Ive mentioned in earlier posts my quandary over what models to use for my legion auxilla squad, GW's Cadians and catachans were out as ive allready painted a horde of each, plus scale is a slight issue, Id mulled over several options, from a box of 28mm ww2 minis converted up with gw bits and pieces to spatans games FSA infantry.
However cost (as always) was a bit of an issue, so when I managed to pick up sixteen plastic rogue trader imperial guardsmen on eBay for less than a fiver posted, I felt pretty pleased. I already have a old metal commander body for the squads Prefect, so for the minimum unit size of 20 I only need to pick up another three dudes.
Also on the plus side, they keep things 'OE' albeit with a nice old school flavour that I thinks somehow appropriate for the background of the legion auxiliary units. As a bonus theyre also pretty diminutive compared to a plastic Cadian guardsmen. So the Astral claws tower over them in a manner befitting their genetically modified demi-god status.
On the downside, they appeared to have been painted with those (humbrol?) Airfix kit paints that come in a little metal tin, and I wasnt sure how my usual 'dettol bath' stripping method would work.
A long soak and a hell of alot of scrubbing later, this was what the they looked like, and I was forced to accept that some of the multiple layers of paint just wasnt coming off!
Here are my two test models, they were made with the two that were In the worst condition after stripping, so hopefully the follwing eighteen wont look this bad paintjob wise! I went for a very basic, almost two colour paintscheme, light grey uniform and dark grey armour with lenses in green and any decoration in blue or gold. The heavy stubber gunner is on a 40mm base I had left over, I also need to buy some more black cat bases for this squad to match the space marines.
