revamping the StormTater... er StormTalon

Okay so I've been experimenting with the Storm Talon in my army lately. I still hate the model but it's performance has been really good, too good to ignore so I'm going to build a squadron of three of these birdies. But I hate the model. So what am I going to do? What any sensible converter would do: Re-make it!

Here's why I'm posting. Feed back and suggestions for where and how to go about accomplishing this. I'm leaning toward something more like a cross between the Apache helocopter and the Banshee Bomber from StarCraft II.

Visual references for those who do not know what I am talking about:

Banshee Bomber from StarCraft 2

So, those are the two craft I like parts and pieces of and want to draw from to craft a new version of the Storm Talon. So I went into Photoshop and started working on it. I began with the Banshee, thinking I could take the paper-craft models I've seen around the net and modify them as needed.

Version 1 for a revamped Storm Talon

So I extended the tail rotor, and added the Talon's engines. It's an OK start but I feel like I'm loosing too much of the Space Marine in this approach.

So I started working with the Talon itself:

Version 2 for a revamped Storm Talon

 And did the first obvious thing: Extended the tail. Okay that helps a fair amount, but there's still more to accomplish with it. So I continued working and came up with what I'm calling Version 2.1:

Version 2.1

 I like the smaller assault cannon and pairing it with some sort of scanner array, I think I can get away with calling it Twin-linked. But this didn't work for me. So I went to the Apache for reference and started looking at a couple things.

Version 2.2

Which gives rise to Version 2.2. Still keeping the smaller assault cannon but and mounting it more or less where the huge clucky Twin-linked one was. I'm going to build a better mount for it, one that will allow the entire weapon to rotate and elevate more like what's on the Apache. I want to build the nose so it has the 2-axis rotational sensor array in it like the apache but I wasn't sure how to accomplish that with the drawings. Definitely getting closer to that "attack chopper" feet with it but still not there so I went back to Photoshop and continued working on it.

Version 2.3

I fixed the tail so it wasn't so massively huge and re-designed the nose to accommodate a different style of sensor array. I added the landing skids but I'm not sold on them. I could also just have the skids in a retracted fashion, like the mounting arms retract up into the main body when the Talon's in flight.

But that's roughly where I am now with my design work on it. Thoughts? Post 'em in the comment.