Good morning gamers, Last time we were in this series, we looked at how to replicate the defense of Minas Tirith from the books by seeing wh...
Wednesday, November 4, 2020
TMAT Challenge - Episode 4: Balrog v. Barrow-Wights
It's man versus monster in the ultimate test of survival!
Tiberius, Centaur, and Rythbryt take a break from matching up iconic heroes against monsters to answer the ultimate question you never thought to ask: can 350 points of Barrow-Wights beat 350 points of Balrog?
Gotta say, while I anticipated that result, I had thought it would at least be close. How many Barrow Wights do you reckon you would need to take him on, what's the minimum you could get away with?
Not spoiling anything, but a rematch was in order. :) Not having any Might means high rolls against low rolls is going to swing it either direction. Priority early-on matters a lot too. The Balrog can pretty easily handle 4 Barrow-Wights I think (hard to tell when we don't have a lot of data to make a trend).
At the risk of being overly pedantic, I take issue (and I think the math will bear me out) with the characterization that the Balrog can "easily" handle more than one barrow-wight (and perhaps two). One is manageable because of the Fiery Lash + the height advantage he has, which means you can usually target the Wight, pull him over the line of orcs protecting him, and then (probably) kill him in one go in a 1-on-1 (and almost definitely kill him in one go if you also charge a couple Fearless goblins and a Goblin Captain with Might into the fray). If there's only one, you blow a ton of Will on that turn to maximize your odds that the paralyze doesn't go off, because if you kill him you don't have to worry about Paralyze again. You may be able to comfortably handle two, also, as long as you're willing to blow a ton of Will over 1-2 turns to make sure the second wight doesn't paralyze you while you're dealing with the first, and then you're able to reach that second wight that turn or the next using a Heroic Combat / lash.
More than two is dicey, because (a) any Angmar player who knows what their doing is going to have their 3+ wights spread out anyway to maximize the extent of their Terror bubbles (and is definitely going to have them spread out if you have a Balrog on the table), and (b) you have no Might safety net if the Wight casts Paralyze on the "5" or "6." Even if you roll 3-5 dice (including or in addition to your Resistant to Magic die), getting a natural 6 to resist is not a sure thing, and once he's paralyzed, it disrupts the flow of the game quite a bit.
Having goblins around to add extra wake-up dice will help, of course, but you still need natural 6s to wake him up (unless you can use, say, a Goblin Captain's Might to modify his wake-up die--although a recent GBHL discussion seemed to agree that the Balrog is the one rolling the wake-up dice, and thus Might from other characters can't modify those dice rolls).
Can the Balrog beat four barrow-wights? Sure. (Although at 350 points, compared to their 200 points, one would certainly expect him to.) Will it be "easy"? Only if you roll hot... and I'm not sure any strategy that requires you to "roll hot" counts as "easy." :-P
To answer Sharbie's question, I think three is the minimum you want, if all you're fielding is barrow-wights (or if you're fielding Barrow-Wights plus a squishy support model, like a Shade). 15 Will means you have more total Will than the Balrog does, and since you're on the offense, you can afford to spend them in smaller chunks than he might (you can roll 2 dice per cast to hunt the "6," and trust that if you get the "6"--or even if you get a "5"--he's probably spending at least 2 Will to resist (plus RtM), if not more (3-4 Will is tempting if you need the "6"). At that point, the number of Wights means your Shade is probably safe for a few turns. Yes, Shades are annoying, but they're not the same threat to the Balrog (which is unlikely to be seriously wounded by anything in Angmar other than a monster) as a model that can paralyze him. Taking down a shade will consume at least one of his turns (maybe more if he gets priority first and you ebb away from him, or if he can't win the fight because he rolls low/you roll high), which means it'll take at least two turns to take out the shade and all the Wights (assuming you heroic combat off the shade into a wight, then heroic combat next turn off a second wight into a third), and more likely 3-5. 10 Will is probably enough over 2 turns... it is probably not enough if you have to go 4-5 turns. And that's assuming there's no nasty Angmar Wraith in attendance to further frustrate the Balrog with magic (rerollable compels from the WK) or siphon down his Will pool (did someone say "Dwimmerlaik"?).
But as everyone knows, I'm partial to Angmar lists built around the WK and three Wights... so maybe I'm overrating them. ;-)
It's an interesting question. Will three Barrow Wights be enough to kill him while he's Paralysed before they run out of Will to keep casting it though? It would take them 20 turns of hacking at him to win, which is quite a long time, so it would depend on how well the Balrog rolled to get back up I guess.
Alternative question, is there any single model that can kill its points in Barrow Wights? Galadriel LoL with a channelled Fortify Spirit could last a long time as she hacked away at the 2-3 of them, but she'd go down fast if she did get Paralysed. There'd be a lot that could kite if they had the space, but that's kind of cheating. Sauron would take about six times the hits to kill than the Balrog (if he uses his Might on Ring rolls only), and would be much better at resisting spells, but whether that would be enough against 8 Wights is unclear
@Rythbryt, I was referring to handling 2-4 Barrow Wights in this kind of format - if he can get the charge (which he never did in this match), 1-3 Barrow-Wights can fall in a single turn (Feint during each attack to wound on 3s rerolling 1s, need 2-4 wounds per attack). If they spread out too much, they can't dog-pile into combat very quickly.
@Sharbie's question about how many heroes can do it, we have some more heroes that want to run the gauntlet - not giving any spoilers on that yet. While you can certainly look for heroes who resist magic well (like Galadriel LoL), heroes who shoot really well (like Legolas), heroes who can shoot while mounted pretty well to keep their distance (like Bard), and heroes who have unique shooting rules (like Ori) can do quite a bit of damage. Ori also benefits from only having to fight 1 Barrow-Wight while mounted no a pony, which means he can move 4" each turn and still shoot once with his slingshot (and any natural 6 to hit automatically wounds).
Gotta say, while I anticipated that result, I had thought it would at least be close. How many Barrow Wights do you reckon you would need to take him on, what's the minimum you could get away with?
ReplyDeleteNot spoiling anything, but a rematch was in order. :) Not having any Might means high rolls against low rolls is going to swing it either direction. Priority early-on matters a lot too. The Balrog can pretty easily handle 4 Barrow-Wights I think (hard to tell when we don't have a lot of data to make a trend).
DeleteAt the risk of being overly pedantic, I take issue (and I think the math will bear me out) with the characterization that the Balrog can "easily" handle more than one barrow-wight (and perhaps two). One is manageable because of the Fiery Lash + the height advantage he has, which means you can usually target the Wight, pull him over the line of orcs protecting him, and then (probably) kill him in one go in a 1-on-1 (and almost definitely kill him in one go if you also charge a couple Fearless goblins and a Goblin Captain with Might into the fray). If there's only one, you blow a ton of Will on that turn to maximize your odds that the paralyze doesn't go off, because if you kill him you don't have to worry about Paralyze again. You may be able to comfortably handle two, also, as long as you're willing to blow a ton of Will over 1-2 turns to make sure the second wight doesn't paralyze you while you're dealing with the first, and then you're able to reach that second wight that turn or the next using a Heroic Combat / lash.
DeleteMore than two is dicey, because (a) any Angmar player who knows what their doing is going to have their 3+ wights spread out anyway to maximize the extent of their Terror bubbles (and is definitely going to have them spread out if you have a Balrog on the table), and (b) you have no Might safety net if the Wight casts Paralyze on the "5" or "6." Even if you roll 3-5 dice (including or in addition to your Resistant to Magic die), getting a natural 6 to resist is not a sure thing, and once he's paralyzed, it disrupts the flow of the game quite a bit.
Having goblins around to add extra wake-up dice will help, of course, but you still need natural 6s to wake him up (unless you can use, say, a Goblin Captain's Might to modify his wake-up die--although a recent GBHL discussion seemed to agree that the Balrog is the one rolling the wake-up dice, and thus Might from other characters can't modify those dice rolls).
Can the Balrog beat four barrow-wights? Sure. (Although at 350 points, compared to their 200 points, one would certainly expect him to.) Will it be "easy"? Only if you roll hot... and I'm not sure any strategy that requires you to "roll hot" counts as "easy." :-P
To answer Sharbie's question, I think three is the minimum you want, if all you're fielding is barrow-wights (or if you're fielding Barrow-Wights plus a squishy support model, like a Shade). 15 Will means you have more total Will than the Balrog does, and since you're on the offense, you can afford to spend them in smaller chunks than he might (you can roll 2 dice per cast to hunt the "6," and trust that if you get the "6"--or even if you get a "5"--he's probably spending at least 2 Will to resist (plus RtM), if not more (3-4 Will is tempting if you need the "6"). At that point, the number of Wights means your Shade is probably safe for a few turns. Yes, Shades are annoying, but they're not the same threat to the Balrog (which is unlikely to be seriously wounded by anything in Angmar other than a monster) as a model that can paralyze him. Taking down a shade will consume at least one of his turns (maybe more if he gets priority first and you ebb away from him, or if he can't win the fight because he rolls low/you roll high), which means it'll take at least two turns to take out the shade and all the Wights (assuming you heroic combat off the shade into a wight, then heroic combat next turn off a second wight into a third), and more likely 3-5. 10 Will is probably enough over 2 turns... it is probably not enough if you have to go 4-5 turns. And that's assuming there's no nasty Angmar Wraith in attendance to further frustrate the Balrog with magic (rerollable compels from the WK) or siphon down his Will pool (did someone say "Dwimmerlaik"?).
DeleteBut as everyone knows, I'm partial to Angmar lists built around the WK and three Wights... so maybe I'm overrating them. ;-)
It's an interesting question. Will three Barrow Wights be enough to kill him while he's Paralysed before they run out of Will to keep casting it though? It would take them 20 turns of hacking at him to win, which is quite a long time, so it would depend on how well the Balrog rolled to get back up I guess.
DeleteAlternative question, is there any single model that can kill its points in Barrow Wights? Galadriel LoL with a channelled Fortify Spirit could last a long time as she hacked away at the 2-3 of them, but she'd go down fast if she did get Paralysed. There'd be a lot that could kite if they had the space, but that's kind of cheating. Sauron would take about six times the hits to kill than the Balrog (if he uses his Might on Ring rolls only), and would be much better at resisting spells, but whether that would be enough against 8 Wights is unclear
@Rythbryt, I was referring to handling 2-4 Barrow Wights in this kind of format - if he can get the charge (which he never did in this match), 1-3 Barrow-Wights can fall in a single turn (Feint during each attack to wound on 3s rerolling 1s, need 2-4 wounds per attack). If they spread out too much, they can't dog-pile into combat very quickly.
Delete@Sharbie's question about how many heroes can do it, we have some more heroes that want to run the gauntlet - not giving any spoilers on that yet. While you can certainly look for heroes who resist magic well (like Galadriel LoL), heroes who shoot really well (like Legolas), heroes who can shoot while mounted pretty well to keep their distance (like Bard), and heroes who have unique shooting rules (like Ori) can do quite a bit of damage. Ori also benefits from only having to fight 1 Barrow-Wight while mounted no a pony, which means he can move 4" each turn and still shoot once with his slingshot (and any natural 6 to hit automatically wounds).