I have recently encountered a LotR player who strongly argued that Mordor and Harad are the two most powerful LotR armies out now. My own experience… has shown this not to be the case. Despite my efforts, I could not dissuade him from his very strong opinions.

His overall case was that a “power creep” occurred as a result of Harad and Mordor being the latest two army supplements. His main argument for Harad was the Mahud warriors being far too good for their point cost. Meanwhile, he regarded Mordor as broken for the introduction of the orc drummer and the Shadow Lord.

With the exception of Rohan (which he regarded as a trash army) and Grey Company (which he thought was about as OP as Mordor/Harad), he believed the rest of the armies were on a similar playing field. Thus Dwarves = Gondor = Isengard = High Elves = Easterlings ect…

As I stated earlier, I disagreed with his opinions about Mordor and Harad (and the other armies for that matter…) but I am more curious to see what The One Ring community thinks. Does anyone else believe that a significant (even game breaking) power creep occurred with Harad and Mordor?

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And now… perfected. My fighting Uruk-hai!

I don't know that Mordor and Harad are the most powerful armies. I do think it's a problem that some of the profiles are more powerful than equivalent profiles on the Good side, but only because that's completely out of character for the books. However, I think that GW has done a pretty good job of balancing point costs and cultural features. An all-Mahud army would be overcome by a basic WoMT + KoMT formation for the same reason Goblins overcome Rangers: sheer numbers. Not only that, kill the leader and break the force, and off they go.

In some respects I think the game system itself is broken. It heavily favours quantity over quality. You could not recreate the Battle of Thermopylae, where a few hundred Spartans held off thousands of Persians, using this system. And if anyone was the LotR equivalent of Sparta, it would have been Elves and Numenorians, followed by Gondor. Even Rohan was "up there" in martial prowess compared to all the rest.

The game flavour is driven mostly by the movies, unfortunately, where Peter Jackson (bless him anyway) was happy to sacrifice the dignity of Rohan and Gondor in order to drive up the moment-by-moment tension.

All that said, I do think Rohan is broken. They should at least get lances or the equivalent, and "expert rider" should be a more meaningful talent.

Perhaps slightly stronger than before but that's all. The new Wraiths are very powerful, the drummer is devastating in the hands of a competent general, and those Black Numenorians are tough customers. But overpowered? Hardly. Ringwraiths are already incredibly beastly- a bare minimum one can put down a hero in a small game, and that -1 courage is frightening. The new Wraiths do get some great advantages for a small increase in points, but it's nothing to cry over.

Harad are not much different than before. Sure, Mahud rock in combat, but if they lose they're vulnerable to being killed, and their courage is awful. The poisoned bows + mass shooting is unforgiving. I wish those archers would go back to being unarmed...

But I've no more trouble now beating new Mordor as opposed to old Mordor- I just had to adapt to the changes. The Shadow Lord isn't anything too special. The drummer is easy to kill. Mahud are not OP for their points cost. There may be a small power creep here, but not significant. If this is a big creep, then Dwarves have been holding the (over)power for a long time now. It really sounds like he's just complaining because he can't win, if I had to take a guess.

So, surely that means he thinks ALL Evil armies, with the exception of Sharkey's Rogues are broken, as they can include the Shadowlord?

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A lot of these overpowered debates occur immediately after someone looses. Funny that no-one ever looses to incompetence.

Last night in my 600 pts Gondor vs Isengard battle my opponent whined from the get go that Boromir in my army made it an autoloss for him
Apparantly it didn't matter that
- Saruman never got to fire a spell, due to a few heroic moves I made.
- His Troll strolled to far from the main army straight into Boromir's arms.
- His 5 crossbowmen fired a total of 2 arrows during the fight due to not having clear targets.

So in our club Gondor & Mordor are "overpowered" (not factoring allies).

It looks like everyone that has replied so far is of a similar opinion as I am. I tried to convince him that Dwarves are top-tier and his only response is "just take two-handed weapons and lances". I also pointed out that any Evil army can take the Shadow Lord but I do not think he really comprehended that.

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And now… perfected. My fighting Uruk-hai!

I personally agree....Not with him

The only army in my opinion that are unbalanced a little is the forementioned Rohan, (sadly my own army) and Grey Company do to the no bow limit, which is a little rigged, but overcomable.

My two cents

Frodo

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Statcreep - yes, cummon, every model F4!
Overpowered - no, for these tough profiles you pay the points, Mahud die fairly easily and the drummer gets targeted and shot on turn 1 through volley fire.
However, I do think the Shadowlord has changed the game considerably, don't know whether its for better or worse though and even then is only really effective in some scenarios where all your models can group up around him.

i do believe mordor has become slightly overpowered. i dont like these high strength 2 arttack elites its a bit unfair. however most evil armies lack their courage and pay a lot for there brighter stars. i think the unerpowered army at the moment is rohan. there got no real decent heroes or decent troops the only thing is rrg which are expensive

The Shadow Lord is certainly the most popular named Ring Wraith but, as hithero stated, it might be a good or bad thing.

The previously mentioned LotR player is still intransigent and spent a good deal of time recently arguing with me about why Dwarvers are only average and then, as if to attack me, argued that Uruk-hai are "phenomenal". Kind of ironic since a little while ago he said Isengard Uruk-hai were balanced but now they are broken too.

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And now… perfected. My fighting Uruk-hai!