Hello aftter a loong pause,

Although the LOTR / The Hobbit SBG is not at all popular in Slovenia, I've finally decided to start my hobby. I guess I'm quite late as GW has stopped selling most of the Arnor miniatures. I had the luck of buying Malbeth and Arvedui as well as the RotN-styled Halbarad with banner. The captain and banner carrier are on route via post and now I only need to get a arathorn and halbarad aswell as a vintage aragorn and I'll have an army worth gold. Any tips on army building? I find it odd that dunedain and RotN are both individual characters and therefor can't lead warbands...

https://app.box.com/s/iv9qgolk5r3674qnzoyv17vbf3xrpysd

Read this before you invest too much more....

https://warhammerworld.games-workshop.c ... -Rules.pdf

No one is sure, but everyone seems to be treating this as a glimpse of future Army Lists. If that is true, Arnor will be gutted of all good heroes: only Arvedui, Malbelth and a generic Captain will remain.

Halbarad and Arathorn will be isolated in a separate Rangers of the North army: not really worth allying in, as only 4 of 12 Rangers can have bows.

Arnor is still sturdy and well-priced, points wise --but no longer a strong army without allies.

Keep in mind that Arnor will have Hobbit Archers which makes their warbands pretty cheap to fill. The fearles bonus is also pretty decent for Arvedui but I believe the strength lies in using Hobbits.

With 4 hobbits, 8 warriors and a captain with shield or bow you'll have a warband for about 135 points. That's pretty decent!

If you are only going to be starting with a small collection and only a few players I think Arnor would be a good place to start. I would shoot for about four blisters of troops (twelve models), a command to back up the king and then a box of rangers. That should be enough to go on with and it will give you something to do with finding and painting them until the Middle Earth rulebook gets released in the Spring. Even if old Arnor gets cut off from the Grey Company they can be a good force to use as allies for other armies as you build out a wider collection of miniatures. Gondor, Rivendell, Lorien, and Durin's Folk work well with them for lore and on the tabletop to cover Arnor's weaknesses.

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"Draw your sword with a heavy heart, but swing it with a heavy hand"

Thanks for the feedback! The .pdf with the army bonuses you posted are official or just for a specific competition? Well if they split up the grey company and Arnor I'm going collect both I guess... So far I managed to get 12 RotN (will convert 6 to mounted and I managed to get another Halbarad which I'll mount and remove the banner (I guess there is no need for a banner as it's really expensive and he's mounted. I'm searching for the Arathorn and Halbarad blister and another arnor command to convert a captain to bow (fluff wise a captain of the rangers). Then I'll start ordering the warriors and rangers.

The PDF is only intended for the Throne of Skulls event at Warhammer World, it is not official new rules. There is a feedback session at the end of the event so it seems like a way of the Middle-earth team trying out a few ideas.

Right now, the new armylists are only Additional Pure Army Bonuses, just like with Harad's 'Serpent Horde' bonus in the regular rules. For now, they don't effect regular army lists.

I really hope they (mostly) stay that way, and do not become the permanent lists of the future.

Merging armies (Elrond's House and Rivendale) increases diversity and possibilities: more fun.
Fragmenting armies (Harad into 3, Arnor into 2, Fiefdoms into 2) limits diversity: less fun.

Here's hoping GW lets us keep deciding for ourselves if a Harad chieften can lead Corsairs and Mahud in the chaos of Pelennor Fields.

Here is a longer thread on this issue, and how it effects Arnor:
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=33091&p=416558&hilit=Arnor#p416558

[quote= Arnor will have Hobbit Archers which makes their warbands cheap: about 135 points. The Fearless bonus is also pretty decent../quote]

Nice to have Hobbits Archers back in Arnor...but no spears (assuming the Bonus lists hint at the future). So they are either a specialty bow unit (not useful, generally, after round 2) or cheap frontline fodder: dead if the duel roll is lost.

Lots of unknowns. The Fearless bonus is pretty decent...

rather than creating an impossible army where Aragorn can fight alongside an ancestor dead centuries before his birth, we all should hope for more units. But again, Lore-wise, Arnor should not be as strong as Gondor. At Arvedui's time it was already a ghost of a nation.
And, by the way, why should an Harad Chieftain associated with desert lead Corsairs, who are by nature seabound? There's flexibilty, then there's making sense.



as for the question in the topic.
Arnor has not a lot of units as it is now. I found it good in smaller games, since every unit is an elité but, when big guns appear into the battlefield, they are quite lacking. Usually, Arnor means "grey company" with the occasional Malbeth leading a pack of ranger to save some wounds and an arnorian warrior with banner (The banner of the evenstar is good, but its bannerbearer is too fragile, with 2 wounds, D5 and 1 fate)

I hope GW continues to let the players make sense of it --rather than fragmenting armies and limiting flexibility (with the separate option of a Pure Army bonus if we want it, of course).

Is it so impossible that Arathorn's people find an ancient cache of armour in the ruins of Fornost?

In the last desparate hours of the Pelennor defeat, could a Harad Chieften gather some remnant Corsairs to him?

Beware Thematic Fundamentalism!!

We're all in this for good fun, after all...

Remember that just because an army doesn't get army bonuses doesn't mean it's worthless. None of these army bonuses are going to make or break a force. If you feel you need/want to ally in some rangers then by all means please do so!

I wholly agree: the bonuses are nice incentives to a thematic--if fluffier--army. None are overpowering. The opposite, actually.

A Pure Arnor list with bonus is weaker than an Arnor army I can build without the bonus, with the armylist as it stands today. If the bonus remains an additional option, great: more flexibility, more fun.

If the Bonus lists replace the current armylists....Arnor becomes worthless. Fiefdoms, the Dead, Harad, Far Harad, Corsairs --all of them splinter and weaken. Less flexibility. Less fun.

https://warhammerworld.games-workshop.c ... -Rules.pdf

I read it and it did not mention thrors army are they in the there and back book?