First Impressions: Moria

Good morning gamers,

I've said this a lot on this blog, but I got my start in the Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game back in 2010 with the Mines of Moria starter set. As a result, the first "traditional" army that I collected was Moria. I enjoyed having buckets of Goblins running around the board (for a time, with a 5+ Fury Save thanks to Groblog and two Shamans) and once the Middle-Earth Strategy Battle Game came out, I acquired the long-desired-but-couldn't-justify-it-because-he-was-just-bad flagship piece of Moria, the Balrog. Fast forward six years and my Moria list has grown only slightly, getting some extra grunts, converting a Warg Marauder to complement the one that I own, and the Watcher in the Water. A great list, a fun list . . .

. . . and it's still fun in the new edition. Yes, the list has been GREATLY paired down, but as someone who most enjoyed using the Depths of Moria LL since the release of Quest of the Ringbearer, most of the tools available to that Legion are still available now. In today's post, we're going to walk through the profiles that we still have, look at how they've changed, and then also look at what's been lost (both permanently to the Legacies document and temporarily to the Armies of Middle-Earth supplement). Let's start off with the big guy himself . . .

Moria Profiles: How Have They "Changed?"

Photo Credit: Gifs.alphacoders.com

If you're playing Moria this edition, it's probably for the Balrog. I must say that you don't HAVE to take the Balrog in the Depths of Moria army list, but since your list of units is Goblin Captains, Goblin Warriors, Cave Trolls, and the Watcher, you need to really want to use the Watcher or a horde of Cave Trolls to skip on the Balrog. As has always been the case, the Balrog pays a lot of stats and special rules, but not for the traditional complement of heroic resources that you'd expect on a big hero. Yes, the Balrog has retained nearly unparalleled combat stats (F10, S9, 4 Attacks) and very good defensive stats (D9, 10 Wounds), as well as a suite of good special rules (Fearless, 18" courage debuff radius, Terror, Resistant to Magic), but without Might points or Fate points, there are limitations to taking the big man (though he has special rules still that mitigate these handicaps somewhat).

There were some changes to the Balrog's profile, most of which were positive. Like the Dwellers in the Dark of the previous edition (affectionally called "baby Balrogs" by us and I assume others), the Balrog now has an 8" Move value - which is not the Fly special rule (because . . . you know . . . he has wings), but the extra movement on a big-base model is always nice. Like all monsters, the Balrog picked up Dominant, but Dominant (10) is one of the very, VERY few double-digit Dominant keywords and while he's passing on the Dominant (3) he'd get for being the army leader in a Depths of Moria list, it VERY much offsets his high price tag.

He picked up a new rule (Large Target) that is sort of a nerf, but also probably should have been on his profile anyway - lots of monsters have picked this one up, so it's not a big deal (and frankly, if your opponent wants to target him with most kinds of archery instead of your grunts, you're kind of okay with that. Similarly, his Flame of Udun rule changed slightly, allowing Balrogs to wound immune-to-fire models with their swords, which they were previously unable to do (seeing two Balrogs fight in a Contest of Champions game was hysterical in the last edition, since neither could wound the other). They can't wound immune-to-fire models with anything else (no whip damage, no Flame of Udun damage, etc.), but at least they can do damage with their swords now.

But the Balrog didn't come through from the old edition without nerfs. Goblin Mastery was one of the Balrog's best keywords before - 12" auto-pass Courage test rules for Courage 2-3 (now 8+ or 7+) warriors and heroes are super slick, no matter what list you're in. Now, that radius has shrunk down to a 6" bubble, which is far more reasonable and still plenty big - but it's also not functionally most of the battlefield. The other big nerf came in the form of a prominent change to the fiery lash special rule - and it's oddly enough both a buff and a nerf at the same time.

In the previous edition, when the Balrog shot at someone with his fiery lash, he moved the model into base contact in as direct a line as possible. There were funny shenanigans that you could do where lashing a model into base contact with the Balrog and other models (like a Moria Goblin Prowler and a Bat Swarm) might result in the model being lashed also being trapped. With a base F10 monster, a warrior with bad courage who could half your Fight Value (Bat Swarms), and another warrior who gave you a banner reroll and got +2 To Wound from Backstabbers and a two-handed weapon, you were in a pretty great spot overall to kill the target model (and get that Heroic Combat off that you would call for free with the Demon of the Ancient World special rule.

In the current edition, you don't have to lash the model directly towards you anymore - you can actually lash the model into any spot in base contact with you, which opens up some interesting plays for getting traps off if the model is particularly tough. Additionally, there's no limitation on model size with this ability (as has been clarified on other special rules), so you can lash monsters into positions that will make them trapped (and most of them have the opportunity to get to F10).

But here's the thing: there's an addendum to the rule that wasn't there before - any friendly models who happen to be in base contact with the lashed model don't count as being in the combat, so you can't half people's Fight Value with a Bat Swarm (who are not currently available to Moria anyway) or get a Goblin in the fight to trigger a banner reroll (now a special rule from the Depths of Moria army list instead of requiring the purchase of a Moria Goblin Drum - more on that in a later post) just by using the lash. This changes the tactical utility of the lash, of course, since really big heroes who have the ability to threaten the Balrog are probably NOT good targets for lashing anymore. In many respects, this is probably a net-nerf, but there are still perfectly good targets for lashing, so he certainly doesn't seem unplayable to me.

We get a similar song from a different orchestra with the Watcher in the Water, who I am THRILLED to have added to the Depths of Moria list . . . though you have to be playing at a pretty high points level to take both of them. He got some boosts as well - 6+ Courage instead of the previous 7+ Courage, Dominant (6) - better than a lot of monsters - and Large Target. Some good changes to be sure.

However, this guy also took some flack, and I think it was worse for him than for the Balrog. For one thing, his tentacles suffered from the same addendum as the Balrog's fiery lash - he can't drag models into combat with Goblins/Bat Swarms as well, and with stats that are largely worse than the Balrog's, he REALLY doesn't want to yank anyone into combat with him that poses any kind of threat. Still, he can use these to yank one or more warriors into combat with him (or a vulnerable support piece) and has full control now over where they're placed (banners beware).

His Water Dweller got a slight boost in that he can shoot while in deep water now . . . but I don't know how many people build boards with deep water because of how one-sided those terrain features can become. Perhaps the biggest nerf to this guy was the change to From the Deep, which used to allow the Watcher to displace enemy models when he arrived in play. Previously, if you wanted to protect a valuable support piece (like Cirdan or Galadriel), you always had a niggling fear that the Watcher might show up below them, forcing them to be placed 1" away from him and in "tentacle" range - now, you can have a scattered group of warriors protecting you from the Watcher's arrival, similar to how you can fight flying monsters.

The last big change for the Watcher is an odd one: a change in base size. Before, the Watcher had an oval base - now it's a circular base. I have no idea how I'm going to alter mine to fit on the new size (and with the release of a new Bolg sculpt, I have to wonder if there's going to be a new Watcher sculpt as well). If you did what I did and had the head emerging from the depths, you're in a much better boat than the players who built that whole shrimp body that barely fit on the oval . . . we'll see how that all goes.

The last of the monsters in this review are Cave Trolls - these were Centaur's bread and butter in the previous edition for both Moria and Angmar (and golly have I painted his Troll Hammers red and black with the blood of Elves and Uruks over the years). These guys got a few boosts that Centaur and I are happy about - a 4+ shoot value makes their stone throwing (and Troll Chains) a lot more reliable, which is good because any extra damage you can do with an expensive warrior monster before you're fighting is a good thing. Additionally, Troll Chains got rolled into their base profile, which means they are contributing to your throwing weapon limit, but you can definitely field 2 Goblins for every Cave Troll you bring (this will require some minor list building tweaks for Centaur though). Their Courage also grew a bit and they picked up Dominant (3), which is the bottom of what monsters got, but hey, it's better than not having Dominant at all!

But these guys also suffered a bit in this edition: Cave Trolls have to choose between paying for a spear (which follows the normal rules for spears OR doubles wounds an engaged model suffers if you get natural 6s To Wound that aren't blocked - super niche rule and usually won't apply) or a hand-and-a-half hammer (which was the go-to, but now they don't have Burly, so you have to want to have the dueling penalty or roll a natural 6 to deal the damage you were doing before). Oh, and yeah, they lost Burly - that's a hit, for sure. Also, their Intelligence stat is not great, so Hurls are gonna be a lot harder to pull off (which is not good for Centaur).

The greatest tragedy, of course, is that despite being "cave" trolls, these guys still don't have - and never have had - the Cave Dweller special rule. Ordinarily, I'd just say, "Well, they probably just don't want monsters being able to get the jumping-related boosts of Cave Dweller", but the Three Trolls can get Cave Dweller now - and more than one list can make you play at night where having Cave Dweller has defensive boosts that could help these guys stay alive. I'm just saying, when Bill, Tom, and Bert appear to be more at home in caves than a "cave troll," I think you've got a problem. All told, I'm not planning to run very many of these guys (if any) - I think the other two monsters are a much better deal than 2 or 4 of these guys, especially at low points levels (but more on that when we do the Depths of Moria army review).

Okay, no more griping (for now) - let's talk about the Goblins! Goblin Captains went up by 5 points and had . . . exactly zero changes (besides not being able to take a shield anymore). Yes, that's a nerf, straight and simple. Goblin Warriors had precisely no changes, except that they are required to take only one piece of wargear (so no spear-shield combos or spear-bow combos . . . and I guess no "I'm not taking any wargear, thank you very much" Goblins either). This is probably also a net-negative, though at least they didn't go up in points.

I do have good things to say about this list - and we'll get to those later on in the year when I review the Depths of Moria list - but what I'd like to do to close out the discussion of Moria is to remember the fallen and look with anticipation to the things we lost that we're getting back in the future (or functionally have now) and those that are "permanently gone" (at least until the legacies document comes out and your local TO decides whether they're legal or not).

We're going to start off with the Moria Goblin Drum, which was removed as a unit in the current iteration of the game, but all of its effects are present in the Depths of Moria army list rules . . . so we effectively get all of the perks for free without the need to keep models alive. This is a really good thing, especially at lower points levels where the cost of taking the drum often meant leaving 10-15 guys at home (although Depths of Moria LL players will lament the fact that they can't get banner VPs in this edition with the current list).

We had a bunch of models escape the list of Legacy profiles and so I anticipate that they'll show up in the Armies of Middle-Earth supplement - Bat Swarms, Moria Goblin Prowlers, and Moria Goblin Drums have already been mentioned in this post, but we've also got Moria Goblin Shamans, generic Dragons, Cave Drakes, and the famed named Goblin heroes, Durburz and Druzhag (along with probably wild beasts to flesh out the fast-attack options).

Most of these models had incredibly good tactical options - Durburz was a cheap army leader that could ally with other things (that's not a thing anymore), Druzhag had reliable magic that could make cheap things really good (or expensive things super good), Bat Swarms nerfed people they could fly into, Prowlers got multiple To Wound bonuses against trapped models (and +1 To Wound against everything), Cave Drakes were cheap, durable monsters, Dragons (with wings) were fast, flexible attack models, Drums gave you massive banner radius rerolls (essential to making your low Fight Value horde work - though again, we get that in the army bonus for free, currently), and the lowly Moria Goblin Shaman kept us from fleeing the board (or stopping in our tracks when charging certain Terror walls).

Most of these boosts are not present in the current edition of Moria, but 2 Cave Trolls might be similar to having 1 Cave Drake - and the Balrog/Watcher were already competitive alternatives to both Cave Drakes and Dragons. Durburz and Druzhag are good, but Goblin Captains are cheap unit leaders and came in at half the cost of either of them. Bat Swarms and Prowlers can't really be replaced, but saving the points spent on those guys to buff out your numbers more (or afford that big hero) still has value. Finally, the drum is in the rules for the list and you have a Fury rule in the Balrog's Goblin Mastery rule, so while there are definitely things you're missing, you still have a lot of what you had before.

When we look to the Legacy models, however, we see a lot of things that are not available now. Groblog was more than a glorified Goblin Captain - he could make your grunts get +1 Fight Value (which could go all the way up to F4 when paired with the old Moria army bonus). Ashrak could make spiders positively scary, which included not just the Venomback Giant Spiders, but he could also give the rules for invisibility to the likes of Shelob or the Spider Queen. Druzhag will be able to do some of what Ashrak used to do (make cheap spiders better), but Ashrak can't really be replaced. 

The entire Blackshield contingent of profiles (the Captain that I loved, the Shaman that everyone loved/hated, and the Warriors/Drummers that some people loved) were axed and while we could quibble about whether they were overcosted compared to regular Goblin Warriors, the fact that they could get to D6 and started with a higher base Courage meant there were situations where you wanted them (and Hatred (Dwarf) was really good in our meta here at TMAT). Miss them or ignore them, the Blackshield options provided some interesting alternative gameplay options for both normal Moria lists as well as the Depths of Moria LL - and while I'm not pining for them actively, not having those options does feel like a bit of a loss.

Warg Marauders and Dwellers in the Dark are also doomed for legacies, but I always preferred Cave Trolls to Dwellers (or just taking the Balrog and a pile of guys), so the loss of the babies doesn't bother me. Still, they were monsters that could heal themselves if you got the timing right, so they were plenty good (and could force Might out from Striking heroes who then wouldn't have as much Might to take on the Balrog). Warg Marauders had some very interesting tactical play options that simply can't be replicated in anything else in the Moria list (and could only sort of be replicated with the Spider Queen). These guys were fun and could deal a TON of damage on the charge. They will be missed by me for sure. They also got complicated when it came to niche rule situations, so while I miss them, I also don't mind passing on explaining their odd interactions with rules like break point or models exiting the battlefield.

Conclusion

Moria has changed a lot - but what remains still feels pretty similar. Yes, some rules have changed for the worse, but Dominant is a nice add, as is the cleanup on the wording of some of the rules for the two big monsters. I still think this list is viable and I've been enjoying tinkering with it over the past month. If you have thoughts on Moria (especially if you're a Moria player), let us know in the comments below! Until next time, happy hobbying!