Rogue Trooper Traitor General

It’s Bob Naismith Challenge Time on the Oldhammer Community. Painters the world over are working on pieces from the grandmaster’s extensive back catalogue of gems, to be judged by the Lord Bob Almighty himself. Bob was so prolific in the 1980s (and still is today) that my shortlist of entries was 38 ideas, and one mini that bubbled to the surface was the Traitor General.

Citadel 2000AD Rogue Trooper Traitor General

The Traitor General is the central antagonist in 2000AD’s Rogue Trooper strip – a treacherous military commander being hunted by the eponymous Rogue Trooper.

Citadel 2000AD Rogue Trooper Traitor General comic panel
Natseon natseon yeojaui natseon hyannggue! Yes I want some new face!”

The Citadel Miniature is a great likeness of the comic art, burnt face and all. Bob’s sculpted him with a blinded swollen eye, permanent snarl from soft tissue damage to the lips, and the ultimate signaller of evil – a bald head.

I have modified the miniature – filing away the original scupted detail of the burnt scalp, which I feared would look like a hairpiece rather than damaged skin.

Citadel 2000AD Rogue Trooper Traitor General angles showing tank
I added a little Souther symbol to the air tank.

The miniature came courtesy of Jason Fulford, who’s already painted a copy and has been a great help pointing me at reference material and inspiration for the colours. A lot of Citadel’s 2000AD range never appeared painted in the official publications, and the comics were in black and white so colour choices took some research. Thanks, Jason!

Citadel 2000AD Rogue Trooper Traitor General with friends
All the 2000AD miniatures I’ve painted as an adult. More on Johnny Alpha and friends here. More on Judge Dredd here.

There’s still loads of time to get your own entry into the competition, just head over to the Oldhammer Community for full details.

Rogue Trooper Traitor General
The Traitor General in the Quartz Zone.

But this one miniature isn’t my complete entry to the competition. Coming soon… more Naismithery!

Curis

Curis has painted for Games Workshop, Forge World, Warlord Games, Mantic Games, Avatars of War, Wargames Foundry, Studio McVey and many others. He's won at Golden Demon and Salute. He publishes monthly painting tutorials on Patreon.

6 thoughts on “Rogue Trooper Traitor General

  • January 22, 2020 at 1:18 pm
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    He looks lovely Chris! It’s really pleasing to see a great paint job on such a cool mini.

    The burnt scalp detail was filed away you say? It would have looked too messy and/or too difficult to paint it to look like burnt skin?

    Reply
    • January 22, 2020 at 4:24 pm
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      Thanks Papa! Yeah, I got as far as base coats then got out the files.

      WIP Traitor General

      I wasn’t confident I could get it looking like a bad wig, or something dropped onto his head.

      Reply
  • January 22, 2020 at 3:32 pm
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    Filing the sculpted head detail off really improves the mini in my book – it removes a slightly confusing element and increases the likeness to the drawn character. I wonder though if you could have added some painted scarring and blotches on the scalp to evoke the artwork? Not that I don’t like big pink baldies like Richard O’Brien of course.

    The camo trousers work very nicely indeed too. Great job!

    Reply
    • January 22, 2020 at 4:26 pm
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      Thanks axiom! I was actually going to add some nasty red and purple paint blotches but totally forgot until I’d finished the photographs last night! I got carried away with the camoflague pattern and forgot the other finishing touches. Oops.

      Reply
  • January 23, 2020 at 3:09 pm
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    That’s impressive, I can see the messed up areas of the model (casting issues) but you manage to fly between those and never get trapped, Impressive !

    Reply
  • January 28, 2020 at 12:27 am
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    What the others said, you made an improvement to the mini by taking that decision. Judging by the WIP pic, it really has a comic-book from the 80’s hair style, I know what you mean. I think you did right and the result speaks by itself.

    Reply

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