Settra the Imperishable

Settra the Imperishable, Khemrikhara, Mighty Lion of the Infinite Desert, He Who Holds the Sceptre, Great Hawk of the Heavens, and so Settra's many, many titles go on, and on...

I could go on about Settra's story, but it involves about 3,000 years of events leading up to the end-times. To bullet-point some of his most significant deeds:

• united warring city-states of Nehekhara under the single banner of Khemri
• started the Mortuary Cult to win his final conquest over death
• was ressurected after several generations to reclaim Khemri from usurper Nagash
• ressurected other kings as sentinels to Khemri while he campaigned across the world
• battled with Nagash time and time again
• spanked Arkhan the Black a couple of times
• Nagash left his skull in the sand for centuries to stare at the ruins of his capital
• double-crossed Chaos Gods who ressurected him for the purpose of killing Nagash
• after Nagash devoured the Khmerian God of Death, Settra told Nagash what he could do with himself after being offered the position of Nagash's Mortrarch

No matter how bad he despised Nagash, in the end Settra was ressurected and sent to kill Nagash, but instead Settra killed the Bloodthirster Nagash was battling. Settra raised his giant middle finger to Nagash (it is said his middle finger is as long as his beard!) and stormed off into the rising tide of Chaos. That was the last anybody saw of him.

It is rumored that Settra could be Celestant-Prime, but I don't think so. Settra refused to serve Chaos to kill Nagash, why would he serve Sigmar to kill Chaos or even Nagash? Settra does not serve. Settra rules (His last words). It's great fluff to speculate, but seeing how Games Workshop just announced the discontinuation of the Tomb Kings, I think Settra may finally be put to rest permanently. On to the model!

This was a really fun and challenging model to build. It is cast from resin, a material I hadn't worked with. The pieces have to be superglued together because normal plastic model glue doesn't work. I found a lot of pieces kept breaking off. His right arm I had to pin to his body just for extra support.

I had the most fun coming up with the color scheme and painting the front and sides of the chariot. I wanted to do something different with the base of the chariot instead of just drab wood. I originally painted it black and did a wash and outline detail with Nihilakh Oxide and dulled it with a thin layer of Nuln Oil. The effect was cool looking, but it didn't really go with the reds, blues, and golds with the rest of the theme, so I just went plain black to allow those colors to stand out.

The horses are pinned down at the hooves for stability, as are the chariot wheels. 

The arm attached the harness to the chariot was a little wonky. It doesn't attach to the chariot very well, and the cast wasn't flush with the chariot, so I had to do some precision sculpting and pinning there too.

I put some Blood for the Blood God on the "Leg Choppers" as Chaos Joe called them (Leg Choppas if he was Ork Joe) for the lulz. I opted not to put Settra's cape on because it didn't fit well and his weapon got in the way. The only cool thing I miss about it is that it was covered in scarabs.

 And finally, I had to carve some little platform shoes for Settra to angle him more upright in the chariot. Otherwise, his Blessed Blade of Ptra was digging into a horse's undercarriage. Yep, Settra needed a booster seat.

The base is a 5" x 6" custom made by my friend Alex at Eldritch Entertainment. I wanted a round base for him, but it need to be wide enough for the row of 4 horses across the front and long enough for the chariot in the back. Here I mix some black ink paint from Vallejo into some Elmer's wood filler and spread it with a popsicle stick.

The ink wasn't giving the color effect I wanted, so I spray primed it black and carved some wheel treads before it dried. I gave this a good 24 hours to dry and solidify before priming.

And finally, I painted Agrellan Earth to give the crackled effect. I tried doing a mix of sand but hated how it looked, so I scraped as much sand as I could and did the rest with the Agrellan Earth. By the way, I tried other crackle products, and Citadel's Agrellan Earth is the only one that worked.

I have to say this is my first "real model," and I'm quite please with it. He's sort of the flagship for my army. If you can find a Settra kit I highly recommend getting it. I'd love to hear some constructive criticism or any hints or tricks I can use moving forward with modeling. Thanks for reading!