Celtos, Slaine and heavy metal Celts

I was quite excited at first glance of the Warlord Games email announcing the Slaine miniatures game.  I thought/hoped they'd done the usual Warlord trick and bought up an existing range (in this case the Celtos range from Brigade Models) and repackaged it.  I have a good sized collection of these and a decent set of rules may see them get some use.

Alas, on looking into it properly it is a new range of figures for another Warlord "boutique" game.  Will it be supported properly or will it just disappear in a year or so?  Who knows but it did make me start thinking about Celtos again.

This has been the only fantasy game I've really gone for.  I really like the Celtic mythos which I'd first been introduced to as a lad through Michael Moocock's Corum books.  

I was also drawn to the superb artwork by Clint Langley who did the Slaine art in 2000AD and I really liked the overall game concept.  

I got into the game from the early days in 2002.  I-Kore, who were the original company had big plans but they never came to fruition.  Apparently they had financial problems, became Urban Mammoth and then the range was sold to Brigade Models where they've more or less sat in Limbo like a Fir Bolg hero (Celtos geek joke there).  

Cricket bat swords and poor groin defence stances apart, I still think the figures are great.  I believe they were sculpted by Kev White, Mike Owen and Steve Saleh so are of a high quality.  Truth be told I also like the Warlord Slaine figures, but the last thing I need to be doing is collecting another Celtic fantasy line.

Gael chariots

I always felt the Celtos rules seemed unfinished.  I suppose if the game had grown and they'd have released the planned army books for each of the races, it would have developed into a much more rounded system.  Only the Gael (human) army book was released and it's more or less unusable as it gives so many additional options for this army it skews the balance of the game.

I have looked at other rules like Dragon Rampant, but have yet to find anything that gives a true Celtic feel to it.  I even toyed with using the Slaine RPG or Slaine Runequest rules but that would have been a lot of effort.  I'm hoping against hope that Warlord will make the Slaine rules available on their own.  If anyone reads this and does have any good suggestions for rules to look at, or if there is anyone out who like me still has some love for Celtos, please leave a comment.