Building Bretonnians on a Budget

Building Bretonnians on a Budget
Hi! For those of you who don’t know me or remember me, my name is Mike Clee. I’ve been in the wargaming hobby for the past 17 years although I kind of disappeared over the last two as I needed a break as real life was getting in the way. Well I’m now slowly getting back into the hobby.
After following the tactics used by Aston Villa of selling off expensive purchases at discounted prices and replacing them with cheaper French ones, I decided to sell off my old armies and replace them with discount Bretonnians.
So after selling most of my stuff on eBay, including my Dwarfs, Orcs and Goblins and various 40k models, I managed to come up with some funds to purchase my new Bretonnians. I felt this would be best to give me a fresh start with the hobby and also allow me to build the one army which got me into the hobby in the first place.
When I was 11 going on 12 and first entered the mysterious shop with toy soldiers on 3 walls and a couple of gaming tables in the middle I felt in awe and completely lost. I felt at home in the surroundings but also completely out of place at the same time as I realised I had absolutely no idea what I was doing there. I remember being sat down and had a chat with long haired bearded man with an evil laugh and he tried to explain what the hobby was about. I was given a couple of guides to look through and told to have a long think about what it was I wanted to do as its an expensive hobby. I went away and looked through the booklets, examining each picture carefully to see which army appealed to me. Did I want to play sci-fi or fantasy was the big question I asked myself. After chatting to me friends I was outnumbered and decided to play Warhammer 40,000 along with my friends as there isn’t much point playing a game lie this without any opponents and at such a young age it wasn’t going to be easy find new ones.
I remember almost regretting my decision back then. For months after I’d flick through those same booklets and look at the ranks of high elves and various other armies facing off against each other in the pictures. I’d always been fascinated by knights in shining armour charging into battle. I told myself that one day I would have my own Bretonnian army. Finally, 17 years later, I got a knock at the door and there was a postman with my very first unit of Knights of the Realm. I was finally fulfilling the promise id made to myself all those years ago…
Anyway, I went out to buy myself some new paints as part of having a fresh start with the hobby. I found myself looking at the new range of Citadel paints which along with having new names, no contains a little of 2000 different colours including inks, shades, bases, layers and dry paints. Dry paints? What’s the deal with them? I thought I’d just chucked a load of them away before going to buy new ones. Luckily Lian was on hand to help me out and I came away £50 poorer but at least I was the proud owner of a bag full of new paint pots so I was happy. Unfortunately Amy wasn’t as impressed with my new purchase as I was.
I’d spent a couple of weeks buried in my army book and rule book trying to write a somewhat competitive 2400pt army list while trying to refresh myself with the rules as I had only played a couple of game of 8th edition Warhammer before going into hiding. My task now is to buy the last few bits and build and paint the little fellas so I will once again have an army which I can then play with. I’ve heard a lot of people say that Bretonnians aren’t very competitive in the new edition of the rules but as long as I can have a good games with some good friends then it won’t really matter. And there’s always the slim chance that a new army book will be released with Grail Knights riding atop dragons which they’ve tamed rather than slain.
In my next post I’ll add photos of the models I’ve painted so far. I’m going to put a lot more effort into keeping this updated so I can use this as a way of encouraging me to get my army done to a decent standard in a reasonable amount of time.

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