To my knowledge, it all began with a 'Eavy Metal article published in WD136 explaining the painting of bretonnian knights (if you look closely at the second picture, you'll notice the unique apparition of some crossbowmen, knights and men-at-arms probably coming from an older army).
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One month later in WD137, several regiments were joining the bretonnian army: les Archers de Brest, les Arbalétriers de Lyons, le Baron d'Angon, l'Ordonnance du Roi, the Feudal levy and les Hommes de Renault. Interesting color schemes, but look at the peasants and the cannon servants: they've received the basic flat colors on each area... and that's all! Rather disappointing considering the usual 'Eavy Metal standards...
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Best article of the series IMO, WD138 showed a new unit of knights and three character models: the General, the Army Standard Bearer and a Wizard. Painted with more care than the rank and files, they really stand out and give us a glimpse of what a bretonnian army can be when painted at the highest standards.
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As far as I know, WD143 featured the last addition to this army: a regiment of Mounted Spearmen, painted by Neil McIntosh and Matthew Fletcher.
"The horses were all painted different colours, but the techniques for the shading and highlighting were the same. After the base coat was dry, the highlights were gently drybrushed on in lighter shades of the base colour. To smooth out any roughness in the highlights, a thin wash of ink was applied before the reins were painted in Chaos Black. When the black was dry, the reins were painted Skull White, leaving a thin line of black on the edges of the reins to make them stand out against the horse. Finally, the white coat was painted over with Blood Red."
And that's it! I don't think I've ever seen this army again.
The Army articles were done in response to the release and relaunch of the newly designed Bretonnian army. There had been a few Bretonnian Knights released the year before in a similar design to the Empire, Chaos knights, and Chaos renegades on the then new unbarded plastic horses, but this was a new relaunch of the range.
ReplyDeleteThey also updated the army list from the one in the Warhammer Armies book in White Dwarf 137.
The crossbowmen are part of the old C26 Bretonnian/men at arms range that was used before these new miniatures. They have been re-released by Foundry Miniatures in thier War of the roses range.
Before the article, the old mounted knights had been discontinuted and the foot troops phased out, to make way for this more coherent newer 1990's style range, so the Bretonnian Army was in limbo for a couple of years before this. GW had released the new Empire stuff at Games day 1990 (I remember seeing it all there at the time!), and this article was the follow up the next year for Bretonnia.
The peasants were the old Milita range, used for the old style Empire army.
If memory serves me right, the Bretonnians were used in a scenario/battle report with undead in the same year, and were avalible to buy in a ready made deal.
Hope this helps.
Incedently, I am planning to complete my old style 1980's look Bretonnian army with the miniatures from foundry at some point.
Thanks Goblin Lee, I didn't know all that story (and to tell the truth, I'm also considering painting some old Citadel/Foundry bretonnian/Middle-Age models)
DeleteReally love this series you have done (and the intention behind it). I'm surprised they didn't do a High Elf one. It certainly has given me a few new ideas, and I honestly feel that the White Dwarfs from this era are beyond compare. Thanks again!
ReplyDeleteAgreed these "army spotlights" were great and my bret's are all from this era and before having picked them up in the big sell off for £1 or less each blister pack (I think it was two cav and 4 infantry in each at the time). I bought tons of stuff including over 100 cav! and then discovered years later when I started painting them that I hate painting horses doh!
ReplyDeleteSo currently my bretonnian army consists of 20 archers,15 sword and shield armed retainers, 20 xbows,15 spears,20 halberdiers (from front ranks wotr range), 25 peasant levies, 6 (count them) mounted spearmen and two charicters (the 100 years war foot knight with the two handed sword over his head, and the old lord of battle with the hammer,shield and the flur de leys on his flat toped barbute). Pretty sad considering the amount I have to paint. Though I did like this article so much that I copyed the red and black colour scheame for my xbows.
On the whole I liked the idea that rather than havin one big unified army you would have a powerfull lord with his retinue (and possibly sons leading some of the units) and then have a few vassal knights with their smaller retinues forming the army as a whole. So you get re-occuring heraldry or simplified versions of the knights colours for the "peasants" or retained fighters. So for instance my bretionian barron has blue and white halved heraldry which is repeted on his archers and halberdiers. Then I have the retinues of different lords each with their own heraldry on their units.
Of course I still have to paint up the lords but the idea is there..
ttfn
Impressive! I hope to see them soon on your blog.
DeleteAnother great WD article. Thanks for sharing. How's your dwarfs coming along? /Hans
ReplyDeleteI'm trying to finish my second unit of crossbowmen. Difficult :p
DeleteI'd forgotten about some of these articles (having destroyed, yes, destroyed my old WD's many years ago!) so it's great to see them again. Now the big question is, do you have scans of the army list from WD137? That would be really useful if you do and were willing to post pics (along with any other Bretonnian articles from the time).
ReplyDeleteDestroying such articles... shame on you! Scan added.
DeleteYou're a gent! :D
Deleteyour not the only one, in the early 00's I cut the spines off of all my old issues, and took out the pages that I wanted, shoved them in a folder and binned the rest.
DeleteNow Days I HATE myself for having done that, since I lost that folder in a move in the years since :(
Thinking back, there were a few nice diorama set ups shown in WD too, one might have been a back cover image. And there was the Chivalry one on one combat game that used various cards (they weren't printed on card though) to determine attacks and wounds. I think I'm going to have to scour Ebay for all these old mags ;)
ReplyDelete