List Review: Besiegers of the Hornburg

 The sales pitch:

Do you love Trolls? Do you hate banners, fury rolls, fight value buffs and winning games? Then throw Usurpers in the bin, Besiegers is the army for you!

Credit Games Workshop

What makes it tick?

OK, that intro was a little harsh. Maybe undeservedly so. But it is impossible to talk about this army without comparing it to Usurpers at every step, and the comparison is… not favourable. Fortunately, we covered Usurpers a few weeks ago, so you can refresh yourself on it here! In brief, Besiegers is a very similar army composition, but you trade out Thorne and Freca and get the Troll Trio instead, along with a new smattering of army bonuses (or should I say, penalties…!) As a result, I would treat it as a stepping stone on the way to Usurpers, or as a spin-off if you want to play something slightly different.

Starting with the good stuff, your warriors get a +1 to wound within range of an objective – a good start. Hordes really love wound bonuses and this gives them some surprising teeth, albeit in only a third of the current scenarios. Past that, Wulf gets a free Heroic Challenge vs the enemy general once per game – neat, he usually wants to kill the enemy general anyway.

*Checks notes* that’s it for bonuses. Let’s get to the army penalties.

Wulf must be your leader. Oh dear. He’s great in Usurpers because he can be a hero-seeking ballistic missile on a horse, and you lose no VPs for trading him for a high value target. Not so for this army – you will need to keep him safe or risk conceding VPs - which is not easily done when he must charge an enemy model if possible. Oh dear oh dear. Smart opponents will use this to bait him in to combats he wants no part of, especially if he’s got a 10” charge range. Finally, Shank, Wrot and the Snow Troll can’t benefit from Dunland heroics, and vice versa – we’ll get to them in more detail later.

That’s it for army rules, but it would be prudent to spell out exactly what you’re giving up by playing this instead of Usurpers:

-          Two characters that provide Fight 4 bubbles to your troops.

-          Access to a War Horn.

-          Access to a sodding Banner.

-          An army-wide 6+ Fury save for your Dunlendings.

-          An army-wide +1 to wound Heroes.

-          Access to throwing weapons.

-          Ability to equip 2/3 of your models with ranged weapons (bows & spears).

-          Access to D5 troops.

-          The ability to have Wulf not be your General.

-          One of the best Hero assassin characters in the game (or half his toolkit).

I’ll be referring to this list a lot, so let’s call it “Exhibit A”.

Credit Games Workshop

When I say that the Troll Trio needs to do some serious heavy lifting, it’s because those are the boots they’ve’s got to fill, as you’re getting damn near nothing else in return for losing the above.

So are they? Yeah, they’re pretty good. Shank and Wrot are both F4, S4 D5 with 2 wounds 1 fate. Wrot packs 3 attacks, which is pretty good and can be used to fuel the ‘Loot the Bodies’ special rule – whenever either of them gets a kill, they roll a D6, with a 6 netting you a VP up to 5 VPs. Wrot can also roll a second D6 and potential regain a Wound or Fate. I don’t see these rules winning too many games, until you’re against an opponent that can’t stop rolling 6s – but it is really fun, and could definitely make for some hilarious late-game hail mary plays (i.e. you’re 2VPs behind and your only chance to win is by getting some lucky kills), especially when troops are scattered and they can mop up some stragglers.

But let’s be honest, you’re taking these guys for the Troll. F6, D7, 3A, 3W – and +1 attacks and FV on a turn where he charges. Both 4A and F7 are a big deal, as charging will see you out-fight the likes of Eomer and Lurtz - and going from 3A to 4A equates to an expected 2 wounds increasing to an expected 2.66 wounds, when rending against S4. That’s likely the difference between an alive captain and a dead captain, or bouncing off a three-fate General versus sticking a wound on them. Also, if Shank gets to activate before the troll, he can spend a point of will to ‘Call the Beast’ and give the Troll rerolls to wound, pushing the expected wounds to 3.55 – huge. It also gives him fearless, which will help him to charge Terror-causing models, but will not help him stick around on the board, as if Shank is using his rule then he has already activated his Stand Fast.

However, let’s talk about that Charge stipulation. Given how powerful the bonuses are, that means we’re in the realms of heroic move offs – nobody is going to let you put their heroes at risk voluntarily. As we mentioned, the Troll can only benefit from heroics called by Shank & Wrot, limiting you to 3 per game, or an average of 1.5 successful charges during the might-spending portion of the game if we’re assuming your opponent counter calls every one of your moves while the Trio have might to spend and makes it past the Troll’s Terror. However, it’s not all bad news – let’s not forget Barge, which will be this guy’s bread and butter. It allows him to trade a fight in which he isn’t charging for one in which he is, so he will do this often. There’s the potential for smart positional plays where you keep him away from an enemy F6 hero, only to barge in to them to gain F7. Terror is your other get out clause, and if your opponent fails their courage rolls, you may well get a charge off that way. Plus, if your opponent is using bodies to fail terror checks to tie up your troll, that’s bodies that are out of the fight for this turn.

So the question on the lips of the nation is – are they worth it? Well, that depends. Are they worth 150pts? Yes, easily. Shank & Wrot themselves are probably 100pts worth of hero by themselves, and a Cave Troll – a worse Snow Troll – is 75pts. But are they worth trading in the list of advantages (See Exhibit A) that you give up from Usurpers? Safe to say I’m unconvinced.

For the rest of the army, we’ll refer you back to our usurpers article for the in depth run downs. Wulf is still Wulf – albeit now he’s your General, has to charge, and doesn’t get +1 to wound enemy heroes (this one really hurts his assassin role), but does get his free Challenge. He still always wants his horse and his opponent still wants to take him off it ASAP. The ‘must charge’ is a bit brutal as his D5 is particularly weak to S3 troops, so a smart player will lure him in to a tar pit of warriors, at which point as soon as he fluffs his duel roll, you may as well cut him in to soldiers and dip him in to an egg, because he is toast.

Targg is still Targg, and is generally overshadowed by a pair of Chieftains. Those same Chieftains are still great value – however, they lose the mean trick of taking a 2H weapon and gaining +2 to wound enemy heroes, which I was a huuuuuuge fan of. Crebain are still Crebain (from Dunland!) Your Tribesmen are now locked at F3, making them even squishier and way less killy against most armies. They still bring the same bag of tricks and the same rules apply – max bows, plenty of spears, then sprinkle in torches and two-handers, but don’t sleep on the naked guys. (There must be a better way to phrase that…)

As a final point, I’ve just got to harp on about quite how bad not having access to a banner is. It sucks.  For the record, I really, really like what they’ve done with the rules for banners this edition – they’ve doubled down on them scoring for scenarios, while making them more difficult to pass along, and taking away their ability to spear support. They are now a true battlefield liability that must be protected, as they can account for up to 20% of the VPs. Keeping them safe is a tactical minigame in itself. All very cool and thematic – and yet there are still armies that can’t take them! Besiegers, as well as other armies, will be starting some scenarios at a 4VP deficit - more than the points for killing the leader or breaking in most scenarios. It’s like playing on hard mode. No bannerless army can ever be top-tier, regardless of their power, because they don’t have access to all the VPs other armies do. It makes no sense. It needs fixing. Rant over.

Assembling your Army

Buy the Battle of Edoras box, give the Rohan half to a friend (or keep it for yourself, to play Rohan or to use the Rohan Warriors as Traitor Rohirrim in Usurpers) and then pick up the Troll Trio. That’s everything you need to get up to 500pts (see List #1 below) and to its credit, it’s a fantastic budget entry to the game with only 2 purchases needed (we won’t entertain the idea of running this list without the Troll Trio). This new edition has been fantastic for decent entry-level armies, and this is one of the best examples of that. The only issue is that Usurpers itself is also a very beginner-friendly army - alongside all its other advantages (see Exhibit A).

Beyond the initial purchases, you’ve only got Crebain and more Tribesmen to add. Crebain seemed to be a hot button issue for our Usurpers article – they are fantastic and you can certainly go heavy on them, but with accessibility and budget in mind we’d recommend just one or two to start with. As there is still no Chieftain model, you’re looking at proxies or conversions here – but there are tons of shabbily dressed evil Men out there that could sub in for the time being.

Credit Games Workshop

Possible Pivots

We’re parroting the Usurpers article again here – but you’ve got Usurpers of Edoras itself (pick up Thorne and Freca and some Rohan Warriors if you haven’t got them already), or you can take your Tribesmen and fast forward to the War of the Ring and play them as Army of the White Hand, which requires a few more purchases but can itself pivot nicely in to the Isengard scouts lists.

Pros:

Extremely cheap to collect

Great starting point for new players

Troll Trio are powerful and have some fun tech

Wulf & Tribesmen are still fun

Cons:

(Please refer to Exhibit A)

Very, very few reasons to play this over Usurpers

Almost no troop variety

No Banner

Poor courage

Squishy

Low Fight value

Army bonus not useful in all scenarios

May have to double-call Heroic Moves

 

Lists & Discussion

As with all of these reviews, we’ll start with an ‘entry level’ list that you might want to aim for as you start collecting the army, and then move on to something more fleshed out.

These aren’t necessarily super-optimised lists, but they will be built in a sensible way that capitalizes on what think are the strengths of the list – and where possible, in a way that doesn’t mandate buying a whole box of infantry for a single model!

List #1:

If you are approaching this game as a self-contained board game with a friend, and have no interest in tournaments or endless expansion – you can absolutely make this list and stop there.

List #2:

If you’re thinking it’s basically the same list but bigger, you’d be correct. Besiegers runs out of variety around the 600pts mark, at which point you’re spamming Chieftains. Still, this army has got plenty of bodies, two large threats and a decent Might pool – though this will dwindle quickly if you’re trying to affect both the Troll and the horde with heroic moves. We’ve also put Targg on a horse, because the more threats we can give this limited army at 800pts, the better. 

On to the scores! Each category is scored out of ten, and we’ll explain below each score what it is we’re looking for.

Theme: 6

How well does this army encapsulate a moment from the books or films? Are all the right models present and does it feel like the moment it’s based on?

Power: 3

How well does it fare against other armies? We’ll be assuming that this is based on the Army’s ‘preferred’ points range, as it’s not very useful to assess how Lurtz’s Scouts performs at 1000pts, or Barad Dur at 300pts.

Cost & Collectability: 8

We’re looking at entry level cost to the army, how many purchases are needed, and are the models available off the shelf?

Hobby factor: 8

How good are the models? Are we dealing with shiny new plastics or stinky old finecast? Does the army require any converting, and does it lend itself to cool and unique paintjobs?

Fun factor: 5

How fun is that army to play, and crucially, how fun is it to play against?

Total: 30

A measly 30 for Besiegers, and this is really propped up by the fact that the models are new, easily available, and overall it’s a very cheap army to collect. Theme takes a bit of a hit – if we’re honest with ourselves, the Troll Trio were kinda just there at the siege and weren’t really fighting with the Dunlendings, though this is somewhat shown by their inability to share heroics. The fun factor is buoyed heavily by the Troll and its funky rules, and if you’re wondering why it only gets a 3 for power… well, I’ll refer you to Exhibit A.

That’ll do it for our Hornburg coverage. If I’m honest, I’m disappointed in both of these armies, and would only recommend them as a starter kit for those not intending to expand their collections, as a change of pace for competitive players, or as a ‘just passing through’ on your way to playing either Usurpers, Army of Edoras, or other larger Rohan armies. Still, they offer variety to people who have bought or received the Edoras starter box and are not looking to build an extensive collection of miniatures.

 

List Reviews: Defenders of the Hornburg

The sales pitch: The besieged Rohirrim’s desperate last stand! Depending how you build this army, it’s either Helm or Hera’s show – and, in this blogger’s humble opinion, one is for when you want to re-enact the movie and the other is for when you want to win games.

Credit: Warhammer Community

What makes it tick?

It’s a Rohan Infantry army, so you’re looking at mid-to-high numbers, low-ish defense, and lots of throwing spears, with a rather good hero lineup in the form of Hera, the surprisingly great Olwyn, the supporting Lief, and the Rohan Swiss Army Captain - and then you’ve got Helm. Yes, that’s two digs at Helm in as many sentences, and don’t worry, we’ll get to him later. In terms of infantry, Dominant (2) is the headline, and not only is it really strong, it’s very thematic for a beleaguered, besieged force. Basic S3 D5 Rohan troops aren’t setting the world on fire, but they are cheap, and the effective extra head count will help your ragged late-game battle line clutch out objectives in many scenarios.

Credit: Warhammer Community

Hera is a must-take, a F6 D6 3A brawler that prevents your opponent from striking, meaning you can throw her in to a F7 hero and guarantee to at least tie fight value if you strike. With Defense too, she can be a real roadblock and punch far above her weight, and can even withstand a charge from a mounted cavalry hero with her combat stance. While her reroll-wounds-on-the-charge means she isn’t bad at killing things, she’s not exactly an assassin at S4 3A, and will take a while to chew through any multi-wound model at D5 or higher. I’d give her a shield and put her in more of a defensive role against those big heroes – she’s survivable enough that you can play her conservatively and keep your General VP’s relatively safe.

Olwyn on the other hand – at 100pts mounted with F5 3A and no strike, you want her in the thick of it. Enemy heroes and even F5 troops will give her cause for pause, but as she only takes wounds on a (modifiable) 6, and with 3 fate backing up her 2 wounds, she will take quite a bit of punishment before going down. I’d expect her to drop eventually, but if you throw her in to the fray and get her killing troops, I’d expect her to earn her points back almost all of the time.

Credit: Warhammer Community

Lief is an interesting one. For 50pts, you get access to a suite of once-per-game 3” buffs, but using them efficiently is hard as they all want Lief to be in different situations. Compounding the issue is that fact that his buffs are switched on after his activation – meaning that anything that wants to make use of it during the movement phase needs to start its activation near where Lief finishes his activation. I’m sure someone smarter than me can come up with an optimal flowchart for Lief that involves him seamlessly moving from one buff to the next, but here is the most sense I can make of it:

• Free hero heroic combats – easy enough, have Lief finish his move near several heroes. If you can bunch up your heroes and get 3 or 4 might points worth of value, then Lief has already paid for himself. This is your most important buff.
• Fearless – a little awkward, as it kicks in after Lief’s move, meaning Lief need to lag behind the units he’s buffing. Best used after lines have already clashed and preferably to guarantee tying up a terror-causing model.
• No move-and-shoot penalty and reroll hit rolls – potentially really strong, and worth a bit of engineering to make the most of. If you can get Lief in to a block of 12 archers, this takes your expected hits while half moving from 4 to 9; or, to put it differently, 12 buffed archers are pulling the weight of 27 unbuffed ones for a single turn. If you’re on your game with movement, you can probably get even more in to the bubble.
• Woodland creature / mountain dweller for a turn – situational, and awkward to use as it kicks in after Lief’s move. However, I can see a fringe use for this if you can use it to mount a surprise cavalry charge through terrain. Situationally powerful.
• Extra 2” move – awkward to use, as if you’re using this to march up the board, Lief is likely dropping behind – he can’t move ahead and switch on the buff as the other models will then be out of range, so he has to ‘sacrifice’ his move for the turn to affect his pals. However, as it doesn’t come with the restrictions of a heroic march, you can definitely use this to surprise your opponent when they think they’re out of charge range.

It’s an interesting, janky toolkit, but is it worth 50pts? For fun factor alone, definitely. And he can definitely win you games, though I think newer players may find it tough to get value out of his situational bonuses – he isn’t the likes of Freca or Gamling who can sit back and give passive benefits, and will require you to actively engineer situations where he can give benefit. At F3 1A, he’s a lover not a fighter, and can be a liability in scenarios that reward killing heroes. He provides capacity for high-skill and unpredictable plays, which is always valuable in the hands of a player who can recognise and exploit those opportunities. More importantly though, he seems really interesting to use and comes with a high skill ceiling, something we always love to see.

Rounding out the hero roster is the trusty Rohan Captain, who runs anywhere from 45 to 75 points. Fully kitted, they are real speedbumps even for assassin characters – most heroes will need 6s to wound their D7, meaning they can take a few turns to chew through 2W 1F - but they can also be taken lean if you just want the march, the might, and the extra unit capacity. If you’ve got Lief, I’d give your Captains horses for another high-impact free heroic combat – an extra 2 dead enemy warriors will mostly repay the cost of the horse. The Captain is also your only access to Heroic March, which is important in a foot slogging army.

 

Credit: Warhammer Community

On the troops side, you’re just looking at Warriors and Riders of Rohan, with only infantry gaining Dominant (2) and rerolling 1s to wound – both great, although neither of them change the fact that you’re topping out at F3 troops, or F4 in the case of charging cavalry. In general, when you have access to cavalry, you’ll always want at least a couple for objectives, but cannot take them en masse here due to them being counted towards your bow limit. There are other flavours of Rohan that do massed cavalry far, far better - this is a Rohan battleline army through and through. You are probably looking at one third shields, one third bows, one third spear & shield, with a few cavalry thrown in.  

Okay, let’s talk about the Helmephant in the room. He’s just... not good. I’ve spent some time trying to find the silver lining in his profile that makes him worth 180pts, but it’s just not there. I won’t list all of his little bonuses and gimmicks – he has a metric ton of them, but none of them substantially remedy the fact that he’s a squishy, expensive model with no innate magic defense, no utility, that can’t bring troops, and is costed like a combat monster but isn’t even that good at killing things.

Let’s break it down. He’s 3A, S6, D5, F7. Good start, especially the strength 6, but he’s still looking at 4s to wound D5/D6. For a 3-attack model, that’s not setting the world on fire, and can’t reliably kill a pair of D5 troops to trigger a heroic combat…which he only gets for free when charging.

When comparing to the similarly priced infantry heroes Azog (a hero killing monster), Elendil (a great all-rounder) or Aragorn (a versatile utility piece) he looks bad. But the comparison that stings the most is Lurtz - a 100pt hero that trades a point of strength for a point of defense, and gets an unconditional heroic combat every turn. Ouch. Not to mention the fact that those heroes can all bring troops, use Stand Fasts and Heroics to help out their mates. Oof. For me, the final nail in the coffin is his Berserk Rage forcing him to charge if he can, which a smart opponent will use to cause him big problems – I would just lure him in to a pit of D5+ troops, and with no means of modifying his own dice, his 3 might will evaporate quickly as he has to force the 6 on the duel every turn to stay alive. It’s the same strategy I’d usually use against Aragorn, except Helm doesn’t need de-horsing first, doesn’t have the free might to help on the duels, and will likely die the first time he takes hits as D5 is very weak to S3 troops.

How would I improve Helm, other than a 30+pt drop? As a glass cannon character he really doesn’t have the hitting power to justify his fragility, so that’s what I would change. I really think there is an argument for him being the only native 4-attack small base infantry model in the game (2 per fist?), or for having a built in +1 to wound (but not both of these). His free heroic combat and terror should always be switched on, no question. The latter would also make his Horn of the Hammerhand much more useful – you’d always be forcing terror checks at a -1 on the turn he blows it, as opposed to this being reliant on winning the heroic move off to switch his terror on as it is now.

Let’s talk about a few of his upsides – I’ve given him quite a scathing review, but he’s not a bad profile, he’s just overcosted. Can he perform well? Yes, absolutely. Raw killing power backed up by fight value will always do good work in the right hands. He terrifies high-wounds, low-fate heroes. He can’t be your leader, so you can afford to play him recklessly or trade him. S6 prevents you from being knocked prone by charging cavalry so he’s not easy to assassinate with a cavalry hero. War horns are always good (although less so if you lose them before breaking), and there is the potential for a smart play by using the once per game -1 courage on a turn in which you expect to kill an enemy hero, combining the once per game ‘Horn of the Hammerhand’ with the ‘Frenzy of the King’ rule. Models within 3” of Helm must then pass a courage check at  -1 or run away from Helm during the end phase, so the -1 courage can really help to disrupt enemy lines – you will just have to win a heroic move off the next turn to capitalise on this. You can also save the once-per-game horn toot for when your opponent has broken, which could be devastating to armies with already low courage values – orcs sticking around on a 9+, anybody?

And lastly – glass cannons are just good fun. If we’re really honest with ourselves, if your aim is to play a competitive Rohan infantry army, you’re probably looking elsewhere anyway… So why not throw angry santa in the mix and have a good time?

Assembling your Army

Normally for a Rohan army we’d be recommending starting with the Edoras box or the Rohan Battlehost, but if you’re looking to run this army in particular, there’s nothing wrong with just buying a couple of boxes of Rohan Warriors – none of the heroes from the Rohan bundles are present here. But to be honest, it’s so easy to transition between Rohan armies once you’ve got a bulk of Warriors and Riders painted, there aren’t any bad options when buying in to Rohan, and the bundles will give you more options later on. At the time of writing, Helm and Hera are available individually and Lief is on the way, but Olwyn is currently unreleased and will require proxying. You’ll also need to pick up a Rohan Commanders pack for a captain and a banner. The forge world heroes are pricey, but it’s not a tough army to collect as the bulk of its troops are new plastics, making the price pretty agreeable overall.

When assembling an army list, your only complication is that if you’re bringing Helm, he can’t take any troops, which makes him almost impossible to include at low points. This evens out at higher points as Hera and mounted Olwyn are both great heroes who can bring a good number of troops with them, so I think they are always your starting point.

Possible Pivots

I would imagine that a lot of people eyeing up this army have played Army of Edoras from the starter box and want to expand their options. Defenders is a great, low-commitment pivot that only involves painting a handful of heroes and potentially a few more Warriors.

After these two, you can expand to the more contemporary flavour of Rohan, adding in more heroes, Riders, and Royal Guard as necessary. You’ve got great options for foot-slogging Rohan in Defenders of Helm’s Deep, which adds in elves for some high fight value support and vicious shooting. Unmounted Rohan also show up in Men of the West. If you have purchased one of the bundles then you can pivot to any number of armies that feature mounted Rohan, and after playing Defenders you will be well stocked with painted dismounts!

 

Pros:

Super themey

Fun and flavourful named heroes

Dominant 2 wins games

High skill ceiling with Lief

Decent at range if maxed on bows & spears

Cons:

Helm is overcosted

Limited troop options with no real F4

No model for Olwyn at time of writing

Cannot bring a full back rank of spears due to throwing weapon limit

Low defense across the board

 

Lists & Discussion

As with all of these reviews, we’ll start with an ‘entry level’ list that you might want to aim for as you start collecting the army, and then move on to something more fleshed out.

These aren’t necessarily super-optimised lists, but they will be built in a sensible way that capitalizes on what think are the strengths of the list – and where possible, in a way that doesn’t mandate buying a whole box of infantry for a single model!

List #1:

This is a lovely starting point. You’ve got slightly above average numbers, two really robust heroes, decent might, very healthy shooting (if you can get a round of shooting off with all of your bows and spears, it’s quite scary) and even better, you only need a single pack of warriors and riders each.

List #2:

For the record, if I was trying to make a strong list, I’d absolutely have Olwyn here instead of Helm, and she would definitely find her way in to the list at 800. But this is really a pretty good balance of power and theme. I think the game would pivot on trying to get a single turn where the Captain, Helm and Hera all have a free Heroic Combat to smash apart the enemy lines, and go from there. Considering you’ve got two fairly massive heroes, this list is pretty healthy on numbers, too!

On to the scores! Each category is scored out of ten, and we’ll explain below each score what it is we’re looking for.

Theme: 8

How well does this army encapsulate a moment from the books or films? Are all the right models present and does it feel like the moment it’s based on?

Power: 4

How well does it fare against other armies? We’ll be assuming that this is based on the Army’s ‘preferred’ points range, as it’s not very useful to assess how Lurtz’s Scouts performs at 1000pts, or Barad Dur at 300pts.

Cost & Collectability: 7

We’re looking at entry level cost to the army, how many purchases are needed, and are the models available off the shelf?

Hobby factor: 6

How good are the models? Are we dealing with shiny new plastics or stinky old finecast? Does the army require any converting, and does it lend itself to cool and unique paintjobs?

Fun factor: 6

How fun is that army to play, and crucially, how fun is it to play against?

Total: 31

 

A fairly middling 31 for Defenders, and that score is really buoyed by theme and collectability. Hobby drops a few points – but will gain these back once the full roster is available for purchase! On the fun side of things, the troop selection is very limited but you’ve got some very unique heroes and a big glass cannon, which always leads to eventful games, one way or another.

Next week we’ll be continuing our coverage of the War of the Rohirrim armies with the counterpart to Defenders – it’s Besiegers of the Hornburg!

List Reviews: Usurpers of Edoras

Dan Stu:

The sales pitch: It’s a true horde army with access to F4 and plentiful spear supports, which is a huge deal. You’ve also got a really punchy hero-seeking missile in Wulf, who doesn’t even have to be your leader so he can go full assassin mode. And with a large variety of troop wargear options and heroes, Usurpers brings a surprising amount of list building flexibility and a diverse toolkit. It’s a battleline horde army that can also make big plays. This will be a long one – there’s lots to talk about!

Credit: Warhammer Community

What makes it tick?

The army consists of the War of the Rohirrim antagonists – Wulf, Targg, Freca and Thorne, backed up by cheap Tribesmen and Rohirrim Traitors, with Crebain thrown in to the mix. We’re definitely in the realm of mid- to low-tier heroes and large numbers of low value troops, and solving your problems by throwing bodies at them – the very obvious exception being Wulf, who we’ll talk about in a minute.

In terms of special rules, there are some good ones – all of your Tribesmen (including their Chieftains) gain a 6+ ‘feel no pain’ roll, which might not reliably turn the tide of a battle on its own but can definitely prevent some key heroic combats from happening, and may deter your opponent from calling them in the first place. Almost everything has Hatred (Rohan), and the other is a blanket +1 to wound against enemy Heroes for all your Dunland models (everything except Thorne and co.) This is great news for Wulf, but perhaps even better news for your Wildmen. For a lot of horde armies, your answer to big heroes is to throw bodies at them and incur losses until they run out of might. With a +1 to wound, this will happen much more quickly, as even 2 or 3 Tribesmen pose a large threat to heroes, and can force them to spend might to recover from a fluffed duel roll.

Credit: Warhammer Community

For me, the beating heart of this army is the twin 6” Fight 4 bubbles provided by Freca and Lord Thorne for Dunland and Rohirrim warriors respectively, and while building your army around these two is not the only way to make a Usurpers list, it’s where I’d start most of the time.  Smart placement will see these guys cover your entire battle line, and while horde armies are generally expected to be out-fight-valued, F4 will tie with (or even beat) a lot of armies, massively boosting the survivability of your D3 tribesmen. These two bring a combined 27 models’ worth of effectively-fight-4 Hill Tribesmen and the less squishy Rohirrim Traitors, who can get to D5 with wargear - in the land in the land of D3 Tribesmen, the D5 man is king, so these guys can add a solid anchor for your army.

Credit: Warhammer Community

Tribesmen have three great wargear options in spears, bows and brands, or can be kept naked as an efficient 5pt warrior. Light shields are terrible, and 2h weapons are fun but risky - though +2 to wound heroes is hilarious and cannot be ignored, especially in the hands of a good player. The Rohirrim Traitors also bring along some really interesting wargear options – they give your only access to a Banner (a must have), but also a Warhorn, which can bring tons of value for a low-courage horde, pushing your OK-not-great 7+ courage rolls to a very healthy 6+. For a meaty 3pts (almost the cost of a naked Tribesman) they can also bring a shield and spear which can double as a throwing weapon - however, all these wargear options can really eat in to your model count, so it’s up to you how ‘hordey’ you want your army to be, though maxing your throwing weapons as well as your cheap wildman archers can give you a surprisingly shooty army, if that's your thing. Finally you have Crebain, a bit of a wildcard unit – fast and durable, and while they can't carry objectives (which they will be sad about when Heirlooms and Seize the Prize return), they can hold or destroy them. At the cost of 4 naked Tribesmen they’re a tough sell at low points, so I probably start including some in at 500pts or above - their ability to flap over to any objective marker on the last turn can win you a game of Fog of War or Domination, if taken in threes they can put your opponent on the back foor for Reconnoitre, and a well-placed Crebain can win Destroy the Supplies single-taloned. Extra tools in the tool belt is always a good thing. 

Gosh I love these models.
Credit: Games Workshop

The Hill Tribes Chieftain gets a special mention for pure value. 40pts is a bargain. For the cost of a single Freca or Targg you get a full two Chieftains – that’s double the attacks, double the might, double the wounds. Sure, they’re only F4 and D4, but they’re still prickly with their +1 to wound heroes and feel no pain. The two handed option is really intriguing for 5pts (the cost of a single body), with +2 to wounding heroes all but forcing them to spend resources to win their fights. You’ll be leaning on these guys if you want to maximise your body count.

In terms of your rank and file, this all adds up to a horde army that should outnumber most enemies, but can fight two-deep at fight 4. And while you will undoubtedly lose D3 models quickly, your aim should be to wrap and trap your opponent. You should avoid engaging until you have a good opportunity to this – your squishy battle line will only have a few turns before they are whittled down and you need to use this time wisely.

Let’s talk about Wulf. In keeping with his character, everything about his profile screams ‘hero seeking missile’, more so if the hero in question is infantry and he is mounted, and even more so if they are F6 or lower. And if they happen to be of the Rohan persuasion, Eru help them when Wulf gets in to charge range. If you manage to get Wulf charging in to a hero and under a banner effect, you’re looking at 4 attacks with 2 rerolls (5A if you Challenge), Heroic Strike, with +1 and rerolling 1s to wound. With knockdown, this should be enough to kill most heroes in the game. Cementing his role as assassin is the General Hunter rule which refunds the might you spend on striking, and the fact that Freca has to be your General, allowing you to be incredibly (and thematically) reckless with Wulf. Unlike Freca, Wulf provides no buffs to your troops, so if you have a shot at trading Wulf for the enemy General, there are few reasons not to have a go. As a cherry on top, if he succeeds in taking out the General, Freca will become a 6” banner if he’s nearby which will help you mop up afterwards. 

Credit: Warhammer Community

All that is to say - the first question you should ask yourself when playing this army is, 'can Wulf snipe the enemy general early on', and go from there. Of course, all this paints a massive target on Wulf’s back, meaning that any opponent with the means to de-horse him will do so as a top priority - it's the difference between your their General being dead in one round of combat or not. That said, I’d still give him a mount every time. The equivalent cost of 4 wildmen may occasionally win you a game, but Wulf’s horse will do so regularly in matchups where the opponent does not have a means of unmounting him. Plus it's more fun. Plus the model is cool. 

In terms of the rest of your named heroes, they are all fairly lukewarm in combat, bringing 2 attacks at F5 S4. While Freca and Thorne earn their points for their fight value buff, Targg is a more dubious value proposition, with a 4+ Master of Battle and a highly conditional ‘reroll 1s to wound’ buff bubble. This relies on you giving priority to your opponent, something you don’t often do once in combat, making this rule both situational and weak – big whiff. I don't want to undersell Master of Battle, it's fantastic, but it's also the only compelling reason to bring him. Free heroics 50% of the time is well and good, but you know what's better? 4 might points instead of 2 for the same cost, in the form of a pair of Chieftains. This makes Targg probably the last priority for inclusion, as he contributes very little to the ‘horde plus Wulf’ archetype.

Assembling your Army

The models in Usurpers are state-of-the-art. Nowhere else will you find a list made of entirely new plastic troops, with the sole exception of your Rohan Commander models. Freca, Thorne and the Crebain are in Forge World resin, and sadly we currently have to proxy or convert our Tribesman Chieftains (tactical rock and skull helmet?) but this is still a very easy army to collect.

Without question, the Battle of Edoras box is the only sensible starting point. It gives possibly the best value of any box set in the game’s history, owing to the fact that you can use both the good and evil troops in a single army. While you can collect this army in other ways – just don’t. Flog the rulebook and Good heroes if you have to, and make use of everything else. Freca and Thorne have a slightly eye-watering price for two 25mm base heroes, but as I see it, it all averages out to one of the best value armies around. If you’re buying Thorne, you will definitely also want a Rohan Commanders box, giving you access to a banner and a horn – you may even consider a second banner beyond 600pts or so.

When assembling your Tribesmen, you get 8 bows, and then it’s your choice between spears vs 2h weapons, and brands vs hand weapons with optional shields. Spears are incredibly important to how this army plays, so I’d ensure you have plenty of those first before considering a few 2h weapons. You definitely want some brands too, but probably not maxed out – naked Tribesmen for 5pts are a gold standard of efficiency, and at such a low cost, the jump to 6pts is significant. To grow your army past ~500pts, you will need a further box of Tribesmen to increase your options and head count. On a very practical level, assembling Tribesmen is quite fiddly - very doable but a little time consuming, so make sure you put some time aside!

Traitor Rohirrim are straightforward - I would go all shields, half spears and a banner, making Thorne & Co a nice little self contained warband. The Rohan troops in the box will give you 8 with shield, 8 with spear & shield, allowing for some flexibility. I would avoid using the bows, because the D5 is invaluable in a D3 army, and Tribesmen have the same shooting profile for a point less while still dying on 5s vs S2 archery. The D3 is weaker against S3 bows, but you’re probably not trying to win the shooting war against those anyway.

Possible Pivots

The obvious pivot is to Besiegers of the Hornburg. After painting up this army you’d only need to pick up Shank, Wrot and the Snow Troll if you wanted to use them (and as we’ll discuss, if you’re running Besiegers, you probably do).

The next pivot is in to Isengard, and it’s a good one – Army of the White Hand. Hill Tribesman double up as Wildmen of Dunland, and your Crebain can come along for the ride too. You’ll need to pick up Saruman and Grima, and your choice of Uruk Hai Scouts, Mordor Orcs, and their associated banners. The Wildman Oathmaker is not available at the time of writing, but his fearless Wildmen bubble makes him a must-take as far as I’m concerned.

Credit: Warhammer Community

Pros:

-          Great numbers

-          Varied toolkit

-          Strong, playmaking hero

-          F4 and spears on a horde army

-          Almost entirely brand new models

-          Great value

Cons:

-          Squishy across the board

-          Only one playmaker who hates losing his horse

-          Restricted banner access

 

Lists & Discussion

As with all of these reviews, we’ll start with an ‘entry level’ list that you might want to aim for as you start collecting the army, and then move on to something more fleshed out.

These aren’t necessarily super-optimised lists, but they will be built in a sensible way that capitalizes on what think are the strengths of the list – and where possible, in a way that doesn’t mandate buying a whole box of infantry for a single model!

List #1:

Normally we’d start off at 400pts, but given that the starter box gives you all the troops needed, there’s no reason not to jump in at 500! This army requires just 4 purchases, is made up of all the wargear options provided in the box, has good numbers and good shooting. If you’re just getting started in the game, this is a really solid thing to aim for. With 33 models at 500pts I’m not sure I’d call this a true horde army just yet…

List #2:

Oh yeah, that’s the stuff. With the Chieftain’s warband costing just shy of 100pts, you can more or less copy & paste this to get to 800pts or higher. More seasoned players may wish to go for a full warband of throwing spears with Thorne, but it makes your deployment more awkward if you want to optimise their efficiency as spear supports. I’ve gone for lots of bows here but if you wanted to spam numbers even harder, you could ditch the bows and go for even more Tribesmen with no wargear. And speaking of spamming numbers:

Bonus List #3:

A disclaimer – please don’t do this. I’m not saying it’s not fun or not good, but I really don’t want the thought of anybody painting 66 Hill Tribesman models on my conscience.

Bonus List #4: 

Okay okay, I'll stop now - it's just such a fun army to write lists for! This is a decidedly ranged skew approach to the army, and it really looks pretty devastating. 24 ranged attacks at 600pts is nothing to sniff at - and by the time you've closed ranks, you've still got a very competent fighting force of F4 infantry, great numbers and a couple of objective grabbers - it just goes to show how well equipped this army is to build a variety of list types.  

On to the scores! Each category is scored out of ten, and we’ll explain below each score what it is we’re looking for.

Theme: 7

How well does this army encapsulate a moment from the books or films? Are all the right models present and does it feel like the moment it’s based on?

Power: 7

How well does it fare against other armies? We’ll be assuming that this is based on the Army’s ‘preferred’ points range, as it’s not very useful to assess how Lurtz’s Scouts performs at 1000pts, or Barad Dur at 300pts.

Cost & Collectability: 9

We’re looking at entry level cost to the army, how many purchases are needed, and are the models available off the shelf?

Hobby factor: 9

How good are the models? Are we dealing with shiny new plastics or stinky old finecast? Does the army require any converting, and does it lend itself to cool and unique paintjobs?

Fun factor: 8

How fun is that army to play, and crucially, how fun is it to play against?

Total: 40/50

A mighty 40 for the Usurpers! While their big hero is easily shut down, I believe they have the tools to deal with most scenarios and matchups. Theme wise, I’d love to see a reason to include Targg, but at the cost of two Chieftains, I just don’t think he makes it in to most lists. They only drop a single point on cost & collectability due to the pricey resin heroes, and their beautiful new model range sees them score high in hobby factor. The horde & hero play style is a blast, and there’s a ton of granularity in how you build your troops, giving the army a high skill ceiling.

Our random article generator has blessed us with a glut of War of the Rohirrim armies to cover - so keep an eye out for a Hornburg double-bill in the coming weeks!

Army List Review: Barad-dur

The sales pitch:

Barad-dur is about one guy and his name is Sauron. He basically never dies, he will outfight almost everything in the game, he stops your Orcs from breaking when they inevitably die in droves, he can take a tonne of them (24) and he makes them generally braver when he's around. It's a bit of a shame then that despite all this he just isn't that good. 

Credit Games Workshop

What makes it tick?

Don't get me wrong, he has some crazy impressive stats at F9 S8 D10 and a 2+ to stand back up again when he dies, but his problem is the same as it's always been in that those stats don't mean much when he is likely just being fed one model a turn. Imagine this guy if he got free Heroic Combats each turn, then we'd be interested but as he is, he just isn't going to pull his weight at 400 points. Chill Soul on a 4+ is pretty good since he gets a free point of Will each turn, but again it just isn't enough to justify his cost. Also once he's taken 3 wounds (no easy feat I concede) he's not even stopping your Orcs running away any more. To me this is a real shame as his 400 points could absolutely justify him being a monster. Think about how much damage the Mumak War Leader does when he tramples your line at the same points. I think his never dying rule has been way over valued and would have preferred to see him as a combat monster instead. "But Dan, he does a S8 hit to everyone including supports in combat" I hear you cry. Well if your opponent is stupid enough to put 10 guys into him then fair enough but if that's the case you probably already were going to win anyway.

You can also include the Witch King, Ringwraiths and Mordor Troll Chieftains, and while all of these are decent, you'd have to be playing a truly gigantic game to be able to afford to bring them. I think the strategy here has really got to be Captains and a huge mass of Orcs to make up for your 400 point big lad. 

I feel like I have been very negative in this review and honestly that's because when writing lists I found myself constantly disappointed in what I was getting. Sauron being Dominant (10) will win you some games (specifically Hold Ground) but otherwise it's just hard to see how you have a chance. Here is my spicy hot take: make Sauron 250 points. 400 is just way too much, and that extra 150 points could buy you a Troll Chieftain. Imagine if you just got a free Troll Chieftain with Sauron, he'd instantly be something you'd actually want to take. As it is I'm afraid this list is just a bit of a dud. 

Credit Games Workshop

Assembling your Army

If, despite that cavalcade of negativity, you still fancy giving Barad Dur a go, then you'll need Sauron and a bunch of Orcs. Both are easily available and actually it means you can get an army together really quite cheaply. After that you can add spice to taste. All the models in the list are pretty easy to get hold of and the majority are plastic too which is great. 

Possible Pivots

This is another place where I can be positive, in that once you have got a horde of Orcs there are a decent number of things you can do with them. Minas Morgul is the obvious one, where you can even use your Witch King, Ringwraiths and Trolls if you fancy. Your Orcs getting blades of the dead and not having to take Terror checks is pretty great! If you want to add some Mordor Uruk Hai you can pivot into Cirith Ungol where you can have Wish.com Legolas and Gimli (Shagrat and Gorbag) as well as Shelob. And let's not forget about the 3 Angmar armies too, Host of the Witch King, Shadows of Angmar and Buhrdur's Horde, all of which are great, thematic, and make good use of Orc warriors.

 

Pros:

Cheap to collect
You get to use the big bad of the franchise!

Cons:

You have to take Sauron and he is not worth 400 points.

What will happen to your army almost immediately

 

Lists & Discussion

As with all of these reviews, we’ll start with an ‘entry level’ list that you might want to aim for as you start collecting the army, and then move on to something more fleshed out.

These aren’t necessarily super-optimised lists, but they will be built in a sensible way that capitalizes on what think are the strengths of the list – and where possible, in a way that doesn’t mandate buying a whole box of infantry for a single model!

List #1:

Barad-dur at 500 points

To be fair, this isn't a terrible amount of models at 500 points, but considering the Orcs are F3 S3 D4 (or 5 with shield) they aren't going to last a long time. I umm-ed and ahh-ed about a banner but you'd have to go down to 13 models and that seems really bad. Sauron not being a gigantic banner himself is also a bit of a travesty to be honest. The strategy here is to walk Sauron in a straight line towards whatever heroes you opponent brought whilst Chill Soul-ing anything that looks at him funny (banners, cavalry, etc). Your Orcs are just body blockers that hopefully delay the game long enough for Sauron to actually make an impact . I think this could be ok but it is really going to depend on how long your Orcs last and that's generally not something you want to depend on.

 

List #2:

Barad-dur at 800 points

    

    

Yeesh man I really though we were going to get bigger numbers than this. I got bored of clicking on Orcs at one point and threw a Troll in before hastily taking him back out. Whilst it would be nice to have another big threat this list can't afford to take a 15-Orc hit to fit one in. The strategy is the same as before here, but at least now you can use your Captains to March everyone to the enemy quicker I guess.



x

 

 

On to the scores! Each category is scored out of ten, and we’ll explain below each score what it is we’re looking for.

Theme: 9

How well does this army encapsulate a moment from the books or films? Are all the right models present and does it feel like the moment it’s based on?

Power: 3

How well does it fare against other armies? We’ll be assuming that this is based on the Army’s ‘preferred’ points range, as it’s not very useful to assess how Lurtz’s Scouts performs at 1000pts, or Barad Dur at 300pts.

Cost & Collectability: 8

We’re looking at entry level cost to the army, how many purchases are needed, and are the models available off the shelf?

Hobby factor: 4

How good are the models? Are we dealing with shiny new plastics or stinky old finecast? Does the army require any converting, and does it lend itself to cool and unique paintjobs?

Fun factor: 5

How fun is that army to play, and crucially, how fun is it to play against?

Total: 29/50

Sauron and a tonne of Orcs certainly feels like the opening scenes of the movies so the theme is good, as is cost as you only really need the big man and a box of Orcs to get going. However we lose points because the models are almost as old as me, and as discussed extensively, I just can't see how the list is good. Fun factor really depends on how much you like the power fantasy of being the lord of all darkness I suppose!

So come on then, what have I missed? There's got to be some reason to take this, theme aside. Let us know in the comments!