Sorry, Im just wondering guys. Can someone please clue me in? Im wondering why high elves would be chosen by anyone.

So far Ive looked over the books again and again and I can only manage to come to the conclusion that someone would choose them because they like the idea of a high elf of Rivendell. Or just like the models, or want a cool theme.

Basic troops:

-High fight
-decent defense but not necessary/even more expensive when maxed with shield
-no special bow limits
-no variety of troops
-UGLY POSES.
There, I said it.


So, I know a bunch of people seem to love these things. Please tell me either why, or more importantly, in what way do you see these things as a tactical advantage for those who play them? I would rather take most of the forces in this game to be honest.

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BLACKHAWK 2010 2013 2015 DYNASTY

Pretty much (I presume)

I remember the dude in GW giving me a sneaky look at the upcoming elves from Lotr in White Dwarf a few months before the film came out. Pretty much gave up warhammer in anticipation of Lotr.

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Yeah, high elves could do with a revamp, if only to add some character. We have wood elves with shielding spears and Sentinels, Galadhrim with Guards and 12" moving Knights, Mirkwood Rangers with attack-matching.

Still, they are effective. The Twins can whirl-wind through tons of the enemy by themselves. Their high Fight means winning not only against most opponents, but the heroes of most opponents, including wraiths. That plus their high Courage means they can hold out long enough for the inevitable breaking of the enemy.

Basically, using them requires taking a fairly conservative and defensive stance, while taking opportunities to charge enemy heroes like wraiths with ease to take away their standfast, then waiting for the enemy to break.

If they went by the book, IMHO high elves should be D7 (that ancient First Age armour) and S4, and have attack-matching like the Mirkwood Rangers, and/or cause Terror. They'd have to cost 18-20 points, but they would be more thematic.

I couldn't help but notice your user name LOL.

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Honba

Yeah I understand that but Ive gone from wanting to totally do an army with them when the hobby came out, to now, wanting to build armies of stuff I wasnt interested in, all because of the rules.

Harad for example. I thought they looked like meh, and were weak, and I loved doing Minis Tirith stuff. Now, I HATE Gondor and Harad is sweet.




Yeah, I mean, D7 would be at least nice, and they could have some more cool rules or maybe heros can make them special like Elronds last alliance Elves.

Something. New figures too....ewww at the current ones. All these years and no new models....

Basically its just bowmen, spearmen, and now Knights of Rivendell which are good but overpriced to me as well.

I mean, theyre good but eventually they can only kill so many models before you realize the enemy can put 3 or even 4 models to your 1 knight. Better run....

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BLACKHAWK 2010 2013 2015 DYNASTY

The reasons I love and play high elves,



1. This! Very much this!

2. I love the models, I love the look of the golden armour and most of the heroes are pretty sweet to. Pose wise, conversions are not overly difficult if they're really bugging you, the worst ones are the elven blade plastics mostly because their all in similar pose (but for the first plastic kit of the game released over 10 years ago...I think some slack can be cut).

3. They are pretty elite and have their own advantages, heavy armour with high fight, decent archery (if no fancy new bow limits which are being handed out like candy today, that said knights have no bow limit), some excellent heroes, Elrond, Glorfindel, Erestor, the Elf twins, Gil-galad, even Arwen when used right all rock and Gildor is a nice way of including some very effective wood elf 'scouts'. Cirdan is certainly useful as well.
The basic warrior....is expensive and has average strength, still has good armour, high courage and excellent fight value.
The new Rivendel Knights are also expensive but have everything, lances, bows, shields, expert rider hell they can even throw in an (admittidly expensive) warhorn to practically make your heroes auto pass courage. If you like your cavalry, you wont be disappointed.

4. Because ultimately, they aren't wood elves. Don't ask me why but I hate playing the popular armies, the ones that everyone looks to and thinks competitive. Much prefer the underdogs (in fact see, the post I made the underdog tactical challenge, high elves were mentioned a lot lol).
Wood elves were considered powerful in the game, before they had access to Mirkwood rangers, The heavily armoured palace guards and Tauriel.
Don't get me wrong, wood elves are a very decent army but they play differently to high elves partly due to different abilities on heroes and the trade off of defence for numbers.


In the grand scheme of things it would be nice for a couple of tweaks for the high elves but to be honest I don't think they need any major overhauls. They're a strong enough army in my opinion though its been a while since I've taken mine to war, perhaps if I get them repainted I can help defend their good name

Yeah I pretty much get what youre saying. For me, the high elves are vastly underpowered. To me though, I never was a guy who was all like oh Im choosing the wood elves because theyre so powerful.

I honestly dont like the high elves being so snooty. They live in their palaces away from everyone wear their shiny robed and eat lettuce meals.

I dont like it. The wood elves are down, dirty, violent, and very protective of their city. And furthermore, the wood elves were the only ones to come to the aid of men later in such a fashion.

Haldir, leading his contingent of wood elves, on a suicide mission, to help protect men in Helm's Deep. I know high elves wouldnt have bothered. They think they're too good for everyone. Thats just what I think.

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BLACKHAWK 2010 2013 2015 DYNASTY

The thing with Haldir and his contingent never actually happened in the books unfortunately.
In addition the High elves have been seen to be co-operative (Although admittedly they are quite snooty) with the last alliance, Gil-Galad and co knew they weren't capable of defeating mordor by themselves and so asked the Numerians (Numenorians?) for help.
The wood elves were also stated to of been rather snooty themselves during that time with their king creating all sorts of problems for Gil-Galad as he believed he shouldn't be told what to do.
Although my memory is hazy at best I'm pretty sure there's an incident where they deliberately ignore an order and many of them are killed, although I could just be imagining things with that .
Don't judge the high elves to harshly though, after all I'm pretty sure they looked after and raised all the heirs of Isildur in Rivendell and work alongside the rangers.
Of course it's each to their own opinion and I was just offering a different view
Billy

No no I understand and I happened to be a guy that watched the movies before the books so I tend to like what happened and dont take one or the other over each other.


I understand they can be snooty and jerkish themselves but I like their style more. They are more cutthroat.

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BLACKHAWK 2010 2013 2015 DYNASTY

The movies didn't cover every battle. There was war in the north too, it just wasn't the focus of the story.

PJ made the men of Gondor wimpish in the movies, compared to how they were in the books - remember, they had been the front line for a very, very long time. And I am afraid he also glossed over the High Elves to some extent. So, given their minimal presence in the movies, I assume GW have felt little obligation to give them any real poke in the rules as they do not have a large range to sell.

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Yeah I know guys. I know the movies didnt do them justice. I just feel that even if the Elves didnt have war at their border the high elves would be the last to help. Eh, maybe its just me.

And yeah they made Gondor so weak....not just in the movie, but in the game too. The average soldier is weak. They make Rohan horrible too. Seems like men were the weakest by far according to the game. Theyve got no special powers, some great heros, and their elite units even arent good compared to others.

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BLACKHAWK 2010 2013 2015 DYNASTY

Elves from Rivendell and the Grey Havens sent aid to King Araval of Arnor to combat Angmar, and they joined forces with Eärnur to finally overthrow the Witch-king, who was chased off by Glorfindel. Yeah, just eating lettuce...

Part of this is the power creep that started after the last movie was released and GW needed to milk the license. Very few of the original warrior profiles had special rules, and most of these were shared. Bodyguard, poison arrows, expert rider...I think that's about it.

I started a "By the Book" conversion a while ago trying to make profiles that reflected the books more than PJ's vision, eg: Numenor was F4/S4, Gondor was F4/S3 but could be upgraded, elves were divided into their appropriate groups, etc. I got pretty far, but it's on hold until the Hobbit movies are done and GW has released everything it plans to. I do like some of the new special rules they're coming out with, so they might be co-opted. You seem of like mind, so if you're curious:

http://lotr-bythebook.wikispaces.com/

I don't see where this idea of Gondor being weak is coming from. You can get D6 models for a very low cost, and considering how cheap their heroes are (i.e Beregond, Damrod, and Faramir) you can field a lot of them. That makes it very tricky for an opponent who isn't mostly ST4 to deal with. Opponents running STR4 are going to be outnumbered, as are those who run D7, which isn't much of a difference except for the heroes.

As for the elites, the cheap FV4 often combined with the bodyguard rule tends to play out very nicely.

I'd rather take a Gondorian force over Wood Elves or Haradrim any day. Maybe it's because after a decade of playing with them I feel very confident in how to use them , but for me they're a very competitive choice.

You should reserve your judgement until you've faced Elrond or Glorfindel in combat. They're extremely powerful and generally more than make their points cost back. While they lack in variety, they're still a great army. And the new knights are terrifying to face.

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I meant weak like, you take 100 troops of Minis Tirith against 100 Uruk Hai straight up and the Uruks are winning.

Of course points balance but the WOMT fought for a long time to be given such weak stats.



Yeah those are one model. Id feed him canon fodder while I wiped out the rest of the crew.

And the knights? Im sure they are, but Im also sure the minimum warband of them costs at the very least 190 if you use the box.

Thats a lot in a 500 pt and in a 750 or 1000 Ill have plenty of models to contend with.

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BLACKHAWK 2010 2013 2015 DYNASTY

I meant weak like, you take 100 troops of Minis Tirith against 100 Uruk Hai straight up and the Uruks are winning.

Of course points balance but the WOMT fought for a long time to be given such weak stats.

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BLACKHAWK 2010 2013 2015 DYNASTY

Yeah those are one model. Id feed him canon fodder while I wiped out the rest of the crew.

And the knights? Im sure they are, but Im also sure the minimum warband of them costs at the very least 190 if you use the box.

Thats a lot in a 500 pt and in a 750 or 1000 Ill have plenty of models to contend with.[/quote]

Model count isn't everything, a high elf army will always assume it will be outnumbered and a good player will pick a very strong position to filter larger enemies against him or try to use his army to engage a part of the enemy at a time.
The Rivendel Knights are expensive but add extra bow fire and combat power to an all ready strong battle line. Even as an all cavalry army, they are formidable.
In regard to feeding elrond or glorfindel a single model a turn, great if you have priority every time otherwise they're free to engage at least two a turn, elrond only needs to move to fire off a nature's wrath which helps the army a lot.

I get the impression that high elves are just not for you, you don't like them or want them which is fine. I've probably had a similar stance to wood elves for a good ten years.
However, you asked why people want to take them, these are the answers, they are not a weak force, they perhaps lack the variety that the woodelves now have (even when treating Lothlorien and Mirkwood as completely separate factions both have more options than Rivendel) but they have their own strengths and should not be dismissed lightly.

Elrond and Glorfindel have terror, so it won't be so easy to tie them up every turn.

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"Leave Sauron to me."
If you're in the Raleigh, NC area, let me know.