I took pictures this time which will help me remember what happened in each turn!
My list
Lord - Gauntlet of Duel, Gromril Helmet, Birth-Sword, Dueling Virtue
Prophetess w/ Verdant Heart, Lore of Life (Earth Blood, Throne of Vines, Regrowth, Shield of Thorns)
+3 CR Battle standard bearer
lv2 damsels on horse, Lore of Beasts (+1 S/T, Amber Spear), rode with Lord
lv2 Damsel on horse, Lore of Beasts (+1 S/T, Pan's Pelt), rode with Grail Knights
4x 6 Knights of the Realm - Full command
3 Pegasus Knights
6 Grail Knights - Full command, +1M Banner
3 Trebuchets (represented by catapults)
My opponent's list
Lord - No armour save rune, 4+ ward save, 2+ armour save
Rune Priest - +1 to dispel attempts
Battle Standard - +2 CR
19 Iron Breakers - full command
16 slayers - 4 of them are giantslayers
20 Handgunners
20 crossbowmen
2 bolt throwers
1 cannon
Bugmen + 11 rangers
We played a standard pitched battle as we were still getting used to the rules.
Bretonnian deployment
Dwarf Deployment after scouts (his two bolt throwers were on my extreme right while his cannon was on my extreme left.
I used my vanguard move to put my pegasus knights in the clump of 3 buildings.
Turn 1
My opponent moved his units forward except for the crossbowmen and Bugman's rangers. Shooting saw the bolt throwers miss the trebuchet that they could see and the crossbowmen wounded one of the pegasus knights.
My turn I moved everything forward 8" and a bit. No charges. The pegasus knights moved behind Bugman's rangers threatening the crossbowmen.
Magic was uneventful as I rolled a 1 and 4 so he was able to dispel everything.
Shooting saw me land a hit on the iron breakers with one of the trebuchets scoring 11 hits! I killed 8 of them. They would have panicked but his Battle Standard helped them out a lot. Two slayers also die to another trebuchet.
Turn 2
He wheels his slayers so that if I do charge his Iron Breakers they can hit the flank the turn after, Bugman's rangers oddly enough turn around and face the Pegasus Knights exposing their rear to my Grail knights.
His shooting sees two of the pegasus knights go down to his crossbowmen, the cannon kills 3 crew from my trebuchet on the right and the handgunners kill 2 of the knights in one of the lances in front of them.
On my turn I charge his iron breakers with two lances of knights (one of them has my battle standard), the hand gunners get charged by the lance they shot, and my general's unit can't find the room to hit the iron breakers despite having the distance. Oh and the Grail knights hit Bugman's rangers in the rear.
Magic sees me get off Shield of Thorns on my Grail Knights which promptly kills two of the rangers.
Shooting is a complete miss.
In close combat my champion manages to survive his lord's attacks and even wounds him. I win combat by 7 and he passes his break test. I don't break his handgunners unfortunately.
Turn 3
His slayers charge my battle standard bearer's unit.
Shooting is ineffective as the Blessing stops both bolt throwers and his cannon finishes off the trebuchet on my right.
Combat sees his Iron Breakers and slayers kill my two knight units (killed all of them except the battle standard and one knight. Not surprisingly they break and the battle standard is run down (new rule says if battle standard breaks he dies on the spot) but the other knight manages to flee. His slayers overrun while the iron breakers pursue the lone knight. He probably should have just reformed with both units.
His handgunners kill a knight but they hold.
On my turn my Lord finally gets into battle and charges the slayers. The pegasus knight champion hits the handgunners in the flank and the Grail Knights just wheel themselves into a good position.
Magic is ineffective again (it sucks when you roll a 1 on the 2d6 for winds of magic as your opponent has just 1 less dispel dice than you rather than the previous half)
Shooting is equally ineffective as the two remaining trebuchets fail to hit.
Combat sees my Lord's unit finish off the slayers (yay for horses) and my unit reforms to face down the Iron Breakers. Unfortunately the handgunners hold as I fail to do enough damage.
Turn 4
Not much he can do. He turns his Iron Breakers around to recieve the charge from my lord's unit.
Shooting sees his crossbowmen gun down my prophetess (she was hiding in the woods on my left the entire game) and his bolt throwers kill 3 grail knights.
Combat sees me lose combat to his handgunners and the knights flee. The pegasus knight holds.
On my turn I charge into his iron breakers with my grail knights and my lords unit.
Magic sees me cast the +1 S/T spell on my grail knights with irresistible force and causes a S10 hit on the Grail knights in base to base with my damsel (which is all of them), thankfully the blessing saved both grail knights that were wounded.
Shooting is ineffective again.
Combat sees me wreak absolute havoc on his iron breakers with the buffed up grail knights but they hold. My general causes another wound on his general in a duel.
The handgunners and pegasus knight stare at each other causing no damage but because of the standard I lose but hold.
Turn 5
We called it quits after the combat phase on his turn as he couldn't shoot anything and in combat his iron breakers were killed to a man.
Conclusions:
- Game went better. Some better decisions on my part and better luck with the trebuchets. 3 of them are nice for taking away ranks. Really helped me out as without Steadfast, breaking those iron breakers was a lot more likely with a charging pair of lances.
- Definately had to be more patient with all my units. I probably could have gotten first turn charges but it would have been against a steadfast infantry unit with LD10 (re-rollable) and 3+ armour saves. Not the best prospect.
- Trebuchets are freaking amazing and if I could take more I would. With 3 of them, statistically one should hit each turn and that will cause a lot of headaches for infantry based armies and allow the MSU Bretonnian army to be a lot more effective.
- I have to admit, against my opponent's army, the MSU strategy works as each lance is hard to kill, even if 20 handgunners/crossbowmen are shooting at them and there are only 6 knights in each lance. If he concentrated his fire, he probably could have killed one lance a turn, but with 5 such lances, he can't kill them all before they hit your lines. If I had 2 large lances, he probably still had enough firepower to neuter (not necessarily kill) one lance a turn if he concentrated his fire. With multiple units vying for his attention, it really stretched his firepower (not to mention he was shooting my war machines with his war machines which was probably a bad decision).
- I really like my catapults from the Siege boardgame. Perfect scale and actually physically possible (the Bretonnian trebuchet is too short). Now I just need to find a way to make crew for each of them.
- If the terrain allowed for it, I probably would have refused flank away from his bolt throwers and crossbows on the top of the hill. The narrow frontage of the lance makes it fairly easy to move around and get through narrow passages. As it was the terrain forced me to spread out but still able to concentrate on his important combat unit with overwhelming force. Not sure how I'd fare against an army with two (or more!) tough combat units.
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