Announcing the Glare And Hack Again Tournament of 2015

Good morning gamers,

It is my great pleasure to announce the fourth annual THRO tournament! The purpose of this tournament, like previous THROs, is to try new things and to bring fun armies (very little, if any, prestige attached). The tournament will be held at Patrick Henry College on November 21, 2015. This year's tournament, occurring in November, is going under a different name: the "Glare And Hack Again" Tournament (shorthand GAHA, a play off Bilbo Baggins' classic work, There and Back Again). Without further ado, here are (in my typical style) the Ten Commandments of the Tournament (Rules):

Workbench Update: Orcs and Elves

At long last, we're back! October is going to be crazy, but finally got time to pull the camera out and showcase some of the stuff I've been working on.

Here's the full complement so far - plenty of Ringwraiths, a handful of Spectres (hoping to grow up to 10 of them), and plenty of Orcs. Army is all in dark hues and once I get the basing done, should have a menacing horde.

Castle Siege: Uruk-Hai vs. Dwarves

In preparation for THRO 2015, Centaur and I decided to have another test-round of the Hold Ground (castle siege!) scenario. Centaur won the deployment roll and opted to attack, taking his whole force and not reducing my rolls to deploy. I left 120 points at home and took the fort and the Rocks upgrade. Here are the forces:

Isengard Strategies: Ballista Crews

Hey Reader!

As we prepare for October's THRO tournament (woot!), I'll be releasing a number of tactical posts alongside the battle reports I usually produce, talking about different elements of the Isengard lists that I'm tinkering with for my force for THRO.  In today's post, we'll be touching on ballista crews, and some of the thought into why you'd take them, what they are designed to do (as well as what they are not designed to do), and how to get the most out of them in your games.

Over the past few months I've heard a number of players complain (and rightly so) that ballistas don't really work because gamers in our gaming group put down a boat-load of terrain, making the range, line of sight, etc. substantially worse than the stats in the book.  I'll note upfront that I disagree with a reduction of their effectiveness (though I grant the point on how this limits line of sight), and in my next few battle reports I'll be playing urban games just to prove this point, :)  It definitely limits range, but as you'll notice in Section II below, limitations from terrain can be used to our advantage, and we actually embrace this.  But we are getting ahead of ourselves, :)  To begin, let's start at the beginning: why would you ever take a ballista crew.

Summer Workbench: Mordor

Good afternoon gamers,

As I mentioned in a previous post, I did a lot of hobbying this summer, but due to purchasing a condo and moving, I didn't get a lot of time to post on the blog. This summer, I focused on two projects for the most part (besides purging my terrain collection before the move): Mordor Orcs (and their Ringwraith handlers) and Rivendell Elves (and some of their High Elf lords). Both of these lists will be getting a post on some of the strategies I've developed while learning how they play, and today's post will be focusing on Mordor.



The army is mostly composed of Mordor Orcs (not Morannons, more on that in a bit), but there are some Trackers and Spectres too to bring out the model count. I also own some Wild Wargs, which thanks to the new sourcebooks can be brought with a Mordor list (or Angmar under the old LOME rules). A few thoughts on why this collection of models...

Sneak Peak: THRO 2015

Good morning gamers,

So I've been thinking about our Fall "The Hunter's Red October" tournament (THRO, pronounced like "throw") a lot in the last few months, and so we'll begin this post with a short overview of the purpose of the THRO tournament and then give a sneak peak to the scenarios that are going to be played and the army list-related rules we're going to have. This is not only to field comments before the official tournament post goes up (read: this is not binding yet, so comment if you have better ideas...or if you think one of these ideas stinks), but also to allow players to practice before the tournament is posted to get a better idea of how they want to structure their armies.

Throwing Weapon Theory: How to Make Them Work

EDIT: If you found this page, you should know we've posted an update for the new MESBG rules (2018)! You can find the updated page here.

Good morning readers,

So my wife and I just bought a condo, moved, and have been doing home-improvement jobs for the last few weeks. It's been really busy. But now that most of that stuff is put to bed, I can get back to writing on the blog. Rest assured, my hobbying-hands haven't been idle in the past few months, so I'm hoping to get up a lot of content over the next few weeks (give Glenstorm a break - thanks buddy).

Today, we're talking about throwing weapons, and this post constitutes the climax of a four-year journey in learning how and why to use throwing weapons. Since starting to collect in this hobby, I've really liked throwing weapons. First with Gimli, then with my Wood Elves, I learned that there is not only a reason, but also a tact to using these things. As a preliminary note, all references will be in inches - assume 2 cm for each 1 inch we talk about here if you use the metric scale.

Battle Report: Domination: Isengard v. Rivendell

Hey Reader!

This is Centaur here with another battle report!  This battle involves me testing out one of my crazy ideas for an army for THRO 2015 (which is coming up in October) against a very odd Rivendell army concept that Tiberius is dabbling with right now.  I'd mention what makes it odd but...you'll see when he lays out his army list, :)  Since this was a "Eh, let's just test some crazy ideas and see what works" game, we decided to play a Domination game (as it has very easy rules) to help get some of the dust off of my Isengard game (as it's been years since I've used Isengard in a tournament).  The lists are below:

Easterling Summary, Part III - Strategy and Tactics

Hey Reader!

Welcome back to TMAT!  Today we're wrapping up our study of the Eastern Kingdoms (Easterlings and Khand) by talking about strategies and tactics for Eastern Kingdoms armies.  Over the past two weeks we covered a brief discussion of the hero and warrior selections as well as the overall strengths and weaknesses of the list, and now that we have all of that in mind we'll talk briefly about how we weave these elements together into cohesive armies.

Per my notes on army list building, it befits us to first note that different strategies for army building are going to affect your strategies when using Easterlings.  For people who are running more themed armies, we'll have some thoughts for you all first (with the two major themes being All Easterlings and All Mounted armies), followed by some strategies for Warbands-specific armies (talking about which units would be best served by specific heroes, pairings of warriors, etc.), and then ending with some commentary generally about in-game movement tactics to get your men into their optimal place on the table.

Easterlings Summary, Part II - Warriors

Hey Reader!

Welcome back to TMAT!  We're continuing our discussion of the warriors from the Eastern Kingdoms army list, and as there are only five army choices for Eastern Kingdoms this will be a pretty short post.  In our last post on Monday we talked about the overall strengths and weaknesses of Eastern Kingdoms lists, as well as the various hero choices that are available to generals for Easterling armies.  In this post we will be going over the different unit options - which actually have quite a bit of versatility, for only having five warrior choices - that are at your disposal.

Easterlings Summary, Part I - Heroes

Hey Reader!

Welcome back to TMAT!  Life has been pretty busy for all of us here, but I'm excited to bring you all some new content over the next few weeks regarding the end of my Easterling month.  For the next three posts we'll be discussing Easterling armies, starting first with a review of the hero choices for Eastern Kingdoms players, and noting their strengths and utility to your army.  In the next post we will be examining the unit choices for the Eastern Kingdoms (which is a small list, so it will be pretty short post), followed by a final post discussing tactics and strategies for using Easterling armies effectively.

Before jumping into a discussion on the heroes available for Eastern Kingdoms players we'll first talk about the major difference between LOME and Warbands armies for Eastern Kingdoms, followed by a quick discussion on the strengths and weaknesses of the army as a whole that players should be aware of before playing Easterlings.

Centaur Tactica Post: Army List Building, Part 2

Hey Reader!

This is Glenstorm with another tactical post, picking up with Part 2 of our Army List Building blog series.  I'm hoping to get a recorded video version up later on this, but we will see how long that takes (as I'm still trying to video my army review posts as well for Grey Company, Rohan, and Shire).

As the guiding light for this post, I'll be hearkening back to a tactical post from my favorite YouTuber for Warhammer Fantasy, OnceBitten.  OnceBitten has a tactica post on army building for Warhammer Fantasy (which you can find here), and I've found it very useful in my army list building for both Fantasy and LOTR SBG.  In our last post we chatted about mindsets behind army list building, and the seven common list building philosophies.  In today's post, we want to look at the seven things to think about when building a list, set within the context of the two types of army building schemes we use here at TMAT: Warbands (the official army building rules as of this writing) and the modified LOME scheme (for all the "old school" players, which happens to include us).

Hold Ground: Easterlings vs. Wood Elves

Hey Reader!

This is Centaur with another battle report!  I got together with Tiberius last weekend for another Easterling game, and we decided to play a Hold Ground scenario.  We're testing the castle that I own (tons of fun - I love this thing), and the scoring radius almost perfectly lines up with the lower section of the castle (so all the attackers have to do is breach the walls and get down the slope; pretty simple).  So for this match I'll be the defenders (lose 150 pts from my list), and Tiberius is bringing a wood elf army to challenge us for control of the walls, which should be fun, :)

I changed up the list a bit since our last battle (so that I can test more ways to use the army, as this is in preparation for a write-up), and since I dropped 150 pts from my list as the defender (hence why Warband 4 doesn't have a hero), it also meant that there were some things in the list that I didn't have (my D7 "Bunker Cap," for example).  After modifications, the lists look like this:

The Dragon Maw (Eastern Kingdoms, Warbands)

Warband 1
-Amdur, Lord of Blades (Army Leader): 100 pts
-5 Easterling Back Dragons with shields: 50 pts
-1 Easterling Black Dragon Kataphract: 16 pts

Warband 2
-Easterling War Priest: 60 pts
-4 Easterling Black Dragons with shields: 40 pts
-4 Easterling Warriors with halberds/shields: 36 pts

Warband 3
-Dragon Knight: 70 pts

Warband 4
-2 Easterling Black Dragons with shields: 20 pts
-7 Easterling Warriors with bows: 56 pts

TOTAL: 448 pts, 26 models, 6 Might

Muster Of The Forest (Lothloien & Mirkwood, Warbands)

Warband 1
Thranduil (Army Leader): 90 ps
1 Wood Elf Sentinel: 25 pts
3 Mirkwood Guard with Elf bows: 33 pts
5 Wood Elf Warriors with Wood Elf Spears: 40 pts
2 Wood Elf Warriors with throwing daggers: 18 pts

Warband 2
*Legolas with armor: 95 pts
1 Wood Elf Sentinel: 25 pts
3 Mirkwood Guard with Elf bows: 33 pts
5 Wood Elf Warriors with Wood Elf Spears: 40 pts
2 Wood Elf Warriors with throwing daggers: 18 pts

Warband 3
^Haldir with Elf bow: 75 pts
1 Wood Elf Sentinel: 25 pts
2 Galadhrim Warriors with Elf bows: 20 pts
3 Galadhrim Warriors with shields: 27 pts
4 Wood Elf Warriors with throwing daggers: 36 pts

TOTAL: 600 pts, 35 models, 9 Might

Pre-Game Assessment from Centaur: On the one hand, Tiberius is not running Galadriel, which means I don't need to worry about Blinding Light taking my archers out of the game in the Shoot Phase (as 6+ to hit is not going to land anything).  On the other hand, my archers have a way of not contributing in the Shoot Phase as it is, so there's that, :P  My plan is quite simple: shield off my foes, kill the elves as they scale the walls with my heroes, and remove 2-3 elves/round so that we can break them before they break us (because they will break us).  That should keep the game close as the time runs down.

Pre-Game Assessment by Tiberius: I'm experimenting with running my Wood Elf army without Galadriel, since most members of the gaming crew have abandoned archery as a dominant element of their armies. Instead, I've opted for a shooting-oriented army that sports 15-17 Elf bow shots each round (that should translate into 2-4 wounds/round). I'm also excited because I've been on the defensive end of this particular fortress, but now on the offense, I'm hoping that all that archery will get past the in-the-ways of the fortress and nail some D6 guys before I get up there...

Scoring

We're playing a Hold Ground scenario (which would likely be the scenario for a "Castle Siege" mission in the future) with the following scoring rules:

• 1 Victory Point for breaking the enemy force, or 3 Victory Points for breaking the enemy force and not being broken
• 2 Victory Points for killing the enemy army leader
• 2 Victory Points for bringing your opponent to 25%
• 1 Victory Point for each model within 6" of the center objective

Deployment

We rolled for deployment, the Easterlings won the roll off, and to start the game both Amdur's warband and the Dragon Knight's warband rolled 1s for deployment (which means you don't come on the board the first turn, and when you roll for Turn 2 they don't arrive in the castle), so I paid a Might Point for each to get them on the board at the start (so starting at 1/3M gone for Amdur and 1/2M gone for the Drag Knight - great start to the game, :P ).  After deployment, the board looked like this:

And with that... (For death and glory!) (For the Lady and apple-pie-flavored-lembas!)

Turn 1 (P: Easterlings)

In the Move Phase the elves moved up, mostly going 3" forward to screen the archery this round, though a few of the throwing dagger elves moved up 6".  My forces to the north moved up, with a few infantry moving into the guard house entryway (just in case the elves sweep that way), and the kataphract moves up to join them.

The War Priest also gets up Fury (1/3M), and one of the Sentinels targets the Dragon Knight and attempts to move him (Courage Test), and the Drag Knight passes the test.

In the Shoot Phase my archers do nothing (which I've come to expect), and one of the Mirk Guards takes down one of my bowmen.  Haldir burns through 2 Might, but successfully kills one of the Black Dragons (2/3M) (gotta spend them on something...).  Nothing else happens in archery, and we head to Turn 2.

Turn 2 (P: Wood Elves)

In the Move Phase one of the Sentinels targets the Drag Knight again with that moving song he's got, and the Drag Knight passes.  Otherwise the elves move up, the throwing daggers are now in throwing range (strike true!), and my War Priest and forces continue to charge forward to reinforce the south.

In the Shoot Phase Haldir kills two bowmen (3 kills so far for Haldir), and we return fire and kill one of the wood elves.

Down below one of the Mirk Guard kills a Black Dragon, and with no other shooting we move to Turn 3.

Turn 3 (P: Wood Elves)

Heading into Turn 3 we have the elves first assaulting the walls.  Thankfully the throwing daggers didn't kill anyone on the charge, and five of my models found themselves engaged against six elves.  The Wood Elf Sentinels all ganged on the Drag Knight, singing their moving song against him and (thankfully) he passed all three tests before being engaged in combat (boo).  In the Shoot Phase we all had a lot of misses (in the case of the elves it was a lot of shots against the walls), and we moved into combat.

In the Fight Phase we won combat about evenly, though there were very few wounds.  The Drag Knight managed to kill one of the elves in his fight, but otherwise no wounds dealt.

Kill Count: Easterlings 5/26 (8 from Break), Wood Elves 2/35 (16 from Break)

Turn 4 (P: Easterlings)

Move Phase was pretty straightforward: my War Priest and and his troop got into position (just in time to fend off the elves - you go, guys!), my men formed up on the walls, and the kat moved out of the entryway to prepare his charge against the elves next turn (and to divert archery away from the guys on the walls).  The elves moved up as you see, had six groups of scalers coming up the walls (Galadhrim is not engaging Amdur yet, so he will not be in combat this round), and none of the throwing daggers hit their targets on the charge.

In the Shoot Phase we failed to hit anyone (as per normal), and Legolas manages to kill one of the Black Drags near Amdur (failed Fury save) (finally).  Haldir picks off one of the bowmen (please, take him - I want him to die), and one of the Galadhrim archers kills the armored horse that the kat was riding, and he passed his throw test to maintain his footing.

In the Fight Phase one of the Black Dragons kills the wood elf in his fight on the south side, the Dragon Knight kills the elf in his fight on the west wall, and one of the elves kills one of the Black Drags on that side (failed Fury save).  So as we approach Turn 5, things are looking tight for the Dragon Army.

Kill Count: Easterlings 8/26 (5 from Break), Wood Elves 4/35 (14 from Break)

Turn 5 (P: Wood Elves)

In the Move Phase nothing interesting happened; the elves continued their assault, and any wounds caused by throwing daggers were Fury saved (don't think there were any, but if any were caused we didn't lose anyone).  Virtually everyone is engaged now, and I started pulling my archers off of the tower to bring them into scoring range.

In the Shoot Phase Haldir kills another bowman (5th bowman killed by Haldir), and Thranduil pops one of the archers in the tower (nice shot, Thranduil).  So with my army 3 from Break Point, we headed into the Fight Phase, :P

...And thankfully we didn't get mauled in the Fight Phase!  We lost a pikeman (not a huge problem), and we were able to down two of the throwing dagger elves, so we can't complain too much about that.  So heading into Turn 6, the kill count looked like this:

Kill Count: Easterlings 11/26 (2 from Break), Wood Elves 6/35 (12 from Break)

Turn 6 (P: Easterlings)

So for starters, the Move Phase actually looked pretty good for us at the start of the Move Phase, :P  We moved up, formed up to block a good number of the elves as they approached the wall, and then Tiberius took his turn.  Thranduil cast Nature's Wrath in the near vicinity, Amdur attempts to ressist it (as I didn't want to resist with my War Priest), and he rolls like a 2 to resist the spell (1/1W), so the spell still goes off.  So a bunch of my guys get knocked over, elves start pouring over the walls, and a number of my guys get tagged by people (oh, and to make matters worse, the Drag Knight failed his roll to stay standing because...reasons).  Once again we didn't lose any of my forces to the throwing weapons (a good number of hits against the walls; the elves were actually throwing really well here), nothing really happened in the Shoot Phase, so we moved to the Fight Phase.

Legolas called a Heroic Combat, killed the Black Drag he was against (3/3M) and took his place on the wall before charging the Black Drag on the ground (bringing me to 1 from Break).

At the end of the Fight Phase the wood elf spearman on the west side kills the Black Drag in his fight (so my force is broken), Amdur is able to kill the Galadhrim in his fight, and the Black Dragon next door kills the sentinel in his fight.

Kill Count: Easterlings 13/26 (Broken, 7 from Game), Wood Elves 8/35 (10 from Break)

Turn 7 (P: Wood Elves)

The Wood Elves finally get priority, and on a turn where it really helps them.  Legolas charges the War Priest and the pikeman near him, Thranduil is able to jump over the wall and attack the Drag Knight, and the elves not only completely take over the western wall, but also pop through the gate.  We countercharge them, running two of my archers into the galadhrim closest to the objective, and I make a desperate effort to save the War Priest.  With no shooting, we commenced with fighting.

Amdur calls a Heroic Combat (2/3M), is able to kill the wood elf with throwing daggers in his fight, and charges into the two spearmen (one on the wall, and one spear supporting Legolas), so that Legolas is not alone taking on the War Priest, the pikeman, and two other pikemen who are charging him from the side, and the re-roll from Amdur, which is the best I can do, :P

...And it wasn't good enough; Legolas wins the fight (on a 6) (yeah-yeah), kills the pikeman on the ground, and Fury goes down.  Up top one of the wood elves kills one of my bowmen, Amdur downs both of the spears in his fight, and we are able to kill one of the spearman in the fights on the southern wall.

Kill Count: Easterlings 13/26 (Broken, 7 from Game), Wood Elves 12/35 (6 from Break)

Turn 8 (P: Easterlings)

Good news: we got priority!  Better news: the War Priest passed his Courage Test (1/1M, 2/3W), so he's still around and capable of casting Fury.  Still better news: he got Fury off on a 4 (3/3W)!  So the whole army (which believe it or not fits within 6" of him) sticks around!  Gotta love it when a plan comes together, :)  We formed up, started the slow advance to get back toward the center objective, as I'm going to need all of the 13 models I still have on-table within scoring range.

I wasn't able to totally protect the War Priest, so he's back in combat this round (which is not exciting), and against a Galadhrim (so I wound on 5s, which is not good with a 1A War Priest).  Otherwise the combats are as you see; Amdur is in combat with Legolas, the elves are crumpling our western line, and we are badly outnumbered on the southern wall.  With no shooting on either side, we move to the Fight Phase.

In the Fight Phase we get really lucky: our bowman at the top, who was surrounded by 5 guys, got off very easy (Haldir whiffed his dice, the sentinel whiffed his dice, and the lone galadhrim archer wounded him, and then he saved the wound on a 6 with Fury, so he's still with us (eh, happens).  We did lose one of the pikes to two of the wood elf spearmen (not surprising) and one of the Black Drags was able to kill one of the spearmen (Yay!  Someone is contributing!).  There were also some really amazing things that happened: the War Priest won the combat (didn't wound, but hey: we've still got Fury up!), Amdur won combat and was able to put a wound on Legolas (1/2H), and the Drag Knight, believe it or not, won combat against Thranduil and dealt a wound to him (1/2H).

Kill Count: Easterlings 14/26 (Broken, 6 from Game), Wood Elves 13/35 (5 from Break)

Turn 9 (P: Easterlings)

As we headed into Turn 9, things looked bad - really bad, :P  We were badly outnumbered, but courtesy of Fury we didn't lose anyone to failing Courage tests for being below our Break Point, and we were able to centralize our position around the War Priest, though we still weren't able to get him out of combat.  Oh - and there are a host of elves in scoring range, :P

In the Shoot Phase the wood elf with throwing dagger standing to the left of Legolas threw a throwing dagger at the pikeman who is spear supporting and he failed to wound, so we moved to the Fight Phase.

In the Fight Phase we lost a ton of guys - yeah...we lost a ton of guys, :P  We lost the Drag Knight to Thranduil and his men, the archers got womped by Haldir and his men, the Black Drag on the walls and the other guys in the tower all got crushed.

There was good news, though: the Black Drag near Amdur who was fending off Legolas + spear support + two more archers won his fight, Amdur won his fight but failed to wound the Galadhrim, and the War Priest (WAR PRIEST!!!) killed the wood elf in his fight (WAR PRIEST!!!).  So we were brought down to 6 models remaining, which ended the game.

Kill Count: Easterlings 20/26 (Game), Wood Elves 14/35 (4 from Break)

So for the final score, the Wood Elves received 3 points for breaking the enemy force and not being broken, 2 points for bringing the Easterlings to 25%, 10 points for models in scoring range, and 0 points for failing to kill the enemy army leader.  The Easterlings received 6 points for models within scoring range, bringing the final score to a 6-15 Major Loss for the Easterlings.

Concluding Thoughts from Centaur: Wow, that was brutal, :P  Archery didn't work hardly at all (one kill I think the entire game; not terrible, but not great), we didn't kill nearly enough people on the walls, and those two rounds where we were on the ground and then lost Priority really hurt, as it both cost me the fights on the wall and then control of the walls the following turn, allowing him to get into scoring range with a flood of guys.  On the whole, though, there wasn't much else we could do; it was a fun game, and elves are tough to beat.  Well played, Tiberius.

Concluding Thoughts from Tiberius: That was fun - I've played one mission where I was defending the walls and I think both Glenstorm and I agree that the mission works (who knows, you might see this mission in the next THRO tournament). Still trying to figure out if the cost is right, but I think it works on the whole. Having D6 foes on the other side of that wall can be really painful - if I didn't have a dedicated archery front I this game, I would have had a much, MUCH harder time.

Stellar Unit for Centaur: Easterling Warrior with halberd/shield.  These guys don't get a lot of praise in the battle report itself all that often, as they often work from behind the scenes to contribute.  In this battle they gave me extra attacks where I needed it to kill a few elves each turn, and that was valuable when I had the barrier helping to save some of the wounds coming my way from the elves as they scaled the walls.  Once the walls were breached they provided both the shielding support we needed and the extra attacks required to do a few wounds on the ground.  While not the best troops in the game, in this game these guys performed well and helped us hang in until Turn 9.

Stellar Unit for Tiberius: Mirkwood Guard with Elf bows. Tough call between the "mirk guard" and the wood elves with spears, but these guys got extra hits on target which translated into more kills before the fight got going. The trick to beating D5+ teams is getting plenty of hits, and these guys do that very well.

Hope you enjoyed the battle report - I got in a "double header" set of games against Glot and Tavros (Rohan and Angmoria armies) on Friday night, which was a blast - I made a few changes to the army list, most notably the addition of these two bad boys:

Not a lot of commentary here on how they did (as I'd like to test it out some more), but you'll definitely see some commentary on chariots in the army write-up in May at the very latest.

I'm hoping to get the second post in the army list building series up this week (though I've got a huge event at work on Thursday/Friday, so it may not be until the weekend), and I'm also hoping to get in a few more Easterling games as well.  Until then, you'll know where to find me,

Watching the stars,

Centaur

"I watch the stars, for it is mine to watch, as it is your's, Badger, to remember." ~ Glenstorm, Prince Caspian

Centaur Tactica Post: Army List Building, Part 1

Hey Reader!

This is Glenstorm with a bit of a different post to lead off Easterling month, and that is a two-part series on list building for Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle players.  Over the past few months I've helped a few friends prepare lists for tournaments, and from what I've learned from helping them and building lists myself I thought I'd take a moment just to step back and think about list building.

Before jumping into how to build an army list, I'd like to give a shout out to a guy that I follow on YouTube who plays Warhammer Fantasy (which I also play).  OnceBitten is a longtime Warhammer player, and his thoughts have been very influential in guiding my thoughts on list building, both for Warhammer Fantasy and LOTR SBG.  You can find his tactica post on list building here, and this post will mimic some of his thoughts (as he has a lot of good points), though with a very LOTR focus (which means some things will change from his commentary).

Busy Weekend: Workbench Products

Good morning gamers,

I had a very productive day yesterday and got a few projects done that have been sitting on the workbench for a LONG time. Most of them are woodland terrain pieces, so hopefully you'll get to see some Elf games coming up in the next few months. All of these are still WIP, but here's a look before they get to their final state.

1) Large Mountain

The mountain was provided to me as a free bonus after purchasing a new vacuum...great deal right? :P Spray painted dark brown with some added gravel to it, I'm preparing to paint it up grey in some spots (to include the rocks, I think) and add some towers and ladders. I think I even have some stone stairs that will be added too...

  2) Small Abandoned Wall

I'm growing my Wild/Lonelands collection to support my Weathertop map and this is one of the pieces. The wall is very low, providing a minor barrier bonus and an in-the-way for short/crouched models. Besides that, there's a rock and a "pillar stump" that might become a well. Not yet figured out what that will be. This too will get some gray and some grass flocking around some of the wall, pillar, and rock.

3) Small Woods

Three small woods that have been in my collection and in dire need of repair/creation since I started the hobby. Been working on twist-tie wire trees for a while and I think I have enough of them now. I need to add more flocking to the ground and find a way to get leaves on the trees, but we'll work on that later - especially with the following project...

4) Larger Wood

Ah, nothing like a woodland clearing with lots of trees surrounding an open space. Some of the entrances restrict deployment with woods that can be crossed through, while others are nice and wide, allowing for large battle lines to walk through. Tried to not mess up too many formations, but we'll see how much of this becomes woodland terrain and how much of it is open after the next spray-painting session (ran out before I could do this one).

Some Elves defending a copse of trees - you can see from here that an individual model can navigate through the tight trees.

Northern side, other models can walk through that one too.

That's it for now gamers - expect to see some additional content this week, as I try to get some detail work on my armies (especially Goblins and Elves)!

Battle Report: To the Death: Easterlings v. Moria

Hey Reader!

This is Centaur with another battle report - the first in a series on the Easterlings, which is the army I'll be working with until the end of April.  The army list will likely vary from one game to the next (as I'm experimenting with different heroes and unit choices, so we'll see how that goes), but on the whole the army will be a Warbands-certified list that will feature a few mainstay heroes across all of the reports and a few changes here and there.

For today's battle report I met up with Tiberius and we got in a game with a unique Moria build (I really enjoyed the list), and mine will be a mix of traditional "battle line" Easterlings with a couple of kataphracts (heavy cav) supporting Khamul, the Black Easterling as its army leader.  So to show you all the army lists:

TMAT GT15 recap (part 3)

and here we are back again for Round 3 of the 2015 TMAT GT!


Round 3, Board A: The Host of Rohan vs. The Glory of Erebor

Weary and sore from the drawn-out campaign, the trudging feet of the dwarves are soon drowned out by the sound of hoofbeats as a band of Riders comes from over the hill. Balin swore he would contine to lead his bretheren, and Eomer claimed his mount would carry him past the dwarven lines to victory as the too adversaries prepared to clash. The dwarven brothers wasted no time hacking at the Rohan standards, with Dwalin handidly destroying one and Balin striking a hefty blow against a second. Spurred on by their example, the missiles of the dwarves proved uncannily accurate, felling many skirmishing riders.

TMAT GT15 recap (Part 2)

On with part two of the TMAT Grand Tournament recap (played Mar 7, 2015).

After a few minutes checking out the awesome pre-tournament hobbying projects, the tournament started off with...

Round 1, Board A: The Defenders of Eriador vs. Isengard Unleashed

Saruman, ever determined to scour the shire, rallies his uruks and prepares to march on the halflings. Much to his surprise, the little folk are joined by a squadron of valiant dwarves who lead the shirelings. Balin swore he would push the uruks back behind their lines, and Saruman placed a bounty on Balin's head. Although the magic of the Istari would cause chaos among the halfling ranks, it could do little to stop the shower of stones that rained down on the fighting uruk-hai. Balin personally led the charge to force the denizens of Isengard from the field [Shire Oath kept, Uruk Oath failed].

TMAT Grand Tournament 2015 Overview (Part 1)

This past weekend the TMAT crew got together for our fourth annual TMAT Grand Tournament. Dice were thrown. Armies clashed. Players laughed. Schnazzy game boards were put on display. Good times gents.

I'm still working to compile all the tourney info and gather photos, but here is a quick teaser of what is to come. Details on the tournament scenarios and army lists can be found here:

1. Tiberius' uruks once again took the tournament field led by Saruman. Breaking from his usual heavy-armor build, this time Isengard comes with an orcish filler contingent to pad the model count, counting on numbers and the power of its four heroes to lead them to victory.
2. As has been fortold, (as in, pre-GT14) Centaur's long-awaited shirelings finally had their day of glory. Led by Balin, Dwalin with a picked handful of dwarves to provide cover, the valiant hobbits sally forth for battle - making up with heart, valor and a whole lot of throwing stones what they lack in combat statlines.
3. Sallying forth from the Halls of Erebor, El zorro's dwarf army came well-prepared to enter the fray. With brothers Balin and Dwalin at the head of an eclectic mix of dwarf units, hoping axe and hardened armor would carry the day.
4. Captain Glot’s Rohan army is a nigh-staple at TMAT tournaments and the trio of Eomer KotP, Erkenbrand and Grimbold once again sought to prove their mettle. Backed by outriders, helmingas and Royal Guards, they valiantly carried the banner of the westfold into battle.
5. The Black Prince opted to take another crack with his all-mounted Rohan list from THRO14. Despite being only 26 models, the army served him well last fall with a very respectable second place finish. Led by Eomer, Eorl & Sons, the Riders of the Riddermark were ready to test their mettle against a playing field that greatly outnumbered them.   
6. Our final competitor, Red Jacket, brought the ever-popular army of uruk heavies. Led by Vrasku and Mahur, and backed by a drummer, it was an army that moves fast, hits hard and shrugs off all but the strongest blows. Unlike most of the Isengard lists we've seen, this one opted to drop ranged abilities almost completely in favor of melee units that close quickly.

Through the Smoke Rings: Thoughts on Shire Armies, and Moving Forward

Hey Reader!

Hope this post finds you all well!  This past weekend we held the TMAT Grand Tournament 2015, which was a ton of fun - major thanks to Zorro for being the tournament director for the tournament.  Much fun was had, :)  As I sit on the front porch thinking about the tournament (and without giving anything away), I wanted to provide some final thoughts on Shire armies (at least for now; I'm putting that army away for a bit, as I will explain a little later in the post).  So if you will indulge me, feel free to pull up a chair, find a comfortable position, and I'll give you some time to light your pipe as I recap a bit about my army for the GT.

The army represents the "little folk" of Eriador coming together to defend what they love from the "big folk" who would oppress them.  The army is composed of 299 pts of hobbits (well, in addition to three dogs and a horse, but yes - hobbits) and 304 pts of dwarves to add a bit of durability to the army.  Now for those of you who follow the blog you know that I usually run Aragorn fully decked out (Anduril, bow, armor - everything except the elven cloak) in this army, alongside a couple Dunedain for some additional suppressing fire in archery and a spread of Might Points in close combat.  For this tournament I opted to scratch Aragorn and the Dunedain, switch over to a Warbands scheme (instead of an LOME Shire build), and instead go for a larger model count and a number of S3 D7 warriors just to help hold the lines against the armies that I'd face.

A "Shade-y" Subject

Good morning gamers,

I've been working recently on a Mordor-Angmar army (more on them in the coming weeks), and one of the pieces I'm working on in earnest is a Shade conversion. The model is completely from scratch, using up some of my odd models that I've either decided I'm not using anymore or model swaps for Ringwraiths (more on them in the coming weeks too).

Let's give credit where it's due, though: the following is not an original thought. I've always liked the rules for Shades and thought them to be more effective than Barrow-Wights as support players for your army, but I don't like the GW model (sorry). A while back, though, I read a post by Chef of War who did a conversion very similar to the one you're about to see - even to the point of using Ringwraiths and Barrow-Wights. I liked the idea so much, that I stored it on a back-burner in case I ever decided to collect Orcs. For a number of reasons (not least is my love for Ringwraiths), I'm not creating a Mordor-Angmar list and so a Shade is justified (or necessary?).

WIP: Dwarves of Erebor

So we are fast approaching TMAT GT15 and... no posts?

Yeah, life has been a little crazy, but that doesn't mean the pre-tournament hobbying flurry has been lacking. Due to scheduling, we had a very narrow window of availability for this year's GT and so the tournament got pushed up earlier - cramming the hobbying window to a fairly uncomfortable size. But there is nothing quite like a time crunch to amp up the motivation burner, so yet again I dove into the pile of plastic and metal to bring up a whole-new army for tournament from the halls of Erebor.

For any of our long-time readers, you know that Tiberius is a longtime lover of Dwarves, and has written multiple tactica posts on the civ. Centaur also had dabbled with the longbeards, but up till now I have shied away from the civ. They just don't really fit my playstyle - slow movement, no support, etc. However I do love Dwalin and have been sitting on all three versions of the model and been dying to field him. . . I've also picked up a few stray dwarves here and there due to the "really cool model" effect. So for GT15 I decided to put them off the project pile and throw together an army that Dwalin can take into battle.

Announcing: TMAT GT 2015!

Time to announce the opening of registration for the fourth annual Tell Me A Tale Grand Tournament! This tournament is a small 1-day independent tournament for the Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game and will be played on Saturday, March 7, 2014 in Purcellville, Virginia starting at 10am (players are asked to arrive at least 20-30 min early for check-in and setup). LOTR SBG players in the greater D.C. area and beyond are welcome to attend, but are asked to register NLT Feb 28. The tournament is free to play and the rules for the tournament are provided below.

First Ever PCTPTGTA - Contestant #3

Good morning again gamers,

Our first contestant in the popularity contest (rules in the previous list) was a Goblin list with a dragon and the second contestant was a hardened army of Dwarves. In this final list, we hearken back to a TMAT army I ran two years ago and look to Isengard!

The Scions of the White Hand: Isengard Warbands

First Ever PCTPTGTA - Contestant #2

Good morning again gamers,

We recently unveiled the first army in the grand "popularity contest" to determine what army I'm taking to tournament. For official rules, please follow the link above to the post from a few days ago. Today's army features the antithesis of Contestant #1 - an army of Dwarves!

The Moria Expeditionary Force: Durin's Folk Warbands

The First Ever PCTPTGTA - Rules and Contestant #1

Good morning gamers,

So I have several armies that are vying for a chance to be taken to a grand tournament his year and try as I might to figure out which one to take, I can't make a decision. Ergo, I am placing the power of deciding in the hands of our viewership. The rules for the first ever "Popularity-Contest-To-Pick-Tiberius'-Grand-Tournament-Army" are as follows:

• On March 1st, I will take a snapshot of the total votes cast in favor of all three armies. The one with the highest number of views will be the winner.
• Posts will go up in rapid succession (within a few days), reducing any advantage of one post being put up before another one.

Without any further ado, Contestant #1 is...

From The Mountain Depths: Moria Warbands

Warg Update

TGIF y'all! so progress was slowed by the holidays, but I've been working on and off to get these beasties finished. I think I'm pretty pleased with the results.

Wild Wargs of Angmar (and occasionally Harad)

Beware of Dragon, Part 5: To Fear or Not To Fear

Good morning gamers,

We've talked about the "vanilla" dragons who have no upgrades, the "utility" dragons who have a single upgrade, the "offensive versatile" dragons who have two upgrades and use their Will to breathe fire, and the "defensive versatile" dragons who have two upgrades but no fire. Given these 11 possible builds, how does one go about fighting these things? To all the dragon hunters out there, this post is for you.