Shooting: Skirmish models, Revisited

Good morning gamers,

Today’s post is something special – today I'm joined by Centaur in talking about different skirmish lists in MESBG. The intent of this post is to highlight some of the tactical thoughts that go into using different lists. For our purposes today, skirmish lists will be focusing on dealing damage outside of melee in order to whittle down an opponent's force to a more manageable size. This generally requires movement, as skirmish troops don't want to be engaged right away.

Without further ado, let’s take a look!

Rohan: The Swift Skirmish Approach (Centaur)

I've played Rohan, Shire, Azog's Hunters, and Rangers for a while, and with the new MESBG rules things have changed slightly but not by much. Rohan still relies on outrunners (aka, Rohan Outriders without horses) as its core ranged model, but has the flexibility of throwing spears on virtually everyone, so almost any hero and any warrior can become a skirmisher. And with the option for a fully mounted force with great bonuses (whether you use the Legendary Legion or the standard Rohan list), you can have arguably the best mounted skirmish force in the game.

I would say more, but there's plenty of tactica on this blog for Rohan, so I'll simply say: "You can stay at range and shoot at people all day, softening them up for a devastating charge from your melee-centric characters."

(Ed: for specific tactics for Rohan, please check out Centaur's dated-but-mostly-still-applicable-works on general Rohan tactics, Rohan Heroes, and Rohan Warriors - though there's also the famed debate Centaur and I had a while back on why you should or shouldn't bring mega-Eomer, which has since been nullified by the merging of his two profiles. All of this will be revisited, I'm sure, with the release of War in Rohan in the coming weeks).

Shire: Complicated Skirmishing with "The Deep Breath" (Centaur)

Okay, I'm writing a whole post on Shire skirmish tactics (complete with pictures) because there's frankly too much to talk about here, but suffice it to say for now, Shire lives on ranged attacks, and that means you need to be wise and judicious as regards skirmishing. 

Every hobbit character starts with a throwing weapon, but it has very limited uses as regards skirmishing as you can't move and throw in the same turn. But with dirt cheap 18" archers on a 3+ Shoot Value, you get a good corps of cover fire for your lines and a massive army size, allowing you to buy lots of rounds for your force to shoot (again, if you're judicious in when you lose people). More on that in a future post.

Isengard: Uruk-Hai Bows vs. Crossbows? (Tiberius)

Okay, let's get something out of the way off the bat:

Crossbows don't skirmish. 

Crossbows can shoot, crossbows hurt a lot, but to properly understand "skirmishing," you need to be able to maneuver AND still pose a shooting risk.

Possible skirmish tactic with crossbows: half shoots, half retreats. Inefficient, but gets you movement.

Now you can kind of do this with crossbows if you put them in two groups and do what musketeer companies did historically, with the two groups staggered (one 3" ahead of the other in MESBG terms), the forward line retreating as the enemy got close (6" move backwards) while the other provides cover fire. This can be alternated every turn so that half of your crossbow strength is firing each round.

But let's face it: no one running 10+ crossbows wants to fire 5 shots a round - you want to shoot 10 shots a round and eventually get into fighting. So, though you _can_ skirmish with crossbows, people don't. So the question stands: "How can I skirmish better with Isengard (and should I skirmish with Isengard)?"

The answer? Uruk-Hai Scouts (and Warg riders)!

This is WAY more powerful than it was in the previous edition - if you haven't faced it yet, prepare yourself...

Uruk-Hai Scouts got a lot better as archers in the new edition: while their stat line didn't get any better, they got 18" S3 Uruk-Hai bows (vs. the old 18" S2 Orc bows). While S2 and S3 aren't guaranteed to make a difference, most armies tend to run a mixture of even-Defense and odd-Defense models. Since your Uruk-Hai (and Dunlendings and Warg Riders and crossbow bolts - so basically everything) are even-Strength models, armies that have odd-Defense ignore the benefits of your increased Strength. But not so with Uruk-Hai bows - their Strength 3 is a nice complement to the predominently Strength 4 army not because it's better, but because it damages odd-Defense targets just as well as more expensive range options. Consider that an Uruk-Hai Scout with an Uruk-Hai bow costs 2 points less than a crossbowman and only loses -1 Defense (which, ironically, doesn't make a difference against S3 opponents) and 6" of range/-1 Strength on the range weapon of choice. In trade, Uruk-Hai Scouts gain the ability to move and shoot (suffering a small penalty on the To Hit roll, but gaining better positioning - especially if they're affected by a Heroic March, upgraded to Uruk-Hai Marauders (more on that next), or within range of an active Uruk-Hai Drum).

Converted Mauhur and Actual Lurtz

You can augment these archer's capabilities by getting them into the action sooner by varying who leads them. Lurtz can take up to 15 models (who could all have Uruk-Hai Bows) in his warband and deploy them wherever you choose (pick your board edge in Maelstrom fights, at any rate), making sure they can activate how you want (and where you want) from the beginning of the game. A properly constructed "Lurtz-Ball" is really dangerous - 16 Uruk-Hai Bows tearing into someone's position? Yes please! Alternatively, you can run up to 12 of them with Mauhur, who can pay +1 point/model to boost their speed to 8" (allowing them to move up to 7" a turn and still shoot if affected by a Heroic March and an Uruk-Hai Drum - perfect for moving up the field and getting ready to engage in melee).

Not my Ballista - this one is Centaur's...

While taking Uruk-Hai Scouts is a great way to skirmish, there are other options available to Isengard as well. While Warg Riders can take throwing spears (probably the best skirmish weapon available to Isengard), their shoot value is pretty low. Functionally, we haven't seen Warg Riders perform well as skirmish troops in our gaming group. If you want to force your opponent to engage with your army (and pursue your Uruk-Hai bows), one of the best ways to draw them out is to use a Ballista - a tactic that Centaur aboslutely LOVES to do (BALLISTAAAAA!!! :D).

Ballista not only have incredible range, but their ability to throw the target unit back makes them great for shooting at/near tactical units that provide some kind of auric boost to their friends. Centaur remembers quite fondly a game where he threw the Dark Marshal backwards TWICE (two direct hits!), keeping his banner buff away from the Orcs that needed it (not to mention, he almost killed the Dark Marshal with it, so I had to play more carefully with him after that).

Now like crossbows, ballista don't skirmish - if you move them, they can't fire. However, the purpose of the ballista is to make your opponent come towards your army, bringing them in range of your skirmishers. Armies that can shoot will do their best to avoid getting decimated by a ballista and armies that can't shoot at all will rush like mad dogs towards it. All of this plays towards your strengths: get them in close so you can whittle them down before you engage with your full force.

Don't like your throwing weapon options? How does a magical blast of energy sound?

Alternatively, one of the other options you have for skirmishing can be found with Saruman. Recall that the idea of skirmishing is the ability to whittle down your opponent before he gets to you. While damage with Sorcerous Blast is possible, the damage output you get tends to be small (unless you're hitting Defense 3 models). The greatest advantage that Sorcerous Blast gives you isn't actually it's damage - it's the Knocked Prone condition is places on its victims. While you can't send a poor warrior barrelling through ranks anymore, you can target a model in a shieldwall formation at a 45 degree angle and simultaneously hit two models (the model beside him and the model behind him), since you'll hit them both at the same time. These three models (even if they don't die) will slow down the formation, allowing your archers more time to skirmish. Since Saruman can cast Sorcerous Blast decently well on a single die (thanks to the reroll, 0.75 probability of success) and incredibly well with one die from his store as well (0.875 probability), you can do this strategy for ages without wearing yourself out (and the more you do it, the more likely you are to get some kills in).

Sample List: Skirmish-Heavy Isengard
Saruman - 180pts
7 Uruk-Hai Warriors with shields - 70pts
6 Uruk-Hai Warriors with pikes - 60pts
2 Uruk-Hai Scouts with Uruk-Hai bows - 18pts
3 Warg Riders with shields and throwing spears - 39pts

Lurtz with shield - 90pts
11 Uruk-Hai Scouts with Uruk-Hai Bows - 99pts
3 Uruk-Hai Scout with shield - 27pts
1 Uruk-Hai Scout with shield and banner - 34pts

Isengard Assault Ballista with +2 Crew - 83pts

700pts, 40 models, 14 Uruk-Hai bows + 1 ballista + 3 throwing spears + 1 Sorcerous Blast, 7 Might

This list has three warbands in it - each with a skirmish element in them (or the ability to force yoru opponent to skirmish with you). The list has a ballista with four crew and a siege veteran (because we had enough points for 2 more guys but didn't have any space in any of the other warbands), which means you can beat a hasty retreat with a guy or two tying down enemy pursuers OR keep those pesky Goblin-town Goblins from sneaking up on your ballista. The list also has an 11-strong Lurtz-ball, which is good enough at doing damage at a distance if required. The addition of a banner not only makes Lurtz more effective in combat, but also helps the archers not wilt away as quickly (we opted for more melee Uruks so they can pick up the banner if it falls - and, you know, be able to stall for the archers if needed). Finally, we have a pike block supported by some Warg Riders (and two Uruk-Hai Scouts with Uruk-Hai bows) led by Saruman. While we could have gone with Vrasku and Mauhur, Saruman provides a unique boost to skirmishing, since he can move at full speed with the Uruk-Hai in his squad and still "shoot." At 40 models, it won't take many shots (be they from the ballista, the Uruk-Hai bows, the Warg Riders, or Saruman) to make the disparity of numbers a real threat to your opponent.

Azog's Hunters: New Skirmish Force (Centaur)

So, I didn't used to take bows very often with Azog's Hunters, mostly because with a 5+ Shoot Value they didn't hit much. I'd mostly take a small band of them just to bait enemy cavalry to charge me, and then whip out 2 Attacks at S4 to tear them apart, but that only worked a few times in the gaming group before people started catching on.

But with the new army rule that increases their Shoot Value to 4+ there's a lot more reason now to take archers, both on foot and mounted on fell wargs. Sure, it's still 4s or 5s to hit (depending on if you move) and the 18" max range is hard, but the advantage that you get with Azog's Hunters is the same that you get with the next group we'll talk about, and that is that your archers fare decently well in close combat due to their high volume of attacks. You can get away with being charged without losing as many guys because of the 2 Attacks standard on each model.

(Ed. Bringing Bolg also makes all of these bowmen get Morgul arrows, so a single wound against a multi-Wound target could translate into damage over time against heroes and especially monsters - which will allow your warriors to focus on doing damage to enemy warriors).

Rangers of the North: Power Skirmishing (Centaur)

The big change for Rangers came in the removal of warrior models. Back in the old ruleset you could purchase rangers for 8-9pts to accompany your Dunedain, Rangers of the North, and named heroes, but now we're down to a few (albeit more defensible up close) heroic models rather than a larger swarm of warriors supporting heroes. 

But the concept for Grey Company is still the same: soften up with a 100% bow limit, use firing lanes to mitigate (not eliminate) elements of the enemy force, and make them untenable in a straight fight against the rangers that stand against them. The addition of 2 Attacks on foot now is huge, as it means that 4 rangers (c. 100pts) can hold about double as many people in a fight with relative ease, especially if you are within Halbarad's 6" banner radius. 

So skirmishing and then closing to kill is much easier and more effective than it used to be in older editions of the game, even though your army size is also lower.

(Ed. It's also worth pointing out that while the named heroes available to the Rangers are limited, the Grey Company Legendary Legion from Gondor at War provides the inclusion of Elladan/Elrohir, Legolas, and Gimli at the cost of Arathorn, who, if we're honest, we weren't bringing anyway).

Lothlorien: Wood Elves or Galadhrim Warriors? (Tiberius)

Before we get into the Wood-Elf-versus-Galadhrim debate, there are two other units that bear mentioning when we look at Lothlorien and skirmishing: Galadhrim Knights and Wood Elf Sentinels. Both of these units provide some powerful capabilities to a Lothlorien army, albeit at a high point cost. Let’s look at a few of their benefits:

• Galadhrim Knights are Expert Riders with Fleetfoot, so they can move 10” through woodland terrain and still gain their charge bonuses. While this certainly makes them good charging infantry, they’re even better as horse archers, since they can get the defense bonus from their shields (which makes them D6 now) AND still take a bow and shoot (moving 5” through woodland terrain while shooting). While they lack the lances of Rivendell Knights, they’re fantastic horse archers, able to keep pace with the best mounted units, be they from Rohan, Dol Amroth, or Mordor.
• Wood Elf Sentinels are the only multi-attack models available to Elves in the Lord of the Rings book (and are only matched by Mirkwood Rangers if they are engaged by multiple opponents). While their melee combat skills are incredible, their Elven cloaks paired with Elf bows make them potent at range as well (since a piece of horizontal terrain can keep you from targeting them with archery, magic, or cavalry charges). Thanks to their Songs (specifically the Eldamar Madrigal), they can also slow down a model that’s charging them so they can shoot longer.

Two of my sentinels - expensive, but lethal at range and in close combat.

While I don’t own any Galadhrim Knights, I’ve thought about changing that and picking up a few – they’re expensive, but could be really useful. I’ve owned three Sentinels for years and even brought one of them in my Lothlorien list to last year’s TMAT GT. While I don’t use them as much as I could, I do like the models a lot and they’re really useful against low Courage models (Shades especially, Trolls aren’t bad targets either).

Most of the Lothlorien lists I’ve seen use a healthy helping of Galadhrim Warriors and Guards of the Galadhrim Court in order to have maximum Defense for the inevitable grind. While I think Galadhrim Warriors are (now) worth their cost and Guards of the Galadhrim Court are great for lending F6 to certain fights, there’s a very strong case for using Wood Elf Warriors in your army to make them more of a skirmish force than your traditional “rank-and-meet-them-head-on” force.

For this to work properly, you'd want to be behind some horizontal terrain - or be near Galadriel. This particular set up would end very, very badly...

If you’re going to run bowmen, you should field Wood Elf Warriors with Elf bows instead of Galadhrim Warriors with Elf bows. While Galadhrim Warriors pay 11 points/model to get D5 on their archers, Wood Elf Warriors pay only 10 points/model to be D3 and benefit from Elven cloaks (which, if you can find some horizontal terrain that you can see over, will make you an ineligible target for shooting AND charging AND magic – which is way more than the D5 will get you).

Wood Elf Warriors are critiqued for having low Defense (D3 is really bad – everyone agrees). 

However, against certain armies (armies that field a lot of S4), being D3 (wounded on 4s) is only slightly worse than being D6 (wounded on 5s). While it is harder to get 5s than 4s, when you’re rolling two dice to wound, you have a good shot at getting at least 1 Wound against either set (0.75 probability of getting at least one 4+ vs. 0.55 probability of getting at least one 5+). Since Wood Elf Warriors are innately cheaper than Galadhrim Warriors (Wood Elf Warriors with throwing daggers cost the same as Galadhrim Warrirors with shields - and Wood Elf Warriors with throwing daggers and Wood Elf spears cost the same as Galadhrim Warriors with shields and spears), know your meta before deciding if one is “better” than another!

Wood Elf Warriors are the only Elven models in the game who can equip non-bow-armed models with a shooting weapon (throwing daggers), which is huge because all Elven models have a 3+ Shoot value (and in most cases, only one-in-three can actually do anything with it). Throwing daggers, as we’ve already talked about, are also a great way of breaking up an enemy formation when you charge, making it harder for your opponent to keep his forces united. It's this point more than the others that convinced me to collect Wood Elf Warriors when I first got started in the hobby.

At first blush, Galadhrim seem to be the better choice across the board when it comes to spearmen: a Galadhrim Warrior with shield and spear costs 11 points/model. The Wood Elf variant (equipped with just a Wood Elf Spear) costs only 9 points/model, but suffers from being D3 vs. the Galadhrim Warrior’s D6. For a boost of 3 pips of Defense for only 2 points more per model, it seems like it would be worth it to field Galadhrim spearmen over Wood Elf spearmen. Unless, of course, you use those 2 points/model to get something better (fielding a Wood Elf Sentinel you couldn’t afford before, bringing some Galadhrim Knights along, or choosing to equip all the Wood Elf spermen you bring with throwing daggers). The reduced points overall for the spearmen makes them really flexible warriors, capable of racing along a flank to shoot while they charge, and then charging into two models with the anticipation of shielding.

Sample List: Skirmish-Heavy Lothlorien

Galadriel - 130pts
6 Wood Elf Warriors with Wood Elf spears and throwing daggers - 66pts
1 Wood Elf Warrior with Wood Elf spear, throwing daggers, and banner - 36pts
5 Wood Elf Warriors with throwing daggers - 50pts

Haldir with heavy armor and Elf bow* - 85pts
6 Wood Elf Warriors with Elf bows - 60pts
6 Wood Elf Warriors with Wood Elf spears and throwing daggers - 66pts

Wood Elf Captain with Elf bow - 70pts
5 Wood Elf Warriors with Elf bows - 50pts
6 Wood Elf Warriors with Wood Elf spears and throwing daggers - 66pts
1 Galadhrim Knight with Elf bow and shield - 21pts

700pts, 39 models, 14 Elf bows* + 24 throwing daggers, 8 Might

With the exception of Galadriel (who makes it much harder for you to be out-shot by enemy skirmish armies), everyone in this list can shoot - all of the non-bow armed models have throwing daggers and we have 11 Wood Elf Warriors with Elf bows supporting two shooting heroes and a cavalry archer. Haldir and the Wood Elf Captain have Elven cloaks, so they and their warriors can shoot with impunity behind horizontal terrain at enemy armies and if no such cover exists, you can always just hang out near Galadriel's warband to benefit from her Blinding Light. Speaking of Galadriel, her warband has no bowmen in it, so you can press forward with all speed towards a good position. With 7 of her units having spears, you can not only support friendly models, but can also charge into multiple foes and parry (shielding rule) with your spears, allowing this block of soldiers to become a tough warband to shift. Add that to Galadriel's spells that can neutralize enemy power heroes, you should have time to let your throwing weapons do their thing!

Conclusion: Skirmishing in MESBG

Skirmish troops can be annoying for new players to fight and even more annoying for new players to use. Trading Defense for the potential to pluck an early Wound or two doesn't make a lot of sense at first, but the flexibility you gain in dealing with different threats is well worth the investment. While all of us at TMAT are continuing to grow in our use of tactics for different armies, many of us have put a good bit of thought into shooting over the last month and we're happy to share what we've learned with you. If you have thoughts of your own, please share them with us in comments!

Hopefully you thought this was interesting and informative. I agree with many other SBG players that the most fun part of any SBG event/game is the post-talk afterwards. These kinds of posts do that too, so I’ll try to keep things like this coming.

With the conclusion of this series on shooting, we’ll be going back to the workbench and seeing what’s been happening there – lots of show! Our next series focuses on heroes, revisiting one of our older posts on Uruk-Hai heroes/hero builds from January 2013, taking a very in-depth look at all 15 members of Thorin's Company and seeing which version is better than the other, identifying the best ways to waste Might points (aka, things to avoid), finding heroes who are good at stopping enemy magic, and revisiting our “Nobbie’s Top Twenty” post from January 2014. Lots to come and it's pretty exciting stuff - until next time, happy hobbying!