth stuck through his lip as a piercing!

He uses the tusk for its intimidation factor. It lets everyone know who he is.

One extra rokkit because the first one might miss! 

The only thing better than hunting tusked beasts is hunting tanks!

While posting these pictures, I noticed a few small details I missed. These zoomed-in photos on the monitor are actually larger than the actual model and I always see imperfections when I look at them. I will touch him up and post the final pictures of the mob after I finish all the bases.

Tankbusta 2: Shrap

Second tankbusta is done. This guy is a pretty straightforward kitbash, but I think he conveys the look I am going for. The goggles and bandana around the mouth definitely look like what you would wear in a desert environment prone to dust and radiation storms (if you couldn't find a gas mask to scavenge!). He has a tankbusta bomb and a choppa made from scrap metal to help him fight his way to the big, juicy targets! The running legs from Spellcrow were perfect because he should be sprinting forward ready to use that bomb up close.

A Native of Xhorik Prime

I'm currently working on converting some feral native Orks of Xhorik Prime as Tankbustas with a "techno-savage" look. They have a tribal culture and salvage their technology from the ruins of the deserts.

Here is the first one, affectionately named Chuck. I'll do all their bases at the end.

He prefers hunting the big metal squigs in the traditional way: with spears.

"This is my boom stick!"

I was going for a pose that looks like he is winding up and ready to launch his explosive spear.

Tanks and beakies beware!

I figure the fact that he is throwing a spear is covered by the poor Ork ballistic skill.

In the second picture, you can see he has metal studs stuck in his skin. When he blew up his first tank, several pieces of shrapnel buried themselves in his skin. Rather than remove them, Chuck pinned them in place as decorations, to show off his toughness and bravery.

I have six more modeled up and I will be posting them as I get them painted.