Gondor At War Inspired Lists: The Men of the West LL Revisited

Good morning gamers,

This is our last post in the how-to-use-your-scenario-focused-units-in-Matched-Play series for Gondor at War - and the last of our army reviews for the year (we have something very special planned for December, but more on that next time). So far in this series, I've avoided covering Legendary Legions - even though I could have cobbled together pseudo-competitive lists for the Return of the King, the Riders of Theoden, and the Army of Gothmog quite easily. Today, that all changes - because we're going to look at a Legion that is uniformly dismissed across the community and commonly held to be one of the worst Legions ever made: yes, it's my boys - the Men of the West (you didn't REALLY think I'd talk about Gondor at War without mentioning these guys, right?)!

With this being our last post in this series, I thought it fitting to cover a Legion that shows up at the end of the films and books. The list has the models you'd expect from both the books and the films in scenario play - mostly because you're allowed to play the Black Gate mission as either one game based on the "movies" (mostly) or two games based on the books. Here are the models we have:

• Aragorn, King Elessar
• Legolas Greenleaf with armor
• Gimli, Son of Gloin
• Gandalf the White
• Eomer, Marshal of the Riddermark
• Meriadoc, Knight of the Mark
• Peregrin Took, Guard of the Citadel
• Elladan & Elrohir
• Prince Imrahil of Dol Amroth
• Captain of Dol Amroth
• Captain of Rohan with shield
• 13 Knights of Dol Amroth (12 vanilla, 1 with banner)
  
• 37 Warriors of Minas Tirith (12 shields, 12 spears and shields, 12 bows, 1 banner)
• 25 Warriors of Rohan (8 shields, 8 throwing spears and shields, 8 bows, 1 banner)
  

This is (actually) the most models we've had to date - which is pretty crazy, when you think about it. In theory, this list has it all when it comes to heroes - it has one of the best casters in the game (Gandalf the White), arguably the best archer in the game (Legolas Greenleaf), one of the best slayers in the game (Aragorn, King Elessar), and an assorted cast of some of the best F5-6 slaying heroes in the game for 100-140pts (Gimli, Eomer, Imrahil, and Elladan/Elrohir) - but since none of these guys can be mounted (and five of these guys can't lead troops), this list is often looked down upon because "you should just ally." Tack onto that the lackluster warrior profiles and it's pretty easy to see why people wouldn't be excited about this Legion.

While I've gone in depth before on why the cost-savings that you get in this Legion can make it playable, the world still seems against these guys - and my recent experience running them against two Aragorn lists at our TMAT GT of 2022 demonstrated to me why most people think this: if you get a tough matchup or your killing heroes are divas, you'll probably lose.

Photo Credit: Gondor at War

So, in this post, we're going to do something different: we're going to look at how to use this list at LOWER points levels (where your points are more limited, but your success rate seems to increase because the counters to your army are more limited too). Let's take a look at two 600-point lists instead of the usual 700-point lists (technically three lists - yeah, I really like these guys) to get an idea of how to bring the pain with this Legion, all while living within the constraints of the Gondor At War scenario participants!

Quest of the Ringbearer: Model Collection Update, Part VII

Good morning gamers - and happy Thanksgiving for those of you in the States!

We're back in our discussion of what models I need for Quest of the Ringbearer (Fantasy Fellowships especially) and before we dive into the Gondor at War missions, I have an update from Part IV. Back in April, we visited Frodo/Sam's journey through Emyn Muil to Cirith Ungol and at the time, I had three Haradrim painted up (showing off two of the four color schemes I intend to use for my Haradrim in the Ambush in Ithilien scenario). Today, the update shows off the 12 melee guys, which includes five converted archers into dagger-wielding guys (in the scenario, they'll have spears):

Clan Fire - also, Haradrim are described as having "crimson blades" and "crimson armor" in the Return of the King, so a fitting start, I think . . .

These were fun models to paint - lots of flowing cloth everywhere and represent the "fire" clan. Their brothers from "air" clan got a painting update (as I didn't like how strong gold was as a primary color and chose to make it an accent color only, like Fire clan):

I also got a Fell Beast, which was fun to paint and I've been thrilled to test him out on the tabletop (with some really mixed results - oh, and he's actually going to show up in next week's formations article):

The Witch-King gets the side shot - playing around again with flame effects . . .

Front shot with the generic Ringwraith - there's a 2mm x 1mm magnet on the bottoms of each wraith and on the saddle, pretty pleased with how strong those mini magnets are!

Okay, that's all the updates for now, let's dig into Gondor at War!

Gondor At War Inspired Lists: The Dead of Dunharrow Revisited

Good morning gamers,

Today we're digging into one of the easiest factions to start collecting: the Dead of Dunharrow. An incredibly popular faction for those who started playing the game when the Pelennor Fields box set was released (with Gondor at War providing a new King of the Dead sculpt/a new hero profile in Heralds of the Dead) and a cool Legendary Legion that allows Aragorn to join the Army of the Dead and get Anduril/a 6" banner rule for free, the Dead of Dunharrow are an oddity for the Forces of Good: a low-Fight, Terror-heavy list that absolutely shreds any army to pieces if they can just win fights. Oh, and they don't have any shooting or power heroes of their own - they're an expensive spam team.

When I was preparing for this series, I originally had in mind to actually review the Return of the King LL (Rythbyrt did it for me in our Stuff of Legends series because I don't like it - and I omitted covering it in the main part of our Bare Necessities series by going with an Elessar-led Minas Tirith contingent allied with some Dead of Dunharrow). I don't like the Legion and I was clawing for ANYTHING that would remotely compete with it for this article.

And then, like a gift from the skies, Sharbie on his Against All Odds blog released not one article but TWO articles on using the Dead of Dunharrow as a pure list at recent tournaments in Australia - and I immediately went to see if I could do it for a Gondor at War piece. As it turns out, we actually have over 700pts of models from Gondor at War to work with, so I thought, "Scrap the Legion - we're going pure!" Here are the models we can pick from:

• The King of the Dead
• 2 Heralds of the Dead
• 20 Warriors of the Dead
• 14 Warriors of the Dead with shields*
• 6 Warriors of the Dead with spears*
• 6 Riders of the Dead
  

*As we noted in our what-you-need-to-collect post, you can choose to:

• Have 20 infantry the way you like them and ignore their shields and spears for the scenarios;
• Have 26 Warriors of the Dead - 20 with nothing that can have up to 14 Warriors of the Dead with blue-tacked shields and 6 spearmen; or
• Have 40 Warriors of the Dead - 20 vanilla, 14 with shields, and 6 with spears.

We, as it happens, will be doing a modified version of the third option today. :-)

Sharbie's work on his blog is incredible - check it out if you haven't already (though he's not an exclusive MESBG content guy - though I will say his reviews of 40K are also quite interesting, even though most of it goes over my head due to not really knowing how the gaming system works, #Uninitiated). To summarize his experience with pure Dunharrow, here's what we want:

• Get into 1-on-1 combats as much as you can (to make it unlikely that you'll be wounded and mitigate whatever liability F3 provides);
• Get around the enemy flanks (keeping a two-rank shieldwall works sometimes, but usually isn't as good as wrapping);
• Avoid getting stuck against big heroes and focus on killing grunts;
  
• Fight in the open (so you can bring your numbers to bear/wrap the enemy); and
• Don't bother with Heralds (you want the numbers and you don't need the heroic actions/Resistant to Magic).
  

With this in mind, let's dig into the list!

Minas Tirith Me Up: Osgiliath/Minas Tirith Terrain, Part IV

Good morning gamers,

Today brings us to Part IV in our series on building Minas Tirith/Osgiliath terrain and today, we're turning to the walls and plinths and doing the monotonous job of detail work . . . ugh. Easily the least fun part of any terrain task is adding rote detail to things - not adding cracks, impressions, colored washes to simulate filth and such, but the drawing of brickwork lines, the indentation of certain bricks to add character, that sort of thing. Yes, it's important to the end result of the build, but it sure . . . is . . . boring.

So today, we're going to do all that dull stuff, but to keep our sanity, we're also going to do other things - namely adding our water features to two of our panels, spraying the board so it isn't pink/black, and prepare the board for use in Osgiliath missions! Let's get into it!

Photo Credit: Sott.net

Detailing The Outer Wall 

If you've seen Lachie's videos on YouTube for the Minas Tirith project, you know what this entails: running an aluminum foil ball around the faces of the wall to add texture, followed up by depressing certain stones with something solid (I've chosen the box for my utility knife blades, like Lachie does), adding some cracks to some of the stonework, and noting where I'm going to add green bits for moss growth. I then slathered these guys in a mix of Mod Podge and black paint so they'd be protected from the spraying that's coming:

I need to paint a few bricks here and there green, black, or grey (specifically choosing sections that were thinly mod-podged) and then spray a gentle white primer coat over it, but I plan to do that after I have the crenellations done. Once they're sprayed and have been washed in black, I think they're going to be great, but I don't want to start washing until I have the gatehouse done too.

Gondor At War Inspired Lists: The Corsairs of Umbar Revisited

Good morning gamers,

We're almost done with this mini-series on how to take your Gondor at War collection and use it in Matched Play and today we look at one of the nastiest, shooty-est armies that Evil has to offer: the Corsairs of Umbar. A mix of light-defense horde models, high-defense shooting models, and throwing weapons on nearly every model (and Backstabbers - don't forget those Backstabbers if you keep your army bonus), this army can be a pain to deal with whether you're running a spam horde or a smaller, elite force. But while Corsair players have access to nearly all the models they'd usually want in their army, the limits on force construction imposed by Gondor at War's two missions that feature Corsairs leaves us with some interesting choices. Here are the models we can take:

• Dalamyr, Fleet Master of Umbar
• Delgamar, Gatemaster of Umbar
• 2 Corsair Captains with no additional gear
• 2 Corsair Bo'suns with no additional gear
• 12 Corsairs of Umbar with shields
• 12 Corsairs of Umbar with spears
• 12 Corsairs of Umbar with bows
• 12 Corsair Arbalesters
• 12 Corsair Reavers

That's a whopping 66 models - though bow limit makes it a still-impressive 61 models. What you're missing from a normal Corsair list is a) Hasharins as pinch-hitter heroes (though as I noted in the what-you-need-for-Gondor-at-War post, you could take the two Hasharins you get with Dalamyr and convert them up into Delgamar and Raza pretty easily if you want to save some money), b) Black Numenoreans for high-Defense Terror models, c) the Knight of Umbar (if you like the guy - I don't), and d) Black Numenorean Marshals (if you like these guys - I do).

We're also TECHNICALLY missing any gear options on the Captains and Bo'suns as listed above, but quite frankly, I'm not going to worry about that. Bo'suns probably don't NEED extra gear if they intend to stand around as banners, but having a spear for 1pt is always a good thing - and having a crossbow on either a Captain or a Bo'sun for 5pts is a really good deal. So . . . I'm going to ignore this constraint as we delve into the list - our first pure list of this series!

5 Things I Learned from Bolt Action

My Polish forces, almost complete

Hey Reader!

So for the record, this is a Middle Earth SBG blog: we will not be adding Bolt Action content to it, even though the amazing Rick Priestley was involved with both games. In fact, we won't even be making a tab for it below, because we know you guys are here for Lord of the Rings, :) But every now and then I like to play other games as well, mostly to remind me just how much I love this game, and today is a post sharing some of my thoughts on what I love about it.

#1: I Love Artillery!

Polish artillery: the only good thing we have

My "main faction" in Bolt Action is Poland, and as you probably know, Poland was invaded on September 1, 1939, and the ceasefire and surrender was negotiated by October 6 (so the whole thing was over in like 5-6 weeks). This means that Poland doesn't have the high-level tanks or airpower that other factions have, because, surprise - they were out of the war before most other nations had even mobilized.

But one thing that the Poles did have - and they'd been using these during incursions against the Soviets for years leading up to the German invasion - was heavy artillery, bringing 150mm guns to bear against enemy armor and infantry. And while I hadn't really thought about this before, I discovered in the process that I really, really like artillery.

I've praised trebuchets, Uruk-Hai ballistas, and trolls/ents throwing rocks for years, and even though a lot of people have argued that more archers are better (and they probably are), I just keep feeling drawn to them. And now I know why: I like being able to reach out far beyond your average archer and touch a target well before it can strike back, forcing them to play the game as I dictate it, and providing high-end damage from a distance. I like getting into melee - and that will come up later - but I do enjoy the board control that comes from artillery pieces.

But in MESBG they do this better, as it's simultaneously more dangerous (with the ability to inflict auto-kills) while also being easier to plan against and prepare for (Blinding Light being the obvious choice, but also not receiving a larger volume of hits if you fire at a building), making it more fun to play against.

"But Centaur," you say, "have you ever fought the Assault on Helm's Deep Legendary Legion? How can you call that 'more fun to play against' when they're basically hitting with every attack every turn?" Great question - and you clearly haven't played my list that involves 3 Heavy Artillery cannons firing 4" radius templates that do basically auto-wounds to every infantryman in that radius (which could be upwards of 10 models with a single attack), and nothing you can do to protect yourself save drop to the ground to halve the number of hits and lose your turn for that unit. 

Oh, and did I mention that there are almost 50 infantry protecting those guns by providing cover fire while you try to cross the board? Oh, and did I mention that I've wiped out super tanks with this force because it turns out that if you fire at a tank enough times with enough guns you'll crack a tank?

Yeah, that's not fun. So I've come to even appreciate that legion, dangerous as it is, :)

#2: Courage Matters!

Cover reduces casualties, which helps with morale

So, in Bolt Action, your Leadership score actually determines a lot: if you want to take an action and you've suffered "pin markers" (aka, your unit has been shot at and possibly even suffered some casualties), you have to make a Leadership check (which is between 1-10, suffering penalties as you come under more fire) by rolling 2D6 and getting equal to or lower than your current Leadership to take the action you declared.

So imagine if you had to do this in Middle Earth: imagine if, in order to march forward, your hunter orcs (which don't have a Fury shaman) had to make a Courage test? That would be awful. But you know, as I thought about it more, part of why I go for higher veterancy in Bolt Action is because I like having generally higher Courage in Middle Earth, either by use of a shaman, the Bodyguard special rule, or Merry's Horn of the Riddermark.

When tactically planning, I don't like being thwarted because someone couldn't pass a Courage test. I'd much rather have weaker troops or less troops but have more reliability to do what I need my guys to do when the time comes, rather than take a risk of a lot of models failing a check. And I've found that this is something I care more about than I ever truly realized.

#3: Melee Is Awesome!

Polish cavalry WRECKING FOOLS

While most of Bolt Action is a ranged game (which makes it quite different from Lord of the Rings, where everyone has a melee weapon and a lot of people use those in a given game), I've found that my favorite thing to do is to assault (aka, charge an infantry unit or tank into another unit). As a Polish player I do this with lancer cavalry (which did NOT use lances against tanks - they carried grenades), but I've also had to charge with masses of infantry as well, and I've found I really love it. 

And I finally know why: I love clearing my way through enemy units with a wall of my own guys, and I enjoy clearing enemies in melee far more than I enjoy mowing them down at range. It's probably just the adrenaline of whether or not we can break through the line before we lose too many of our own men, but I really, really love the fight in the thick of it.

And that's something you get in Middle Earth that you don't really get in many other games, actually; even Warhammer Fantasy heavily rewarded "Gun Line Dwarves," "Gun Line Wood Elves," and even summoning zombies in front of units so that they never charge your actual units. But in Middle Earth, a lot of scenarios encourage you to get into melee, and/or give you tools to keep "gun lines" from dominating the game.

#4: Independent Models Are Great!

The "rolling retreat" is hard to do in Bolt Action

I don't mind unit-based games; I played Warhammer Fantasy and Warhammer 40k for a few years and I enjoyed the fun of maneuvering and pivoting. But I very much appreciate the more dynamic and choice-filled Move Phases of Middle Earth because of independent model movement. 

Sure, having units of archers, or spearmen, or whatever would be interesting, and I'm not talking trash about War of the Ring (which I never played), but I love that I need to choose whether to send 4 Warriors of Dale with Esgaroth bows toward an objective, or whether I should send 6 instead. I'm glad that I can send one lone Knight of Dale to hold down the Balrog, even if only for a short time, instead of sacrificing all of them.

And with moving and shooting adding a -1 penalty in both games, I think it actually makes more of a difference in MESBG. Since you can pull back a few archers while not moving others, you can do the whole "rolling retreat" thing better than in a unit-based game, and of course we have a whole series on this blog involving various tactics and positions you can place your troops to give yourself an advantage that you cannot do (or at least that don't give you any bonuses) in unit games. And I love that.

But perhaps what I love most of all...

#5: Might Points Are Awesome!

"Hero" models don't really exist in Bolt Action - they have officers (and they can activate multiple units near them at a time, so that's nice), and in some of the historical scenarios they get extra bonuses to make them more like the historical character they are supposed to represent, but on the whole they are not good warriors, and your average artillerist or tanker will kill far more than your officers.

Middle Earth, on the other hand, has so much variety of heroes, but what is more, they offer more to the game because of the presence of Might Points. They can fight better than troops. They can fight more often than troops (thanks to Heroic Combats). They can make your boys shoot more accurately, or sooner, and they can move your army to other places more effectively. They do everything you'd expect from a good military officer, but they also get that epic factor that makes them fun to play with.

And that's so cool in a tabletop strategy war game, because at the end of the day we like doing awesome stuff, and these guys help us feel awesome. Even lowly captains have their days in the sun, pulling off impressive feats on the table. And a lot of that comes down to the effective use of Might Points, and I love Might Points.

Conclusion

I like Bolt Action - it's been a good diversion, and I love painting tanks and artillery guns, so it's been a fun experience and I look forward to collecting more armies. But I don't think I'll ever play it with as much frequency as Middle Earth because I feel like MESBG is the best tabletop game on the market. 

It's fun. It's easy to play (oh my gosh, if I have to consult another chart to see what kind of plane gets called in by an Air Force Forward Observer, I declare...). It's flavorful and thematic, while also being engaging and dynamic. And the models are just beautiful, on-par with the best you're going to find elsewhere.

So all that being said, here's my love letter to the hobby, to the rules set, and to the community that makes it as great as it is. And so I suppose, as we close out this post, I'm also kind of writing this letter to you. So thank you guys for being part of what makes this game the best game in the world, :)

Watching the stars,

Centaur

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

Gondor At War Inspired Lists: Rohan Revisited

Good morning gamers,

In this our third post on how to turn your scenario-oriented Gondor at War collection into a Matched Play fighting force, we come to the plains of Rohan. Ah, Rohan - an army that has dominated top tables with its spam of heroes and horde of Rohan Royal Guards. While new Legions in War in Rohan opened up a variety of ways to play Rohan competitively, when Gondor at War was released, there was exactly one hyper-competitive way to build a Rohan list: run the Riders of Theoden. This makes sense, since the models you have in Gondor at War all appear in the Riders of Theoden list:

• Theoden, King of Rohan with everything
• Eomer with everything
• Dernhelm
• Gamling with everything
• Deorwine (as we mentioned in the what-do-you-need post, he TECHNICALLY doesn't have his horse except in the big Pelennor Fields scenario, but surely this is an oversight)
• Elfhelm with horse
• Captain of Rohan on foot with shield
  
• 16-36 Riders of Rohan (with 8 shield/8 bow dismounts - the 36 number reflects the big Pelennor Fields scenario)
  
• 8 Riders of Rohan with throwing spears (with 8 throwing spear and shield dismounts)
• 1 Warrior of Rohan with banner
  

Photo Credit: Gondor At War

We certainly have the heroes for a Riders of Theoden list (6 named heroes - and if we have a Captain of Rohan on foot, we probably have a mounted one too), but what we're lacking that the Riders of Theoden usually have is Rohan Royal Guards. Those guys are absolutely monstrous on the tabletop (F5/S4/2A on the charge with Bodyguard and fielded for 15-17pts each), but we have precisely . . . 0 Royal Guards (of any type) in this list. In fact, the War in Rohan scenarios only give you up to 4 of them in the main scenarios (to get more, you have to dig into the appendices), so it's fair to say that if you're looking at Scenario Play vs. Matched Play, Rohan has a pretty different feel if you're running the all-cavalry approach.

So what, then, would be an interesting army to view today? Should we run the Riders of Theoden anyway and just run Riders of Rohan? I don't think so - instead, let's look at what the books would have shown us happened at the Black Gate, where the White Horse of Rohan flew alongside the White Swan of Dol Amroth!

Unexpected Military Formations: The Quagmire and the Battle on the Ice

Good morning gamers,

We're back with another formations post - and this time, it seeks to answer the question: how do I try to handle an elite infantry force with a less elite mixed arms force? Unless you run Elves all the time (some players do), chances are good that you may find yourself with an army that has lower Fight Value and possibly lower Defense than your opponent. So the question is begged: how can you take a lower-quality battle line and beat a higher-quality enemy? To address this, let's look at a battle that was fought in the frozen north of Europe and served as the last battle in the Northern Crusades during the thirteenth century: the Battle on the Ice.

The Historical Record: The Battle on the Ice

You can read an exposition on this battle with old iconographic paintings here (though beware the propaganda in the article, as usual), but the gist of the road to this battle is as follows: the Orthodox Novgorod Republic (modern day northern Russia) had a long-standing feud with the Catholic German Holy Roman Empire during the 1220s - so much so, that Pope Honorius III wrote letters to Catholic lords in northern Europe to place embargoes against Novgorod sea towns. By 1240 (while the Mongols were oppressing the Novgorod Republic from the east, tools of soft power were abandoned by the Teutonic orders and German/Danish kingdoms in modern-day Estonia and they began to attack Novgorod tributary lords. In reply, former Novgorod prince Alexander Nevsky (called "Aleksandr Iaroslavich" in the text listed above) was recalled from his banishment to lead the armies of the Novgorod and drive out the Teutons.

Both armies postured for a while, harassing towns along the way, until they both came to Lake Chudskoe. Though the Teutons were outnumbered 2:1 by conservative estimates (~2600 Teutons vs. ~5000 Novgorodians), their elite training made them a more fearsome force than those of the Novgorod. The battle, however, took place on the icy surface of Lake Chudskoe and when the Teutons advanced against the Novgorod militia (by far and away less skilled than the Teutonic knights), their charge was slowed and their progress halted because they had problems keeping their footing on the ice (and couldn't bring the weight of their charge to bear).