Okay, about time I revealed to you guys that I'm not dead and nor am I wasting my summer not doing any building. I'll have you know between decoration, partying and work, I've been very busy modelling, just not modelling on a computer for once!
This 'ere, is an old Epic Leviathan, courtesy of the Imperial Guard.
Several people have now built one, though back when I started (I kinda took a 30 month sabbatical from it!) nobody had done such a thing. There I was thinking, muha hah haaa... They'd probably say this is impossible but meh, I'll go ape and make one.
I'd seen bigger models, but I wanted big -and- detailed.
Okay, for those of you true fans who remember the old beast, I must admit one thing to you. 4 years ago you couldn't find a picture of this thing anywhere. I remembered what it looked like, but in terms of scale, I couldn't remember.
The most important thing to top that caveat off with, is the fact that I didn't want to just recreate the model. No, not me, I wanted to REIMAGINE it!
So, This is what I think the Leviathan -should- have looked like... And the additional features of my tank shall be revealed as we go!
Posts
So, to honour the Royal Volpone, I decided to make the Leviathan the same scheme, to act as their command vehicle. If you object to the difference in normal from design, then call this a Volpone Pattern Leviathan.
I'm not gonna bore you with the abandoned attempt, I'm gonna go straight into the second version of the track sections. How's this for a start?
@ Odyssey Slipways - As far as those pictures go, so far I'm using 5mm Foamboard for the thick white bits. for the thin white bits, Acrylic canvas boards. For the thickness, they are the most sturdy stuff goin. As for the grey bits, various bits and pieces from Cities of Death terrain. The tank wheels?... Well, I went out and bought 5 1:35 scale tank kits and used them only for the wheels (and one turret) the rest are sitting in a box wondering why I spent the money..... As for the tank tracks, Imperial Guard Tank Tracks (Baneblade wasn't out then, so no good thick tank tracks out there. No less than 5 rows of tracks, glued together side by side in a mind numbing fashion....
@ Meph - Thanks dude. This will actually end up bigger than the original scale, but yeah, as I said I wanted to reimagine it and adapt the design. The 'Volpone Pattern' Leviathan is probably closer to GW art, than the games, where you tend to find these massive cathedrals on wheels in the background! Colonel gravis has made the most accurate and true-to-scale and design version of the Leviathan, and I can post a link up if you haven't seen his amazing work.
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Updates:
Here's where the main floor goes:
And here we see one of the initial differences with the Volpone pattern Leviathan. Now I believe the original Leviathan was supposed to carry command squads or something. Seeing as Command platoons are never far from dozens of troops, and also thinking maybe nistead of an HQ unit, you would expect and HQ unit and 2 troop choices along, I figured the Leviathan didn't need to just ferry a couple of men around. It also needed to ferry armour.
So, this pattern is designed to take 4 normal sized tanks based on either Chimera or Leman Russ chassis. Alternatively, you can fit one superheavy tank in there, though fluffing properly I would expect the Leviathan would carry some chimeras and perhaps Salamander Command/scout vehicles.
This is the first major difference between the Volpone pattern Leviathan and the Epic one. The mega sized 'doomsday' cannon on the front has been replaced with something smaller, since anyone with a 3 inch wide gun on their model needs a place to store 3" wide ammunition... Mine can carry more ammo cos it's smaller (yet still really big) - but yeah, no fixed wall mounted gun. I have a balcony with a really big mortar on it!
While the gantry is 10cm off the deck (I missed a trick not using IMPERIAL measurements, tee hee!) it still only clings to the edges of the bay, and the main reason for that is to fit a rather large superheavy in.
Necros
Leviathan Blog - WarSeer
Col Gravis
Col.Gravis' Praetorian Imperial Guard: October 2007
Irfpio
Vostroyan Greens/Leviathan - WarSeer
...
You can also find another one in Bell Of Lost Souls' lords of battle codex... BoLS also boasts a CAPITOL IMPERIALIS... which is a bit bigger than my Leviathan. And more crazy... .. As far as I know, no gantries inside, but does double as a carrying case... and coffee table.
Just to prove mine is providing an interior tank bay...
And had to start painting some detail, since once this thing is assembled, painting inside is going to be a mite tricky!
Back door.
Rivets-u-like
Amazing progress mate and seems like a solid construction. Good idea on mounting the forward gun on a mount, because the placement and size on the original is just sheer ridicule. Even the p1500 Monster Landkreuzer of the Nazi's was supposed to have 'only' 2 naval 280mm cannons...
Landkreuzer P. 1500 Monster - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://robotheart.tumblr.com/post/70374449/the-landkreuzer-p-1500-monster-tank
p1500 landkreuzer - Google Afbeeldingen
Landkreuzer P. 1500 Monster - Wikipedia (this dutch page ghas a picture of it's artillery variant)
But anyway, that is some pretty fast progress. Keep it up and we'll see it finished pretty soon.
Soon as Cities of Death came out, I made a start... then I took, kind of a three year break after doing the basic track modules. Where I started again with the Cd tray, the sides, the heavy bolter sponsons, and onwards all started again about 6-8 weeks ago I guess, but I've started to pick up the pace on my work on it. I've been told to bring it to Warhammer world as an objective in the Horus Heresy Campaign weekend (September - warhammer world) so I've got a tight deadline! .. but yeah, I'm working full time evenings on weekdays doing this at the moment.
As for the scale, yes, she is much much larger than the Epic model was. Gravis had done his calculations well, and his Leviathan (about half the size of mine) is more accurate to the model. Mine is closer to GW art, with the cathedral on wheels engines in the background of those paintings...
While she is closer to the size of the Epic Capitol Imperialis in terms of relative scale, you need to remember, this tank was supposed to hold regimental command. In Epic, that was two little men. In 40K, technically, you would expect escort platoons and for everyone to have a Chimera in the 'garage'... The tank bay is intended for Chimeras and Salamanders, but can hold Super Heavy tanks (because commissar Yarrick in Epic, for example, once rode a Baneblade into battle!)
The Capitol Imperialis is supposed to be able to hold 30 tanks. My version of that would actually fit 30 guard tanks... and I'd buy another 25 guard tanks just to prove it... I'm sick.
Going back to the point about showing some of the back catalogue of pictures also means you are missing a lot of pics, but then I'm trying to select the interesting ones for you.
This one is to prove, once I'd finally built the command module, that I could remove the command module from it's emplacement. The whole kit comes apart (deliberately!) into 7 distinct 'modules' not only so it's easier to transport but also so you get a chance to see inside!
So there I've taken the command module off and nothing blew up.
Thats it again with some additional panelling added and a bit of primer. I find Primer useful to differentiate all my offcuts from my keep-pieces... since my table has around 1000 bits of foamboard on it...
I had a quick check now I'm at my home Pc and I believe I have taken you guys to about 20th July, so you're only a couple of weeks behind real time. I have over 100 photos of this thing being built and I doubt you wanted to watch them all, so enjoy the short version.
Amongst other things, by this point I also decided to throw in some Necromunda plastics!
So the big one down bottom originally was called the doomsday cannon. What was the weapon on the top, was it a normal battle cannon? If so, then what I've lost in firepower with the doomsday mortar, I've probably made up with this turret... Double barrelled means it's twin linked too.
Models eye view
a few greebles to break up the flatness.
Amazing progress mate. And considering the size of it, why not sell it off as a Capitol Imperialis? Or christen it as a class on it's a-own? Not that there's anything wrong in labeling it a Leviathan or anything, just wondering.
Well, and wether you're slowly bringing us up to speed with a photo history or if you have a sweat shop in your basement, it's a cool and impressive build nontheless.
I'd be tempted to Capitol it up, but you know, the Capitol was supposed to take a tank company... Mmm, I'd have to make it bigger... muha ha haaaa...
This is some work on the back I did.
Which one? I figure that several (or perhaps even all of them) are appropriate to some degree.