Good morning gamers,
In last week's article, we looked at the Usurpers of Edoras. Today, we're continuing "Dunland" month and looking at the Besiegers of the Hornburg. This list has a lot of familiar faces from the last list, but it's missing a lot of its previous identity. In trade . . . it gets one of the most interesting and fun profiles in the game! Let's see what this list has to offer (and whether it's any good).
The Besiegers of the Hornburg: Changes for 2025
Profile Selection
We have fewer options, but surprisingly the same number of profiles in this list as we had in the Usurpers of Edoras last week. We still have Wulf, Target, Hill Tribes Chieftains, Hill Tribesmen, and Crebain, but we've lost Freca, Lord Thorne, and Rohirrim Traitors. In trade, we gain, Shank, Wrot, and their Snow Troll "pet". The list feels like it has a lot less going for it - the Rohirrim Traitors were the only means of getting a banner and war horn (also throwing weapons) into an Usurpers of Edoras list, so our Hill Tribesmen are going to be patently worse than before (oh, and there's no Freca to make them F4). Yep, our bench is thin, but hopefully we have some slick special rules to equal things out?
We have . . . some okay special rules (mostly because they're situationally good). The most positive of the special rules is The Promise of Wealth, which gives Dunland Warrior models within range of an objective a bonus of +1 To Wound when making Strikes, which is going to really hurt for your opponent . . . if you're playing a scenario that has Objective Markers. There's a good number of those scenarios, but it won't always come up.
A more situational rule is Wulf's Revenge, which requires Wulf to Charge if possible whenever he moves, but also allows him to declare a free Heroic Challenge against the enemy general once per game (regardless of heroic tier). Heroic Challenge is better this edition than last edition because you can declare it BEFORE you're engaged in combat - oh, and Wulf will get +1 Attack (4 Attacks when he's NOT on the charge!) and +1 To Wound against that hero. While Challenge only requires you to charge that hero if the challenge is accepted, Wulf does need to charge if he can when he moves. I recommend that you take a little time to declare the challenge if it has a chance of being accepted (don't Challenge a full-stat Aragorn - he'll definitely accept and you might be hosed) - but if you're angling for charging into the hero anyway, consider Challenging before you are forced into the confrontation (it can't really hurt you).
Finally, there's a sorta-negative rule (Shank & Wrot) that prevents your Mordor models (Shank, Wrot, and their Snow Troll buddy) from benefiting from your Dunland Heroic Actions/Stand Fasts and vice versa. There's no real benefit to the Mordor units from Dunland Stand Fasts (none of the Dunland heroes can affect other heroes with their Stand Fasts and the Snow Troll is Courage 5+), but not being able to use Shank and Wrot as Stand Fast/Heroic Move caddies is a little unfortunate. You'll probably not be short of heroes for Dunland, so the primary concern is that Shank and Wrot are not going to be able to be Moved/Marched by your Dunland units.
We have even fewer profiles to review this time than last time - and a good number of them will look familiar (though different, because of the army bonus changes and the difference in supporting heroes):
- Wulf, High Lord of the Hill Tribes is required in this list but he isn't your only assassination piece in this list. For 130pts mounted, he's got good offensive stats with F6/S4/3A and 3-Might-and-Strike (as well as a banner-like reroll and rerolling 1s To Wound when fighting heroes - which may be a trap, more on that later) and fine-not-great defensive stats with D5/3 Wounds/2 Fate. He definitely doesn't want to be shot at by S3+ ranged weapons and he's TERRIFIED of Legolas, but he hits hard and he's pretty well costed all things considered.
- General Targg is . . . still really expensive. For 80pts on foot and 100pts mounted, he's fine on offense with F5/S4/2A with 2 Might and Heroic Defense/March and fine on defense with D5/2 Wounds/2 Fate. With Master of Battle (4+), he might get some extra heroics, but that's purely based on you positioning him well and your opponent being forced to call heroics near him before he has to call. You can also give priority to your opponent to reroll 1s To Wound when making Strikes with Dunland Warriors near him . . . which isn't enough of a reason to hand over priority on its own (but if you wanted to hand it over anyway . . . sure, that's a bonus?). While I might take him in this list, I'd first take . . .
- Hill Tribes Chieftains are your basic generic heroes and are half the cost of General Targg (40pts before gear) and have 2-Might-and-March for getting your infantry up the field. I love these guys and think you probably want at least one of them in your army. While you can certainly take a two-handed weapon on a Chieftain, you don't need the light shields - paying points for the ability to defend by shielding just isn't worth it.
- Shank & Wrot, Orc Scavengers are the replacements for Freca and Lord Thorne in this list - and while they don't give you F4 troop access, they do give you access to bonus VPs (sometimes - very neat mechanic that we'll look at more later) and a Snow Troll. Shank's stats are similar to an Orc Captain's stats (D5, but 3 Will) and Wrot has 3 Attacks base with 1 Might/Will/Fate - and with the entire squad costing 150pts, if each of them is ~45pts in value, that means the Troll is only 60pts . . . and with better stats than a Cave Troll (D7/Courage 5+, Mountain Dweller, and +1 Attack/Fight when he charges from Horned Charge), that's a darn good deal! After Wulf (and possibly a Chieftain for March), I think these units should absolutely be added to your list!
- Hill Tribesmen are basically Wild Men of Dunland and are REALLY different from the way the unit was before - they're still perfectly good without extra gear if you need to save some points, but they can take spears for 1pt, flaming brands for Terror (Cavalry) and effectively Dominant (2) for 1pt, bows for 1pt (incredibly useful in a horde list like this), and banners/war horns for 25pts with the release of the new command blister. I wouldn't bother with taking light shields (on their own or with other gear options) - as was just said, paying 1pt to defend by shielding isn't worth it. Because Hill Tribesmen with one piece of gear costs 6pts, I would never take more than 5 Hill Tribesmen without extra gear - if you can take 6, you should take 5 guys with a piece of gear each (bows, spears, or flaming brands). In this list, you might consider taking two-handed weapons, since the +1 To Wound from two-handing will stack with your army list bonus of +1 To Wound near objectives (usually 3" range) - and possibly the +1 To Wound from Hatred (Rohan) as well!
- Crebain are the talk of the town right now - 20pts for a fast mover (who can't snag objectives, but can contest them) with 4 Wounds and can't be trapped is pretty great. In this list, of course, they also help Saruman get angles for casting that he probably doesn't want to expose himself to get, which is wild and crazy. Competitive players will tell you to take at least 6 of these guys - I got a pack from Rythbyrt for Christmas and have converted a that pack of two Crebain into eight, so . . . yeah, I guess that's an endorsement. :) In this list, they also have the Dunland Warrior keywords, so they will get +1 To Wound while they're near objectives as well . . . which makes them a bit insane in scenarios that have objectives.
We have a lot fewer options than we did last time, but we have a lot of good stuff too. Let's see what this list is giving us and where it falls a little flat . . .
The Besiegers of the Hornburg: Strengths and Weaknesses
If I'm honest, there's a lot working against this list - but it's pretty clear that its biggest strength comes from having Shank, Wrot, and the Snow Troll. Apart from the "cool factor" that a good centerpiece model brings to your army, the Snow Troll is not paying the proper number of points for the stats he has - see my comments above for why they're an auto-include in this list. With the potential to be F7/4A on the charge, Courage 5+ (very nice to have on a monster), and access to all the BPAs that normal monsters do (his Intelligence isn't great, so Hurl is probably a reach for you), this guy can really pack a punch - and don't sleep on using Barge on a turn that you've been charged so you can get to F7/4A on the second attack! Shank and Wrot bring the opportunity to get VPs, but don't count on this happening - be surprised and enjoy the mini-game that you get to play!
The biggest negative is that this list lacks almost all of the tools to make their basic troops better. If you're playing with either the Army of the White Hand or the Usurpers of Edoras, you'll have access to banners (both), bonus Courage (both, if you can see Saruman/took a war horn), a 6+ save (Usurpers only), and bonus Fight Value (supporting/getting in the same fight as Uruk-Hai Scouts/Rohirrim Traitors near Thorne or Hill Tribesmen being near Freca). Instead of those things, this list will sometimes get +1 To Wound . . . which is great IF you can win a fight. If you don't win the fight (with F3), you're probably dead (and you should be grateful if your opponent flubs his roll and you live to tell the tale). The Troll is great, but most of your army is not. NOTE: I left portions of this section in strike-through to prove a point: just by giving this army access to a banner and a war horn, you can basically strike this whole section - yes, you don't have F4 or a 6+ save, but utilizing the 2-4-8 math principle that I'm very fond of makes it possible to work around those issues. Other factions would benefit from this change as well . . . just sayin', GW.
Wulf, on the other hand, is fabulous in this list. In a way, he's better in the Usurpers list, where he gets +1 To Wound against heroes and doesn't have to Charge if he can when he moves. That said, this version of Wulf gets a free Heroic Challenge, which is a really nice way to make Wulf more competitive against some of the bigger units in the game. Challenge doesn't boost your Fight Value, so you'll never be able to tie the Balrog - but you will be throwing more dice and if you save your Might for boosting dueling rolls when the Balrog fails to get a natural-6, you're in a good place (well, a better place - you're still fighting the Balrog, after all).
That said, while Wulf is pretty cool against heroes (or at least, the enemy General in most situations), your best option for dealing with heroes is just to blunt them with Crebain. One could say that this is true in the Usurpers list as well, but at least in that one, there are bonuses that warriors get at cracking through heroes, so you COULD lean into a swarm of guys to speed-bump a hero and might get lucky and kill him instead . . . you're pretty much hoping in this list that your opponent gets burned out of Might to call Heroic Combats and you tie them down with one guy . . . or one Crebain.
The Besiegers of the Hornburg: Strategies for the Tabletop
This section is going to be pretty lean today because I think most of it has already been covered. For Wulf, while you have anti-General rules/bonuses, Wulf is still pretty vulnerable to being killed - and unlike a Freca-included Usurpers list, Wulf is your General, which means racing in with him could cough up VPs if something goes wrong. That said, Wulf is incredibly hard-hitting for his cost and he's got very, VERY strong offensive stats even when he's not fighting the enemy General - manage his fights (and who he can charge when he starts his move) and try to give him an opening once your opponent's heroes (especially the General) is vulnerable.
When it comes to Crebain, I think you want as many of these as you can managed to get - more so than in the Usurpers list (and definitely more than in the Army of the White Hand list), Crebain are pulling a lot of different duties to help their team. Yes, they can slow down enemy heroes who can't deal 4 wounds to them in a single turn and yes, they're difficult to kill on objectives from a distance (due to their wounds and anti-archery special rule), but they also need to head-hunt vulnerable banners, clear far-flung objectives with the +1 To Wound bonus, and support your battle lines (which really do need support because they don't have F4 access in this list). You'll see a mix of Crebain-light and Crebain-heavy in the lists below - while I don't think I'd change the 500pt list, I might change the 650 to get fewer models and more Crebain.
For your Hill Tribesmen/Chieftains, you're not racing towards the enemy - you're managing the board. If these guys form a two-rank "shieldwall" and move to engage almost any enemy shieldwall . . . they're gonna die and lose badly. Ideally, you face half the models you have with these guys - and if your opponent is pressing towards you with equal/higher numbers, you need to scoot and get out of there. I would lean into bows and spears as heavily as you can if you're going to horde-out on Hill Tribesmen and have a few flaming brands guys to help cover objectives (though they will flee more often in this list than they will in the Army of the White Hand).
Finally, have fun with the Snow Troll and his buddies. The Troll can crash through things, draw aggro (but try to managed his fights - he's not that much more survivable than a Cave Troll and boy are those hard to keep alive sometimes), and his friends might even snag you a VP during the game! Having some dedicated escorts would probably be good (either of the bird or Tribesman variety) so you can extricate yourself from a tough fight and keep the Troll from being trapped.
Also . . . consider taking Targg . . . if you don't want another Chieftain or you can't afford anything else (though honestly, I'm always drawn to more Crebain). Okay, let's look at some lists!
Sample Lists
To start with, we're taking a mounted Wulf, a Chieftain, and the Mordor contingent for a nice 320pts. Three Crebain and a banner bring us up above 400pts, which means we can get a heap of Tribesmen and end up with 24 models - not a great number of models, but hopefully enough guys to buy time for Wulf and the Snow Troll to do their thing (and to let the Crebain do whatever they need to do). As I said above, you could swap out some of the war gear in this list for two-handed weapons if you wanted to really lean into the wounding mechanic (a bit risky with F3 across the board, but defensible, I think):
As we scale up, we . . . just add another Chieftain and flesh out our warbands a little - I've opted for putting the bows across all the warbands, so you'll always have a harassing option. I do not think this has enough Crebain, but at an exchange rate of 2 crebain for 7 Tribesmen, just know that as you scale up your Crebain total, you're dropping 5 models. If I were to add more Crebain, I would not drop below 35 models (so you're looking at 8 Crebain in that case):
At 750pts, we could just add 100pts (a third Chieftain leading 10 men OR upgrade a Chieftain to Targg on foot and add 3 Crebain to the list), but instead, I've opted to make a list that mimics what Damian O'Byrne did in testing out this list with all those Crebain he made during the last edition of the game. This list is, apparently, a load of fun - and while you could kit out your Tribesmen with different gear, I feel like the torches are particularly useful if you plan to have a small number of models at 750pts (though you could drop them all to get a banner-man if you think you can keep him alive):
As is probably evident, this list - like some other lists - basically becomes a copy/paste exercise once you're above 750pts (especially if you took Targg at that points level). It's going to rely on hitting your opponent with more of the same stuff - and in some match-ups that might work, and in some it won't. Still, this list features a few good beaters, some very interesting mechanics, and a nice horde of guys. Is it better than Usurpers? Probably not. Is it still worth giving a whirl? I think so.
Conclusion
That's it for the Dunland factions from War of the Rohirrim. Since we've already covered the Army of the White Hand, only one Dunland list remains: the Army of Dunland from the Legacies documents. This list is the OG Dunland list with all the legacied characters that we had last edition. It's also got a very different vibe now than it had before, thanks to some changes in the profiles, rules changes in the game generally, and the existence of Usurpers as the "new" Dunland list. We'll see how good this list is next time - and until then, happy hobbying!
No comments:
Post a Comment