My favorite projects are the ones that come about organically– An idea that turns into a quick conversion I can knock out in an afternoon.
Skaven Warlock Engineers are fun to experiment with because they're dirt cheap. They start at 15 points (about the cost of the average elite rank-and-file trooper) and upgrading them to a wizard or giving them equipment increases their cost to that of a more conventional character.
This makes it possible to create a bunch of Engineers, each with a single magic item, for a cabal of disposable characters that each clock in under 50 points. My Warplock Snipers follow this principle, and it was what led me to build my Rocketeer.
The concept for the Doom Rocketeer was inspired by the Protectorate Deliverers– Troops armed with rocket launchers that are little more than a tube housing a projectile. I wanted something similar for my Rocketeer, with a little more Skryre tech.
I began with these parts for the Warpfire Thrower and Packmaster in the Warhammer starter set.
To begin, I removed the Warpfire Thrower's arms and weapon.
The arms were taken from the Packmaster.
I cut away most of the shock prod, and rearranged the Warpfire Thrower to build launcher. The handle on the top is made from brass rod, pinned through the hand and into the weapon.
I removed one of the shock prod cables and assembled the parts to complete the rocket launcher.
A little trimming was necessary to get the arms in place, but the pose is exactly what I was going for.
A little putty work to fill out the joins, and the body of the model was complete.
The Doomrocket itself is made from thick floral wire and plastic tubing. The nose cone was sculpted from putty, and the fuse is brass rod. Basically a giant firecracker with a needlessly complicated warpstone-fueled fuse lighting system!
As I was working, I decided to make the rocket removable, as the Doomrocket is a "one use only" weapon. Removing the projectile will serve as a reminder that the weapon has been fired.
If the Doomrocket ever misfires, there is the potential for it to land as a dud that may explode in a subsequent turn. I made a token to mark the spot where the rocket lands. The plastic smoke is from the smokestack on the Warpfire Thrower's backpack.
