MESBG Christmas Lists, List #9: The Serpent Horde . . . and Friends?

Good morning gamers,

Tiberius: I hope you have some time on your hands, because today's Christmas list is LONG! Yep, it's our resident Armies of MESBG writer Rythbyrt and he has a write up on one of the weirdest lists I've ever faced. Take it away, mate!

Rythbryt: If you’ve been following the blog for any amount of time, you know that two things are true anytime there’s a tournament: (1) I take forever to write my lists, and (2) I like a lot of threats in my armies (aka, lots of heroes or hero-like models). So when Tiberius sent around the info for TMAT’s annual Grand Tournament this past Spring, I went into the bunker for a number of weeks. And after thinking about Rangers, Castellans, and Khazad-Dum dwarves, here's what emerged from the mire!

Suladan [Army Leader]

• 4 Haradrim Warriors with spears
• 5 Haradrim Warriors with bows and spears
• 5 Watchers of Karna with Twin Blades

Mouth of Sauron

• 9 Black Numenoreans

Mahud King on war camel with shield and war spear

• 3 Mahud Raiders with war spears
• 5 Half Trolls

623/623, 34 models (breaks at 18 casualties, quartered at 8 remaining/26 casualties)

This is but a taste of our full grandeur!

Photo credit: Me!

I'd never played a list quite like this before, but I've used most of the pieces at various times in "friendly" games, so I mostly knew how they were likely to perform. The list tries to strike a balance between "tough to engage" and "hard-hitting"... and I think it mostly succeeded. :-P 

The points total was on the lower end (623), which presented a number of interesting challenges. The first was that I’ve always said “I’ll take Goblin-Town to an actual tournament sometime,” and 623 is actually a pretty good points value for them. It’s just high enough that you can really horde out with the Goblin-King (60-70 models, depending on whether you go for maxed-out +6 warbands, or opt for more captains/Might and/or more mercs). But it’s also low enough that a lot of the stuff that gives the Goblin-King fits (and, to a lesser extent, your standard goblins) just might not be there (elf lords/elves in general, wizards, ringbearer + big baddie, Sauron, Harbinger ringwraiths + Terror troops, etc.). And I actually playtested a GT army quite a bit in the lead-up to the tournament (GK, Gollum, Grinnah, Scribe, 20 mercs with 2 captains, and 68 models all together). But there were a couple things that held me back, most notably the time limit (it was hard to finish matches in 90 minutes or less that weren’t just close draws), and the third match’s scenario pool (To the Death, Lords of Battle, Contest of Champions)… mostly because no one would let me take Contest. Also, goblin courage is terrible… and when your breakpoint is “only” 35, you actually get broken sometimes.

I also really looked at the standard armies I love playing (Rangers, Castellans, Grim Hammers), and even dabbled in some Khazad-Dum towards the end (one of these days I will break out 20+ Iron Guard… sadly, probably before I actually take Goblin-Town). But in the end, I ultimately decided to go evil (cuz I hadn’t for a while), and because I’ve always loved the idea of Black Nums and Half-Trolls, and wanted to see if I could meld them somehow. So here's why I made the choices I made, and what I'd change if I could have a do-over/more points.

Basic Strategies and Synergies

For those of you keeping track… Suladan and the Mouth of Sauron are clearly sub-optimized in this list. Neither has a horse, and there’s no bow on Suladan, either. He’s here primarily because (1) he’s got 3 Might with 3 wounds and 3 attacks (even on foot), (2) he’s got access to Strike, March, and Resolve (secretly huge), and (3) that big ol’ 6" banner strapped to his back (cuz when you have F4/F5 troops, with a healthy contingent of spears, banner rerolls are very nice). I hemmed and hawed about putting Suladan on a horse… and if the limit was 650, I would have. But I liked where having 34 models put me, and those 15 points allowed me to invest in some upgraded troop options which, I felt, probably offered more threats than just Suladan on a horse. Plus, it turns out Suladan on foot is plenty potent… as long as you don’t throw him into something stupid (which, to be fair, you also wouldn’t do even if he were mounted on a horse).

Suladan also offered me access to the Serpent Horde suite of troops. On the whole, they’re pretty fragile on their own (D4 or less), but I like them quite a lot as support troops to something tankier. At 8 points, a corsair with a spear is probably a better buy than a generic Haradrim with a spear (7 points) because you pick up the throwing daggers and F4. But 7 points for a F3/S3 spear with decent courage is fine, and a Haradrim spearman with a bow for 8 points is a vast improvement over an Orc warrior with a spear and bow (+1 point for the same fight/defense, but you improve your shoot value to 4+ instead of 5+, 24” range instead of 18”, C3 instead of C2, and the arrows are Poisoned... which usually doesn't matter, but does sometimes).

I also ended up bringing 5 Watchers of Karna (which, it turns out, are hard to get ahold of these days). I had 3 lying around from years ago that I finally painted (good excuse, a tournament), and ended up using a couple of Hasharin for the final two (which seemed to work fine). I’ve since found a few more, which I’ll paint up at some point, I’m sure. Stat-wise, they’re pretty fragile, but as long as you take them with the twin blades, it’s hard to go wrong with 2 attacks at F4 for just 9 points. The fact that they double as a response to Terror models, and also get a +1 to-wound against Spirit models, also gave my force some nice versatility to take out stuff that the rest of the army might struggle to deal with. And if you manage to trap a Spirit model with a couple of these… well, suddenly, you’re rolling 10+ dice to wound (most of which are also +1 to wound) without breaking a sweat. It’s kind of nuts.

To pair with my Haradrim, I opted for Mordor (as I’m sure many of you have, too). The Mouth of Sauron was the clear choice at this points-level to lead that contingent (since I was always looking at a Yellow alliance). Like Suladan, he also has Heroic March (in case we drew a “we have to deploy on two different sides of the board” scenario, which was on the table). And he’s solid (if unspectacular) in combat, while also offering a little magic. Magic is swingy, and with just 4 Will (and only one really good spell, a 3+ Transfix), he’s not a serious magical threat by any means. But if your opponent has no answer to magic (besides “roll gud”), he’s better than nothing. And maybe the threat of that sneaky Transfix would make opponents think twice about charging one of my other threats (which is worth it, in my view). In retrospect, one of the named wraiths would have probably been a better choice, for the added Harbinger and a more sustainable magic threat (I regretted not having The Shadowlord multiple times during the actual tournament). But at a difference of 50 points (120 vs. 70), it was just too big for me to stomach at this points level. At 700, though…

In the Mouth's warband was a healthy contingent of Black Numenoreans… and just Black Numenoreans. I’ve always liked their profile (and I really like the proxy models I’ve found for them). And as I’ve written elsewhere, apart from their “low” strength (S3), their stat line is excellent for the points (F4, D6, C4 base—up to C6 with a war horn/army bonus—and Terror). My model count (34) ended up being pretty good given the points level + quality of other models in my force, but you never know how the games themselves will play out, so I thought the tankiness of the Black Nums would give me a good anvil to operate behind, while my hammer(s) were hammering away elsewhere. And that proved to be true a lot of the time during the tournament itself.

My last contingent comes from Far Harad, and features a Mahud King (with basically everything except the blowpipe, which I don't have the patience for), five half-trolls, and three Mahud Raiders. I love everything in the Far Harad list... with the exception of the basic Mahud Warrior (S4 is great, but F3/D5 for the cost is just not my cup of tea). So I left them at home, and opted for just the cool stuff instead. I’ve run camels before in “fun” games (for me), and as long as you’re not facing serious Terror threats, they’re pretty devastating (if fragile). And the Mahud King is an absolute boss (he’s still surprisingly scary on foot, but let’s be real: the 3 attacks/S5, on a camel, with warspear, on the charge… is abjectly terrifying to anything D7 or below… which is most things).

[HTs]

We're malicious, mean and scary!

(With sneers that'd curdle dairy!)

Photo credit: (Also) Me!

But the real winners in my tournament list were the half-trolls. I’m relatively late to the half-troll party, mostly because I think, in general, you get more bang for your buck from the mounted Mahud Raiders (faster movement, impact hits, and 5-6 points cheaper each, which adds up). But when you’re trying to grind out shieldwalls (something Black Nums struggle to do), half-trolls really shore up that weakness with their D6 and 2 wounds (to pair with F5, S5, and 2 attacks on offense). And the fact that they have Terror synergizes really well with the Black Nums, too. Their Courage is trash (C2), which is why in the abstract, I’d still take a shieldwall of Castellans over a shieldwall of half-trolls. But at about half the cost, and a much better alliance matrix, the half-trolls were the clear choice here, and more than carried their weight in my tournament games.

Stacked together, I really liked the way these three elements combined to present different threats to different match-ups. The Mahud King is a threat all the time, to anyone (especially with the potential Transfix from the Mouth, to support him against beefier targets). After that, it’s probably the half-trolls and Mahud Raiders in some order. Or is it Suladan? Maybe the Watchers in certain match-ups? However you wanted to slice and dice it, there were eight F5/2+ attack models with multiple wounds to contend with, four potential models with impact hits, and up to 16 models with 2+ attacks in a turn if things broke right. The rest? Black Nums backed by spears.

Now don’t get me wrong--you can definitely crack a Black Num shieldwall. But it generally takes some committed resources to do it--usually elite troops and/or heroes. And those are also typically the same resources you need to deal with half-trolls, or F5 combat heroes. Throw in Suladan’s 6” banner for rerolls, a timely Heroic Resolve from Suladan when needed (a life-saver against Tiberius’s 4 Barrow-Wight Angmar army), and the flexibility that comes from the Watchers (capturing far-flung objectives, suicide-Bob-ing the Betrayer, etc.), and I was pretty sure this list would present a ton of threats for the opponent to deal with, all over the board. That proved to be the case in practice, which of course meant that I absolutely loved playing this particular list.

Scaling Suggestions

Lastly, I think the bones of this list would scale decently to 700-800 points. A few things I’d consider (beyond the obvious “give Suladan a horse”):

• For the Mordor contingent, the Mouth of Sauron is a good budget hero, but both his damage and magic potential are capped (even mounted). I’d strongly consider swapping him out for a named wraith at 700, which provides both Harbinger and more reliable/sustainable magic. The Shadowlord for the ranged protection is always nice, especially against siege weapons; but I’d also consider the Dark Marshall (if you need a F6 hero who can provide a second 6” banner effect), and the Tainted is always solid (especially if you can pair him with some sort of ranged threat that will require opponents to charge into your Terror wall, so you can then start messing with your opponent's heroic moves). I would keep at least the same number of Black Nums (probably slide the number slightly higher, into the 10-12 range), and from 750 onwards I would definitely consider a War Horn on a Black Num (to boost the half-trolls and Mahud Raiders from C2 to C3, which is huge for them... along with the Black Nums to C5 and the Watchers to C6... both of which are excellent for evil troops).
• The Serpent Horde contingent is also fine as-is, although if I had the points, some cheap Haradrim Raiders (for more cavalry models) would offer more speed and flexibility. If you also wanted to swap some Abrakhans in for either standard Haradrim or Watchers, I wouldn’t object (although I do think you want at least 9 spears in whatever you end up with—both the Black Nums and half-trolls love having that extra die to win fights).
• Or, you could go in an entirely different direction, and swap either the Serpent Horde or Mordor contingent with a Corsairs contingent, led either by Dalamyr (if you swap out the Serpent Horde) or the Knight of Umbar (if you swap out Mordor). Both ways, you get a named wraith for Harbinger/magic, and can keep your Black Nums (as both Mordor and Umbar can field them). Losing Suladan is a real loss (although the Dark Marshall can help you weather it), although I’d probably opt to keep Suladan, and just bite the bullet that is the Knight of Umbar. He’s situationally good, but not exceptional at… well, really anything. So you’re making that trade primarily to swap out your Haradrim Warriors with spears/bows for Corsairs with Spears/Arbalesters, which increases your ranged damage significantly (to the point that an opponent may actually consider trying to charge your Terror wall). Plus you have the option for a cheap Bosun, if you find you want a floating 3” banner effect to supplement Suladan’s 6” banner on the field.
• That just leaves the Far Harad contingent. I’d be tempted to lean more into Half-trolls myself (especially if you go the Umbar route, where you’ll probably be trading a few Black Nums for spears/crossbows), but I can see the argument for more camels. I probably wouldn’t lean into a second King… but boy, is it tempting.

Once you get past 800, I would start to worry about the quantity and quality of the heroes—Suladan, Dalamyr, named wraiths, and the Mahud King are all great heroes, but they’re low-Might (not great), and are also probably better suited as the second-banana to a more “solid” combat hero (as they have “just” F5, with either a low number of attacks, or squishy defense stats/wounds/fate/all the above). At a thousand points, I play-tested a variant with the Dragon Emperor and a Troll Chieftain (along with a named wraith and the Mahud King) for a while, and they definitely fit that bill. 

[Army]

That sad moment when you realize that 1000 points still isn't enough...

Photo credit: Me, myself, and I

Numbers also start to become an issue past 800 (as the half-trolls and camels eat points, and Black Nums—while efficiently costed—aren’t cheap). And of course, the number of heroes that can deal with half-trolls also tends to increase once you get above 800 (trading 3-4 of them for a down-payment on a Troll Chieftain wouldn’t be a bad investment at 750+). I did end up taking a list that was kind of based on this one to our tournament this fall (1000 points), and it did fine in limited action (two games, one defending a castle with half-trolls… which went exactly the way you think it would), but the games were all definitely closer than when I played the game at just 623.

But this is already long enough for Christmas… so I’ll stop jabbering, and let you pick up the ball if you like, and run with it. ;-)

Tiberius: While I was certainly pleased to not see Goblin-town on the table at our Grand Tournament, I quickly felt that this list was going to win the attrition war against my Angmar host. And I was right. :-) Thanks, Rythbyrt, for the list - we're closing in fast on Christmas, so we'll be back with another list soon. Until next time, happy hobbying!