This is the free figure which came with pre-orders for Gripping Beast's new 'Saga' 'Viking Age' skirmish rules. Yes, I am sad, I pre-ordered the rules - although, in my defence, I did think long and hard, and nearly didn't pre-order in time for it to be a pre-order at all. Bill 'Musketeer Miniatures' Thornhill sculpted the figure, and I have to say that it is simply gorgeous.
The rules are very interesting - the mechanics are unlike anything I've seen before, and will really make players think (or lose bigtime!). Very expensive though - £25 for a 74 page soft-back seems excessive. But I think I'm going to like them, and I can see me using them (probably with 'tweaks' to suit the periods) for all sorts of ancient and medieval skirmishing. Hopefully I'll end up getting my money's worth out of them. More on the rules when I've had a chance to fiddle with them properly. 'Battleboards' are the key - both to playing the game, and to 'writing' new add-ons - if one can get the Battleboards to have the right 'flavour' and mix of abilities, I reckon you've cracked it. Hopefully, at some point, the Beasties will give some hints on how it's done.
On the subject of rules, I'm intending to spend a day or two this week working on AVGVSTVS to AVRELIAN - alongside painting some third century 'lanciarii' for my 'Fire in the East' project. Early days on the figures so far - only got a couple of colours on them yet, but photos will appear here once they're done.