Top 10 Most Improved Evil Profiles from the Armies of the Lord of the Rings

Hey Reader!

We're back with another Top 10 post, today looking at the top ten most improved profiles in the Armies of the Lord of the Rings book from the Forces of Evil. Now that we know all the armies that someone can be fielded in, potential models that they can pair with, and special rules, we're set to rank the top ten most improved models for the Forces of Evil in the Armies of the Lord of the Rings book.

As we did in the last post talking about the top ten most improved profiles for the Forces of Good, a few caveats before we look at the list: 

• We're ranking the most improved profiles in The Armies of the Lord of the Rings book: we will be reviewing profiles for the Armies of the Hobbit, Armies of Middle Earth, and the Legacy PDF in separate posts, but that means they don't count toward this ranking.
• We're ranking the top ten most improved profiles for the Forces of Evil in the book, so only evil profiles will be considered here.
• We're ranking the most improved profiles, not the strongest profiles: Sauron is still really powerful (more on him later in our Honorable Mentions category), but we're looking at the people who jumped up the most from last edition, not the most powerful profiles in the book.
• The "Most Improved" means that the profile had to exist last edition, so the new War of the Rohirrim profiles were not reviewed. I know, we love snow trolls (boy do I love snow trolls! Super cheap F7 with 4 Attacks if you can keep them charging!), but we're skipping them in this review.
• There were more profiles than this list can hold, so yes, I couldn't include all of the ones that I thought were interesting/useful. There will be some honorable mentions, but suffice it to say, if you really thought that someone should have made the list and didn't, there's a good chance that they were considered and just didn't break the top ten.

And so with that, let's look at some cool profiles!

Honorable Mention: The Dark Lord Sauron

While most spellcaster saw an increase in their difficulty to cast spells, Sauron basically stayed the same, while still picking up useful spells like Fog of Disarray and Foil Magic. In most respects he stayed the same, but he picked up a few really useful abilities this edition.

First off, he gained Dominant 10, which means you have to wound him to allow his army to break, but you also kind of do need to remove him if you want to control an objective near him.

Second, he added a new Brutal Power Attack. In addition to Unstoppable from last edition (which he still has, and while all monsters have a smaller version of this, Sauron's is still better since he gets a guaranteed strike against all spearmen, not just a strike against those supporting the models he slays in close combat), he also gained Flames of Evil, and this ability allows him to, instead of performing strikes normally, allows him to choose a single model in the combat: it suffers a S10 hit, and if they survive, they are knocked Prone and Set Ablaze.

Now this is a niche ability: most of the time you want to use your 4 Attacks, or 1 Attack against everyone. But if you know that you need to wound a D9-10 model, and if you don't finish them off you'll at least be keeping them on the ground for a bit, Flames of Evil will do the job.

Also a small thing, but he's one of the few monsters that is still on a 40mm base, so getting a monster into fights is far easier to do with Sauron than it is with most monsters nowadays, which is not nothing.

Not a major change over last edition, but he's seen some improvement, and we should probably note the guy whose title is in the name of the original source book and the Armies of book that we're studying, so here's the big man himself, :P 

Quick Starter Armies with the Armies of the Lord of the Rings!

Good morning gamers,

We've previously looked at how to take the Army of Edoras box set or the Armies of the Hobbit supplement and get started for $200-$500 USD in the Middle-Earth Strategy Battle Game. Today, we're tackling the Armies of the Lord of the Rings supplement as a new player - and since we've already looked at the Army of Edoras box set, we'll be assuming that you aren't interested in playing the factions from the War of the Rohirrim film (but might be interested in playing a Rohan/Dunland faction, so the starter set will only be on the table if you are interested in these factions).

As we said last time, GW is not sponsoring us here at TMAT. I get no kickbacks from the way you spend money, I don't have affiliate links, and I'm not associated with a webstore or physical store of any kind. We here at TMAT are just a bunch of gamers trying to play with toy soldiers on a budget. As a result, the recommendations I provide here are the result of much thinking and planning - mostly for myself and maybe my musings and plannings will help you too!

Like we did with the Armies of the Hobbit, we're going to assume that you've spent $60 on a rulebook and $50 on the Armies of the Lord of the Rings supplement, which means that we'll be looking for armies that you can get for $100 to $400 more (between $200 and $500 total). I'll do my best with as many of these as possible to provide stacking ways to get into the more expensive armies at lower points levels (to ease into the purchase structure). With that, let's start with the Good armies . . .

$300 Investment in The Breaking of the Fellowship: the Fellowship, Haldir, and 1 box of Lothlorien Warriors

I could have said, "Just buy the Fellowship", but let's be honest, that's boring. :-) This way, you get not only a Fellowship list (and are on your way to any number of other lists), but you're also starting out a Lothlorien army. Now I will say that the three purchases required for this list - the Fellowship, Lothlorien Warriors, and Haldir is just shy of $300 with the main rulebook and the Armies of the Lord of the Rings in hand, so if you wanted to pick up a mounted Boromir to fill out your Fellowship roster (or the Wood Elf Command blister so you can have a banner), you can do that.

The list provided below is a fun list and you can try it out with just the purchase of the main rulebook, the Armies of the Lord of the Rings, the Fellowship, and the Lothlorien Warriors (if you proxy one of your bowmen as Haldir):

20 models isn't a lot at 650, but 17 Might and counting is CERTAINLY good. Also, 11 arrows go twang! Purchasing three copies of Haldir is pretty pricey - but if you did go all-in on buying him, you'll be a good ways towards collecting a Lothlorien list, so you're getting into at least three army lists with this purchase plan!

The New Age Is Begun: The Muster of Isengard Army List

Good morning gamers,

In the last edition, one of my favorite ways to run Isengard was to have Saruman and Grima leading a ton of Uruk-Hai and utilizing a supporting cast of Thyrdan on a horse and Mauhur leading fast Scout bowmen. You can't run that list exactly in the current edition, but you can get most of the way there with the Muster of Isengard army list. With the addition of Uruk-Hai Shamans from the Armies of Middle-Earth and Vrasku from the Legacies document, you can get a pretty interesting Isengard army with this list (especially if you've purchased the Isengard Battle Host box and a commander pack - or converted an Uruk-Hai Captain for yourself). Let's see what's great about this list!

Muster of Isengard: Changes for 2025

Profile Selection

The profiles available to us now, compared to what was in the Isengard army list, is now quite limited:

• We have Saruman and Grima - and unlike the Army of the White Hand army list, this one has to take Saruman (so we'll always have Saruman . . . and likely will always have Grima).
• We have Uruk-Hai Captains/Uruk-Hai Scout Captains and Uruk-Hai Shamans, but we don't have any of the named Uruk-Hai heroes (except Vrasku if Legacies are in play).
• We have Uruk-Hai Drummers thanks to an FAQ, but none of the Orc or Dunland heroes.
• We've got Uruk-Hai Warriors, Uruk-Hai Scouts, and Uruk-Hai Bersekers - but none of the other warriors (no Orcs, no Warg Riders, no Dunland stuff).

This is a lean list - but there are some pros to taking this army list instead of the Army of the White Hand (or even Isengard in the previous edition).

Army List Bonuses

If you ran vanilla Isengard in the last edition, you broke like everyone else after losing more than 50% of your models, but you didn't have to test for breaking until you lost 66% of your models. The updated text for "You do not know pain, you do not know fear" is that "The Break Point for this army is 66% rather than 50%," so now you both break and start testing at 66% - perfect. 

Top 10 Most Improved Good Profiles from The Armies of the Hobbit

 Hey Reader!

We're back with another Top 10 post, today looking at the top ten most improved profiles in the Armies of the Hobbit book from the Forces of Good. Now that we know all the armies that someone can be fielded in, potential models that they can pair with, and special rules, we're set to rank the top ten most improved models for the Forces of Good in the Armies of the Hobbit book.

As we did in the top ten most improved profiles for the Forces of Good, a few caveats before we look at the list: 

• We're ranking the most improved profiles in The Armies of the Hobbit book, so we won't be looking at profiles beyond that book. Never fear, though, we plan to go through all the books!
• We're ranking the top ten most improved profiles for the Forces of Good in the book, so only good profiles will be considered here.
• We're ranking the most improved profiles, not the strongest profiles: Dain is incredible, always has been, and he remains incredible in this edition. But he stands mostly where he did last edition (near the top of the slayer heroes for the Forces of Good, maybe higher since most axes can't add +1 Strength anymore, and via his Headbutt rule he can still knock people prone, so he hasn't technically lost the benefit of a hammer from last edition), so he doesn't make the list. No shade: some of the greats are still great, but that's a post for another day.
• The "Most Improved" means that the profile had to exist last edition, which is not really an issue with the Hobbit books (there's a comment coming, I'm sure, about how GW doesn't really do much with this part of Tolkien's timeline, and they're not wrong to be disgruntled about that), but it is a disclaimer we're making: you do have to step above where you were last edition.
• There were more profiles than this list can hold, so yes, I couldn't include all of the ones that I thought were interesting/useful. There will be some honorable mentions, but suffice it to say, if you really thought that someone should have made the list and didn't, there's a good chance that they were considered and just didn't break the top ten.

And so with that, let's look at some cool profiles!

Honorable Mention: Mirkwood Elf Knight

All images from
the new book!

Mirkwood Elf Knights were my least favorite elven cavalry last edition, in part because they lacked the punch and mobility of Rivendell and Lorien cavalry (unless they were right next to Thranduil, like so many other models in the Halls of Thranduil list), but they got a nice new bonus this edition. The King's Knights special rule changed from a banner bonus to a +1 FV and +1 Defense within 6" of Thranduil, so they're now F6 D6, which is really good, especially since you can still buy a banner, and you may not always need the banner reroll if you're rolling 2 Attacks with F6 (whereas the bump from F5 to F6 is a big step considering how much more common F5 is now - even hobbits can get up to F5 in the right configuration).

Not a huge jump, but it does make them more than just "the one swift option you get beyond heroes," which is really nice.

Quick Starter Armies with the Armies of the Hobbit!

Good morning gamers,

Last time, we looked at how to take the Battle of Edoras box set and get started for $200-$500 USD in the Middle-Earth Strategy Battle Game. Today, we're answering the all-too-familiar question:

I don't want the start box - I'm not interested in those armies - so how do I spend my money and get into the game?

Well, fear not - today we're looking at the Armies of the Hobbit book and finding armies that you can scale up into the hobby with. As we said last time, GW is not sponsoring us here at TMAT. I get no kickbacks from the way you spend money, I don't have affiliate links, and I'm not associated with a webstore or physical store of any kind. We here at TMAT are just a bunch of gamers trying to play with toy soldiers on a budget. As a result, the recommendations I provide here are the result of much thinking and planning - mostly for myself and maybe my musings and plannings will help you too!

We're going to do this a bit differently this time - we're going to assume that you've spent $60 on a rulebook and $50 on the Armies of the Hobbit supplement, which means that we'll be looking for armies that you can get for $100 to $400 more (between $200 and $500). I'll do my best with as many of these as possible to provide stacking ways to get into the more expensive armies at lower points levels (to ease into the purchase structure). We won't be looking at all armies in the book, but I'll be laying out different options for the factions of Dwarves, Men, Elves, and Orcs so you can determine what your best point of entry is. 

I will start off by saying that these models are newer, so getting into these factions is going to be a bit more expensive than you'll find with armies from the Lord of the Rings. We'll start with the Good armies . . .

$250 Investment in the Garrison of Dale: 1 Windlance, 2 Dale Commanders, 2 boxes of Warriors of Dale

I know, I know, there's no Girion in this list - that's intentional, actually. Girion isn't currently in the GW webstore, so I have a Windlance taking his place temporarily - pick up Girion when he arrives again and he'll probably be cheaper than the $62 Windlance in my calculation. Dale Commanders only cost $38 for the set and 20 Warriors of Dale can be purchased for $52, so doubling up on both of these options means that for less than $200, you can get two Heroes of Fortitude and full warbands for them with 16 guys left over (plus two banner/war horn carriers) for Girion to lead. We can max out our warbands and get 45 models with something like the following list:

You could drop the second banner and get a war horn, but we don't have any extra warrior slots and no equipment that we can manipulate on our heroes besides getting a Windlance for Girion. If you allow the purchase of a Windlance (either on Girion or separately), the list jumps right up to 650, which is pretty good. For each additional $130 you invest (give or take), you can add another 2 Captains of Dale and 24 Warriors to your collection, but honestly you probably only need to do this once more and you're good to go (so at $400, you're all set for Dale . . . unless you want to get Knights of Dale now that they got their profile back).