500 Under 50 - Corsairs of Umbar

500 (Almost) Under 50 – Corsairs of Umbar

Dan Stu: We’re really getting to the tricky end of our 500 under 50 lists now! Safe to say that any of the remaining armies require a bit of creativity, a bit of hobbying, and perhaps bending the rules slightly in order to meet the criteria.

That being said, we’re still trying to come in as close to budget as possible, and while we’ll need a few conversions, these will be as newcomer-friendly as possible.

This time, it’s the Corsairs of Umbar, which I previously covered in my ‘Noob’s Perspective’ article way back in January of last year. They’re a fantastic army that lend themselves to fast-paced, bloody engagements with tons of casualties on both sides. They also have many tricks up their sleeves, from the ludicrous amounts of throwing weapons to the ‘backstabbers’ special rule which, if used correctly, can be absolutely devastating.

For a cheap entry into this army, there are really two ways you can go, and both have their pros and cons. Let’s dive in!

Option 1: Heroes and Elites

Shopping List:
1 box of ‘Corsairs of Umbar’ (£26)
1 box of ‘the Lords of Umbar’ (£20)
2 boxes of ‘Corsair Arbalesters’ (£16.40)
Total: £62.40

Alright, we’re just over budget, but this isn’t our worst offence to date!

If we want to use everything here (which we do), we have too many bows. 30 warriors gives us a bow limit of 10, and we have 14. We’ll need to convert 4 of the Corsair archers into plain old Corsairs with hand weapons (no shields). Fortunately, there are some archers in the box with outstretched bow arms, and these shouldn’t look too strange with a sword in their hand instead of a bow.

Assuming that you have a few swords lying around in your bits box, it will be straightforward – you can either snip off both parts of the bow and replace it with the blade and pommel of a sword. Or, even easier, if you have a spare hand holding a sword, you can just snip the bow hand off your Corsair and replace it with a sword hand.

To-do list:
Snip the bows or bow hands off 4 Corsairs with Bow. Replace these with swords or sword hands to make 4 Corsairs of Umbar with hand weapons only.

If you have any spare shields or spears in your bits box, you can add shields or spears to 2 of these to fill out the points limit.

Army List:

Dalamyr, Fleetmaster of Umbar
8 x Corsair of Umbar with Shield
8 x Corsair of Umbar with Spear

Hasharin
2x Corsair of Umbar
2 x Corsair of Umbar with Bow
3 x Corsair Arbalester

Hasharin
2x Corsair of Umbar
2 x Corsair of Umbar with Bow
3 x Corsair Arbalester

Totals: 498pts, 33 models, 4 Might, 10 bows

Okay, so this is an unusual Corsairs list. It’s relatively lean and elite by Corsair standards. You’ve got your main body of pirates, but also a high proportion of Arbalesters, as well as three high-impact heroes who will really need to pull their weight to make this list work. This is a bit different to normal Corsair lists, who can solve a lot of their problems by throwing bodies at them!

33 models isn’t very low at 500pts, but it is low by Corsair standards – given how easily they drop, a bad round could see you fighting at a numbers defecit, particularly if they have some nasty shooting. This is not a normal thing for Corsairs! You’ll really have to leverage your Arbalesters to make it work. Remember, while you’re strong at range with your crossbows, your regular line troops will take a lot of casualties in the return fire, so you’ll have to deploy carefully and choose targets well.

Dalamyr and the Hasharins are very good at killing things – they all have 3 attacks with Bane of Kings, so wounding will be no problem. However, their offense is locked behind fight 5, and their defense is woeful. Plus, with 4 might across the whole list, you won’t be Striking much, if at all. These guys can be absolute Hero-seeking missiles, but they can’t take a punch. They’ll have to tread the line between hunting Heroes, and helping out your troops by thinning out the enemy herd.

Certainly not a bad list – but perhaps not a natural fit for the Corsairs’ playstyle. Having said that, if you were looking to expand your Corsairs army to 800pts or higher, you’d absolutely be looking to buy all of these kits (Dalamyr is a must for any large Corsair army) so it’s a fantastic starting point.


Strengths:
* Lethal at range
 *High-offense Heroes
* Sets you up well for expanding your Corsairs
* WYSIWYG-compliant

Weaknesses:
* May struggle with numbers
* Fragile, low-might Heroes
* Requires a little conversion work and some spare bits
* Weak to cavalry and bow fire

Option 2: The Pirate Horde

Shopping list:
2 boxes ‘Corsairs of Umbar’… And that’s it!
Total: £52

The elephant in the room – there are no Heroes on your shopping list. This is because we’re going to convert 2 Bosuns and 2 Captains from the normal Corsair models. Converting troops in to captains is a tried-and-true process, and there are a few ways you could do it - rummaging around in your bits box for a fancy helmet, sword, or some other identifying piece of wargear, or go for the old ‘put him on a big rock’ approach!

However, the tricky part of this is that we need to differentiate the Bosuns from the Captains. Here, I think it’s best to go for colour coding – for example, yellow tunics for Bosuns, and red for Captains. Not very elegant but it will get the job done. And the good thing is that bright colours won’t look out of place on your pirates!

Alternatively, you could always buy the 2 boxes containing and Bosun and Captain each. However, this is an eye-watering £30 on top, and neither model is that spectacular - so I’d say you should only do this if you’re intent on ending up with a large WYSIWYG Corsairs army.

To-do list:

Convert 2 Corsairs of Umbar with bow in to Bosuns. Chop off the bows and replace them with swords as we did in the first list, and paint them a bright colour to distinguish them.
Convert 2 Corsairs of Umbar with shields into Captains. Stick them on a big rock and paint them an easy-to-spot colour. As we have so many Corsair models, you could always use a particular pose for Captains (such as the sumo wrestler pose) to make them easier to spot.

Army list:

Corsair Bosun
4 x Corsair of Umbar with Shield
3 x Corsair of Umbar with Spear
3 x Corsair of Umbar with Bow

Corsair Bosun
3 x Corsair of Umbar with Shield
3 x Corsair of Umbar with Spear
3 x Corsair of Umbar with Bow

Corsair Captain with Shield
3 x Corsair of Umbar with Shield
3 x Corsair of Umbar with Spear
3 x Corsair of Umbar with Bow

Corsair Captain with Shield
3 x Corsair of Umbar with Shield
3 x Corsair of Umbar with Spear
3 x Corsair of Umbar with Bow

Totals: 496pts, 41 models, 6 might, 12 bows

I think as a starting point, this is a far better representation of the Corsair Experience™ - which means a ton of bodies, a ton of fight 4, and a ton of throwing weapons. Quantity has a quality of its own!

With so many bodies, you’ll be outnumbering just about any other army, and while fragile, you’ve got a great fighting line of swords backed up by spears, all at fight 4. Backstabbers will be activating frequently, threatening even high defense targets like trolls. Your throwing weapons will do great work against just about anybody except dwarves and ghosts, and you can even threaten enemy Heroes by shooting into combats. If you kill your own guy, don’t worry – there are 41 more where he came from, and now the rest of your troops have an unobstructed shot.

Your heroes aren’t here to do much more than to provide might and to bring their mates along. The list tops out at Fight 4, so you’ll have an uphill struggle against most heroes. However, you’ve got a decent amount of might to call Heroic Moves, which is important to get your weapons thrown and to tie up Heroes with sacrificial Corsairs.

I’d say this is really one to think about if you’re reasonably confident with conversions, and are fairly sure you will be expanding up to 800pts or beyond. You will absolutely want 2 boxes of Corsairs eventually, so this will give you a great head start on that. Having 2 Bosuns and 2 Captains (even converted ones) will give you a lot of list-building flexibility, too, and the Lords of Umbar box is an obvious expansion point to bring in Dalamyr. Plus, if want to replace your Heroes with WYSIWYG models later on, you can just repaint a few robes and turn them back in to regular Corsairs!

Strengths:
* Loads of troops, good for Backstabbers
* Loads of throwing weapons
* 4 warbands is very solid at 500pts
* Great foundation for large Corsair armies
* Solid line of archers

Weaknesses:
* No big Heroes, no high fight values
* One-dimensional, fragile
* Requires a bit of conversion ability

Not WYSIWYG-compliant – conversions will need to be explained to your opponent (unless you want to drop £30 on 4 models :(

So we didn’t keep it under budget (this may be a running trend from now on...) but I think we did OK on this one! Keep your eyes peeled – we’re coming to the end of our 500 under 50 journey, and it’s only going to get sillier from here…