First Impressions: The Free Peoples, Part III

Good morning gamers,

This is my last post for now in the First Impressions series and today we're finishing sort of where we began: with the Free Peoples. While we've already looked at the members of the Fellowship, their associates in Bree, the Ents, and the Hobbits of the Shire, our focus today is largely on the White Council - three of the strongest wizards that the Forces of Good have access to and one fairly erratic Dwarf (who is surprisingly reliable in the new edition).

I'd like to begin this discussion with a brief review of the previous edition and the role these characters played in shaping the meta and many of the rules changes we saw in the semiannual rules updates. When the MESBG revamp happened in 2018, it didn't take long for a lot of people to find out ways you could abuse the alliance matrix to include characters like Cirdan, Arwen, and Shades in your lists - and the inclusion of these characters in basically everything not only added the list building restriction that you needed a Hero of Valour/Legend to ally conveniently/impossibly, but some heroes underwent heroic tier changes (like Cirdan/Arwen becoming Minor heroes, but also Haldir/Dwarf Kings/other Kings becoming Heroes of Valour to make most thematic list building dilemmas work).

While this initial wave of changes didn't involve the members of the White Council, it was the limitation of Cirdan from the "easy alliance" choice that made many competitive players look to Galadriel, Lady of Light as the new default - a Hero of Valour who could ally with just about anyone conveniently and brought good anti-archery, good anti-magic, and a decent combat buff to your army. I mean, with very few exceptions, a strong competitive list began with Galadriel (and Rythbyrt even won one of our GTs with Galadriel+).

As a result, Galadriel herself got reduced to a Hero of Fortitude so you'd have to bring her with another big hero (which you could certainly do, but it came at the cost of using other big heroes - like Gwaihir - or dumping a budget hero and 10+ warriors from your list). At about the time that Lady of Light players were driven to sadness, the Vanquishers of the Necromancer Legendary Legion dropped and players figured out that they could cast Nature's Wrath/Wrath of Bruinen on their own fights while engaged in combat to knock EVERY enemy model prone and never take damage. The heroes who didn't have access to these spells could also rely on things like Sorcerous Blast to knock people into the right fights and knock all THOSE people prone, preventing anyone from being able to do reliable damage in melee unless they had very strong magical resistances on EVERY model in their army (which basically no one else had). Oh, and the list was very strong against magic and archery because Galadriel was in it.

This Legion got nerfed in various ways, not the least of which was the requirement to have 470pts of heroes in it (Saruman, Galadriel, and Gandalf), which meant you probably weren't running it below 650 because you wanted Elrond in the list (unless you were crazy like me - I was fine at 500 with those three characters), but also the heroes were prevented from casting their knock-Prone spells while engaged in combat. This made the Legion still show up in some events, but it was certainly never as strong as it was when it was released.

So with all this as background, let's look and see what's become of some of the characters who have shaped the meta at various times and see if they're still as good as they were or if they've fallen a bit by the wayside.

Top 10 Soup Lists for MESBG v2!

Good morning gamers,

Perhaps the most defining (and divisive) change in the newest version of MESBG is the change from a list of Good and Evil factions that have an alliance matrix that rewards or "penalizes" historically-accurate or historically-impossible list building choices to a set of "army lists" that can't interact at all. Throughout the previous edition of the game, Rythbyrt was a big fan of the "mix up a cool army from multiple army lists" approach to list building, including some that involved Khazad-Dum/Army of Thror Dwarves mixed in with other factions or Camels into just about every Evil list you can think of. This kind of "soup list building" approach was dabbled in by me near the end of the last edition (particularly so I could get Floi and Bombur together for the "eternal Floi" shenanigans that it opened up) and a little bit by Centaur (who, like me, is more of a purist when it comes to list building).

While the first pass through the new edition might make you feel like "soup list building" days are a thing of the past, think again - as we wait for the Armies of Middle-Earth book to drop and eventually the Legacies document (though as has been pointed out to me, there is no money coming off of that supplement, so the more cynical side of me feels like "it'll get done whenever they get around to it"), here is a Top 10 list (yes, Centaur might be our usual Top 10 guy, but he doesn't have a monopoly on those posts!) of armies you can use out of the box today to get cool mixed lists on the tabletop (and maybe even use some of those Legacied/Armies of Middle-Earth lists that we don't have access to yet). 

By "soup lists," I'm referring to armies that can field different mixes of units together in order to get a more interesting play experience - and of course, those that rank higher are going to be those that can have radically different play experiences depending on how you mix them. There will be some where you're a little stove-piped, but each has ways to make them feel different and interesting. Let's start off with . . .

Pick #10: Battle of Fornost

This list has a lot of list building options in it, but of course it differs from some of the other "soup" lists we're going to talk about later because it has required heroes. Earnur and Glorfindel are unlikely to be taken without their mounts, so they're a 320pt tax on the list right out of the gate. With 36 warrior slots between the two heroes, you could run this list with just the two heroes and fill out their warbands with some Elven infantry and a mix of Minas Tirith infantry and cavalry (and someone will clearly have a banner).

Where the "soup" aspect of the list comes in, however, is what you choose to do AFTER you've gotten a solid anvil of men and Elves with some sort of Cavalry hammer to support them. The list has access to Captains of Minas Tirith and Rivendell Captains (on foot) if you want to take "more of the same", but it also has other options that you shouldn't sleep on.

First Impressions: Gundabad and Dol Goldur, Part II

Good morning gamers,

A while back, Centaur walked through the Azog's Hunters/Azog's Legion elements of Gundabad and Dol Guldur and today, I'm wrapping up the discussion on these new profiles with those that appear exclusively in the Rise of the Necromancer army list. Back in the old edition, this was an all-hero list that sported the Necromancer, the nine Nazgul of Dol Guldur, the Keeper of the Dungeons, and an unlimited number of Castellans of Dol Guldur. The list has lost access to Castellans (at least until the Legacies document tells us otherwise), but has gained some very interesting things in trade. Let's dig in and see how this spooky list looks in the new edition!

Sauron, the Necromancer: How Have He "Changed?"

The most profound change to this profile has got to be the no-spoiler-alert-given nature of outright naming "The Necromancer of Dol Guldur" "Sauron, the Necromancer." I mean, if I've only read the Hobbit and I read a casual reference or two to some necromancer who has set up shop in some castle called Dol Guldur in the south of Mirkwood that Gandalf apparently sends packing while the Dwarves are blundering in the Lonely Mountain without him and haven't read the second chapter of The Fellowship of the Ring since its release seventy-one years ago . . . okay, I hope everyone catches the sarcasm here because I can't flag it any better - the name change is good, moving on. :)

Besides the name change, the Necromancer went down 50pts to a jaw-droppingly-low 200pts and can lead Fell Wargs, Hunter Orcs (on or off Fell Wargs), and Spiders just like he used to be able to do in the Dark Powers of Dol Guldur faction during the last edition. Being able to set up a cheap wall of guys to screen him from danger, protect the flanks of his minions (who can also lead these troops), buff out your numbers, and give you access to things like raw speed and bows (but not banners) is super, SUPER helpful.

He also picked up the base 2 Attacks, free casting die when he spends at least one casting die, the ability to cast two different spells against two different targets each round, and Resistant to Magic rules that he had in the Rise of the Necromancer Legendary Legion, which makes him both a reliable caster, but also fairly resilient to enemy magic and can stand his own in combat (especially since he retained Drain Soul and Curse . . . and can be fielded with Mirkwood Spiders who can Paralyze enemies or sap them of their Fate points - more on these guys later).

The Road to the TMAT GT 2025 - Tiberius's List

Good morning gamers,

I've been busy for the past few months (not too busy to write, but my weekends have been taken up by a TON of things), so I was happily surprised when Red Jacket reached out to us and scheduled our GT for the year. It's not every day that I attend a tournament without having to do any of the planning, so I was excited to figure out what list I'd be bringing. The tournament will be a three-round, random-pairing tournament with assignments being made before the first round is played. The pools will be #2 (multiple objectives), #4 (killing things), and #3 (objects).

This tournament will also be the last hoorah of the old edition (while we wait for the Armies of Middle-Earth supplement - and possibly the Legacies of Middle-Earth document - to drop), so when picking my list, I was first and foremost interested in running lists that don't appear to be valid lists in the new edition. There is a prohibition on Impossible Alliances at this event (so Floi can't be run with Bombur this time), but there were still plenty of lists that I wanted to run. Without further ado, here are the lists that I considered for the event (and the one I locked into running)!

Honorable Mention: Isengard

Years ago, I stepped out of a tournament that Red Jacket threw so my son could take his first step into our gaming community. It was the first time that any of our kids had participated in an event and I offered to be his coach (and sub in if he got tired). He got a little overwhelmed by the end of the last game, but he also had a lot of fun and played well. The list I almost took to that event was a 750-point version of the list below - and so naturally, I considered taking a list like that, since a) I never actually ran Saruman in one of our events under the 2018 MESBG revamp because I dropped, and b) because the list felt really, really strong:

• Saruman [ARMY LEADER]
• INDEPENDENT: Grima Wormtongue (or in an enemy warband)
• INDEPENDENT: Uruk-Hai Drummer
• 8 Uruk-Hai Warriors with shields
• 7 Uruk-Hai Warriors with pikes
• 1 Uruk-Hai Warrior with pike and banner
• Thrydan Wolfsbane on horse
• 4 Uruk-Hai Berserkers
• 4 Uruk-Hai Warriors with pikes
• Mauhur
• 12 Uruk-Hai Marauders with Uruk-Hai bows

The thing is . . . this list is basically a Muster of Isengard list in the new edition. Yes, I need to swap out Thrydan/Mauhur for Uruk-Hai Captains/more guys and I can't upgrade the Uruk-Hai Scouts with Uruk-Hai bows to Marauders to boost their movement (but will have an extra guy out of it), but this is the kind of list that I can run now without having to "waste" a throw-back event moment. So as much as it pains me to admit that this is the list I probably should run, I'm not going to run it. Don't worry, my dear Uruk-Hai boyz, I'll bring you out to play this edition, I promise.

Pick #5: Lothlorien Pajama Party

This list is a variant of a list I took to a GT a few years ago - but it's got Celeborn and the Mirror of Galadriel instead of Haldir and a few guys. The "pajama party" doesn't work quite like it used to, since the current edition of the game slaps half of the throwing daggers off the Wood Elf Warriors (now Lothlorien Warriors), but it is harder to shoot when you don't have cover thanks to changes with Elven cloaks. This list also has a mounted Galadhrim Captain and some Galadhrim Knights, who are not currently in the Lothlorien list, so this would be something I can't run now (that and Celeborn has a weapon and heavy armor):

• Galadriel with the Mirror of Galadriel [ARMY LEADER]
• 1 Wood Elf Warrior with Wood Elf spear and throwing daggers
• 9 Wood Elf Warriors with Elf bows
• Celeborn with Elven-made hand-and-a-half sword and heavy armor
• 3 Galadhrim Knights with Elf bows
• 4 Wood Elf Warriors with throwing daggers
• 4 Wood Elf Warriors with throwing daggers and Wood Elf spears
• 1 Wood Elf Warrior with Wood Elf spear and banner
• Galadhrim Captain on armored horse with shield and Elf bow
• 6 Wood Elf Warriors with throwing daggers
• 6 Wood Elf Warriors with throwing daggers and Wood Elf spears

The Lothlorien list in the new edition certainly can't run this way, but it can also do things that this list cannot do. While the new Armies of Middle-Earth supplement does not appear to have a Lothlorien army list, Galadhrim Knights were not listed as moving to the Legacies document, so I assume they'll be provided in the Armies of Middle-Earth book but be added to the Lothlorien army list (kind of like models released in the supplements of the last edition were said to be included in existing factions - like Anborn/Mablung being included in Minas Tirith lists). We'll see how all this shapes up, but I'm reasonably certain that once the new book drops, I'll be able to run a list like this. So . . . in the bin it goes for this event.

First Impressions: The Kingdoms of Men, Part V

Good morning gamers,

It is probably a little ambitious to try to tackle close to twenty profiles in a single post, but I couldn't find a good way to break up the Minas Tirith faction (like I did with Isengard, Mordor, or Rohan with Red Jacket's help). So, today we close out the last of the "big four" and cover ALL of Minas Tirith in one fell swoop. There's a lot of overlap between army lists in the warrior department, but many of the heroes appear in only 1-2 army lists - let's see who the big winners in the new edition are!

Minas Tirith, Osgiliath, & Ithilien: How Have They "Changed?"

Last edition, almost all of my Minas Tirith lists had Denethor in them - for 35pts, he was a SUPER cheap Hero of Valour who had enough Courage/Will points to almost never fail his Broken Mind test and his combat stats - while unimpressive - were not bad at all (F5/S4/2A, the kind of stats you'd find on upper-end mid-tier heroes who cost twice as much as he does and usually lead fewer troops). In the new edition, Denethor has gotten a price hike and a few very cool upgrades.

Photo Credit: Giphy

For 50pts, Denethor joins the Minas Tirith regulars and has heavy armor instead of normal armor, pushing him to D6 (which is great in a world where Piercing Strike is not a thing). He also picked up 2 Might/1 Fate, which means he finally has the ability to boost his arrival rolls in maelstrom missions or calling Heroic Moves/Combats - nothing special, unless you were used to him needing an escort to go where you wanted him and when you needed him to move.

He's also got a 5+ Intelligence stat, which is important because now the Broken Mind rule requires you to pass an Intelligence test instead of a Courage test (and since Intel tests can't be boosted with Will, this means you'll need that raw stat to be as high as possible - and a 5+ is pretty dang high). Assuming you remember to roll for this special rule and you don't have Boromir in your list and alive on the board, Denethor remains well-positioned to pass this test, so if it's contributing to a lower price point, I'm good with it. The Broken Mind rule itself is largely the same, but now that Denethor has Might/Fate points, there is a clarification that the opposing player can't force you to burn those resources while Denethor is under enemy control - that's nice!

Nine Companions: Building a Hero-Heavy . . . Shieldwall?

Good morning gamers,

Today we're continuing our ongoing formations series (my, it's been a while since we did one of these!) and we'll be talking about hero-heavy and all-hero lists (more to come on this topic as the year progresses). Most of the posts we've done with formations have to do with conventional armies that have a handful of heroes working in concert with a host of warriors (usually infantry, occasionally cavalry). If you've ever tried to move from a conventional force to a hero-heavy force (either all-hero or heavily slanted towards heroes), you have probably found that you need to think differently and play differently than you would with a conventional force - especially in objective missions.

Today, we're going to look at a few different ways you can set up your heroes on the board in order to make all-hero or hero-heavy lists function well as a shieldwall (especially if you find yourself up against a conventional force). We're going to first look at why you'd want to run more heroes as opposed to the bare minimum number of heroes (maxing out on warriors instead) and then look at how you can change your formations to maximize the value of your heroes. Let's dig into it!

Understanding Heroes: Why Run More Heroes?

Heroes are one of the best features of MESBG - and chief among the reasons they're so great is that they give you access to Might points (or at least, most of them do). Might points can, of course, be used to boost rolls (making an almost-win into a win-by-tying or a win-by-being-higher), which makes the hero unit FEEL better than his weight in grunts in certain situations. Most players, however, want to use their Might points for calling heroic actions - though which heroic actions you want to be calling will be heavily influenced by what your opponent has.

When I got started playing MESBG back in 2010 (it was LOTR SBG back then), there were only three heroic actions: Move, Shoot, and Combat. Move and Combat were basically all anyone called - and we all hoped that our big combat heroes with 3 Might would be able to call 3 Combats and kill 2 models followed by 2 more models for three turns . . . well, this doesn't really happen very often, but if it does, boy do you feel like your hero is something special!

For hero-heavy and all-hero armies, Heroic Moves and Heroic Combats are your most useful heroics - not only because every hero has these, but also because Heroic Moves and Combats alter the tempo of the game, allowing you greater control in where your heroes are and what their matchups are. Yes, having Heroic Strike can be really valuable too - but hero-dominant lists will get FAR more value out of crashing through grunts than they will rivaling big pieces . . . especially if your force doesn't have warriors around to guard the flanks of the heroes while they work.

First Impressions, Dwarves of the Hobbit, Part I

Good morning gamers,

Back in 2019, I wrote an article that compared the Dwarves of Thorin's Company and their Erebor Reclaimed "future selves", looking at which version of the two was better (hint: it was basically always the Champs). While there may have been slight changes to the Dwarves over time, the difference between the book-released profiles and their ending state was pretty negligible. This led to a common critique of Thorin's Company in particular (and to a lesser extent the all-Dwarf-hero Erebor Reclaimed list) when new all-hero Legendary Legions were being released and the lack of synergy between the Dwarves made Thorin's Company and Erebor Reclaimed look like a poor all-hero army choice.

Now we have a new edition and we'll be looking at nearly thirty profiles today as we consider how the profiles for all thirteen Dwarves of Thorin's Company (and their Hobbit companion Bilbo) have changed - and boy do we have some interesting changes today! Let's start off with the two that are not related to each other . . .

Thorin and Bilbo: How Have They "Changed?"

Thorin has always been a bargain deal for less than 150pts - and he was such a good deal, that I considered an Impossible Alliance with Thorin's Company Thorin and Balin, King of Moria for our GT last year and ended up taking Thorin King Under the Mountain with Balin, King of Moria instead. Dwarf heroes tend to pile in a lot of stats into a small points package and golly is that still true of Thorin in this new edition of the game. 

Thorin's Company Thorin is still 100pts base but he picked up Heroic March as a heroic action (which matters less in the Thorin's Company list since everyone gains March and can use Will to call it, but it matters a lot more in the Rangers of Mirkwood list where he is the only Dwarf hero that can declare a March). His stats remain the same as they ever were and the rerolling-1s element of the old Thorin's Company army bonus got rolled into his profile, which is really good for him and particularly good for his S4 buddies. Additionally, friendly models can benefit from Thorin's Stand Fast, which is good to have in the same way that it's good to have Stand Fasts in Elf lists.

Photo Credit: Giphy

King Thorin went up in price by 15pts (130pts base) and picked up F7, Fearless (which he never had), Hatred (Gundabad), and the old Du Bekar army bonus - though it applies to all Dwarf models now instead of just the Champions of Erebor, but also only has a radius of 3" instead of 6". Ancestral Fury was modified to only give him a free Heroic Combat on a turn in which he Charges, but it's still a free Heroic Combat, which makes Thorin an excellent choice for carving through troops.

He traded Heroic Resolve for Heroic March (which doesn't matter in Erebor Reclaimed since everyone has March in that list too, but matters a lot in the Ravenhill and Battle of Five Armies lists) and he lost access to the war goat - which hurts A LOT - but retained access to Orcrist and if you build your list in a particular way, this can make him very, very deadly. I do fear that he may fall into the "Durin problem" a bit in the Ravenhill/Battle of Five Armies lists since a 5" move hero isn't hard to stay away from, but in the Erebor Reclaimed list, he can declare a Heroic March and still charge after using the 8" movement from it - that's the same maneuverability of a goat on a straight-away, but might actually be better than the movement of a goat in a congested area.

Turning now to Bilbo, Bilbo got a 5pt-reduction in cost (55pts base) and still has Strike/Defense/Resolve like he did before (which is a good suite of options, especially on a Ringbearer/support piece). His profile didn't otherwise change - and honestly, with all the other changes that are happening (and the fact that the Ring doesn't half Fight Value if there's someone other than the Ringbearer in combat), I'm not sure how high Bilbo is on my to-take list anymore. Still, he was overpriced before, so I'm glad he got a slight points drop.

Burglar Baggins also got a points drop and is 75pts now (-15pts!). Despite this steep decline in cost, he got boosted to 2 Attacks, his Mithril Coat protects against Rend now and allows him to reroll Fate rolls of 1. Like his Thorin's Company version, he still has Strike/Defense/Resolve, which gives him some good options in a Lake-town list, but he seems kind of expensive for a Battle of Five Armies list (so expect to see him a lot more in Assault on Ravenhill and possibly Survivors of Lake-town lists).