Warhammer 40,000 – Skorpius Disintegrator and Dunerider

With the updated Apocalypse rules for Warhammer 40,000 the Adeptus Mechanicus receives a battle tank and armoured transporter of their own, the Skorpius. It can be build either as a Skorpius Disintegrator or Skorpius Dunerider.

I'll cover a couple of vehicles this week, as announced in an earlier post, not with Apocalypse in mind, but the idea of using and partly converting these kits into industrial or utility vehicles, to be used in the 40k setting, like Necromunda or Inq28 (or a special Kill Team mission), or general sci-fi games.

The Skorpius costs 60 EUR and comes with 104 parts spread across two larger sprues, a decal sheet and a coloured instruction manual, that covers a data sheet in multiple languages as well.

As mentioned above, the more than 100 parts are spread across two sprues. One covering the larger parts and the other one with the fine details. Casting on both is very well done. Minor mould lines and no warpage. And as we are used to by Games Workshop tightly packed sprues, that use the available space to a maximum.

As the Skorpius boxed set can be build either a tank or a transporter, we will start with the shared chassis, that both, the Disintegrator and Dunerider are based upon.

The Skorpius is a Anti-Grav vehicle, similar to a hovercraft, and that shows due to the round frame around the lower part of the skimmer. It can be seen as an hommage to the original Grav-Attack Vehicle build by Rick Priestley.

The basic frame of the vehicle goes along quite easily and fast. No problem with gaps or the fit here. I went in broader steps than the instructions, because as long as the glue hasn't settled yet, you can add pressure / move the parts a bit, to give it a snug fit.

The front "bumper" may have a bit of tension, so it is best you add this one to the remaining hull before the glue settles. The engine cover gives the whole structure additional stability.

There are bars around most of the lower part of the hull. Easy and stable to add, I just didn't glue the rudder onto the kit, just sticked them to the body, as it will be easier to paint, if you add them afterwards.

Now the cupolas and brackets are added, along with the antennas. Be careful while clipping the brackets from the sprue, as these kind of parts tend to break easily. They are more stable than the old Leman Russ brackets, but still take care.

In the next step the guns (heavy stubbers) are added to the sides of the hull and the commander's luke is added. The guns are mounted on a half-ball that is added in a fixed position. You could snip of the little tongue on the bottom of the ball-mount and position the gun freely, just make sure that it either aligns with the gunmen afterwards or you go with the closed Disintegrator variant.

As we built the shared hull of both variants of the Skorpius, now we begin with the different pieces, beginning with the Disintegrator.

The first thing we do is to close the hull, by adding a front that looks a bit similar to the ones the Mastodon or Spartan assault tanks have. The prow has missile launchers on each side, and receives an additional bar on the front, closing the side pieces together. The upper plate closes the hull and has a mount for the turret in it. The second cupola is closed with a hatch.

Next up the turret of the Disintegrator. The turret is half open and only armoured towards the front and side. It shares the servitor with the Dunerider, which makes magnetising this kit a bit of a problem.

You can mount either a ferrumite cannon or a voltaic belleros energy cannon to the turret. The weapon is moveable and interconnects with a tongue and groove connection to the side.

Due to the socket for the main weapon, you could just magnetise or pin the weapon and keep it interchangeable. Other than that, the Disintegrator is finished.

To give you a size comparison of the tank, it is around the size of a medium battle tank, like the Space Marine Predator.

And the build tank from different angles. If some of the gaps seem a bit large, that is due to the fact, that they are not glued, just put into place to show you further below the second option of the Skorpius kit, the Dunerider.

So let's get back to the chassis, with only the heavy stubbers mounted on each side. The Dunerider is build like a landing craft, with a huge ramp on the front. So the sides of the hull are extended and a front opening door is added to the middle. As the sides need to be glued, magnetising this kit to cover both options will be difficult. As well as the ladder going onto the engine cover, and therefore would collide with the closed hull top from the Disintegrator.

The ramp is moveable and doesn't need to be glued, so you can open or close it during your games.

Similar to the landing ships of the US Army during world war 2, the Dunerider has a back mounted turret, with two heavy stubbers, and a small armour plate to the front.

The tank commander can be build either as an Skitarii Ranger or Vanguard. And you can choose between two different arms for each side. I can really see this guy in a dunecrawler as well.

Same goes for the gunmen arming the heavy stubbers, they can be build either as rangers or vanguard. When I finished building the parts for both variants, I noticed that the part 90 is a spare and I didn't find the use for it in the instructions. Could maybe be an alternative to the ammo feed for the heavy stubbers.

I wouldn't glue the gun men into the tank until you have painted them. As you can see they fit in there quite nicely, but will take up more space, in case you want to add actual transported soldiers. I think they would fit great for a Mechanicum Stormlord conversion.

The Dunerider is roughly the size of a Chimera (excuse the bad paint job, I bought this one second hand in a larger lot). And as every transporter it is nowhere near able to put in the same amount of miniatures on bases as the transport capacity says.

In the first picture you can see the Dunerider jacked up on a couple of dice, to give it the actual floating look. It doesn't come with any bases, neither a regular black base nor a flying base. I don't understand why they didn't give it some small skids as least, to raise it a bit above the ground.

The second picture shows it in the way, I want to use it, as intended within this themed industrial vehicle week, as a ferry for the underhive. I went for both closed hatches and maybe close the sides or at least remove the heavy stubbers and replace them with some small hatches. It will make for a great hovering "swamp ferry", used in a scenario to cross acidic lakes or rivers.

And of course the final build of the second variant, the Dunerider, shown from different angles as well.

Conclusion
When I first saw this vehicle earlier this year announced at one of the Warhammer Events, I forgot about the actual purpose and directly went for the Underhive Swampferry. If they did such a vehicle, it would be a Forge World Kit, it would cost around 70-80 EUR and I am not that keen on working with resin on a kit that size. So as a plastic kit, easier to convert, I see this as a great resource for further converting crazyness.

As a Adeptus Mechanicus vehicle? Though question. The 60 EUR price range is a heavy hitter, a Rhino is half that, of course, much simpler design and less exciting, but even Chimera is still half the price. If we go up to compare it to a battle tank, which is a more appropriate comparison, those are still 45-50 EUR. So the kit is giving itself a hard time simply by the price point. Yet, this one offers a couple of miniatures on top, and not just the half-body crew. Maybe if they added 2-3 further crew man / about to embark, similar to the Genestealer Cult Goliath, it make the overall feeling a bit rounder.
But beyond the price, if you compare it to other vehicles from the Adeptus Mechanicus, there is little similarity in design. The round bulges on the side, where the commander sits and the turret is similar to the onager. But if you talk a look at the Forge World range, that is an entire different approach to the design and use of forms and shapes. Maybe a walking tank, like the mech tanks from some of the Pulp / Weird War settings would be a better fit, as the front loading barge like the World War 2 landing crafts. I know that the front ramps are a thing in 40k, but I usually associate them with heavier troops like Space Marines or Terminators and not Skitarii.

Still, it is a nice kit, it went together great without hassle. It has a lot of lovely detail, especially if you compare it to some older kits. The casting is properly done and it was way less trouble, than for example the rather aged Land Raider kit (it has been around for 20 years!). I would have preferred if they had added some kind of flying base, giving the whole kit a bit of height or at least the illusion of floating. The price will be problem for some, and I can understand that. The 60 EUR price tag is something that you can convince yourself for a single kit, but for my taste, 50 EUR would make that decision much easier. It is rather close to the start collecting box, the Onager has a very appealing design, and if you want to use this tank as the backbone of your army, mixed as Disintegrator and Dunerider, the costs will stack. And that is something price-concious players will keep in mind when choosing their army, which is a pity, as the Mechanicus is quite the interesting army.

Warhammer 40,000 is a brand by Games Workshop.

The reviewed product item was provided by the manufacturer.