Okay, so we come to the Eastern Kingdoms. Since I have no experience with Khand, I will be talking about Rhun exclusively, which I think is decidedly the better force. While with Harad and Umbar I talked just about which troops are good, I will go a little more in-depth into the actual composition of what IMO, is a good Easterling force.
Easterlings are a very maligned list in SBG. This is not readily apparent; their heroes look okay, they get a Nazgul and solid Def 6 troops. So why is this one of the least competative and I think difficult to use lists in the game?
THE CONS OF EASTERLINGS
The problem with Easterlings is they are very un-meta. While they are balanced point-wise, they have a bad combination of stats which leads to a weak profile.
Take, for example, the standard Easterling Warrior. While he is costed as he should be, his Fight 3 means he is neither an effective hoard troop nor high enough to be an elite. Likewise, his average courage means Fury is more wasted than on a courage 2 troop, but not high enough to guarantee he passes important tests. This, compounded with Strength 3 means he is also not a good shock troop.
This is the exact problem with Easterlings- they do not excell at anything. While being all around solid is handy, the most effective lists rely on troops who are great at one particular thing. The men of Rhun cannot hoard as effectively as Gondor, shoot as well as Harad, fight as well as Elves of wound as well as Uruk Hai. As a result, every army they face with outnumber, outshoot, outfight or outwound them. They are stuck in a limbo of mediocrity.
The heroes are similar. They lack truly solid heroes defensively, (a shield captain comes close, but still not quite there), they have no 3/3/3/3/3 hero (Amdur and the Dragon Knight can come close, though) and their Wraith is one of the hardest to use effectively.
So basically, Easterlings suck. Well, not exactly. There are a couple of tricks up this lists' scale-armored sleeves.
More later...
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