Bretons and Enfilade 2017

On my bench now are Bretons (mainly for Saga). I started work on them a month ago and putting out about 4 figures a week, all mounted of course as that’s the “flavor” of the figures; So more like 8 figures a week if you break up horse and rider.

Historically Bretons are people from Brittany in what is now western France. They migrated from Briton (Wales and Cornwall) during the migration period and settled there and in Galacia (northern Spain). They kept up their Celtic lineage and a nation grew.

Their “flavor” in Saga is mounted javelin throwing troops. Their Saga Battle Board supports this. Right off the bat you’ve got mounted troops with range capability and special tactics that boost that with some hit and run type special moves thrown in for even more flavor. The range (mounted move of L and shooting attack of M) coupled with some guerrilla tactics every now and then gives them good flavor. The big counter to that is their lower armor.

My interest in them is mainly due to my interest in Normans (their neighbors to the east) and the relationship between the two. Seems most of the time they were at each other’s throats and then in 1066 William brought Rufus with him to England and the Bretons (re)established themselves in Briton after some notable action at Hastings.

Also piquing my interest was to run, yet another, Saga warband. Being a quasi-completionist I wanted to have a faction or 2 for every book in the Saga Dark Ages world. Saga Core I have Vikings and Normans. Saga Varjazi and Basileus I have the infamous Pagan Rus. Saga Raven’s Shadow I have Norse Gaels. Saga Northern Fury I have Scots and will soon have Bretons. That’s how much I like the game!

Further, I can combine my Breton and Norman collections into larger armies for other games I am interested in like Lion Rampant or Hail Caesar. I can also do so with my Vikings and Norse Gaels and Scots. Pagan Rus figures are a bit distinctive in both sculpt and bases (snow) so, aesthetically, not the best to mix with. I am contemplating some future projects with Mongols though so I can get into Medieval era Rus…

On my work bench, currently, are the first 4 of 16 Warriors (or Soldiers as they are denoted on the Battle Board). To speed things up I am doing the 16 figures in only 2 major colors and all the horses will be base-coated in Army Painter’s leather brown primer. The figures are all Gripping Beast thus all metal. I like the “pill” shaped 2” x 1” bases but I have been moving to multi-basing some figures but that is another blog post altogether.

My deadline (we all need deadlines right?) is end of May, Enfilade. I have volunteered to host a fun little game Friday night called “Fight for York” based off the 1069 Harrying of the North by William the Conqueror. Historically there was not much of a battle, probably a lot of little skirmishes with one side being over-powered compared to the other. It all culminated into some pretty actions on the part of the Normans though a lot of evidence currently are indicting that William’s harrying was not as bad as initially thought. After all that William placed his friend (and cousin?) Alain Rufus, Big Breton Guy In Charge, as the Duke of York or something like that. He then became very rich and pretty powerful.

My Big Plan is to play a small battle between William and his Norman retinue of knights and archers with his Breton allies. They will be tussling over a chapel that is just outside York against Svein and a group of invading Danes (Vikings) and their Scottish allies. It will be for 4 players and I am providing everything but the skills and gamesmanship.

I reserved my room at the Red Lion Olympia, after my annual tripping over the difficulties of reserving rooms on line and then being advised by many to call it in. I've also signed up for a few games on the PEL but am holding out for a few periods though the longer I do that the more the games I'm interested in are filling up.

Hope to see some of you there and hope to have a beer with you Saturday night if you are so inclined.