This goes without saying, but the same advice applies to sauramon and radagast.

Sorry to revive a dead thread, but I wanted to compare notes. I played a game of sbg today, I also wrote a battle report on it within the walls of these forums. I used gandalf the white on shadow fax. I did so with this thread in mind, therefore I paid very close attention to gandalf's spell casting rate. The game was 9 rounds in length. I cast a spell every round (2 bright lights [yes, i failed to cast a 2+ spell], terrifying aura [yep, failed to cast that one too], and 6 sorc blasts). The first 3 spells were cast using gandalf's free will and were not augmented with might. They all failed but it did not effect me in the end. The sorc blasts however, were cast using 1 free will augmented by 1 extra will. They are successfully cast on a 4+. They were cast with 100% accuracy. With a fresh game in my head, let me recommend some sorc blast advice. When using sorc blast, make sure gandalf expends whatever resources he needs to cast sorc blast successfully. Second, make sure your target hits someone else when he flies back wards (my record was 6 uruks in one hit. 2 of which died, the others were saved by fury), thirdly, gandalf on a horse is *awesome!* spend the extra points to stick that maia on a horse.

I was fortunate. Gandalf was only engaged by a single warg rider once, and despite being outmatched 2a to 1a, gandalf won the fight. I know that doesn't always pan out, but I also made efforts to keep gandalf unengaged. By the time the warg rider caught up to him, it was turn 7 of 9. This could have been circumvented if I had cast terrifying aura. Gandalf with terror equals awesome!

Much like in the books, gandalf is a tide turner. A well placed magic spell will save the lives of your warband. Just don't assign gandalf tanking duties.