Good morning gamers,
We're continuing our walk through the Gondor army lists and we're turning to a list that's sort of like a list I used to run in the old edition - and if you've played through the Gondor at War supplement or Fantasy Fellowships, you'll recognize the name of this army list right away: it's the Atop the Walls army list, which means the most important units you can take are Gandalf on Shadowfax and . . .
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| TREBUCHETS! Photo Credit: Guerre-Anneau |
This isn't the only list that has access to trebs, but it's certainly the list where they are the most effective (and thanks to having such a limited selection of profiles, you're most likely to field them here). This list is basically a streamlined version of the pure Minas Tirith list from yester-year, but with a few special rules tacked on to make things interesting. Let's see what's in store on the white walls of Minas Tirith, shall we (as we have been doing, anything related to the Legacies document will be highlighted in red)?
Atop the Walls: Changes for 2025
Profile Selection
Our heroes of Legend and Valour are simple: Gandalf and Hurin respectively. The addition of Hurin is great - he's in Minas Tirith in the books and governs in Aragorn's stead after the battle of the Pelennor is over, so he'd be here for sure. We'll dig into the profiles more in a moment, but suffice it to say that we have two solid beater heroes available to us. On the Fortitude side of the house, we have access to the two heroes that you got with Gandalf (and Pippin) in the Atop the Walls scenario from Gondor at War in the form of Beregond and Irolas - both of whom remain solid choices in this edition (and Beregond got QUITE the glow-up with the rules changes). You also have generic choices in the form of Captains of Minas Tirith (very reliable March heroes) and Knights of the White Tower (F6 generic heroes with Heroic Strike). You also have Pippin, who you will never take just for himself.
In addition to these traditional hero options, you have access to both Gondor Avenger Bolt Throwers and Gondor Battlecry Trebuchets. As we'll see next in the army special rules section, these guys can be a tad more effective in this list than in other lists and the way that they're helped can make them reliable means of forcing your opponent to play the game the way you want. There will be some times when they're also just like all other siege engines, so there's that.
Finally, on the warrior front, you have access to Warriors of Minas Tirith (reliable melee troops, so-so archers), Knights of Minas Tirith (reliable shock cavalry), and Citadel Guards (great second-line units behind Irolas or solid archers). Citadel Guard can only be taken by Irolas, so if you plan to have spears backing up your shields or bows with S3/Bodyguard, you'll need to pack them into his warband. Otherwise, it's tin-can-city for these guys.
We've lost a lot of Minas Tirith hero options and a few Minas Tirith warrior options. Rangers of Gondor are probably still the best archers Minas Tirith has to offer, but Citadel Guard get the stronger-bow-worse-Shoot comparison that Dwarf Warriors had against Dwarf Rangers in the last edition (boy has that changed now - but more on that next year). Guards of the Fountain Court would be nice to have, but Citadel Guard and Warriors of Minas Tirith can cumulatively do most of what they do. While this list is clearly more restricted than Minas Tirith used to be, it's still got a solid core of options and I like it.
Army List Bonuses
There are three army list bonuses in the Atop the Walls list. First and foremost, friendly Gondor models within range of an objective marker may re-roll To Wound rolls of a natural 1 when making either shooting attacks or performing Strikes. Assuming your scenario has objective markers in them, these markers might have a variable range - but if you're playing a scenario with multiple objectives on the map (like Domination), it's possible for your siege engines to park next to them and reroll 1s when they probably wound on 3s - that's pretty good! As you assault objectives (or if the only objective is in the center of the board), your melee troops should be able to get a slight boost to their reliability, which is always nice to have. I will note that the keyword distinction is important here - Gandalf lacks the Gondor keyword, but everyone else has it (so Gandalf is not rerolling 1s To Wound . . . which might be fine).
The other two rules affect friendly Gondor models within 12" of Gandalf: they will both pass any Courage Test they have to take and gain the Hatred (Mordor) special rule. Now I'll say this: one of the things I liked about the changes they made to Osgiliath Veterans this edition is the addition of Hatred (Mordor). Hatred is a powerful keyword but it's always constrained to something (sometimes it's a little open-ended, like "Hatred (Man)" in the Muster of Isengard list, but it's usually limited to a faction or a race). The Mordor keyword shows up on enough stuff that the rules feels relevant, but also won't be active every game unless . . . well, unless those Black-Numenorean-Morannon-Orc-
Profile Adjustments
We've talked about some of these profiles already in our review of the Men of the West, but here's a recap on a few of these guys and an intro to the new fellas:
- Gandalf the White feels like a very, VERY different piece in this list than he was in the old edition. The ability to be mounted (with Pippin!) and being F6/3A makes him a really potent combat piece on the board. Previously, his job in a list like this was to get Fortify Spirit up on himself and any other power heroes you had, Sorcerous Blast into big heroes to keep them from killing your guys, keep Blinding Light up to protect you from archery, and threaten Spirit models (like Ringwraiths - but also Barrow-Wights, the Balrog, the King of the Dead/all Dunharrow models, and Sauron) who got too close to you or tried to shut Aragorn down. In many respects, he can still do all of these things - it's just that Blinding Light doesn't stay up, so you'll have to choose how much augmenting you want to do before you start using Blinding Light. With 6 Will and a free Will to cast spells (yaye for having his staff in this list!), Gandalf is likely to cast his spells all game - and if he wants to cast any difficult ones easily, it only requires his free Will point and a Might point for Heroic Channelling. Being able to use Pippin's Might point (as well as Pippin's Will/Fate points) is super slick and being mounted gives him an incredibly strong combat profile to augment his powerful casting. Yes, he'll be 250pts if you do this, but he'll also be a force to be reckoned with.
- Hurin is . . . surprisingly not great in this army list. He's still F5, which puts him on the same level as basically all of our other heroes in the list (except for Gandalf and one other), he still only has 2 Attacks (no dueling reroll anymore), he has 3-Might-and-Strike still (not as good now that Strike is only D3 when you start from F5), and has access to a horse. In this list, his Line of Command special rule is meaningless since Gandalf is always your Army General and lacks the Gondor keyword, so that's not doing anything good for you - and since his In Defense of the King special rule is superfluous with the army list bonuses, that rule doesn't matter either. So . . . he has a master-forged hand-and-a-half sword and can be taken with a mount . . . maybe this isn't the best list for him.
- Irolas saw a pretty balanced suite of changes - he's a 2 Might hero without Heroic March, but he can still shield without a shield and make a single S4 strike if he wins and now all friendly Citadel Guard within 3" of him get +1 To Wound when making Strikes (which includes both Engaged Citadel Guard and spear-supporting ones). Irolas also picked up a second Fate point, which can make him a little more resilient than your other Fortitude options. Without March, I think he's a good third-choice of hero (fourth behind Pippin-with-Gandalf, I guess).
- Beregond, Guard of the Citadel has seen a HUGE glow-up! He's a big character in the book, so I'm happy he got the Damrod treatment and went up from 30pts to 65pts and has F5, 3+ Shoot, 2 Attacks/Wounds, and 2 Might/Will/Fate now. He still has a longbow (no Sharpshooter), still has Bodyguard (good usually but unnecessary in this list as everyone effectively has Bodyguard), and picked up a special rule that lets him reroll all failed To Wound rolls while within 3" of Pippin (so run him with Elessar and Gandalf, I guess). He's not quite the cheap archery hero he was before, but he's still a cheap archery hero and he's also decent at fighting now!
- Captains of Minas Tirith are some of the big winners of the new edition - and losers, depending on your opinion of lances and horses on F4 heroes. While the horse and lance helped these guys kill things reliably last edition, the F4 was always a bit of a let-down unless they had help from another hero (probably one that couldn't take a horse). Now these guys are on foot, but they're 60pts instead of 55pts, they're F5 instead of F4, and they still have Shieldwall, which makes them reliable tanking heroes at low points levels. He's the only source of Heroic March in this list, but he is competing with Beregond for time in the sun, so I don't think he's a shoe-in necessarily for your cheap-hero slot (though getting Gandalf, a Captain, and your choice of Irolas or Beregond really isn't that expensive.
- Knights of the White Tower are back if you allow the Legacies profiles and they're base F6 now (higher than Hurin?) with unchanged stats otherwise. They still have Heroic Strike (which their base F6 makes pretty relevant), but for 75pts each, they're the most expensive of your lesser heroes - though I will say that taking one of these guys looks a bit more appealing than paying 5-25pts more for Hurin, so that's a mark in their favor. As they were in the last edition, these guys can be embedded in a battle line like Captains of Minas Tirith and with a two-handed weapon that has Mighty Blow (on the off chance you face a multi-wound model), these guys can really wreck a battle line . . . if you can afford them.
- Peregrin Took, Guard of the Citadel has exactly one utility in life: sitting on Shadowfax with Gandalf. Gandalf's first Heroic Channel should take advantage of Pippin's Might point, Gandalf's first non-channelled spell should take advantage of Pippin's Will point, and then for the rest of the game, Pippin is just another model that can race off the board on Shadowfax or who can be unceremoniously dumped on an objective late in the game. Giving Gandalf the White Resistant to Magic reduces Gandalf's need to cast Fortify Spirit on himself (which you might do in a rare heavy-magic match-up, but probably not normally) and allows him to focus on casting Sorcerous Blast and Banishment with his Channels (and maybe trying to get in a Compel or Transfix otherwise). Pippin's great, but not for his profile . . . that fairly well stinks still. :)
- Warriors of Minas Tirith are also big winners this edition for this list - they're still great front-line troops and are even more reliable in that role now that they're F4. They do cost more than they used to, but at 9pts/model with shield or bow, they're not THAT pricey (and since Warriors of Minas Tirith are more ubiquitous in this list than Citadel Guard, they may actually be taken as archers). If you're paying 18pts/file for a Warrior of Minas Tirith with shield backed by a Citadel Guard or 19pts/file for two Warriors of Minas Tirith with shields (one with spear), you're doing pretty well for yourself. Take these guys - take a lot of these guys - and call it a day.
- Knights of Minas Tirith have become some of the best shock cavalry for price in the game - F4 is pretty common now, but they're not F3 and they're not that expensive for D6 troops. Knights are nothing to write home about, but they're still plenty good and I love them - take a few to ride alongside Gandalf or race to objectives as you need to, but please don't throw them into a horde of infantry and expect them to come out alive!
- Citadel Guard are a nice alternative to Warriors of Minas Tirith. They're only available in Irolas's warband and while they can make decent archers, having spears that can get +1 To Wound while near Irolas is pretty big. Citadel Guard backing up Warriors of Minas Tirith is a powerful combo and no one should underestimate what these boys can do when they have a protected battle line to support.
- Trebuchets are more expensive than they used to be, but they can still fire over models (and limit in-the-way options), they can still auto-kill whatever they hit (and people nearby), and they will still knock over whoever lives after the impact of the rock. For 100pts, you can get a Captain and 4 guys - and for another 100pts, you can fill that warband completely. Take one of these if you take any of these - if you plan on spamming siege engines, you'll want to look into . . .
- Bolt Throwers have long been the more competitive Gondor siege engine, and while Centaur will always be a Treb player, Bolt Throwers are certainly the better option for spamming out range threats in this list. Not only do they shoot multiple shots (which can each benefit from the rerolling 1s To Wound if you're near an objective), but each of those shots is a very powerful hit that won't auto-kill, admittedly, but is also likely to punch through a warrior as well as a hero. Volume plus reliability on the wounding roll strikes fear in basically anyone, so if you're going to field two or even three siege engines, you want these.
Okay, let's go over the strengths and weaknesses of the list.
Atop the Walls: Strengths and Weaknesses
We need to begin with the shooting potential of this list, as it's really a mixed bag of really good options and pretty so-so options. As I said last time with regard to the Men of the West army list, Warriors of Minas Tirith are 9pts/model now and pay for F4 and D5 over their comparable alternatives for the Men of the West, Warriors of Rohan. While paying for D5 might be helpful in a shoot-out, most melee units that are running down your archers have a good chance of being S3 (or S3 with +1 To Wound), which means that paying for D5 might not always help you. Additionally, the F4 will only matter if you're engaged in melee and if you could save 1pt/model to get F3 (as you can do with Warriors of Rohan - though they save you 2pts by being D4), you probably should do that if you don't intend for your archers to be engaged in much fighting.
That said, being F4 is an interesting deterrent against fast units that might be racing to clear out archers. While most mounted heroes are still very much a threat, most warrior cavalry that might be screening themselves with terrain to get into your archers without losing their horses cap out at F4, so being F4 gives your opponents an interesting dilemma between charging down archers who might be sitting on objectives and leaving them alone to focus on your battle line. Any time you can make your opponent question if killing off some of your models is worth doing, you know things are probably in a good place.
Now Warriors of Minas Tirith are not great archers - at 9pts/model with a standard bow and a standard 4+ Shoot Value, you need quite a few of these guys to reasonably punch through a D6 opponent. However, they do make excellent guards for the two siege weapons that you have. Trebuchets, as we just finished saying above, are often the left-at-home option when compared to the multi-shot Bolt Throwers, but their range is unparalleled, and if the siege veteran is okay boosting the To Hit/Scatter roll to hit what he wants, the damage these things can deal is incredible. As is generally the case in MESBG, you want more than one threat so your opponent can't avoid you - that's pretty hard to do with a treb, but even having one of these things around can really mess with your opponent's day. As a large siege engine, they're also great at crushing other siege engines, who don't prompt a scatter roll and who will probably be wounded on a 4+ - and Wall-breaker makes it so that if you're hitting a siege target (like a large siege engine), you pick the highest of two To Wound rolls and deal D3 wounds if you wound the thing . . . that's pretty good!
The argument for bolt throwers is a lot easier: from each of these things, you can expect 3-4 hits at S7 with the standard range and limitations of bows (including the does-not-auto-kill thing). These things are insanely reliable at mowing down troops and since the siege crew don't have bows themselves, for every bolt thrower or treb that you take (2 crew each), you can take 1 extra bowman than you'd normally have in your army. The bowmen aren't phenomenal, but they can serve as untrained crew in a pinch and they can throw an extra die at a distance to possibly kill someone (though to pose a serious threat to D5-6 armies, you'll want to field 12-18 of these guys - check out my simple math facts post from the last edition for why this is).
Our next stop is the optimization of profiles in this list. As far as generic March Captains go, Captains of Minas Tirith are some of the best there are - they can be D8, they're base F5, and they can lead 12 guys and have 2 Might for Moves/Marches/sometimes Combats for only 60pts. There are MANY factions that would love to be able to buy a unit like this for his cost. Gandalf is a little pricey, but he's got a good combat profile and a stellar casting array with access to an extra Might/Will point from Pippin (and if you do take damage, he has two rerollable Fate points from Pippin as well) - it's pretty crazy, actually, and when compared to the cost of heroes like Elrond or Imrahil who have good combat profiles and might have casting capabilities, the longevity and survivability of Gandalf surpasses both, I feel.
The options for Irolas and Beregond (and Knights of the White Tower) as supplementary heroes is also excellent, as these guys are still cheap (65 or 75pts), they're all F5-6/D6, and they're all bringing the stock-standard 2 Might to the fight (with differing utility from their specialized heroic actions - but two of them definitely fall into the category of anti-hero). While there are certainly heroes who might try to run over these guys, they're cheap sources of Fortitude warbands, they fight just fine/well for their cost, and they should be pretty survivable if you have to keep someone alive. Season to taste which one you want in your list.
Warriors of Minas Tirith and Knights of Minas Tirith are incredibly lean and efficient profiles - they don't need access to high Courage while within 12" of Gandalf, they are all base F4 now, and they're D6 with the potential to be higher. Their offense is a little limited by S3, but with access to rerolling 1s To Wound in objective scenarios, possibly access to Hatred, and lances on the Knights, these guys should be able to survive a shieldwall scrum while getting a reliable kill from your heroes to augment the warriors.
You also have Citadel Guard, who can operate outside of Gandalf's Bodyguard radius of 12" and who can help tear through battle lines while near Irolas. I don't know that you want to take 12 Citadel Guard in Irolas's warband, but somewhere in the 6-8 range is probably a good target so you can have them when you need them in the bubble of Irolas. A banner in this warband might not be amiss either to ensure that they win and get the +1 To Wound.
The last topic to discuss in this list is its strengths in certain scenario types. If you took siege weapons, then maelstrom missions will be interesting for you - but you can guarantee that if you took bolt throwers, your opponent won't be jumping into your backfield to surprise you (no minimum range means a few guys are getting skewered before they're allowed to charge). If you ignored the siege weapons, then this list can operate pretty well with independent warbands, as we'll see in the strategies section below. With resilient troops at average cost, you can field quite the array of guys that can stick around, which is useful.
Scenarios with multiple objective markers can boost your damage a bit and most don't require you to go very far, so there will be some opportunity for your ranged units to sit back and shoot (while benefitting from rerolling 1s, which is a nice pip to have - especially for siege weapons). If you're able to sit back on those objectives and shoot (or defend them if they're in the center of the board), the slight pip up you get on your wounding rolls (turning totally-not-working rolls into possibly-working rolls will add up). As a big-time proponent of the Feint special strike in the last edition, I can say that being able to reroll 1s may not do much for your probability of killing things, but a 1 is a failure most of the time - and not getting a 1 when you get a 1 is a good thing. The power of this list will also be felt in killing-things scenarios where you don't have to go anywhere (objectives or not): if you can shoot at your opponent and wreck up his battle lines with siege weapons and he has to come to you because you have a banner and are scoring points just as much as he is, you're in a good spot.
Scenarios that require you to get places aren't bad for this list either - Knights and Gandalf are fast and with well-timed Heroic Combats (which would be easy to trigger with Compel if Gandalf still had it), you can surge up the board at an incredible rate when you have to. Those all-infantry or mostly-infantry armies might find it hard to get similar speed boosts if you can shoot out their horses and stall out with D6-7 troops (consider NOT spear-supporting in order to extend your battle line and cage in enemy troops). While not a shoe-in victory, you certainly stand a good chance of succeeding.
Finally, there's the hero-hunting ones . . . Gandalf is great for hunting down enemy heroes, Pippin can stay safely tucked away with Gandalf, and Shadowfax apparently can't be targeted (despite having the Hero keyword), and your other heroes are resilient. Job's a good one - just break the enemy and have a great time!
Okay, let's talk about strategies.
Atop the Walls: Strategies for the Tabletop
We've already given a general overview of how to think about the different scenarios, so we're not going to look at that here. We'll start off with some give-me warbands that you'll want to consider taking. Besides the siege engine warbands that you can't change, a Captain of Minas Tirith should probably have at a minimum 4 Warriors of Minas Tirith with shields and 5 Warriors of Minas Tirith with shields and spears. If you have the points, throwing in a banner into this warband (if you don't have Irolas) is a good idea, as is having a token Knight of Minas Tirith if you want your cavalry able to deploy in a more spread-out way. Similar warband structures can be used for Knights of the White Tower if you like them.
Gandalf's warband is actually the most flexible to build, since he's probably not sticking around with anyone in particular (except maybe some Knights). In a shootout scenario, you'll want him central to your army and popping Blinding Light each turn, but in any other context, he'll be skirmishing with your opponent and slowing down whatever big nasty there is OR making a mess of your opponent's ability to hold objectives. I tend to drop most of my archers in his warband because . . . he can just leave them at any time. I usually try to have at least one Knight with him for tactical play, but you don't have to put all of your Knights in his warband (and it's probably better in general if you don't).
Irolas's warband usually fills itself out: 6-7 Citadel Guard and the rest are Warriors of Minas Tirith with shields. As I mentioned above, you could probably push this to 8-9 guys if you're doing a crescent formation of some kind, but since the difference in cost between these D5 guys and their D6-7 cousins isn't that big, I think Warriors of Minas Tirith with shields and spears are going to be better in general for your battle line than Citadel Guard. Near Irolas, however, your entire second-rank should be spears. You COULD take up to 6 Citadel Guard with longbows if you want the S3, but I'd only do this if you know that your warbands will be able to deploy together - it seems better to just stick with the Warriors of Minas Tirith with bows if there's a chance that you're going to be split up (or just pass on bows altogether).
Next, we need to talk about Gandalf's spell suite. I didn't bother talking about this last time because without his Staff of Power, you have to be quite picky with what you cast. In this list, your options are pretty wide open - and that means we need to think carefully about what we're casting. You have two static magical powers, Terrifying Aura and Fortify Spirit. Gandalf has had these magical powers since the last edition and the former is great against horde armies that haven't bothered investing in Courage and Fortify Spirit remains a great way to make sure your heroes aren't shut down by enemy casters. If you're facing either of these kinds of foes, consider casting them on Gandalf early with your free die for Terrifying Aura (3+) or your free die and Pippin's Will point (4+). Once Gandalf has Fortify Spirit up on himself, you can cast it on all of your other heroes if you have nothing better to do - you won't have to cast it on Pippin while he's riding with Gandalf.
Then we get to the specialist spells - if you happen to face an opponent with a magic wielder who has a Staff of Power, use Your Staff is Broken to force Will points out of them and DEFINITELY consider Heroic Channelling with Pippin's Might and later your own and using your free Will point from your own staff. Losing a Staff of Power is a great way to make sure a reliable, long-term caster becomes a not-caster very quickly. Similarly, if you're facing an opponent who has an Exhaustion spell that you want removed (like Fury), consider casting Foil Magic on your free die (maybe one from your store if it's super important) to make it go away. As I discussed with Saruman, there are very few spells that actually have Exhaustion mechanics anymore, so this is a super niche ability. If your opponent brought a lot of bows (like the Garrison of Ithilien - but also a lot of other lists), Blinding Light is an old method but still a good method for making enemy archery a lot less effective for "good" archers (Orcs and Goblins normally hit on a 6+ if they move and shoot, so they're still going to move and shoot as normal). Finally, if you've burned some Will on yourself and have absolutely nothing left to do, recharging your Will battery with Strengthen Will on your free die is still a perfectly viable strategy - it's just not something you can do to grow your Will above its starting number like you could in the last edition.
That brings us to the three real spells that you'll be casting in a standard game: Transfix, Banishment, and Sorcerous Blast. Transfix is cast on a 3+ and still keeps someone big and powerful from moving, using active abilities, calling heroic actions, making shooting attacks, and making Strikes if they win a fight. This is the classic shut-down spell and when you need it (like to keep an enemy Champion form getting kills), you need it. Banishment is now cast on a 5+, but remains the second-most reliable damage spell in the game since it skips the To Wound roll entirely and just deals a wound to an enemy Spirit model. If you're facing Spirit models, this is a solid damage spell - and to force Will points out of enemy Spirit casters (or just really BIG Spirit models that can wreck your day, like the Balrog and Gulavhar), consider channelling the spell.
If your opponent didn't bring any Spirit models and didn't bring any big heroes to lock down, you're looking at Sorcerous Blast and this spell has changed a bit since the last edition. The target model still suffers a S5 hit, but it doesn't travel anywhere. If it survives the S5 hit, it will be knocked Prone (cavalry suffer Knocked Flying as well, so that's a S3 hit too). This spell still knocks Prone any other models involved in the same Combat as the target model (friend and foe), provided that their Strength value is less than 6 - so while you can't deal damage to a heap of people anymore (either by throwing someone from one multiple-combat into another multiple combat OR just by affecting one big fight), you can still knock a lot of people on the ground if they try to wrap-and-trap one of your lone models. This leads to a very interesting strategy you can employ: move up a few of your models ahead of your army so that on a turn where you're moving second, you can Sorcerous Blast whoever's in that fight and put everyone on the ground. If you don't have an opportunity to get that to work, settle for forcibly dismounting warrior/low-Will hero cavalry models or putting banners on the ground so they can't provide their boosts - that's pretty good too.
The final strategy I'll mention is how to use your shieldwalls. The core of this list is solidly the Warrior of Minas Tirith with shield and whoever's backing him up. A warband of 9 Warriors of Minas Tirith led by a Captain of Minas Tirith and a warband of 4 Warriors of Minas Tirith and 5 Citadel Guard led by Irolas can be fielded for less than 300pts and you'll have two 5-file shieldwalls that you can use to assault the enemy (one with Shieldwall on everyone, one with +1 To Wound on the back-rank models). If anyone tries to engage your Shieldwalls head-on, they'd better have +1 To Wound on their troops too or they're in for some pain. If your opponent tries to spread out instead, use our recommendations for extending your shieldwalls to make sure you avoid getting trapped while still having some models spear-supporting so you can get maximum damage each turn (the Citadel Guard don't want to fight on their own, but everyone else (including Irolas) can defend by shielding, which an get you an insane battle line that's still rolling 2 dice each!
Okay, let's wrap this up with a lot of lists!
Sample Lists
At 500pts, you're spending half of your points on Gandalf - yes, that's a hefty investment, but you want to be able to wreck the day of whoever your opponent chose to bring (either a horde of guys who don't have a prayer of beating him up or whatever big nasty decided to show his face on the other side), so you're taking Gandalf with everything. Thankfully, Captains of Minas Tirith and Warriors of Minas Tirith are priced for a budget, so you can still get 20 models at 500, with the certainty that if you can use Gandalf well, you'll be able to make your opponent struggle to keep up with you (you can swap the bows on the Warriors of Minas Tirith in Gandalf's warband for shields if you prefer - I like having archery options to leave places if I need to):
As the points level gets bigger, you want to consider whether to bring Beregond or Irolas - as a general rule, I'd always take Irolas, as I feel like his bonuses are a bit better. The list hasn't grown much because we've just added Irolas, but having three reliable heroes and two very solid shieldwall formations is a nice add-on to this army (though we left the archery at home for stream-lined Shieldwall stuff):
I've done something silly for the 650 list - I've gone for Gandalf/Pippin, a Captain, and two Trebuchets - yes, this is only 24 models, and no, it's not very competitive (no banner, no where near enough guys), but I dare any opponent who thinks they're going to have a good time getting to your army in a kill-the-enemy Pool 4 scenario against this list (for those of you with a more competitive bent, you can easily get to 32 models by dropping a treb and getting +11 warriors):
At 700pts, we can continue the theme of going light on archery and leaning into a Shieldwall-heavy list with the following list - there are 35 models in it, four of which are mounted:
A shooting-heavy variant would look a little different - I've kept the Captain for March, but you could go with Beregond if you wanted to (probably downgrading a Knight of Minas Tirith into a Warrior of Minas Tirith with shield and spear):
While I could have taken Trebs instead of Bolt Throwers, I think the 40-pt difference probably means you're looking at one siege engine instead of two (and using the 20pts saved to get 2 more guys) - take whichever pair you want, you're going to change the way your opponent plays either way. I've also opted to skip the Swift Reload on the Bolt Throwers - while I think it's a fantastic upgrade if you take one, I think the 40pts is better spend in this list on bodies instead of a best-of-two upgrade that results in approximately 4.5 shots per round instead of 3.5 shots per round.
You will notice that the lists above have basically used seven profiles apart from the siege weapons: Gandalf, Pippin, Irolas, Captains, Warriors/Knights of Minas Tirith, and Citadel Guard. While I like having Beregond, Knights of the White Tower, and Hurin in the list - and if you want to take them instead of the siege weapons or Irolas, I get that - I think the ram-down-the-field nature of Warriors of Minas Tirith requires a Captain and I think that if you're looking for a second cheap hero to lead more guys, you're picking the +1 To Wound bubble from Irolas over rerolling failed To Wounds on Beregond and increased hitting power at a higher price point for the other hero options. I think if Hurin's special rules mattered more, I could find a place for another mounted hero . . . but not here, sadly.
Conclusion
This is a list that I think a clever player (who doesn't mind painting a lot of silver dudes) can make good use of. It's got a surprisingly good set of profiles and a lot of tricks in it. If you've used the list or are excited to use it based on what you've read, let us know in the comments below! We're sticking in Gondor for another week next week as we tackle the more generic Minas Tirith army list. There's some great stuff to be found in it - and it uses yet another of my favorite Gondor heroes! Find out whether you can live without Boromir's banner next time - until then, happy hobbying!
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