Back to Basics Revisited: All the Tests

Good morning gamers,

We're continuing our how-to-play series and we're covering seven different tests that you may need to make in a game of MESBG. We've recently looked at how to build lists and the general flow of the game, but these are oddities that everyone should know before they have to make tactical decisions in the game - and since these rules have changed from previous editions, veterans of the game would do well to brush up on these as well (as retraining old habits can be hard).

Movement-Related Tests: Jump, Leap, and Climb Tests

There have been three types of movement-related tests in the game for ages: jump, leap, and climb tests. Depending on the era of the game, these tests would allow you to charge people or not allow you to charge people, depending on the value of the roll you got. Each test effectively works the same way: you roll a single D6 and you consult a table - a 1 is bad, a 6 is good, and a 2-5 is fine.

The New Age Is Begun: The Defenders of Erebor Army List

Good morning gamers,

Last edition, one of my favorite Legendary Legions that I never took to an event was the Defenders of Erebor - I played a LOT of practice games with them, but never actually locked in with them as my list for any of the events I attended. I plan to rectify this in the coming months (maybe a year) because I think there's a lot that you can do with this particular list. The heroes are great, the warriors are great, and the rules are tricky - let's see how this Dwarf-plus-Men list squares up in the new edition!

The Defenders of Erebor: Changes for 2025

Profile Selection

Our available profiles haven't changed since last edition - you can still get the four royals (Dain, Thorin III, Brand, and Bard II), the six mobile members of Thorin's Company who were still at Erebor during the War of the Ring (Dwalin, Dori, Nori, Bifur, Bofur, and Gloin when he got back from Rivendell - Bombur was too fat, still think there was a missed opportunity to put him in, though!), your stock-standard generic captains, and two warrior profiles for each side (Iron Hills Dwarf Warriors/Goat Riders and Warriors/Knights of Dale). 

All in all, this both is and isn't a deep bench - it's deep because it has twelve hero choices and four warrior choices and between them all, you get a nice spread of possibilities. However, you're unlikely to be able to afford more than four of them in any given game, not only because of the relative expense of the heroes we have (many are in the 70-100pt range), but also because the warriors we have (unless we REALLY focus on the Dale contingent) are pricey. All that being true, this list doesn't have a problem getting to a healthy model count and it will do it with solid Dale archery, the occasional Dale melee guy, and lots of doughty Dwarves.

There are some list constraints, but nothing that's weird for these kinds of lists. Your Dwarf Warrior models can only be led by Dwarf Heroes and your Man Warrior models can only be led by your Man Heroes. As a result, the more you want Dwarves, the more you'll need Dwarf Heroes in the mix. Additionally, any unit with the Iron Hills keyword (Iron Hills Captains/Dwarf Warriors/Goat Riders) pick up the Erebor keyword, which is really nice.

Announcing the TMAT GT 2026!

Good morning gamers,

It's that time of year - The TMAT GT is upon us! The tournament will be held in Purcellville, VA on May 23, 2026. Without further ado, here are (in my typical style) the Ten Commandments of the Tournament (Rules):

1) Thou Shalt Understand The Canon

The ruleset we will be using is from the most recent Middle-Earth Strategy Battle Game Rules Manual (the Fellowship walking one). The supplements for the Armies of the Lord of the Rings, the Armies of the Hobbit, the Armies of Middle-Earth, and the Legacies of Middle-Earth will govern the profiles and army lists being used. Any GW errata for these books will take precedent over the printed text of these documents.

2) Thou Shalt Honor Thy Alliance

This tournament follows the alliance "restrictions" provided in the main rulebook - players will pick one army list from one of the GW-issued supplements for this edition and follow all requirements for that army list.

The New Age Is Begun: The Erebor Reclaimed Army List

Good morning gamers,

This post was supposed to kick off our April series, but Centaur got busy, so you get this article either a day late or six days early, depending on your perspective. Today and through April, we're back with Dwarves - but this time, we're plowing through the Iron Hills Dwarf Warriors from the Armies of the Hobbit and the Armies of Middle-Earth! My son has used these guys a ton - they're a bit expensive for 1 Attack infantry, but they're incredibly durable and if you can manage to get good numbers with them, you can find yourself with the numbers advantage pretty quickly and then the battle swings hard in your favor.

The list that I think showcases these guys the best is Erebor Reclaimed. When I first read the updated rules for the Champs (three in particular) and saw the army list special rules, I was absolutely flabbergasted that they weren't the meta. I think there's a lot going for this list - so let's see what we have to work with and how it's changed from previous editions of the game.

Erebor Reclaimed: Changes for 2025

Profile Selection

This list has only lost one profile technically speaking from the previous edition of the game: Iron Hills Goat Riders. This list has actually lost another profile (the "champ chariot") and has effectively lost six other profiles (King Thorin, Fili, Kili, Dwalin, Dain, and Iron Hills Captains on their mounts). While the mounted heroes are still available in their infantry forms, they function quite differently than they did before - and without warrior cavalry options, this list faces the perennial problem of all Dwarves: how do we make up for being slow and getting where we need to go when we need to be there? Thankfully, one of our army list bonuses helps us with this . . .

Army List Bonuses

The glamor rule of this army list is that everyone in your list has Heroic March and while this isn't great for Iron Hills Captains finding a place in the list, this list goes the extra mile and allows the Dwarves who are benefitting from a Heroic March to ALSO charge . . . which means if you have enough Might in the list, you can basically have 8" move infantry. Now it should be noted that the standard rules of ending within 6" of the March hero still apply, so that 8" move is going to be highly predictable, but considering that anyone can trigger it means you have a lot of flexibility with where and with whom you move 8".

Back to Basics, Revisited: Magical Powers in MESBG

Good morning gamers,

I have always been a HUGE fan of the magical powers in MESBG and how the system of casting and resisting spells works. The rules for casting and resisting hasn't changed much since I got started and the only additions that were made (Heroic Channelling casts a spell on a 6 now and you get Will points back on resist tests that get a natural 6) have been good - and I think the change to Channelling was epic in this edition. The purpose of today's article isn't to go in-depth into every spell - we'll be doing that in a later series - but rather to explain how casting works, things to think about for different caster types, and how to pick the right targets for your spells. Furthermore, you should be aware that I'll be using the term "spell" and "magical power" interchangeably in this post (and have already done so in this paragraph). Let's dig in!

How It Works: Casting and Resisting Magical Power in MESBG

Casting got both harder and easier in the new version of MESBG. This is partly due to the change to Heroic Channelling, where you spend a Might point to "get the spell off on a 6" (more on that later), but also the casting difficulties of most spells went up (nothing is cast on a 2+ anymore and many spells are cast on a 4+ or a 5+). While the casting difficulties went up (and many people would say this had made casting magic harder - and it is now), the fact of the matter is that magic itself got stronger in this edition of the game - so learning how to use it is definitely a good idea. We'll see why magic is so good at the end of the post.

In order to cast a spell, a model with at least one magical power has to be unengaged in order to cast one of its magical powers (though there might be a list that gives its members the ability to cast some of their spells while engaged). This means that if you can charge an enemy caster before they get to cast, you can prevent them (most of the time) from being able to cast a spell. Perfect!

As you probably noticed in the statements above, each model with at least one magical power can only cast one magical power each round (though again, there are models that might plead an exception in certain army lists). Since many casters have access to more than one spell, they have to be selective and intentional with which spell they're using this round. It's often a good idea to figure out BEFORE you play a game what spells you intend to use and in what situations you intend to use them. For casters like Moria Goblin Shamans, this may be decided pretty easily (I'm casting Fury with two dice and then I'm done OR I'm channelling Fury and will save 1 Will for a one-off use later), while casters like Ringwraiths and Wizards might require an entire chart to figure out what spell you're going to cast. Experience and practice helps with this a lot.