The Scouring of the Shire, Part 16: The Battle of Bywater

Good morning gamers,

This is it - this is for all the bananas! We've reached the end of the Scouring of the Shire campaign and we're playing the Battle of Bywater scenario. This scenario is really old, but with the campaign bonuses we've been getting for winning scenarios, there are a few adjustments from what's in the book:

• Maggot with his dogs, the Gaffer, and Ted Sandyman are here;
• Holfoot Bracegirdle and Robin Smallburrow can't call heroic actions because the Ruffians won the Arrest of Folco Boffin scenario;
• Pippin has -2 Might for losing the Attack on Tuckburough; and
• Merry gets a free Heroic action from winning the Old Cotton's Farm scenario.

The Battle of Bywater

The board is set up with the Ruffians on one side and the Hobbits hemming them in on the other three board edges. As you can see, the flowers from the Gaffer have been placed near the middle . . . apparently Centaur thinks he'll be fighting there (and he would be right).

Thematic List Challenge: The Deeping Wall of Helm's Deep, Part 2

Good morning gamers,

Last week, we looked at how you could run a historical or convenient alliance between the Fellowship (or the Halls of Thranduil) with Lothlorien in order to bring the defense of the Deeping Wall of Helm's Deep to life from the silver screen. Today, we're back in Helm's Deep, but this time, we're going to try to find a thematic but competitive list that showcases the defense of the Deeping Wall based on the participants who are there from the BOOK. Let's dig into the theme of this list . . .

The Theme

We've rejected all the Elves and we're digging in hard into what Rohan has, as well as getting some heavy-hitting heroes from the Fellowship to flesh out the list. The defense of the Deeping Wall in the book is a great drama, with speeches by Aragorn, Legolas, Gimli, and Eomer about their hard fight - as well as a lot of talking about their weapons and kill counts. Some of this made its way into the films, but most of it is strictly in the books.

Because we're focusing on one part of the battle for Helm's Deep, there are going to be some models that were clearly AT Helm's Deep who are going to be absent from this list - but we also have a lot more to work with than we did last time. I theorized running a list from this thematic army back in March for our Spring Zephyr tournament and it's been fun to run thematic lists like this one throughout the year (even though I ended up not running any of them). Let's look at the models that we're going to constrain ourselves to . . .

The Scouring of the Shire, Part 15: Old Cotton's Farm

Good morning gamers,

We're almost through the Scouring scenarios - and today, Centaur gets to use one of his favorite heroes: Farmer Cotton. The Hobbits have the Ruffians surrounded - can they keep most of their heroes alive and quarter the Ruffians? Let's find out!

Old Cotton's Farm

The Ruffians begin surrounded and the Hobbits have surrounded their circle of models. The southern ambush has Frodo and Merry in it, while the northern ambush is led by Sam and the Gaffer. Several Hobbit Archers have perched themselves on the smials on the northern side. The Gaffer's flowers are all near the southern side (to up the damage there).

Thematic List Challenge: The Deeping Wall of Helm's Deep, Part 1

Good morning gamers,

There are lots of good podcasts and blogs and such out there on the internet with players who have podiumed at the world's most prestigious tournaments - and we aren't one of those blogs. I've been playing the game for a long time, but with young kids at home, going to multi-day events that are hosted by other people (or single-day events that are run on Sundays) are just out of the question for me. Heck, I barely have time to throw/attend 2-3 events run by our local group every year!

But one distinctive that our group does have is that in one way or another, we love themey lists. We do - sometimes it's trying to run lists that play off a particular gimmick or rule in the game, and sometimes it's attempting to portray a battle force from the books or movies. As someone who's played a lot of games and doesn't really care how he does in the end, I'll say that it's the theme of a list that really sells me on using something (maybe that's why I don't win much at our events . . .).

But I had an idea last year: write a few articles about lists that are rich in theme, don't appear to be toppling the meta right now, but have a lot to offer both thematic-minded and competitive players. As such, I've set for myself a "list building challenge" to explore some new ways for players to bring theme to the tabletop (and maybe win some games along the way). Our first stop is a newly-found favorite of mine: running a "Deeping Wall" list based on the Two Towers film!

The Theme

I've said this many times before: I was a bit saddened when War in Rohan came out and you couldn't run a "Deeping Wall only" Legendary Legion (though admittedly, this is pretty much my only critique of that sourcebook - it's really great!). Running Aragorn, Legolas, Gimli, and a bunch of Lothlorien Elves is really fun - especially if all of the Galadhrim could take bows . . . because THAT wouldn't be broken, right? Well, I happened to pick up a bunch of Galadhrim off eBay one day, and then Centaur and I split a Galadhrim box . . . and then I got MORE Galadhrim for Christmas . . . and suddenly, I had gone from being a Wood-Elves-only Lothlorien player to having a legitimately large number of armored Elves. What was I to do with all these Elves (and basically no shields because that's how the blister works)? Why add them to my three Hunters and play around with a Deeping Wall list, of course!

The Legacies of Middle-Earth Supplement: What We Know and What It Means

Good morning gamers,

In case you didn't see the October 29th article on Warhammer Community, we got a preview of (probably all of) what's going to be in the Legacies of Middle-Earth supplement, which is supposed to be a downloadable PDF document of profiles that are being retired from MESBG officially, but will still have new-edition-compatible profiles so if your local tournament organizer wants to allow them, your collection isn't null and void (some people will rejoice, others will note care).

The recent GW articles have actually been hinting at a lot of different changes if you know to look for them (like the fact that the Isengard faction will have at least two subfactions in it, named the Army of the White Hand and the Usurpers of Edoras). The article we got on October 29th was far less hidden in its reveals - but that doesn't mean there weren't odd things included that hint at other changes to come.

What the article gave us was a long punch list of profiles that were moving to Legacies - but hidden in this list were some other gems about the new edition, so what I wanted to do today is break down a) what profiles will be free-to-download from Games Workshop (something I very much support), b) how this will change the factions that were targeted, and c) what OTHER changes have been previewed and what we should expect from the forthcoming supplements for the Armies of the Lord of the Rings, the Armies of the Hobbit, and the Armies of Middle-Earth (book-oriented supplement). Let's dive in!

What's In Legacies?

The Legacies document will be populated mostly with profiles that the GW team invented to flesh out the world of Middle-Earth. Many of these things are mentioned in The Lord of the Rings or The Hobbit (like Half-Trolls and everything from Khand - re-read Book V of The Return of the King if you doubt me). 

Fleshing out the Faction: Fiefdoms Revamp

Good morning gamers,

Back in June 2021, Centaur tried his hand at "revamping" the Fangorn list, providing lots of cool upgrades for Ents, profiles for Huorns, and some neat named heroes who do different things. About a month later, Centaur also tried his hand at revamping Arnor, providing flavors of units based on the major regions of Arnor that would have existed during the apex of that kingdom (the profiles offer more variety than what Rise of Angmar provided, for those interested in seeing what could have been).

In December 2022, Rythbyrt did not one but two posts on how to revamp the Rangers faction (and some Legendary Legions that surround that faction - or should include members of that faction) and like Centaur's post on Fangorn, there were some really great ideas in it.

I'm the last one to join the fray, but I gotta say, the idea for this revamp has been growing in my mind for years. Every year when I begin re-reading The Return of the King, I'm always intrigued by the end of Book V, Chapter 1 where the various fiefdoms of Gondor arrive in their hundreds to assist the garrison of Minas Tirith. While the Fiefdoms has a lot of great units in it - and a really neat theme overall - there's also a LOT of missed opportunities, I feel, for that army list. Today, we're going to walk through the profiles that already exist for the Fiefdoms, and then we'll walk through the passage in chunks and look at profile options for the various fiefs that we're told about. Let's dig in!

NOTE: it's entirely possible - however unlikely - that the Fiefdoms (probably relegated to the Armies of Middle-Earth/book-not-movies sourcebook) could get a revamp in the new edition. We already know that the Men-at-arms of Dol Amroth have been relegated to the Legacies document (and Forlong the Fat is probably losing his horse - and probably getting his war spear downgraded to a standard spear), but so far as we know, the rest of the Fiefdoms is staying as it is. Since we don't have a roadmap for GWs plans, I figured I would throw out these ideas - and who knows, maybe it'll happen!

The Fiefdoms: Existing Profiles

Dol Amroth

This is actually the eighth and final fiefdom to be mentioned in the chapter and Imrahil is described as "kinsman of the Lord, with gilded banners bearing his token of the Ship and the Silver swan" - basically, he's awesome. Imrahil does a lot in the book and leads some of the finest warriors in all of the kingdoms of men - they can trace their lineage back to Numenor and apparently that allows them to have a higher Fight Value than Eomer when they're within 3" of Imrahil and 6" of Boromir's mighty flag. #NotBitter

Imrahil's profile is super solid, with his only limitations being "just 3 Might points" and only getting his wounding bonuses on the charge. Still, with a 12" banner rule for Dol Amroth units (and this rule gets applied to all Fiefdoms units if you keep your army bonus), F6/3A with D7/3 Wounds/3 Fate, there's a lot to like about Imrahil - and many a model that I've fielded have been run over by him.