5th Place (Thranduil's Halls, White Council, Fellowship and Minas Tirith Yellow Alliance)
Thranduil with Heavy Armour, Additional Sword and Circlet of Kings
9 Mirkwood Elves with Shield
1 Mirkwood Elf with Glaive
2 Palace Guard with Spear and Shield
Galdariel, Lady of Light
Boromir of Gondor with Horse
Madril
2 Knights of Minas Tirith
6 Warriors of Minas Tirith with Spear and Shield
4 Rangers of Gondor with Spears
28 Models, 15 Might
A bit of a Frankenstein of a list here! It is a small force for 700 points (though not the smallest one in the Top 5!) but it contains 2 combat monsters and 2 super supporters. Boromir has 6 Might and Thranduil has 3, so once these guys are in combat they are very much able to just throw Might at things until they die! Not that they necessarily need to, both being absolute monsters anyway! Galadriel, Lady of Light is incredibly good in the current meta. She naturally has Blinding Light active (The Light of Earendil), she causes Terror and she gives a -1 to enemy courage. This also makes her Instil Fear spell better too. Banishment is good to have and Fortify Spirit is very useful, especially for Boromir who only has 1 Will and no Fate. Galadriel is also surprisingly decent in a fight herself if she ever needed to help out in other ways. Madril is an excellent hero who provides 3 Might, Heroic March and help with Maelstrom Deployment for a very cheap cost! Finally the troops are there to keep the heroes from getting swamped, but with F5 and D7 in abundance they can be a threat in themselves.
4th Place (Arnor and Rivendell Yellow Alliance)
Arvedui
13 Warriors of Arnor
1 Warrior of Arnor with Banner
Malbeth
11 Warriors of Arnor
1 Warrior of Arnor with Banner
Captain of Arnor with Bow
6 Rangers of Arnor with Spear
6 Rangers of Arnor
Captain of Arnor
Cirdan
43 Models, 9 Might
This is a bit of a horde but not a usual one. Usually the troops in a horde army are completely disposable and pretty rubbish. Here though, the base Warriors are actually really good being F4, D6 and a built in Spear! The Rangers are only D4 but have a 3+ shoot value which is great. When these masses of troops are combined with the huge amount of buffs from the heroes they really do become formidable. Arvedui has a 12" Stand Fast, Malbeth gives everyone within 6" a 5+ Fate roll (which is disgustingly incredible) and Cirdan has his usual suite of spells to fit any occasion. The list does lack a big combat hero but Arvedui and the Captain are both reasonable, with F5 and S4. Cirdan can back them up with Enchanted Blades if need be, but I would imagine the tactic really is to just tarpit anyone too scary. It seems the whole army is built around simply outlasting the opponent and clearly it has worked!
3rd Place (Barad Dur Pure list)
Sauron
12 Black Numenoreans
10 Orcs with Spear
1 Orc with Spear and Banner
1 Warg Rider
Shelob
26 Models, 3 Might
This is smallest army in the top 5 and also the least Might-y (by which I mean it has a lack of Might points, not that it isn't powerful!) It's basically Sauron - The Army List. I can't really do more than point you in the direction of his profile if you want to know what he does - there is simply too much to describe! The rest of the list is backup/objective play. It is worth noting that over half the army causes Terror though! I am very impressed that such a small army did so well, especially considering that it lacks a lot of the tricks of the other small lists, which tend to Frankenstein together all the most powerful stuff from several lists.
2nd Place (Defenders of Helms Deep Legendary Legion)
Theoden with Heavy Armour and Shield
Gamling with Royal Standard of Rohan
Haldir with Heavy Armour and Elf Bow
Legolas
Aldor
Haleth
10 Royal Guard with Spears
10 Warriors of Rohan with Spear and Shield
10 Warriors of Rohan with Bow
(Not sure about the distribution of the warbands here)
36 Models, 14 Might
I feel like I must be missing something with this list as it seems OK but not great. Clearly I am wrong though and it has come second at a big tournament! The troops seem self explanatory, forming a F4, D6 block as the LL allows throwing spears to be used as regular spears. There are a lot of heroes in the list, which is clearly where the power comes from. We have 3 excellent archer heroes to back up the 10 troops with bows, so this has got to be a list that wins a lot of shooting battles, especially as the LL increases the range to 30". In combat, Legolas and Haldir provide some much needed F6, which Rohan lacks. Having said that, Haleth can make the troops F5 if he is engaged and Theoden also becomes F6! Haleth is a really important piece in this list, which makes the whole thing risky as he can be easily killed if you aren't careful. Gamling can help to keep him alive by refreshing his Might every turn. As you can see there are a fair few tricks that aren't immediately obvious but it still must have been played masterfully to do as well as it did! If I am missing something about the list then please let me know!
1st Place (Survivors of Lake Town Pure list)
Bard with Horse and Armour
AlfridSigrid and Tilda7 Militia with Shields7 Militia with Spears1 Militia with Spear and Shield
Gandalf the Grey12 Militia with Bows
Bilbo6 Militia with Shields6 Militia with Spears
45 Models, 9 Might (Possibly infinite Might!)
We have written about a very similar list like this before in our Scouring of Stirlingshire list review (though that was at 800 points) so I will just paraphrase that. This is a horde army headed by a big hero and supported by an excellent Magic user. Bard has all the usual buffs, including the ability to restore Alfrid's Will with Gandalf's free point of Will each turn and then give that to Bard in the form of a Might point. Essentially this gives Bard the Mighty Hero special rule in a roundabout way! Gandalf can also cast a load of other spells too if Bard isn't in need of the Might. He's also no slouch in a fight (F5 S5) but with only 1A base that certainly isn't his main use. Bilbo is a great Ringbearer as he never suffers the possible downsides of having the Ring on but he gets all the benefits (halving Fight value etc). The troops themselves are nothing to write home about but there are a lot of them! They are basically Orcs when within 6" of Bard (or Goblins when they aren't) but with better courage. Use them to tarpit enemy Heroes until Bard can deal with them. There is also a large shooting contingent in this list which, combined with Blinding Light from Gandalf, is likely to win the shooting war against most armies.
So a bit of a mixed bag here. Two Pure lists, one Legendary Legion and two Yellow Alliances. There is also a good mix of LOTR and Hobbit stuff. To me, this feels like the most varied set of lists we have reviewed so far. Perhaps 700 points is a particularly good level for lots of different armies to shine? As a newer player it was a fun puzzle to be able to have some, but not all, of the powerful toys, but at the same time trying to balance the amount of troops to bring. I haven’t been including the names of players in case they’d rather I didn’t mention them. However, it’s easy enough to find them, and if you do you will notice the same ones popping up again and again. This is excellent testimony to player skill being the real deciding factor when it comes to the big tournaments, which in my opinion is just as it should be!
No comments:
Post a Comment