Using/Fighting Spellcasters: Combat Mages, Revisited

Good morning gamers,

Today we continue our series of revisiting old posts and updating them for the new rules set. A while back, we did a three-part series on using/fighting spell-casters and we classified some of them as “Combat Mages” (or basically, people who fight really well and ALSO have magic). In that post, we also lumped in Auxiliary mages who do a few niche things to help your army and since there wasn’t that much to say about either of them, we lumped them into the same post. Today, we’ll be talking about the first group only (Combat Mages), though the list will be a little longer (four entries instead of two). We’ll be covering Auxiliary Mages/Ringwraiths/unlimited Will casters in the next few posts of this series. For our purposes, we’re following this taxonomy for casters:

• Multi-Purpose Will Mages: Anyone with the Will of Evil rule (or a similar rule) and has spells (who uses Will to cast magic AND fight AND stay alive…and possibly other things);
• Unlimited Mages: Anyone who gets "free Will," has spells that can be cast, and does not fall in the previous category;
• Combat Mages: Anyone with 2+ Attacks, has spells that can be cast, and does not fall in either of the previous two categories;
• Auxiliary Mages: Catch-all for everyone else, usually limited casting with some kind of immediate/lasting benefit to the army.

Armies of Middle Earth SBG: The Fellowship of the Ring in the Middle Earth Strategy Battle Game

Photo Credit: NewStatesman.com

In a story known for its heroes, there is no more important collection of heroes than the Fellowship of the Ring. Every member was defined by their role in the Quest of Mount Doom, though many of them took different roads ere the Quest was completed.

In the Middle Earth Strategy Battle Game, the Fellowship is its own army, with a unique army bonus, iconic heroes, and powerful synergies. The list is adaptable for many points levels, though for the full-group you'll want at least 750 points (and the list is fully fleshed out at around 900). There are a ton of special rules to master, and the list demands an incredible attention to detail, but every game with the Fellowship plays out like a mini-story, making them extremely memorable.

The Last Alliance: Concept and Strategy, Revisited

Good morning gamers,

Well, today we're continuing our sixteen-part series where we revisit articles from our archive and redo them for the new rules set. We've already looked at Ringwraiths and allied contingents you can ally into your army. Today, we turn our attention to one of the most iconic alliances from the movie series: the Last Alliance (between Rivendell and Numenor). For those interested in the original post, you can view it here.

The Last Alliance: What Has Changed (and What Hasn't Changed)
There are a good many things that haven't changed - both Rivendell and Numenor have very strong heroes (Gil-Galad, Elendil, and Elrond in particular) and both armies retain a single infantry warrior choice (Rivendell has one cavalry choice now). The profiles for these models has changed only slightly, though the changes they received were very, VERY good. The heroes have all changed in small ways (mostly compensating for weaknesses or making them more effective in combat). While some (Gil-Galad and Elendil in particular) saw some big price boosts, the way they play hasn't changed that much (though they're better at what they do now). Let's take a look at each army and see what they bring to the table to complement the other.

TMAT Battle Report: Fellowship vs. Isengard (Hold Ground)

With Centaur out of town for personal reasons, Tiberius and I got together last week to play a friendly game of MESBG. We ended up with a pseudo-thematic match-up that pitted the Fellowship of the Ring against the forces of Isengard (so, if Frodo had opted to make for the Gap of Rohan instead of entering Moria--talk about an alternate universe). We decided early on to try to make a Battle Report of it, which would be my first here on TMAT (very exciting). The game didn't disappoint. 

Heroes of Middle Earth SBG: Dain Ironfoot, Lord of the Iron Hills (Profile and Basic Tactics)

No discussion of the Iron Hills and Erebor Reclaimed army lists would be complete without Dain Ironfoot, the Lord of the Iron Hills himself. He made a name for himself (in the books, anyway) by slaying Azog at the gates of Moria in the Drimrill Dale, and in the Middle Earth Strategy Battle Game, he’s on any short-list of top-tier dwarf heroes. He is the undisputed commander of some of the slickest-looking dwarves in Middle Earth, and has some incredibly thematic rules to pair with an exceptional profile (plus an iconic mount). So if you want to indulge your reckless side, or just want an excuse to tell Sauron’s messenger to shove it or call an elven lord “princess,” Dain’s your man (er, dwarf).

(Oh. And his maths are pretty good, too…)

Appendix A: Alternate Shieldwall Formations

Good morning gamers,

So Rythbryt recently did an AMAZING post on Shieldwall tactics - read it if you haven't already. While he puts forth some great formations, I'd like to address a few variants on some of the Shieldwall formations Rythbryt discussed (since he got the nerdy-geeky-historical-warfare-formation juices flowing).

Rythbryt's Formations: Standard, Crescents, Halos, and "4s"

Rythbryt covers four basic formations in his post (with variants on some of them): a “standard” Shieldwall (where you have two neat ranks of troops), a “crescent” Shieldwall (either forming a bubble for your opponent to charge or forming a curve for your opponent to charge), a “halo” Shieldwall (an enclosed circle with either lots of space or not a lot of space between models), and a “4s” Shieldwall (where your models are clumped into groups of 4 so that their blocks remain maneuverable but their models remain protected at the same time.

Let’s start with this from the get-go: these are all useful formations in their own way (though some have innate risk, as Rythbryt points out). While I personally like the 4s formations the best, there are times when each might be useful (and times when some might be unwieldy). My purpose today is to address three different variants of three of the formations presented by Rythbryt (the 4s, Halos, and Crescents), complete with historical examples.

Workbench Update: Numenor

Good morning gamers,

In our last post, we looked at the work I did on my High Elves recently. Today, we look at the other side of the Last Alliance and visit with Numenor. The last time I did a workbench update on Numenor, I had only just finished painting most of them and was still working on cleaning up new acquisitions of Isildur and Elendil. Today we’ll look at finishing the work on most of the infantry and some touch-ups on the heroes.

Armies of Middle Earth SBG: Shieldwall Tactics (Making it Work)

Having done a lot recently on Iron Hills dwarves, while preparing to paint up a couple boxes of warriors of Minas Tirith, I've been thinking a lot about Shieldwall recently. On paper, the ability is very strong: the jump from Defense 6 to Defense 7 (Minas Tirith) is fantastic against Strength 4 opponents and heroes (there are a lot of those), and the jump from Defense 7 to Defense 8 (Iron Hills) makes it very difficult for Strength 3 troops to deal any wounds to you.

The knock on Shieldwall is that while it's fairly easy to keep it up against enemy archers (more difficult against certain siege weapons), it's not easy to keep up in-combat unless you keep your infantry in a very disciplined (but inflexible) formation. Since flexibility of movement is a key concept in the Middle Earth SBG (we have to protect our flanks, pressure our opponent's flanks, and get to/contest important objectives--sometimes all at once!), I spent an evening last month trying to figure out if there were any more flexible formations that could sustain Shieldwall. Here's some of what I discovered.

(Apologies in advance: this post contains a lot of pictures, so hopefully your load time won't be too long. Also, no maths!)

Workbench Update: Rivendell

Good morning gamers,

Today our travels take us to Rivendell, where we catch up on what we’re doing for my High Elves. Those who follow our blog know that I took a Last Alliance list to Brawler Bash this past January, taking the power of Elendil and Elrond to fight all comers. Had a bit of a rough go against a full-Rivendell list (Elendil and Gil-Galad had a not-so-epic show-down), had a good time though overall.

There are three big projects that have been in the works for Rivendell since that time: a) adding spears to some of my guys (can’t rely on Numenoreans being in position to support), b) converting a Cirdan model out of an old Celeborn model (because Cirdan is awesome and I didn’t want to pay a ridiculous amount of money to get the made-to-order one that was released recently), and c) making a banner for them (as well as one for Lothlorien).