Well yesterday saw my last game with Antony's Brettonians and what a game it was!!! Lezle is one of my favourite opponents - we don't actually play each other often (he jumps frequently between Fantasy, 40k and Mordheim) because he has a great sense of humour and an eye for the narrative side of the game. Straight away it was determined our two Generals (both mounted on flying monsters) would simply have to clash in the middle of the board in epic combat... man-a-mano. Lezle is a real life knight (well... he rides a horse - called Abby for ayone who's interested - and does sword-fighting and other knightly stuff) so I really felt like I had something to prove!
Lezle used a Vampire Counts army, again built with available miniatures and fun in mind but it's still VCs and as a result still effective and reliable. He had a fighty boss on Abyssal Terror (probably the worst option but you see, Lezle isn't fazed by that at all) with Hatred/Fury and Carstein Ring, 2 Dreadknight Vamps with Infinite Hatred and one had the Periapt, 2 Skellie blocks, Zombie block, Ghoul block, Graveguard block, 4 Wraiths and Banshee and the icing on the cake - 6 Blood Knights. I had painful recollections of the last time I played against Blood Knights. Hrm...
For two turns a unit of Mounted Yeoman bravely baited the Blood Knights on my extreme right flank, keeping them from making a right mess of... well, anything they touched really. Lezle was ready to charge his General (on the opposite flank from the Blood Knights) into the Realm bus with BSB until I explained what would happen (static 7, champion challenges, even with max overkill Vamp general loses by 2, next turn my general charges in - game over Vampire Counts). The two buses easily smashed up the Ghouls and a Skellie block with an accompanying Dreadknight Vamp but the resulting overruns put me waaay out of position and a reform in my turn resulted in the Realms charged by the Wraiths and the Errants charged by the Zombies (gah - tarpit hell). Meanwhile the Pegs and little Realm unit bounced off the Graveguard with the other Vampire after they were flanked by the second Skellie unit. Ouch.
The Blood Knights, having chased off the Yeoman, about-faced and headed towards the action in the middle of the board. A combined charge from the Grail Knights into the front and the Brett General into the rear of the Graveguard did for them; the Grails overran into some Skellies and mashed all of them but ONE (the unit champion) in Lezle's turn. They killed off the last one in mine but were then charged by the Blood Knights and, being unable to flee due to Immune to Psych (yay), died horribly. My General overran from the Graveguard towards the Vampire Lord on Abyssal Terror and it looked like we'd finally get our epic boss fight.
The Vamp Lord charged in and after Infinite Hatred and Red Fury had done it's work I needed to pass one ward save to keep him alive but it was not to be. In a twist of fate however the Hippogryph failed it's monster reaction test and promptly became Unbreakable. Lezle fluffed his rolls in the following turn and the Hippogryph started tearing the Abyssal Terror a new one. This combat was still going on when the Blood Knights plowed into the back of the Hippo.
The Realms eventually beat down the Wraiths (thanks to the BSB and his magical death stick) but only the BSB and Damsel survived. They charged into the flank of the Zombies which was finally enough to break them and wipe them out. This left the Errants with just enough time and space to charge the Blood Knights (who had just overrun into the Hippo) in the flank! Result!
In the final combat the Errants smushed some Blood Knights, the Hippo finally died but so did the Abyssal Terror. At the end of the game Lezle was left with his General on two wounds and 3 Blood Knights (still an astounding amount of points there!). I had the Errants above half, a Damsel and BSB, the Paladin leading the Errants (who challenged the VC general - thank-you Gromril Great Helm!), some Peasant Archers and a unit of Yeoman. As the peasant units both were holding table quarters I won by 450VPs so really it was a very close game!
What an outstanding end to the Brettonian saga! In my 8 games I've played a variety of opponents and armies. I've learnt lots about less familiar aspects of the game - some hard lessons for me (and some for my opponents - hehehe). Won some, lost some. Just how it should be.
Having spent quite some time "army whoring" (nice way of saying it Dave) I've decided to go back to my roots and once against castle up with the little bearded lads. Time to remind all and sundry how shooty and static-ressie stunties are. There are more than a few outstanding grudges to be called out so I'll be loading up the old Organ Gun once more and taking on the unwashed masses. Andrew's new Slanneshi Chaos Mortals army (with the mega - seriously these guys are HUGE - Knights of Dooom!) is high on the list.
And while I'm distracting the unwary with Dwarfy killiness... the Vampire Counts get closer and closer to completion. Bwahahahahaha!
Thanks to all the people I played with Brettonians. Your patience (and knowledge) helped me out immensely. Maybe next time I have to face Brettonians I won't wet myself in absolute terror. As long as the next time I play them I'm not facing Marcello maybe I'll be ok :-)
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