I decided to build an Angmar army, fielded almost entirely from Battlehosts (including the Hordes of Angmar and the Spirit Legions of Angmar) and adding a few allies from the faction of Mordor.

Epic Heroes

The Witch-king of Angmar - 200 pts
The Tainted - 125 pts
The Dwimmerlaik - 125 pts

Common Formations

Ghostly Legion - 180 pts
3 companies

Ghostly Legion - 180 pts
3 companies

Spectral Host - 240 pts
3 companies

Angmar Orc Warband - 85 pts
3 companies
Orc Drummer
Shields

Angmar Orc Warband - 70 pts
3 companies
Orc Taksmaster

Angmar Orc Warband - 60 pts
3 companies
Bows

Rare Formations

Court of the Fallen Kings - 120 pts

Shade - 100 pts

Shade - 100 pts

Shade - 100 pts

Allies

The Dark Marshal - 125 pts

Black Numenorean Regiment - 35 pts
1 company

Mordor Troll Drummer - 150 pts

Points Total: 1995

What do you think? Feel free to comment or suggest

Why have you got one company of Black Numenoreans?

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"There are few left in Middle Earth like Aragorn, son of Arathorn." - Gandalf, Many Meetings

I only have it because it looks great with the Dark Marshal in it. I usually keep it behind other formations and use the nazgul's special rule or spells. But i should expand the formation (maybe 3 companies?) if i want to take it into battle.

Putting the Dark Marshal in a one company formation is a really bad idea. One clever move or lucky shot from a siege engine could kill him easily.

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"There are few left in Middle Earth like Aragorn, son of Arathorn." - Gandalf, Many Meetings

Hi Fingon, I have some questions/comments:

I presume that the battlehost (Spirit Legions) still does not get you out of the 'We Stand Alone' component of the Spirit Legion rules? While it is pretty cool to get immunity to Shades and +1D, +1Str, having to bunch two Nazgul in one small formation to gain the perks is not ideal. Further, the Shades themselves are probably not worth having in any numbers. They are tough, but have minimal strength and their perk to drop fight values only really has a real benifit in duels. You can take advantage of some of that benifit using the Witch King to kill a couple of tough heroes, but IMO that could be acheived through having a single shade tail his formation. If the Nazgul were allowed to join Ghostly legion, there might be some potential there...

Overall, my comment is that there is not much in this army for 2000pts! The Angmar Orcs without bows are not really suited to being in such small units, and really want to be consolidated into a larger unit and spend less on upgrades. Having a Ringwraith (probably the WitchKing) lead them to use Wings of Terror/Pall of night and try and work flanks could at least make them quite effective in melee. However, any army with a reasonable bow, let alone crossbow, component would scare the hell out of me if I had to face them with so few troops.

Would I be right in thinking that this is in part an effort to 'morph' Angmar out of Mordor? Or do you have the chance to buy alternate troops to provide some backbone for those hideously (since GW has done everything they can to make their abilities as hard to use as possible) overcosted Ghostly infantry?

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http://www.roughwotr.blogspot.com

I'm going to be honest, I don't like it. Xelee gives good advice. How about this:

Epic heroes:
The Tainted-125 points
The Dwimmerlaik-125 points

Common formations:
Ghostly Legion, 3 companies-180 points
Ghostly Legion, 3 companies-180 points
Ghostly Riders, 3 companies, Ghostly Captain-230 points
Spectral Host, 3 companies-240 points
Angmar Orc Warband, 5 companies, two-handed weapons-100 points
Carn Dum Warband, 4 companies, Barbarian Chieftan-170 points

Rare formations:
Court of Fallen Kings, 1 company-120 points

Legendary formations:
Witch King of Angmar on fell beast-325 points
Gulavar, the Terror of Arnor-200 points

Total: 1995 points, 9 formations, 24 companies, 12 might

You may want to swap the captains for shades but I felt the list needed might.

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"War does not determine who is right, only who is left."
- Bertrand Russel

Ok, i've taken all that you said into account, and I've come up with a new one:

Epic Heroes
The Witch-king of Angmar - 200 pts
The Tainted - 125 pts
The Dwimmerlaik - 125 pts

Common Formations
Ghostly Legion, Ghostly Captain, 4 companies-290 pts
Spectral Host, 2 companies- 160 pts
Spectral Host, 2 companies- 160 pts
Angmar Orc Warband, 3 companies, Orc Taskmaster, Shields- 85 pts
Angmar Orc Warband, 6 companies, Orc Drummer, Bows - 145 pts
Carn Dum Warband, 3 Companies, Barbarian Chieftain-140 pts
Carn Dum Warband, 3 Companies- 90 pts

Rare Formations
Court of the Fallen Kings, 1 company- 120 pts
Shade - 100 pts
Shade - 100 pts


Additional points from Battlehosts' special rules: 150

Total: 1990 points, 10 formations, 26 companies, 9 might

Drop the drummer and get another company of Orcs.

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"There are few left in Middle Earth like Aragorn, son of Arathorn." - Gandalf, Many Meetings

Hmm.. still nothing fast moving which is really needed at 2000 points. I still think you only need max one shade.

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"War does not determine who is right, only who is left."
- Bertrand Russel

He needs the two shades for the battlehost, and he has three x 'wings of terror' casters - so three of those units are the fastest you get in this game.

That said, Fingon, I don't think that trying to have both battlehosts is the best idea. I agree that the Spirits one at least makes horrible troops better, but you can easily do without the Witch King's one.

As a rule of thumb, Carn Dum warband (being only def 4(6) ) really want to be at least four strong. I think you can live without a Cheiftain for them, since you have three Nazgul and actually only a limited number of places to put them anyway. In the case of the Orcs, bow need to be in threes but melee need to be much bigger, and their upgrades aren't really worth it. I quite like Spuds4ever's suggestion of running them as 2HW. A unit of those with 'Wings of Terror' will be impressively destructive, if a little brittle.

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http://www.roughwotr.blogspot.com

Xelee is right, I need to have at least 2 shades.
So, I can swap the formations and give 2HW to the formation of the Orcs (6 companies strong), and keep 3 companies with arrows. As for the barbarians, I drop the Chieftain and build a single formation, 6 companies strong. I'm also including Buhrdur at 125 points.

Epic Heroes
The Witch-king of Angmar - 200 pts
The Tainted - 125 pts
The Dwimmerlaik - 125 pts

Common Formations
Ghostly Legion, Ghostly Captain, 4 companies-290 pts
Spectral Host, 2 companies- 160 pts
Spectral Host, 2 companies- 160 pts
Angmar Orc Warband, 6 companies, Orc Taskmaster, Two-handed Weapns, 145 pts
Angmar Orc Warband, 3 companies, Orc Drummer, Bows - 85 pts
Carn Dum Warband, 6 Companies- 180 pts

Rare Formations
Court of the Fallen Kings, 1 company-120 pts
Shade -100 pts
Shade -100 pts

Legendary Formations
Buhrdur -125 pts

Additional points from Battlehosts' special rules: 75

Total: 1990 points, 10 formations, 26 companies, 10 might

How set are you on the 'Court of the Fallen Kings'? Losing them wouuld net you another 4x Carn Dum or more Orcs and another company of Spectres. Also, those upgrades...

Essentially, this is going to have to be an army where you get good at screening the Spectral hosts until you are in close. Having enough to do this long enough will be key. I think that once you are in melee range it is doable, even vs enemy missiles. However, you are very dependant on both 'Wings of Terror' to keep the weaker Spectral formations (80pts, and not even Indomitable, hmm.)around to the flank, and 'Transfix' to sort out enemy missile troops. There are a total of 9 spell levels in there, so it is possible. It is going to be much easier vs a melee orientated army, since you can just control things with 'Pall of Night'.

Do not let enemy spellcasters live, with this army you will really regret it.

I wondered about the absence of Buhrdur, which is why I thought this might be a morphed Mordor army. Angmar is a perfectly fine list, but you definitely need to take the good things in it.

(edit) It occurs to me that Grima Wormtongue is just made for the type of spell/spirit combos you need to be able to pull reliably

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http://www.roughwotr.blogspot.com

Thanks for the advices, for now I will stick to the "Court of the Fallen Kings" and the upgrades to see how effective they are (first time playing with an evil army). Otherwise, I get Grima and more Orcs or Spectres.

Gidday Fingon.

I ran into this when I was trawling the Web for spirit army tactics last night: http://fearandloathingonthetabletop.blo ... bel/Angmar

It is a detailed guide to the Angmar army list, including allies. It is pretty good, and I think he is almost always spot-on. Spectres IMO have something going for them, in that if they get in (with courage sapping combos in play) they are probably halving the damage put out by the units they hit.

WOTR is generally the type of game where this type of thing is pretty obvious, so you will probably have thought of a lot of this yourself, but it never hurts to have it all written out. That said, I've read a Gondor guide on a prominant Warhammer site which was aboout 1/3 wrong, so perhaps this isn't all so obvious afterall!

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http://www.roughwotr.blogspot.com

I see. I don't have the battle-hosts book. I guess Xelee does have a point about wings of terror, though it isn't as consistent as normal move.

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"War does not determine who is right, only who is left."
- Bertrand Russel

seriously? why is noody120 posting lots of random things on one-ring? i suggest banning him if this continues... and is there anyway to delete these posts? (someone contact alan or something)