From SamuliS: I AM THE LAW! (25 points)

I promised some Oldhammer a while back, and now is the time I'll deliver. Staying with a grim dark(tm) theme, but this time in a larger scale!

If there is anyone in the Imperium with as large steel ball as an Imperial Guardsman it has got to be an Adeptus Arbites officer. Going up against alien scum might be bad, but at least you have some heavy back up. An enforcer will have to go down into the bowels of a hive city with little else than his weapon and badge to bring order into the world of gangers and mutants. So with the introduction done these are 5 of the 7 Adeptus Arbites sculpts from the early 90's. Still missing the last two, so if you happen to have them sitting unused I'm more than happy to give them a new home :)

What could be more ballsy than going up against a Defiler with only a bolt pistol and a power maul?

Arbites are at least for me some of the most iconic 40k models. Might have something to with seeing the Stallone Judge Dredd film at a very impressionable age and getting my hands on some of the comics soon after. Beefed up cops with trigger discipline that would make US cops look like girl scouts somehow just seems to work brilliantly. With the same kind of characters in my favorite miniature universe I was instantly sold on the Arbites enforcers. Now looking back at some of these older Citadel sculpts and how a lot of the aesthetics is completely copied from somewhere else, it's a bit funny that now they are going after everyone and their cousin for even the smallest IPR infringements. 

I wanted the bases to be urban themed to show them battling in the depths of hive worlds with some corrugated steel, rubble and rusty barbed wire thrown in. For the colour scheme I chose the traditional black and red that features quite often on the older artwork and some studio miniatures of the time. It was bit of a tricky combination as I find both red and black quite hard to highlight as red easily tends to turn into orange and black into gray. In the end I ended up just doing a dark gray edge highlight on the black areas and a bit of layering on the red. Turned out rather nicely, though the black is a bit hard to see in the pictures. Taking photos of black minis against a black background wasn't too easy.

With these done I guess it's time to play Necromunda again! I think the last time I played a game was in the early 00's with my old gang, that has sadly been sold with most of my other old minis when I quit the hobby for a few years in my late teens. Still it's never too late to get back in as it's a great game system. And what would be better than bashing in a few ganger skulls while dishing out the Emperor's justice.

Painting this week has been dreadfully slow with a minor panic at the office due to customers showing up unannounced for a three week long visit to tour all our factories etc. Luckily most of the stuff related to our team has now been dealt with so I can breath once again and hopefully have some more free time. I guess buying stuff for tens of millions does seem to give them a bit more leeway with how they can act :)

The odd moments I've had to paint have been slightly disastrous at times as I've managed to spill my brush washing cups onto the table two times this week, with the last one being just after taking these pictures. The flooding has resulted in a few MDF and cardboard sabot bases becoming soggy and starting to swell quite a bit. It wouldn't be an issue, but I have half finished minis on them that now might have to be rebased. Considering that my normal procedure is to first do the bases and then paint the minis this will be quite a pain. I'm hoping that once they dry up I can salvage them somehow as I definitely don't want to start fixing them up now. On top of all that my air compressor is starting to act up and it's power button seems to be slightly broken and getting the thing started is tricky. Will have to tear it down this weekend in an attempt to fix it. AAARGH...

Adding to the injury, my local ice hockey team lost in the KHL in the first play-off round and started their summer holiday. So no Finnish dominance in the world's second best hockey league this year... Multiple injuries late in the season and frankly slacking off against an opponent that was considered an easy first round rival didn't really help out. Oh well at least there's NHL for a few months still! If they would just start to play at a more reasonable time for us ;)

More classic Citadel goodness Samuli! These Arbites figures are wonderful and look every bit the part of menacing, tough-as-nails figures of Imperial will and law to be deployed against the scum of any hive depths.  Black can be a real SOB to sort out, but you've done excellent work here, and I believe the red has turned out beautifully as well. A solid 25 points!

Spilled water - on figures? Ouch.  I think we've all faced similar disasters - at our own hand, or sometimes at the hands of others. I'm fortunate (knock on wood) that I haven't pulled that move in a while, but I did manage to recently spill some Vallejo primer on the hardwood floor upstairs.  Cleaning that up was a LOT of fun - maybe not as bad as re-basing, but still way better than a divorce. 

I can relate somewhat to your hockey woes, but at least your team made the playoffs.  Not to worry, however. Despite the miserable time difference, the NHL still has months of trench-warfare slogging ahead as the Stanley Cup Playoffs come into view. I hope you will enjoy a few games...