So i played my first legit, WotR game today, as the title says, and i have to say i'm a little dissapointed in the elves. Anyway, i'd really like to know what army would best suit me.

After some browsing through the WIPs, i thought elves would be a cool army to start, since the high elves look so darn cool. I made a list, and me and my friend proxied everything today. He played mordor.

Maybe i'm getting this wrong, but the elves rely way too much on the terror/higher fight value to get bonus attacks, but against stuff with D7+... they're terrible. The extra few attacks dont do much when you need 6s or 6/4s to hit. How are elves supposed to go up against armies like dwarves, or evil armies with high defense (the list i made for my friend included morannon orcs, morgul knights, and trolls)? Everyone says that the elven shooting tears stuff up, and agree, but only against stuff with D5 or lower. Maybe it was just my rolls....

Anyway, just wondering what people do to make elves work out. Most of the magic my friend was throwing at me was cool... but devestating. He took my rivendell gaurd down to C2 and then did visions of woe... twice. I rolled a 3 both times, and lost 10 guys. Legolas also had a hard time taking out the trolls.

The only thing i really liked from the Elves were the Knights. So deviating from elves, are there any other cavalry units (in other armies), that yeild the same results? I know people go gaga for the Swan Knights, but i don't really think theyre worth the points.

The first army i ever looked at was an all easterling army. Are those fun? Do Khataprakts ever do anything? Would it stand up to a misty mountain army?

Another army i looked into was Isengard, which looks more appealing now that ive played, since alot of thier stuff has D7 and S4+. The crossbows are probably devestating, but they dont have very great cavalry choices.

The list i made for my friend was a Black Gate themed list, which looks cool, and fun to play, but i dont know how easy that would be to paint. It looks simple, but easy to mess up. Does ayone have any good tips/instructions on how to paint morgul knights/morannon orcs and stuff like that well?

I have a lot of sympathy for Elven players. The best I could figure for that list was to go for Galadrim, wood-elves and perhaps Galadrim knights, make heavy use of their cheaper spell casters and rely on 'Epic Defense' to protect screening units while Elven spellcasters damage the enemy units and you move in and try and hit a flank.

Seems like a lot of hard work though. Still, I think they are an army that is better a higher points.

Magic heavy Mordor is a beast of a list, given how undercosted many of their primary spellcasters are for their abilities, then the baseline troops aren't half bad either. So unless your opponent was using Shamans, I can imagine that they seemed pretty 'effective'.

Gondor is actually not a bad Cavalry army at all. 25pt basic lancers, the option of heavier cav as a common choice and you can reasonably ally in more Rohirrm. What makes them work is that their baseline units are reasonably priced, and they have some affordable heroes. That means you can have both plenty of cav an decent amounts of supporting troops.

spuds4ever has been having exactly the same trouble as you, maybe you should PM him and you two can discuss your problems.

I've found my Gondor cavalry to be extremely effective. They're almost impossible to pin down, and their long charge range means that you should be able to charge every turn (by waiting just outside your opponent's charge range), even without a Hero.

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

Shooting dosen't do a *word deleted* in WotR which really dissapointed me as that was what elves were feared for. High elves are really, really, really etc. not worth the points. Their strength and defence values are appalling for a unit that costs 55pts. per company. I'm with going for Galadhrim because if they have shields they'll be twice as hard to kill as high elves by S3 opponents and they're still cheaper. By the way, you can't cast the same spell more than once so what your friend did was actually illegal. It says in paragraph 6 in the wotr book on page 70.

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

Unless he had 2 casters to cast Visions of Woe of course~

I keep seeing this everywhere... but i dont like the way galadrahim look. The old metal models were so much better. The high elves appeal to me the most out of every other faction, because they look, and they look easy to paint. The high elves dont even come with shields, aside from the spearmen, so i can't really use high elf models, but use galadrahim stats.

Is isengard as agressive as a mordor magic list?



He had 3. I have him the dark marshal, so he could take the Morgul Knights as commons, the Mouth of Sauron, for the battlehost, and another ringwraith of his choice to stick in a big unit of mordor uruks (he chose the betrayer).

Is an all cavalry mordor list feasible? Like 1/2 wargs and 1/2 morgul knights, with some characters/trolls thrown in?

I'm not sure... it might work though. Because you'll (normally) strike first you'll be able to wipe out large enemy formations before they even have a chance to wound you.

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

To a degree you are right on target with the difficulty in fielding a competitive Elf force in WotR vs. SBG. Their bow range and extra dice from shoot value is great, but with a standard Str 2 and the distance rule of the game you are often going to need 6 or 6/4 to wound must decent foes.

In a recent game, I played a 1700 point Mirkwood force totaling 14 Companies that was 100% bow armed ( Sentinels and Wood Elf warbands with bows ). This kind of heavy ranged fire helped greatly but in reality each Formation of mine that would fire would only score wounds on 2-3 enemy models per turn because of the weak bow strength. And with the closure rate my enemy had (using combos of Wings of Terror, At the Double, Heroic Move, etc.) it didn't give me more than one "free" turn of shooting before he was on me and I was more limited in my ability to shoot each turn after. Now in SBG my Wood Elves at 33% bows would have done serious damage to an enemy force closing across an 8' table, but in WotR, even at 100% bows, when I needed to first hit, then roll 6/4 to Wound, Elf bow fire just isn't as impressive most of the time.

To make an Elf force really effective I believe you need to find a core to focus on and build and play to that core strength. Magic, special rules, etc. really make a difference. My force is centered around the White Council's strike against the Necromancer. As such I had Galadriel, Protectress of Lothlorien (her war-aspect form), Gandalf, Thranduil and Legolas as Epic Heroes. They were leading a Battlehost of Thranduil's Halls with one 4-Company Sentinel Formation, one 4-Company Woodelf Warband (bows) and two 3-Company Woodelf Warbands (bows).

In play, I used a number of Epic Shots from Thranduil and Legolas to deal automatic hits on tough Formations, as well as Nature's Wrath from Thranduil for similar reasons. Gandalf helped support the other three Heroes by restoring Might where he could, using various low-Focus spells to assist where needed, and almost always hit the most critical enemy Formation with Blinding Light (forcing them to either burn a Might to resist or being stuck with a Fight 0). Galadriel is like an "always-on Epic Strike" so she can duel with the best of them and on the attack she could provide a lot of extra dice (especially if hitting a Fight 0 foe). Since my force was all Defense 3 already she could also call Epic Rage for the Strength benefit if needed without really impacting her force at all.

But I had to do everything I could to control when and where the melee clashes took place. With my force being D3 my opponent usually needed 4s to Wound. Against his generally high Defense I would need 5s, sometimes 6s. Almost nothing helps address that basic issue. If they can score 2x - 3x as many Wounds on you per turn of combat then you will eventually be worn down and loose. To top it off my opponent had the Bane of Kings so if he didn't get enough 4s the first time, he had a chance with the re-rolls. It's good to be Evil sometimes. So when we did fight I needed to try for the side or rear charge, had to maximize the use of my Sentinels ( reduce enemy Strength ), leverage Legolas's Swift Strike and count on the extra kills from winning Heroic Duels to help equalize the battles. Every turn I had to not only Move and Charge for that turn but had to keep in mind my actions next turn (both "with" and "without" priority options) as well to be sure I was positioned well. Though I usually try to do this, back in SBG I could often let my Wood Elves play more 'fluidly', but in WotR there is a lot more need for chess-like planning of a turn or two in advance and then adapting to the turn-by-turn results.

Meanwhile, with my Dol Guldur force (Morannon Orc, Mordor Uruks, regular Orc, Warg Riders, Ghostly Legions and Castellans) all I have to care about is getting in close quickly and they just about take care of themselves with chopping thru most foes while holding up against damage.

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Wait ye the finish! The fight is not yours.
Beowulf

http://TacticsInMiniature.com

Thanks Beowulf for putting even more perspective on elf armies.



Can the same be said for a misty mountain army or isengard?

How does gondor play? It seems to me all the really cool stuff is metal...

Whats the best army to ally Ents/Eagles? Theyre really cool, but it seems to me that i don't have room in any of the armies except for Gondor.

I find Isengard is a very easy and fun force to play in both SBG and WotR. Their core troops both deal and take a lot of damage and they have a good spread of medium power Heroes. Add to this that Saruman is a very potent evil spell caster and the named Uruk captains have some cool rules.

In SBG Warg Riders were generally weak unless in great number. In WotR they have gotten much more potent and I strongly recommend fielding one or two Formations of 3+ Companies each. Each box will give you three Companies so its not too hard to build these guys up in time. In addition to the Warg Riders, Uruk warriors and Scouts are all plastics and are both effective so you can build your army relatively cheaply. Only the Crossbow and Berserkers are going to start setting you back significantly. You're going to want some of each eventually but can always grow into them or do some proxy substitutions early on.

So perhaps get one box of Warg Riders and two boxes of Uruk Scouts, plus some Heroes as a low-point start. While playing some early games with them get a couple boxes of Fighting Uruk Hai and a second box of Warg Riders painted up and you're ready to go. Then build from there (adding to either the Scout or FU group or getting some other useful Formations). Isengard is also a very fast army to paint, and you can combine them with large numbers of basic Orc as well as Men to make your army larger with more variety.

On the Good side, Ents and Eagles are both cool, but be careful about any H2K models (including Trolls too). They can easily go down dead in the very first round of combat if your enemy rolls a lucky 6 (or scores more than one roll on the table). For this reason I find Eagles to be more versatile since you can keep them out of harms way most of the time and swoop-attack your foe instead of charging him. It makes it harder for your opponent to engage them. And since Tolkien used the Eagles a few times as a surprise salvation for an otherwise desperate situation then you can justify them almost anywhere. Ents are a bit harder for theme, especially with Gondor, such as your example. I can see Ents with almost any Elf force as easy to accept, and could see them with Rohan as well. But not much else personally. If you do use them though, Treebeard can be a killing force.

We have someone in our group that has his Misty Mountain force up to almost 2000 points. I haven't had a chance to face him yet so I can't speak to the effectiveness. I will say though that he had to pain a LOT of Goblins to get there. Enough that I'd say, if he didn't already have a good sized Goblin force from SBG, he may never have made it while keeping his sanity.

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Wait ye the finish! The fight is not yours.
Beowulf

http://TacticsInMiniature.com

I just wanted to bring up some of the things i did with my elf list.

The first, i proxied some elnaith. I don't know where that name comes from, and i'd like to know, but those are high elf cavalry. I gave them the same stats as Galdrahim knights except i gave them lances for +5 pts/co, just because if i did start a High elf army, i would be converting them from spearmen, and thus they should have lances.

I put legolas in the unit, so they would strike the same time as monsters, and the unit destroyed a 4 co unit of morgul knights and a 3 co unit of mordor orc archers, but then got killed easily by a rampaging troll. Early in the game i was using Legolas's ability to down the troll to R1, but never used epic shot, because Gothmog was around, and i figured... it would be too risky. Tactics wise, was this a good idea? Should have I tried to epic shoot the troll, and should i have tried to charge a big formation of morannon orcs w/ shields + gothmog, instead of the morgul knights?

The second thing i did was use the stats of Guards of Calas Galadhon for High Elf spearmen, but gave them shields for another 5 pts per company. These guys never got into combat with orcs, and eventually died to Visions of Woe.

Anyway, i was just trying to make adjustments so that High Elves would be a little better... but in the end, it sorta failed me.

This was my 1000 pt list from a while ago:

Lurtz
4 Companies Uruk-Hai Phalanx w/ Captain
4 Companies Uruk-Hai Warband w/ Banner
3 Companies of Uruk-hai Crossbowmen w/ Captain
Uruk-Hai Berserker Warband
Isengard Troll
Isengard Troll

Right now i'd probably drop a company of crossbowen and maybe the berserkers to get a big formation of wargs in the mix. I planned out the army so that i would get the first 1000-1250 points in one chunk, and then after that add 250 point expansions to the army. At 2000 points i had hoped to use this list:

Lurtz
Saruman the White Hand
9 Companies of Wargs w/ Shields + Tormented Seeds
5 Companies of Uruk-Hai Phalanx w/ Captain
5 Companies of Uruk Warband w/ Banner Bearer + Cursed Armor of Udun
3 Companies of Scouts w/ Bows
2 Companies of Uruk Hai w/ Crossbows
2 Companies of Uruk Hai w/ Crossbows
Uruk Hai Berserker Warband
Isengard Troll Capt
Isengard Troll Capt
Isengard Troll Capt

Fearl Uruks look awesome beacuse of the ambushing, but theyd be expensive.



Although i always wanted to build an army peice by peice, I always end up ordering a big chunk of an army all at once from online, just beacuse its so much cheaper.



I wasn't asking for myself, because i would never be able to paint all those... and keep my sanity (like you said), but my friend is very interested in a misty mountain army because of some neat combos i showed him with allies (Ex: shade + big formation of goblins. The shade reduces everything to fight 2, but the goblins are already fight 2, so they dont suffer. Another is allying a mordor troll chieftan and using the troll charge with a bunch of cave trolls nearby). In the event that he started such an army, i just wanted to know if i would get my ass handed to me every single game... cuz thats sorta how elves feel.

I play Mirkwood Elves [1500 points], and had the same problem with high defense of orcs.

After some research, I'm really into fluff for LoTR, I found enough "evidence" that Mirkwood Elves did have some armour. So I built a unit of 4 companies of Galadhrim Elves\glaives. Although I could never justify them using shields, I did pay the points for them to be shielded. Let me add, that my regular opponents had no problem with this.

Now................I add in Legolas in that unit for a possible Epic Defense, and I can bump the defense to 8.

Here's the kicker..................Give the unit Orc Bane. Yeah, it's expensive, but with all those attacks, the +1 to hit is huge. And coupled with your defense of 6 for sure, 8 if you want it, will win you combats. Also, remember that Legolas' unit attacks as if cav!!

So, even the staunchest of orcs will be killed on a 5+, while they will have a really hard time dealing with your Def6, or Def8 if needed. Finally, our group has decided that Uruks are classified as orcs, so it makes the 100 points more justifiable.

As for playing against Dwarves. I got nothing..............so far. They are a tough nut to crack, for sure.......

-Dave-

Thanks dave.

Epic defense is pretty awesome, but i never called it beacuse Gothmog was around... and i dont want to be going against Def 9 orcs.

I don't understand why orcbane is 100 points if you take it as a fate. Its at most 5 pts per company, and there isnt anything that can take 20 companies.

Rivendell Gaurd: F6, S3, D5(7), Stalwart
Gaurdians of Caras Galadhon: F6, S4, D5, Pikes, Stalwart, Orcbane
For 5 points more per company (10 points if you factor in that shields cost 5 points), the Galadrahim get +1 str, pikes, and Orcbane.

From High Elf Cohorts to Rivendell gaurd, they are paying 5 extra points for stalwart. From Gaurds of the Galadhrim Court to Gaurdians of Caras Galadhon, they are paying 5 pts for Stalwart and +1 str.

To be sure, it's pricey, but it's really worth it in my army. It's S3 across the board, all Mirkwood, so it was almost impossible to break those huge blocks of orcs with just shooting, and hand to hand. So for 100 points, I have the biggest kids on the block, so to speak.

My other charcter is Thranduil. Epic Strike, put him in the same unit, and Gothmog is toast, more than likely.

And just for fun, you can more than likely use Radagast. He resided there after the big war. But I prefer to just use 2 characters and alot of troops at 1500.

-Dave-

I think you have forgotten about Gothmog's master of battle rule which, coupled with epic strike, makes him a real blighter to take down in duels.

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

Oops, sorry, my mistake..........You are absolutely correct. He's, indeed, tough to take out.

-Dave-

Not only tough to take out, but also extremely annonying!

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