Part 4: The Helm's Deep Sequence
These are three fun scenarios with four of our most exciting members of our Fantasy Fellowship team - and ALL the scenarios are about killing stuff. Here's who we have:
- Aragorn (2 scenarios)
- Legolas (2 scenarios)
- Gimli (1 scenario)
- Gandalf (1 scenario)
- ALLIES:
- Haldir with heavy armor and Elf bow (1 scenario)
- Theoden with everything (1 scenario)
- Gamling with everything (1 scenario)
- Eomer on horse (1 scenario)
- Erkenbrand on horse (1 scenario)
- 12 Galadhrim Warriors (1 scenario, standard gear)
- 12 Warriors of Rohan (1 scenario, standard gear)
- 4 Rohan Royal Guards on horses with throwing spears (1 scenario)
- 24 Riders of Rohan (1 scenario, standard gear)
In case you didn't pick up on it - you really have three different games that all have totally different participants (except for Legolas and Aragorn, who cross over between two of them). There's a lot of cavalry models in play (27 in Eomer's Return, 8 in Ride Out) but we also have a lot of Uruks to kill:
- 3 Uruk-Hai Captains with shields (3 scenarios)
- 20-30 Uruk-Hai Warriors (3 scenarios, standard gear)
- 8 Uruk-Hai Berserkers (1 scenario)
As we saw in the Amon Hen scenario (and possibly for Merry/Pippin in the Ambush at Night scenario), it pays to be F5 (or ideally F6) in these missions. Chances are good that you had extra points to spend on these characters when you were building your Fellowship, so it would be surprising to see F4 or below models here.
There are some exceptions, though: if you have Gamling with the Royal Standard of Rohan as Legolas and you're running a Rohan-hero-heavy Fellowship, you can have Gamling with his banner in the Warg Attack scenario (with a Captain of Rohan subbing for Gamling in that scenario), you'll get him in the Deeping Wall is Breached scenario (where he wouldn't have been in the first place), and you'll still get him in the Ride Out scenario (where you'd get him anyway - once again, he'll be subbed out by a Captain) - which means you're getting a LOT of Might back over the course of these scenarios. F4 though he be, you can get a lot of mileage out of him. There's also utility in the Moria missions to having a banner in your force, and since he's a hero with Heroic March and the ability to replenish his own Might, you could have him Marching Gimli up in the Amon Hen scenario and Marching your whole army up during the Moria missions (not to mention hopefully needing 1 fewer resource/Rohan hero to restore at the end of each scenario).
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| Photo Credit: War in Rohan |
The scenarios are going to make you deal with Berserkers, who will have 2-4 Attacks in their fights, thanks to being 2 Attacks base with up to 2 pikes behind them. Without a banner, though, any hero who has 3 Attacks and the higher Fight Value has a better than 50% chance of winning their duels without Might (a 2A hero has a slightly worse than 50% chance of winning even with the higher Fight Value), so having 3 Attacks is really good. There is a surprisingly short list of F5+/3A heroes on foot who cost 110pts or less for your Gimli/Legolas slots (which is about the points level you can afford if you've gone with a big wizard and decently-priced Hobbit replacements) - of the 152 heroes you can choose from in Fantasy Fellowships (as of the time of this writing - let that number sink in for a minute), 44 of them have 3 Attacks (all of those are F5+), but only 19 of THOSE profiles can be 110pts or less. These profiles are pretty good options for your Legolas/Gimli slots:
- Arathorn (75pts, has Heroic Strike)
- Arvedui, Last King of Arnor (80pts, has Heroic Strike/Defense)
- Brand, King of Dale (110pts, has Heroic Strike)
- Bard II, Prince of Dale (100pts, has Heroic Strike/Defense, +1 To Wound if charged)
- Boromir of Gondor (100pts with the shield, has the trifecta of March/Strike/Defense)
- Either version of Dori (55-75pts, Champ Dori has Defense and +1 To Wound)
- Dwalin the Dwarf OR Young Dwalin the Dwarf (85-95pts, both have Strike, Dwalin the Dwarf has +1 To Wound)
- NOTE: Champ Dwalin is 115pts and just barely didn't make this list - and from experience he's great as Legolas!
- Eomer (110pts with shield and throwing spears, has Heroic Strike, potentially has +1 To Wound if you bring Eowyn/Theoden)
- Either version of Gloin (85-90pts, has Heroic Strike, Champ-Gloin has +1 To Wound)
- Nori the Dwarf, Champion of Erebor (80pts, has Heroic Strike)
- Orophin (85pts)
- Tauriel (90pts with Elf bow, has Heroic Strike)
- Theodred (90pts with shield and throwing spears, has Heroic Strike)
- Thorin Oakenshield or Young Thorin Oakenshield (100pts base, option for the Oakenshield on both for 5pts or Orcrist on "older" Thorin for 10pts, both have Heroic Strike/Defense)
- NOTE: Thorin, King Under the Mountain is 115pts with the option for Orcrist and just barely didn't make this list - from experience, he's a great choice!
- Thorin III (110pts, has Heroic Strike/Defense that could be free, option for +1 To Wound)
If you run two of the guys above as your Legolas/Gimli characters, they should be fine if they get in a fight on their own. Should you pick someone with 2 Attacks (and there's a LOT of those characters to choose from), just make sure they have a spearman behind them or a banner nearby (or they're carrying one, like Gamling).
Because you probably don't need to call Heroic Strike with your Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli characters, your main objective is to call Heroic Combats - and as we've already said, Heroic Combats are gold. Bonuses to Wound help a lot, as does lots of Might (though you may not regain all of it). If you focus on running models from the list above, there are lots of Dwarves represented (10-12 depending on whether you're willing to bump the limit up to 115pts) and a lot of men represented (2 from Rohan, 5 from other lists), but there are also two Elves: Orophin and Tauriel. Both of these heroes can be great in your Fellowships as Tauriel can get extra dice when she's outnumbered and Orophin (without Heroic Strike/Defense) is encouraged to call Heroic Moves/Combats anyway (and has the opportunity to roll extra dice if he gets natural 6s to win the duel - so make sure he's near a banner if you want to run him).
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| Photo Credit: War in Rohan These guys need to kill a LOT of Uruk-Hai . . . better have Heroic Combats working for you! |
Your Aragorn character is going to have his work cut out for him - he's got lots of Uruks to kill and is probably where you dropped a good chunk of your points. While you could certainly run three characters from the list above, I'd encourage you to splurge on someone extra big - while we've already said he should be able to pass Courage tests, it would also help if Aragorn is F6+, has access to Heroic Strike (potentially useful against the Balrog and in the final scenario), and ideally has free Heroic Combats. This makes Aragorn - Strider (Centaur's choice) or Aragorn, King Elessar (Gorgoroth's choice) a really good pick for his own slot, but so would other heroes like Thorin Oakenshield, King Under the Mountain (115-125pts), Elendil (185-190pts), Bard if you run Sigrid and Tilda (170-175pts - though you won't have free Heroic Combats in THESE scenarios), or sometimes Thorin III Stonehelm (110pts)/Braga if you run the Master of Lake-town as Legolas (100pts, though he's only F4 and has no Strike - I wouldn't do this option, but still . . .). With the exception of Braga, any of these guys would make for great Aragorns - and both King Thorin and Thorin III are cheap enough that you could probably run both of them in the same army (breaking the timeline) to get (potentially) two guys with free Heroic Combats in your list (maybe as Aragorn and Legolas to really chop through guys during the Ride Out scenario?).
Now also seems like a good time to talk about your Wizard slots, since we have the first of three missions where your only Fellowship member (or one of two) is your wizard. During the four Moria sequence missions, your Wizard will never be acting alone, so who you have doesn't really matter. Yes, breaking the bridge can be really difficult with Arwen or Gildor, but the fact of matter is that if you kill the Balrog, you're probably going to be able to break the bridge without much difficulty if you can throw all your Might into it (and especially so if Will is no object). But in Eomer's Return, our wizard needs to be able to supplement Eomer and Erkenbrand in their charge against a lot of Uruk-Hai. And I mean a LOT of Uruk-Hai - your Wizard needs to be working for you.
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| Photo Credit: War in Rohan Time to play with your super-buffed wizard hero! |
Thankfully, our wizards get some buffs after their "respawn": if we took Gandalf the Grey or Galadriel, we get "better profiles" for them in the form of Gandalf the White and Galadriel, Lady of Light respectively. The upgrade to Gandalf the White is awesome - we lose two spells (Collapse Rocks, which is very hard to actually use, and Protection of the Valar, which is completely unnecessary for Fantasy Fellowships since Gandalf doesn't run into any casters in Moria) and in trade we get 3 new spells (Fortify Spirit, Banishment, and Your Staff is Broken - none of which will be useful in the four scenarios we'll have Gandalf for except for MAYBE Fortify Spirit against the Mouth of Sauron) and reduced casting difficulties for 4 spells (all of which are useful - Immobilize/Command for neutralizing a hero, Sorcerous Blast for knocking stuff over/dealing damage, and Strengthen Will for buffing our Will store before we go charging in).
While I think most players would generally prefer Galadriel, Lady of Light in Matched Play to Galadriel (at least, before she was downgraded to a Hero of Foritude), having Galadriel upgraded to Galadriel, Lady of Light in Fantasy Fellowships is both a good thing and a bad thing. On the good side, Galadriel would never get to 3 Attacks without the transformation and since the evil Courage values are low and shamans are nowhere to be seen, the 6 inch "mini-Harbinger" bubble she projects can be really helpful in keeping any Terror-causing heroes you have from being charged. Paired with Cirdan, Thranduil with the Circlet, or Radagast who could make other people cause Terror via Aura of Dismay, Galadriel can be a real powerhouse - but that's never going to happen in Fantasy Fellowships (except in Moria, I guess). Still, it'll at least keep her from getting swarmed (and if you ran any other Terror-instilling Elves or monsters, those guys will be harder to charge near her too).
Galadriel, Lady of Light's spell suite isn't that great for Fantasy Fellowships - she doesn't fight any Spirit models, so Banishment isn't great. Similarly, because the only caster we'll be fighting is the Mouth of Sauron, Fortify Spirit isn't great either. This leaves us with Instill Fear - which IS quite useful at clearing out Orcs and sometimes Uruk-Hai (both of which we'll need to fight). It will not be useful against Citadel Guard thanks to the Bodyguard rule, but still, it'll be useful in most of her missions. By contrast, normal Galadriel, if given the same boosts as other casters in this slot, would become a 2A unarmed model (not great), but would cast Immobilize on a 2+, Command on a 3+, and Blessing of the Valar (Fate restoration) on a 2+ - a 2+ FATE RESTORE! Yeah, I could get used to that . . . but alas, that's not meant to be. The combat boost (+2 Attacks without the penalty of being unarmed) is really good and I guess we'll take it.
The other wizard choices vary in usefulness, but generally speaking, you're looking at one of three kinds of casters: the hitty kind, the casty kind, and the cheap kind. Your combat mages include Elrond, Celeborn, and Thranduil - Elrond will be 170-180pts and is the most expensive (but also gets Restore downgraded to a 2+ to cast and Wrath of Bruinen downgraded to a 3+ - which is really solid), Celeborn will be at least 145pts because you probably want the heavy armor and you definitely want the sword, but could be 150pts if you choose to also give him the shield. Even at his max 150pts, he's probably the cheapest of these guys and gives you quite a bit of killing power. When he comes back, he'll be casting Immobilize on a 2+ or Enchanted Blades on a 2+, both of which are super useful (especially if you're casting Enchanted Blades on Eomer so you have two really good punchy pieces in Eomer's Return).
Thranduil requires a bit more configuration: at the very least, you want the heavy armor and he becomes a lot worse if he doesn't have the extra sword, so a reasonable "minimum" for him is 140pts. But . . . you probably want to get the Circlet of Kings too - it gives you the ability to make everyone near him cause Terror (great for the Moria missions that don't have the Balrog - and really great in Atop the Walls and The End of All Things) and gives you the ability to knock enemy models within 3" of him prone once during the game (great for clearing guys out or slowing them down). With F7 and extra Attacks for being on foot (and potentially for being swarmed) from the extra sword, Thranduil is a nasty piece of work for only 160pts!
None of these three guys, though, is that likely to break the bridge in the Bridge of Khazad-Dum scenario. We have to assume that these guys will be casting Sorcerous Blast on a 5+ on the bridge (since that's what Gandalf would normally cast it on) and with only 3 Will points and a 6 required on the subsequent damage roll (no Might to boost the roll), we probably want to only spend 1 Will each attempt trying to get a 5+ so we can get multiple tries at getting a 6 on our wounding roll. That's . . . not very likely to work out on 3 attempts without a dedicated flow of Might (or Will restoration from some version of Bombur). The good news is that winning a game of Fantasy Fellowships just means you don't get a +1 to your Injury rolls . . . so don't lose anyone and you're fine with a draw or loss. :-)
When it comes to the "caster heroes," you're counting on them using their free Will point each turn to "buff your guys" or "debuff your enemies" - and you have a non-zero chance of destroying the Bridge of Khazad-Dum if you're given enough time to work. We've already talked some about Gandalf the Grey and Galadriel (who both get new profiles starting in the Eomer's Return scenario), but there are three other casters who fit in this category. Saruman the White is a crowd favorite since he has lower casting difficulties relative to Gandalf the Grey and costs the exact same number of points. With the ability to break the Bridge of Khazad-Dum on a 4+ every time he casts, he's easily the best at breaking the bridge - and with the reroll he gets, he can REALLY make each cast work. When he gets "supped up," he becomes a 2A hero who doesn't benefit THAT much from the reduction in casting difficulty since three-out-of-five spells are innately cast on a 2+, but being able to cast Command on a 2+ and Sorcerous Blast on a 3+ is incredibly strong. Yep, he's a great choice if you want an offensive damage caster.
Probably the best overall caster to take the Gandalf slot is Radagast the Brown, though: as we've already mentioned, Terror is super powerful in Fantasy Fellowships since there are no shamans/auto-passing Courage Test shenanigans except in the Bridge of Khazad-Dum scenario and Radgast can cast Aura of Dismay originally on a 5+ (becomes a 4+ when he becomes "Radagast Reborn"). Most of Radagast's spells are cast easily to begin with, but starting in Eomer's Return, he'll have four spells cast on a 2+, Nature's Wrath cast on a 3+, and Aura of Dismay cast on a 4+ - that's pretty ridiculous too.
Finally, we need to talk about Cirdan: Cirdan isn't like the other guys in this list - a lot of his spells are either unnecessary or difficult to cast. Like Radagast, he has Aura of Dismay, but with only 1 Might point to make it work, it could take more than one attempt to get the spell up. Like Gandalf, he has Blinding Light, but there's very little evil archery in Moria/Helm's Deep/Minas Tirith, so that won't be that helpful. Like Saruman, he has Aura of Command, but most of the evil models (unless they're really, REALLY big) don't cause Terror. So . . . you're really looking for the boost to casting Enchanted Blades on a 3+ and Aura of Dismay on a 4+ (oh, and while you'll have 2 Attacks base, you'll still be unarmed, so your combat abilities will be "better," but not that much better).
Cirdan's other appealing factor is that he's cheap - and for this reason, he crosses over into the third kind of caster choice (the budget casters). While Cirdan certainly qualifies in this list, the final two caster options are the main focus: Arwen and Gildor. Both of these heroes have limited Will stores and have one casting trick each (except in the Bridge of Khazad-Dum scenario, where they pick up Sorcerous Blast, presumably cast on a 5+).
Arwen has 4 Will points and will get boosted to 2 Attacks with the ability to cast Nature's Wrath on a 3+ when she goes into super-mode - both of which are awesome. Her one downside is that she's incredibly squishy: D3, 2 Wounds, 1 Fate isn't very good by anyone's standards - and with base 1 Attack (eventually 2), she can lose fights and get killed even against 2 foes.
Gildor, by comparison, begins as a 2A hero (so he won't get a boosted Attack stat when he enters "god mode") and has 4 Will points to cast Immobilize - which is surprisingly useful in the Moria sequence to shut down the Wild Warg Chieftain and Cave Troll, with marginal/possible effectiveness against the Balrog if you get a high enough roll. Once he's fighting in Rohan/Gondor, however, this spell loses a lot of its utility. Still, he's got a decent profile for only 70pts, but is going to be of more use to you during the Moria missions than in the later missions. Ultimately you run him for one reason: you need someone cheap as your caster and you don't want Arwen or Cirdan. Lovely model, but not that great of a choice overall in Fantasy Fellowships in my opinion.
How Do Our Fellowships Compare?
That's a lot to mull over - but do our Fellowships follow our own advice? Let's take a look:
- Are your heroes F5+ with 3 Attacks?
- Tiberius: I have Dwalin, Gloin, and Nori as my heroes. Nori is F5/3A with a reroll to his dueling roll built in, while Gloin and Dwalin are both F6/3A heroes (and Dwalin can be F6/4A if he wants to omit the +1 To Wound). All told, I've got this one smashed out.
- Is Aragorn F6+ with Strike and possibly free Heroic Combats?
- Tiberius: Dwalin is a great Aragorn hero - he's F6 with Strike, but he doesn't have free Heroic Combats. Thorin would have been better in this category, but alas for theme.
- Which wizard did you pick?
- Tiberius: I picked Gandalf as my wizard for thematic reasons, but I love Gandalf the White and I think he puts me in a really strong position in the missions he's in, so yes, I'm quite happy with my choice.
Conclusion
Okay, that's a good deep-dive into what you need for four of the profiles in our list - in fact, we've done a deep dive into seven of the nine profiles we need, so as we turn to Part 5, our focus goes entirely to the Ringbearer and Companion profiles that we haven't reviewed . . . and as you'll see, they're probably the ones we have the least amount of choice over and where the MOST weight actually lies. We'll tackle Path #5 after we do the scenario walk-throughs and with it some directives on how you can play the missions (before actually walking through how I fared later). Until next time, happy hobbying!
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