The New Age Is Begun: The Battle of Bywater List

Image Courtesy of GamesWorkshop

Hey Reader!

Welcome back to the blog! Today we're looking at the Battle of Bywater list from the Armies of Middle Earth book, aka "The Defenders of the Shire legendary legion" but with a few new twists.

In my last article we talked about The Shire army list, and while some of the models here are the same, you'd be surprised how differently this one plays from both that list and the old Defenders of the Shire legendary legion.

The Battle of Bywater: Changes for 2025

Profile Selection

The list of models you have in this army list hasn't changed much from the previous edition: you still get access to the Four Travelers (Merry, Pippin, Frodo, and Sam), all of the old hobbit sculpts (with Maggot and Lobelia, ironically, being the big two here), and the new hobbit sculpts we got from Scouring of the Shire (except Lotho Sackville-Baggins, so no F5 shenanigans with Shirriffs in this list). And of course, a horde of peasants ready to do their best to defend their cabbages (or whatever it is you put on your table).

FAQ Time: Unpacking the February 2026 FAQ

Good morning gamers,

It took a week longer than I'd hoped, but the GW development team have spoken and we have some balance updates! This FAQ changed a few things that had to do with the "big lists" that we see talked about (or bemoaned playing against) on top tables - some of whom got hit harder than others. There was one profile that appears to have gone unscathed though, so there will be a discussion about that at the end.

Photo Credit: Reddit

What Didn't Have Changes

Amazingly, everything had changes - though not everything had significant changes. I decided this time around to mostly save the erratas for the end, as the changes there seemed a bit more interesting to me than the FAQs themselves. We're going to begin first, though, with the clarifications that seemed to be pretty close to what we assumed from before . . .

Rules That Worked Like We Thought

The first change is simple: to account for the new Shelob model, Shelob's base size has been upped to 80mm:

Page 146 – Shelob – Base Size Change to 80mm. 

Thankfully, Shelob is fast enough that she can probably make due with a larger base size - but golly 80mm is a bit bigger than it was before! I've been playing with Mumaks a lot recently and I've got to say, having big bases can be great, but you have to not want to be too precise to make your plays happen. Having a base that is the same as two cavalry next to each other can maneuver through most places, but not in all places - and those heroes who are embedded in their battle lines are gonna feel pretty safe against Shelob while their mates are everywhere.

The New Age Is Begun: The Army of the Great Eye Army List

Good morning gamers,

It's here . . . it's come . . . oh yes, we've been building up to the "big Mordor list" from the Armies of Middle-Earth all month and it's finally time to tackle the Army of the Great Eye! Back when I got started in the game, there were lots of Mordor lists in the Legions of Middle-Earth supplement. About a year after getting started, we got "the warband books" and all of those Mordor lists got compacted into one big "Mordor" supplement (the only faction that got its own book). Then, in the last edition, Mordor both retained its omnibus nature AND split up into smaller groups (first by getting a Barad-Dur faction/losing access to Spectres, then later getting Legendary Legions that gave them more rules in trade for fewer profiles).

This list feels like we've gone back the warband books a bit - and if you liked your Mordor Soup lists in the last edition (like I did), this very well may be the list for you! Let's see what's available to us and what we're giving up by going with this list!

The Army of the Great Eye: Changes for 2025

Profile Selection

I'm not going to go over the whole list - it's everything from the Army of Gothmog, Cirith Ungol, and Black Gate lists that we've looked at over the course of this month PLUS some more guys (the Witch-King, Black Numenorean Warriors/Knights, and a lot of Legacy profiles). If you want it, you can find it in this list . . . just like you used to be able to do in the vanilla Mordor list of the previous edition. A profile selection this vast, however, comes with one big balancing factor, though . . .

Army List Bonuses

This list has exactly ONE special rule . . . yes, that's right, it functions not only like the omnibus lists you'll find, like the Legions of Mordor or the Battle of Five Armies, but this is not actually that much different from the way pure Mordor lists used to be run in the last edition. The rule is called The Great Eye and you place a 25mm marker on the battlefield somewhere in your deployment zone (how this works in a maelstrom scenario is anyone's guess). At the end of each Move Phase, the controlling player rolls a D6 and on a 2+, the controlling player can place it anywhere within 6" of its current location (measure first before you pick it up!). On a 1, however, the opposing player can place it anywhere within 12" of its current location (measure first!). Like Ringbearers and other weird-moving models, you can't overlap model bases with this token, but models can end their movement on it.

The Great Eye token provides three bonuses to its controlling player. First, friendly models treat it as a banner (3" range because a range is not specified). Secondly, enemy models within 3" of the token suffer a -1 penalty to Courage/Intelligence tests that they have to make (I assume this is not cumulative with Harbinger, but I may be wrong there). Finally, if your opponent has a Ringbearer (not Sauron, obviously), then if the Ringbearer is wearing the Ring within 3" of the token, you roll a D6. On a 3+, the Ringbearer is corrupted and removed as a casualty!

When you boil it down, this is basically giving you a 5/6th chance of getting a banner that cannot be shot off the board each turn . . . and you can redeploy through enemy units without risk. Additionally, you can pester a Ringbearer with it . . . but with at least one Ringwraith on the board, I doubt most Ringbearers will be putting on the Ring. That said, even if your Ringwraith dies, there's still a threat you can pose to Ringbearers who aren't Sauron.

The New Age Is Begun: the Black Gate Army List

Good morning gamers,

A few weeks ago, we looked at the Army of Gothmog, which in this edition has picked up a few profiles and lost a profile from the previous edition. This time, we're looking at the Black Gate army list, which has also picked up a few profiles but lost two critical profiles. This is mostly based on the Black Gate Opens Legendary Legion, which was one of the first Legendary Legions released and remained popular for quite some time (mostly as a way to field lots of Troll Chieftains!), but there was also a very interesting discussion amongst Black Gate players as to how much you leaned into Morannon Orcs (S4/D6) and how much you leaned into Mordor Orcs (cheaper, same FV/Courage). Today, that discussion won't be necessary - but there is, I think, a big question as to how good this list is with the current requirements it has. Let's see how things have changed . . .

The Black Gate: Changes for 2025

Profile Selection

Most of the profiles we have available to us are the same as before - the Mouth of Sauron, Mordor Troll Chieftains (one is the "Uber Troll Chieftain" and has to be taken in the list), Morannon Orc Captains, Morannon Orcs, and Mordor Trolls. The bones of this build are good - most of these units are available in the Army of Gothmog, but you're adding a much cheaper supporting piece in the Mouth of Sauron (at least when compared to Gothmog), a more expensive but much more powerful hitting piece (again, when compared to Gothmog), and you get some additional units that weren't present in the last edition: Ringrwaiths on Fell Beasts, Mordor Orc Taskmasters, and Mordor Orc Shamans.

We've lost two critical profiles, however: Mordor Orc Captains and Mordor Orc Warriors. The Orc Captain was great in the last edition because, like the Army of Gothmog, this army is pretty much dependent on war drums on their Trolls (or Heroic Marches from their heroes) to get them anywhere in a hurry - but Orc Captains used to be able to be taken on Wargs in this list, so you could have a few very fast heroes and now, if you want mounted troops, your options are the Mouth of Sauron and Fell Beasts . . . that's pricey.

Tiberius's Top 10 Ranking - Best Middle-Earth Film Adaptation

Good morning gamers,

Usually, Centaur does our "top ten" posts, but I've been thinking a lot about the various film adaptations that we have for Middle-Earth and figured someone on this platform ought to finally put them in a ranking. Those of us who are excited for new Middle-Earth content and "going back to Middle-Earth" are probably at least a little interested in how the Hunt for Gollum is going to go, so in preparation for that, feast on the following Top Ten list, though I will begin with a couple of quick caveats . . .

First, this is NOT going to include TV shows - which means you will not be seeing either seasons of Rings of Power in this article. Telling a story through 6-8hrs of TV time isn't a fair comparison to the 1.5-4hrs that a film can cover - that, and I know people can have polarizing views on the series. I will keep my opinion about the series to myself (though I think I will not be alone in sharing that I thought the storytelling in Season 2 was tighter than Season 1, perhaps because it had most of its characters introduced in Season 1), but as most of you might be able to guess if you've read this blog for any period of time, I'm generally pretty optimistic and positive about things - and if I can search for good in something, I usually find it.

Second, just because I rank a film on the lower side of the scale doesn't mean there's nothing good in it. Building off the previous thought, there are good things to be found in all of the films we're about to view - but it appears to me that the greatest reason people rank things poorly is because of the "deviation from expectation". If you came to a film like The Desolation of Smaug and expected it to cover just what was in the Hobbit (more on this later), you were probably disappointed - and if you're like my wife, you probably thought that much of the fighting in the Battle of Five Armies and the extra-canonical relationship stuff from the Desolation of Smaug could have been dropped to make the trilogy into two films. Fair enough - those were deviations from your expectations and you're more than justified in feeling that way.

While I will try to manage my criticisms of the films, please understand going into this that my reviews will still be pretty positive - I'm not here to bash someone else's creative genius and I certainly don't think I could have made any of these films better than their creators. I am a fan of all things Middle-Earth and I love a good story - so the films that get me the most immersed into the world and that tell a well-contained story are going to rate well . . . and those that don't will rate less well. With that in mind, let's start off with . . .

The New Age Is Begun: The Cirith Ungol Army List

Good morning gamers,

One of the last podcasts that the TMAT team has done (we don't have a lot of time for podcasting these days) was a draft of the various Legendary Legions that were available for both the Forces of Good and the Forces of Evil. If you haven't listened to the episode, I'll drop this spoiler: one of the Evil Legions that I drafted was the Cirith Ungol Legendary Legion. In many ways, this Legion was like Ugluk's Scouts - you had different unit keywords that could trigger the Animosity special rule, but giving speed/Courage buffs to one group meant NOT giving those boosts to another group of units. How is one to know how hard to lean into each group?

In this post, we'll be digging into the newly revamped Cirith Ungol army list - which is honestly not THAT different from the Legion of the previous edition. Some of the units have changed, but the bones are mostly the same and I think the play-style is very similar. Let's see what we have to work with.

Cirith Ungol: Changes for 2025

Profile Selection

We have all of the old profiles that were available to the Cirith Ungol Legendary Legion (Shagrat, Gorbag, Shelob, Orc/Mordor Uruk-Hai Captains, Orc Shamans, Mordor Uruk-Hai, and Orc Warriors), but have also added Orc Taskmasters and Orc Drummers. How much these additions change the list is anyone's guess, but some additional options (at least for the Taskmaster) makes things interesting.

Compared to many of the other Mordor lists, this . . . is a serious step back in options. You have some list building constraints that are typical to army lists (Orc heroes lead Orc warriors, Uruk-Hai heroes lead Uruk-Hai warriors) and you're missing access to any kind of heavy infantry (D6), cavalry (Mordor is pretty limited in general on this, but there are options), spellcasters who aren't Orc Shamans (especially of the Nazgul variety, but don't sleep on your other options), siege weapons/decent shooting options, and war beasts (which, to be fair, are pretty rare in the game). Still, if you compare this list to the Army of the Great Eye (we're building up to this guy) or the Legions of Mordor, you're going to find that what those lists give up in rules seems like a pretty small price to pay for the vastly greater selection of profiles.

The New Age Is Begun: the Army of Gothmog Army List

Good morning gamers,

This February will be "Mordor Month" and we're kicking off our review of four Mordor army lists by looking at the Army of Gothmog. This was one of two Mordor-oriented Legendary Legions that hit the meta when it came out . . . and it really struggled to go anywhere because you could run basically everything in it (without the "big man" you were required to take) in the generic Mordor list last edition. In this current game, this list might suffer from a similar fate with the appearance of the Army of the Great Eye army list from the Armies of Middle-Earth supplement, but time will tell if this old list still has some life in it. Let's see what it does and why you would want to run it over other Mordor lists.

The Army of Gothmog: Changes for 2025

Profile Selection

The list of models you can take in this list is not that different from last edition - you still have the quad-fecta of Gothmog, Guritz, Goroth, and Zagdush (if you're playing with Legacies) for your named heroes, "Gothmog's Enforcer" for your named-without-a-name hero option, and Morannon Orc Captains, Mordor Orc Shamans, and siege veterans for the siege weapons as your generic heroes. What we've lost in this edition are the Orc Taskmasters and Orc Drummers that you could take. For warriors, we have Morannon Orcs and Mordor Trolls . . . and if that seems like a scant list, that's just because it is - not having Mordor Orcs actually punishes this list a bit from how I was running it last edition, since the Orc Warriors provided you with the option for cheaper bowmen or spear supports for your Morannon Orc frontline. Still, Morannons are good and Mordor Trolls got a lot better, so this list is . . . well, it was never in a great place, but it's in an okay place now.

Back to Basics, Revisited: The Shoot Phase

Good morning gamers,

We're in our third post on how to play the game and we're tackling one of my favorite aspects of the game: the Shoot phase. This phase of the game is the only phase where your opponent doesn't really get a say in what happens - sure, he can maneuver his troops during the Move phase to make his units harder to hit (or impossible to see) OR even use special rules that make shooting at his troops harder, but once he's done moving, it's all in your hands. For a game that is heavily dependent on "rolling better than your opponent," it's nice that at least one aspect of the game doesn't involve that kind of competition. This also makes armies that focus too heavily on shooting hated by some members of the community, so just be aware of that before delving headlong into it. Let's understand what you can do in the Shoot phase!

The New Age Is Begun: The Riders of Theoden Army List

Good morning gamers,

This is it for Rohan (for the now, anyway) and we're wrapping up two months of Rohan lists with the one that started it all, really: the Riders of Theoden. Back when the MESBG revamp happened, Rohan was . . . well, it's always been a popular list, but it was really popular: the new starter set landed a lot of people with new Theoden models and lots of Riders of Rohan and anyone who didn't already have a host of Rohan models got to enjoy painting three models (a rider, a horse, and a dismount) for every 14-17pts they wanted to spend on warriors . . . good times. A few months after the revamp, the Gondor at War supplement dropped and with it came a host of new Legendary Legions - and while the Black Gate Opens and Return of the King Legendary Legions were incredibly popular, neither of these Legions was as popular or as dominant on the top-tables as the Riders of Theoden. It was, quite honestly, one of very few Legions that looked like it was an improvement on a trimmed-down army list - and from a game design perspective, it was basically the poster boy for what any Legendary Legion was supposed to be.

Fast-forward six years and we've got the Riders of Theoden army list, which hasn't seemed to dominate quite as much as it did back in the day (even as new Legions and a host of new models were introduced to the game). Is this list still worth running? And if so, what's making people shy away from it? Well, let's take a look and find out what we have to work with vis-a-vis last edition!

The Riders of Theoden: Changes for 2025

Profile Selection

The profile selection is essentially the same as we had before - we have all the named heroes you'd expect with Theoden, Eomer, Eowyn/Merry (formerly Dernhelm), Deorwine, Elfhelm, and Gamling. Joining the fight we have Captains of Rohan (one of whom you can name as Grimbold - give him heavy armor and a shield why don't ya?), Riders of Rohan, and Rohan Royal Guards (who can be led by Theoden, Eomer, Deorwine, and Gamling . . . so you can field a lot of them, if you don't want throwing spears on all of them. This is the same list as in the previous edition and honestly, it doesn't need any changes . . . you know, unless you wanted to make a mounted Grimbold model and a revamped profile to go with it, GW? :)

Army List Bonuses

Two of your army special rules are the same as they were before - your mounted models get Strength +1 on the charge and once per game, Theoden can cry "DEATH!" and your heroes get to declare free Heroic Combats or Strikes. Getting in a good DEATH! turn has always been the way this list has stood above standard Rohan lists and if you really lean into the heroes, you can have an absolutely devastating turn with this rule (much like the once-per-game Look to the Sun ability for the Riders of Eomer).

There is a new rule, however: any friendly Cavalry Warrior models near Theoden and Eomer get Dominant (2), which is a situationally useful (but the situation is present in most of the scenarios) ability that makes your all-cavalry force feel larger than it is. Like some of the Erebor and Dale rules, however, this is a rule that competes with DEATH! a bit in that the harder you lean into your heroes, the less this rule will be useful. Also, staying within 3" of Theoden and Eomer is not that big of a radius - but in a scenario like Hold Ground, Command the Battlefield, or Divide and Conquer where you really want to be in one or two places, it can be super useful.

The New Age Is Begun: The Road to Helm's Deep Army List

Good morning gamers,

This is the second to last Rohan list we'll be covering (we have a few more to do, but having been in Rohan for most of December and all of January, we need a change of pace, ey?) and this one is an intriguing one. I'll be honest, I think there are some significant drawbacks to taking this list, but it also has some unique abilities built into it and it has plenty of room to scale out to various points levels. Let's see what we get in this list (and what we can do here that we can't do in other lists)!

The Road to Helm's Deep: Changes for 2025

Profile Selection

This list is closest to the generic Rohan list of the last edition, but if you include Aragorn, Legolas, or Gimli in this list, you would have had to run a Convenient Alliance with the Fellowship of the Ring in the last edition. Your units are pretty standard - Theoden, Gamling, Hama, and Captains for the Rohan side of the house, along with the Three Hunters - and you can lead Rohan Royal Guards with Theoden/Gamling/Hama and Riders of Rohan (and maybe Rohan Outriders, if you're playing with Legacy profiles) with the others.

Army List Bonuses

Like most Rohan lists, Riders of Rohan don't count towards your bow limit, so if you want to go shooting-heavy (and/or cavalry-heavy), you can. This list also gets the fairly-standard rule of +1 Strength on the Charge for its Cavalry models, but unlike the Ride Out list, this bonus is limited to Rohan Cavalry models (so if you take Aragorn, Legolas, or Gimli . . . no dice).

There are two cool things that this list offers. First, if you take both Legolas and Gimli in your list, Gimli may begin as a passenger for Legolas. While mounted on Legolas's horse, Legolas gets rules similar to what Eowyn and Gandalf gain when they have Merry or Pippin mounted with them - Legolas goes up to 3 Attacks and can borrow Gimli's Might/Will/Fate (the Might can't be used to boost shooting rolls). Normally, if a passenger dismounts, they can't do anything - but if Gimli dismounts, he can activate as normal, which is great for making sure that he gets to charge into someone and fight.

Additionally, if one of your heroes dismounts voluntarily or is forcibly dismounted during the game, the hero can end its Move in base contact with a friendly Cavalry Warrior model who is not engaged and "take the horse." The dismounted Warrior model is placed where the Hero was and the mounted Hero model is placed where the Warrior was. This is SUPER good for making sure that your heroes keep up their damage as the game goes on - and also disincentivizes your opponent from attacking your horses if you have warrior support nearby.

Back to Basics, Revisited: The Priority and Move Phases

Good morning gamers,

Last time, we talked about how you build an army and what a model's profile looks like. Today we're covering the first two phases in a battle round: the Priority Phase and the Move Phase. While these two phases are technically separate, they often flow together because the player who wins priority on certain turns can dictate how the round goes. It's also not too controversial for me to say that these are the two most important phases in the game - you can win some games just by moving where you want to and you can lose some games by not being able to move where you want to. So, let's dig in and learn how to play!

The New Age Is Begun: The Defenders of the Hornburg Army List

Good morning gamers,

This is the second Rohan list from the War of the Rohirrim film and it feels a lot more constrained than the Army of Edoras list that we looked at last week. The heroes are fewer, the warriors are basically the same, and you have a powerhouse hero who can't lead troops . . . why run this list, you might be asking?

Well, the answer is pretty simple: this list is good at the fundamentals of the game. Let's look at the units we have and the rules they get to see what we can do with them.

The Defenders of the Hornburg: Changes for 2025

Profile Selection

Our bench is pretty thin, not gonna lie. We have a different version of Hera in this list - she's better into heroes but also less mobile. We have Olwyn and Lief from last time and with fewer F5+ heroes in the list, you might be taking both of them. You have Captains of Rohan (great mounted heroes or on foot in your battle line), but not King's Huntsmen (which is fine).

And you have Santa Helm. This guy only has 6" movement, which makes both Captains (for Heroic March) and Lief (for +2" of movement once per game and a free Heroic Combat on a turn in which he was charged once per game) must-haves for me. He's got great stats, Mighty Blow, and Dominant (4), which makes him a hero/monster hunter, but a vulnerable one with only 3 Wounds/1 Fate and D5 with light armor. He's very expensive but also very fun to use.

On the warrior front, we have Warriors of Rohan and Riders of Rohan - and that's it. F3 everywhere and maybe some F4 on the charge - that's it. Can we make this list work? Well, let's look at our warriors and see what we can do.

Army List Bonuses

The go-to rule for this list is that all of your infantry models gain Dominant (2). There will be times when this doesn't matter - but in a LOT of scenarios, Dominant is useful. when EVERYONE counts as two models AND you can field a lot of them, you're in a really, REALLY solid spot. I like this rule - the others are fine but won't greatly shake your games. Your infantry warrior models must reroll To Wound rolls of a natural 1 when making Strikes . . . which has shifted the result of a duel for me in times past, but it's never carried a game for me. Additionally, if Helm is in your list and kills an enemy hero/monster, then all enemy models within 3" of Helm have to pass a courage tests or make a full move away from Helm . . . which is kind of like a Nazgul shriek and may not do anything. Still, Helm wants to be killing those kinds of things, so it could be fun and you very well might forget to use it. :)

This is it - and I gotta be honest, the Dominant (2) rule is the only attraction here (and other army lists have that). So . . . is this list DOA? I don't think so - there's good stuff here when you look at the profiles . . .

The New Age Is Begun: The Army of Edoras Army List

Good morning gamers,

We're still in Rohan this January (what can I say - there's a lot of Rohan lists) and we're kicking things off with one of the new Rohan lists from the War of the Rohirrim film: the Army of Edoras. I'm going to preview the rest of the article here and just say that regardless of whether you liked the film or not, this list is SOLID. There are lots of good heroes that you can buy on a budget, very functional warrior options, and good special rules. Let's see what this list has to offer (anything related to the Legacies document will be marked in red)!

The Army of Edoras: Changes for 2025

Profile Selection

This list doesn't have a corollary really from the last edition. The Helm's Guard list is the closest you're going to get - and that list was really starved for hero options. This list doesn't have that problem. Besides the generic Captain and Huntsman profiles, you have access to Helm, his four relatives, and two other members of his court. You also get the expected warrior options of Warriors of Rohan, Riders of Rohan, and Rohan Royal Guards (if you bring Helm).

Army List Bonuses

Like most Rohan lists, Riders of Rohan don't count towards your bow limit, so if you want to go shooting-heavy (and/or cavalry-heavy), you can. While charge bonuses are usually not hard to come by in Rohan lists, this list can get to reroll all failed To Wound rolls on one round for models within 12" of your General if your General charged that turn. This will affect infantry and cavalry models, but only once. Beyond that, you have just the base stats for your units . . . so beware those D6 shieldwalls!

Additionally, if any of your heroes charge, all Warriors within 6" of the Hero auto-pass Courage tests to charge Terror models - this won't matter for any Rohan Royal Guards in Helm's warband, but can be a brilliant way to tie down a monster while your heroes crash into the warriors of the enemy. These aren't glorious rules, but they're perfectly functional.

Back to Basics, Revisited: Army Composition & Unit Profiles

Good morning gamers,

Well, we're in a new world since the last time we did a "how to play" series, so we're kicking off 2026 by revisiting our "Back to Basics" series. To my surprise and delight, some of the articles from this series remain some of the Top 20 articles viewed in any given 30-day period - which could be a Google roaming bot or it could be that both new and returning players are reading our older stuff. Either way, I'll take it. :)

As we did back in 2021, we're going to learn to play the game by looking at the fun aspect of the game that starts before you show up at the table: creating an army and how to understand the profiles you're looking at.

Army Composition Basics: Heroic Tiers

When building an army, you have to start with heroes - and not all heroes are equal. In past editions of the game, there either wasn't a hero-to-warrior ratio you had to follow (during the Legions of Middle-Earth days when I got started) or there was a 1:12 ratio (when the "warband" books came out). Since the last edition, there are five different tiers of heroes, giving you differing levels of command for your heroes. What is interesting in the newest edition of the game is that heroic tiers aren't listed on the hero profiles anymore - this is good, because many army lists and Legendary Legions in the last edition would change the heroic tier of a hero, so there would be conflict between the unit profile and its army lists. Now, the heroic tier is determined by the army list alone - which I think is at it should be.

Like we did last time, we'll look at Minas Tirith unit to illustrate how these heroic tiers work:

Aragorn is the King is a Hero of Legend - many would follow him and listen to his commands . . .

Heroes of Legend can lead 18 warriors in their warbands. They also pass their first "Stand Fast" roll automatically, which we'll cover in a later post (but for now, just know that when your army thinks it's time to flee the field because they've lost a lot of guys, these heroes say, "No, we've got this!" and the warriors stay in the fight). Heroes of Legend are rare - 0-3 choices for most army lists - but they allow you to bring a LOT of guys with them (relative to the "standard hero"), allowing you to bolster your numbers without the "tax" of an extra hero.