Thematic List Building Challenge: The Road to Rivendell

Good morning gamers,

Last time we were in this series (just over a month ago), we looked at a highly restrictive list of units (those defending Minas Tirith in the films) and tried our best to find a way to make it competitive. Whether we succeeded or not is anyone's guess. Before that, we looked at the book-variant of the Defense of Minas Tirith, which means we had two lists from the Return of the King. The two posts prior to those were the book-variant and film-variant of the defense of the Deeping Wall of Helm's Deep . . . which means we had two posts from the Two Towers. Looks like Fellowship is due for a look, eh?

Today, we're looking at a list that I've tried to make work for years - and it involves cherry picking out desired units from SIX different army lists, all centered around the events that surrounded Frodo's departure from the Shire until his arrival in Rivendell. Can these units be run in a competitive setting? Well, let's find out . . .

The Theme

I read the Lord of the Rings every year (and by "read," I mean "listen to audiobooks" - which is kind of like reading if you have long commutes and get car sick . . . or are the one driving . . . as is the case for me). Every year when I relisten to The Fellowship of the Ring, I always come back to a list idea: bring an army that represents Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin (and I usually try to get Fatty Bolger in there too) trying to get to Rivendell. There are a HOST of characters that are introduced in the first book of Fellowship and most aren't revisited when you get to the return journey in The Return of the King.

Thematic List Building Challenge: The Walls of Minas Tirith, Part 2

Good morning gamers,

Last time we were in this series, we looked at how to replicate the defense of Minas Tirith from the books by seeing what kind of alliances we could build with Minas Tirith and the Fiefdoms. Today, we're looking to the defense of Minas Tirith in the films, which gives us far fewer profiles to work with - and whether you can make this build "competitive." Let's see what our theme is . . .

The Theme

I remember well where I was at 12:01am on December 17th, 2003 - I was sitting in the middle of a crowded movie theatre with about a dozen friends (and two dads, who drove all of us) watching the ads run before the Return of the King midnight debut in Hawaii - it was a glorious night and I'll never forget it. I remember being incredibly pumped when Gandalf assumed command of the defense of Minas Tirith and the trebuchets began to shoot back at the hordes of Mordor. While this scene got a lot of amping up with the release of the extended cut about a year later, there's plenty to enjoy about the theatrical version - and to this day, whenever I watch the films, I'll stop what I'm doing and enjoy again the masterful work that went into making that scene.

Well, in MESBG, the lowly Warrior of Minas Tirith is a "fine" profile - the bowmen are uninspired (and sub-par to their Ranger/Citadel Guard counterparts), the shield guys are good but can be eclipsed by Guards of the Fountain Court in the front rank and Guards of the Fountain Court, Citadel Guard, and Rangers with spears in the second rank. Unfortunately, while there are Guards of the Fountain Court and Citadel Guard in the films, none of them are seen actually defending the city . . . so for our purposes today, we're going to skip them.

We're also going to skip on the knights - and basically everything from the Minas Tirith list except Gandalf, Pippin, and the absolute most basic units in Minas Tirith. No fancy bells and whistles . . . can such an army be good? Let's look at the models we have and what they're going to force us to do . . .

Quest of the Ringbearer: Model Collection Update, Part IX

Good morning gamers,

My goodness, it's been a while since I updated this thread! My last collection update was in June 2023 and thanks to Star Wars Legion, the new additions for Quest of the Ringbearer have been slim. Here's what we've been up to since then . . .

After the Winter Whirlwind tournament in February 2023, I picked up 12 Warriors of Rohan (5 shields, 3 shields and throwing spears, and 4 bows) from the prize station, which got me the last of the Warriors of Rohan I needed for the End of All Things (took me a while to get them touched up and stuff), along with all the bows I needed for my shooting-heavy Men of the West lists (still need more throwing spear guys - maybe a new starter set can help with that?):

Yes, it took me over a year to get these guys looking like my other Rohan guys . . .

This year, I bought Dernhelm (Eowyn and Merry) and have used them a few times (but not at a tournament - at least not until the THRO doubles event gets rescheduled):

Work gave me a thank you gift for working hard and I used it to get this big boy:

Yep - he's pretty great. On his back are all of Clan Water - here's Clan Earth to finish the set:

Finally, I ordered a bunch of Riders of Rohan from a guy in the UK through a Facebook buy/sell page - most of the horses and spears required some minor surgery after they arrived, but I got the last throwing spear Riders I needed!

Quest of the Ringbearer models remaining:

• 6 Wargs (which will be Warg Riders)
• 2 Rangers of Gondor with spears
• The Mouth of Sauron on foot and mounted

Fantasy Fellowships: 

• Grishnakh and Snaga
• Legolas (and Gimli) on horse
• Sharku on foot and mounted
• 4 mounted Royal Guards
• Deorwine on foot and mounted
• Elfhelm on foot and mounted
• 16 Warriors of the Dead (6 as dismounts for the Riders of the Dead)
• 6 Riders of the Dead

Conclusion 

That's it for this year - and things are moving along quite nicely! I'm hopeful that I can power through the Quest of the Ringbearer stuff next year (we'll see how that jives with the changes in the new edition). While there will be plenty of matched play content on the blog in 2025, scenario play remains a big part of what we do here, so you can expect to see more from us in the coming year (though it won't be Fantasy Fellowships - need some time to get more of these models before that happens). Until next time, happy hobbying!

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.

The Scouring of the Shire, Part 16: The Battle of Bywater

Good morning gamers,

This is it - this is for all the bananas! We've reached the end of the Scouring of the Shire campaign and we're playing the Battle of Bywater scenario. This scenario is really old, but with the campaign bonuses we've been getting for winning scenarios, there are a few adjustments from what's in the book:

• Maggot with his dogs, the Gaffer, and Ted Sandyman are here;
• Holfoot Bracegirdle and Robin Smallburrow can't call heroic actions because the Ruffians won the Arrest of Folco Boffin scenario;
• Pippin has -2 Might for losing the Attack on Tuckburough; and
• Merry gets a free Heroic action from winning the Old Cotton's Farm scenario.

The Battle of Bywater

The board is set up with the Ruffians on one side and the Hobbits hemming them in on the other three board edges. As you can see, the flowers from the Gaffer have been placed near the middle . . . apparently Centaur thinks he'll be fighting there (and he would be right).