How to counter Beorn the Bear?

Morbag_the_Orc · **Posted:** Sat Mar 29, 2014 10:27 am

Eeeek! That mighty bear is the next buy of my opponent. How do I kill him?
1. He is resistant to magic so my Nazguls are pretty not so handy.
2. He has fight value enough to outmatch all of my guys.
3. I think he is Fearless, so breaking his army won't help much.

My tactics so far are to feed him one orc/goblin at time and kill the rest of his army or swarm him with goblins and try to kill him that way. :roll:

Thoughts?
Cheers!

Dorthonion · **Posted:** Sat Mar 29, 2014 10:34 am

Try putting out pot of honey.

mertaal · **Posted:** Sat Mar 29, 2014 11:15 am

Resistent to magic isn't as great as it sounds- it just means when he's out of Will points he gets a free 1 dice to resist a power. You should still be able to get a few spells off at him.

Dice advantage: surround him, trap him, and be sure you're always rolling more dice than he is. There's only so many times he can roll sixes! It's a big base so you can crowd a whole lot of horrible little goblins around him. Spear support is also a critical factor.
If you can Transfix him while he's outnumbered in a fight he's in serious trouble.

Morbag_the_Orc · **Posted:** Sat Mar 29, 2014 2:46 pm

Dorthonion wrote:

Try putting out pot of honey.

I will definitely try that! :rofl:

mertaal wrote:

Resistent to magic isn't as great as it sounds- it just means when he's out of Will points he gets a free 1 dice to resist a power. You should still be able to get a few spells off at him.

I always forgot that! One Nazgul should enough then!

ElfGeneral · **Joined:** Fri May 11, 2012 6:04 pm **Posts:** 336

Also remember Beorn is a whole bunch of points, something like 40 goblins with shields worth. I've used mine to tear the Goblin King apart before (it was awesome) but the goblin king is like half his points. I'm putting him in my elf army because I like the theme, the model and like using monsters as the good side because makes my lists a little unique but I've found sadly he is very rarely worth same as the comparative number of points worth of elves, a well optimised warband with Tauriel, some rangers and wood elves is more likely to recoup their worth in points I can only imagine this is true for other good armies as well. He is also an independent hero so he can't lead troops (well he can lead eagles bit there not really troops).

In short a side that takes Beorn will have to make a big sacrifice to do so meaning they will likely use some versatility, mobility or numbers use this to your advantage and rememberer to play to the objectives not destruction, you don't even need to kill him

ElfGeneral · **Joined:** Fri May 11, 2012 6:04 pm **Posts:** 336

Also I've never had a friend do this before as we are not that competitive but his berserk rule means he must charge if he can, you could use this to draw him away from the main fight by making sure you have a really cheap model 9 inches away from him and everyone else is more than 10. At this point he either keeps chasing you till you run out of guys or has to convert to man from (50% chance) run back to the fight and them revert back to bear form (again 50% chance) meaning he spend most of the game achieving very little

LordoftheBrownRing · **Posted:** Sun Mar 30, 2014 12:53 am

Your idea is good and what mertaal said is too. Hes expensive just don't give him your captains and heroes. Feed him offs goblins etc and eventually he is BOUND to break first and you murder all his other troops while he's busy killing nobodies. Think....if he even eventually kills off one hundred points that's like minimum 10-12 turns with average point cost warriors you have to feed him. If you can swarm the rest of his tiny force by then I don't know what else to say.

SouthernDunedain · **Posted:** Sun Mar 30, 2014 8:16 am

If you feed Beorn troops, I think you'll find they will be thrown straight back at your guys. Feeding monsters doesnt work any more. You want to ideally take him down in one turn. Get a strong hero, Shagrat WL or Gothmog, Bolg etc and combine them with a wraith who can transfix him. Also make sure he is trapped.

Leonardis · **Joined:** Wed Oct 05, 2011 4:06 pm **Posts:** 891

SouthernDunedain wrote:

If you feed Beorn troops, I think you'll find they will be thrown straight back at your guys. Feeding monsters doesnt work any more. You want to ideally take him down in one turn. Get a strong hero, Shagrat WL or Gothmog, Bolg etc and combine them with a wraith who can transfix him. Also make sure he is trapped.

...or run away!

rigg1313 · **Posted:** Sun Mar 30, 2014 9:52 am

Don't run away from Beorn... He has a 8inch move.
Don't feed Beorn... He will hurl or barge through all your troops.
Instead combine transfix/compell/(the one ring) with a solid hero backed up with enough warriors to surround Beorn and even then your crossing your fingers!

I used Beorn in Two games today. He killed two Isengard Trolls easily and many more uruks as well as throwing Saruman 10inch in game 1. In game two he killed a further two more Mordor Troll Chieftains and in the space of only 3 turns!

DEFINITELY WORTH HIS POINTS - 8 inch makes him so much better than Treebeard! Fearless and Man/Bear changing is decent as well.

samoht · **Posted:** Tue Apr 01, 2014 11:14 am

Use magic on him. That will either make him easier to kill or at least stop him running rampage.

Leonardis · **Joined:** Wed Oct 05, 2011 4:06 pm **Posts:** 891

rigg1313 wrote:

Don't run away from Beorn... .

It was a joke!
My Thranduil and Leggy combo did the job on him - check out our blog :-)

BOLG22 · **Posted:** Sun Apr 06, 2014 8:48 am

He is a tough nut

I threw a balrog at him and it was hugged to death in two turns

Grungehog · **Posted:** Sun Apr 06, 2014 3:57 pm

CROSSBOWS

rigg1313 · **Posted:** Sun Apr 06, 2014 4:24 pm

Xboxs wound Beorn on 6s. He has 3 wounds, 3 fate, moves 8inchs. I would hate to be one of those Xbowmen when Beorn comes my way!

Grungehog · **Posted:** Sun Apr 06, 2014 10:13 pm

A warband of crossbows would make mince meat of him, with the way I roll dice, a 6 is not a terribly difficult roll to achieve

LordoftheBrownRing · **Posted:** Sat May 24, 2014 5:41 am

So yeah I finally had a game with him. I picked up this model and I used Beorn against my friend. He had wood elves with some Minis Tirith and nobody was a match. The store closed like a turn or two before Beorn reached legolas and Gabriel and possibly a few more captains. .....
From my perspective yeah....the bear is unstoppable other than a wraith or wizard pretty much. And he had GandAlf but got too close to my lines and was killed quickly.

How to counter Beorn the Bear?

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