Crisis Suit Conversion, Completed

Finished! Here it is, the XV-100 Battlesuit. I'm not sure if I should come up with another name for it, instead of "Crisis" (others being Broadside, Stealth, and Forgeworld's new "Hazard"). Any ideas?

The purpose of the suit is a command unit for a large force of drones, as well as a long range support unit for that force.  The suit has a additional armor protection, an extensive communication and sensor suite, with an integrated drone controller system.  The primary weapon is the railgun, with an Airburst Fragmentation System for close-in defense.  The suit is equipped with a larger jetpack to to handle the extra weight, and yet maintain the mobility of a standard XV-8 Crisis Suit.

I had been working on the high-lighting for a while (mainly extreme highlighting on the edge of the armor plates, etc.), and it seemed to be taking forever, and then, almost suddenly, I realized I was finished with most of the pieces.  I started assembling them all together, and before I knew it, it was practically done!

Currently the post that supports him is only 1/8" plastic tube, so he wobbles a little.  The weight of the rocks on the base help keep him from falling over, which would have been a real concern otherwise.  I may provide some additional support to the tube by filling it with a brass rod, or, if necessary replacing it entirely with something more sturdy.

As I mentioned in a previous post, I decided that I needed to varnish this guy.  I approached it with some trepidation, but decided to bite the bullet.  I took some pictures of him before I varnished him, just in case I ruined him I could point to the photos and say "Look at the model I made, before I destroyed him!"
Checking the weather before I sprayed him, the temperature was 66 degrees F and 35% humidity, so I had near ideal conditions.  So I went outside and gave him two light coats of Testors Dullcote.

The results were even better than I hoped!  The dullcote dulled the finish down a bit, reducing the annoying gloss that the Vallejo's paints had given it.  Another side effect of the original gloss finish was that the imperfections in the sculpting I had done really showed up.  The matte finish reduced that, so the finished product looks better than it really should.  But I'm not complaining!

Here's a close up of the armor plates around the hips.  It's hard to see, but the attachment points for the hip armor is a rectangular piece, parallel to the ground if the suit was standing up straight.  The anterior and lateral armor plates attach to that piece, angled off of it.  The lateral and anterior plates protect the hip joint, but they "float" above the leg, and don't touch it anywhere.

The white marks on the plates and on the chest above the Tau symbols is supposed to be markings on the suit itself (things like "Danger" and "No Step" etc., that you see on real world aircraft, etc)

In painting up the rail gun, I was partially inspired by the video game Fire Warrior, where one of the weapons you can get is a rail rifle (the coolest looking weapon in the game).  In the game, when you're holding the rail rifle, little charges of blue electricity crackle their way down the barrel of the weapon from the receiver to the muzzle and then starting at the receiver again.  Really cool.  I didn't think I could achieve an effect like that, so I decided instead to try to make it look like there was a glow inside the barrel that was being reflected by the edges.  I think the result came out ok...but hopefully I can do better next time.

Originally I was going to mount the Airburst Fragmentation Projector on the right shoulder, but after test fitting it a few times, it didn't look all that good, so I decided to scrap that idea. Instead, I drilled a pair of holes into the left arm. The left forearm of the model is very bulky, so I think a good argument could be made that the AFP is integrated directly into the forearm, rather than a separately mounted system.

The suit is really much larger than the standard Crisis Suit, which I first realized when I set them up next to each other.

And finally, an "action" shot, showing the two suits heading off to kick some butt.

In the end, I learned a lot in making this guy, not the least of which was building up my confidence in using both greenstuff and plasticard.  The other side of the coin, is that it just gives me more and more ideas for new projects!