Since your tournament is meant to be today I guess it won't help (unless there's a big timezone change), I only just woke up.
Shadowswarm wrote:
how many pts was it? you list seems to be using alot of the under priced stuff (blackshields, gothmog, mumak....) so im not that surprised.
where there any decent lists (ones that didnt use lots of ringwraiths, or just underpriced stuff like the mumak) in the tourny?
It was 1 army 1500 points, therefore max 375 in allies (I used 360). Underpriced stuff is more point-efficient, so competitively a lot of players will take any advantage to win.
Yes, there was quite a few nicely themed forces, like 160 Galadhrim I had to play, all-cav Rohan Riders, one army had combined Battlehosts of Army of the Dead and the Return of the King. Pretty much everything was there. Then there were also armies like Mordor with 5 foot wraiths and mass Morannons with Gorgoroth Horde (in fact, I think i saw 3 Gorgoroth Hordes); another Mordor with 3 foot wraiths (or 2, not sure), 1 winged Nazgul, Mumak and lots of Morannons again. Another Mordor (which I played in the final game 5, both of us being on 4 wins at the time as the only 2 players) with Winged Nazgul Battlehost - 5 Wraiths (WK, Tainted, Dwimm, KoU, Betrayer), company of Morannons and Doom and Despair Fate. In the top 5, there happened to be I believe my Moria, 3 Mordors, 1 Harad and a Grey Company mega combo with Elendil/Aragorn/Dain/Galadriel (which frankly lost to 5 Wraiths on the way and drew against one of the scarry Mordors) - yeah I know that's 6 armies, but some were tied around 3rd place.
Note about the Grey Company and their Councellor rule with Dain and Galadriel - it was found by the other players (not the one using it) and rulled in our favour that you are only allowed to use 1 Councellor per turn, not both, because the rule states that model uses the rule at the start of priority phase - now technically, once the first roll has been made, it is no longer the beginning of the priority phase, therefore the second Councellor may not be used. The argument that 'in this case Heroic actions could not be done multiply' does not apply IMHO because it states specifically in Heroic Actions that you do as many as you want and roll-off and Councellor is not a Heroic Action. If GT rulling is the one you want to take, feel free, but no-one is forcing you because it's not official. (although they've made notes for design studio to look at).
Also I'll take this moment to say something about Radagast's Epic Tranquilty, because there is a way around it - it states that it is called at the start of the Charge Phase, so exactly same time as a Heroic Charge. Once you roll-off which action goes first, it is possible that a formation will able to charge before Epic Tranquility takes effect. (In case anyone was thinking the Tranquility was broken
).
Shadowswarm wrote:
one thing that im curious about is your commons. how would 1c of bats really help? im sure you would use them for flank charges but there pretty expensive just for that... also the giant spiders, I havent used them yet but what ive heard is that they are so fradgile that they get killed very quickly?
you said that the command options are useless, although a capt seems like he would be quite useful (at the doubles, resisting might, heroic actions), or was that because they would become duel targets and you only wanted heroes for the blackshields? im quite interested how you played this list as im a MM player my self (although i havent played WotR much... and i have a tourny tomorrow)
1 Company Bats - they were not originally for flank charges, their purpose was for combo-play with Mumak and double Overlords: Bat Swarm gets Heroic Move behind enemy formation, then Mumak gets heroic into that formation (3x3d6), the formation has to flee towards the closest board edge and it happens that the Swarm is on their way. They get automatically destroyed. However, I happened to usually use other formations that were in better/safer positions to the bats, so they proved useful otherwise - when I had priority they would charge a Troll or a flying Nazgul, stopping it from countercharging my flank or forcing it to use Might (which Trolls don't have and Wraiths only have 1). Also, their Terror helped others sometimes because once formation failed, my other formations also had more attacks. Movement blocking/slowing down and forcing opponents to use one spell on them was also sometimes useful. Overall, the two single companies proved to be very useful throughout the tourney.
The Giant Spiders are the best cavalry in the game IMHO. They have D3, so what? Unless you're going against a formation of 24 archers, there's nothing to be afraid of. Note that they are not a front-charge cavalry like Morgul Knights could be, but when they attack the flank however, they have S5 with prowlers and 8 attacks per company. Now S5+Prowler eats Heavy Armour+shields (ignore shields for flanks) on 3+ and re-rolls 1s because of poison, so from 3 companies' 24 attacks you will usually get around 18 dead before your opponent gets to strike. Being on the flank, they'll get less attacks on you and usually they'll have the problem of also fighting to the front something else, so you're guaranteed to win combat just thanks to their flank attacks (and if your hero in the other formation called a Heroic Combat, that's usually the whole enemy formation gone). Against Khazad Guard on the flank they're killing on 4+. Against Orcs, Rohan warrior and anything else that's D3, flanks they kill on 2+ with re-rolls, so 3 companies will kill average of 23 models.
Oh and add to that that you ignore terrain, so it's easier for you to flank than with any other cavalry and even when charge through terrain and end your move inside it, you still get the bonuses while others don't (Pathfinder Master ignores all difficult terrain penalties)
For anti-archer screening purposes there's always the option of summoning some Broodlings.
Command options first of all weren't required for this army - 3 Epic Heroes, each goes into a formation of Blackshields to get At the Double, other formations move 10 or 12, so they will catch up a turn later. In addition, since Epic Strike works in Duels (which I believe it shouldn't, but I don't write the rules, so whatever), captains always get eaten first and with them around another company of men on average (winning by 8 = 4d3 autohits = 1 company dead), effectively having a Captain lose a duel means you just lost the combat (unless you had spiders on the flank
). Drum might be useful, but I'd rather have 2 more companies.
The way I set up was from left:
Spiders / Wargs / Blackshields with Gothmog / Mumak (depending on terrain could be somewhere else. 2 Swarms close to the Mumak) / Blackshields with Durburz (for Heroic on 1 Bat Swarm) / Blackshields with Druzhag / Wargs / Spiders.
That meant I just barely fit on the board, having formations of 1 / 1/ 3/ M / 3 / 3 / 1 / 1 companies wide. From that, the only strategy you can do is move forward really because there's barely any space for maneuvering. Mumak was often moved first with Gothomg's Overlord, unless I felt it would be disadvantageous.
We rolled for set up and scenario from the rulebook each time, so shieldwalls I played only twice. Once was Take the Pass, where 1 Blackshields had to stay behind the others. I also played Maelstrom of Battle twice, so you just have to improvise with that (btw, it was ruled that Might cannot be used for set up in this one).
Shadowswarm wrote:
can you give us some of the other lists?
and a last note, how did tainted palantir work out for you?
The lists are in one of the previous replies. Palantir was excellent - ever since my Mordor playing days I always believed it was the best Fate (because I can't stress how important it is to be able to choose whether you're first or second in a turn, and usually 2nd is better), but for this Moria army I seemed to not have enough points to take it untill I dropped another formation. The +1 to your roll means that you win priority 64% of the time, that's almost twice as often as your opponent. And how many times have you wished to move 2nd to be able to dispell Pall of Night from your main formation with Druzhag while your opponent smartly chose to go 2nd? How many times have you run out of Might and wished you moved first for cavalry charging purposes but your opponent saw it and chose to go first himself? And how many times you wished you move 2nd to set up a perfect flank charge, while moving first wouldn't let you?
Priority is the most important role of the turn, so why not give yourself a bonus to it?
I'm glad someone asked questions, I really wanna help the WotR community get bigger, the game is good and we need more fans of it
BlackMist