Question about a for fun Bretonnian army.

[emptyhat]

I was thinking of getting some more fantasy stuff in a couple of months and since I have the old boxset Bretonnians (12 knights & 24 archers) it looks like it might be cost effective to buy a Bretonnian battalion and call it a force.

I'd mostly use this to try and improve modeling and painting skills and as a "I'm feeling in a fun mood" for playing games since I have a secret stash of Lizardmen for a more serious Fantasy project later on when I have a better idea of what I want to do with them.

Is the above a viable idea for a force? Is there anything else I should consider?

Also I don't want to ask about points but I was wondering what sort of area I would end up in for points. Would it be around 700 or maybe 1000?

I'd end up with

20 Knights
40 Bowmen
20 Men-at-Arms
1 Pegasus Knight

Any and all comments welcome.

~empty

[Romer]

With all that, you'd probably end up around 1200pts. You'd have to play your Pegasus Knight as a Paladin (As Pegasus Knights come in units of 3 only).

Pegasus Paladin
BSB Paladin

4 x 10 Bowmen
1 x 20 Men at Arms

8 Knights of Realm
6 Knights of Realm
5 Knights Errant

That's a helluva lot of bowmen. I'd be tempted to turn 10 of them into Men at Arms. A Damsel for buffing those Men at Arms would go down well to.

[F.K.M]

I think bowmen suck even with BS 3. Fantasy has a way of tacking on the negative BS modifiers to all shooting to the point where it's not good unless you have a ton of it, automatically hit or possibly have poisoned shooting (so you only want to roll high anyway). I don't even use items that only effect BS anymore because it's not even really a threat. The real threats are war machines.

So i suppose you could use a lot of bowmen if you just want to surprise somebody since i don't think they expect shooting. My problem is i don't think they'll do much of anything even with 40 guys. I could be wrong though. You can go with one big block of archers but the problem is every rank beyond the 2nd can only have half the guys firing and i don't think it can be used to stand and shoot if you do that.

Like i said though the reason why i don't use BS shooters much is because of all the negative modifiers fantasy imposes. You move there's a modifier, stand and shoot modifier, shoot at full range and there's a modifier, cover, etc. You tack on other abilities to add negative modifiers to shooting like multiple shots and special items enemy's may wield (and they probably will wield thm) and it's not even worth the points. I mean i have several items that ruin all sorts of ranged weaponry and my roommate's vampire counts have a banner for 75 pts (often goes with blood knights) which gives them a +4 ward save against any and all types of shooting and possibly even magic missiles. Given the armor of blood knights shooting them with that banner (which they'll almost undoubtedly have) would be utter stupidity and suicide. You'd only do it because you'd be ignorant of it. Best thing to do against any knights esp. blood knights is charge them and in this case pray. Also considering van hel's danse macabre they'll get 8" free movement that can be made into a charge during their magic phase. If they march horses up near your guys it'll be all over if they get that spell off in most cases.

Surprisingly i heard peasant mass can be devastating. I know of somebody that does a combo that makes a unit of peasants stubborn. I think they need a BSB for it though. May as well charge the unit and declare a challenge with a hero killer. My favorite tactic for that though is to accept with my champion. You might want to do that to save your BSB for at least one round. Don't charge that unit into a unit with a character killer though. It'll be the death of that whole unit possibly.

May luck be with you though. Bretonnian armies are underpowered currently until they can get a new codex or something. They didn't get the same boost that the ogres got with the new rulebook.

[emptyhat]

Thanks for the information and advice guys. I'll certainly consider it when I think about my options for this project.

The problem with the archers is that I already own 24 of them anyway and the older plastic models have a very narrow profile and pose which only really suits them as archers.

[F.K.M]

I'm no expert on bretonnia but i think bowmen would suck even though they're BS 3. I personally think most things aren't worth shooting unless they're BS 4 and if they're BS 2 you may as well not even bother with the negative modifiers. So just use knights and some of the awesome stubborn banners and banners that possibly get rid of stubborn in enemies. I know of one bretonnian player and he has knights, a pegasus leader, some bowmen and a lot of peasants. I could be urging you to do the wrong thing but a trebuchet would be interesting. Don't know if it's used but i'm guessing it works like a stone thrower and would kill people in a small blast. Probably not worth it but might give high strength attacks against monsters if you need it. You'd probably rather just fly in with a hero and monster killer though. I don't have a bretonnia army so i don't know what to say on it.

[Romer]

Yeah, you're wrong about bowmen. Two units are pretty much standard for a lot of armies. And the Trebuchet is absolutly mandatory for a competitive list. Don't get me wrong, they arn't wonderful, but the game is more fun when you are taking part in all phases and they are good at taking down those units.

Also, did you miss the part where he said this was mainly for improving his painting and modelling rather than playing? It's clearly not being built to be an A-grade competitve army.

[emptyhat]

I think you've got a good point about taking part in all the phases Romer. Things can be a lot less engaging for 40K Orks at the start when they are just charging forwards.

I'm interested in hearing all the different takes on it though.

[F.K.M]

Yeah romer plus he said 'any and all comments welcome' and he asked how it'd be as a force. I think my comments are still valid.

emptyhat: I think some flying units would be good as you can fly over some units. If you keep them in the back so they don't get hurt or if you fly them beyond some enemy units it can be beneficial. Not sure about the bretonnia codex so bear with me.

A big problem you may have to deal with are skirmishers. I don't have much shooting but i use random movement units to mow them down. The best part is the enemy can't stand and shoot against them or flee. The bad part is it's random movement so you can move a lot or almost not at all. I don't think you have random movement on anything though. I suppose that is one good thing about shooting though generally good placement of units and magic could kill an enemy's skirmishers. Like i said the first game i played against lizardmen with a guy who had a ton of skirmishers killed off my random movement creatures in a heartbeat. The 2nd time i played him i used random movement creatures to mow down the same skirmishers even with their poisoned attacks.

I know some people like shooting it's just there's so many negative modifiers with it that it's just ridiculous. Sure skirmishers die easily but you'd be surprised how annoying skink skirmishers with quick to fire weapons can be. The one good thing about quick to fire weapons is you can move and fire without negative modifiers. Problem is it's also usually incredibly short ranged like 8 inches for throwing weapons and that's full range so you'd practically have to hump the enemy to be in half range with throwing weapons. Not to mention if you have to shoot at skirmishers it can be tough. They are easy to kill if you hit melee but if they're in a forest (they're stubborn) and if you shoot at them that's another negative modifier. I suppose i'm just annoyed by all the negative modifiers of fantasy. Unless you have BS 4, a ton of shots (even then don't expect to kill much), poisoned attacks or your shots hit automatically then shooting is a waste. Hit vulnerable weapons teams like salamanders, goblin fanatics and skaven weapons teams with your shooting. It handles much better. War machines are also usually really good. I can't stress enough how annoyingly good they are for empire and dwarfs. In fact they nearly save those armies and this is without their decent to better than average melee. I suppose bolt throwers on the other hand aren't too great. So yeah considering trebuchets roll a scatter and a misfire dice i'd use it. I'm not sure on the stats of it but stone throwers usually double over as both monster and war machine killers and horde killers. They're pretty good so i'd suggest you use them.

Also 40k orks may have some decent shooting but against an imperial guard army just try to having a heavy shooty army and make a dent in it. The armor of their vehicles is too high and their numerous and expendable infantry just means it's a waste.

[verminard]

Ive been playing Bretts for a while now, and it all started with the same desire that emptyhat had for building a paint challenge army (seeing as my main was Beastmen and painting poo is easy).

First off, Peasants will win you the game every time. Trust in them, there is some strange synergy that they have with the Knights that goes way beyond points per model that you pay for them. Men @ arms are fantastic with halberds, weather its guarding a knight units flank, or threatening a flank charge by angling as the opponent nears your battle line.

Archers, I usually take 2 units of 16 with flaming arrows. They are chap, can out range most other shooting units in the game (as they have longbows) and come with a fence. I never found with bretts that you need to kill or do much damage to a unit with archers, they are there for 3 reasons. First is to knock a few guys off a back rank and hopefully make it easier for your knight charge to break a unit by robbing them of stubborn and rank bonuses. Second is they have a cheap flaming attack and it lets you do some damage to regenerating units before slapping them with a Trebuchet. Third, well third is sneaky. They have a fence. That fence is an obstacle and in the rules for shooting a cannon, if the cannonball bounces into a fence it destroys the fence and continues no further. That being said, it can guard a unit of knights from a cannon shot or sit in front of a trebuchet (my usual ploy) and make it harder to snipe with a lucky shot.

Trebuchet is amazing, take one or two. They will do so much damage its silly. Plus, if you want fun modeling take a cow from the giant box and attach it for a great Monty Python joke.

Knights. I usually run 6 per group before characters. Much more than that and they stick out too far in lance formation, plus it lets you get way more flank charges with small groups like that.

Peggies are fun, but I like running 3+ if your serious about them. Otherwise just make it a lord so it has survivability. They are fun for war machine hunting and flank hits, plus they have stomp and a vanguard move and who doesn't like stomp!

Hope it helped.