MA Bretonnia: Compulsory hype/brainstorming thread.

[Burnsaber]

Ok, I decided to do this.

I'm really going to try bring the Bretonnian laser-focus on feodalism in the spotlight here. The noble commanders autosummon units (domsummon for 'religious' types), which represent them mustering the peasants from their lands to fight for the cause of the awakening. Most units will be plain recruits however.

Several commanders will also summon a "honor guard" of additional troops at the start of combat, to encourage their use in combat.

Brettonia is all about the knights, virtually everything else is just filling. To avoid the "MA Man late-game" pitfall, they will also have powerful magic, but it is mainly consentrated in the kick-*** capital only Damsels. Castles will be cheap, temples too, but laboratories very expensive (Bretons are very superstitious people).

Here is my current troop line-up, feel free to point out possible flaws and make suggestions:

Recruitable Units:

Men-at-Arms: Come with either leather or chainmail and equipped with either halberd or shield & spear. They are cheap, but lack morale & skill (since they are levied). They also form the core of PD

Peasant Bowmen: Archers with poor morale. Also in PD

Pilgrims: Chaff infatry with poor equipment, but better morale. Also use Sticks and Stones.

Yeomen: "Elite" peasantry. Have higher morale than their peasant brethen. Also come as mounted variety.

Knight Errant: Cheapest Knights. Great morale, but lack the elite stats of the more experienced knights. Come also as footed variety.

Knights of the Realm: Stats slightly better than MA Man Knights. Come also as footed variety. You will get these at PD 20+.

Pegasus Knights: Knights of the Realm, who fly. The Pegasii will fight on if the knight falls until the end of combat. Capital Only.

Grail Knights: Sacred, Capital only, expensive, kick a*s like it's going out of style.

Commanders:

Scout: Yeoman scout. Nothing to see here folks.

Courtier: A bretonnian noble who doesn't have the stomach for fighting. A "ambassador" style spy.

Brettonian Lord: Basic commander. Autosummons men-at-arms. Can summon (with a command) Yeomen. Honor Guard of footed knight Errants. PD commander.

Brettonian Marquis (a'k'a noble who is charge of defense in a border province): Knightly commander. Thuggable. autosummons men-at-arms & domsummons Knight Errants. Can command-summon Shephards. Honor Guard of Mounted Knight Errants. PD commander at 20+.

Brettonian Duke: Sacred Grail Knight commander. Very bad-*** stats. Always blessed in combat (onebattlespell "blessing"). Come pre-equipped with magical gear. Autosummon Knights of the Realm and command-summon Grail Knight. Honor Guard of mounted Knights of the Realm.

Bretonnian Hero: A Pegasus mounted Knight Commander. These nobles devote their attention to slaying monsters and acting chivalric instead of managing their land. They lack the summons of the other noble commanders, but have very good stats, are sacred and possess weapons of thug-destruction. ("Lance of a Hero" that deals 3x damage to larger foes, and a magic regular weapon.)

Grail Maiden: "Lowly" Grail damsel. These are not part of the orginal warhammer Brettonian army, but the nation needs a "research" mage. W1A1N1H2 With 100% A/W/N/E/S pick. Honor Guard of footed knight errant

Grail Damsel: Capital only. As Expensive as they can get. W2A2N2H3 with 200% A/W/N/E/S picks. Honor Guard of a single Grail Knight.


Summons:

Questing Knights: These are not a part of the normal troop line-up (they're questing for the Grail, so they're kinda busy to be enlisted regularry). But Grail Maidens/Damsels can summon them to fight for the holy cause of brettonnia. They come as commanders and domsummon Battle Pilgrims (a'k'a religiously minded peasants who follow and fight alongside the quester).

There will also be a line of "Call of Virtue" type spells, which summon large numbers of knights to remote attack provinces. (the Damsel sends a magical vision to compel the knights)

I'll also probably incorporate the Grail Virtues as a line of army buffs (castable by Damseös) which only affect sacred units.

Summons for Unicorns/Hippogriffs & Pegasii are not out of the question either.

Heroes:

Louen Leoncouren, the King of Breton: Kicks *** and summons hordes of knights. Did I mention the Griffon?

The Fay Enchantress: Grail Damsel on crack, obviosly. Probably something like W3A3N3S3H4 and riding a Unicorn.

The Green Knight: Will be nearly unkillable thug. Immortal, ethereal, regenerating...

"Merlin": Fleshing out the details at the moment..

Multihero: This will something from my imagination. I was thinking of a "beast-master", someone who handles the Pegasii, Hippogriffs & Griffons. Suggestions are highly welcome.

Custom Pretenders:

A pretender modeled after the Lady of the Lake. Human sized, ethereal and aweriffic expensive rainbow chassis.

Summary:

Strenghts: Free summon troops by noble commanders, skilled armomred knights accompanied by cheap peasant units make for a great troop line-up, recruitable thugs, cheap castles, good PD

Weaknessess: Only research mage blows, expensive laboratories, main caster expensive and capital only

[BandarLover]

WOOHOO!!

I really have nothing to add at the moment...

[rdonj]

It'll be interesting to see how this balances out. On the one hand, it can be very hard balancing so much freespawn, even if it does come with upkeep. On the other hand, having to give up magic for it is a tough choice. I'm very much looking forward to it though.

[llamabeast]

I'm not quite sure about the freespawn (I think it would be better if the troops were still at least mainly recruitables), but I'm very excited about this!

[Burnsaber]

Well to be blunt, the freespawn will be just 1 unit per month. Honor Guards will be between 1-5 units at most. To get something really noticeable you'll have to use the command spawning (a'k'a actually spend the month mustering your subjects). Besides, each regular commander you recruit makes you fall even more back in research, so the opportunity cost is really high.

The research gap is just so thematic handicap for the allways backwards Breton, but it poses it's own problems. Bretonnia is all about gragon-slaying knights and stuff, so I *really* need to encourage the use of knight commanders to get the theme of the nation trough and avoid armies commanded by 20 Damsels (Ugh...).

[analytic_kernel]

I like the mod idea.

I really can't comment from a Warhammer perspective, but from an Arthurian legend perspective, here are a couple of thoughts:
(1) What about Merlin or his equivalent? :-)
(2) What about a Questing Beast remote spell modelled after the Monster Boar one? (Cause unrest in enemy province until hunted down.) This may not be doable - I did a quick search in the forum and it seems that damage is not used as monster ID for this particular spell effect. But, it is an idea anyway....

From a vanilla Dom 3 perspective, there are Knights of the Chalice (and, indeed, The Chalice magic item) already, and it seems like the Grail thematically clashes somewhat.

(I guess if you're looking for a pure Warhammer reconstruction, then these suggestions/concerns are probably irrelevant....)

[llamabeast]

Oh, so the majority of troops would still be recruited as normal? Sounds great to me then. I thought you meant you could only get troops as freespawn, which I think would be kind of frustratingly inflexible.

I like the honour guard idea quite a bit by the way.

[rdonj]

Originally Posted by Burnsaber

Well to be blunt, the freespawn will be just 1 unit per month.

Actually I'm rather relieved by this. Skaven only autosummon one creature a month themselves, and if the brettonians could summon greater numbers thematically that would feel a bit off. The knights are makemonster knight summons are potentially problematic though.

The research gap is just so thematic handicap for the allways backwards Breton, but it poses it's own problems. Bretonnia is all about gragon-slaying knights and stuff, so I *really* need to encourage the use of knight commanders to get the theme of the nation trough and avoid armies commanded by 20 Damsels (Ugh...).

If they have recruitable thug-strength commanders I could see you actually choosing not to recruit a mage... or perhaps some of those knights should actually be able to do research, and get rid of the lesser mages altogether? Might have trouble justifying that thematically though.


As to chalice knights vs grail knights, I don't think they necessarily conflict. Who's to say there can't be more than one order of knights seeking the holy grail?

[analytic_kernel]

Originally Posted by rdonj

As to chalice knights vs grail knights, I don't think they necessarily conflict. Who's to say there can't be more than one order of knights seeking the holy grail?

If the Holy Grail and the Chalice are considered one and the same, then there isn't a conflict as far as I'm concerned. It seems that in some definitions a grail can be considered a chalice, but in others a grail is more of an open dish whereas a chalice is a cup-like drinking vessel. The references to the Holy Grail (Sangrail) in Morte D'Arthur seem closer to the open dish definition. If they are considered distinct items, then there are so many parallels that it seems conflicting....

But, I don't want to make a big deal out of this. I think the mod idea is great and this is simply a minor detail.

[Burnsaber]

Originally Posted by analytic_kernel

I like the mod idea.
(1) What about Merlin or his equivalent? :-)

I like this idea. Perhaps he could be last surviving druid of Maverni or something, to tie the nation to the original myths.

And yeah, I'm not going to exact Warhammer duplicate (since vanilla warhemmer Bretonnia is a bit bland).

Originally Posted by llamabeast

Oh, so the majority of troops would still be recruited as normal? Sounds great to me then. I thought you meant you could only get troops as freespawn, which I think would be kind of frustratingly inflexible.

Oh, I'll have to edit the first post to be more clear.

Originally Posted by llamabeast

I like the honour guard idea quite a bit by the way.

Well, it's a bit of necessity. If I don't encourage their use in combat, the knight commander will just stand back behind castle walls and summon troops. Besides, this way I can get some additional troop types to the PD.

I figured out a nice way to get all the vanilla spell slots I need to make custom #onebattlespells (I'll overwrite Bogarus nationals, since it's LA. If someone really, really badly wants both Bogarus and Bretonnia in some game, he can just rename the #selectspell commands)

Originally Posted by rdonj

Actually I'm rather relieved by this. Skaven only autosummon one creature a month themselves, and if the brettonians could summon greater numbers thematically that would feel a bit off.

Yeah. My thoughts exactly.

Originally Posted by rdonj

The knights are makemonster knight summons are potentially problematic though.

Well, I'm going to keep the knight summons mostly as footed versions (which are easier to counter).

Originally Posted by rdonj

If they have recruitable thug-strength commanders I could see you actually choosing not to recruit a mage... or perhaps some of those knights should actually be able to do research, and get rid of the lesser mages altogether? Might have trouble justifying that thematically though.

Well, one thing is. Since Grail Maides reguire the full deal (a'k'a fort, temple & 800gp labratory) but your castels are cheap, you will likely manage to build more forts than labs and temples. You could outsource your Thug recruitment to those forts.

Originally Posted by rdonj

As to chalice knights vs grail knights, I don't think they necessarily conflict. Who's to say there can't be more than one order of knights seeking the holy grail?

Yeah, there are numereous differences. Knights of the Chalice seek the cup but never find it. Grail Knights actually drink from the thing.

I'll probably explain the "sacredness" of grail thus:

"The first king of Bretonnia was appointed by a ethereal Lady of the Lake, a being of mysterious origin. She gave the King a drink of gods from a golden cup, known as the Grail. By drinking from the cup, the King became the embodiement of nobility, gifted with divine wisdom and mandate to rule wisely over the people of Bretonnia. The Grail has appeared to many other Noble Knighta, but only after a long quest where they have proven their worth."

But yeah, thanks for the feedback everyone. I'll probably show off the first picks by the end of the next week.