The Scouring of the Shire, Part 2: The Ruffians Arrive

Good morning gamers,

We're back for scenario two of the Scouring of the Shire campaign and today Bill Ferny is back, leading a ragtag band of Ruffians and Lotho Sackville-Baggins against a company of Hobbit Shirriffs and a few Hobbit Militia bounders, led by Holfoot Bracegirdle and Robin Smallburrow. Let's see how this goes!

The Ruffians Arrive

The Ruffians and Hobbits start on opposite sides of the Brandywine Bridge in roughly equal numbers. The game lasts for 12 turns and Evil wins if they can Paralyze Robin and Holfoot and get them off the western board edge. The Hobbits win if they can prevent this from happening and if Holfoot and Robin are still alive. If either Holfoot or Robin should be killed, the game is a draw.

Nemesis: How to Fight Against the Dark Lord Sauron

Good morning gamers,

We're back with a how-to-counter-tough-models post today and since we covered the "big four" heroes of the Last Alliance, it seemed fitting that we'd also cover Sauron in the discussion - especially since he showed up on most of their countering lists. If you make a short list of models that are a) great in combat, b) hard to kill, and c) great at casting magic, Sauron is probably very, VERY high on the list. He's expensive, but he also does it all. So if you see him on the other side of the table, what on Middle-Earth are you supposed to do? Well, let's dig into what makes this guy good - and then we'll look at how to beat him.

What Makes The Dark Lord Sauron So Hated?

Any discussion about Sauron has to begin with his profile - he's got a beastly combat profile with F9, S8, 4 Attacks, and 3 Might with the option to call Heroic Strike (though when you start from F9, there's a real risk against F5-6 heroes that you don't need it). If his offense was great and his defense was poor (like Gulavhar), he probably wouldn't be worth his cost, but with Defense 10 (the only hero in the game with a Defense rating that high), 5 Wounds, and a 2+ mightable save against the final wound he suffers thanks to his modified One Ring rules, wounding Sauron is hard - and killing Sauron is all but impossible. 

Photo Credit: Warhammer Community

If you'd like to see a rather hilarious science experiment about how hard it is to kill Sauron, you should check out the Conquest Creations video that Jacob Lucas did earlier in the year - if you don't mind spoilers, Sauron managed to kill 532 Hobbit Militia over 157 turns and died after making 17 One Ring saves . . . no game is going to last that long, of course - and it's very rare that you'll see over 500 Hobbits on the board . . . or that all you'll be facing are Hobbit Militia with axes. :)

He's also got a great spell array - arguably the greatest in the game (I certainly think so). Most of his spells have an 18" range (6" longer than most other casters), and he can cast Drain Courage/Transfix on a 2+, Compel on a 3+, and Chill Soul/Sap Will on a 4+, giving him the ability to neutralize low-Will heroes while they're a long way off to slow their advance, weaken Ringwraiths with either of his 4+ spells from beyond a Fly-able charge range, and he can pluck wounds off army leaders or banner-bearers far before they get into combat with him. Oh, and he casts Instill Fear on a 3+, which can be great for clearing out objectives (especially when paired with his Ancient Evil special rule).

Nemesis: How to Fight Against Isildur

Good morning gamers,

This year in this series, we've looked at Gil-Galad, Elendil, and Elrond as the major heroes from the Last Alliance (well, and Bill Ferny) - today, we're wrapping up the quadrivium of heroes by covering the cheapest and potentially most difficult to deal with of the lot: Isildur. This guy can be crazy good - and he can also let you know (or at least, mine has let me down a time or twelve). Isildur is a bit of an odd choice for this series, since he's the first model that I'm not only covering here in Nemesis (as a model that you can hate fighting on the other side of the table) AND a model we've previously covered in our In Defense Of series (as a model that gets critique for not being good enough by some players). Isildur is a bit of a polarizing piece, either shredding your army and best heroes to bits or underperforming and seeming inferior to his dad (and sometimes multiple captains).

Recently, Evan Iverson has had some international success with Isildur (allied with some friends that aren't Rivendell to help maximize his benefits) and so we're going to look today at what you can do to help fight against Isildur and make him pay if he shows up on the other side of the board. Let's see what all the fuss is about this guy first . . .

What Makes Isildur So Hated?

For starters, Isildur is usually fielded without Elendil so that he has the One Ring. Isildur is the only Ringbearer who follows the rules for the One Ring and has innate F6, which will give him a higher FV than most other models who can engage him (more on this later). Since he's the second model in the hierarchy for getting the Ring (only behind Sauron) and since you have full control over whether you have Elendil (and eventually Anarion) in your list, you are very likely to have the Ring if you take Isildur - and as I've discussed before (several times, actually, to include an article in our Back to Basics series), there are some really powerful things you can do with the One Ring.

Photo Credit: The Armies of the Lord of the Rings

Before he puts the Ring on, Isildur is still a powerhouse hero with F6/S5/3A, access to a horse, and 3-Might-and-Strike. By any hero's reckoning, this is a great offensive profile - and while there are heroes who can have more Might than Isildur, the presence of the Ring often means that he needs to spend his Might less for calling heroic actions and can use it more for passing the two things that actually matter: dueling rolls and Ring tests.

Announcing the TMAT GT 2024!

  Good morning gamers,

Wait, we just had a tournament - what's all this? Well, we had a short window this year for our Grand Tournament, so here's a three week notice post! The tournament will be held at Patrick Henry College on May 4, 2024. Like the event last year, we're going to do four rounds with the veto system, but the way we do pairings will be a little different. Without further ado, here are (in my typical style) the Ten Commandments of the Tournament (Rules):

1) Thou Shalt Understand The Canon

The ruleset from the updated Middle-Earth Strategy Battle Game Rules Manual (the Sauron one) will be our baseline. The Armies of the Lord of the Rings supplement will govern the rules for armies from the Lord of the Rings, while the Armies of the Hobbit supplement will govern the rules for armies from the Hobbit. Legendary Legions and profiles from any of the GW supplements may be used, provided that the army building requirements for the Legendary Legion are followed. Any GW errata for these books will take precedent over the printed text of these documents.

2) Thou Shalt Honor Thy Alliance

This tournament follows the alliance "restrictions" provided in the Armies of the Lord of the Rings and Armies of the Hobbit supplements - players are allowed to have "pure" armies or Historical/Convenient/Impossible alliances. Legendary Legions from any of the Games Workshop supplements can be taken as well, but obviously cannot take allies nor be taken as allies.

The Scouring of the Shire, Part 1: Ruffians in Bree

Good morning gamers,

Last year, Centaur and I played through Fantasy Fellowships every other Saturday and it was a lot of fun. I think Quest of the Ringbearer is the best supplement released to date and the scenario options in it certainly contribute to that. Centaur (Hi Reader!) firmly believes that The Scouring of the Shire supplement is better, so when we were probing through scenario campaigns to do this year, the choice was clear: we were doing Scouring.

Centaur has been collecting Hobbits for ages and has recently printed a bunch of Ruffians to support his GW Sharkey's Rogues heroes, so after finding and painting Robin Smallburrow, he was good to provide all the models. With his help getting some 3D printed roads and smial doors (and a mill - all paid for by advertising revenue from this blog by viewers like you . . . thanks, guys), I undertook the terrain side of the house. Now you know who to critique for what.

Our first scenario begins in Bree, which means I get to show off some really old, child-proof terrain today . . .

Ruffians in Bree

The board is a 4'x4' board in two panels - I have an Inn of the Prancing Pony in the middle for Quest of the Ringbearer, so we measured out a 12" radius in all four cardinal directions and marked the edges with black dice (you can see one at the bottom of the image behind the Ruffian models).

The scenario participants are 4 Hobbit Militia and 8 Bree Villagers (Hobbit Militia with +2" of movement, +1 Strength, and -1 Courage) against Bill Ferny (remember him?) and 9 Ruffians (3 bows, 2 whips, 4 vanilla). To win this scenario, the Bree-folk need to kill Bill Ferny (2 Wounds/1 Fate with Defense 3 and only 1 Attack), while the Ruffians need to quarter the Bree-folk AND Bill Ferny needs to kill two models. If the Ruffians quarter the Bree-Folk but Bill Ferny kills 0-1 models, the game is a draw. Let's see if we can make some mischief in Bree . . .  

Nemesis: How to Fight Against Elrond

Good morning gamers,

This is our third week in our Last Alliance-focused thread of our Nemesis series (after stepping away from the series for a few weeks) and we're looking at one of the greatest Elven heroes in the game: Elrond. When Centaur and I got started playing MESBG, Centaur jumped feet-first into both Rohan and Isengard . . . and he bought Elrond. Why? Because Centaur LOVES Elrond. I mean, he really, REALLY loves Elrond. I mean, if you asked him who the top three spell casters for the Forces of Good are, Elrond makes the list. He . . . REALLY . . . likes Elrond.

His Elrond has been epic in many a game against me. My Elrond has been hot and cold - and while he's killed many things, he has never gotten me more than two Foresight points in a tournament game before (while Centaur's seems to always roll 5s or 6s . . . not that I'm bitter or anything). Yes, Elrond is good - and if you're not ready for him, he can really make things look unwinnable. So how does one prepare to fight this guy? If you think it's with the same tools you'd use against Gil-Galad, you'd be kind of right . . . let's see where the overlap is by understanding what Elrond is bringing to the table.

What Makes Elrond So Hated?

Like Gil-Galad and Elendil (though certainly not to their extent), Elrond has a really solid combat profile - he's F6 with 3-Might-and-Strike on an Elven-made weapon, he's got 3 Attacks, access to a mount, and Lord of the West for effectively 4-5 attacks when he's dueling and 3-8 wounding dice with an unconditional reroll, depending on whether his cavalry bonuses are all active. His sword, Hadhafang, is also a hand-and-a-half sword, so if you're okay with two-handing (which you generally should be - give it a try sometime), he can also get +1 To Wound, which is a great way to make sure he's not blunted by most units. Furthermore, Hadhafang gives him +1 To Wound against Spirit models, which means he'll wound those pesky Warriors of the Dead on a 5+ WITHOUT two-handing (4+ if he is) and can even get some crazy-low wounding difficulties against the likes of the Balrog.

Photo Credit: Warhammer Community

I actually didn't mention Elrond in my discussion on how to counter the Balrog (though if you go ALL the way to the bottom of the comments, you'll see a discussion of it in brief), so I'll just go over the highlights now: Elrond (base S4) begins by wounding the Balrog on a 6/4+, which is pretty good all things considered (lots of heroes start - and stop - here). This means Elrond is expected to deal maybe one wound/turn if he can manage to trap the Balrog. Thanks to the Balrog being a Spirit model, this gets improved to a 5/3+, which puts him quite close to 1 wound/turn without a trap (and close to 2 wounds/turn with a trap). If he two-hands as well, he can improve his wounding difficulty to a 4/2+, which is going to put him on 2-3 wounds against an untrapped Balrog and 3-5 wounds against a trapped Balrog - which is INSANE. 

If Elrond is also able to reroll all failed To Wound rolls with Enchanted Blades (say, from Cirdan), he's likely to be wounding the Balrog very, very well and actually stands a better chance of killing him than any other Rivendell or Numenor hero. And this assumes that Cirdan used his Might point to channel Blinding Light, instead of channelling his Enchanted Blades to give Elrond yet another +1 To Wound (3/1+ with rerolls on all failed To Wound rolls). I think in most worlds, Cirdan isn't going to be channelling this spell . . . but Celeborn has 3 Might for channelling it and is historical allies with Elrond . . . so that might happen. If you're a D8 or lower Spirit model (as basically every other Spirit in the game is), Elrond is basically wounding with everything without the Enchanted Blades . . . chew on that for a bit . . .

Nemesis: How to Fight Against Bill Ferny

Good morning gamers,

After a few weeks off, we're back in the Nemesis series and I wanted to talk about one of the most ANNOYING characters you'll ever face in MESBG: Bill Ferny. This guys is a cheap hero in a faction that has a bunch of cheap warriors, so that alone will complicate your day - but when you stack onto the mega-horde-with-bows-and-whips annoyance an absolutely game-shattering rule (I don't know HOW this hasn't been errata'd yet), you get just a filthy character. No honorable person would ever run this guy - and yet, there are some people who do. Should you ever run into one of those people, this article will help you beat them. Let's dig in and see what all the fuss is about Bill Ferny and then look at how to beat him.

What Makes Bill Ferny So Hated?

Bill Ferny only costs 40 points (Goblin-level Captain costs) and for that you get a very points-efficient profile. F3/4+ doesn't look great, but compared to Goblins, that's better than you'd think - and since he has a dagger and a whip (2" S1 throwing weapon), the 4+ shoot value actually matters (and will hit on a 3+ or a 4+ depending on whether he's charging or moving-and-shooting if he's taken from the Chief's Ruffians Legendary Legion, which you should always do).

Photo Credit: Warhammer.com

S3/D3 doesn't look great - and 1 Attack/Courage 3 doesn't look great either, but to get the really awesome rules he has, something has to give. As it is, since increasing your Strength and Defense doesn't always help you, these stats are perfectly fine for fighting certain foes who have invested in extra Strength (S4 models won't wound him any better than S3 models) or Defense (D5 models won't be any harder to wound than D4 models - and being D7 is similarly not any better than being D6). Many of his other stats are perfectly normal with 2 Wounds, 1 Will, 1 Fate - look at how efficient this guy is!

Fleshing Out the Faction: Sharkey's Rogues (and The Chief's Ruffians)

Hey Reader!

Welcome back to the blog! Having recently run Sharkey's Rogues at our 2024 Spring Zephyr Tournament, I've been thinking a lot about this faction and what it could use to make it...not more competitive, because I don't think there's anything you can add to make you better at the scenarios where you're starting heavily down-handed without going beyond the theme and written source material of the army, but I do think these few new additions would help to fill a few (read: three) of the gaps currently in the force.

We don't do these very often, but let's be real: post The Scouring of the Shire, I don't think Sharkey's Rogues is going to get any more love than they've already gotten (and admittedly that book was just a beautiful labor of love for two factions I love running, so I'm not complaining about that book), but I do think that these few additional profiles will offer quite a bit of versatility that is much needed in this faction.

We'll start by looking at the "why" behind these additions before looking at the "what," and then look at what changes these make to a few typical Sharkey's Rogues / The Chief's Ruffians lists at common points levels.

I.  Why Does Sharkey's Rogues Need Some Love?

This faction is very small in terms of overall profiles (though admittedly up 100% from pre-Scouring, so no complaints here!): Ruffians with access to whips, bows, and knives/clubs (and possibly Hobbit Militia) for your warriors, and then a smattering of F4 and lower heroes, all D3-4, with 1-2 Attacks, and no access to Heroic Strike or Defence, both of which would be very, very helpful.

Armies of Middle-Earth SBG: Countering Angmar, Part 4 -- Avoiding (Avoidable) Mistakes on the Table

What?!?! Back for more tricks?!?!

Photo Credit: Hint--I'm a creature of habit (it's me again)

Editor's Note: This article is part of a larger series on dealing with Angmar. Click the links for Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4.

* * *

The semester's over, so I'm back baby! (Raise your hand if you had an article from me on your bingo card for today ;-P )

As some of you may recall, over the Summer we explored strategies to counter Angmar (if you missed it, or need a refresher, you can check out the previous articles on dealing with Terror, maintaining control over our own pieces, and weathering magic spells by clicking the links). In terms of list-building, these are the primary tactical issues that we'll want to make sure we address, or at least think about. And as we discussed at length, most armies have at least some tools available to counter these tactics (or at least make things harder for the Angmar player).

What I want to talk about in this fourth and final discussion, however, is something that often gets lost in all the tactics: mental overload. I touched on this some in my write-up of the Angmar faction proper, but playing with and against Angmar lists (especially optimized Angmar lists of the magic-heavy variety) is a taxing thing for both sides. And in taxing situations, it's easy to forget things that should be obvious, scrap our game plan because we think we see "ghosts,"* and make mistakes. So here's the big-picture idea:

Whenever Angmar has a lot of nasty debuff pieces, you want to make their job harder (not easier) by planning ahead, avoiding simple mistakes that play into their hands, and pressing on. 

Admittedly, that's easier said than done, especially against an experienced Angmar player. But here's a few "meta-tactics" (plus a few practical tactical tactics) that can help us accomplish that primary goal.

* Although when playing against Angmar, you may in fact be seeing actual ghosts...

Reminder 1: Playing Angmar does typically make risk-taking more dangerous, so plan accordingly. We've all done them--those risky, "Hail Mary" plays that put all our chips on the table. A hero calls a heroic combat in a fight where the opponent has one more model than we'd prefer; we do a cavalry charge knowing that everything will come down to the 50-50 roll-off next turn; we march 15" into the line of fire, knowing that if we can just weather this turn of shooting, we'll catch them in the open next turn; we call 4-10 heroic combats in a singe fight phase, hoping to evaporate the enemy's battle line. We'd like to think that every game can be won with planning, precision, and patience. But we know there's games that come down to daring, guts, and dumb luck.

The reality is that Angmar has lots of ways to muck up those risky plays, and then to capitalize on any mistakes we made (especially if you're moving first and Angmar moves second). And an Angmar player wants us to think that because of that fact, we shouldn't take risks like we normally would. Just play it safe--conservative. Now there's certainly something to be said for conservative play against Angmar (if nothing else, that style tends to commit fewer of the "stupid" mistakes that Angmar can really capitalize on, which we'll talk about at the end). But you can certainly take risks against Angmar--you just need to take Edna Mode's advice, and have a plan in place should the risky play fail.

Sage advice, that.

Photo credit: pinterest.com (not me this time... I'm not this creative)

So how do we do this? Here's a couple of practical questions to ask ourselves at the start of the game (and periodically as the game progresses):

What's my target priority this round and next round (at least)? One of the best tips for combatting mental fatigue is taking the initiative (i.e., taking control of things you can control), and pressing your advantages. Think of it as being active/positive-minded ("What am I going to make happen?") instead of passive/negative-minded ("What nasty thing is going to happen to me next?"). After all, we are a participant in the game (not just a passive observer), same as the Angmar player. So we should participate.

Threat assessment is an important part of any game, and games against Angmar are no exception. But Angmar armies often have more threats than we're used to dealing with at once, so we need to be constantly assessing and re-assessing what's the most dangerous thing to us, as well as what weakness(es) we're going to exploit to buy us some breathing space. If it's Gulavhar, am I going to avoid him? Try to bait him over to a far flank? Pour every available shot into him, and try to scare him off? Or am I going to ignore him because he'll have trouble causing my Terror-causing Black Numenoreans (or because my big hero can deal with him later, as long as I can eliminate his supporting Barrow-Wight in the first two turns)?

Now again--this kind of in-game calculus feels like it takes on added significance in a match-up with Angmar (because the threats are more varied, and in some ways more subtle). But the calculus itself isn't any different from what you would typically do against any other opponent. And that's sort of comforting, if you think about it long enough. 

The Road to the TMAT Spring Zephyr Tournament - Tiberius's List

Good morning gamers,

Well, I've broken my every-other-week Thursday cycle again - hopefully you don't mind. This weekend, we'll be having our Spring Zephyr tournament, where we'll have small armies, short games, and lots of chances for redemption. It'll be grand - but as is always the case, there were a lot of armies clamouring for my attention. Today we'll walk through the various lists I considered running - and what list I finally landed on. Let's start with . . .

Honorable Mention: The Kingdom of Khazad-Dum 

There's nothing in this game I love more than using an army of Dwarves (except maybe one with a Balrog) and Khazad-Dum is a great choice at lower points levels. At 350 points, I was able to get a 19 model army with a Dwarf King, a King's Champion, and a mix of Dwarf Warriors and Rangers to fill out the ranks. Nothing fancy here:

• Dwarf King
• 5 Dwarf Warriors with Dwarf bows
• 4 Dwarf Rangers with throwing axes
• King's Champion
• INDEPENDENT: 2 Heralds
• 6 Dwarf Warriors with shields 

It's the "nothing fancy" bit that made me not take this list - I'm sure it would have done well, but it's also very boring to play. With this being a teach-new-players-to-play event, I didn't want to show up with a grind list of Dwarves, so these guys get to stay in box. I was surprised that my dishonorable mention even fit in the points level . . .

Dishonorable Mention: The Serpent Horde 

So . . . it's a Mumak with Rappelling Lines and some guys in it . . . which would be very hard at this points level to stop with magic or archery. I have no doubt that winning certain scenarios would be hard - and that winning other scenarios would be easy:

• Haradrim Commander with War Mumak of Harad with Rappelling Lines [ARMY LEADER]
• 5 Haradrim Warriors
• 5 Haradrim Warriors with bows

But this is not a good gateway army - no new player is going to look at a Mumak and say, "Yeah, let's go fight that." So, he's staying in the box as well. This leads us to our first actual list . .  

Candidate #5: Rohan - Fellowship Convenient Alliance 

Centaur has done book-accurate Helm's Deep lists before, but this is a first for me. Eomer and Gimli retreat to the caves of the Deep in the book, so I made an all-shooting list with 16 models that reflects their stand at the caves (though Eomer was smart and grabbed a horse):

• Eomer on horse with shield and throwing spears
• 4 Warriors of Rohan with bows
• 6 Warriors of Rohan with shields and throwing spears
• 4 Rohan Royal Guards with throwing spears 
• CONVENIENT ALLY - The Fellowship: Gimli, Son of Gloin 

The list is very skirmishy, but doesn't really have the time to skirmish. The time constraints require an aggressive game play that is just too swingy with this list for my liking. Still, I liked it (and will have more thoughts on this list in a future post).

Candidate #4: Lurtz's Scouts LL 

A better skirmish list is one that can skip shooting and just engage - and a really fun way to do that is with Lurtz's Scouts. Lurtz is a good hero who gets outclassed as the points level increases, but at 350, you can get a big horde of Uruks to help him out:

• Lurtz with shield
• 4 Uruk-Hai Marauders 
• 4 Uruk-Hai Marauders with shields 
• 5 Uruk-Hai Marauders with Uruk-Hai bows 
• Mauhur 
• 3 Uruk-Hai Marauders 
• 4 Uruk-Hai Marauders with shields 
• 3 Uruk-Hai Marauders with Uruk-Hai bows 

This list has an impressive 25 models and was a strong contender for my choice, but then my son expressed an interest in running it, so I backed off. This led me back to Helm's Deep and another Legendary Legion . . .

Candidate #3: The Defenders of Helm's Deep LL

At last year's 300-point Winter Whirlwind tournament, an attendee brought a Theoden/Haldir version of this list - and it did okay. This list has Legolas and has lots of Elf bow shots, 8 supporting models, and some cheap Rohan infantry to form the front-line:

• Theoden, King of Rohan with heavy armor and shield
• 6 Warriors of Rohan with shields
• 1 Warrior of Rohan with throwing spears and shield
• 4 Galadhrim Warriors with Elf bows and spears 
• Legolas Greenleaf with armor
• 4 Warriors of Rohan with shields
• 1 Warrior of Rohan with throwing spears and shield
• 2 Galadhrim Warriors with Elf bows and spears 

20 models is pretty good - and with a few of those as supporting models, you're in a pretty good place if you have a shieldwall match up! While I could get good shooting in on most of the scenarios, this army depends on the spearmen being with the melee units - and with a lot of objective scenarios and not a lot of time on the clock, I just didn't think I would be able to score VPs and still shoot. Maybe next time guys. To get lots of shooting while still getting to the objectives, the better list turned out to be . . .

Candidate #2: Rohan 

Apparently, I have had Rohan on my mind. :-) This list abandons the numerical focus of the other two lists and instead goes for the mostly all-cavalry focus that makes Rohan great. I could have upgraded the Riders of Rohan to mounted Royal Guards and run the Riders of Theoden Legion, but I wanted the extra body:

• Theoden, King of Rohan on armored horse with heavy armor and shield [ARMY LEADER]
• 5 Riders of Rohan 
• Gamling, Captain of Rohan on horse with the Royal Standard of Rohan
• 4 Riders of Rohan
• 1 Warrior of Rohan with shield and throwing spears

Up until the moment I submitted my list, I kept coming back to this one. I ran Rohan at the last event and frankly, I wasn't sure that the infinite Might in this list was going to be appreciated. The list itself doesn't look scary - but all the warriors shoot, we can move quickly if we want to, and our numbers are good (for being mostly cavalry). I looked into turning the Warrior of Rohan into throwing spears/Royal Guard upgrades, as well as turning Gamling into various heroes (Erkenbrand and Dernhelm, in particular - and running Theoden as the only hero with 15 Riders of Rohan/Rohan Royal Guards), but while this list was fun to play, it was facing off against a very strong contender . . .

Candidate #1 and Tiberius's List: Minas Tirith 

I don't know that there's ever been a points level where I have felt better about bringing Denethor than this one. I have a horde of guys (my maximum of 29 models) and plenty of F4 or D6 and spears everywhere. With objective missions being a thing, I feel pretty good at being able to contest my opponents in most games:

• Denethor, Steward of Gondor [ARMY LEADER]
• 4 Warriors of Minas Tirith with shields
• 2 Warriors of Minas Tirith with shields and spears
• 1 Warrior of Minas Tirith with shield, spear, and banner 
• 1 Knight of Minas Tirith with shield 
• 3 Rangers of Gondor
• 4 Citadel Guard 
• Madril, Captain of Ithilien
• 6 Warriors of Minas Tirith with shields
• 6 Rangers of Gondor with spears

This is a proper spam list that has forsaken only one thing: a powerful hero. I have a lot of guys - and not a lot of answers to big heroes - but I can be where I want to be and hopefully that will be enough. In the end, I thought this list was better than the 16-model Men of the West list I briefly looked at, so there's that. :-) I also explored getting an extra Knight or two at Rythbyrt's and Centaur's suggestions, but I couldn't get the points to work out without having to purchase a bunch of models - so I left it with one mounted model. 

I think it'll be fine - the list can have a 13-file F4 shieldwall if it needs it (three F4 Rangers of Gondor will be in the front rank supported by the Warriors of Minas Tirith with spears/banner; ten Warriors of Minas Tirith with shields will be around them supported by F4 Citadel Guard/Rangers of Gondor with spears), so if we face another shieldwall list, I'm feeling confident that the FV we have will be fine - and we can probably wrap-and-trap to make up for being S3 all around.

Conclusion

I'm excited for the event and I hope the players who come have a good time. I'll see if I can get an update out after the event with how things went - until next time, happy hobbying!

Sharkey's Rogues: A "Game Master" Army

Hey Reader!

In preparation for the upcoming TMAT Spring Zephyr Tournament, I've been playing around with Sharkey's Rogues, 1) because I've owned the models for a while, 2) because I painted SO. MANY. of them, so I need to use them at some point, and 3) because a 350pt tournament is about the highest you can go before you're worried that you're being outclassed (450 is probably the highest I'd ever go, maybe 500), so when is this opportunity going to come up again? :P

But as I started practicing with them in earnest (and doing okay, actually), I realized why I enjoy playing them so much: it's a "Game Master" army, and as someone who has been a game master semi-professionally for roleplay games for over 10 years, it means I have the mindset to use them correctly. And that's what I wanted to chat about today.

Literary Corner: What the Hobbit Films Did Better Than the Book

Good morning gamers,

Over the past month and a half, Centaur and I have been having a literary debate about whether The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings books or the films by Peter Jackson are better than each other. Rythbyrt has told me that there's a defense for saying that the Lord of the Rings trilogy of films might be better (at least in some ways) than The Lord of the Rings books. Centaur hotly disagrees. Last time, Centaur went first and argued for why The Hobbit book was better than the Jackson films . . . and today, I'm not exactly going to disagree with him, but rather, I'd like to focus on the things that the Jackson trilogy changed that actually improved on what was in the books (*gasp* *horror* *gasp*).

I think I agree with both Centaur and Rythbyrt that The Hobbit book is better than the films - on the whole. It's quite defendable to think that The Hobbit book is better than the Jackson films - and it's also defendable to think that the animated Rankin Bass classic film of The Hobbit is better than the Jackson trilogy - but there are things that I don't like in the book (or that just confuse me) that I think a departure in the films made them better. As such, I've moderated the title of this post from the stronger statement I made about The Lord of the Rings trilogy and will instead focus only how how I think The Hobbit films improved on the book. Let's start off with . . .

Reason #1: Distinct Dwarves

One of the things that Peter Jackson said he feared about The Hobbit in his production diaries is that there are so many Dwarves - fifteen lead protagonists is a lot (before you get into guys like Bard, Thranduil, and of course, Legolas - let's not forget about Legolas). If you read the book, most of the Dwarves are learned about in pairs - Balin and Dwalin are the best scouts and have longer beards than the others, Kili and Fili are the youngest and have the best eyesight, Oin and Gloin are the best at making fires, and Dori and Nori order more breakfast than the rest (though everyone likes food).

There are a few situations where a single Dwarf gains some renown away from the others - Dori is the strongest, Thorin is the most revered and probably the best in battle, and Bombur is, of course, the fattest (large enough for two - this comes up a LOT, much to his chagrin). The sad thing is that the other three Dwarves (Bifur, Bofur, and Ori) are basically just referenced in passing so that we don't forget that they're there. Ori is said to have had the best handwriting in The Fellowship of the Ring, but in The Hobbit, he's quite forgettable. 

Nemesis: How to Fight Against Elendil

Good morning gamers,

Last time, we looked at Gil-Galad and ways (with specific units/army building emphases) you can counter him with. Today, we're tackling the biggest hitter from Numenor: Elendil. While some of what we're going to talk about is copy-paste from Gil-Galad, there are a few rules that Elendil picks up (and a few that he drops) that makes his use (and his countering) different from Gil-Galad. Let's see what's so great about the greatest hero of men . . .

What Makes Elendil So Hated?

Elendil has a beastly combat profile - with F7, S5, and 3A with the option for a mount (if you're willing to do some conversion work, since Games Workshop never made a model for this guy), Elendil is about as punch as man-sized heroes come. While F7 isn't the F9 that we see on Gil-Galad, it's higher than any man-sized warrior is going to get and it's also higher than most heroes. Additionally, he carries Narsil, which is a Master-forged hand-and-a-half sword (so he can two-hand without suffering the To Wound penalty) that allows him to declare a free Heroic Combat each turn - if F7 wasn't enough to make you want to hit warriors with this guy, Narsil certainly incentivises it!

Photo Credit: Warhammer Community

On Defense, Elendil is no slouch, with D8 if you give him a shield (and aren't two-handing - otherwise he's D7) and has 3 Wounds/1 Fate, which is "fine" and expected for someone who died in the story. Elendil is the quintessential "a good offense is a good defense" character (well, him and Gulavhar, I guess), which means that once he gets into combat, it's very hard to pluck a wound off of him - especially if he's backed by a banner (for a reroll on one of those 4 dice he gets on the charge).

If this wasn't enough, he has the Unbending Resolve special rule, which grants him two free dice when resisting magical powers - even if he runs out of Will. This makes targeting him with magic (especially spells that just barely go off on a low difficulty) very difficult to cast on him. With 3 Will in his store (that he can regain on a natural 6) and 3 Might that don't have to be used if he's just declaring Heroic Combats, it's not hard for him to shrug off the worst magic in the game (well, almost - more on this later).

Nemesis: How to Fight Against Gil-Galad

Good morning gamers,

We're back in our Nemesis series for the next few months and we're going to be focusing on the heroes who fought for or against the Last Alliance for most of the next few posts. Our journey begins with one of the nastiest Elven heroes in the game: Gil-Galad. Back when Heroic Strike wasn't a thing, having a F9 hero was pretty sweet, but even in an age where Strike exists, having a F9 hero is guaranteed to make your opponent cough up some Might (and being guaranteed to get to the all-desired F10 is a nice option). So what makes this guy so hard to deal with? And what tools can you use to fight against him? Let's dig in and find out!

What Makes Gil-Galad So Hated?

Like most combat heroes, we need to start by looking at Gil-Galad's offensive profile. He's one of four heroes who is innately F9-10 (and by far the cheapest - his rivals are the Balrog and the Dark Lord Sauron) and with 3 Attacks, a reroll to his dueling and wounding rolls with the Lord of the West special rule, Aiglos (a spear that confers +1 To Wound without any penalties), and a mount (your stock-standard horse for 10pts), it's not hard to get a lot of damage out of this guy.

Photo Credit: Warhammer Community

The pairing of Fight 9 and the Blood and Glory special rule make him particularly dangerous against heroes, most of whom will have to declare a Heroic Strike (if they even have that option) to tie or beat his Fight Value and if he manages to kill the hero (not hard if he can knock the model prone while on the charge or if he's got some help in trapping the target), he gets a Might point back. Striking from F9 can be unnecessary, but if you're going to get the Might point back, it's probably worth doing anyway.

If Gil-Galad was all that was potent or dangerous in his list, he'd probably be okay - but the Rivendell list is loaded with options to make Gil-Galad work at basically any points level. There are some Rivendell heroes that confer no penalties at all to your army building - Elrond and Glorfindel are pricey heroes, but they make excellent wing-men for Gil-Galad (especially Elrond, since he might be able to help you win you priority on a close roll with his Foresight points or knock foes near Gil-Galad prone with Wrath of Bruinen). If you're looking for more budget-restricted killing power, a mounted High Elf Captain or Erestor are excellent choices for 85-100pts. Most players who face Rivendell fear Cirdan with Gil-Galad, since shooting Gil-Galad and charging all those Elves they brought gets harder. Oh, and any Terror you invested in is a lot harder to preserve unless you have Sap Will in your army.

Literary Corner: Why The Hobbit Is Better than the Films

Hey Reader!

So, as you might recall from our discussion about The Lord of the Rings movies and books, this year we're doing some literary study and comparing the books and movies tied to Tolkien's legendarium, and this week I'm kicking us off with a look at The Hobbit. In our last discussion on the Lord of the Rings trilogy I largely agreed with Tiberius's thoughts: the movies are pretty good adaptations and do a lot of things really well.

Today's post is not going to be as understanding to the Hobbit movies, though admittedly I have toned back a lot of my rhetoric because 1) people do like the movies, and I don't want to rain too hard on their parade, and 2) because I really am trying to cut back on being salty about most things in life, so I have to practice somewhere, :P

Like last time, this is not intended to be exhaustive: I've kept myself to five overarching reasons, but you can definitely add more in the comments if you wish. But as someone who had the equivalent of a Literature minor in college, has spent a lot of time specifically studying faerie literature and Tolkien's works, and even wrote a high school course on The Hobbit and its themes, it will surprise no one when I tell you that I have thoughts on this.

I think the Lord of the Rings movies are decent adaptations of the books: it's not a 1:1 recreation, but it does try to remain faithful to the themes and (generally) character arcs in the original text. I do not think the Hobbit movies are faithful adaptations of the source material, as a lot of what they do in them takes away from the central themes of the story, and overly complicate what should be a deeply resonant story for all of us who have ever felt like we weren't quite "home" yet, and are still searching for that place in our hearts (if not our physical bodies). And as a literary person, I really don't like it when themes aren't properly adapted from the source material.

So let's get started.

Back to Basics: Heroic Actions in MESBG

Good morning gamers,

Today, we're talking about what heroic actions are available to heroes in MESBG. When I first got started playing SBG back in 2010, there were only three heroics: Heroic Move, Heroic Shoot, and Heroic Combat. These heroics are the only ones available to all heroes, but other heroics have crept up through the intervening years (and when the MESBG rules revamp happened in 2018, the other heroics became specialized and were listed under each profile . . . which was good, because Captains of Rohan being able to out-fight Cave Trolls for two rounds was just silly).

But what heroic actions are out there? And are there traps to any of them that should be avoided? We're going to deep-dive into all of this today as we explore one of the best aspects of the MESBG system. I'll be dropping links throughout the discussion to our previous Heroic Heroes series where I talked about how these heroic actions work and some of the best heroes that could use them back in 2020 - the articles are old, but the lists have held up pretty well over time - and other articles that we've done on heroic actions so you can learn more if you want to. Let's take a look!

Common Heroic Actions: Move, Shoot, and Combat

As has just been stated, every hero in MESBG has access to Heroic Move, Heroic Shoot, and Heroic Combat. At least two of these are incredibly useful heroic actions (whether there's value to calling Heroic Shoot is very much a debatable question) but all three share one thing in common: they all change the cadence of the phase that they're called in. Let's see how they work.

Heroic Move

I mentioned very briefly in the Move Phase post of our how-to-play section of this series that a hero who declares a Heroic Move can either move before the normal priority-player's movement or can call "With Me!" to allow the declaring hero and all friendly models within 6" of the hero to move before the normal priority movement, though the declaring hero has to move first, the friendly models within range have to end their movement within 6" of the declaring hero's final movement, and anyone who can't end within 6" of the declaring hero's final position OR that doesn't want to move within 6" of the declaring hero can't move at all. Heroic Moves are incredibly useful because they can allow you to move first.

Because Heroic Moves alter the cadence of the Move Phase, if both players have heroes who declare Heroic Moves, a roll is made to see which player gets to move first - one player is assigned the values 1-3, while the other is assigned the values 4-6 and a single die is rolled (the Evil player is 1-3 and the Good player is 4-6, but in Matched Play, you'll need to decide which player is which if it's a Good-vs.-Good or Evil-vs.-Evil match). Each player then takes a turn resolving one of their Heroic Moves. You can cancel a Heroic Move declared by an enemy hero by charging them.

For most factions in the game, moving first is really good - cavalry models can get their charge bonuses by moving first, heroes get to pick their matchups instead of having their opponents decided for them, and models that are trying to escape from enemy models with an object that's worth victory points have the opportunity to get in a better position (and even out of reach of an enemy model). Yes, Heroic Moves are awesome.

They're also costly - you'll hear veteran players talk about "Heroic Move-Offs," which is the colloquial term for when both players declare Heroic Moves to see who goes first. In most cases, the side that loses the 50/50 roll is going to have their Heroic Move cancelled, which results in a wasted Might point (hence my caution about counter-calling Heroic Moves with actual Might points back in 2019). For most players, this is just seen as part of doing business, but as the game drags on, wasted Might is felt acutely and this can have a psychological impact on your game play. Blaming dice is all fine and good - and losing priority a ton of turns in a row and NOT winning any of the Heroic Move-Offs can be a real pain - but the choice to counter-call a Heroic Move is a choice that we make, and so before you counter-call a Heroic Move (or even declare the first one), one should always examine the board and see what the ACTUAL risk is of moving second. Sometimes it's fine to move second.

FAQ Time: Reviewing the February 2024 FAQs

Good morning gamers,

I know I said we would do Thursday posts every other week this year, but golly I couldn't wait two weeks to cover the FAQ drop, now could I? I'll admit it - I was a little afraid we weren't going to get a February FAQ, but surprise, surprise, the GW MESBG team does in fact love us and dropped us an FAQ . . . albeit the shortest FAQ we've gotten to date. Perhaps this means the game is in a good place - and it probably means they didn't read my mail again (or just wrote it off as the antics of a crazy man). Still, it's good to get some updated content for MESBG, so without further ado, let's get into the changes!

Photo Credit: Reddit 
Where is it? Did they fix all those things I asked about for Fantasy Fellowships and the Men of the West? No? Oh well . . .

What Didn't Have Changes

This time around, there were only changes to four of the GW supplements - the main rulebook, the Armies of the Lord of the Rings, Defence of the North, and the Matched Play Guide. If you're interested in any of the other sourcebooks, you can look at our article for the August 2023 FAQ (or in the case of Quest of the Ringbearer and Fall of the Necromancer, before then).

While I don't have any insider knowledge, it would appear that the older supplements are being left alone unless there are game-altering changes that need to be made. In my humble opinion, this is a real shame - mostly since the errata requests I submitted were tied to clarifying things about certain scenarios from the older books (all tied to Fantasy Fellowships - which I think is a great way to keep the game entertaining and interesting for players who have been in the game for a long time . . . and it can make you buy hero models that you'd otherwise avoid picking up) and to Legendary Legions that have been chucked to the wayside by competitive players (though my hat off to the guy who won a GBHL90 event with the Men of the West - you are truly a legend).

Right or wrong, the only non-rules-heavy supplement that got any changes was Defence of the North - which, honestly, was totally expected (or for you double-negative lovers out there, wasn't unexpected). Before we dig into the meat that we got in this release, let's take a quick look at rules that got clarified and worked as we expected (and by "we," I mean us here at TMAT - I know these have come up before and we ruled on them the way the FAQs said).

Back to Basics: Magical Powers in MESBG

Good morning gamers,

I am a HUGE fan of the magical powers that are in MESBG and (generally speaking) how the system of casting and resisting spells (as well as channelling them) works. The rules for casting and resisting hasn't changed much since I got started and the only additions that were made (Heroic Channelling and restoring Will points on resist tests that get a natural 6) have been good - though perhaps not always implemented the way I would have done it. The purpose of today's article isn't to go in-depth into every spell - we've actually already done that in a previous series - but rather to explain how casting works, things to think about for different caster types, and how to pick the right targets for your spells. Furthermore, you should be aware that I'll be using the term "spell" and "magical power" interchangeably in this post (and have already done so in this paragraph). Let's dig in!

How It Works: Casting and Resisting Magical Power in MESBG

If you want a slimmed down version of this, you can check out my post from 2019 on the Top 5 Ways to Waste Might Points - the third topic covers the basics of casting. That article was specifically focused on whether channelling certain spells (some heroes have the ability to declare a "Heroic Channelling" with a Might point in the Move phase - if they do, the spell/spells they cast that round have a "stronger effect" than normal), while this article will be focused on the nuts and bolts of casting spells, regardless of whether they're channelled.

In order to cast a spell, a model with at least one magical power has to be unengaged in order to cast one of its magical powers (though the Vanquishers of the Necromancer Legendary Legion gives its members the ability to cast some of their spells while engaged). This means that if you can charge an enemy caster before they get to cast, you can prevent them (most of the time) from being able to cast a spell. Perfect!

As you probably noticed in the statements above, each model with at least one magical power can only cast one magical power each round (though Saruman in the Vanquishers Legion and the Necromancer of Dol Guldur in the Rise of the Necromancer Legendary Legion have rules that allow them to do a little more). Since many casters have access to more than one spell, they have to be selective and intentional with which spell they're using this round. It's often a good idea to figure out BEFORE you play a game what spells you intend to use and in what situations you intend to use them. For casters like Moria Goblin Shamans, this may be decided pretty easily (I'm casting Fury with two dice and then I'm done), while casters like Ringwraiths and Wizards might require an entire chart to figure out what spell you're going to cast. Experience and practice helps with this a lot.