Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

To say that this iteration of the Arbites looks more like sisters of battle than the originals is pretty funny. Even funnier to suggest they look more like Scions. If I stood one of the new ones next to an example of the older versions, a sister and a scion, and then asked my six year old who it looked most like, I know what she’d say lol.

 Taarnak wrote:
The thing that bothers me most is the exposed midriff, I think. Really stupid design decision IMO. If the cloth "armor" underneath the plates is good enough, why bother with the plates at all? If the plates are necessary, then the exposed midriff is an huge failure.

Phobos Marines and the Cadians would like to discuss this with you

I think this lack of lower torso armor is a GW thing. They do that on a lot of models.

 alextroy wrote:
Phobos Marines and the Cadians would like to discuss this with you

I think this lack of lower torso armor is a GW thing. They do that on a lot of models.

I can accept it for both of those examples, when I cannot for Arbites.

Here's why:
1. Phobos Marines. Well, they're Space Marines, right? Their undersuit is definitely more protective than cloth. Plus, Space Marines. Also, I did find that silly here too, but I was willing to look the other way, because: Space Marines.
2. Cadians. They aren't wearing Carapace Armor. Theirs is more like a Plate Carrier, to put it in modern terms. If you only want to wear a little extra protection, then the heart and lungs are the organs to protect.

The Arbites are supposed to be wearing heavy, protective Carapace Armor. If you aren't going to cover all of the delicate bits you can, why bother with the weight and restriction to your movement?

Dread Master wrote:
To say that this iteration of the Arbites looks more like sisters of battle than the originals is pretty funny. Even funnier to suggest they look more like Scions. If I stood one of the new ones next to an example of the older versions, a sister and a scion, and then asked my six year old who it looked most like, I know what she’d say lol.

“Daddy what’s funny is that you can’t see similarities. They all look the same is my tea ready I want fish fingers?”

I'm guessing a lot of people may find them "medieval" looking because of the angular nature of the boots and chest plate, which has been really strongly highlighted by the GW painters. I'd imagine that if you took about 30 seconds with a file, you could smooth those out the creases running up and down the center of boots/chest pieces to a more traditional rounded shape.

Dread Master wrote:
To say that this iteration of the Arbites looks more like sisters of battle than the originals is pretty funny. Even funnier to suggest they look more like Scions. If I stood one of the new ones next to an example of the older versions, a sister and a scion, and then asked my six year old who it looked most like, I know what she’d say lol.

Something like;

"Why is the policeman wearing the nuns clothes?"

They look like Sisters, not like Arbites.

Bob Lorgar wrote:
I'm guessing a lot of people may find them "medieval" looking because of the angular nature of the boots and chest plate, which has been really strongly highlighted by the GW painters. I'd imagine that if you took about 30 seconds with a file, you could smooth those out the creases running up and down the center of boots/chest pieces to a more traditional rounded shape.

I am wondering how tricky it will be to give them the old style knee pads. Can do it with just scoring lines or does it need greenstuf?

Weird that they are 100% Arbites, but so much of them has changed.

Some elements found their way into the Enforcers:

 JohnnyHell wrote:

Dread Master wrote:
To say that this iteration of the Arbites looks more like sisters of battle than the originals is pretty funny. Even funnier to suggest they look more like Scions. If I stood one of the new ones next to an example of the older versions, a sister and a scion, and then asked my six year old who it looked most like, I know what she’d say lol.

“Daddy what’s funny is that you can’t see similarities. They all look the same is my tea ready I want fish fingers?”

Similar is not what was said. Looks more like…. than…. Is what was said. If all that was said was they were similar looking, well, there would have been no comment to be made. And saying they look like sisters, not Arbites….. well that’s just silly.

The biggest change is the helmet and the legs. The new helmet and legs are 100% medieval armour styled. The old ones were much more "Modern".

I like both looks, and I like the new miniatures. But they are clearly different.

Main reason they don't look like old Arbites models is because the original Arbites models came out in like 1994.

NINETEEN NINETY FOUR

Nearly 30 years ago. I'd totally understand if a toddler couldn't tell that they were the same model.

Either way, if you think they look like Sisters of Battle, good for you. That is such an unimportant opinion and yet here we are discussing it.

Hmmm, you’ve got me thinking now; the weakest point of the Enforcers to me has always been the helmets (too Primaris-y); I’m wondering if the new Arbites kit will have enough variations to also equip my Enforcers?

(And yes, I know third-party Arbites helmets are one of the more common products, I’ve just never gotten round to buying any and I’m getting this box anyway, so may as well use the spares…)

Hmmm I don't usually agree with these comparisons but I guess they do look more like knights and less like Judge Dredd / uparmoured rugby players. You might be able to kitbash them with Blood Bowl to get something more like the classics.

Or print the ones by Monstrous Encounters

The new Arbites are an accident. We wanted dreddful new models, but somehow GW must have misunderstood.

drbored wrote:
Main reason they don't look like old Arbites models is because the original Arbites models came out in like 1994.

NINETEEN NINETY FOUR

Nearly 30 years ago. I'd totally understand if a toddler couldn't tell that they were the same model.

Either way, if you think they look like Sisters of Battle, good for you. That is such an unimportant opinion and yet here we are discussing it.

Battle Sisters are almost as old, but you'll find a lot of people appreciate the faithful remake in plastic. There is nothing unimportant about continuity in design in a hobby with an aesthetic component. It's one of the bigger topics. A lot of people like that Battle Sisters stayed their classic design, to stay with that example. Yet you also had people who wanted a move away from boob plate armor, for instance.

Genestealer Cultists also draw from designs that old and that has not been a detriment to their reception.

The new Arbites design deviates from the classic design quite a bit. Especially the feel of the helmet, which is one of the worst things you can do as people's eyes are naturally drawn to the head to identify someone. You don't have to mind. That's a perfectly valid opinion. But some people had hoped for a faithful remake over a redesign and are understandably disappointed.

Yeah, I like the new models, but they aren't especially faithful to metal Jez sculpts, they are significantly more gothic.

Odd really given GW design is leaning more tacticool nowadays, but it is what it is.

drbored wrote:
Main reason they don't look like old Arbites models is because the original Arbites models came out in like 1994.

NINETEEN NINETY FOUR

Nearly 30 years ago. I'd totally understand if a toddler couldn't tell that they were the same model.

Either way, if you think they look like Sisters of Battle, good for you. That is such an unimportant opinion and yet here we are discussing it.

How entirely childish of you.

 TalonZahn wrote:

drbored wrote:
Main reason they don't look like old Arbites models is because the original Arbites models came out in like 1994.

NINETEEN NINETY FOUR

Nearly 30 years ago. I'd totally understand if a toddler couldn't tell that they were the same model.

Either way, if you think they look like Sisters of Battle, good for you. That is such an unimportant opinion and yet here we are discussing it.

How entirely childish of you.

Welcome to dakkadakka

Bob Lorgar wrote:
I'm guessing a lot of people may find them "medieval" looking because of the angular nature of the boots and chest plate, which has been really strongly highlighted by the GW painters. I'd imagine that if you took about 30 seconds with a file, you could smooth those out the creases running up and down the center of boots/chest pieces to a more traditional rounded shape.

Why stop there? File the forearm, thigh and knee plates to look more like “law enforcement” armor. You can also file off all of the buttons and hems from the soft belly to make it look like an indented part of the carapace. Then file the top of the visor plate smooth with the rest of the helmet. Then congratulate yourself for “saving” the hilariously expensive yet disappointing models you just bought instead of buying better models at a more attractive price.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

Bob Lorgar wrote:
I'm guessing a lot of people may find them "medieval" looking because of the angular nature of the boots and chest plate, which has been really strongly highlighted by the GW painters. I'd imagine that if you took about 30 seconds with a file, you could smooth those out the creases running up and down the center of boots/chest pieces to a more traditional rounded shape.

Why stop there? File the forearm, thigh and knee plates to look more like “law enforcement” armor. You can also file off all of the buttons and hems from the soft belly to make it look like an indented part of the carapace. Then file the top of the visor plate smooth with the rest of the helmet. Then congratulate yourself for “saving” the hilariously expensive yet disappointing models you just bought instead of buying better models at a more attractive price.

Well excuse me for offering a quick, easy, and likely effective fix. I apologize for trying to help.

 The Phazer wrote:
Yeah, I like the new models, but they aren't especially faithful to metal Jez sculpts, they are significantly more gothic.

Odd really given GW design is leaning more tacticool nowadays, but it is what it is.

Well, they've got random elements of that, too. It doesn't do them any favors.

Bob Lorgar wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

Bob Lorgar wrote:
I'm guessing a lot of people may find them "medieval" looking because of the angular nature of the boots and chest plate, which has been really strongly highlighted by the GW painters. I'd imagine that if you took about 30 seconds with a file, you could smooth those out the creases running up and down the center of boots/chest pieces to a more traditional rounded shape.

Why stop there? File the forearm, thigh and knee plates to look more like “law enforcement” armor. You can also file off all of the buttons and hems from the soft belly to make it look like an indented part of the carapace. Then file the top of the visor plate smooth with the rest of the helmet. Then congratulate yourself for “saving” the hilariously expensive yet disappointing models you just bought instead of buying better models at a more attractive price.

Well excuse me for offering a quick, easy, and likely effective fix. I apologize for trying to help.

I read your tone as dismissing disappointment in their redesign as some trivial thing easy to fix. If that was not your intention, I apologize.

Tsagualsa wrote:

About as dumb as the guy who packed the standard manacles instead the four-hooped version for genestealers

"He's a Peeler, 716. Come to arrest the genestealers."

drbored wrote:
Main reason they don't look like old Arbites models is because the original Arbites models came out in like 1994.

NINETEEN NINETY FOUR

Nearly 30 years ago. I'd totally understand if a toddler couldn't tell that they were the same model.

Either way, if you think they look like Sisters of Battle, good for you. That is such an unimportant opinion and yet here we are discussing it.

Point of information

The ORIGINAL Arbites Models came out in year of our lord 1988



The models you're talking about are for posers and NOOBS.

But if you're a REAL ARBITES PLAYER and not some bandwagon jumper from 1994 then you know the ORIGINAL ORIGINAL Arbites models were made in Anno Domini 1987 and were Judge Dredd models with green stuff!



(Still available from Wargames Foundry BTW)

https://www.wargamesfoundry.com/collections/ex-citadel-games-workshop-fantasy-sci-fi/products/ba001-empirical-absolution-and-liquidation-squad

 Shakalooloo wrote:
The main change from the Goodwin sketches seems to be which shoulder is 'the big one'!

Spoiler:

Man, looking at these Jes Goodwin sketches makes me sad. The new ones are an abomination

I'm going to be the first person to replace the Arbites heads with Skitarii Vanguard heads.

Yeah, the idea of Arbites has always borrowed heavily from the Judge Dredd influence, with the "original" figures having been resculpts from when GW held the license. The subsequent iterations have featured some flavour of the Galaxy's Greatest Comic's lawman of the future, too, in terms of their designs. Bear in mind that many artists worked on both 2000AD and producing artwork for GW throughout the 80s and 90s, and the use of eagle iconography for both the Dreddverse Justice Department and the Warhammer 40,000 Imperium means there was almost no chance of ever really properly divorcing the designs. Back then, at least.

In fact, it's probably difficult to overstate the influence 2000AD has had on GW designs over the decades. The whole "big shoulderpads" sci fi was arguably started/popularised by 2000AD themselves.

That means that what many of us see as being "quintessential Arbites" design elements are probably, more accurately, quintessential Judge Dredd design elements... In the cold light of 2022/2023, I don't know how easily Rebellion (2000AD's owners and licensees of their own tabletop wargames based on 2000AD-derived universes) will simply let that go, nor do I think GW themselves want to make that influence as explicit in their models as they have done over the previous 30+ years.

So I get why people don't love them. But I don't mind them. There's a bunch of different routes you can go with the concept of "futuristic policemen", and GW have already done one flavour with the Palatine Enforcers. So going the opposite direction with the Arbites, leaning into the gothic feel, that's just as valid. (Crossover with the Sisters makes sense to me, too)

If you want them to be more Judge Dredd... Those options are out there for you.

JWBS wrote:
I'm going to be the first person to replace the Arbites heads with Skitarii Vanguard heads.

Sounds like a good idea.

I'm not actually gonna do that I like their heads, just a little joke

 lord_blackfang wrote:
No doubt there will eventually be GW Facebook poll on which is their best plastic dog.

Not a poll, but here you go. Yes, it was inevitable.

 Dryaktylus wrote:

 lord_blackfang wrote:
No doubt there will eventually be GW Facebook poll on which is their best plastic dog.

Not a poll, but here you go. Yes, it was inevitable.

Hah. Was a decently fun read.