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As we all know, Bretonnia last received an armybook update in early 2004. That's also when it last got its last model kits. And other than the End Times, it was the last time it got any decent fluff coverage.

Over the past 5 or so years both the show Game of Thrones and the books it is based on have exploded in popularity worldwide. Never before have kings and knights and medieval times been so popular in pop culture.

They've made things in Warhammer more grim and dark and grimdark over the last 15 years. What better way to continue this by following in Game of Throne's footsteps? Bretonnia has a supposedly pious and noble king on the throne. Is he really? He has a bastard son named Mallobaude who is in league with dark powers and vampires in Mousillon. What kind of intrigue and manipulations were going on behind the scenes with Athel Loren, the Fay Enchantress and the Lady of the Lake (even though we found those answers out in the End Times)? Bretonnia even had a civil war occur off screen prior to the End Times between the king and his bastard. All of these things just scream "rip off GoT" like they've ripped off countless other historical and pop culture events throughout the last 30 years.

So did Games Workshop majorly miss out by not capitalizing on this? Bretonnia could have been a major hit and brought in a new crowd. But instead they chose to simply ignore a golden opportunity.

Brettonia sadly has been a sideshow army, I still have to use that 2004 army book, yes they missed out big time, they could have made brettonia less arthurian and more GoT like and cashed in, but as usual for GW lately they punt.

Im confused by b the question, are you talking about how their fluff was a ripoff of GOT, or forgetting the story of Arthur and the knights of the realm?

Fantasy was relatable because their stories took from other popular stories and myths, with AOS their just doing it without citing sources.

If you're saying what I think you're saying, no.
I mean, GoT is the flip side to Arthurian legend - the knightly paragon vs. scheming & backstabbing.
Wouldn't fit.

Game of Thrones itself is inspired by the Wars of the Roses.

If GW wanted to capitalise on GoT I think they would have needed to licence the setting and make some specialist army books and models for the different factions. These could have been based on Bretonnians. The rules could have been a cut-down version of WHFB (like AoS) or a new system like LoTR, or the LoTr system.

Given the amount of GoT merch on sale, ranging from the books to figurines, Nendoroids, a board game and diaries and notebooks with GoT coats of arms, etc, it could have been as big a success as LoTR.

But I don't think GW want to follow the strategy of licensing settings from popular culture. They want to create their own popular settings (actually, a singular setting because it's all Warhammer Universe now.)

Sorry if the wording was a bit confusing. I'm not saying they ripped off GoT. Nor am I saying they should have licensed it like lotr.

But they should have updated their medieval knightly faction to capitalize on the popularity of GoT. Sort of like how some think Tau were created to capitalize on the anime boom in the late 90s.

The Warhammer setting is dark and gritty enough to emulate a lot of the infighting and scheming in GoT. It has magic, monsters, etc. With a little effort I believe they could have been "inspired" by GoT and made Bretonnia into something popular.

I have heard that older WHFB editions and WHFRP especially had cast Brettonia in a very dark light of scheming nobles and downtrodden peasants, before they got a Knights-of-the-round-table style makeover. I would be all for it - and perhaps it is something they could do well in Age of Sigmar because there is much more scope for vying kingdoms to clash against one-another.

With regards to official models (which is not what the OP is suggesting but others have talked about) - well, there is already a model for Tyrion ;-)

Just to add as well, the amount of female fans of GoW really goes to show that fantasy (and Warhammer) does not have to be marketed just for boys. Some powerful female figures and miniature ranges that girls could identify with would be a really good way of appealing to a whole new demographic.

It's a long way from being their greatest miss! A game of thrones minis game would have been a better choice than the LotR minis games, but I get to say that with the benefit of hindsight; I wouldn't have predicted that before LotR came out.

As for making Bretonia more Games-of-Thronesy; I don't think that would be a good fit. Bretonia is all about knights and heros and Arthurian legends. Games of Thrones is about conscripted peasants dying in the mud because the people in power are arguing about who gets to be the big boss. It's about spies and misinformation and stabbing people in the back, both figuratively and literally. It's about knights that are a bunch of donkey-caves murduring and raping because they can get away with it.

By the time you finish making Bretonia like that what you're left with isn't Bretonia; it doesn't even fit the style of minis. Rewriting the Empire would be better, but the Empire doesn't need a rewrite IMO.


They could make a new faction but I don't think that would do well enough to justify the investment. The best I can think of would be to do a campaign that is Games-of-Thrones like, but without being able to use the Game of Thrones names I don't see it being worth the effort.

(semi-related: If it was to be a GoT collectible wargame I'd want it to use something like a 6mm scale so it felt more like huge numbers of units being sent to their deaths; I want casualties rates in the hundred or thousands, not in the dozens.)

It will be interesting to see how Bretonnia is handled in Total War: Warhammer.

Bretonnia is almost certainly going to be a playable faction in Total War: Warhammer -- the latest map has the Bretonnians with seven provinces on the map, more than Chaos or Vampire counts at the start of the game.

http://wiki.totalwar.com/images/9/9e/Factionstartmap.jpg

 Nepenthe wrote:
As for making Bretonia more Games-of-Thronesy; I don't think that would be a good fit. Bretonia is all about knights and heros and Arthurian legends.

Wrong.

Bretonnia back in 4th edition (and before, I think) was a pretty dark and oppresive feudal setting, with corrupt and scheming nobles, and opressed peasants (at the same time the Empire was heavily inspired by modern-age Holy Roman Empire, with a puppet emperor used and abused by conspiring counts, and constantly under siege by the Chaos threat).

Then 5th edition came along and Bretonnia was turned into pure Arturian high fantasy. Bleargh.

6th mostly did a mix between 4th and 5th edition settings: the arthurian themes were kept, but the country got back a bit of its old gritty background, with opressed peasants and the like. The darkest tones from 4th were confined (and even ranked up a bit) to Mousillon.

Bretonnia had a lot of potential, as well as many other Fantasy concepts that GW stopped caring about (Chaos Dwarfs, Dogs of War). The proliferation, during the 2000s, of plastic historical miniatures ranges that offered pretty decent alternative models at a fraction of the price is usually believed to be one of the main reasons for the sidelining of Dogs of War first and Bretonnia later.

Well, maybe it was accidental but GW did bring back the Bretonnian range(most of which was out of stock for years) when everyone was GoTs crazy on the Round Table site and making armies to match the series.

So I'd say it wasn't a total missed opportunity.

It has been 12 years since Brettonia got a revamped book. They need it. I also wouldn't mind seeing what they do with the minis seeing the great job they've done with Stormcast and the Fyreslayers.

If I saw new Bretonnian (or Bretonnia-like) figures for AoS I'd probably/certainly cry tears of joy.

I imagine the free people will take alot of inspiration from them as they're basically living in dark age to feudal age societies after chaos invaded. I also take encouragement that Bretonnians and Stormcasts work really well together with their shared paladin keywords.

Yeah would view it as a miss but it's redundant really after the red button was pressed on the Warhammer world. Thought that there were possibly more interesting plot directions that would take precedence like Vlad as an elector count but a Bretonnia with the return of Gilles Le Breton would have been interesting to see developed.

I always thought that the Bretonnians were never really explored or developed properly even at the time of the last army books release. Worst part is that crusader stories offered great potential for developing campaigns in other parts of the Old World

Baron Klatz wrote:
Well, maybe it was accidental but GW did bring back the Bretonnian range(most of which was out of stock for years) when everyone was GoTs crazy on the Round Table site and making armies to match the series.

So I'd say it wasn't a total missed opportunity.

Really? I don't remember anything from them in fourth other than a few pages of Chivalric and Arthurian romance stuff in the boxed set Bestiary book, they didn't have an army book. In 5th they increased the Arthurian/Robin Hood/Troubadour stuff up to 11. From my memory it was only really with the 6th edition army book release where a lot of the stuff about how they mistreated peasants and how corrupt and realistically "gritty" they were in contrast with their hypocritical adherence to the chivalric code.

@Lt.Donomar, I definitely agree on all the lost opportunities for the old world that could've been explored.

If it's any consolation, there's one large project called Endhammer that's a fan-made continuation of the old world after the end times. 1d4chan has the best info on it.

@Dai, I believe you misunderstood my meaning. I meant that there was a flood of GoTs-styled Bretonnian armies made by the players.

The Round Table of Bretonnia's painting section was filled up with Stannis armies.

You're spot on in your description of Bretonnia's development, however.

Baron Klatz wrote:
If I saw new Bretonnian (or Bretonnia-like) figures for AoS I'd probably/certainly cry tears of joy.

I imagine the free people will take alot of inspiration from them as they're basically living in dark age to feudal age societies after chaos invaded. I also take encouragement that Bretonnians and Stormcasts work really well together with their shared paladin keywords.

I think some of GWs problem with e Brets is they're too close to the historical inspiration.

For me, for example, I'm likely going to grab the new Perry Miniatures Agincourt French Infantry (and foot knights) to use in both my historicals armies and as foot troops in my Bret armies. I use a lot of the old Perry metals for infantry anyway, so the size may not be as obvious on the table. Sure, I lose huge tower shields, but they look the part.

GW is likely going to make Brets/Empire into something different enough to appear to be able to claim IP protections.

Regardless, building up that GoT army using Brets in AoS is super easy, there are lots of choices for models.

Agreed with everything you just said.

My only addition would be that I'm going to give kitbashing the Malignants and starter set forces together as well to create AoS Brets.