Viking Bondi from Footsore Miniatures

My favorite shields that I painted for my Footsore Miniatures Viking Bondi - Thor's hammer and the worm Ouroboros

Awhile back, when Jenny was ordering her Viking army from Footsore Miniatures, I decided to join in on the order. Nearly all of my Vikings have chainmail -- most from Old Glory miniatures. There are some from various other sources, including Gripping Beast. When I am playing Saga Dark Age skirmish rules, I like my opponent to be able to tell the difference between my Hearthguard, Warrior, and Levy class troops. My idea was to have the mail-clad figures be Hearthguard and those without armor the Warriors. With the Vikings, the Levy are obvious because they're armed with a bow.

My new Viking Bondi pillage a Celtic monastery, preparing to loot the church and beehive huts

My plan was to order enough for 24 unarmored warriors, and luckily Footsore produced six packs (4 figs each) of unarmoredViking Bondi. The North America store showed four of those packs on their website, so I ordered those. Jenny chose to order from the UK site to be able to order from their full Viking range, and get the Saga package deal. I had her add the two packs that North America did not have to her order. As it turned out, the North America site was really struggling filling my order. After two months of waiting, I just cancelled the order. So, these eight figures are the ones that arrived (in a week or so) with Jenny's order.

More Viking Bondi from Footsore Miniatures, looking for treasure to steal and monks to capture as slaves

I have seen many others post pictures of Footsore Miniatures on Facebook or their websites, and the figures are indeed cleanly cast and wonderfully posed. There is a great variety among them, which is perfect for a skirmish game like Saga. I am a little disenchanted with the fact they don't come packaged with weapons. By scrounging through my unpainted lead, and chopping the weapons off some figures that had the weapons cast on, we were able to equip her army. I've been told the UK website has weapons packs you can order, but why not just toss in a variety in each pack?

I really like the clothes the front two Vikings are wearing -- the quilted one on the right and animal skin on left

Another thing that turned me off a bit was that the fists that you need to drill out to put in those weapons are rather undersized, in my opinion. The sizes are probably anatomically correct, but when you have to use a pin vice to drill it out and then place a 28mm scale weapon in the hand, a larger fist would make things MUCH easier. Or casting them with open hands, like some manufacturers do. When drilling out and equipping Jenny's troops (and mine), there were a number of fists that cracked and had chunks break off.

More Footsore Vikings prowl through a Celtic monastery - I like the execution of the shield design in the center

Still, the figures do look great when completed. Another thing I like is that they are not festooned with tons of extra equipment. Some don't even have a knife at their belt or a sack for carrying supplies or whatever. In addition to being cleanly cast, they are cleanly equipped, if that is a thing. I like that. Maybe I'm just scarred from painting all those 28mm Eastern Woodland Indians with more straps, bags, sheaths, and miscellaneous stuff festooned on the figure that I appreciate painting a figure that is not over-equipped!

Any monks hiding in their cells are going to be disappointed when these warriors burst in on them

All of the shields are hand-painted, too. I know that decals would look nicer, but I just haven't gotten into using them, yet. The few times I've tried I really struggle with the process of getting them positioned correctly and cleanly. I used a variety of faded colors for their clothes, for the most part, and really like how they turned out. So, if you don't mind drilling out the hands and buying or supplying weapons yourself, they are quality miniatures to add to your Viking army.