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I've seen in several threads here on Dakka that the Brettonian army is now probably the worst that can be fielded with regards to power, I'm just curious as to why exactly this is.

I made a mock list of 1500pts and, without itemising it all here I got the following, roughly:

Lvl 3 Prophetess (Wizard) General with magic kit
2 x Paladins with decent magic kit to lead units
2 x units of 10-12 Knights (one Errant, one Knights of the realm, both with points for magic banners)
2 x units of 16 Peasant archers with braziers, one skirmishing.
3 x Field Trebuchet.

Now I'll be the first to admit that I'm not experienced, but that list looks far from terrible, really. Lance formation seems quite a powerful tool, so providing the Knights get up the board and into combat in a hurry they should be able to confidently charge most things. Three Trebuchets seemed like a healthy amount of firepower and the Prophetess (very likely picking Lore of Life) should be able to sustain the Knights for long enough to cross the board.

Am I being naive?

You cant have 3 trubchets in less then 3000 points.

No i dont belive brets are bad, im currently trying a list thats all mounted except 1 trbuchet

So far ive downed the 50 pheonix guard with teclis block in two turns. people dont seem to realise that they have awsome saves and awsome attacks (they generally get the charge) and that life magic resurects horsemen and burns units down..

you can run a unit of grail knights, with a 2+ armour save, 6+ ward and 4+ regen.. then if they die you can resurect them.. and the green knight/paladin on pegasus is amazing at taking down war machines.

Ahh. Whoops. Forgot the multiples rule with the Trebuchets, yeah... still I'm quietly confident that it can be made to work.

It completley can we can tkae the fight to our foes and once again bretonia shall rise! i quite like the book as it is atm (exept for a few things like green knight being so easy to kill in this ed)

and i think bretonia is still very competative especially full mounted lists. anyways have fun

No, there's always Wood Elves

Seriously, brets still have plenty of things going for them, including the most 2+ in one army, they hit as hard as WoC on the charge and their characters make Empire players green with envy

I play an Empire army (and a budding Skaven army). My friends play Dwarves and Bretonnia. Quite frankly, Bretonnia can go either very well or very bad depending on how many mortars I bring.

We've only had two games, and only at 600 odd points (he only has the battle force right now), but twice he's come close to destroying my balanced Empire army. The first he was just about stopped by my swordsmen after his knights took a pummelling from my mortars and he was left with just Men-At-Arms.

The second time, I won because I had a tower full of swordsmen while all he could take the building with was Men-At-Arms.

Bretonnia aren't as awful as people say, they certainly hit extremely hard and in a one-on-one with my troops, my Empire will get slaughtered. It's just a problem for him at the minute because my war machines slaughter his men, allowing me to wash over his troops.

That said, we certainly don't have min-maxed forces and he is certainly limited by the fact that he can only have one squad of knights on the field, atm.

my empire for 1500 would be 30 crossbows, 2 x12 knights 2 wiz l2 1 hero stuff, 3 cannons and 1 volley gun. = brets loose.

Battlecannon it phil wrote:my empire for 1500 would be 30 crossbows, 2 x12 knights 2 wiz l2 1 hero stuff, 3 cannons and 1 volley gun. = brets loose.

it could also mean your 3 cannons and 1 volley gun misfire on the first turn you shoot them....= empire lose.....

I have been playing the empire for 10 years, believe me it happens!!!!

EmilCrane wrote:No, there's always Wood Elves

Seriously, brets still have plenty of things going for them, including the most 2+ in one army, they hit as hard as WoC on the charge and their characters make Empire players green with envy

Hey, now!

I think brets are still good, with lance formation. In fact, because of that they're one of the few really viable cavalry armies out there! And flaming archers are nice, too

The thing with Brets is that a lot depends on whether your group accepts that Brets can form ranks even though they're not five wide. If people play by strict RAW then Brets can really struggle, other than that they seem a reasonable army, albeit one that has had to adjust tactics more than the rest.

sebster wrote:The thing with Brets is that a lot depends on whether your group accepts that Brets can form ranks even though they're not five wide. If people play by strict RAW then Brets can really struggle, other than that they seem a reasonable army, albeit one that has had to adjust tactics more than the rest.

Hmm... Have I missed something here? I only read it the once, but I thought the army book specified that ranks of three were legal in lance formation?


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Battlecannon it phil wrote:my empire for 1500 would be 30 crossbows, 2 x12 knights 2 wiz l2 1 hero stuff, 3 cannons and 1 volley gun. = brets loose.

Also, as it was pointed out with my Trebuchets, you can't have 3 Cannon unless we're playing 3000pts+. Back to the drawing board Pip, my old chum.

He can have 3 cannons, because its a special and you can take 3 of the same special units, also it doesnt depend on wether your gaming group accepts ranks in the lance formation, the codex reads that the lance formation gives you bonus ranks in the lance formation. and in one of the first pages of the BRB it says that the codex trumpts the BRB so..

I'm a proponent of this as well. Brets MUST get lance formation still, and army book does trump BRB...

I haven't read the ins and outs, and really that would belong in YMDC, anyway, but I think anyone who is saying they are still viable is saying it with the lance formation in mind.

The argument with lance formation has to do with breaking steadfast I thought.

Steadfast states you must have ranks of 5 models..

Lance formation states they only need 3 models for rank bonus...

rank bonus != steadfast ranks

ShivanAngel wrote:The argument with lance formation has to do with breaking steadfast I thought.

Steadfast states you must have ranks of 5 models..

Lance formation states they only need 3 models for rank bonus...

rank bonus != steadfast ranks

Ahh, I see. Thank you for the explanation. That seems rather harsh to impose, although I am aware that some people do play strict RAW. Shame they didn't spot that for the PDFs. I checked... Nothing.

However, an exception was already made in the BRB for monstrous infantry, whose entry states that anytime a sentence says "5 models" are needed, for them it is 3. It would make sense to apply the same logic to the Bret book, although being an older book obvioulsy it doesn't have that language in there.

They should've just fixed it with the FAQ, though . But we have a bret player here and you can be dam sure we're giving him the benefit of the doubt and counting his ranks towards negating steadfast...

Not to mention, of course, that that ward save is always extremely handy for a knight.

Worst that can be fielded? Eh...

oh i don't know they aren't that bad, you just have to be a bit more careful what you charge now, and to soften everything up with very large rocks, magical blasts and pointy arrows.

the things you have to be most weary of are hords if you charge them with a lance the knighs are dead, even if you get the flank (exculding a sneaky double charge), it just takes a few extra combat rounds, there is atleast lore of life and heavens can hurt these along with trebs

i don't think skirmish is worth it on archers now with the new shooting rules just buy a few extra archers.

lvl 1 damsel with beasts take basic spell unless the one rolled is better so you get a better charge with knights or use on men at arms to actually make them ok, not good. but with a combined charge with a lance will win combat and if the pesants keep enough ranks you get past a steadfast


have a look on "the round table of bretonnia", i often go there to look at ideas and stuff since it is 100% for bretonnian players by bretonnian players

i hope it's ok to plug another site, please be gentle i'm new here