Army List Review: Lurtz's Scouts

Dan Stu: This week we're looking at our first Evil army, and it's a great one to begin with - easy to collect, and has really had a glow up in the new edition. It's Lurtz's Scouts!

The sales pitch:

The clue’s in the name! Lurtz and scouts. It goes really fast, it hits pretty hard, has great numbers and, thanks to some massive buffs, Lurtz is now the rockstar he was always meant to be. Find the halflings!

Credit Games Workshop

What makes it tick?

While this list keeps the 66% break point common to other Isengard lists, there are really two rules that define it.

First and most important is the 8” move across the whole list. Add to this the free march from your drum and you’re looking at 11” moves during the opening turns of the game thanks to a War Drum – make no mistake, these are some speedy boys and will get you to your objectives fast, so you're looking strong in missions like Hold Ground and Recon. 

The second defining rule is Lurtz’s flashy new free heroic combat once per turn. Used correctly in tandem with Lurtz’s very healthy combat profile of F6 3A S5, this makes it a really dynamic army, capable of some really big flashy plays. A big heroic combat in which Lurtz and a handful of scouts can move 8” can do some really unpredictable things.

Lurtz also has a really fun ‘assassination protocol’ built in to his toolkit. It goes something like this:

• Use sharpshooter to kill the enemy General’s mount, if applicable and possible.
• Use free heroic combats to chew a path to the enemy general.
• Charge in to the enemy general, using your rerollable shield throw (75% chance) to knock them prone on the way in.
• Heroic strike and attempt to kill them in one turn of combat, burning might if necessary - 6 attacks at S5 should put a dent in most Generals.
• Regain might from General Hunter if you kill them.

Sure, it takes a few stars aligning to make it happen, but it’ll feel mighty slick when it does!

Ugluk is somewhat less convincing in this list. At first glance he has a ton of brilliant special rules – which he does – but the best of these does not apply in this army as it needs Orcs present to activate. That means the 20pt differential between him and a captain is buying you a point of might, a hand weapon instead of a 2H (important when you have no spear supports), his special rule, and a second heroic strike. Not great, not terrible, and still probably worth bringing.

Thanks to the very lean selection of models, it would be fair to call Lurtz’s Scouts a one-trick pony. It does what it does well, but it is definitely not a varied toolkit and will run out of options to deal with armies that have lots of toys at higher points levels. Your games will usually involve you trying to encircle your opponent with your high move value – given their lack of spears, this is really the only way to bring your body count to bear, meaning that they really struggle in dense or urban terrain where they have no option but to throw themselves against an entrenched shield wall.

Rounding out your special rules is a board-wide Woodland Creature, giving you options to be very tricky on certain boards.

Credit Games Workshop

Assembling your Army

On the hobby & collectability side of things, it’s a very newcomer-friendly army. You can run it with 3 purchases – scouts, which you can source on their own or in the Isengard Battlehost – Lurtz & Ugluk, and the Uruk Scout commanders, from which you’ll use every model except the Shaman. Past a certain points level, you will most likely need more scouts, another captain and another banner, but there’s a real argument for just running this list at low points. It’s a really cheap army, doesn’t require any converting (unless you want to add shields to your shieldless scouts), and all models should be easily available. Sadly we have no plastic heroes (yet) so we’re stuck with metal characters and a really wonky-looking Ugluk, but there are far worse in the Middle-Earth range. The Scout models are a little long in the tooth at this point but they’re still extremely serviceable.

Possible Pivots

With a suite of painted scouts, you can easily run Ugluk’s Scouts by adding a handful of orcs, Snaga & Grishnakh. Alternatively, if you picked up the Isengard Battlehost, you’re well on your way to taking Muster of Isengard (add Saruman & Uruk Warriors) or Army of the White Hand (Saruman and Hill Tribesmen).

 

Pros

Fast & excellent scenario play

Great objective holders

Great model count

Decent shooting inc. Sharpshooter on Lurtz

Robust combat stat lines

Great at low points

Very good at Maelstrom deployment

Easy to collect

Powerful at flanking

Cons

A one-trick pony

No spear supports

Struggles against big heroes

Low defense across the board

Need to be able to flank – weak against strong infantry lines

Bad at higher points

Where’s Mauhur!?!

RIP
Credit Games Workshop

 

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. However, in this case, the entry level list might be as far as you want to go!

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:

You’ll struggle to find a more natural fit than Lurtz’s scouts at 450pts. This army can be made with 3 purchases, assuming you’re able to source a few extra Uruk shields and add them to the naked scouts – it’s probably worthwhile, as D5 is a big step up from D4, and is often the difference maker for denying an enemy S4 hero a successful heroic combat. The main reason I’ve gone for Ugluk over a captain here is because it allowed us to hit 450pts without needing to buy a second box of scouts, but that’s less of a concern at, say, 400pts.

List #2:

As we’ve said, the list really tapers off at higher points levels. Beyond 500 or so, you’re firmly in the ‘spam captains and troops’ territory and, what’s more, you’re really looking at including a second banner to cover you army’s extremely large footprint. At higher points, more armies are able to gum up the board with their infantry lines too, meaning that the shine really wears off on the Scouts’ flanking strategy.

 

On to the scores! This being our first evil instalment, we’ll explain below each score out of ten, and 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: 6

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: 10

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: 8

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

Total: 39/50

A very robust 39 for the Scouts! Very high scores on theme and collectability, as this army wants for nothing in those areas. The small roster of fast and strong lads will always be something you're happy to get out on the table, too. 

Join us next week for a trip to everybody's favourite spooky forest!