Bretonnian tactics
Like the Empire the Bretonnian army consists of humans. They are your basic Warhammer race costing just 5 points per model and they have a very avarage line of stats. Unfortunately their points cost means that they just fail to qualify for the special equipment costing deal. They really have no basic weeknesses or strong points and they are not subjec to any special rules.
Unlike the Empire however the Bretonnian army has a very small selection of troop types to pick from. They have none of the more esoteric types that the forces of Karl Franz have access to. This means that even more than with the Empire you must know your troops and have a very clear battle plan when you design your army list. Just picking a few units "cause they look nice" and then not know what you are going to do with them is a recipe for disaster.
Bretonnian Lord A standard human lord level character
with one difference. They can get Bretonnian Virtues. These are
aditional abilities that you can buy for your characters that can
make them immune to psycology, give them the ability to lead a
counter charge etc. You always ahve to take either the Grail
Virtue, the Questing Virtue or the Knight Virtue
and you can take one other if you so desire. The various Virtues
are discussed in further detail later. With the new rule making
all your units take a panic test if your general dies you need to
give him some good protection and this normally involves a Magic
Item. I used to like the Black Amulet but with the new
magic rules (Power exhausted on a roll of a 1) I prefer the Armour
of Protection When mounted on your barded warhorse this will
give you a save of 2+ followed by 4+ (Unmodifible) which is not
too shabby.
Bretonnian Hero As with the lord these have stand human hero stats. Again they can have two virtues with the first being chosen from either the Grail Virtue, the Questing Virtue or the Knight Virtue. With the large character allowance that the Bretonnian army gets I would suggest that each Knight Unit that you have is led by a Hero.
Champions Unlike most races the Bretonnians have several different types of champion from the lowly Commoner champion to the powerhouse that is the Grail Knight Champion. Champions of Knight units will always have the same virtue as the rest of the unit but the poor old commoner champion doesn't get a virtue and is left to fend all on his own. Its a hard life being a commoner!!
Wizards : With the new magic sytem if you play under the standard rules all the headaches of which colour mage to take have disappered. You can get Battle Magic, Battle Magic or Battle Magic. If you do decide to play the colour rules then you'll have to decide which colour magic to take. Everybody has a personal preferance and mine happens to be for gold magic but its really up to you to choose which deck suits your style of play the most.
Who need magic items when you can have virtues. These are extra abilities that you can give your characters to make them just that little bit more special - and with 75% character allowance you can be sure that you'll always have the points to buy the virtue that you want. Note that only Knightly characters can have virtues so you can't give any to your wizards or commoner champions.
Knights Virtue : Makes you immune to panic caused by fleeing commoners. I would ignore this virtue and go for the Grail Virtue at only 10 points more.
Questing Virtue : Makes you immune to panic, full stop. Again I would ignore this virtue and go for the Grail Virtue, this time at only 5 points more.
Grail Virtue : The best of the three common virtues, this one makes you immune to all Psycology. This means no nasty fear checks when you charge that horrible unit of rotting zombies. Excellent value at 15 points, but remember that just because you are immune to psycology, the troops that you are leading won't necessarily be.
Virtue of the Joust : This is good if you are going to use a Lance but most characters will have a Magic Sword and thus won't benefit from this virtue.
Virtue of Purity : Under the old magic system this virtue would have been as good as a multiple use Amulet of Fire. However as it is a natural dispel you can't power it up so it will have limited use. Still it could discourage your opponent from targeting you with spells, unless they have plenty of power cards.
Virtue of Knightly Temper : You can get a lot of attacks with this virtue, especially if you pick on troops with lower weapons skills than you. It might not be heroic but war is about winning.
Virtue of the Impetuous Knight : This virtue enables you to get into combat that little bit sooner. I wouldn't recomend relying on it to enable you to make the charge but if your opponents choose to flee that extra d6" could make the difference between failing to charge and cutting down the craven dogs as they flee.
Virtue of Valour : This virtue relies on you fighting troops that are better than you are. As this is a bad idea (Heros should be butchering rank and file) don't bother with this one unless your up against a Chaos Army in which case even the rank and file troops are better than you!
Virtue of Discipline : Repeat after me, the ability to reroll leadership tests is a good one. Putting a hero in you big knight unit with this virtue is the same as placing the army standard bearer with the unit for about 100 points less. Remember that this virtue lets you reroll ALL Leadership tests, including ones cause by Spells. The break test is also a Leadership test so you can reroll those as well.
Virtue of Devotion : When I first read this virtue I thought that it was a cheap alternative to the Amulet of Obsidian but closer reading reveal that it only protects the knight from hostile magic. This could lead to situations when the unit around him is affected by a spell such as Blast and he was completely unharmed. If you take this virtue put the character with it at the front of your lance formations. This means that he will likely be the target for all those "Hits the first model in path" spells and the spell with thus be wasted.
Virtue of Noble Disdain : If you play against Wood Elves a lot then this is a good virtue to have as in my experince Hatred is a good thing. If you decide to give your character this virtue then ignore the advice given above and don't give him the Grail Virtue. Hatred is just another form of psycology and therefore if he had the Grail virtue he would be unaffected.
Virtue of Knightly Ardour : My favourite virtue, this gives you the ability to counter charge. The rules state that you can't use this if charged in the flanks or rear but as your lance formations have neither flanks or rear you don't need to worry. Every Knight unit should have a character in it that has this ability. Most of the Bretonnian armys hitting power comes from the charge so the ability to counter charge is an excellent one. Just remember that the fight is carried out in iniative order so get those Lords and Heros hacking.
The bretonnian Knights are far superior to their Empire
counterparts but at a greater points cost. As you have to form at
least 25% of your army from units of Knights it is worth learning
there abilities inside out. All of the Knight units have a 2+
save and can use the lance formation. They all get Standards and
Musicians at no extra points cost and all are immune to Panic and
other forms of psycology to a lesser or greater degree. Finally
they are mounted on bretonnian Warhorses giving them a charge of
16" and probably more importanty enabling them to roll 3d6
for pursuit when most other heavy cavalry only rolls 2d6.
Grail Knights : The epitomy of a man and horse in perfect union. Their Leadership stat is as good as a human lord. These are the ULTIMATE heavy Cavalry. Immune to all Psycology
Weaknesses : Watch out for enemy warmachines and those ever so nasty night goblin fanatics. Lots of points tied up in a few models.
Uses :There is really only one use for Grail Knights. Take a big unit, put them into the Lance formation, charge you enemy and watch them crumble. Your opponent will know that your Grail Knights are your strong arm and will try to charge them if at all possible to rob you of you big charge bonuses. To get round this take a Grail Knight Champion and give him the Virtue of Knightly Ardour. Problem Solved. You still count as charging and due to the lance formation and your armour you should still be able to devastate the enemy.
Questing Knights : An extra point of iniative over Knights of the Realm and immune to Panic rather than Panic caused by Commoners
Weaknesses: Do I really need to tell you.
Uses :I would expect these to be the least used of all the knights. The advantages over a Knight of the Realm are insignificant yet they cost more. Leave them at home except in big battles.
Knights of the Realm : These troops are your most commen type of knight and I would expect most armies to have at least one unit of them. They ignore panic caused by troops who are not Knights.
Weaknesses : Normal heavy cavalry problems of a few models taking up a lot of points. This makes them a prime target for all of your opponents unchivarous warmachines.
Uses : Assuming that you've got a big unti of Grail Knights going down the centre I would take two smaller units of Knights of the Realm and place them on the flanks of your army. This way they can effectively use a double oblique line stratagy and provided you can coordinate your charge properly you can finish your enemy off in a single round. These are probably your best all round knights.
Errant Knights : Normal human stats but still have a 2+ save and charge of 16".They ignore panic caused by troops who are not Knights. They are the cheapest Knights that you can get at 32 points per model.
Weaknesses : They are expensive mounted cavalry.
Uses : Good as a second wave to go in after your Grail Knights have blown big holes in the enemies battle line. If you take Morgiana then you can automatically gain a fovour for your Grail Knight champions
Mounted Squires : The audacity of it. Mere peasants mounted on horses. Out of the way riff raff.
Weaknesses : There humans on horses.
Uses: The two big advantages of mounted squires is that they can Skirmish and that they cost an unbelivably low 10 points per model. You can use them to drive off enemy skirmish screens so that your Knight blocks can get a clear charge and also to fufill the Kislev Horse Archer role of commiting suicide to pull out Night Goblin fanatics so that they can be turned into pincushions by your bowmen!
Squires : Bog standard humans.
Weaknesses: It took so much metal to make all the armour for the knights that there was none left over for these guys.
Uses: Well you could deploy them as a Spear Block but you'ld be bette of using Men at Arms or you could use them as a Skirmishing longbow unit but then you can't use the Arrowhead Formation. It probably best just to leave these guys lloking after the castle. Whatever you do don't be tempted to use them as skirmishing spearmen .
Men-at-Arms : Your best foot soldiers. I would always take a large block of these jusat because I get very worried if I haven't got at least one unit that has a +3 rank bonus.Spears are a defensive weapon, so if you plan to dig in and shoot it out and receive a charge, spearmen are perhaps useful.
Weaknesses : Take a large block of them (40 sounds a good number) place a Knight Hero in the centre and then place them in the centre of your battle line. Hopefully if charge they will be able to survive and hold up the enemy so that you knight units can manouvre to charge them [the enemy] in the flanks or rear. It is up to you wehter you go for the extra hits that spears will give you or the extra damage capacity of halberds. Me, I would choose Halberds but then I always was a bit vicious. The best thing about this tactic is if your enemy does break this unit then your knights just won't care and will carry onhacking and slaying as if nothing had happened.
Bowmen : They're humans with longbows.
Weaknesses : They're Humans with longbows
Uses : I would always take a few units of these just to give myself something to do in the shooting phase. The arrowhead formation can be very effective in enabling you to concentrate firepower from a very small frontage but it doesn't really compesate for the fact that these guys probably couldn't hit a barn door at 50 paces. If you opponent lets you it is always worth taking a large unit of bowmen and then turning them into the Bowmen of Bergerac. Just don't drink any of that wine.
In more and more tournaments these days you aren't allowed to use special characters due to the perceived unbalancing effect they have on the game. I personally don't have a problem with using specials in your army provided you don't start switching magic items around as this just means that you want all the abilites that the characters tend to have but not the crap selection of items that they get. However in the Bretonnian Book you cant change items so its all or nothing with these guys (and gals).
Louen Leoncoeur : Lets face it Louen could whip the floor with his nearest rival Karl Franz with one hand tied behind his back. They have the same stats (including a Leadership of 10) but Leoncoeur's Virtues and Magic Items make him the far superior of the two. He is however only a human lord so watch out for nasty Khorne Lords. Don't worry about enemy spells however, as the Tabard of Kings should protect you. Louen should be used as a focal point of your army. As he can't gain missile cover from a unit you should watch out for massed ranks of cannons etc. You can always use him to take out you opponents warmachines and then charge his other units once they are engaged in h-to-h combat. I would suggest doing the rolls for the Crown of Bretonnia in this order. WS, A, T, W, S.
Repanse de Lyonesse : Repanse replaces both the General and the Army Standard Bearer so if your short of points she could be a good choise. She causes Fear and has both the Knights and Devotion virtues. Her Standards ability to drain power n the magic phase is very useful if you are going to use magic phase shutdown tactics.
Baron Odo d'Outremer : If you are using Questing Knights you can use Odo as the unit champion. He has Questing Knight Champion stats and is armed with the Morning Star of Fracase which works as a flail (+2 strength in the first turn of combat) except that if you score a wound on a character with a magic weapon a roll of 4+ will deprive your opponent of the weapon for the rest of the game. Along with Odo you get Suliman, another champion level character who has a special ability that enables him to always strike first in combat. However if you follow my advice and don't take Questing Knights then Odo will never see the battlefield.
Roland Le Marechal : Another chamion level character, this time for either Knights of the Realm or Knights Errant. Has an excellent magic item that is supurb for driving flocks of harpys high and then keeping them there. This is a special character that is well worthi taking if your opponent has a prepensity for taking a large ammount of flyers. Against Wood Elves this character alone will be able to paralyse most of the typical wood elf armies around.
Tancred, Duc de Quenelles : Tancred is another Lord level character, but he doesn't have to be the General. He has a Leadership of 10 so he is well worth including. His magic items fit in with his background of having continuous battles against Heinrich Kemmler so if you opponent plays undead then I would take him.
Bertrand the Brigand : With his ability to make normal commoner bowmen into archers rivaling the high elves and his two travelling companions Bertrand is well worth taking. He personally has a bow skill of 5 but his magic item is a bit poor (OK pathetic). Hugo has a strength of 5 and he has a special rule making his arrows hit with a strength of 5 as well. Gui has his barrel of wine but if you are actually hoping for the bowmen to hit something I would leave well alone. All three of these only cost 83 points so find a place for them in your army at all costs.
The Knight of the Perilous Lance : Who is our mystery super hero? The Knight is a human hero with no magic items but a couple of battle skills that give hive an extra -1 saving modifier and the ability to reroll his own saves. He has a nice background and is a homage to that most famous of fanttasy characters The Knight with No Name but I would sugget that the points he costs could be better spent elsewhere.
Tristran le Troubadour : A Grail Knight hero with his own travelling court jester. He hasbn't got any magic items but has some heroic songs instead. These give him abilitys equal to some magic items but are not effected by things such as the Sword of Destruction. He's very expensive for what you get (205 points) so I feel he's another of these "Nice Idea but I wont' be using him" characters.
Reynard le Chasseur : Reynard is unusual in that he is a Knightly Champion (with 3 attacks) but he can be placed in a unit of mounted squires. He has an excellent magic item that deducts d6 attacks from his enemies so answer challenges from frenzied witch elf heros with him. He is alos accompanied by his two wolf hounds Groffe and Griffe who are WS4 S4. If he leads mounted squires they follow his shining example and all gain the Knights virtue. This can be very useful if points are tight as you can make a unit of mounted light cavalrt almost as good as a unit of Knights Errant for have the points.
Armand D'Aquitaine : Another replacement Battle Standard Bearer though he still only has 1 wound. He is very expensive and I would have thought it would be better to take just normal Battle Standard rather than this character.
Jasperre le Beau, Dragonslayer : A Bretonnian Hero who rides a Pegasus and can carry three magic items. He is good against large monsters and you can just bet that the miniature will be lovely.
Bohemond, Duke of Bastonne : Bretonnian seems to be replete with heros. This one has an extra wound and a couple of interesting magic items but again I wouldn't use him
The Green Knight : This is what a special character should be all about. Not just a hero with a bit of background but a completely different stat line and some cool special abilities. The model is superb as well. The Green Knight has a weapon skill of six, toughness and strength of five, a leadership of 10 and one wound. Yes he's only got one wound but he has a special regeneration rule that enables him to carry on fighting on a roll of 2+ So chop off his head and he still keeps coming. He has a natural dispel against magic of 2+ cause fear and can be deployed anywhere on the battlefield outside your enemies deployment zone. The mother can be killing the enemy whilst your opponent is still thinking about what his first move should be. All this for only 170 points. Get him.
Morgiana le Fay : As seen in White Dwarf Morgiana is the epitomy of Bretonnian Magic. From the ability to turn the enemy into frogs to the fact that she can bolster the fighting ability of your hero's with her favours Morgiana kicks butt. She has a ward save of 4+ and rides a Unicorn, one of the few mortals so to do. I love her.
Written by: Mike Marshall