Greetings Terrans – exciting news today! After 8 months, I have completed Rulko and Kulo to finally finish all the Orks for Wolf Time! First up, let’s take a look at Rulko, Captain of the Guard. From the Book of the Astronomican:
“Rulko is the new captain of the guard following the execution of the traitor Gort. Rulko is a nasty ‘stab-in-the-back’sort of Ork. He prefers to advance his cause by underhand dealing rather than by actual fighting. He is armed and equipped as follows:
Powered armour. Flamer. Bolt pistol. Chainsword.”
And here he is:
I used another classic ‘Ork-in-Power-Armour’ as the base model for Rulko, but removed the power glove & replaced it with a metal Painboy arm (donated from Doc Spleenripper!). I over-sculpted the arm to match it to the rest of his power Armour, and did the same with the Doc’s saw to make it into a Chainsword. Finally, I sculpted on a wee Bolt pistol, and converted his main gun to be a Flamer (including fuel tank on the back). It’s all quite subtle work, and I think Rulko really does look like a ‘proper’ figure from that period. He doesn’t really look sneaky as per his character description, but really, how sneaky can an Ork in Power armour actually look? I painted him up predominantly red, and with less weathering & rust compared to the other PA Orks – I figured as Captain, his kit would be better maintained than the other guards.
Now for the big guy – Governor Kulo himself! From the Book of the Astronomican:
“Kulo is in charge of the whole base, the whole island, the whole damn world. He is a merciless, murdering maniac, and thus well cut out to run the planet. Kulo has become justifiably paranoid following several unsuccessful assassination attempts, and now prefers to rule Xit from the deepest and most secure level of Castle Kulo. He is enormously fat, and wears two suspensors just to enable him to walk normally. His maximum move is 4”, which is never increased (to charge etc.). Kulo is armed and eqiped as follows:
Conversion field armour. Stasis field armour. Two suspensors to offset personal weight problem. Two bolt pistols. Power-glove. Neuro-disruptor.”
Hmmm… Fat, megalomaniac, paranoid, political survivor extraordinaire, names buildings after himself, bit of a cunt… I don’t know why, but Kulo just reminded me of someone. Here’s how he turned out:
As you can probably guess, the current POTUS was the inspiration for this mini, and the opportunity to poke fun at the big man was too good to miss. Old RT used to be full of political commentary, (Ghazghkull Thraka famously being a mangling of Margret Thatcher for example), so really this is a nod back to those times. I hope none of my American followers are too offended – it’s just a bit of fun.
Appropriately for the head honcho, this was a very involved and complicated conversion… I started with an old Judge Dread Fatty, and added the shoulders & head from the Evil Sunz Nob from the ‘Ere we go range of Orks. His left arm comes from the mini I used for Rulko, and he has twin Bolt pistols mounted on the power glove (otherwise, how would he ever be able to use them!?). The right arm was donated from a damaged LE1 Space Orc that I picked up on the cheap – note the delightfully small hand ;-) I also changed the gun out for a new Neuro-disruptor from the Harlequin mini. Next, I added a backpack from an ‘Ere we go Mega Armoured Nob, and started adding cables and other gubbins to the mini. I wanted the backpack to look like some sort of primitive life support system for Kulo, as well as the generator for his Powerglove. Finally I sculpted on a few details – more suitably sized feet, collar & (power) tie, baseball hat, pouches, a holster & doodabs.
Paint-wise, the armoured bits were a mix of grey and black, rust and gunk. I went with the classic power-dressing blue trousers, white shirt & red tie, and the ‘Make Xit Great Again’ hat finishes the look. The Neuro-disruptor was a faff to do – I’ve never painted a crystalline gun before, so it was a bit of an experiment… I hope it works!
Here’s Kulo with his Captain, just to show the size difference between the two. Kulo is obviously a hefty lad, but I don’t think he’s so big that he looks out of scale:
Finally, here’s a group shot of all the characters from the final scenario:
And that completes all the Orks for Wolf Time! Want to see what a full set of Wolf Time Orks looks like? Of course you do :-)
Now it’s time to start the Marines, so I’ll be in another building & prep phase for a while & I won’t be posting for at least a week. Next time I do post, it’ll be all about the Space Wolves. Haarooo!!!
Fantastic – what a project this has been! Rulko is great and Kulo is just a fabulous pastiche. The only thing that’s missing is a group shot out of the box and set up on the table! I’m looking forward to seeing the Space Wolves – not a sentence I thought I’d ever write to be honest but after seeing all the care you’ve poured into the Orks I’m intrigued to see what you do with the old Space Vikings.
Cheers dude, I’m pleased with all of it but Kulo just delights me on every level :-) I’m waiting until the Marines are done before I do the massive ‘all the things’ pic – my little incentive to get it all done I suppose. I’m actually a bit nervous about the Marines… they’ll be done in the RT style, so before they became ‘Vikings in Space’, and hence a bit… bland? Dunno… we’ll see how they turn out :-)
Brilliant! I loved the Orks at every step and Kulo is a stunning conversion.
Oh, I was too young and too Italian, I guess, to have caught on Thatcher and Thraka, I must go back and have a look at the lore…
And, btw, it’s the Orks who should take offense, not the other way around! ;)
Cheers mate – yeah, there’s quite a few in-jokes hidden away in the old stuff if you go looking… mostly irrelevant now of course :-) As for who would be most insulted? I’ll leave it to the reader to decide ;-)
Haha, you made me laugh with Kulo, I had never thought of that! What an impressive collection of (so characterful and unique) Orks. Congratulations on the milestone!!
Cheers Suber, he is meant to get a smile – glad it worked :-)
Love the conversions- Rulko especially looks like a stock min- and i mean that as a compliment.
Your take on Kulo is great- personally I was imagining an Ork version of Baron Harkonnen (especially the film version…).
Cheers,
Pete.
Thanks Pete, that is a wonderful compliment mate – Rulko just came together so well & is probably the best conversion of the lot! I saw Kulo the same back in the day, but I thought I’d keep up with the times ;-)
They are amazing! The sculpting you have done looks great, if you had said your first hero there in the red was a model from time period and you had just picked it up and painted I would of believed you.
Thanks mate – that’s the highest praise possible :-)
Absolutely smashing it as per usual mate. You already know it but I love your interpretation of Kulo!
Cheers bro-beans ;-)
Excellent stuff! Very nice minis indeed! Had a good chortle at this, so well done all round!
Cheers mate, glad he got a laugh :-)
Hahah, brilliant! Thought I recognized a JD fatty in there, clever conversion work, Alex!
Cheers Mikko – it had to be done ;-)
Aww congrats on finishing the project man and what a finish. Both models are brilliant but Kulo is amazing. You’ve done so well with the entire project and with the amount of sculpting, converting and painting involved I’m very impressed by your determination to get it all done. Take a bow my friend.
Thanks dude – still got the Marines & terrain to go, but it certainly feels like progress :-)
Nice work, though not offended, I am a big Trump guy! Nice work Alex!
Thanks mate & I’m genuinely glad you’re not offended…
I was actually getting a bit concerned – the OldHammer group pulled my Facebook post on Kulo & I was worried that I’d misjudged the current climate (wouldn’t be the first time!). Very cool to disagree without being disagreeable imo :-)
Really great mate but I reckon you need to get these little guys all out on the table for a proper group shot, no pressure!
Cheers dude, I’ll do that when the Marines are done ;-)
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Both models look great (obviously). Rulko really does look like “a real one” and it’s only by looking closely and seeing (modern) parts that I’m familiar with that I can spot the conversion and see that it’s not an older variant of Kev’s work that I wasn’t familiar with, especially since there were always *at least* 2 variants of each model in those days.
As for Drumf – again a great model. Not sure if you posted it up as is, or with the full description that you’ve got here on that Oldhammer group. The “flavour text” might have been the trigger, rather than the model, because the model is pretty bloody tame in context, to be quite honest…
Cheers dude, I am very pleased with both of course, and while Rulko is overshadowed by the big guy, he really is the better conversion imo, so I’m glad you approve :-)
And no, I didn’t add any contentious intro to my facebook post on Kulo ;-)
🤔
Hahaha Oh, wow! Governor Kulo is AMAZING. You nailed it! :D :P
Cheers IM, he’s a bit of a cheeky one for sure, but it’s all good fun ;-)
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Great round-up mate, and thanks for the add :-)