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

Good morning gamers,

This month is "Pelennor month" and we've covered the Fiefdoms (lots of Gondor units with special take-this-hero-to-get-these-warriors rules), the Grief of Eomer (a mix of Gondor and Rohan units, led by two smashy heroes), and the Return of the King (all of the ghosts with the Three Hunters thrown in). Today, we're taking all of those units - plus a bunch of others who show up in the Atop the Walls list - and putting them into one monster list! In trade for this greatly expanded roster, we're going to have a single special rule . . . but don't let that knowledge cramp your style. The list is very strong and gives veteran players a lot of options for list building. Let's see what we have to work with today!

The Defenders of the Pelennor: Changes for 2025

Profile Selection

There are a ton of profiles in this list - the full list is provided in the profile adjustment section below. Suffice it to say that if you're looking for someone from Minas Tirith, the Fiefdoms, Rohan, or the Rangers who was fighting in the War of the Ring, chances are good that you'll find them in this list.

Army List Bonuses

This list has some army building restrictions - none of which are unique to this list. Your Rohan Warriors have to be led by Rohan Heroes, your Gondor Warriors need to be led by Gondor Heroes, and your Dunharrow Warriors have to be led by a Dunharrow Hero or one of the Three Hunters. The omission in this list is that the Rangers don't have the ability to lead anyone - they're included because of their appearance in the Return of the King book, where they led Clansmen of Lamedon (and other Fiefdoms militia from the coast), so it seems to me that they should be able to lead other units (maybe if there are no Dunharrow units in your list to be book-accurate?).

Beyond this, there's only one rule: each Hero in your army gets to declare a free Heroic Combat once per game. This is a really great rule since a) it's free, so Grima can't make it cost extra Might, b) it affects all heroes regardless of their affiliations, and c) it's easy to keep track of for both you and your opponent. On its face, this is weaker than the Riders of Theoden army list (where you get a once-per-game Heroic Combat on a single turn if Theoden is still alive, but also get +1 Strength on the Charge) and probably weaker than the Return of the King (where you get Anduril for free and F4 on some of your Warriors), but overall, it helps this list a lot in that you can take the list in any direction and you won't be fighting against the army list bonus.

The New Age Is Begun: the Grief of Eomer Army List

Good morning gamers,

Last week, we looked at the Fiefdoms army list and today, we're truncating down the Fiefdoms side of the house and adding in some Rohan units as we look at the Grief of Eomer army list. This list finds its origin in a scenario from the Gondor at War supplement from the last edition and it feels like several lists we've looked at over the past few months. Let's see what's in this double-heavy-hitter list, shall we (there's only one legacy profile, we'll highlight the relevant sections in red like we always do)?

The Grief of Eomer: Changes for 2025

Profile Selection

This list is supposed to represent the scene from the books where Eomer rallies his Eored after seeing Theoden and Eowyn on the ground and begins a death-charge into the thick of the enemy. He's rescued by Imrahil and a host of Dol Amroth and Minas Tirith troops. As a result, we have two distinct contingents: a Rohan side and a Gondor side, both of which can only take Warriors in warband led by Heroes of the same faction.

The Rohan side of the house is incredibly light, with just Eomer, Captains of Rohan, Warriors of Rohan, and Riders of Rohan. The Gondor side of the house has Imrahil and Hurin as the named heroes, Captains of Minas Tirith/Dol Amroth for the generic heroes, and Knights/Men-at-arms of Dol Amroth for the Fiefdoms working alongside (maybe) Warriors/Knights of Minas Tirith. You don't have any specialized units for either side (unless you count the Dol Amroth troops as specialists). 

Army List Bonuses

The army list bonuses that this list gets are pretty good - Eomer is always under the effects of the Price of Grief, which isn't a downside if you plan ahead (more on that in the Strategies section below). He also gets +1 Fight Value when he Charges, so if you can keep him going, he'll be a F7 hero (like Imrahil). Eomer also gets Fearless and any Rohan models (Hero and Warrior) who can see him automatically pass any Courage Tests they have to take - so they have Fearless as long as they can see him, which is brilliant.

Finally, the Gondor side of the house gets a bonus of rerolling 1s To Wound when they Charge . . . which is not nothing, but also not very much. This bonus is better as the wounding difficulties drop, so charging into D3 Wild Men is pretty good, charging into D4-5 Orcs will feel good sometimes, charging into D6-7 heavy troops from a whole heap of factions (and in particular into lists that play like this one) will see the rule crop up occasionally but rarely. So . . . whatever.

The New Age Is Begun: the Fiefdoms Army List

Good morning gamers,

We're kicking off Pelennor Fields month with a list that I'm very glad I waited to review until after the FAQ dropped: the Fiefdoms. At the start of the last edition, I was completely blown away by the "overlapping bubble" rules that the army list had (the Fearless and Banner buffs in particular) and the units themselves were pretty average cost for above-average Fight (for the most part) and low-to-average Defense (for the most part). At the end of the last edition, I was building lists around Imrahil and Gandalf the White, using Minas Tirith frontliners supported by Dol Amroth pikemen. This edition, the Fiefdoms plays pretty differently with some very, VERY drastic changes to reign them in (and yet no commensurate price drop appears to be present for their units) - I'm a pretty generous person and I try to write that way on this blog, but I gotta say, this army seems a little over-priced on a few units and so . . . prepare for not a lot of variety in the lists at the end. :) Let's see what lies beyond the realm of Minas Tirith as we travel south and west through Gondor to find the oft-unsung heroes of the Pelennor fields. As we do in this series, anything that's strictly tied to Legacy profiles will be in red.

The Fiefdoms: Changes for 2025

Profile Selection

There aren't any new profiles for this Gondorian subfaction - though Imrahil got a fancy new sculpt! We have the OG named heroes of Imrahil, Forlong, Angbor, and Duinhir alongside Captains of Dol Amroth for our generic heroes. We also have Knights of Dol Amroth (foot or mounted), Men-at-Arms of Dol Amroth if you're using Legacies, Clansmen of Lamedon, Axemen of Lossarnach, and Blackroot Vale Archers. While we have all of these guys on the roster, your actual roster may vary a little . . .

Army List Bonuses

The army list in this edition is . . . a little weird, but thematically better than last edition. While you used to be able to take all of the warrior types in the list, regardless of which heroes came with them, now you have to have at least one hero of each subfaction (Dol Amroth, Lamedon, Lossarnach, and the Blackroot Vale) in order to bring warriors of the same type. This makes sense to me - though as was noted in our custom list at the end of the last edition, the Clansmen of Lamedon that show up at Minas Tirith are led by an unknown Captain, not Angbor . . . so maybe there should have been an exception for Clansmen of Lamedon?

The profiles are, however, exactly what you expect: Prince Imrahil and Captains of Dol Amroth (who can give you access to Knights/Men-at-Arms of Dol Amroth if you want someone cheap), Angbor the Fearless (who gives you access to Clansmen of Lamedon), Forlong the Fat (who gives you access to Axemen of Lossarnach), and Duinhir (who gives you access to Blackroot Vale Archers). This functionally means that you might be forced into two or three of the factions if you want an all-around list (cavalry/expensive front-line infantry - and/or supporting models - from Dol Amroth, bows/supporting models from Blackroot Vale, front-line guys from either Lamedon or Lossarnach).

Thematic List Building Challenge: The Walls of Minas Tirith, Part 1

Good morning gamers,

We're back in our thematic list building challenge series and while we've looked so far at how to capture the film-accurate and book-accurate defense of the Deeping Wall of Helm's Deep, today we're headed to Gondor to look at how to represent the defense of Minas Tirith as described in the book (with special emphasis on Book V, Chapter 4 and informed by the people we know came to Minas Tirith in Book V, Chapter 1).

NOTE: a change has been made to this post based on a thread in the comments - changes are in parentheses/red.

The Theme

There are passages in the book that I love - and one of those passages comes from Book V, Chapter 4, where we read about Gandalf and Imrahil taking command of the garrison of Minas Tirith as Denethor sat paralyzed by Faramir's side:

So it was that Gandalf took command of the last defence of the City of Gondor. Wherever he came men's hearts would lift again, and the winged shadows pass from memory. Tirelessly he strode from Citadel to Gate, from north to south about the wall; and with him went the Prince of Dol Amroth in his shining mail. For he and his knights still held themselves like lords in whom the race of Numenor ran true. Men that saw them whispered saying: 'Belike the old tales speak well; there is Elvish blood in the veins of that folk, for the people of Nimrodel dwelt in that land once long ago.' And then one would sing amid the gloom some staves of the Lay of Nimrodel, or other songs of the Vale of Anduin out of vanished years.

I was recently reading this passage and was like, "Man, I should make a list that has both Gandalf the White and Imrahil in it." I've heard of players running Gandalf and Elessar together - and theoretically you can save some points by running Gandalf and Boromir together - but there's a very fascinating synergy that you can get by running Gandalf and Imrahil together, and that's that you can get the high-Fight/average-cost of the Fiefdoms to support your high-Defense/average-cost Minas Tirith warriors. Let's look and see how we can make a competitive list with ONLY the models we know are at Minas Tirith from the book.

Fleshing out the Faction: Fiefdoms Revamp

Good morning gamers,

Back in June 2021, Centaur tried his hand at "revamping" the Fangorn list, providing lots of cool upgrades for Ents, profiles for Huorns, and some neat named heroes who do different things. About a month later, Centaur also tried his hand at revamping Arnor, providing flavors of units based on the major regions of Arnor that would have existed during the apex of that kingdom (the profiles offer more variety than what Rise of Angmar provided, for those interested in seeing what could have been).

In December 2022, Rythbyrt did not one but two posts on how to revamp the Rangers faction (and some Legendary Legions that surround that faction - or should include members of that faction) and like Centaur's post on Fangorn, there were some really great ideas in it.

I'm the last one to join the fray, but I gotta say, the idea for this revamp has been growing in my mind for years. Every year when I begin re-reading The Return of the King, I'm always intrigued by the end of Book V, Chapter 1 where the various fiefdoms of Gondor arrive in their hundreds to assist the garrison of Minas Tirith. While the Fiefdoms has a lot of great units in it - and a really neat theme overall - there's also a LOT of missed opportunities, I feel, for that army list. Today, we're going to walk through the profiles that already exist for the Fiefdoms, and then we'll walk through the passage in chunks and look at profile options for the various fiefs that we're told about. Let's dig in!

NOTE: it's entirely possible - however unlikely - that the Fiefdoms (probably relegated to the Armies of Middle-Earth/book-not-movies sourcebook) could get a revamp in the new edition. We already know that the Men-at-arms of Dol Amroth have been relegated to the Legacies document (and Forlong the Fat is probably losing his horse - and probably getting his war spear downgraded to a standard spear), but so far as we know, the rest of the Fiefdoms is staying as it is. Since we don't have a roadmap for GWs plans, I figured I would throw out these ideas - and who knows, maybe it'll happen!

The Fiefdoms: Existing Profiles

Dol Amroth

This is actually the eighth and final fiefdom to be mentioned in the chapter and Imrahil is described as "kinsman of the Lord, with gilded banners bearing his token of the Ship and the Silver swan" - basically, he's awesome. Imrahil does a lot in the book and leads some of the finest warriors in all of the kingdoms of men - they can trace their lineage back to Numenor and apparently that allows them to have a higher Fight Value than Eomer when they're within 3" of Imrahil and 6" of Boromir's mighty flag. #NotBitter

Imrahil's profile is super solid, with his only limitations being "just 3 Might points" and only getting his wounding bonuses on the charge. Still, with a 12" banner rule for Dol Amroth units (and this rule gets applied to all Fiefdoms units if you keep your army bonus), F6/3A with D7/3 Wounds/3 Fate, there's a lot to like about Imrahil - and many a model that I've fielded have been run over by him.

Gondor At War Inspired Lists: The Men of the West LL Revisited

Good morning gamers,

This is our last post in the how-to-use-your-scenario-focused-units-in-Matched-Play series for Gondor at War - and the last of our army reviews for the year (we have something very special planned for December, but more on that next time). So far in this series, I've avoided covering Legendary Legions - even though I could have cobbled together pseudo-competitive lists for the Return of the King, the Riders of Theoden, and the Army of Gothmog quite easily. Today, that all changes - because we're going to look at a Legion that is uniformly dismissed across the community and commonly held to be one of the worst Legions ever made: yes, it's my boys - the Men of the West (you didn't REALLY think I'd talk about Gondor at War without mentioning these guys, right?)!

With this being our last post in this series, I thought it fitting to cover a Legion that shows up at the end of the films and books. The list has the models you'd expect from both the books and the films in scenario play - mostly because you're allowed to play the Black Gate mission as either one game based on the "movies" (mostly) or two games based on the books. Here are the models we have:

• Aragorn, King Elessar
• Legolas Greenleaf with armor
• Gimli, Son of Gloin
• Gandalf the White
• Eomer, Marshal of the Riddermark
• Meriadoc, Knight of the Mark
• Peregrin Took, Guard of the Citadel
• Elladan & Elrohir
• Prince Imrahil of Dol Amroth
• Captain of Dol Amroth
• Captain of Rohan with shield
• 13 Knights of Dol Amroth (12 vanilla, 1 with banner)
  
• 37 Warriors of Minas Tirith (12 shields, 12 spears and shields, 12 bows, 1 banner)
• 25 Warriors of Rohan (8 shields, 8 throwing spears and shields, 8 bows, 1 banner)
  

This is (actually) the most models we've had to date - which is pretty crazy, when you think about it. In theory, this list has it all when it comes to heroes - it has one of the best casters in the game (Gandalf the White), arguably the best archer in the game (Legolas Greenleaf), one of the best slayers in the game (Aragorn, King Elessar), and an assorted cast of some of the best F5-6 slaying heroes in the game for 100-140pts (Gimli, Eomer, Imrahil, and Elladan/Elrohir) - but since none of these guys can be mounted (and five of these guys can't lead troops), this list is often looked down upon because "you should just ally." Tack onto that the lackluster warrior profiles and it's pretty easy to see why people wouldn't be excited about this Legion.

While I've gone in depth before on why the cost-savings that you get in this Legion can make it playable, the world still seems against these guys - and my recent experience running them against two Aragorn lists at our TMAT GT of 2022 demonstrated to me why most people think this: if you get a tough matchup or your killing heroes are divas, you'll probably lose.

Photo Credit: Gondor at War

So, in this post, we're going to do something different: we're going to look at how to use this list at LOWER points levels (where your points are more limited, but your success rate seems to increase because the counters to your army are more limited too). Let's take a look at two 600-point lists instead of the usual 700-point lists (technically three lists - yeah, I really like these guys) to get an idea of how to bring the pain with this Legion, all while living within the constraints of the Gondor At War scenario participants!

Gondor At War Inspired Lists: Rohan Revisited

Good morning gamers,

In this our third post on how to turn your scenario-oriented Gondor at War collection into a Matched Play fighting force, we come to the plains of Rohan. Ah, Rohan - an army that has dominated top tables with its spam of heroes and horde of Rohan Royal Guards. While new Legions in War in Rohan opened up a variety of ways to play Rohan competitively, when Gondor at War was released, there was exactly one hyper-competitive way to build a Rohan list: run the Riders of Theoden. This makes sense, since the models you have in Gondor at War all appear in the Riders of Theoden list:

• Theoden, King of Rohan with everything
• Eomer with everything
• Dernhelm
• Gamling with everything
• Deorwine (as we mentioned in the what-do-you-need post, he TECHNICALLY doesn't have his horse except in the big Pelennor Fields scenario, but surely this is an oversight)
• Elfhelm with horse
• Captain of Rohan on foot with shield
  
• 16-36 Riders of Rohan (with 8 shield/8 bow dismounts - the 36 number reflects the big Pelennor Fields scenario)
  
• 8 Riders of Rohan with throwing spears (with 8 throwing spear and shield dismounts)
• 1 Warrior of Rohan with banner
  

Photo Credit: Gondor At War

We certainly have the heroes for a Riders of Theoden list (6 named heroes - and if we have a Captain of Rohan on foot, we probably have a mounted one too), but what we're lacking that the Riders of Theoden usually have is Rohan Royal Guards. Those guys are absolutely monstrous on the tabletop (F5/S4/2A on the charge with Bodyguard and fielded for 15-17pts each), but we have precisely . . . 0 Royal Guards (of any type) in this list. In fact, the War in Rohan scenarios only give you up to 4 of them in the main scenarios (to get more, you have to dig into the appendices), so it's fair to say that if you're looking at Scenario Play vs. Matched Play, Rohan has a pretty different feel if you're running the all-cavalry approach.

So what, then, would be an interesting army to view today? Should we run the Riders of Theoden anyway and just run Riders of Rohan? I don't think so - instead, let's look at what the books would have shown us happened at the Black Gate, where the White Horse of Rohan flew alongside the White Swan of Dol Amroth!

The Bare Necessities, Part XLVII: Grimbeorn and his Beornings

Good morning gamers,

With the release of Defence of the North, we have a new faction that you can ally with if you have a Forces of Good army: the Beornings. No, this isn't the new Legendary Legion (view our article from last week on that list) - it's "just Grimbeorn" and up to 15 Beornings. They lose a lot of rules, but they gain something valuable: the ability to ally with other factions. Do any of the other Forces of Good factions have anything to offer that rivals the boosts from the Legion? Let's dive in and find out - I think the answer might surprise you . . .

More gifs of daddy - Photo Credit: Tumblr 

Grimbeorn and the Beornings: How Important Are Army Bonuses, Anyway?

When it comes to the alliance matrix, running a pure list or a historical alliance has one advantage: you get to keep your army bonus. For most factions, though, you can live without it - it might help your army, but sometimes an alliance can get you as much or more than your army bonus does.

While a Convenient alliance makes you "just lose your army bonus" (and this would appear to be the best route for the Beornings to take, since they have no army bonus of their own), an Impossible alliance grants three additional penalties: first and foremost, heroic actions only affect models from the faction that's calling them. This can be bad, but can also mean nothing. Second, banners/banner effects are faction-specific as well. If you don't run banners, it's no big deal (and since Grimbeorn counts as a banner for his guys, bringing another banner will just help the other guys). So there we go - not much lost there.

Third, impossible allies break independently of each other. Giving up points for being broken can be really bad (3-5 VPs in some scenarios) or not that bad at all (1VP in some scenarios). Since there's only 12 VPs up for grabs in any given game, avoiding being broken is generally a good idea (and it causes many armies to avoid Impossible Alliances where possible - even if they have no banners or stand fasts that need to help the army as a whole).

Armies of Middle-Earth SBG: The Fiefdoms in the Middle-Earth Strategy Battle Game

After the sprawling thematic tableaus that are Minas Tirith and Rohan, the Fiefdoms army list may seem a little... confined? But don't let that put you off your guard. This list is a power-house, packed with powerful named heroes, fantastic warrior profiles, great synergies, and so, so, so many Heroes of Valor. So gather your wing-crested helmet and mount your noble steed. To Gondor! (By way of Dol Amroth, of course.)

Photo Credit: Evan Amundsen

New Rules, Part VII: The Kingdoms of Men, Part II

Good morning gamers,

Today we continue our discussion on the armies of the Kingdoms of Men – focusing on the Gondor-based civilizations. Most of the armies in this book have remained true to their Legions of Middle-Earth and Warband versions, with a few slight changes. As mentioned in our previous posts, you should also check out Mik's Veni Vidi Vici blog for thoughts from the “experts” (the only army that has been covered at the time of this writing is “Gondor”, which is predominantly focused on Minas Tirith, but includes a Fiefdoms list).

1) The New Lists: Minas Tirith, The Fiefdoms, The Dead of Dunharrow, The Wildmen of Druadan  

Let’s begin by looking at the lists – most of which stick to the old Legions of Middle-Earth builds. The Wildmen of Druadan (who had their own list in Legions and got lumped with “Wanderers in the Wild” in Warbands) and the Dead of Dunharrow (who also had their own list in Legions and got lumped into “The Fiefdoms” in Warbands) are back to having their own lists. Like Sharkey’s Rogues, they got a special rule that allows them to field warbands without a hero to lead them – which is not only really cool, but encourages us to play a mono-focused list with each of them, instead of having a Captain of Dol Amroth leading the Dead of Dunharrow (or Bilbo Baggins or Bullroarer Took leading Woses). We’ll delve into the fun this provides later.  

For Fiefdoms, they’ve returned to their Legions roots (losing Dunharrow guys) and relying instead on the strength of men. Unlike Dunharrow and Druadan, you need to buy more than one hero for them, but many of their heroes can field more than 12 warriors (Imrahil, Duinhir, Angbor, Forlong). All told, it’s pretty great. 

Back in the Legions days, there were many Minas Tirith lists – a generic “Minas Tirith” list to cover the early Third Age kings/stewards of Gondor, the Rangers of Ithilien with Faramir, Damrod, Madril, and Cirion, and the White Tower of Icthelion with Gandalf the White, Mega-Boromir, Mega-Aragorn, and Denethor. What has basically happened to the lists today is that all of these have been wrapped up in a single list (patterned mostly after the White Tower of Icthelion list from Legions) with all of the other heroes (including the Kings of Men) added to their number. The joining of all these lists gives you flexible choices for expensive and cheap heroes and many, MANY different ways you can play them. All told, Minas Tirith remains a good starter list for the hobby, though its competitiveness I think is greatly determined by your gaming meta. 

TMAT 2016 Preview: The Army of the Dead

Hey Reader!

Also been a long time since I last posted - between working full-time (with growing responsibilities as I train a mostly green team, including my boss), starting up a small business, and blogging for the aforementioned small business - on top of normal life - it's been a whirlwind of excitement around the How, :)  But the Forge has been busy with a brand new army for the upcoming TMAT GT, and I'm super excited about it!

In retrospect, I don't think anyone (except maybe Tiberius - I was chatting with him about it when I was adding the wash) that I even owned models for the army, so when I posted on the blog I got a few responses of, "Wow: you own Army of the Dead models?"  And I was like, "...oh yeah: I haven't show you guys these."

So I decided to do a post (much in the same style as the post Tiberius put up, which you can find here), highlighting my army for the tournament.  So with no further ado, my Fiefdoms army...