Dark Elves vs Bretonnians 1500 pts (Warhammer Renaissance ruleset)
Posted: Sun Aug 22, 2021 8:22 pm
Today I plalyed a battle vs Bretonnians. We played a 1500 points battle of Warhammer Renaissance, which is a homebrew ruleset which combines rules from 4th, 5th and 8th. Some standout rules are
- free musician and banner bearer (for units of a decent size)
- All units can take magic banners
- It does have the step-up rule and units always have supporting attacks from the second rank, but enemy models touching corner to corner are not considered in base contact and cannot fight each other.
- The magic system is that of 5th, including Magic Cards.
- To prevent herohammer, magic items are not as powerful as in other editions
My list:
- Dreadlord on Dark Pegasus with Deathsword (S10) and Parrying shield (all models in base contact have -1 attack)
- Lvl 3 sorcerer with Sacrificial Dagger, Dispel scroll and Staff of Stealing (Steal your opponents magic cards, one use only) (the sorcerer is bunkered in the unit of warriors). He also had a warrior familiar with him, who protects the wizard when he gets in melee combat
- Assassin with Gromril Blade (No armour save allowed), placed in the unit of warriors
- A champion with a Parrying Blade (all models in base contact have -1 attack)
- 18 Executioners
- 25 Warriors with swords, light armour and shields and a banner which allows +4 rank bonus
- 2 units of 5 Dark Riders
- 5 shades
- 1 Repeater Bolt Thrower
Bretonnians list
- Lord with Virtue of Knightly Temper (double attacks on the charge)
- Lvl 3 damsel wizard with the Knight errants. 2 dispel scrolls
- 1 unit of 9 Knights of the realm with the Lord
- 1 unit of 9 knights o the realm with a champion
- 1 unit of 8 Knight Errants with champion and the wizard
- 3 units of archers (1 of 16 and two smaller ones of 8 archers)
My main strategy was to hold back and let him advance as slow as possible and have a solution for each of his units of knights.
A unit of warriors was to serve as an anvil with the executioners as the hammer. Using narrow (4 models wide) but deep units I wanted to prevent double charges, limit the amount of models in base contact and win match-ups by having more ranks. I figured it's no use giving the warriors any equipment, as they won't do much damage against 2+ armour. So I'd better go with higher numbers and a banner that gives extra rank bonus. The anvil was reinforced with the assassin, a champion to reduce the number of knights that can attack and the warrior familiar, which has an impressive stat line and Always Strike First for 10 points. The unit of executioners was placed a little further to the back. I left just enough space between the warriors and the RBT for the exectutioners to pass, but not enough for the knights to pass, so it couldn;t be reached for a charge.
The Dreadlord was kitted out so it could handle a unit of knights on his own (or so I thought, but more on that later).
By concentrating all magic and the RBT on another unit of knights, I planned on weakening/ taking out a third unit of knights.
The Dark Riders and Shades were to eliminate his archers and other chaff and eventually turn back and attack any remaining knights in the rear.
Fool proof strategy right? Well... maybe in theory, but in practice not so much.
- The Dark Riders and Shades did basically nothing. They failed to take out even a single unit of archers and were slowly taken out themselves. I like to think it was mostly due to bad luck (they did not hit anything firing 30 shots in total in the first turn). But maybe I should have concentrated their fire and charges more. Despite this, I never thought 5 dark riders would be unable to take out 8 simple archers.
- The dreadlord did ok, but we had a discussion about the rules here. With the Parrying Shield I anticipated none of his knights (except the champion) nor their horses would be able to hit the lord at all, since it reduces the attack of all enemies in base contact by one. With the lance formation, only knights on the sides of the lance formation are in base contact and can attack). However my opponent believed all knights in the lance formation are able to fight since he believes the knights in the middle form a second rank. Also he thought his horses were able to fight. He argued each model loses one attack and the knight and the horse form one model together. We played at his house, so I did not press it too much, but I still believe he misinterpreted the rules here. Anyway, the lord managed to kill off 7 of the 10 knights before being slain in the second round of melee. (Ofcourse it was one mere horse that dealt the final blow). The remaining three knights continued to charge and kill my RBT.
- I was absolutely abysmal with magic. Despite setting of all his dispel scrolls in the first turn, I was only able to cast one spell, Arnzipal's Black Horror, but it stopped half an inch before his Lord. Here we made a rule error as he side-stepped his unit and by-passed the horror in his next movement turn. It was only after reading the rules again after the battle, that we discovered that a lance formation is not able to do so. To be fair, his magic wasn't too succesful either, as he only managed to set of one spell in the entire battle, with which he killed my wizard in one of the last turns. Magic in this edition is strong, but fairly easy to counter.
- The only succesful part of my strategy was the anvil/ hammer tactic. The warriors easily held the knights up and I was able to countercharge with the executioners and destroyed the knights. However in a stroke of bad luck, when rolling to pursue, I rolled double one. This placed my exectioners right between my own warriors and his third unit of knights, which had been held up by the Arnzipal horror. In his next turn, he was able to make shish-kebab of both my remaining units. First he charged the executioners in the flank, destroyed them and continued the charge into the warriors, destroying those too.
- The assassin did not specifically impress me, but he did his job. He managed to kill three knights and was actually the last one of my army standing on the table. With 60 points and a magic weapon, he did not make up for his point cost directly, but since he was the only one doing damage, he did participate in keeping the anvil from breaking.
So, all in all, I console myself that I had some bad luck, but that's part of the game. We made some errors with the rules, but we are both 'beginners'. I have only a handful of battles, and for him, this was his first time playing bretonnians. Either way, I'll need to rethink my strategy for the next battle. I am impressed by the versatility of the Dark Elves and I think I should be able to find other strategies and tactics. I'd love to hear some other thoughts on how to tackle those brets. We decided I could try and get even in our next battle for 2000 points.
- free musician and banner bearer (for units of a decent size)
- All units can take magic banners
- It does have the step-up rule and units always have supporting attacks from the second rank, but enemy models touching corner to corner are not considered in base contact and cannot fight each other.
- The magic system is that of 5th, including Magic Cards.
- To prevent herohammer, magic items are not as powerful as in other editions
My list:
- Dreadlord on Dark Pegasus with Deathsword (S10) and Parrying shield (all models in base contact have -1 attack)
- Lvl 3 sorcerer with Sacrificial Dagger, Dispel scroll and Staff of Stealing (Steal your opponents magic cards, one use only) (the sorcerer is bunkered in the unit of warriors). He also had a warrior familiar with him, who protects the wizard when he gets in melee combat
- Assassin with Gromril Blade (No armour save allowed), placed in the unit of warriors
- A champion with a Parrying Blade (all models in base contact have -1 attack)
- 18 Executioners
- 25 Warriors with swords, light armour and shields and a banner which allows +4 rank bonus
- 2 units of 5 Dark Riders
- 5 shades
- 1 Repeater Bolt Thrower
Bretonnians list
- Lord with Virtue of Knightly Temper (double attacks on the charge)
- Lvl 3 damsel wizard with the Knight errants. 2 dispel scrolls
- 1 unit of 9 Knights of the realm with the Lord
- 1 unit of 9 knights o the realm with a champion
- 1 unit of 8 Knight Errants with champion and the wizard
- 3 units of archers (1 of 16 and two smaller ones of 8 archers)
My main strategy was to hold back and let him advance as slow as possible and have a solution for each of his units of knights.
A unit of warriors was to serve as an anvil with the executioners as the hammer. Using narrow (4 models wide) but deep units I wanted to prevent double charges, limit the amount of models in base contact and win match-ups by having more ranks. I figured it's no use giving the warriors any equipment, as they won't do much damage against 2+ armour. So I'd better go with higher numbers and a banner that gives extra rank bonus. The anvil was reinforced with the assassin, a champion to reduce the number of knights that can attack and the warrior familiar, which has an impressive stat line and Always Strike First for 10 points. The unit of executioners was placed a little further to the back. I left just enough space between the warriors and the RBT for the exectutioners to pass, but not enough for the knights to pass, so it couldn;t be reached for a charge.
The Dreadlord was kitted out so it could handle a unit of knights on his own (or so I thought, but more on that later).
By concentrating all magic and the RBT on another unit of knights, I planned on weakening/ taking out a third unit of knights.
The Dark Riders and Shades were to eliminate his archers and other chaff and eventually turn back and attack any remaining knights in the rear.
Fool proof strategy right? Well... maybe in theory, but in practice not so much.
- The Dark Riders and Shades did basically nothing. They failed to take out even a single unit of archers and were slowly taken out themselves. I like to think it was mostly due to bad luck (they did not hit anything firing 30 shots in total in the first turn). But maybe I should have concentrated their fire and charges more. Despite this, I never thought 5 dark riders would be unable to take out 8 simple archers.
- The dreadlord did ok, but we had a discussion about the rules here. With the Parrying Shield I anticipated none of his knights (except the champion) nor their horses would be able to hit the lord at all, since it reduces the attack of all enemies in base contact by one. With the lance formation, only knights on the sides of the lance formation are in base contact and can attack). However my opponent believed all knights in the lance formation are able to fight since he believes the knights in the middle form a second rank. Also he thought his horses were able to fight. He argued each model loses one attack and the knight and the horse form one model together. We played at his house, so I did not press it too much, but I still believe he misinterpreted the rules here. Anyway, the lord managed to kill off 7 of the 10 knights before being slain in the second round of melee. (Ofcourse it was one mere horse that dealt the final blow). The remaining three knights continued to charge and kill my RBT.
- I was absolutely abysmal with magic. Despite setting of all his dispel scrolls in the first turn, I was only able to cast one spell, Arnzipal's Black Horror, but it stopped half an inch before his Lord. Here we made a rule error as he side-stepped his unit and by-passed the horror in his next movement turn. It was only after reading the rules again after the battle, that we discovered that a lance formation is not able to do so. To be fair, his magic wasn't too succesful either, as he only managed to set of one spell in the entire battle, with which he killed my wizard in one of the last turns. Magic in this edition is strong, but fairly easy to counter.
- The only succesful part of my strategy was the anvil/ hammer tactic. The warriors easily held the knights up and I was able to countercharge with the executioners and destroyed the knights. However in a stroke of bad luck, when rolling to pursue, I rolled double one. This placed my exectioners right between my own warriors and his third unit of knights, which had been held up by the Arnzipal horror. In his next turn, he was able to make shish-kebab of both my remaining units. First he charged the executioners in the flank, destroyed them and continued the charge into the warriors, destroying those too.
- The assassin did not specifically impress me, but he did his job. He managed to kill three knights and was actually the last one of my army standing on the table. With 60 points and a magic weapon, he did not make up for his point cost directly, but since he was the only one doing damage, he did participate in keeping the anvil from breaking.
So, all in all, I console myself that I had some bad luck, but that's part of the game. We made some errors with the rules, but we are both 'beginners'. I have only a handful of battles, and for him, this was his first time playing bretonnians. Either way, I'll need to rethink my strategy for the next battle. I am impressed by the versatility of the Dark Elves and I think I should be able to find other strategies and tactics. I'd love to hear some other thoughts on how to tackle those brets. We decided I could try and get even in our next battle for 2000 points.