By The Chosen of Sigmar and Bartholomew
Prequel:
(By Bartholomew)
I was asked as guest writer, since Stefano couldn’t attend the Green Knight Tournament, to make a report together with Kaio. And as you can see I accepted gladly.
The tables:
(By Kaïo)
The scenery settings on the table were just enough to make tactical use of it, but not enough to strongly dominate a battle. The tables certainly were large enough to field large amounts of troops.
The draw of battles:
(By Bartholomew)
I play a sort of Bretonnia Flying Circus with the mandatory realm knight unit and some peasant bowmen, 2 damsels, a paladin Battle Standard on warhorse a paladin on Pegasus and my lord on Pegasus leading the 3 units of Pegasus knights. I’ve played a lot of tournaments with this exact list and it proved to give me plenty of options during every battle. So I was curious to what armies will cross the path of the Flying Circus of Baron Bartholomew this time.
Round 1:
| Kaïo's Opponent:
Kevin Ledoux. Army: Tomb Kings. About the opponent: Very nice guy who I certainly enjoyed playing. We had a fine battle and even some laughs. As it should be. About the battle: I deployed my steam tank and War Altar at the sides of my infantry and thus tried to prevent the chariot units from entering through the front. A unit of 15 heavy horsemen was wiped out by a single charge of the steam tank but my arch lector wasn't that lucky because he just couldn't get passed a unit of carrions. In fact he stood in combat way to long. My large unit of knights took a charge of a tomb prince and his chariot retinue without so much a dent and won the combat numerous times. Eventually they killed the prince but succumbed to the curse themselves. The steam tank was also destr  oyed
as was the War Altar but in a final blow the arch lector also killed the
tomb king. The battle ended in a minor victory for me. I was on schedule...Most valuable unit(s):
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Bartholomew's
Opponent:
Angelo Verplancke. Army: Bretonnia. About the opponent: A local guy, I think from Ostend. Also plays Bretonnia so didn’t have to explain much about the army. He had a lot of knights on warhorse, very though even for other Bretonnians, so this was going to be very difficult, although all other encounters with Bretonnians my Flying Circus I was at the winning side. About the battle: : Well he deployed as you can see on the picture very wide so I couldn’t immediately take a flank. This was going to be a bit of chess. I was trying to break through with a unit of Pegasus knights on my right and he was coming on my left and center with almost al the knights. Thanks to some very brave peasant bowmen in the center and on my left who kept there ground for some turns against 5 knights, with the help of my general’s Ld and my battle standard near. I was able to stop the attack of the small knightly units and when my knight unit won the combat when being charged I could take the initiative in the center. I could then charge his other big knight unit in the flank but they fled. A turn later I could charge them again and broke them also. In the end my right flank was also stopped by a brave unit of bowmen and was run down by his generals unit of Grail Knights charging in the flank. And so after a lot of killing I went away with a minor victory. Most valuable unit(s):
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Round 2:
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Kaïo's Opponent: Gentes De Clerck. Army: Orcs & Goblins. About the opponent: A player who played Orcs the way it should be: if all goes good smiling and joking, when everything goes wrong even so. Again someone I wouldn't mind facing again. About the battle: I was facing 4 spear chukka's and 2 doom divers. That is a lot of shooting for green skins at a very low cost. I knew my steam tank was going to be the prime target so I urged my knights forward on the right flank. They did an excellent job rolling up a unit of night gobo's , a unit of squigs and charging the flank of the unit Orcs with the general. These however kept succeeding their break tests and when eventually I h  ad
to take one I failed it. Luckily an 'unbreakable' unit of swordsmen
withstood a charge of Savage Orc Boar Boyz and of Spider Riders in the rear.
A rear charge of a unit Free Companies broke both Green skin units after
which they fled in the hands of the just returned flagellants. Careful
planning my last moves I took some table quarters while ignoring my
opponents' and so taking a draw in my favor.Most valuable unit(s):
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Bartholomew's
Opponent:
Patrick Cannaerts (De Witte Ridder). Army: Vampire Von Carstein. About the opponent: Well he didn’t got best sportsmanship on the 2006 Dutch GT for nothing (see my report on the Dutch Grand Tournament also on this site). He is always good laughs when we play Warhammer and we played a lot of battles against each other in tournament as well as “friendly” battles. Apart from fun he is a very good and relaxed player. About the battle: After deployment he wanted to use his wolves to kill my bowmen but they were shot. I could control Patrick’s magic only by letting his Invocation of Nehek through every time, saving my scrolls for his stronger spells. Thus his units were growing at an alarming rate and this will cost me later. So now my flyers start to encircle his force and my big unit was aiming for his Grave Guard unit with general but then his coach came in sight and it was the time to test the Terror on my realm knights when they charge the coach head on. They ran it down but then being after his line we each turned our units and so Patrick charged me with 2 big units of skeletons and when failing one fear test and outnumbered my realm unit fled the battlefield. On the left a unit of Pegasus knights and a paladin were entertaining some zombies with a necromancer who was killed on the charge, so magic was weakened a bit. In the center my big Pegasus unit charged the rear and my general the flank of his Grave Guard and in turn six the general and grave guards were gone. My general was killed in a challenge with the Vampire but lasted for 4 turns, keeping him busy not killing other knights. So at the end I only lost the big realm unit (a lot of points) and my general so I could again write down a minor victory. Most valuable unit(s):
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Round 3:
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Kaïo's Opponent: David Schraepen (De
Witte Ridder). Army: Lizardmen. About the opponent: I've played David before and just as then it is all fun and pure gaming. No endless discussions, a lot of practical jokes and plain throwing dice. About the battle: I was facing a second generation slann and although I knew he had a 2+ ward save I kept on firing at him with my canon(s). You'll never know. My steam tank took the left flank for it's account, the Arch lector took the center and my knight the right. The later soon came to the center and exposed their flank to 4 kroxigors when failing a charge on fleeing terradons. Luckily for me only 3 wounds were caused out of 12 attacks and on top of that I managed to save them all. Doing a wound in return, having a banner and outnumbering made him run but not wide enough. A canon shot direction Slann also killed 3 of 4 Kroxigors and when this last failed even to hit my battle wizard the last of the kroxigors was killed. On the left all the lizzies did was flee for the steam tank which ended up at the far end of the table. By the a scar veteran had slain my War Altar but was also killed by soulfire. Eventually all ended in a battle between my knights and the slann which challenged my perceptor. I won two rounds of combat but only by one and as my opponent was coldblooded it was hard  to
break him. In my last turn I saw a gap: I charged my steam tank in the rear
of the slann and so won combat with an outnumbering terror/fear causing
enemy. Two break tests (slann was also battle standard bearer) failed to
have ones in them so 'crazy frog' was butchered...Most valuable unit(s):
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Bartholomew's
Opponent:
Leonard van Groot Battave. Army: Empire. About the opponent: I know Leonard for some time now and played a lot of tournament games against him with mixed success. He brought 2 steam tanks and a war altar with Arch Lector to the battlefield also 2 knight units and infantry blocks. It was going to be very tough but my general was equipped with Virtue of Heroism (killing blow on Large targets) so he should hopefully live up to the expectation. About the battle: His steam tanks immediately opened fire on my knights killing 2 in the first turn. This firing was answered by my peasant bowmen on his small swordsmen unit which panicked of the table. Now my Pegasus knights could start to encircle the empire troops and wait to strike at the right time. In turn 2 my general had a failed charge on one steam tank’s flank and survived the next shooting to charge the steam tank in the next turn and kill it. One down one to go. Now his big knight unit charged my realm unit thanks to carrying the steel standard (extra D3” on charge) but after inflicting no casualty (due to very very very good saving by my dice) I won the combat big and could break and overrun this unit. Now I had the initiative with this unit but a well placed second steam tank stopped me from charging his swordsmen. So my realm unit was again charged but now by a big unit of swordsmen but they came out again victorious but didn’t pursue because they had the war altar in sight and charged them in the next turn. The swordsmen were charged of the table by a unit of Pegasus knights. The war altar having already some wounds by early expert super shooting by peasant bowmen was overrun by the realm knights. Now the second tank was charged by my general and was killed outright. The small white wolves unit was too late and became charged in the rear by some Pegasus knights who also broke them. So after turn six only the wizard remained in the middle of the forest. And so this became a massacre. Most valuable unit(s):
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Aftermath by Bartholomew :
To my surprise I ended 5th overall what a very good result was to head home. I didn’t hope for this place after the 2 minor victories. Again the Flying Circus of Baron Bartholomew prevailed. It was a fun day playing nice opponents and going home with a very nice prize. Until next year Bruges.
Aftermath by Kaïo:
I ended sixth. A nice result which I didn't expect anymore after battle two. But this makes that already one of my +30 places is wiped out and that I'm heading for top 10 in the ranking if I'm not mistaking.
