Thanks to @MrMelons over here for the reference images that helped seal the deal for me to acquire one of the Warcry Centaurian Marshall models (bought by one of my daughters for my birthday last month).
As usual, progress will be slow, but we’re off to a good start and I thought folks may like to see some of the progress.
For reference, the Centaurian Marshall has horse-like proportions to the lower body, that do not fit with the squat bull-like proportions needed for the model. Note as well that the model also has 4 upper limbs, which I am not down with for a Bull Centaur model. Additionally, while the rearing pose is dynamic, you can see in the second image from the 360o rotation from the GW site that the forequarters are torquing at a 30o angle. Doing some mock-ups in Photoshop, I think I’d be happy with a 10-15o rotation back the opposite way, then it’s not so pronounced. To avoid too much additional hacking and GS work I think I can slightly change how the hind limbs stand on the base to correct for some of this angle.
First things first, I did a bilateral fore- and hind-limb baloney amputation. It’s similar to a below-knee amputation, except that I want to still keep most of the limb, so what it looks like is a fat baloney slice that’s removed. I then used plastic cement to glue the limbs back together. I had to be careful to remove the slice from the centre of the lower portion of the limbs as that was easiest to hide due to the lack of musculature. I used extra plastic cement to smooth over the transitions.
Still have to wait a day for everything to set before filing down the small seam on each limb and will then smooth the rough filed areas over with more plastic cement.
Also need to hide the evidence of the extra limbs protruding from the abdominal walls. I removed some of the armour plating and chainmail on the right side, and although it’s still present in the left side image, there’s also some of the musculature protruding from the back (red arrow) that also needs to be removed.
The hands were a little too gentle looking for my taste. Looking through my bitz box I thought possibly that ogre or minotaur hands would be good, but based on the size of the arms (where are a little on the small side) I found that Black Orc hands were just about right! I needed to trim down the inside of the forearm armour plate and the back part of the wrist, but it seemed to fit OK, but will still need some Green Stuff work.
I also drilled out both hands for some brass rod (coming later). Note the gap in the arm that still needs to be filled with GS. I also trimmed down the protruding neck.
The Centaurian Marshall’s helm is far too small for a Bull Centaur, so I tested a few mock ups. I think the oversized Legion of Azgorh style helm looks good, but I wanted a Bighat model (excuse the crude Photoshop on that one). I think the Bighat head is slightly too large here in this example. Either way, I’ll need to commit to one and to my surprise I’m leaning more toward the helm right now!
He’s also going to need a custom weapon. I’ll need to think on that!
~N