A daemonhost is the result of a daemon being dragged from the warp and trapped within a possessee. Some might be willing volunteers, members of Chaos cults who give their bodies so that the creatures of the warp might walk amongst us. Others might be victims, having been captured by a cult and waking with a daemon inside their mind.

No matter how strong-willed the host is, eventually the possessing Daemon will begin to corrupt the body that it inhabits. This is very much reduced if the proper rituals have been undertaken, but month by month, year by year, the Daemonhost will physically change to suit the needs of the entity residing within their soul, reflecting its inhuman nature. Its eyes will start to change, perhaps going blood red or taking on the look of a cat’s or snake’s eyes. Its skin will start to take on an unnatural sheen, while the skeleton may also undergo changes, resulting in vestigial horns, tails and other daemonic features.

After a bunch of Imperial-related topics and the general chaos taint in the 40k forum, I thought that an opportunity to exercise your evil muscles might be in order. The task for this week is to design a daemonhost. As they vary wildly, you can really go to town!

A quick photoshop painting of a bound demon host, time taken approx 2hrs,



been a while since i posted, but i needed a break from college work and this seemed like just the opportunity....
constructive crit always welcome

thanks

Calamity

@calamity

nice, but the demon looks kinda Kroot-like to me, his face isn't menacing enough. Plus, lens flare. For the love of everything, dude, don't use lens flare in pictures) It's bad taste.

and here is my sketch-in-progress, a sneak peek of a fully done sketch. I'd like some critique on this stage, as I have the capacity to fix it)

Calamity: I really like your one, the beak especially :) It flows with the head, rather than just seeming like you stuck a beak onto it. I love it :P

@ calamity - i think you have done a great job with the whole brooding torment inside, it nails aspects of the brief perfectly, (the part where mol is talking about resisting chaos but eventually succumbing) your figure twisting uncomfortably pale and groaning. I wouldnt like to meet him in a dark alley :o . Yes the lense flare is silly, and kinda undermines the awesome painterly technique you got there, and the restrains and foreground steps? need more work, overall i like it and im amazed how early you got this in (i wonder if its the fastest +2 so far on WSG - mol?) so kudos!

@ kombat-unit - another solid piece of work, with your own kickass style! I love the stances of each character, esp the SoB on all fours like an animal. Just a couple of things need some rework, legs and arms of the SoB seem like they merge or are off abit, fair dos, its an usual position, and arms of the chaos character seem to get muddled with the wings (or is that just me seeing that *blushes*)

I wish there was a lil more reaction/relation going on between the two characters, like the right hand of the chaos character could scratching the SoB, messing her hair like an animal or tying it up to pull her head back, or pushing her head into his groin, stuff that gives an added impression of total chaos dominance and having something once so loyal to the emperor completly broken down

Thanks for the advice man!

The thing with SoBs legs and arms messing - yup, there's such a prob, thanks for pointing that out, already started fixing by adding more highlights to the foreground limbs, that'd balance the values out. The demonhost's arms, I haven't really started working on them yet, so that's just this area being very rough, hence the muddyness.

Hm, and the idea of the demonhost pulling the SoB's head back... Nice, I like it, might employ it eventually. At first I was going for an effect of psychic control, like the Host pressing the nun down and brainwashing her, but we'll see where it goes.

Danke again for the ideas and comment)

Im glad to see we are on the same wavelength, kombat-unit, im still kinda new here and worried about giving honest crits (the ones of my uni lecturer are brutal!)

I defo hope to see your updated version this week or soon (no need to rush :D ), i think i maybe inspired by your effort ;)

ok guys point taken about the lens flare, sometimes i'm just a sucker for a gimmick. :D

knocked out another one Khornate this time wanted to create one that would easily give a marine a run for his money in the bulk stakes... the vestigal wings arte a nod to what demon is imprisoned within.



without light



with light

thanks the crits so far its early days yet, as to the speed, i was in hotmail instead of working :D and seeing as i haven't painted in a while i thought i would give it a go

cheers

calamity

Nice entries so far! It's nice to see you back, Calamity - I've added your 2 points, which've got you started on the scoreboard. :) K-U, I like where you're going with it though I suppose the laspistol lessens the effect - I like to think most most daemonhosts could crush you with their minds! :) That said, it's an interesting take and I like how you've given us a lot of clues as to the original possessee, which is neat. The vestigial wings are neat.

Mes Écribbles (heehee, I've made up some french) whilst watching telly last night, both people having unwanted Daemonific (made up some english too) types forcing themselves out of their poor bodies, the first a khorne-hound-beast-thing & the second a Tzeentch Screamer, I might carry on with that to give the chest-maw a more Manta Ray-like mouth.

calamity I love the idea of your bird-woman-daemon, it's a fascinating & slightly disturbing concept, ignore any silly anthropomorphic+avian=kroot nonsense, it looks pretty darned Daemonic to me. You might try extending the limbs though, I think to have them long, spindly & fragile would work well. The Blood[daemon] has potential, the musculature is very menacing & the sadistic grin is perfect but I think the wings look to 'vestigial', they'd look more threatening if they were just emerging from the shoulders rather than being fully formed outside, the silhouette would pull the shoulders up & out to make the upper torso seem larger & more threatening.

kombat-unit I love the possessee guy, especially the way his coat hangs loosely from his shoulders & arms, & the exaggerated spiked collar on the sister echoed in the huge pauldrons, & the spiteful sneer & generally arrogant air about him , I'd love to see this progressed with more contrasting shading where needed (the arms of the mutant in particular). I also like the subtle red eyes of the Sister & she seems to have very slightly clawed hands, I know it's just sketch but it does seem like there's more going on there...

Yeah here's nothing special... Took me about 10 minutes I think but hey :)



Gonna make me a proper one though.

2½ hrs warmup-sketch

Helexia Daemonhost

When Sister Helexia was captured by the Slaneeshi renegades she had no idea what their plans for her where...



Loads of things could be fixed, but this really is just a sketch and nothing really illustrative, just playing with ideas...

Covered the nipple with a tounge :P

Damn Colrouphobic beat me to a Slaaneshi daemonhost. Oh well here goes nothing.

Calamity Good job I think. Didn't even see the lensflare. Nice colourscheme though you need to keep an eye out for the edges of your creature so it doesn't blend too much with the background. In some spots I have to look very close to see there the edge of the deamonhost is. Just to keep in mind for future.

Second one, the Khornate one- Im having difficult seeing this as anything else but a regular deamon. How is it a Deamonhost? It looks great, but just..trying to help the thought somewhat ;)



Kombat-Unit
I like it, but at first I was unsure which one was the Deamon-host. This due to the fact that I read about Inquisition Deamonhosts, and thats a sororits..anyhow..once I got over tha, I was wondering like Molotov- why the gun?
Then I was wondering- Why the caring hold on the head.

One thing I would have maybe done would have been to make the Sororitas be a secondairy Deamon-host- held in chains by the original deamonhost, raving mad... that would be fun- A deamon-host walking his deamonhost-pet...

Nothing to say about the execution o the sketch, top notch as ever.

Ophicius
probably the freakiest sketches this time around... I like whre you're going... if you have time I would really want to see more scribbles/sketches where you explore more and crazier ideas like these....

Nairo
For 10 mins thats very decent- I would have wanted to see more body but it's still cool.


Nalro (again)

Yes, I beat you too it, but you beat my lame tounge-cover with those smileycovers...
Like the stance and general composition.
Ths one has some real ptential, though I think the face is a bit too SpaceMarine-ish.



Over-all

I think I should have gone with an Inquisitin Deamon-host, seeing as how everyone else went with the chaos-renegade/alligned deamon-host.

Another alternative would have been "possessed" marine, though I wasn't sure that was kosher with the theme...

That would be a cool topc for a later KWSG though...

Some very promising designs thus far.

Ophidicus - I really like the physical aspects of your designs, how you've shown Chaos malforming the host, and how you've incorporated aspects of the daemons in questions - it's nice especially because we currently don't really have "marked" daemonhost models, and this gives a nice indication of what they could look like.

Nalro - Your first design is pretty cool, I like the white light "drifting" from his eyes. Whether deliberate or not, it looks like he's blazing with psychic power, which is very cool indeed. The second design has a lot of malevolent power, which is cool. The pose is very aggressive and really shows that the daemon has full control of the body. I like the daemonette claw, and the mouth in the stomach is really interesting. A corset of stretched skin? Very Slaneesh.

Col - Nice design - always cool when you can find the time to contribute to the WSG. I like the design and the colouring on the tentacle especially, as I think it's very chaotic indeed.

I've added all your points to the board. It's great to see so many entries so early in the week. :) Looking forward to more!

Ok, so I'm in the middle of packing, buying a house and a bunch of other crap... I can't find my Daemonhunters Codex.

can someone tell me the abilities (in general, non-rules-specific terms) what the daemonhosts do? I vaguely recall that they had a random table on what they did, which included assault and a psychic attack, no?

thanks...

Returns to scribbling out his idea...

well, here goes nothing. The Khorne and Tzeentch ones took fifteen minutes so far. The slaaneshi took around three. It is my goal to complete one for each god. Everyone else's are looking great. I would be very interested to know what the background for those two is, kombat unit.
Happy creating everyone :lol:
Edit:
Finished sketches with nurgle, slaanesh, tzeentch, and khorne daemonhosts. All my values got messed up when I darkened it, but here it is anyway.

Thanks man, nice to hear that. Yeah, I wanted the Demonhost look all elitist and arrogant, I thought that it's not a rule that a Demonhost must be either a wrecked tormented being or a mindless killing machine - rather, feeling very comfortable and confident in his state, especially dragging a SoB around to do his bidding)

Your own sketches are very interesting, I like the dynamics of them, how the lines express pain and shock of the possessee.

@Nalro
Awesome stuff, though I think that the Slaanesh demonhost looks like a crossover of a marine and a regular something, that helmet ust kinda kicks off the mood and flow of the overall figure there.

@Colrouphobic.

Very nice technique, the way you define values with solid shading and bring out texture of smaller elements really works for these kind of sketches, defining the focal points and not overloading the concept. However, for the concept itself, it looks rather traditional, and surely a blur between 40k and fantasy. The whole crab-claw mutations had been used hundreds of times for slaanesh, both in miniatures and art, so, well, it's sort of standard. It could as well be a daemonette with some extra clothing. But the way you did the face sells it - the expression, the little eyes embedded in the cheek - very raw and powerful.

Well, I wanted to make a Demonhost that wouldn't be an inquisitorial one, but one operating on his own in some Chaos infantry or warband. One that has been and for the most part remains a regular human, that is forced to use weapons or anything of the sort. Maybe he's some kind of a chaotic version of a Commissar, I hadn't thought yet. I'll sort the fluff out when I finish the picture.

As for the Sororitas... It's merely a trophy of a sorts, kind of a dangerous pet for an arrogant sybarite the character is. Thus - the caring hold on the head and stuff)

Thanks for your comment.

@Commissar

Well, the laspistol... In any case, psychic powers or not, a more reliable backup is needed. Plus I wanted to somewhat emphasize the fact that this character is still down to earth, despite being possessed.
Thanks)


So, I'd been working on the pic, took in consideration several advices, and finished the SoB for now. Here's the progress:


Next time I'll update its gonna be a finished "sketch" lol.

Her fingers appear to have 4 articulations on the left hand. Human fingers have 3, as do those of her right hand.

I'm aware of that. But, as you see, the armor on the arms is vastly different. The right arm with a flat ornamented protector and anatomically correct palm is natural, the left arm is augmented.

In the Daemonhunter codex the daemonhosts get a table of six random powers and they have to roll every turn. They vary - some are shooting powers, whilst some are close combat powers. I don't have my codex to hand so I can't be more specific. In Inquisitor daemonhosts tend to have exotic psychic and daemonic abilities - Precinctomega might be able to expand further.




@Swordhand: Nice concepts! I found it difficult to distinguish which was which - I thought the first was Nurgle, yet the third seems to be. I would also question if they're perhaps closer to daemons than daemonhosts, though. Either way, I've added your points to the scoreboard. It's definitely nice to see you contributing to the WSGs again. :)

I was kind of stalled for finding ways to make them a little human. I think at this point the demon has somewhat taken over most of them, at least the bottom three.
The first is khorne, second is slaanesh which really didn't turn out, third is nurgle, and fourth is tzeentch. Thanks, I'm really glad illuminatus is back and more splendorous than ever.

A quick Nurgle speed paint, time taken approx 1hr

wondering if i can get a slaaneshii one done by the deadline.

Thanks for the comments guys.

All your pieces are really evocative of the whole GW universe and the subject matter.

Cheers

Calamity

There are some absolutely jaw-droppingly stunning pieces in this thread :o

Amazing and groovy B)

Thanks guys I took up some of your advice and applied some of my own critics. And I ended up with this so far. Any suggestion or comments?

Old


New

Really small head and face, proportions are off.

Personally, I preferred the arm in the first picture, as placing it across the main body makes the host seem more dynamic and hostile. In the second post the daemonhost just seems more angry and shouty than anything else.

I liked the first face better. Would a daemonhost require a prosthetic one of those? Sure it could just grow whatever it wanted?

R.

ok, got mine done finally. (a minor miracle, considering)

A Daemonhost breaks free from its master's control on a Barghesi world.

Striogi your style reminds me of the little colour vignettes that used to appear in White Dwarf years ago (the Brettonian borders). Except yours are in B&W.

Good stuff B)

Yay! Finished in time, for a change!



I wanted to do some of that dramatic upwards-vanishing perspective that I've been seeing the more-talented members doing over in the galleries.

Note that there are two daemonhosts here...

R.

Ok, normally when I post I don't leave any feedback, usually theres so many entries by the time I've posted that theres too many to comment on. But this time I have decided to make the effort and try and say something about every entry so far.

Calamity:- I liked the fact that the image was very beast like. I also really liked the way the light was shining in to make it look like so deep forgotten cell.

Kombat-Unit:- Very dark and sadistic. I liked the dominance over the SoB and the daemonic deformations and scarring were ace!!

Ophidicus- The 'Alien' head on the bottom left of your first pic was very well done. The way you've kond of got a step-by-step thing going on is also very cool.

Nalro:-I agree with Mol with you're first entry; the eye flares really make it stand out!

Colrouphobic:- The mish-mash of parts is classic daemonic. Wish there was more detail to that pincer though, it looks a bit 'too' unfinished.

Asmodeu's:- The second Daemonhost, where we can see the heart, I wouldn't mind seeing the finished article of this, its some great imagery.

Striogi:- You're style is hands down my favoutire on the Illuminatus. I love the 'comic book' pane style. Also you've done really well to capture the terror the Daemonhost is causing.

Precinctomega:- I think your efforts of creating the dramatic upwards vanishing perspective are nie on perfect. Its like they are decending on their victims. Brilliant.

And now for mine.

This is just a quick sketch I drew up, scanned in and edited a bit on GIMP.
(Sorry if it stretches the page, I've not posted on here before so I dunno how to do it :/)

The idea was that it was an imperial bound deamonhost, but the eyes ended up a bit too large and the face looked a bit flat :/

Not sure about the Aquila sticking out of his head, cyclocius. I like the effect you've achieved on his pupils, though. He's almost managed to make "puppy dog eyes" look sinister!

R.

I've added points for all the entries thus far - sorry for being absent, but I had real-life (read: girl trouble) issues that were unavoidable.

Cyclocius - welcome to the WSG!

Dazz - I like the menace of the daemonhost, and how the Inquisitor seems so unfazed by him. The 'host does look a little like Venom, though. ;)

Precinctomega - I like the perspective you've given, actually, it's interesting. Also makes me think about the sort of battles that might occur if two radical daemonhunters went up against each other.

Striogi - I like that you're continuing the Barghesi narrative. You need to put up a thread for these at some point! :)

Thanks :P
I wasn't sure about the Aquila either, it was originaly an Inquisitorial I, but it just looked a bit wierd. Then I added tha nail, taht was meant to have a purity seal (or something) from it, but I stuck with a nail, leaving a large gap on his head :/

Cheers. Yeah I was panicing a bit with drawing the human form and even more so a deformation of it, Birdie really helped me out and said just make sure you get references for your piece, don't do a strait copy but have something on screen to guide you in what your drawing then after a while of doing that you'll pick it up youself.

So in summary I downloaded a bunch of venom picks as I liked the idea of having a mouth full of fangs and referenced that. but the rest of the head and the body are my own doings, even the hand. I took a pic of my own hand to reference that.

Hey guys alot later than i usually post (wednesday) but ive been on the move and back home sorting a few personal things out, but that will never stop me doing what i enjoy....

This week is defo more a 'sketch' from me, ive been limited in my tools back home. So ive mainly been doing ideas. The main concept i had that was perciving how chaos effects ones mind before physical transformation, what is like to be corrupted?

So everything in red is an hallucination...



a more final attempt so to speak



and i noticed this drawing i did 5 years ago.... its called "Forge of Grey" since i was going thru a bad time and kinda fitted what was along the lines this weeks project, so i thought id give it a show too



hope you likes :)

This topic has the most participation yet. Awesome to see so many ideas. I can't match up to the great entries so far, but here is my humble effort.



This is the Oracle, a demonhost associated with the Centarius Incursion. Maybe someday I will expand on what that was all about.

Hey, Easy E - that's showing a lot of improvement in your confidence and linework. It sounds like you sketch out a lot of background stuff. Is that for Dark Heresy or something?

R.