A Noob's Perspective: The One Ring

“One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them.”

I'm sure it's no surprise to anyone reading this, new to the game or otherwise, that the One Ring is in this game, it's probably less of a surprise that it's pretty good too.

I've been using Frodo and Bilbo in lists recently, not together, mind. So I need to get familiar with the rules for the one Ring, so I figured writing this would help me, and maybe you, so let's dive in!

All of the Ringbearers (except my man Sam) can take the Ring and use it during their games, the only caveat being, there's a hierarchy table, so if your opponent also has the Ring, it determines which player gets to have it that game since there is only one of them, the hint is in the name!

So, who can get the Ring? And what is the hierarchy?
• Sauron
• Isildur (Can only take the Ring if your list doesn't contain Elendil.)
• Bilbo (Thorin's Company or Lake Town)
• Frodo
• Bilbo (Shire or Rivendell)
• Gollum

So it's all well and good knowing this, but what does it actually do? We'll leave Sauron out for now, cause he has his own rules for it, but everyone else follows the same rules.

So, you can put the Ring on at any point during your movement, and in subsequent turns, you'll have to roll a die to see if you succumb to the “Will of Sauron”, which would allow your opponent to move your Ringbearer should the test be failed. It's worth noting you can use Might to alter this roll too.

If you're Ringbearer is mounted on a horse, or pony, in Bilbo's case, your mount immediately runs off and you have to take a Thrown Rider test.

Once you have the Ring on, you're considered to be invisible, which removes your control zone, and even lets models move through you. Enemies wishing to charge you must take a courage test, and they take a -1 to the roll for every inch they are away from you, so for example, if they're 4” away from you and wish to charge you, the courage test will be at -4! They still have to take the test if they are fearless or would otherwise auto pass a courage check too. Neat!

Once you're in a fight, you half the fight value of enemy models involved in the fight, which can turn any fight in your favour, should you need it.

Finally, when you want to remove the Ring, you must take a courage check, if you fail, the Ring stays on until next turn. This is important, because if you only have your Ringbearer left on the board and he is wearing the Ring, you count him as a casualty!

So what about Sauron? As said above, he ignores these rules and instead, very simply, when he loses his last wound, on a roll of a 2+, he doesn't lose it. You can spend might for this, should you need to.

Well, what can we do with the Ring? Other than the obvious “put him in the fight with another hero” approach there are some great character combos to really maximise the effectiveness of going invisible, we'll have a look at some interesting ones.

Gollum and The Goblin King: 2 S4 attacks from Gollum, and 3 S5 Two Handed attacks from the Goblin King is enough to ruin any heroes day! Gollum puts on the precious, and he and the King run in to the same combat, preferably an enemy hero. Goblin King sits at a solid F6, so will have a higher fight value, even if your opponent Heroic Strikes, as the Fight value is halved after Strikes! Overall a very powerful combo.

Sam and Frodo: Again, Frodo dons the Ring and he and Sam proceed to join a fight. Not as potent as the above combo, due to a naturally low fight value, but Sting being an Elven blade will give you the edge if the result of the duel is a tie. The really cool bit in this interaction, is Sam's rule “Let him go or I'll have you Longshanks!”, which gives a free heroic combat if Frodo is engaged in a fight 6” from Samwise. Should you kill your target, you'll be able to move onto another! This is definitely much better against weaker targets, since Hobbits aren't particularly known for their strength! Clever play might let you get a third hero involved in the fight (like getting Faramir involved if you run this in out 500u50 for Ithilien!) which will make the whole combo more effective.

Bilbo and Gil-Galad: Is it really worth losing your army bonus and becoming a red ally with everyone for this? No, probably not. But Bilbo halving the fight of anyone he's against, backed up by F9 Gil-Galad is unbeatable! Again, a stupid combo, but I thought it was amusing enough to worth note!

Well, that's all I've got, if you know any more interesting combos you can do with Ringbearers, let us know!