The Scouring of the Shire, Part 4: The Old Mill

Good morning gamers,

NOTE: Today, the Kickstarter for Jacob Lucas's Kingdom of Tor Ithilas dropped - and the project is already fully funded! Be sure to check it out (it's a bargain price - and if it's at all like his previous work, the terrain is going to be AWESOME for game play) and back it if you can! Also, I don't get anything for advertising for Jacob - his stuff is just awesome. Okay, back to today's planned content . . .

We're back in the Scouring of the Shire supplement (Hey Reader!) and while the Ruffians had a hard go of it last time, this scenario appears to be a lot more promising. The Ruffians are attempting to take over Sandyman's Mill - and with Ted Sandyman joining them (with the keys to the building in hand), they hope to drive off the rabble-rousing Hobbits that stand in their way and get the wheels of industry moving.

The Old Mill

The board is a 2' x 2' board - but we have a slightly different setup than the book has. Originally, the right board edge is supposed to represent the doors of the mill . . . but Centaur 3D-printed a mill from Dark Realms' Hobbit Village line instead and we're going to enter that. I'll probably do a terrain post near the end of the year, but the design of the 1' x 2' panel that the mill sits on marries up with the two Brandywine River tiles from the previous scenario. 

The forces in this scenario appear to favor the Ruffians pretty heavily - I start with Ted and 12 Ruffians (8 vanilla, 4 with whips), while Centaur has . . . 12 Hobbit Militia. Yikes . . . The Ruffians win if they can get into Sandyman's Mill (with Ted opening the door or by dealing 2 wounds to a D7 door that always counts as being trapped) before they are quartered.

The Board Is Set: How to Play Heirlooms of Ages Past

Good morning gamers,

We're wrapping up our discussion of the Pool 1 scenarios (the "maelstrom scenarios") from the Matched Play Guide and today, we're digging into a scenario that a lot of players don't like: Heirlooms of Ages Past. While the scoring for Hold Ground and Command the Battlefield (the other maelstrom scenarios) are all about having more models in a particular part of the board than the other player, this scenario is very much an all-or-nothing proposition: dig up a shiny thing and hold onto it by the time the game ends. While you can certainly have a knuckle-biter of a game in Heirlooms, what usually happens is that one person secures the Heirloom, bunkers around it, and keeps it to win the game. There's a lot to unpack about this scenario - but let's review the principles of the maelstrom scenarios before we get into specifics (if you've already read our articles on Hold Ground and/or Command the Battlefield, you can skip this section).

Pool 1: Maelstrom of Battle

In most scenarios, you have some control over where you can deploy your units - you usually have a deployment area that is 24-48" deep and you can set up your warbands to support each other however you want. The scenarios in Pool 1 don't work this way - with the exception of siege weapons, one very big tower, and one Legendary Legion, no one starts on the board when you roll for priority. During each player's Move Phase, the controlling player will roll for each warband that hasn't entered the board and depending on what the roll is determines whether the warband arrives (the warband doesn't arrive on the roll of a 1), where it arrives (2 or 4 is the north/south board edges, while a 3 or 5 is the east/west board edge - a 6 lets you choose which board edge you want), and who gets to pick the starting deployment point (2-3 is the opposing player, while a 4+ is the controlling player). Based on the roll, one of the players will pick a point for the warband to walk onto the board. Might can be used to modify this roll. Models are not allowed to charge on the turn that they arrive, but units that can move into enemy units without charging (chariots and war beasts) can, in fact, try to run over enemy units.

Is Arnor Just "Lame Minas Tirith"?

Hey Reader!

Recently when I did my post talking about my predictions/hopes for the new Arnor supplement, one of our commenters made an interesting (and I don't think altogether wrong) comment that "As is, it's hard to see it as anything other than 'lame Minas Tirith'."

And to be honest, YantheMan makes a good point: not only should each army feel different from the others (Mordor and Angmar share a lot of profiles, but they feel very different and are run very differently despite overlapping so much), but there should be a reason to field an army like Arnor over and against Minas Tirith (which will likely always be a more fleshed out faction in the game, and rightly so).

But as someone who has run both Minas Tirith and Arnor, I wanted to spend a few minutes just mulling over whether this claim is actually true, whether this is the right comparison we should be making, and then ending with some thoughts on how the game designers could flesh out Arnor in a way that is satisfying and cool and different without having to invest tens of thousands of dollars into new sculpts (because let's be real: it's not going to happen).

The Board Is Set: How to Play Command the Battlefield

Good morning gamers,

Last time, we reviewed my favorite scenario from Pool 1, Hold Ground. Today, we will be viewing another maelstrom scenario - and one that has a very different strategy to it: Command the Battlefield. This scenario can have far more excitement to it than Hold Ground, but because of how the scoring mechanics work, some armies will have a harder time winning this scenario than others. We'll start off by reviewing how maelstrom scenarios work - if you want to skip this refresher, click here to jump to the specific scenario rules.

Pool 1: Maelstrom of Battle

In most scenarios, you have some control over where you can deploy your units - you usually have a deployment area that is 24-48" deep and you can set up your warbands to support each other however you want. The scenarios in Pool 1 don't work this way - with the exception of siege weapons, one very big tower, and one Legendary Legion, no one starts on the board when you roll for priority. During each player's Move Phase, the controlling player will roll for each warband that hasn't entered the board and depending on what the roll is determines whether the warband arrives (the warband doesn't arrive on the roll of a 1), where it arrives (2 or 4 is the north/south board edges, while a 3 or 5 is the east/west board edge - a 6 lets you choose which board edge you want), and who gets to pick the starting deployment point (2-3 is the opposing player, while a 4+ is the controlling player). Based on the roll, one of the players will pick a point for the warband to walk onto the board. Might can be used to modify this roll. Models are not allowed to charge on the turn that they arrive, but units that can move into enemy units without charging (chariots and war beasts) can, in fact, try to run over enemy units.

The Scouring of the Shire, Part 3: Maggot's Farm

Good morning gamers,

We're back for more Scouring of the Shire fun (Hey Reader)! We're playing the Maggot's Farm scenario which has exactly ten models in it - let's see if Maggot's famous dogs can keep the ruffians out! 

Maggot's Farm

The board is a 2' x 4' space with some wooded areas leading to Maggot's Farm. Centaur added some grazing animals to the landscape and one of his spare Ruffian models is our scarecrow (set up where the road to Maggot's land begins). The dogs start the game as sentries and are spread out within 6" of the scarecrow. The Ruffians will come on from the right side of the board on the first turn and Maggot might arrive starting on the turn after the dogs spot the Ruffians. The Ruffians win if four or more of them cross over the left board edge, while the dogs/Maggot win if they can kill four of them. If three get off and the other three die, the game is a draw.

Unlike other Sentry missions, this scenario gives the dogs a 6" detection range instead of a 3" detection range (or being hit but not killed by archery, per the usual) . . . which is huge. Because this happens at night, the dogs also cause Terror in this scenario (which is big) and I only hit on a 6 in this scenario with my shooting attacks (1 whip and 3 bows), which . . . isn't THAT bad considering our 5+ Shoot Value, but is also not great. With the lower Fight Value and only double the dogs' starting model count, we'll see how this goes!