The New Age Is Begun: The Rangers of Mirkwood

Good morning gamers,

This post officially kicks off Elf month and we're doing so by talking about more Dwarves. :) Yes, we're tackling a really fun list from the last edition that's seen a greatly expanded roster . . . many of which you will probably not be able to throw into your final list unless you're playing at a very, VERY high points level (at which point, I'd like to direct your attention to the Battle of Five Armies army list that we'll look at later this year). Welcome one of the big powerhouses of shooting: the new imagined Rangers of Mirkwood.

Rangers of Mirkwood: Changes for 2025

Profile Selection

Last edition, this list had five profiles in it: Legolas, Tauriel, Mirkwood Ranger Captains, Mirkwood Rangers, and Wood Elf Sentinels. Four of these profiles (not Wood Elf Sentinels) stayed in the list, but the list picked up fourteen new profiles: Bilbo and the thirteen Dwarves of Thorin's Company (a bit awkward for a band name, but their music is alright). This gives the list some much-needed diversity and introduces another angle that you can lean into in order to expand the list to higher points levels (and honestly, I think some kind of Thorin's Company element is necessary in any list, but more on that later).

The list has two composition rules that bear noting when talking about this make up: Mirkwood Rangers can only be led by Mirkwood heroes (Legolas, Tauriel, and Mirkwood Ranger Captains) and Mirkwood Rangers don't count towards your army's bow limit (which is a much-needed carry-over from last edition). I will note that unlike Thorin's Company and to a much lesser degree the Army of Lake-town, you can't field the Thorin's Company members as part of a single warband, which makes your warband count high (good for some scenarios, bad for others).

Army List Bonuses

Besides the two list building rules that were mentioned above, we have two other general rules: you need to include at least one Unique Elf hero (so, Legolas and/or Tauriel) and if you choose Legolas, he must be your army leader (Tauriel otherwise). Both of these heroes are Heroes of Valour, so you'll get 30 warrior slots (625pts for both heroes with max gear and max warbands) - this seems like a pretty decent collection of models for 625pts, but let me assure you, this is probably all you need for this list. If you choose to take Thorin (more on him in a minute), he will only be a grenade hero . . . something he's very, very good at. The other Dwarves will likely be grenades, which can be helpful too.

The New Age Is Begun: The Army of Lake-town

Good morning gamers,

One of our readers asked when we'd do the Army of Lake-town - and I mentioned that I needed to do Thorin's Company first. This post closes out "Dwarf month" and it features . . . exactly four Dwarves. It also has one Elf and that makes it an interesting bridge into the month of May, which will be Elf month. Yes, we're reviewing the Army of Lake-town today - an army that used to be super powerful in the last edition and now really does need to lean into the non-Lake-town elements of the list (which, if we're honest, was always the strength of the Army of Lake-town last edition - see our Bare Necessities post for more on that, which did cover adding in Gwaihir, but not from the Misty Mountains list so he didn't have to be your army leader).

Army of Lake-town: Changes for 2025

Profile Selection

This list has all of the old profiles that you'd expect - the Master of Lake-town, Alfrid, Braga, and Lake-town Guard Captains for your conventional heroes, Lake-town Guard as your only warrior option, and then Alfrid, Bard, and Bard's kids as "the rest of it." This edition, however, we have the guests of Bard's home as well - Tauriel, Kili, Fili, Oin, and Bofur (though notably . . . not Legolas . . . I guess he didn't stay long enough?). These additional heroes are the only way to "ally in" non-Lake-town bodies, which is good because Lake-town has always had fine-not-great profiles that you can buy on a budget to make space for something really strong (and something that's usually better than Bard).

Army List Bonuses

This list has some of the standard rules constraints for mixed-list armies - your Lake-town Guard can only be led by Lake-town Heroes and Bard's Family can be included either in Bard's warband or in Tauriel's warband. Tauriel's warband can also take the Dwarves, which could be useful if you know maelstrom might be a thing.

The New Age Is Begun: the Thorin's Company Army List

Good morning gamers,

This is our last post of all-Dwarves in "Dwarf month" and we're looking at what is mostly an all-hero list: Thorin's Company. I played this list some last edition (never in a tournament) and I've got to say, it's got a lot of rules to keep track of (even more now), but it's FUN to play! The models work together better now and I kinda feel like our recommendation to fix Thorin's Company was heard by GW - but let's see what this list has to offer and what you have to think about when bringing it to the table.

Thorin's Company: Changes for 2025

Profile Selection

This list has the fifteen members of Thorin's Company, as you'd expect. For about $60 (less on eBay), you can get that whole list of models - and now that they can't take ponies (sadness), that's a good 1000-points worth of this list for an insanely small amount of money (relative to what 1000pts requires in most other lists). These units are all infantry and carry the bulk of the rules - and if you choose to just play with these guys, you'll have a jolly time for sure.

That said, the list now includes Radagast the Brown (with access to his sleigh, but it isn't required) and Gwaihir (who can bring Great Eagles, but not Fledgling Eagles). Bringing Gwaihir requires you to also bring Gandalf, which makes the investment kind of hefty - but one could argue that Gwaihir is worth it. Interestingly enough, Radagast has the Thorin's Company faction keyword, so anything that's said below about "Thorin's Company" models can affect him too . . . we'll talk about that a bit in the strategy section below.

Army List Bonuses

This list has a few restrictions in it - but they're not hard to remember. You have to take Thorin and he has to be your General. If you want to take any of the Dwarves, Wizards, or Biblo, they have to be in Thorin's warband (which is great in maelstrom missions, but also gives up a lot of deployment advantages to your opponent in virtually all other scenarios). If you want to take Gwaihir in your list, you have to have Gandalf in your list (fair enough). If you want to take Great Eagles, you have to bring them with Gwaihir. Simple, right? Everyone who isn't a bird with Thorin, get birds by taking Gandalf.

First Impressions, Dwarves of the Hobbit, Part I

Good morning gamers,

Back in 2019, I wrote an article that compared the Dwarves of Thorin's Company and their Erebor Reclaimed "future selves", looking at which version of the two was better (hint: it was basically always the Champs). While there may have been slight changes to the Dwarves over time, the difference between the book-released profiles and their ending state was pretty negligible. This led to a common critique of Thorin's Company in particular (and to a lesser extent the all-Dwarf-hero Erebor Reclaimed list) when new all-hero Legendary Legions were being released and the lack of synergy between the Dwarves made Thorin's Company and Erebor Reclaimed look like a poor all-hero army choice.

Now we have a new edition and we'll be looking at nearly thirty profiles today as we consider how the profiles for all thirteen Dwarves of Thorin's Company (and their Hobbit companion Bilbo) have changed - and boy do we have some interesting changes today! Let's start off with the two that are not related to each other . . .

Thorin and Bilbo: How Have They "Changed?"

Thorin has always been a bargain deal for less than 150pts - and he was such a good deal, that I considered an Impossible Alliance with Thorin's Company Thorin and Balin, King of Moria for our GT last year and ended up taking Thorin King Under the Mountain with Balin, King of Moria instead. Dwarf heroes tend to pile in a lot of stats into a small points package and golly is that still true of Thorin in this new edition of the game. 

Thorin's Company Thorin is still 100pts base but he picked up Heroic March as a heroic action (which matters less in the Thorin's Company list since everyone gains March and can use Will to call it, but it matters a lot more in the Rangers of Mirkwood list where he is the only Dwarf hero that can declare a March). His stats remain the same as they ever were and the rerolling-1s element of the old Thorin's Company army bonus got rolled into his profile, which is really good for him and particularly good for his S4 buddies. Additionally, friendly models can benefit from Thorin's Stand Fast, which is good to have in the same way that it's good to have Stand Fasts in Elf lists.

Photo Credit: Giphy

King Thorin went up in price by 15pts (130pts base) and picked up F7, Fearless (which he never had), Hatred (Gundabad), and the old Du Bekar army bonus - though it applies to all Dwarf models now instead of just the Champions of Erebor, but also only has a radius of 3" instead of 6". Ancestral Fury was modified to only give him a free Heroic Combat on a turn in which he Charges, but it's still a free Heroic Combat, which makes Thorin an excellent choice for carving through troops.

He traded Heroic Resolve for Heroic March (which doesn't matter in Erebor Reclaimed since everyone has March in that list too, but matters a lot in the Ravenhill and Battle of Five Armies lists) and he lost access to the war goat - which hurts A LOT - but retained access to Orcrist and if you build your list in a particular way, this can make him very, very deadly. I do fear that he may fall into the "Durin problem" a bit in the Ravenhill/Battle of Five Armies lists since a 5" move hero isn't hard to stay away from, but in the Erebor Reclaimed list, he can declare a Heroic March and still charge after using the 8" movement from it - that's the same maneuverability of a goat on a straight-away, but might actually be better than the movement of a goat in a congested area.

Turning now to Bilbo, Bilbo got a 5pt-reduction in cost (55pts base) and still has Strike/Defense/Resolve like he did before (which is a good suite of options, especially on a Ringbearer/support piece). His profile didn't otherwise change - and honestly, with all the other changes that are happening (and the fact that the Ring doesn't half Fight Value if there's someone other than the Ringbearer in combat), I'm not sure how high Bilbo is on my to-take list anymore. Still, he was overpriced before, so I'm glad he got a slight points drop.

Burglar Baggins also got a points drop and is 75pts now (-15pts!). Despite this steep decline in cost, he got boosted to 2 Attacks, his Mithril Coat protects against Rend now and allows him to reroll Fate rolls of 1. Like his Thorin's Company version, he still has Strike/Defense/Resolve, which gives him some good options in a Lake-town list, but he seems kind of expensive for a Battle of Five Armies list (so expect to see him a lot more in Assault on Ravenhill and possibly Survivors of Lake-town lists).

Top 5 Profile Changes - Thorin's Company Edition

Good morning gamers,

We're back in anticipation land, looking forward to the upcoming new edition of MESBG and proposing models that should get some revamps. Today's focus is on Thorin's Company - and while others have put forward some very interesting ideas for changes to Thorin's Company, most players agree that there's just something missing about these guys (and what's missing might not be fixable with a Legendary Legion - or instead of getting a Legion, we should just fix the profiles in the first place).

Like I did last time, I'm going to limit my scalpel to a single rule for each model - and while there are fifteen members of Thorin's Company, I'm going to limit myself to only fixing five of them. I'd like to begin by listing the models that will NOT be showing up on this list - mostly because they provide interesting utility options right now and as such don't need any incentives to make them more appetizing choices:

• Thorin Oakenshield - like many beater Dwarf heroes, you get an excellent combat profile and one of the most resilient Dwarf Heroes of Legend in the game (with 3 Attacks/Wounds/Might/Will/Fate) for 100-115pts. His only real downside is that his only mount option is a pony, which means he can move faster, but can't knock anyone prone (the required courage test to charge is rarely an issue).
• Gloin the Dwarf - at 85 points, Gloin has a better combat profile than a Dwarf King (who maxes out at 85pts, but is probably fielded for 75-80pts in most cases) and as the only other member of Thorin's Company above D6 (besides Thorin), I usually field Thorin with Oakenshield and Orcrist with Gloin in any Thorin's Company-heavy list for 200pts.
• Dwalin the Dwarf - look, for 95 points, I don't always take Dwalin because with D6 and only 2 Wounds/2 Fate, he's not ALWAYS going to survive, but 3 Attacks with S5/Burly is going to get work done, especially against grunts.
• Bifur the Dwarf - 45 points for potentially free Heroic Moves (usually if you can get a 5+ on a To Wound roll) and 2-Might-and-Strike from F4 (or 2-Might-to-boost-that-wounding-roll)? Yes please . . .
• Bombur the Dwarf - if you didn't follow any of my crazy Balin-Floi-Bombur builds from earlier in the year . . . yeah, I love this guy! Even if getting Will points back is secondary to your strategy, 3 Wounds/1 Fate with 2 Might and Heroic Defense makes him a pretty good road block against some of the nastiest beaters in the game. You cannot, however, use his Might for Heroic Moves, which is both fine and sad (and totally thematic - please don't change that, GW!).
• Ori the Dwarf - 40 points for a slingshot guy that might auto-wound and pass in-the-way tests and can also get you Might points back after you kill big things? Um, yeah! Sure, he's squishy as heck, but if he's running behind Thorin, Gloin, and possibly Dwalin, he's usually pretty safe (and boy are extra resources useful).
• Gandalf the Grey - yes, I wouldn't mind seeing his Attacks-equal-to-remaining-Wounds rule from the Vanquishers applied to his Grey form (I talked last time about being okay with that in his White form), but I'm not going to talk about revamping Gandalf because frankly, I think he's fine the way he is (or more appropriately, he can't be fixed neatly with a single rule).
• Bilbo Baggins - while I'd like to see the One Ring cost points instead of having the points cost for the Ring included in the base price of all Ringbearers, there isn't much you can change about the Young Bilbo profile without also making changes to other Hobbit profiles. So, let's leave that one as-is and enjoy using Bilbo, okay?
• Dori the Dwarf - I could see some changes to Dori's profile to make him compete more with his Champ version, but honestly, I think for 55pts, you could do a lot worse than this profile - you have slightly higher Fight Value and much better Courage than a vanilla Hunter Orc Captain for only 10pts more. I think this one's fine.
• Nori the Dwarf- Same song, different orchestra. Having S4/Burly will kill a lot of things, and while I think Nori wants to be clearing out warriors as much as possible, having F5/Strike with 2 Might is pretty good (and since he's about the same cost as a Knight of the White Tower, I don't think his cost is outrageous - -1 Defense, +1 Courage, 5pts cheaper).

This leaves us with five profiles, so naturally, those are the ones we're going to work on today! We'll start with . . .

2023 Hobby Bingo: Tiberius's Board

Good morning gamers,

Well, 2023 has been a year - and it's been full of hobby fun! With Fantasy Fellowships, the Minas Tirith board, several tournaments, and lots and lots and LOTS of Morannon Orcs, there's been a lot to keep me busy during my off nights. I haven't officially done the hobby bingo challenge before, though I've always looked at the boards and thought, "I should do that." Well, this year, I said, "Darn it, we're gonna do it this year" - and I am proud to say that it turned out pretty well. Let's have a look!

Photo Credit: Warhammer Community

Row #1: Lots of New Models (and some movies and a tournament)

Our first square in the first row requires us to start a new army, and for me this year, that was easy: Corsairs of Umbar! Throwing weapons are my thing and these guys have them everywhere. I also had these models sitting around for a while, so I don't have all the guys I painted shown here because . . . well, I need a guy for another bingo box:

Box two is easy - watch the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Yes, I watch the extended cuts every year at least once, usually while I'm working on batch painting something or working on a terrain project. It took me longer than usual to watch them this year, since I had to catch up on a bunch of Star Wars shows, but I finished watching the extended editions of The Fellowship of the Ring on June 28th, The Two Towers on August 14th, and The Return of the King on September 9th.

Box three was checked off on June 24th when I attended our annual Grand Tournament - I got last place with a Quest of the Ringbearer Angmar army (you can read about my process of picking that list here and some thoughts on the scoring system - and a brief overview of my games - here).

Box 4 requires scenic bases for one of my armies and I decided to showcase my basing style for my Erebor Dwarves, as shown on Ori. The bases were done by painting white through a dryer sheet, then washing in black, then spot-highlighting in black, and then making piles of gold and emeralds from green glitter, PVA glue, and gold paint:

Finally, I needed to finish a Good army of at least 600 points. Because of the way Hobby Bingo works, I wanted to have a list that "just" reached 600pts (because I need elements of this project to cover multiple boxes, and you can't double-count a model) and since I spent quite a bit of time this year converting up Grim Hammers, Warriors of Erebor, and Thorin's Company heads into a War of the Ring era Erebor Reclaimed list, I figured I'd grab over 600 points from them. You can see here Thorin III Stonehelm, Dwalin, Bifur, Bofur, Nori, Dori, Gloin, and 7 converted Iron Hills Dwarves with shields and spears:

MESBG Christmas Lists, List #11: The Kingdom of Moria . . . and Friends?

Good morning gamers,

Tiberius: Merry Christmas to all! I hope you've been enjoying this series - it's always great when content creators from across the international community contribute to a project like this (and I feel very blessed that anyone out there who generates good content wants to even be involved with our work here)! Today's "Christmas list" comes to you from . . . me! I've hinted at this list several times this year and it has got to be one of the most FUN lists I've ever played - and it's a throw-back to the way I originally built my Kingdom of Moria lists for MESBG (which was actually the "Erebor" list in the LOTR SBG days). So stroll with me down memory lane as we look at the most awesome Dwarf list I ever made (while most of the posts in this series have been short . . . this article will only be short compared to some of my other work . . . and maybe Rythbyrt's article)!

Oh, and I'm going to cheat and provide multiple lists, but they nest together, okay?

The Evolution of a Crazy Impossible Alliance

It's no secret - I'm a huge fan of the Kingdom of Moria: the heroes are excellent (Balin, King's Champions, and Dwarf Kings are/can be all budget F6/D8+ combat heroes - and two of them give you Heroic March, which is always nice to have as an option), the warriors are excellent (their core troops are 9pts each with 1 piece of gear, while their elite units get stronger and more expensive), and as a whole, they're incredibly forgiving as a faction. You can also splurge on two plastic boxes of core troops (two boxes of Dwarf Warriors, two boxes of Dwarf Rangers, or a box of each like I did), the Balin/Floi pack, and a King's Champion pack (with an optional Dwarf King pack, if you can find it), and you can get started with the army quickly and easily.

No matter how competitive you want to be, this is a great starting foundation for MESBG - good, resilient heroes and solid, resilient troops. What more could you want . . . besides cavalry . . . and spears . . . and maybe some magic . . . yeah, there's some to be desired in this list, but hey, you gotta give something, right?

Like most new players to the game, I stuck to pure lists for a while - I mean, I was slowly collecting models and we were playing at low points levels, so allying just wasn't on my mind at the time. I allied Gandalf into some Wood Elf lists (before getting Galadriel), and I allied Legolas into everything (including Dwarf lists), but I eventually got around to looking at the profile for Radagast the Brown . . . and boy did I have a crazy idea. 

You see, back in the day, you were able to do "volley fire" with 10+ bows of the same type, so if you had 10 Dwarf Warriors with Dwarf bows, you could shoot at targets that were within 18" normally and at models that were 18-36" away from you by hitting on a 6. The trick was, only one model in your army needed to be able to see the target . . . and Radagast could (and still can) "see" everyone thanks to the Master of Birds special rule. 

Fantasy Fellowships: The Erebor Reunion, Part 7

Good morning gamers,

I know we're in the middle of a "Christmas List" series, but hey, I can turn a Fantasy Fellowship game into a Christmas List! For many players, these aren't the models you'd want if you ran a Minas Tirith/Rohan alliance, but my love for the Men of the West Legendary Legion has given me TONS of practice with these models! Here's the almost-legit, original participants list, clocking in at a very impressive 1352 points:

• Aragorn, King Elessar [ARMY LEADER]
• 8 Warriors of Minas Tirith with shields
• 8 Warriors of Minas Tirith with shields and spears
• Gandalf the White
• INDEPENDENT: Peregrin, Guard of the Citadel
• 8 Warriors of Minas Tirith with bows
• 1 Warrior of Minas Tirith with banner
• CONVENIENT ALLY - The Fellowship: Legolas Greenleaf
• Gimli, Son of Gloin
• Frodo Baggins
• Samwise Gamgee with Sting (this would need to be on Frodo if you did this in Matched Play, of course)
• CONVENIENT ALLY - Rohan: Eomer, Marshal of the Riddermark
• INDEPENDENT: Meriadoc, Knight of the Mark with shield
• 8 Warriors of Rohan with shields
• 8 Warriors of Rohan with shields and throwing spears
• 8 Warriors of Rohan with bows
• 1 Warrior of Rohan with banner

Besides Eomer having 11 more guys than he should, this is actually a legal list for Matched Play - though where is Legolas's armor and Eomer's shield? I mean, Eomer almost NEVER has a shield in Fantasy Fellowships - what's up with that? Anyway, the participants from my Fantasy Fellowship are nearly the same, except that I paid 15 more points for Dwalin instead of Legolas, 10 fewer points for Gloin instead of Gimli, 20 more points for Bifur instead of Pippin, 15 more points for Bofur instead of Merry, and (wait for it) 135 fewer points for Nori instead of Aragorn . . . that's roughly a 100pt reduction on the original participants.

Of course, Nori now has Anduril (so it's really a 60pt reduction overall) - and thanks to having Weapon Master, he'll be wounding on 3s every turn with no penalty for fighting two-handed and D7 (no shield bonus because I'll be two-handing). With 3 Attacks and the equivalent of Lord of the West (reroll one dueling die and one wounding die), I feel that Nori will FINALLY be able to keep up with Dwalin and Gloin in the wounding department (especially after the last showing - he did NOT do well in the Docks of Harlond scenario). Okay, let's kick off the last scenario in this Fellowship's journey!

The End of All Things

This scenario takes place on two boards: a four-by-four board and a two-by-two board. The bigger board was provided by Rythbyrt and the smaller board has shown up in several battle reports in this series. The terrain is intentionally sparse on the bigger one.

Fantasy Fellowships: The Erebor Reunion, Part 6b

Good morning gamers,

We're closing in on the end of our Fantasy Fellowship campaign and today we have Bofur's second-to-last mission (the Charge of the Rohirrim). Fell deeds awake - let's get going!

Charge of the Rohirrim

So I'll be honest, this mission felt a lot like deja vu for me after the Eomer's Return scenario - I have a bunch of skirmish cavalry, there's no shooting on the other side, job's done. However, there IS a way that Evil can force a draw if we break them before killing Gothmog (Gothmog can walk off the back edge of the map), so we're going to do some whittling down, but then we're going to charge in and "do what the Riders of Theoden Legion does." Let's see how this all worked out . . .

Centaur deployed just shy of 12" forward and I deployed as far up as I could:

Turn 1: Priority Good

I moved my guys up 5" and prepared to shoot, while Centaur prepared to receive my shooting. In a stunning turn of events, I aimed, I shot, I killed nothing. Turn two . . .

Turn 2: Priority Good

In case you're wondering, the "priority" thing is a bit moot, since there's a scenario rule that Good always counts as winning priority . . . so I stood where I was and fired again, with Centaur standing to receive the shots.

In the Shoot Phase, we actually got some hits this time and killed two Orcs!

Fantasy Fellowships: The Erebor Reunion, Part 6a

Good morning gamers,

This is a huge milestone for me - I have labored long and hard this year to make some Minas Tirith walls for THIS scenario (and so I can say I have them) and now I finally get to use them! We'll be looking at the two wizard-and-friend scenarios today - let's get into it!

Atop the Walls 

This is a small board and a TON of models - there are actually five siege towers (I have two that Centaur printed for me and templates for where the other three are) and there are a ton of Orcs! The objective for me is simple: kill 30 guys before Gandalf goes down. Let's see how Gandalf and Bifur fair!

Because of how I built the board, there's a 1" gap between our models and then there's a ton of stairs. There are five siege towers (two from Conquest Creations, three from Costco cereal boxes) and the Orcs have 7-9 guys on each one. Let's see if we can keep the Orcs from overwhelming Gandalf!

Grim Champs: What Do You Do With 13 Broken Dwarves?

Good morning gamers,

If you've followed the last two posts in this conversion miniseries (here and here), you know that I have spent some time this year converting up some Champions of Erebor from a Thorin's Company blister and some Grim Hammers. With the converted models done, I found myself with a pile of headless, mangled bodies:

What does one do with all these? Why, we get our conversion hat out and we turn them into something useful: "bag" tokens for the Three Trolls! Let's get to work!

In Defense Of: Bofur the Dwarf

Good morning gamers,

Today's article returns to a series we did back in early 2022, where we look at models that get maligned by the community and look for why they're good and worth taking (and how to tailor a list to make them work at their best). The model we'll be covering today is one of the most popular Dwarves from Thorin's Company when you consider the actor who played him, but is often left at home when looking to field Thorin's Company (or the Champions of Erebor in either version of the Erebor Reclaimed army list): Bofur the Dwarf.

My son, Gorgoroth, just finished reading the Hobbit and watching the Hobbit films (extended versions for #1 and #2, theatrical version for #3). Your own views of the films aside, chances are that Bofur the Dwarf makes you smile if not outright laugh just as he delights me when I watch the films (excellent work, James Nesbitt - you snagged my "favorite Dwarf" award, but mostly for what you do in the extended editions of the films). I love this guy and really enjoyed painting him, but I gotta say, that profile just doesn't look appealing. So let's dig into why most people critique the profile . . . and then into why I've come around to like this guy so much!

Why NOT To Take Bofur the Dwarf

The first critique of Bofur that everyone seems to make is that he has to fight two-handed. While every other Dwarf (and Hobbit and Wizard) in Thorin's Company has a hand weapon or a hand-and-a-half weapon (aka, doesn't NEED to suffer the -1 penalty to their dueling roll), Bofur has a "mattock," which is a "two-handed weapon, which can use either the Bash or Piercing Strike Special Strikes." Interestingly enough, this is different from the Grim Hammer "Pick-Hammers," which are hand-and-a-half hammers . . . not sure why that is, to be honest. Anyway, Bofur will always suffer than -1 penalty to his dueling roll, so if he's fighting alone (quite likely), his Might has pretty much one purpose: boosting his dueling rolls so he doesn't die.

Fantasy Fellowships: The Erebor Reunion, Part 3b

Good morning gamers,

We're back in Fantasy Fellowships today and will be covering the Ambush at Night scenario - I know last time I said we'd cover Warg Attack too, but having both in the same post was just too long! This mission is surprisingly NOT about our Fellowship members - Merry and Pippin are playing a mini-game against a depowered Grishnakh, with your victory conditions mostly being triggered by whether you can quarter the enemy (and whether you can get the Hobbits off the board before they're killed - which is much harder to do with Merry and Pippin than when you've got two pretty competent heroes as I have today). Let's dig into the scenario!

Mission #2: Ambush at Night

We deployed our forces as you see - the Isengard force isn't allowed to move on the first turn and Eomer's cavalry are split up into two groups - one led by a Captain of Rohan on horse with shield, the other led by Eomer on horse (yes, he has no shield or throwing spears - who does that, GW, seriously who does that!?!?!?!). The only thing of note from Turn 1 is that Bofur was able to untie his bonds (getting the required 6) on the first turn, so he's free to leg it from here on out!

Fantasy Fellowships: The Erebor Reunion, Part 3a

Good morning gamers,

Today we're kicking off Part 3 of our Fantasy Fellowship campaign where my "Erebor Reunion" Fellowship is playing its last game with (almost) all of its members - Dori will have his last mission (as the Boromir character doesn't get to go on) and such an array of heroes will not be seen again in this campaign until we get to the Black Gate (and even then, Bilbo/Maggot will be apart from the rest). If you've been following my conversion series for the Champions of Erebor, this is the first post where you'll get to see those models in action!

Mission #1: Ambush at Amon Hen

Okay, so my thought going into this was simple: Gloin and Dwalin are two of our best fighters and they start WAY out of position. So, what we want to do is move towards them with Bilbo/Nori as much as we can and THEN advance towards the boats. If we can use Heroic Combats between these guys to get some extra movement for them (and Bilbo), we can do this. 

I'm also going to lean heavily into a few pieces of war gear that we picked up in Lothlorien: Nori will be using his new dagger (which gives him the Elven-made keyword, allows him to Feint if he Strikes well above his opponent's Fight Value, and deals D3 wounds for every unsaved wound - perfect for clearing out Uruk-Hai Captains). Bifur will be using his "nice shiny dagger" whenever he's not spear-supporting someone with his boar spear (since the rerolling all failed To Wounds is often better than two-handing) and Bofur FINALLY has a one-handed weapon that he can use (which is also often better than two-handing - though I'll probably two-hand if I'm only fighting one shield-armed guy so I have the option to Piercing Strike up to S5). Finally, if Gloin gets in a tight spot, I've got three full rerolls for him thanks to the three locks of hair he got from Galadriel. The other items are unlikely to see much use (I like the Light of Earendil, but I plan to have the Ring on the whole mission, so I can't use it).

Okay, let's get stuck in!

Fantasy Fellowships: The Erebor Reunion, Part 2b

Good morning gamers,

We're back - my poor broken Fellowship fled Balin's Tomb and is running down some questionable stairs. We're starting pretty battered as you can see:

With a need for five members (including Old Bilbo) to get through the gap at the end, we'll see how quickly our short legs will carry us - let's get into it!

Mission #3: The Dwarrowdelf

We deployed within 6" of the western board edge, putting Dwalin and Dori in front while Gloin and Nori (both of whom were hurting from the last mission) held the rear. Bifur (free Heroic Moves) and Bofur (lots of Might) backed up the leaders, with Gandalf and the Hobbits scrunched in the center with the dogs. We advanced quickly:

Turn 1: only one Goblin shows up . . . great start . . .

I'm going to summarize turns 2-3 very simply - I got priority on the first three rounds, I got off one Strengthen Will on Gandalf (4 Will), I walked down the stairs, and a few Goblins showed up to challenge us (1 warrior, then 2 warriors, then a Captain and a warrior):

Turn 2 - some more Goblins show up . . .

Turn 3 - a Captain and another Goblin shows up . . .

Fantasy Fellowships: The Erebor Reunion, Part 2a

Good morning gamers,

We're back with the next set of scenarios in Quest of the Ringbearer, beginning with Wolves in the Night and going through the (notorious) Bridge of Khazad-Dum. The missions begin with a Rest Point in Rivendell and we will have the full Fellowship for these four missions. Because these scenarios are much longer, we're only going to cover the first two today (Wargs in the Night and Balin's Tomb), while the other two will have to wait two weeks. Let's see how we did!

Mission #1: Wargs in the Night

So in this scenario, I started with my six Dwarves on the exterior, my dogs and Gandalf near the center, and Bilbo/Maggot ready to support Bifur and Bofur. For the first two turns, I forgot to take pictures, but it's fine, since the Wargs stayed away from us as we drifted towards the eastern board edge. Gandalf cast Strengthen Will on himself on Turn 1, getting a 7th Will point, and cast Sorcerous Blast on the Wild Warg Chieftain on Turn 2 (2/3 Might, 5/6 Will), but the Chieftain resisted on a 6. On Turn 3, things looked like this:

Yes, I have nine Ringwraiths standing in for some Wargs . . . it's a thing . . .

The wargs had priority and while I could have called a free Heroic Move, I needed to respond to his charges, so I let the wargs charge. The only models in danger were Wolf (fighting two wargs) and Bofur (who was facing down both the Wild Warg Chieftain and a warg), so Bilbo put on the Ring and pulled one of the wargs off Wolf and Gandalf cast Sorcerous Blast (3/6 Will left) on the warg who charged Bofur and threw it into another warg (unengaged), and most importantly, knocked Bofur and the Wild Warg Chieftain over: the target warg died, while the other warg was knocked prone:

Fantasy Fellowships: The Erebor Reunion, Part 1

Good morning gamers,

Today we're going to look at the first three missions of Fantasy Fellowships for my Fellowship. Our last post walked through what we have to face in these missions (Ringwraiths and Barrow-Wights), so let's see how we did!

Mission #1: Buckleberry Ferry

My team of "hobbits" wants nothing to do with hiding from some lowly Ringwraiths - nope, go in fast, take them down one at a time, job's done. The players I have are:

• Ringbearer: Old Bilbo Baggins with Sting and the Mithril Coat
• Companion: Farmer Maggot with Grip, Fang, and Wolf
• Rohan-bound Friend: Bofur the Dwarf
• Gondor-bound Friend: Bifur the Dwarf

With a Fellowship that wanted to get locked in quickly, I lined up my guys as far forward as possible and were ready to rush for the southernmost Nazgul straight away:

It's surprising how close you can start to these guys if you really want to fight them . . .

I charged headlong forward and the nearest Nazgul got a 6 for his sentry roll, moved into position to see us, and immediately sounded the alarm:

SSSCCCEEEEEETTTCCCHHH!!!

It Has Come To Me (Again): Thoughts On The One Ring, Revisited

Good morning gamers,

When the new rules dropped back in late 2018, I did a post on the One Ring and how it had changed since the LOTR SBG days (when I first got started playing). Since then, we've had a few FAQ clarifications (a few very needed clarifications) and I've played a LOT with the Breaking of the Fellowship Legendary Legion and those experiences have given me some new perspectives on things you can do to both use the Ring well and fight against Ringbearers. So today, we're going to take a look at what the rules are for the Ring, how these rules have been altered by FAQs and Designer Commentaries, and ways you can use these rules to both use Ringbearers better AND fight against them.

Rules Review (With Errata and Designer Commentaries Notes Added)

There is a whole page of rules dedicated to the One Ring - thankfully it's broken up into sections for us. Let's dig in and see what's interesting in each part of the rules (I've color-coded the relevant Designer Commentary questions to the references from the rules (to include the errata that have been made on it).

Wearing the Ring

[Wearing The Ring] The model with the Ring can put it on at any time during their Move phase. As soon as they do so, they become Invisible. [ERRATA: Whilst invisible, the Ringbearer may move through friendly and enemy models, provided they do not end their move overlapping any part of another model’s base.] If a model who put on the Ring is mounted, their steed will bolt and they must immediately take a Thrown Rider test.

Q: Can a model with the One Ring put it on if they have already been charged that turn? (p.90) A: No.

Q: Do Invisible models ignore enemy Control Zones when they move? (p.90) A: Yes.  

Two things jump out at us from this section: first and foremost, as the Designer Commentary on the main rulebook has clarified, a Ringbearer cannot put on the One Ring if he has been charged already. This will require planning a turn or two ahead, but otherwise isn't a big deal. It can bite new players, though, so if you're just learning how Ringbearers work, you may want to just accept that there's an error or two that might be made when learning the game. This will probably be one of them.

Second, if your Ringbearer can take a mount (Isildur on horse or Bilbo Baggins on a pony), then you'll want to dismount BEFORE you put the Ring on. Because you can put the Ring on at any point in your movement, you can dismount, put the Ring on, and then move without penalty - but the timing does matter.

The Bare Necessities, Part XL: The Army of Lake-town

Good morning gamers,

Today we cover one of the most competitive armies for the Forces of Good in MESBG right now: the Army of Lake-town. If you're looking at running a list pure, this army . . . well, doesn't look very good. In fact, compared to their cousins (the Survivors of Lake-town, which we'll cover in a few weeks), it looks downright awful. But this army is one of the cheapest hordes that have access to spears you can find and this means you can get a healthy amount of numbers and have plenty of points to ally in big heroes. Lake-town doesn't have the suite of allies that you'll find from the Armies of the Lord of the Rings, but the options they have are solid. So how do we begin to piece together a good army from Lake-town? Let's dig in and see what we have to work with and you'll soon see.

The Army of Lake-town: Who Needs A Horde?

So when you think of horde armies, you generally think of evil factions - Goblin-town, Moria, and Sharkey's Rogues, for example. Some good factions qualify - like the Shire - but most good factions run average-cost models (or very elite/expensive models), which can keep them from "hording out" (though there are builds for Minas Tirith that can horde out by taking cheap heroes). Lake-town has only one expensive hero (Bard) and everyone else costs no more than 50 points - and with most of them (not Bard's children) able to lead 12-15 models and your warrior models costing 5-7 points each, you can get a full warband of guys for under 120 points. If you're getting that many guys for that kind of cost, you can easily get 65+ models in a 600pt game (and at 700, you're looking at over 70 models easily).

Mastering Magic: Magical Protection

Good morning gamers,

Today we start our sixth post in our "masterclass" series on Magic in MESBG. We've looked at Sorcerous Blast, Immobilize (et al), auric spells, restoration spells, and area-of-effect spells. Today we turn our attention to some of the most useful spells a caster can have when facing an army with a spell-caster of its own (or multiple spell-casters - THE HORROR): Fortify Spirit, Protection of the Valar, and Shroud of Shadows. While we'll only be looking at five models today (three Forces of Good, two Forces of Evil), several of these heroes (Galadriel, Lady of Light from the White Council, Gandalf the Grey from several lists including the White Council, and Ashrak from Moria) can ally with all but four factions in the game either Conveniently or Historically (woe to Arnor, Numenor, Barad-Dur, and Sharkey's Rogues). This means that understanding what these heroes do - and why they might be slapped into a list - is good for any player to know.

Pre-warning: no pictures in this post, mostly because I only own the two Gandalf models and have photographed them a lot already in this series. Call me lazy.

What Do These Spells Do?

Two of these spells are quite straight-forward: Fortify Spirit gives a friendly model (which could be the caster himself) not one but TWO free dice when you make a Resist test against a magical power - and yes, this stacks with other free dice that might come from Heroic Resolve, Resistant to Magic, or a Staff of Power, and they don't require you to spend a Will point of your own to use them. They're just free. When channelled, the highest Resist die also gets +1 to its result (meaning you can automatically resist any spell that is cast against you on the roll of a 5 or 6 - wow-zahs). This spell is an Exhaustion spell, so once cast, you want to make sure the caster (not the person who is the target of the spell) retains 1 Will in their Will store to keep it up.

Protection of the Valar is also straight-forward in that the friendly model that is targeted by the spell is immune to both magical powers and weird special rules for the round (I'm looking at you Golden King of Abrakhan and Dead Marsh Spectres!). When channelled, this spell affects the target and all friendly models within 3" of the target, which can make A GROUP of heroes immune to any magical barrage. Unlike Fortify Spirit, however, this spell isn't an Exhaustion spell, so you need to cast it every round in order to make it work (the opportunity cost is certainly higher, but not being affected by magic for the round is guaranteed).

Shroud of Shadows is the most nuanced of the spells and also the most powerful. Based on the most recent Designer Commentaries, the friendly model that is targeted by the spell is not only immune to magical powers (except from Ringwraiths, maybe Sauron), but is also invisible (granting all kinds of movement benefits) and is immune to shooting attacks and requires a Courage test to charge the model with a reduction of Courage based on the distance the model is from the target. As clarified in the most recent FAQ, models that fail this Courage test get to move normally and aren't rooted in place. When channelled, any enemy models in base contact with the target halve their Fight Value (rounding up). While definitely useful at keeping models from being targeted by spells, this spell ALSO makes it hard to shoot or charge them - perfect for keeping a very important model safe.