'Risk Taker' from BurkhardS - 'Murillo Gladiator'

I have to say, this theme round, as well as the theme for this year in general gave me huge headaches. So from the start it became clear, that this year I would enter my Curtgeld into the theme round. But what was it going to be. After long deliberation, I came up with this... 

A Murillo Gladiator. IMHO a Gladiator is a gambler in many aspects. For one, you are gambling with your life the moment you enter the arena, for essentially you are dead and are fighting to get your life back. You are also taking a gamble, based on your class of Gladiator and the class you are facing, for some of those might leave you at a huge disadvantage. And I think this hold especially true for the auctorati, free (wo)men who chose to give up their freedom to live as Gladiators. Sure you were well cared for outside of the fights you had to perform, but was it worth risking your life?

And in a way, this mini was a personal gamble for me. A few years back I asked Curt "what will the theme be for the next installment?" Reason being simple... the last show I attended that year was a couple of weeks before the start of the Challenge and I wanted to go shopping there. So Curt said, "probably Gladiators, but I cannot guarantee." In the end it turned out not be Gladiators, but I had bought this fine Murillo from Warlord Games. And I thought that after 2-3 year of spending his life on the lead mountain, he finally deserved his moment of glory in the Challenge. So here he is.

Paintjobwise, he is quite simple,but what was to be expected with a mini that is mostly skin and loincloth. I did choose to do the manica and ocrea in steel rather than a bronze colour. I wanted him to be an old Centurio who had to leave the Legions at the end of his tour of duty, but who had whored and drunk up all his money and had chosen to become an auctorati. So he was making use of some of the equipment he had to buy for his army job, which would most likely be less ornamental and more functional.