Tyrant Mechanicus Inspiration

Sometime in 2016 or 2017, I was part of a workplace Warhammer league thing. The goal was that we all would get a Kill team, who's rules were newly released and exciting, and build them during designated lunches with each other. Then, once everyone's were built and painted, we'd skirmish amongst ourselves. Sounds fun, right? Well, one by one, everybody kind of wandered off. That's the way these things go, though. So I came up with my own unique twist.

I immediately picked Tyranids, since they're the best buggies in the whole universe. However, after browsing lots of reddit posts and paint schemes, I felt like I wanted to push whatever my theme ended up being, a bit further. Really make them my own, make them stand out and be interesting. I really like doing that with all projects of mine - taking something standard, and adding my own twist on top. I searched high and low for interesting inspirational images, and this one was the one I landed on. 

Image credit to Marek Okon

I think what connected me to the image was the strong narrative immediately implied in the details. The (literally) blind confidence of the alien's handler, the barely restrained fury of the xenomorphs, and the fearful trepidation of the scientist.The matching designs of the headsets makes it clear who's in charge, and the wires along the xenomorph head imply explosives, keeping them in line. It also draws a line of story forward, I think - Of course they'll get loose, slip their leashes, and run amok. That's the obvious and correct ending to this flippant exploitation.

So I glued some boxes and wires to my Tyranids! I penned a quick lore backstory to explain how these creatures came to be, and why they were so bedecked in armor and gadgets - a nontraditional fare for the alien bugs. I also found that kitbashing bits was by far my favorite part of the WH40k experience - painting is fine, playing is fun, but kitbashing makes me feel ughhh right at home. In the meantime, Starcraft 2 released a line of "Cerberus" cosmetic options for their Zerg, which also galvanized my idea.

As well as supporting concept art and lore snippets, like the short story now taken down, "The Teacher". One of these days, I'm gonna have to paint some tattoos onto the skin of my Tyranids, with a very steady hand.

Years later (Totally copying me despite me never having posted pictures of them before now) I found the Iron Hive line of 3D printable miniatures by Makers Cult. I'm now considering printing maybe a few of them, but honestly - the fun of kit bashing lots of little bits together is an important part of this army for me.

 

 

And so that brings us to Tyrant Mechanicus themselves. I'll post more of them as time goes on, probably in a mega-post with the entire list detailed. And you can read the backstory for the faction here! But for now, here's a sample Tyranid Warrior with a "Venom Cannon", and a backpack where he keeps his applesauce, built long ago circa 2017 and upgraded and repainted recently in 2024.

 

 

Thanks for reading!