- I've been light on generating content recently (and feel somewhat guilty about that);
- I owe Tiberius at least two podcasts on tournaments that have long since wrapped (and, again, feel somewhat guilty about that);
- I really liked a number of the lists that I batted around (and felt like sharing them); and
- Perhaps because I really liked these lists, I actually locked into a list earlier than the final day they were due (actually, almost 2 full weeks before they were due), which meant there was actually time to write a prospective post on it. :-P
As faithful readers of the blog know, the Rangers are my jam. I know they're not top-tier competitive. I'm not sure they'll ever be top-tier competitive, even with my suggested revisions. But I don't care. They're that fun to play, even if you don't win.
This is basically a scaled-up version of a list I thought about a lot at 350 (Halbarad, Maggot/dogs/1 Archer, and 7 Dunedain--13 models total), and a slightly down-graded version of the 800-point list that I took to NOVA two years ago (although that list traded about 10 Dunedain for Arathorn and Gandalf the Grey on horse, where it won 2 games, lost 2 games, and pulled 1 draw... not bad at one of North America's largest MESBG tournaments). This 750 list clearly has some holes compared to that list. In the abstract, it's always better to have Gandalf than not, and there's a lot of potential weaknesses in this particular list that Gandalf would fix (vulnerability to S2 shooting and having only one hero who can Heroic Strike are probably the most glaring). There's also a speed issue without Aragorn (no access to March, in an all-infantry army except for Halbarad). But both just felt a little too costly at 750 (pushing my numbers down to the 15-20 range).
So I swang ("swinged"? "swung"? I know it's not "swunged"...) the other way, opting for a metric ton of Dunedain (with all their Might, Will, Fate, Attacks, and bows) along with a 6" Fearless banner, three dogs for objective running, and a couple of Hobbit Archers (because 1/3 of 5 warriors--three dogs, two hobbits--is 1.67, which rounds up to "2"). The result is 30 models at 750 which is... actually, kind of crazy for what basically amounts to an all-hero army (with three dogs and two halfling archers along for the ride).
So I put them on ice this time... but one day, I will trot out 30 Rangers with Might-powered bows, just to see what happens. I swear it.
(Are all the Nova tickets sold out yet?)
* By the way, this list is a good illustration of why the Grey Company Legion isn't the answer to "just take the legion if you want to run Elladan, Elrohir, Gimli, or Legolas with Rangers."
*rant* Yes, Aragorn gets Anduril for free in the legion. But you can't take Dunedain, and once you get to 9 Rangers of the North (+5 points more per model), you aren't getting any more benefit from the "savings" a free Anduril gave you. At 1000, the Legion would top out at Aragorn (with Anduril, but no horse), Halbarad (again, no horse), and 24 Rangers, for 26 models altogether. That force is better-equipped to deal with S2 shooting, and S4 strikes, but goes down 4 models (8 attacks, 4 bows, 4 Might) plus the two horses. Given that I could just go down two models with standard Rangers to get Anduril and keep the two horses and pick up 10 spears... the legion just isn't a substitute for the standard Rangers list. (Plus you have to put everyone into a single, twenty-six (26!!!!!) model warband. Which just sucks).
Okay. *end rant*
And yet, that didn't stop me from trying. And what I found out is that it's fun to build lists for dwarves, especially when Fight 6 heroes and throwing axes are involved…
If I'm honest, though, I thought much harder at both the 350/750 levels about an old-school dwarf throwing-axes list (Khazad-Dum/Kingdom of Moria). They have cool models, too, and while the D7 on Grim Hammers offers unparalleled toughness, it's hard to match the OG dwarves when it comes to damage output:
Ultimately, I didn't choose this list in part because they're still dwarves (so mobility remains an issue, even with 2 heroes/5 Might available to call Heroic Marches), and in part because the ability of this list to kill things--while pretty good--was still a step below my other contenders (which, as you'll see, are mostly heavy/all-cavalry lists, supported by a lot of damage-dealing heroes/monsters). And when it came to doing missions with 12” deployment zones, or 90-minute kill sessions, there just wasn't any comparison between these dwarf infantry lists and the other contenders. But if these rounds had been scheduled for full-time (2 hours 15 minutes), I think they would have both been solid options.
Scaling to 1000: You could go a lot of different ways with both of these lists if you scaled them to 1000, but for both, I opted to add two more heroes (to push our total to 5--or I guess technically 7 for Kingdom of Moria), and then fill-in some additional troops with the points that were left over. For the Army of Thror, I opted to add Young Thorin (who, like Thror and Thrain, is an incredibly tough tank, with D8, the Oakenshield, and 3 Wounds/3 Fate/Heroic Defense), and Young Balin (who also has a Longbeard-style rule that every Balin has, where he can spend Will to reroll priority). Balin's reroll is just as useful here as it is in the Kingdom of Moria list, and makes our thirty throwing axes just a bit more menacing. The +1 boost to strength from Thorin (boosting standard Warriors, standard Grim Hammers, Guardians, or a mix of all three) isn't game-breaking until it is. But it's nice to have the option in-hand, especially since we don't typically know if our enemy has an "even-defense" army or an "odd-defense" army until you're down on the table.
If your preferred build includes some variation of Floi instead of Gimli, or vault wardens/ballistae instead of Warriors/Khazads, I can't tell you you're wrong. But this sort of build is way more aggressive (which, to me, is just a more fun way of playing dwarves).
Which it was. So easy, in fact, that I had a lot of trouble settling on what to pair him with. :-P
Again, because of the time limit, I was looking for something that could move fast (for those ever-present objective missions), hit fast (because time, time, time), and also wouldn't melt like wax (because with Gwaihir, plus at least a couple other heroes, I expected my numbers to be low). Good doesn't have a lot of options for hard-hitting cavalry once you get rid of Rohan's army bonus (which, since Gwaihir isn't green with Rohan, was a given). Thankfully, Minas Tirith has basically everything--including sturdy, hard-hitting cavalry (Knights of Minas Tirith) and cheap heroes of Valour who can lead them and can take mounts (Hurin the Tall, Faramir), or tougher Heroes of Valour who can lead them/augment them on mounts (King Elessar or Boromir with lance or banner).
Fortunately, I'd ordered another set of Knights of Minas Tirith a few months back, so I had a total of eleven that I could draw upon. That wasn't quite enough for the army I was looking at (I was hoping to end up with around 20 models--about the fewest I felt comfortable bringing, even to an event where I expected model counts to be lower), but it was in the ball-park. Knights also have one glaring weakness: they're only Fight 3 (and if you're a cavalry model, and you aren't winning fights, you tend to die... or at least your horse does). Minas Tirith can fix the Fight problem from within the list (Boromir's banner, which jumps them to Fight 4), but since I needed to flesh out my numbers anyway, I took a broader look at some other cavalry factions to see if there was something else that I could pair the knights with.
I looked seriously at Rohan Royal Guards (Eomer is a nice, cheap Hero of Valor who's overqualified as a third banana), until my son settled on a list idea that featured Eomer prominently. I also looked at Imrahil, but at 160 (plus Gwaihir at 150, plus potentially Boromir at 215), that was a lot of points locked up in heroes (plus Knights of Dol Amroth, while elite, don't help at all with model count). So I ultimately settled on Prince Legolas from the Halls of Thranduil list: partly because he unlocked access to Mirkwood Cavalry (the leanest elf-cav profile in the game, with nary a point wasted), and also because Legolas is amazing (Fight 6, 3 Might, and an unparalleled ability to snipe enemy steeds out from under enemy heroes).
With Gwaihir, Legolas, Knights of Minas Tirith, and Mirkwood Cavalry more or less written in pen, that left basically two choices to make: who was going to lead the Knights of Minas Tirith (basically, Elessar, Boromir with Banner, or Hurin the Tall), and which hero was going to be my "fourth banana" (basically, Rangers Strider (maybe with Halbarad), Fellowship Boromir, or Hurin the Tall). And while it pained me to leave Strider at home (there was a 14-model list featuring him, Boromir, Gwaihir, and Legolas that I tried really hard to make work), the optimized play was always going to be Boromir with his banner (for the Banner VPs, the F7 hero, the 6M, and the buff to the Knights). I also opted for Hurin the Tall (dirt cheap for what he does, plus the Gondor Hero synergy for leader VPs), even though that pushed me under 20 models, to 17. And I also looked seriously at Forlong the Fat, because F4/C4 Knights of Minas Tirith (due to his War Horn) are a lot better than F3/C3 Knights of Minas Tirith... and S5 with a warspear is nice, too.
The result is a list that, while small, is actually pretty flexible. Buffed by the Banner, the Knights are actually kind of nasty for most infantry to deal with if they get the charge (F4, S3 plus a lance, and rolling 4 dice to wound needing only 5s or better to wound anything D7 or below). And if we opted for Forlong instead of Hurin (which we could do at this level, but not at 1000), they'd also be Courage 4, which also jumps into the "reliable" range. But the neatest part of the trick is the four heroes, who can be paired into different groupings, depending on what we want to accomplish (Gwaihir/Hurin go off to take out anything F7 or below, with Hurin calling Heroic Combats to get things going, and Gwaihir keeping his Might in reserve to fix any botched rolls; while Legolas snipes at anything bigger/slower/more important (or its mount), with Boromir supervising the nearby Knights, while waiting in reserve should that bigger/slower/more important thing actually make it near Legolas). With those four heroes kicking around, I suspect that the Knights will end up being afterthoughts in most games... which is exactly what they want to be.
My concerns about Gondor Boromir's cost inflation aside (I'm still not convinced he has enough bonus stats over Fellowship Boromir to cost 65 points base more than Fellowship Boromir), I think this would have been really fun and flexible on the tabletop (and surprisingly scary for opponents to face). And if I hadn't been considering a pair of all-cav armies that were tougher and/or scarier, I might have pulled the trigger. But that's why we go through the list-building process, isn't it?
Scaling to 1000: So given where this list ended up (with Hurin and Boromir both being from Minas Tirith, and 15 Might spread across four heroes--two of whom are really tough to beat), we could be really lazy and just add Knights of Minas Tirith/Mirkwood Cav until we ran out of spots. That's actually not a bad idea either: 250 points will net us 4 additional Mirkwood Cav (6 total), and 13 more Knights (24 total, which will fit neatly into Boromir and Hurin's two warbands). And at 1000, 34 models for an all-cav force with these heroes is actually... intriguing. :-P
But I'd totally get it if you prefer to drop five of those knights for a 70-point Captain on horse (sadly, none of the Mirkwood captains can take mounts, which is... strange). Using those same points to upgrade a 105-point Legolas to a 175-ish point Thranduil is also intriguing. That would give you three F7 heroes to play with, mounted Thranduil also synergizes really well as a 6" banner for the Mirkwood Cav, and adding Aura of Dismay (Terror) and Nature's Wrath (knock-downs before knock-downs) to a force of (roughly) 30 cavalry/monsters could be super useful. Even Strider would fit well here (175-220 points, depending on whether you want the sword/armor in addition to the horse/bow), and leave a few points for extra models... but I opted for numbers, because c'mon--you can't actually run 20 horses at 1000 points and be competitive, right?
(Although I admit that spending about 100 points to upgrade Hurin to Strider, and then spending the rest on more warriors, is intriguing).
But not as intriguing as...Guess who's back in a feature role? ;-)
That list only has three heroes (compared to the four we fielded in Boromir's list), but we've actually gotten to 20 models... which is amazing, considering this army includes Gwaihir, Dain, Legolas, and is mostly Goat Riders (plus some elves). Dain is an interesting contrast with Boromir (since Legolas and Gwaihir are in both lists, and unchanged). He's still incredibly tanky (arguably even more so, since his D8 provides significant protection against S5 opponents, in the same way that D7 really takes the juice out of S4 strikes). And he fills a similar role as Boromir does when it comes to upping the power of the core of the list: Iron Hills Goat Riders. He doesn't boost their Fight value or survivability (both of which were excellent to begin with--F4/D6 riders on D5 mounts). But his 12" Fearless bubble addresses a major potential weakness in our Minas Tirith list: dealing with Terror models (which can present real problems for a surprising number of cavalry models... more on that when we get to the apex).
Once you remove the possibility of a charge stalling out on Terror, there's not a lot that Iron Hills Goat Riders can't take out when it comes to basic infantry (cavalry that move faster than they do can still pose a problem). They're F4, good enough to at least tie against all but the most elite warriors. They're S4 with a war spear, so they'll wound anything D7-D8 on fives, D5-D6 on fours, and if there's anything that happens to be D4 or less, it'll almost certainly be threes--all while rolling four dice to wound knocked-down infantry opponents. That's... lethal. Oh, and by the way--if they get charged? Still 5s to wound D6. Which is nuts.
But back to the charge, because Goat Riders also have an added benefit when they charge: if the model they charged is man-sized, they roll a D6, and on a 5+ the model is knocked prone immediately. That means there's no risk of strikes coming back (which is crazy on its own), and it also means that if you win priority the following turn, you either will have a chance to go into prone targets that you didn't kill last time, or you can disengage safely without fear of those models charging you (because 8" is greater than 3"). It can be especially effective against heroes on foot, who may spend several turns (and maybe even Might, too) just trying to fend off several Goat Riders, so they can stand up before the turn is over (and not get murdered while on the ground). Yes, you don't roll 5+ all the time... but there are fifteen of these guys at 750, which means you'd expect somewhere between 3-6 of these knockdowns each round. And if you can render 3-6 models incapable of dealing any damage each round, that's a win.
There are, of course, some problems with this list at 750. First, it's an all-cav army, and as such, I'm not sure it best leverages what Halls of Thranduil or Iron Hills/Erebor Reclaimed do best. And while that was definitely a product of this particular tournament's rules and the fact that this was a "support Gwaihir" list (slogging across the field with many infantry didn't really further either purpose), there's no doubt that a more competitive Iron Hills list would not have nearly this many Goat Riders (I don't think...). Three heroes at this points level is also a potential concern. Don't get me wrong--they're three pretty solid heroes (Dain and Gwaihir, in particular, are real top-tier when it comes to dealing damage and wreaking havoc). But losing two heroes (one of whom was Boromir) has almost reduced our Might store by half (from 15 to 9). Plus, because this is a yellow alliance (Gwaihir), Dain doesn't have Master of Battle... plus none of the dwarves can benefit from Gwaihir's Heroic Actions (so we really have just 6 Might for Heroic moves and such--although at least we have March on Dain in a pinch). Oh, and we also have no banner (something we really haven't had to deal with yet in any of the other lists). And there's a handful of scenarios in our upcoming GT where that may cost VPs (plus cav armies generally really like banners).
So while this army looks cool, and is lethal when it charges, practically it just wasn't as reliable as our apex-predator all-cav army. So again: not this time...
Scaling to 1000: Fortunately, we can address most of those problems when we jump to 1000 (although to be fair, most problems in lists can be addressed if you simply spend another 250 points). The banner has come in (along with 5 more Goats), and I've spent the remainder of the points to add King Thorin on Goat (although the points get really awkward if you take Orcrist, unless you also take a 90-point Iron Hills Captain on goat). Our model count has only gone up modestly (26), and frankly, it's almost certainly too low. But... we've now got four (FOUR!) F6+ heroes, and twenty (TWENTY!) goat riders, plus free heroic combats to move them ala Thorin (or to push Gwaihir around, while Dain and Legolas tank something else nasty or chew through troops). Again, Dain's 12" Fearless bubble really reduces the number of armies we have to worry about being able to charge. And while F5 warriors will continue to pose problems, the knock-downs and high defense (D6 warriors, when most F5 warriors are only S3) should still ensure that our warriors are at worst breaking even on the casualty count (buying valuable time for our heroes to work). Plus, this army just looks absolutely cool on the table.
One last note--you may have noticed that I changed the leader when I made the jump from 750 to 1000 (from Gwaihir to Dain). There's tactical reasons why you might do that (Gwaihir makes an excellent assassin in assassination, model to keep alive in Fog of War, etc.), but I did it mostly just to highlight how fungible your heroic tiers are, depending on where you take these guys. Legolas and Thorin are locked into just one tier and list (Valour from Halls of Thranduil, and Legend from Erebor Reclaimed, respectively), but you can take Gwaihir as either a Valour hero (Radagast's Alliance) or a hero of legend (Misty Mountains), and you can do the same for Dain (Valour in Erebor Reclaimed, Legend in Iron Hills) without compromising your ability to lead War Goats. I don't think you would ever want Legolas or Thorin to lead your force; but at 750/1000, they're potentially on the table. And options (or "optionality," as the kids are saying these days) are rarely bad.
Although if you like the next list, perhaps options are overrated when compared to simplicity (when the simplicity is brutal).
So before I make any reveals, another (brief) digression that bears on the ultimate forms of the final two lists.
As I mentioned before, the GT presents a mix of "kill missions" and "capture missions," on a condensed timetable (90 minutes). Now, it turns out that I like armies that can "kill" and "capture" quickly anyway--so odds are that even if we'd had no time limits on rounds at this event, I'd probably be leaning towards those sorts of armies. But the abbreviated round duration definitely sealed it.
Now, here's the thing about 90 minute rounds: as short as they are, they're way longer (twice as long, it turns out) than the 45-minute rounds we played at our spring mixer tournament. In fact, I think you'd be hard-pressed to play anything longer than a Battle Companies mission in 45 minutes, unless both opponents were really experienced (so you could dispense with rule discussions). And even then, I'm not so sure.
So as I was going through my attempts at a 350 list months ago, I found myself irresistibly drawn to armies that could move fast and kill fast. And in all the games I played, I never found anything that killed and moved at the speed and ferocity of what is probably the most devastating battle company I've ever played with: Far Harad.
Specifically, a Far Harad camel spam.
For the uninitiated, you can read more about Mahud Raiders here. But here's all you really need to know: they're one of just a handful of models (Khand Chariots--and to a lesser extent, Mumaks, Great Beasts, and the Iron Hills Chariot--are the others) that can rack up kills in all three phases of the game: in the move phase, thanks to Impaler (S4 hits upon charging, and if you kill the model you charge and still have movement left, you can do it again until you fail to kill or run out of movement); in the shoot phase, because every Mahud Raider can take a blowpipe (12" range, S2 poisoned projectile, 3+ shoot); and in the fight phase because Mahud Raiders, while F3, are S4 with a war spear (so like Goat Riders, if they charge they will wound D7-8 on 5s, D5-6 on 4s, and D3-4 on 3s). And since each Raider has a movement of 10", they can kill a lot of things, very quickly. Like, "4-8 models in a single move phase" sort of quickly (which, when your opponent only starts with 10-30 models, is kind of a big deal).
Now Mahud Raiders aren't cheap (19 points with spear and blowpipe, 18 with just the spear--which you'd always take). Fortunately, their Mahud King is (90 points with camel, shield, and war spear--95 if you want a blowpipe on him as well), and he hits like a truck. Fight 5 is good (not great), but S5 (with warspear), 3 attacks, and his own chance at Impaler damage is ludicrously good (on the charge, he'll wound D6 or D7 on fours and D8 or D9 on fives... with eight dice to hunt those wounds... just let that marinate for a moment). He's so cheap, in fact, that at 350, you can actually take a King, and basically a full warband of these guys (8 with blowpipes and spears, 6 with just spears, for 15 total models). Now I like Iron Guard as much as the next guy. Balin's a great hero at 350. But they were all butchered by camels in the test-games I played. Butchered.
The most fun (for me) version of this list actually toned down the camels slightly (there were still 6 Raiders and the Mahud King), in favor of what I think you'd agree is a strange (and Red) alliance: the Spider Queen and four Fell Wargs. That's 12 models total, which was definitely on the elite side of the ledger. And being a red alliance, some things are wonky (the two contingents don't share Heroic Actions, and they break separately--so three dead wargs would cough up VPs for breaking). But as someone who plays a lot with monsters (particularly fast monsters, who are the bane of all-cav armies), I can tell you that running a fast monster with an all-cav force is just glorious. It gives you all sorts of comfort against match-ups that you'd otherwise dread (the most prominent of which is... a mirror-match against an all-cav army, where everyone basically has over-priced infantry (no extra attack, no knock downs) with 40mm bases). Now Mahud Raiders actually love fighting all-cav armies (because Impaler deals S4 hits to both the rider and the mount, so the enemy doesn't tend to stay around/mounted very long). But there's just an added sense of comfort (bordering on inevitability) when you know that if you need it, your monster can just fling one of their horses across the board (knocking down mates in his path), or charge a mounted hero and potentially knock him prone (getting rid of his mount in the process). Plus, in a tournament where four of the five scenarios involved capturing objectives, the Spider Queen is actually really effective at capturing objectives, particularly far-flung objectives (with her ability to spawn up to 3 broodlings anywhere within 3" of her, who can then move an additional 10" in any direction that's open to them).
The Mahud Raiders/Spider Queen variant was by far the hardest-hitting 350 list that I played. But the Red alliance thing (specifically the breaking separately) made the list unreliable when it came to scoring VPs. So in the end, I opted for the "standard" ally for Far Harad... and that list didn't disappoint, either:
These particular variants are all green alliances, between Serpent Horde and Far Harad. As I've written elsewhere, the two lists compliment each other well, and that's on display even as low as 350 points. 14 models isn't huge at that points level, but 14 cavarly is a pretty good count, especially with two heroes.
#3: Super-elite infantry (specifically F4+/D7+). In other words, dwarves. :-P
Dwarves are a tough match-up because unlike most armies, their battleline won't typically fold under an Impaler charge. Yes, it's always possible that one or several camels will get "hot" and roll 2 sixes in a row. But typically, the law of averages says that if you charge 10 camels into a dwarf line, you'll kill 0-3 of them, instead of the 2-5 you'd expect to kill if that line was D5 or D6. That may not sound like much, but over the course of 2-3 charges, it adds up (or, perhaps more accurately, doesn't add up--at least not in the way that you're used to).
With Impaler charges blunted, you're then left to killing dwarves in combat. Which you can totally do, but only if you win Fights (where their F4 becomes a real eyesore). At 750, we've addressed that problem by adding some additional Serpent Guard (I have four), and two more F5 heroes (Suladan and a second Mahud King). I went a little light on the Serpent Guard to maximize the number of Impaler hits we can bring to bear (plus blowpipes--more on that later on). But if four is a little light to you, you can trade two camels (38 points) for basically three Serpent Riders (39 points), so it's relatively easy to season to taste.
Suladan (who's also a staple of the list at 1000) bring some much needed utility, in addition to solid combat metrics (F5, S4 with a poisoned sword, and 3 Attacks base, which become 4 Attacks on the charge and 8 dice to-wound if he gets the knock down). The two biggest are Heroic March (which makes the Haradrim Chieftain expendable), and a 6" banner that's an actual banner (giving us VPs in scenarios where that matters, and 3 dice per cavalry model to win a fight if we charge). Dwarves have a good fight value, but outside of the Army of Thror (with its army bonus and cheap spears), they tend to have fewer options for increasing their duel dice rolls. Iron Hills have spears, but no super banners (so you're only likely to see a single 3" banner at most points levels). Khazad-Dum and Kingdom of Moria usually have two 3" banners when built competitively (King's Champion FTW), but depending on what they're facing, the banners may cluster in one general area--and even if they don't, you're unlikely to see more than just the two. And when it comes to spears, their options are just limited to Vault Wardens (and Mardin... let me know when you see someone running Mardin), which you can usually play around. Cavalry bases are bigger than infantry bases, of course. But so is that giant 6" banner strapped to Suladan's back. And when you add on the fact that your horses and camels move twice as far as Dwarves do, it's much easier to shift that giant banner beyond the reach of the dwarf banners. In which case, the rerolls make a huge difference.
#2: Lots and lots of combat heroes (F5+, beefy stats, and mounted/kit out for damage).
Just to be clear, the Far Harad list as a whole doesn't struggle with this as much as its all-cav variant does, because Half-Trolls are actually decent roadblocks to mid-tier combat heroes (F5, S5, D6, 2 wounds, and Terror basically makes them mini-Captains without the Might). Yes, they'll go down. But they tend to occupy those heroes for a while (and if they win, they have the potential to grievously wound them, if not one-shot them). The all-cav variant still has Mahud Kings (who are excellent assassins in their own right), but no other Fight 5 heroes you can draw upon. Adding the Serpent Horde presents some additional options (Suladan, Haradrim Kings), but there's no option to get to Fight 6... which, at 750, you're likely to see on a regular basis.
What this list has is basically four strategies for dealing with big, beefy combat heroes.
- Option 1 is the traditional "strike and hope" option. With three Heroes who have Heroic Strike, it's a decent option--although charging a combat hero with Suladan is risky because he's fragile (and our leader), and the Mahud Kings only have 2 Might total (so that's a max of two Strikes each, assuming they don't need Might for other things like moving first or fixing a botched roll). But it's an option (and this list unquestionably does it better than the 350 version did).
- Option 2 is far more elegant: shoot the hero to death before it reaches you. This is where the blowpipes come in; with blowpipes on virtually all of our models (and a 3+ shoot value to boot), Mahud Raiders have a better chance of wounding a priority target than might appear at first glance. With a 3+ shoot value, a 12" range, and up to 5" of kiting movement, it's possible to buy 1-2 extra turns of movement before that hero gets to you if you plan your movements out in advance. And while a lot of combat heroes are D7 (which... isn't great if you're trying to hit them with S2 projectiles), most of their mounts are D5 (6s) or even D4 (5s).
- That leads us to Option 3--run into them with camels. That's because either a poisoned dart or Impaler hit that kills a mount immediately requires the hero to take a thrown rider test--and unless that hero rolls a "6," the hero can't make strikes in the ensuing fight phase. Which means they can't kill your guys, even if they win the fight (and by the way, there's still a chance they lose the fight... in which case, if they're D8 or below, they might be in a world of trouble).
- Finally, there's option 4: combine the above, like Corsairs do, by running a camel into the hero; and then, if you don't kill the hero's mount with Impaler, have other camels shoot into that combat, in the hopes of either killing the enemy hero's mount (best outcome) or killing your camel rider (which leaves the hero stranded, in the middle, fighting... no one (so no Heroic Combats). You'd of course much prefer to do this strategy with a 7-point Haradrim or an 8-point Corsair than a 19-point camel rider. But that Haradrim or Corsair doesn't give you essentially two bites at the apple (Impale first, and you may not even need to shoot your own models). So, you know: trade-offs.
#1: Elite armies with Terror. In other words, anything Black-Num related (or Far Harad mirror matches featuring Half-Trolls).
Apart from the F3, the only other potentially game-breaking stat in the Mahud Raider profile is their C2 (D5 rider on a D4 mount isn't great, but as long as you can March 15" on turn 1, that plus a 10" charge is usually enough to get into combat--and if you do that you're generally set, especially if you're playing a good army). Because Impaler only works when you charge (i.e., it's not the same as the Trample rule on Chariots and war beasts), you have to pass Courage tests to have a chance to Impale anything that causes Terror. And if the enemy has any sort of Harbinger of Evil bubble, that will happen... not often. Which kind of eliminates the best strength of the army.
Fortunately, a green alliance with Serpent Horde allows us to mitigate the risk of that happening basically as much as we can, with two additional tools. The first is that the Far Harad army bonus (Warrior Pride) is still intact, which means that any Mahud warriors become Fearless if they are within 6" of a Mahud hero who is in combat. Fearless is great, of course (because any roll you have to make is theoretically botchable). And with two Mahud Heroes (two Kings, with exceptional courage), we've got a bit of redundancy on that front (and if you decided you wanted to trade five Mahud Raiders for a third Mahud King, I couldn't tell you that you were wrong). But Warrior Pride can be a bit trickier to pull off with camels than it is with infantry (because the hero has to be in-combat within 6" of warriors for it to fire). So to add even more redundancy, I've also added a war horn, which boosts our standard Mahud Raiders to Courage 3. That's still not fantastic--but if your opponent doesn't have Harbinger, it's pretty reliable (just a shade under 60%), and it also makes the Mahud Kings even more likely to pass their Courage tests (C6), so Warrior Pride also becomes that much more reliable. That's about as good as you'll get for a Terror counter with this force, so I've leveraged every advantage available, and we'll have to live with the consequences.
Scaling to 1000: Given that the 750 version already has a ton of camels, three striking heroes, March, a 6" banner, and a war horn, there are several directions we could go with an extra 250 points:
- If raw numbers is what we want, we have enough warband slots for 11 more Mahud Raiders, and 3 more Serpent Riders, bringing our model count to a whopping 44 cavalry models at 1000 points (average expected model count, applying the Green Dragon's Rule of 20, would be 50 models... so yeah, 44 is high).
- A more conservative approach would trade four of those camels and a Serpent Rider for a third Mahud King (which would still give us 40 models all-told... also not bad). That would give us four striking heroes, three Warrior Pride pivot points, and an insane amount of redundancy when it comes to heroic kill-power (which is nice if we anticipate things like heavy magic or multiple enemy heroes).
- If we have concerns about Might, want to March without spending Suladan's Might, or want to improve our ability to call Heroic Combats, we could go with a couple of Mahud Chieftains on horse and ten more Haradrim Raiders/Serpent Riders. Executing Heroic Combats that include camels is glorious; but actually being able to get a hero on a camel into a combat with multiple other camels is tricky (since the hero on camel might accidentally Impaler the model we're trying to Heroic Combat off of... normally great, except here, it leaves the other two camels that previously charged stuck in "no man's land" fighting no one, which means they can't participate in a heroic combat). We can solve that problem with two Chieftains on horses, who would then have the option of charging any enemy model that has survived 2+ Impaler attempts, and turning that "failure" into a heroic combat. Plus, we can up our Fight 4 (by as many as +15 models, if they're all Chieftains/Serpent Riders), while still getting over 40 models (up to 45, unless we do some 3-for-2 trades of Haradrim/Serpent Guard into Mahud Raiders).
- Serpent Horde/Far Harad are all "kill faster" armies, because their staying power isn't awesome. But if we want to up that staying power somewhat, there's always the option to ally in some Morgul Knights from Mordor, along with either the cheap Mouth of Sauron (F5, D6, Terror, 3 attacks on the charge whilst mounted, and 4 Will that he can use for Drain Courage, Transfix, or even an Instill Fear in a pinch), a named wraith on horse, or even a named wraith on fell beast. This is a definite trade off, since we lose our army bonuses (because Mordor is stupidly not green allies with Far Harad)... so no more Warrior Pride, and we have to make sure we take two Serpent Riders for every Haradrim Raider with bow (which we were probably going to do anyway for the F4, but maybe not). But we'd still have the War Horn to fall back on (Mahud Raiders are still C3, Haradrim Raiders/Serpent Riders are still C4), and the Morgul Knights (C5) will also improve our chances of being able to charge Terror, plus they add some real protection (D6) against archery (which we could double-down on with the Shadow Lord, if we wanted) and upping our killing power. For the rule of cool, the Fell Beast is the obvious answer (more on that shortly); and I do think flying monsters add something significant to all-cavalry armies (especially in mirror-matches against other all-cavalry armies). But if you're looking for something conservative, either the Mouth on horse with 7 Morgul Knights and three Serpent Riders (41 models total); or six Morgul Knights, a Haradrim Raider, and the Tainted (to gut your opponent's Heroic Moves), the Shadow Lord (to protect your camels and horses from shooting), or the Dark Marshal (F6, a second 6" banner effect if you need it, and an excellent spell suite) offer some intriguing flexibility paired with a pretty good model count (38 models total).
- But the route I've decided to go, ultimately, is adding the Betrayer on Fell Beast, a third Mahud King, and trading a few Mahud Raiders for some more Serpent Riders and Haradrim with bows. There are two major reasons for this. First, we retain the Green alliance (since the Betrayer is also part of the Serpent Horde list), so Warrior Pride is still helping us deal with Terror; and given that we never know what our opponents are going to bring to competitive tournaments, I want every trick available to be able to charge models in scenarios where I must/want to do that. Second, I'm a sucker for flying monsters, and when that monster is also a cavalry model with a magic caster on-top, it's just too good to pass up. I didn't include the Betrayer in my list of named wraiths that I considered adding with Mordor, primarily because he's not a great caster (most of his spells are cast at increased difficulty). In particular, the compel on a 5+ is just brutal (because compel, when you have a flying monster in an all-cav army, is just amazing for lining up hurls on enemy mounted heroes). And if the goal is to bring in some Morgul Knights (who only synergize with the Betrayer's Harbinger of Evil special rule), I'm not sure that trade's any better than gutting the enemy's Heroic Moves (Tainted), shooting protection (Shadow Lord), or Fight 6 with an improved spell suite (Dark Marshal). But if, on the other hand, we're tilting fully into poisoned blowdarts and bows, while keeping the army bonus (so all the Haradrim Raiders also have poisoned lances, to go with the poisoned lances on our Serpent Riders), I think the Betrayer goes back to making sense. But really, this particular list is all about adding that fell beast.
Speaking of which...
Truth be told, I'd been playing around with 650-750 list ideas prior to the Spring Zephyr (most of which revolved around those camels). And I fully expected to take them, right up until Spring Zephyr (when my sons made me make that fateful roll-off). But then the tournament came, and my Fell Beast/Morgul Knights/Black Nums list performed better than expected. More importantly, I was reminded just how much I enjoy playing with these kinds of armies: tough, elite, dependable models that either kill quickly (FB and cav) or die slowly (the infantry block). And once the alliance matrix reminded me that Mordor is actually not red allies with Dark Denizens (they're yellow), that opened up a much less punishing pairing with the Spider Queen (heroic combats could go back to being a thing--yay!), and a lot of cool tech options (fell wargs and bat swarms anyone)?
So there I was, the week after Spring Zephyr, playing a friendly 750-point scrimmage with one of my sons, where I basically trotted out this list (sans the second bat swarm and the war horn). And within two rounds, I just intuitively knew that this list had "it," whatever "it" is:
So there are a few holes in this list, especially at 750 (which will make the GT interesting, depending on match-ups). As you noticed, I have no spears and no bows at 750. That's... well, there's a theory behind it--but if you don't think it's ideal, I can't tell you you're wrong. (FWIW, the complete list at 1000 fixes that problem, with Morannons--nothing super creative there). The number of Morgul Knights (4) at 750 is also less than I'd prefer (my experience from Zephyr and my subsequent play tests is that 6 Morgul Knights is probably the sweet spot). Again, the list really sings once we get to 1000.
But the reason there are these holes is because I've gone heaver into "tech" than maybe you normally would at 750. I have a banner in the list, for a few reasons. It's worth VPs in a few scenarios (always nice). While I have the option of using Will to generate a 6" banner through the Dark Marshal, if we're playing more conservatively (more on that in a bit), it's nice not to have to spend that Will just to get some rerolls. Plus, I did-up a Black Num with banner conversion that I'm quite happy with. The War Horn was a later add; but to be honest, given that this tournament is using the Veto system, it's probably more important than the actual banner. By running predominantly Black Numenoreans and Morgul Knights, our base Courage is already pretty good (C4). But it's still useful, because a bump to Courage 5 makes them very reliable at passing courage tests (2d6 will roll a sum of at least "5" around 83% of the time), and provides excellent protection against Harbinger (2d6 will roll a sum of at least "6" 72% of the time). I don't expect this army to break often (because it's so tough, and because it has tools to blunt combat heroes--including the Terror baked into most of the warriors--and because its damage contingent kills enemy models so quickly). But it's nice to know that even if we do, we're unlikely to run.
Having said all that, the war horn is primarily here for the two bat swarms (base C2) and the Spider Queen (base C4), although the buff to the Fell Wargs (base C2) is also helpful. As anyone who's played the game for any length of time knows, if a bat swarm gets into your hero, things are probably going to get very hairy very quickly. Overall, the bat swarm is an excellent profile. It has Fly, of course, which is brilliant. It's only D3, but its four wounds means that it's difficult to shoot out (and unless it's surrounded or knocked prone, most models can't generate enough to-wound dice in combat to one-shot it). Even its two attacks are sneaky helpful (two extra dice to win a duel is nice, and potentially four dice to-wound if the target is trapped/knocked over can be a nasty surprise). The only real weakness in their profile is that they have a very low courage of "2"... and in Harbinger range, that can become a real problem. The War Horn boosts them to Courage 3... which isn't amazing, but is way better than Courage 2 would be, whether in or out of Harbinger range (our odds of rolling the "7" or "8" we need with the war horn are ~58% and ~42% respectively--way better than the ~42% and ~28% odds we'd have of rolling an "8" or "9" without it). Yes, I have a wraith with Compel (so if I really need to get a hero with Terror into a bat swarm, that's another option we can fall back on). But again--the Marshal's Will is precious. And any I don't have to spend (because the bats pass a Courage test on their own) is an advantage.
But of course, all of this is just set-up for the real threat from this list. At 350, that threat predominantly came from the eight (8!!!!) Morgul Knights (although I grant that fighting fell beasts at 350 is no picnic). But at both 750 and 1000, what really makes the list sing is the redundancy and synergy that we get from the three core heroes (Mouth, Marshal, Queen), and how they augment the strength of our troops:
- We have Harbinger of Evil (Marshal), paired with 24 models (83%) that cause Terror (including all three heroes), which really helps when dealing with enemy hordes (typically C2 base, which becomes C1 in Harbinger Range), and a surprising number of all-cavalry armies (including Far Harad, Serpent Horde, and Rohan once we execute their leader).
- We have the option for a second banner effect, with a 6" range (Marshal)
- All three heroes have sneaky good courage, thanks to the War Horn (the Marshal is C7, the Mouth is C6, and the Spider Queen is a very sneaky C5).
- We have two spell casters (Mouth and Marshal) to help harass enemy heroes, and both also have some nice overlap in their spell suites (Drain Courage on a 2+, Transfix on a 3+, and Instill Fear on a 5+/4+).
- We have two Fight 6/S6 heroes (Marshal and Queen) with very good courage to pair with 2 Bat Swarms (who also have decent Courage).
- And we have two monsters (Marshal and Queen), each with Monstrous Charge, to deal with enemy cavalry forces, armies that are dependent on formations, or heroes with high defense but low strength.
The Dark Marshal doesn't usually rank highly in most peoples' rankings of named ringwraiths, and there's legitimate reasons for that. His special rule is "only" a 6" banner (which is good, but also only affects warriors, not heroes--so it's kind of janky). He doesn't do anything related to priority, or shooting, or buffing your damage output. Apart from his F6 (which is best-in-class), he doesn't have any buffs to combat (he can't strike, has only 2 Might, and loses Will normally when he fights). And then there's Tiberius's observation (which is totally true, by the way) that of all the wraiths out there, he probably suffers the most from Will burnout, because he's an excellent caster (normal difficulties for all spells, except an easier Instill Fear), his F6 makes him good in combat, and his 6" banner effect is also very good (but also costs 1 will per turn to use). Since his Will pool tops out at 14, he can only go 3-4 turns of doing everything (depending on if you're spending 1 Will or 2 Will to cast) before he's depleted. And that's not usually enough turns at 750-1000 points.
Without poo-poo-ing any of that (which, again, there's a lot of truth there), I included the Marshal here for a few reasons: he was in the original list (so there's some nostalgia). While the Tainted would probably make more sense if I were running an all-cav army (like my original 350 list), or the Shadow Lord would make more sense if I didn't have a ton of D6 meatshields to protect from shooting, having a mobile 6" banner (in an army where half the models are fast, 40mm-base models) is also a really nice option to have in the bank. Since his ability doesn't trigger until the Fight Phase, you can also make more informed decisions about when you spend the Will (you look at the board, at the start of the fight phase, and know exactly what benefit you'll receive and if you need it), which is an advantage over both the Tainted and Shadow-Lord (start of the move phase for both). Most importantly, he is Fight 6... and given that we have two bat swarms in this list, having two Fight 6 heroes is actually really helpful at 750+ (for either assassinating big enemy heroes, or at least making them think that you'll assassinate big enemy heroes). And honestly, in practice that really helps preserve some of his Will, because while it's nice to be able to Transfix a hero if I need to, to prevent him/her from Striking, it's also nice to totally not need to Transfix a hero (because no Striking Hero, charged by a Bat Swarm, can ever match my Fight 6).**
** A brief word on the Witch-King, who--don't get me wrong--is also awesome. At 1000 points, I think there's an argument for taking him over the Dark Marshal, based primarily around the sustainability: 16-20 Will is more than 14 Will, and in longer games, having more Will becomes important, especially if you plan to use your wraith to fight/kill things. But the Fight 5 does hold him back, because if you're trying to assassinate a F5 hero, and you put the Witch-King in the fight, that hero only needs to roll a 5+ (33% chance) to match your F5, even with the Bat Swarm in the combat. 50-50 roll-offs involving your army leader (which the WK would need to be, while the Marshal doesn't) aren't great--and of course if the target also has an elven blade, it may be less than 50-50 odds. And yes, the Witch-King can Strike--but if he does, he can't do other things with that Might (like save a botch, or call a Heroic Combat). So it's just less inefficient (by the way, a heroic combat involving the Dark Marshal and a Bat Swarm is "Bolging" at its finest). So again, Witch-King great. But given how I use the Marshal in this list (i.e., he's primarily a combat/assassination piece, who does spell-casting and provides a banner effect situationally), he typically fulfills that role better than the Witch-King would.
But ultimately, which wraith goes on the fell beast is probably less important than the fact that said wraith--whoever he is--is, in fact, on a fell beast. Yes, skilled opponents have ways of dismounting a fell beast. And even a S6 Fell Beast will fail to wound sometimes (as mine failed to kill Red Jacket's Helm Hammerhand at Zephyr). But monsters with Fly are kind of like siege weapons: a lot of their real value comes from before they do anything--because of how they force an opponent to play differently, move differently, commit differently. Infantry armies are skittish about approaching your battle line if a fell beast is lurking behind it. Cavalry armies are especially skittish (because a Compel into hurling position can dismount/kill upwards of four warriors--and probably a hero--before any combat ensues. Tack on the two bat swarms (who can also Fly), and suddenly there's a ton of amorphous threat just sitting behind your line, waiting to be unleashed. And your opponent knows it.
Which is great, because if your opponent is that concerned with the fell beast, he's probably not focusing that much on your army leader (Mouth), or an equally-disruptive (maybe more disruptive) assassin (Spider Queen). The Mouth is a solid third-tier hero: not amazing at any one thing, but he does a little bit of everything. He brings Heroic March (always nice). He's Fight 5 with two attacks (so three dice to win the fight when he charges, six dice to wound if he knocks the opponent down). He can get to S6 in a pinch if he two-hands (not too shabby). He can cast a little magic (his 3+ Transfix is always great, but don't sleep on his 2+ Drain Courage in a list like this--paired with a second 2+ Drain Courage from the Marshal, and his Harbinger bubble, a C6 hero can suddenly be dropped to just C3 in a single turn). And if you also just have him stand safely behind your infantry line, call the occasional Heroic Move, and generally just babysit your infantry line for most of the game, it's fine--because he's only 85 points, and you don't actually need him to kill stuff in order to kill stuff. Just very, very solid.
That leaves the Spider Queen, who brings all of the craziness she brought to my Camel spam at 350, without any of the drawbacks. Thanks to a Yellow alliance with Mordor, we can now put the Spider Queen in Heroic Combats with any of our Mordor heroes--and, more importantly, her accompanying bat swarms can also join those heroic combats. That means we have the option to Heroic Combat with one hero and Strike with the other if we need to; or, just one hero can call the Combat, and instead of Striking we can save Might to win fights (or, in a pinch, to wound--although her Venom makes that usually unnecessary). The Spider Queen also covers a significant base that the fell beast and our Morgul Knights (our other primary damage sources) don't: thanks to Swift Movement, she can traverse all difficult terrain (except deep water, I think) without any sort of movement penalty. Woods are a problem for bats and for knights and for fell beasts, but not the Spider Queen. And not her accompanying Fell Wargs, either (who can move a decent 5" through difficult terrain, so she doesn't need to go into woodlands unsupported). Last but not least, in a tournament where objective capture scenarios are going to be prominent, her ability to move 10", spawn up to three broodlings anywhere within 3" of her, and then have up to three broodlings move up to 10" more--in any direction they choose--means that objective play becomes way easier, and way less predictable for opponents. If there's an objective behind me, I don't need to leave any Black Nums behind to guard it--just pop a broodling (which, thanks to the inclusion of the War Horn, is a respectable Courage 3). Or, if there's multiple objectives up ahead of us, the Spider Queen can generally move in that direction (accompanied by a ton of fast-moving friends--fell wargs, bat swarms, mounted knights, even a flying wraith), and threaten all of them at once. If the enemy concentrates around one objective (say, in Heirlooms of Ages Past), the broodlings have a chance to dig up those objectives from under their nose. And if the enemy divides, this fast-moving force (led by two monsters, fielding two bats (and maybe two casters, if the Mouth has tagged along), and a 6" banner effect if we need it) has all the tools you would want to defeat the enemy in detail (and probably quickly).
Which leads to the final thing that I love about this list--because half the list is tanky, and the other half is incredibly fast, this is not a list that locks me into a particular playing style. The infantry component doesn't have spears, but what it does have is Terror, F4, D6, and a shield on every model (and I mean every model). Yes, there's no orcs with spears. But if an opponent wants to engage my battle-line, they actually have to engage it (and if they're low courage, they may struggle to do that). It can play defensively, setting up a perimeter around key objectives and shielding, while the wargs, bats, knights, and monsters go in for the kill. Or they can be pushed forward aggressively with a pair of Marches, so they can start killing orcs in 2-on-1 or 3-on-1 combats deep in enemy territory, and use their Terror shield to push the enemy around into unfavorable positions. Likewise, the knights, wargs, bats, and heroes can push into enemy territory at lightning speed (especially if the Mouth is Marching them 13-18" in one turn); but they're also perfectly comfortable lurking behind the infantry line, and threatening to go around the flanks--or over the top--when battle-lines finally clash. Finally, the volume of Terror models means that one of the primary problems with this list (only 7 Might at 750 points) can be less of a problem. While it's always nice to move first, opponents aren't guaranteed to be able to charge unless they have special models (Bodyguard, Fearless). But most armies don't have models like that--and those that are, tend to have trouble wounding F4/D6 warriors (S3 elves/dwarves/men). With the war horn in tow, we generally don't have that problem (the Black Nums/Morgul Knights are all C5--and so is the sneaky Spider Queen), which means that we're fine going first (where we're likely to be able to lock the opponent's battle-line in place) and also fine going second (where we can react to--and potentially trap/slay--enemy models who managed to charge, but weren't supported by some of their comrades). And that's before we get into all of the various tools available to erase enemy heroes / support pieces from the game (Compel into hurl, drain courage spam, bat-assassination, Black Dart-ing heroes' mounts, burnout with shielding black nums, etc.).
Scaling to 1000: As much as I enjoyed this list at 750 (again, I could just feel how well everything fit together (and fit my play style) within just a few turns of my first game), it gets a major upgrade at 1000. Again, there's a ton of ways you could go at 1000, including swapping the Dark Marshal for the Witch-King. If you keep the Witch-King on fell beast, you'll pay a lot for that upgrade (at least 25 extra points if you go with a 3/15/2 WK on FB with the Crown--more likely 30-45 extra points to buff your army leader's stats). And while the casting will improve, the drop to F5 and the loss of the option for that 6" banner are actual losses that need to be accounted for. Swelling the Spider Queen's contingent is also an intriguing idea, specifically adding some Giant Spiders or Mirkwood Spiders. I very much like Morgul Knights, and think I'd always take at least 4 of them in a list like this (C5, F4, and D6 is just rock solid). But Giant Spiders with a War Horn are a sneaky C4 (in addition to F4/S5 with 2 wounds), and the idea of having 2-3 of them to tag along with the Spider Queen into difficult terrain or over walls is a lot of fun to think about.
In the end, however, I opted to spend the points to fill-in some gaps to make the force more competitive. So I've added 7 Orc Trackers for some honesty bows (18" range, S2 projectile, 4+ shoot), spread out among the war bands in case we draw some objective missions (again, with the War Horn, they're a sneaky C3, which is perfectly fine). I've also added 9 Morannon Orcs with spears and shields (F3/S4/D6), and moved the banner over to one of them. Morannons fix the one "problem" stat with Black Nums (only S3). Their courage is poor (although again, C3 in this list), but as back-up to sixteen Black Nums (still C5), we're not reliant on them to charge Terror. Instead, they add some selective punch to our front-line, which means that our aggressive push (March with the Mouth into enemy territory) now has some teeth to it, and our defensive battle-lines (walling off important objectives) are now that much harder to shift. Oh, and there's also a fifth Morgul Knight (if you wanted to trade the two Black Nums in the Marshal's warband for a sixth, that'd be fine, too).
But the most important addition is Shagrat, who adds to and completes our core hero ensemble in a few important ways:
- We still have Harbinger; Terror on most of our heroes (Shagrat, unfortunately, doesn't have it); two Fight 6 heroes; and 2 Monsters. But we've added a second Hero who can Heroic Strike. We don't necessarily need that (given our bat swarms), but it's still a great tool to have in the toolbox.
- We've also added a hero who actually likes babysitting our infantry line (while the Marshal, Spider Queen, and maybe the Mouth go alpha-striking). Shagrat doesn't have a mount, so he's ground bound. Black Nums make exceptional bodyguards for him (difficult to charge, surround, or cut through as long as we employ some basic defensive tactics, like inset heroes and refused flanks). Backed by a banner and a spear, he has up to 5 dice to win the fight, with a minimum of three S5 dice to wound (and potentially as many as six, if he charged an infantry model). And again--while you'd prefer that he was charging to kill things, you're also okay if he just stands around guarding an objective that is going to win you the game. Oh... and he's also sneaky Courage 5 in this force, too.
- But the biggest addition is what Shagrat does to the Might pool. Three Might on its own is huge (bumping us from 7 to 10). Again, 10 is a little low for most armies at this points level; but between the Terror, and the bat swarms, and the magic, we generally have to expend less Might to function than most other armies do. But it's Shagrat's Blood and Glory rule that takes this over the top. Because Shagrat (with a Bat Swarm) is more than capable of killing most heroes, without help (especially if we can dismount them first). And that option to regenerate Might--in a list that doesn't generally need Might to function--is huge.
Round 1 (Pool 6): Fog of War vs. Centaur's Woodland Creatures: Things got off to a quick start in our random round, where I drew Centaur's Woodland Creatures. I eliminated Clash by Moonlight (I like having more heroes to kill; I dislike having super-strength hobbit/ent stones), and he eliminated Assassination (surprise, surprise), so Fog of War it was. I think the key turning-point in the game was a roll-off in Round 3 to see who's heroic combat went first: Quickbeam fighting a single Black Num, or the Spider Queen, Mouth of Sauron, Dark Marshal, and a bat swarm fighting the vanilla ent. I won the roll-off, eliminated the ent, and then the Spider Queen killed Quick Beam (who was standing on Centaur's chosen objective) during his heroic combat. Treebeard fell shortly thereafter, and I managed to finally finish off Merry on the final turn (my target), but couldn't quite clear off my objective (although thanks to the bats, I did have more models on it than he did). The Marshal (Centaur's target) was unscathed, and Quickbeam (his model to keep alive) was slain, so combined with points for break, this was a 10-0 major win.Round 2 (Pool 1): Domination vs. Strider's Sledgehammer: As you'll recall from the write-up, this was my "dishonorable mention" list, which I just knew I was going to hit at some point. That happened in Round 2, where both of us were coming off of major wins. One key turning point actually happened in Round 1, when the Spider Queen, on the charge, with a banner, rolled a 4-high in a combat against two berserkers (who of course had the "6"). Rather than risking a dead Spider Queen, I bit the bullet and spent 2 Might to win the fight (and fortunately killed both). But with just one Might left on her, I had to abandon my initial strategy (of trying to heroic combat to eliminate berserkers as quickly as possible), and also ended up with fewer charges than I would have liked, due to the lack of might. Because of how the board was set-up, probably 90% of the models were arrayed around the central objective for basically the entire game (where his berserkers and Gundabads and hunter orcs slowly won the war of attrition against my Black Nums, as I feared they would). The Terror kept the Hunter Orcs and Gundabads at bay once we wore the Berserkers down, but not before he broke me (2 attacks at S4, with F4, is just brutal). Meanwhile, he and I both had two objectives each (roughly 12" behind the center line, that we basically held the entire game). I had a couple of scary courage tests once I broke, but the War Horn came in clutch (keeping a fell warg around one objective, and just barely saving my Black Num who was sitting on the other objective). On the final turn, Fimbul broke through and managed to heroic combat into the Black Num who was guarding one of those objectives (which he killed), while my Marshal broke through and compelled/killed his hunter orc who was guarding one of his objectives, and the Spider Queen survived a turn where she was surrounded on the central objective by a striking Witch-King (heroic defense for the win). In the end, we each had sole control of two objectives, he outnumbered me severely on the central objective, he broke me, and I had wounded his Witch-King, resulting in a 6-5 minor loss.Round 3 (Pool 4): Contest of Champions vs. Ty's Rivendell Collection: Even with the minor loss, I still found myself in the "winner's bracket" heading into Round 3, where I drew Ty's Gil-Galad/elf twins/Kingsguard list. After I vetoed To the Death (why tempt elves with shooting if you don't have to), he vetoed Lords of Battle, and so we settled in for Contest of Champions. Ty won priority on turn one, and charged Gil-Galad into two Black Nums. He did a good job of blocking off Gil-Galad's rear with his own troops (to prevent a bat swarm from coming in over the top), but there was space for a single 40mm (maybe a 60mm) base to get into combat if I moved some of my troops on the inside around. I attempted a pair of Transfixes with the Mouth and Marshal, but neither worked (I believe he resisted one on double-6s, and the second he spent two Might to resist), and didn't feel like I could put either the Mouth or Marshal into his combat without that support. So I instead opted to put one of my two bat swarms into him, which would drop his Fight Value from 9 to 4 (tied with my two black nums). The theory was that the four dice from the black nums/bat swarm, plus the banner reroll, would give me a good chance of winning, and maybe force him to spend Might to Strike (which he did do). Unfortunately, when he did win the fight (I w, the knock-down from charging gave him eight dice to punch through six wounds (on 4s vs. the Black Nums, and 3s vs. the bat swarm), and he ended up dealing four. I did manage to blunt the twins (who had charged) on turn 1, and killed them both by the end of turn 2; but after Gil-Galad scored 2 more wounds on Turn 2, putting him up 6-1 against the Mouth. On turn 3, with the only Might on the board, I managed to isolate and kill Gil-Galad (which took two turns thanks to a major botch by the Spider-Queen, after I decided to strike normally instead of go for the Rend). But even with him dead, I still had a lot of ground to make-up on Gil-Galad's six kills (it didn't help that the Mouth didn't want to wound that round, or that wounding/killing the leader in this scenario only scores VPs if your leader deals the wounds/kill). I did end up getting four kills on the Mouth before we timed out, but that still made it a 4-1 minor loss.
Part of this was the match-up (F5 elves and F6 elves with elven-made weapons made it really tough to win fights, even with my monsters). But there were definitely some mistakes on my part (most of them on Turn 1). In retrospect, I think a Transfix from the Mouth was still a solid opening play, but when that failed, I think a 3-die Black Dart from the Marshal (who still had both his Might) on Gil-Galad's horse would have been a much better call. Removing the knock-down in itself would have made it much harder to deal wounds, and of course Gil-Galad also wouldn't have been able to make strikes unless he got a "6" on his thrown rider check. Alternatively, charging a Morgul Knight instead of a bat swarm into Gil-Galad would have also been a better play. Yes, Gil-Galad would have had a significant fight advantage; but with only three dice to wound, and no knock-down, the chance of killing all three models as part of a heroic combat would have been significantly less (a 12.5% chance of rolling three 4+s, modified slightly upwards by Gil-Galad's Lord of the West to-wound reroll). Finally, I ended up using the fell beast that round to hurl a Rivendell Knight into Elrohir to knock him off his horse (which ended up killing a couple of models on both sides). The twins ended up being completely neutralized right off the bat (and were easily killed by a bat swarm tag-team the following round, with significant might still on them). But I had enough agency with the fell beast where I could have opted instead to go for a hurl into Gil-Galad's fight. Given how many wounds Gil-Galad ended up scoring that first round, that would have also been a better move to make in retrospect. But that's why we play the games, right?
Round 4 (Pool 1): Hold Ground vs. Tiberius's Impossible Dwarf Soup: Despite two minor losses in a row, I once again found myself in the winner's bracket. Since I had already played the other two teams in that bracket (Ty and Strider both had three wins), I drew Tiberius's dwarf soup list. I nixed Command the Battlefield, he nixed Heirlooms, and we played Hold Ground (as did every other table that round). I "won" priority and got all my models down on the first turn, in basically in the same spot (Tiberius wanted me in one place, so he helped some). Tiberius brought Floi and the King's Champion down on the other side of the board, but Thorin and Balin were... delayed a turn (and Balin ended up burning 2 Might to come on where he wanted to come on). Thanks to my superior speed (and having the only Heroic March) on the board, I got to the center first (despite Floi getting rid of Fly on the Fell Best a couple of times), while Tiberius halted his forward advance so the rest of his force could catch up. I did have one awkward turn where my fast models were in front of my infantry, but rather than pausing to re-group (because 6" from the central objective is bigger than you think). But after Tiberius won priority (and moved his models to within about a turn of movement from scoring range, I went ahead and compelled a Khazad-Guard forward (with my not-Flying fell beast), who was then charged by the Spider Queen, Mouth, and a bat swarm (the Mouth then calling a heroic combat). By pulling the Khazad forward, there was now a pretty sizeable gap around Balin and the King's Champion, so I was finally able to do a proper "Bolg," and ended up killing Balin very unceremoneously with the Spider Queen (who made up with her Gil-Galad botch by I believe rolling five 5+s on her initial to-wound dice). The remaining turns involved slowly extricating my fast models out of the front so my Black Nums could take their place, trying to blunt Thorin's attempts to Heroic Combat into the center (a timely heroic Strike on his end got him to Fight 5 against my bat swarm, while a timely counter-charge from a Morgul Knight stripped him of charge bonuses, which prevented his heroic combat form going off). I also discovered that as long as you have a model within 3" of it, a fell beast who cannot Fly can still get Monstrous Charge to fire (which is kind of funny). In the end, we timed out just as Thorin made it into scoring range (the Spider Queen ended up barging into/killing Tiberius's only other model in range). I had 8 or 9 models in scoring range, and no other VPs were scored, resulting in a 7-0 major win.
Solid, solid list - looking forward to seeing it tomorrow! I think Shagrat in particular is a great add: a solid martial threat alongside other heavy hitters, and due to how scary the Spider Queen and the cavalry are, there's a good chance he makes it into the fray without a scratch on him (which makes him very hard to remove). And it gives a bit of much-needed punch alongside the S3 Black Numenorean infantry as well.
ReplyDeleteIt's a shame you didn't bring Dwarves - it would have been fun to have another Dwarf army rocking the tournament. Frankly, I'm just glad I don't have to fight camels. :-)
ReplyDeleteI'm hopeful for Strider at this tournament - his army broke in almost every game (he was 1 model away against me) and now with more numbers, he can hopefully avoid breaking and just pummel the other army. Hopefully, his revenge will be sweet . . . and we don't face. :-)
I think the Dark Marshall is a very solid wraith (easily top-tier). His issue is that Suladan provides a better 6" Banner for cheaper, so it's a no-brainer to bring Suladan. He does fit perfectly in this list though. The Serpent Horde is red with The Dark Denizens, so The Marshall is the better 6" Banner. The Spider Queen also loves having one or more compels to support her hurls, or assassinations.
ReplyDeleteYes, the yellow alliance with Mordor/red with basically everything else from the LOTR-era is interesting... and given that you can actually take the Spider Queen in an LOTR-era Legendary Legion, I'm not sure it's still accurate. :-P The spiderlings didn't come into play much at this tournament (because my opponents wisely vetoed missions where they'd do crazy things), but the fact that you have that option in your back-pocket, on top of having an excellent hero/monster, is pretty nice.
DeleteI like the Marshal quite a bit, although I'm still finding my groove with playing him. Knowing when to cast, when to fight, and when to trigger the banner when fighting is a bit of an art in itself. We've played two tournaments in a row with significantly shorter round times, so that has helped. But at 800-1000 points (where rounds last 2 1/4 hours or longer), I would start worrying about burning out (unless Kardish is in the list), or would think about putting him on the horse instead (because realistically, you're probably going to need to fight less, because his magic becomes more important as the opponents' heroes tier up).
In a vacuum, I wouldn't say he's better than the Witch-King (although his F6 is better). But I think he's probably somewhere in that next tier (with the Tainted, Shadow-Lord, and Khamul, plus the Betrayer in Serpent-Horde). Marshal vs. Khamul is a particularly interesting argument. Yes, Khamul has the Strike, and is able to regenerate Will with wounds. But given that both are F6 base (or can be, in Khamul's case, at the cost of 1 Will), I'm not sure if Strike + a skewed casting table is better than the 6" banner and a standard/improved casting table. I think Centaur has an upcoming article where he's going to rank them, so it'll be interesting to see where he lands.
Some scary lists here! I like the final product, and I think the three heroes you've landed on are solid options overall. I think the argument with the Witch King may actually have been for one on a horse and 40 points more of warriors, but I do definitely like what the Dark Marshal is bringing.
ReplyDeleteI do think the list may be overinvesting in its tricks a little, and face some diminishing returns. The Spider Queen and a Bat are excellent, but the second Bat may be overkill when you already have double casters (and thus, lots of ways to shut down enemy heroes). The war horn to buff the Bats (and also the rest of the list, but the Bats are the models who really care) is then also quite a lot of points invested to solve the problem of killing heroes that cause Terror. That's especially true when you consider that you could just Compel them into you, as you noted already.
If you stripped out the second Bat and the horn, you would still have fundamentally the same anti-hero capabilities, but would have 65 points more to spend on warriors. That could be six Morannons and two Mordor Orcs with spears, such that your model count is now 37 instead of 30 and you have spear supports for most of your line. At that point you now have a warrior base that can stand on its own legs, without requiring your monsters to win the game. They're absolutely capable of doing so, but I think they would appreciate being on less of a clock to do so before the battleline gets overwhelmed.
Always fun to read these listbuilding articles, they're some of my favourite!
Glad you enjoyed the article!
DeleteI mentioned the WK/Marshal/Fell Beast debate, and there's definitely an argument for going an alternative route there. Personally, I prefer the threat that a flying monster puts on the opponent (opponents tend to be more cautious on the approach, models have to be kept in the rear to set-up anti-fly formations, it's earlier to set-up hurls, etc.). The Spider Queen is great, but on a 60mm base her options to attack are generally going to be limited, even with Swift Movement. But with a normal time limit for games (an extra 45 minutes), I would agree that 30 models at 750 is probably not enough.
The war horn and second bat swarm is more complicated. As it turned out, there were only a handful of models I faced at the tournament who had Terror (the Dol Guldur Witch-King, four Castellans, Gil-Galad, and Treebeard/Quickbeam/a standard ent), so it may have been overkill in retrospect (although there was a Return of the King legion there, which would have been interesting to take on without it). I ended up not using the bat swarms much for hero hunting in two of my four games, but I do like them as objective capturers (combined with the spiderlings from the Spider Queen, they make scenarios like Seize the Prize, Heirlooms, or Destroy the Supplies much easier to win, or at least contest). The redundancy against Terror heroes is also nice (and without a war horn, I would definitely be skittish about taking just one). Yes, Compel is an option (in theory). But my Contest of Champions match against Gil-Galad was a good reminder that magic doesn't always get through when you need it to, even if you have two casters (because resist test ties go to the target, not the caster). In any event, I defaulted to preferring the magic as a second- or third-option (attempt a charge, and then either attempt a second charge or move the bat swarm into compel range and then try the compel). But again, I'm not sure there's a "right" answer here.
All that said, having an extra 4-6 models certainly would have been nice. I ended up with two major wins (vs. Treebeard/hobbits in Fog of War and vs. Tiberius's dwarves in Hold Ground), and two minor losses (a 6-5 loss to my son's Dol-Guldur/Hunter Orc/Berserkers list in Domination, and a 4-1 loss to the winning Gil-Galad list in Contest of Champions, because that scenario only awards VPs for wounding/killing the leader if your leader does it). I did end up breaking in both of the losses (which I knew was going to happen against the Berserkers list). I don't think an extra 4-6 models would have pushed my break-point up higher in either game, but of course having the extra dice in fights/to-wound might have turned a few battles... so one never knows.
The 1000-point version would fix that, of course (and looking back, I might swap a couple more of the Black Nums in that list out for Morannons with shields and spears, to get their number to 10-11). Combined with Shagrat, I think that likely upgrades the battle line enough to hold its own against most standard shieldwalls, provided the rest of the army can keep bigger heroes at bay. I'm also not quite sure what to do with the 75-points currently invested in fell wargs and orc trackers. I think some of them are worth having, but not sure I need quite that many of each.
So yeah... list tinkering is never finished. :-P
I definitely do see the logic of the Fell Beast, it's certainly a big part of the character of the list. And I do also agree that magic doesn't always come through for you when you need it, I've failed my share of 2-dice Compels! The second Bat Swarm also feels much more defensible than the war horn, as it will always be useful.
DeleteI guess my biggest concern with the war horn is that it doesn't really solve the problem of Terror-causing heroes, just helps with the odds a little. It's still a nearly 50% chance of failure (or greater into Harbinger), which doesn't feel great. And the Black Dart vulnerability is pretty concerning for the Terror matchups as well, as there aren't that many matchups where there's lots of Terror but no easy way to snipe out your war horn. Ents and Return of the King would actually be two of the only ones I guess.
So the hoops to jump through to make a horn useful for the Bats end up basically being:
facing lots of Terror, especially on heroes; not facing Black Darts/Legolas/Sorcerous Blast etc; enemy heroes being at a Fight value where the Bat Swarm getting in will make a serious difference (e.g. >F5 or not Transfixed); enemy heroes not being Compelled into the Bat Swarm; enemy heroes not being able to screen out the Bat Swarm (which I find happens an annoying amount against players who've used them before); and passing the Courage test to get in by exactly the right amount (1/6 chance by default, or 5/36 if facing Harbinger). That feels rough to me, although I suppose you are getting the additional benefits to your frontline against Terror lists. That's probably the biggest deal into Return of the King, as the hero you're actually looking to hunt doesn't cause Terror anyway.
Looking at those 4 matchups, the extra Bat and horn are potentially better against the Ents (although that matchup is already hilariously skewed in your favour, so it's probably fine regardless), and arguably against Gil-galad if he had Cirdan along as well. It's definitely worse against Tiberius' Dwarves, and against the A2 -spam list as well. So, I guess any changes probably wouldn't have made much difference really!
I got to fight not one but both lists with double Bat Swarms - against Dronak's beast list, I turned off Blinding Swarm on one bat twice because I couldn't keep him out of my heroes. The other wasn't a problem, as he was always pegged or pulled out of a fight by warriors.
DeleteAgainst Rythbyrt, I never targeted the bats with Floi because they worked together all the time, playing very conservatively so the pair would always leave one as a threat. As a result, I was often left limiting the movement flexibility of the Fell Beast instead of neutralizing one bat . . . I can see the argument for taking only one, but Balin might have stuck around if there weren't two . . .
The double bat swarm plays into my general strategy with this list, which is basically designed to be a read-and-react list, but _looks_ like an "oh crap, there's a lot to worry about here" sort of list. In other words, the _theory_ and _feel_ of the list shares a lot of DNA with well-crafted Angmar lists (multiple magic threats, multiple monsters, multiple ways to neutralize your heroes): when playing against the list, you really _feel_ like you need to go first, but the list actually _wants_ you to go first most of the time, so it can react to what you're doing/see which attempts of yours fail (no coincidence that Terror is a key part of both lists), and then try to shut down whatever has worked.
DeleteAs part of that list-building concept, I prefer to have more options for reacting to big heroes than less (in part because most lists are designed to work around the heroes, and less around the troops, so if you can eliminate a big hero or two, _most_ lists will subsequently struggle). The theory is that the more options there are, the opponent will have a more difficult time avoiding/shutting down what I want to do, even if he/she _knows_ that I want to do X. The opponent knows I can transfix their big hero; so I have two casters so that the opponent has to plan to resist 2+ spells a turn, instead of just one; I have an overlapping spell suite on those casters so that we can cast double Transfixes _or_ double Drain Courages; etc. The bat swarms work similarly: there are two of them so that even if the opponent _knows_ I want to get a bat swarm into their big hero, they have to have a plan to deal with/ tag/ block/ immobilize both of them, not just one. Same with Fight 6 monsters (either, both, or neither could charge/hurl/rend/barge). In a full tournament with the full 18-scenario pool available (no veto), there's also some advantage to having two bat swarms (plus the fell beast, plus the Spider Queen/Spiderlings) for objective shenanigans. Finally, redundancy offers some protection against bad rolls/bad luck (although in my case, I probably wouldn't have charged my first bat swarm into Gil-Galad if it had been my _only_ bat swarm... so that's a situation where having "redundancy" actually didn't help :-P ). So that's the thinking there.
But that's definitely a playstyle thing for me--I prefer playing with elite models (and trying to spam them) and elite heroes/monsters over armies that feature primarily grunts and efficiency heroes. So a more "traditional list" that relies on a grind-it-out shieldwall (bargain WK + Suladan + Black Num/Morannon spam list) is less appealing to me than a list with two monsters and elite cavalry, even though I acknowledge the efficiency and power of that sort of list. ;-)
The war horn question is trickier. The fact that they're army-wide in effect is great, but they're still a significant investment (to the point where some factions have heroes who cost basically the amount of points you spend on the horn). They're also pretty frail (unless you luck-out with one of those heroes who has a war horn, like Durin or Forlong or Helm). I usually don't run them, but ultimately included them both in this list and the Mahud/Serpent Horde all-cav list that I almost took. A large part of my rationale for both lists goes back to my preferred play-style: I prefer to have options and redundancy across the board, because botches are a thing, and because it makes the army less predictable. So double-monsters, double-bats, and double-ways-to-get-said-bats-into-a-target (compel/courage test--or two ways to get camels into Terror targets: Warrior Pride or courage tests).
DeleteThere are, however, some other benefits (or at least protections). The bonus Courage to Black Nums/Morgul Knights and the Spider Queen (all C5, or C4 in Harbinger) were very nice to have. War horns also help in objective missions (either charging targets you need to charge, or sticking around after you're broken), and while there weren't any Dead Marsh Spectres/Wood Elf Sentinels in any of these lists, having some added protection against them isn't a bad thing.
The question then becomes (1) is the War Horn actually contributing meaningfully to your chances of passing courage tests (or is there a diminishing returns problem), and (2) if so, at what points level is it worth it to pay for a War Horn?
Here, I thought there was actually a benefit: jumping from C3 to C4 in Harbinger Range on the Black Nums/Knights/Spider Queen is a significant boost (from about 60% to basically 80%); and I thought the gains on the bat swarms and fell wargs (from C1 to C2 in Harbinger Range, and C2 to C3 without Harbinger) were similarly meaningful (instead of being capped at 42% (C2) and potentially falling to 28% (C1), I was capped at 58% (C3, +16 percentage points), and would only fall to 42% (C2, +14 percentage points).
The cost thing is more difficult to gauge. With 30 models, I was basically spending 1 point per model to upgrade their Courage by 1 point. I still think that's a decent trade, given how elite my models are (efficiency-wise, 10-points for a F4/S3/D6/C5 infantry model with Terror (or 19-points for a F4/S3/D6/C5 cavalry model with Terror and a lance) is still really good value, as is an extra point to make the Mouth and Spider Queen more courageous for Terror tests/Stand Fasts. Since that's where the bulk of my war horn points were spent, I thought it was a worthwhile investment. But the investment is definitely improves as the points level goes up (30 points is only 3% of 1000 points, but is 5% of 600), and as the number of models who benefit increases (30 points for 30 models = 1 point per model, while 30 points for 50 models is only 0.60 points per model). The War Horn's effect on the Mahud Raiders would have been similar (base chance of 58% to pass instead of 42% (C3), and a worst-chance of 42% instead of 28% (C2). Given that the Mahud Raiders are costed how they're costed solely because of how devastating they are on the charge (effective S6 with war spears, plus the S4 impaler hits), spending basically 1 point per model to boost their chance of charging by 14-16 percentage points seemed like a better investment than buying two additional models.
So that's how I approached it. But again, in retrospect, I do wonder if having 5 spearmen instead of the war horn would have been a better investment (and it very well may have been).