We all have our tips and tricks but when you face an army with those high defenses, what do you do? What do you play?

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BLACKHAWK 2010 2013 2015 DYNASTY

Well, as I mainly play Gondor, having to deal with such an high defence has really been a pain from time to time. S2 bows and S3 Warriors are quite hard to use as phalanx/shieldwall crackers: but I found that adding a Gondor Ballista, or a few lamendon/lossarnach axemen on the flanks of my army usually turns out to be the right way. Dol amroth cavalry with their +1 for wounding (mount spears) are pretty useful as well, but I really miss some S4 troops

I usually try to bring something that has +1 to wound for these occasions. But I think heroes with +1 like Durin, Balin, Imrahil with lance, Gil Galad, or the Golden King are what I bank on for getting through high defense infantry most often. Since two handed weapons can put your troops at risk in not supported properly, they are really good at taking down high defense models when the advantage in numbers has been given to me by the hero's killing spree.

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

Yeah, that's the main problem when using troops armed with two-handed weapons, if you leave them alone they are probably going to be smashed to death. On a sidenote, if you're using Isengard you just have to bring your regular uruks/crossbows and the deed will be accomplished

I find that the best thing to do is to charge them with cavalry / something with +1 to wound, or gang up on them by shielding in some places to increase your numbers in others. As the Green Dragon say, Traps win Games!
If you have a few mounted characters like this (S4, +1 to wound and mtd) in your army, then trying a burnout right at the beginning, cause if they are down on numbers at the start, you can then swarm/surround/2hw them to death.

* Burnout is when they all call a heroic combat/spend might to kill as many models as they can.

My go to tends to be brute force, I generally have high strength armies, so I will instead talk about alternatives.

If we're going for something different, like LordElrond said: the Green Dragon's catchphrase "Traps win games!" is one. That could mean overwhelming a flank or sending models that can sneak in behind and tie up spear support (flying shenanigans or Broodlings, for instance).

Alternatively, Nature's Wrath is always a good way to go. Hurl and Sorcerous Blast can do something similar.

Like Shapore said, siege engines can do something. One nice thing about them is that they force your opponent to spread out, and D6+ armies tend to like sticking together in a tight formation. Catapults (risky with deployment being what it is, but still scary), breathe fire, Mumakil, Siege Bows/Ballistae, all of it will successfully spread your opponent out (though otherwise can be very hard to use).

Magic is indeed a good point. Prone models count as trapped when you fight them, so anything that knocks a model/models down is brilliant. The way to make killing models easier is by increasing the number of dice you are rolling to wound and win fights (fv also counts here), or to improve the quality of your strikes (strength, 2hw, +1 etc).

If the opponent has a v. high defence, then you should have something that he (or she) doesn't, whether it's more numbers, higher strength, fight value, better heroes, etc. If you don't have anything at all over your opponent, and they have something over you (defence in this case), then you need to rethink your army building.

Mr.dude, would you belive me if I were to tell you that I have never witnessed a successful nature wrath? Even though its effect is extremely useful against high def/tightly packed enemies, due to the fact that its few casters (Elrond, Arwen and Tharandruil) have such a low amount of will, has always been resisted in the matches that I have played

You must be kidding! I have hardly ever successfully resisted it. I think your opponents are not using it right. They should only spend one will at a time – and remember only one model can attempt to resist it. You’ll have to resist literally every turn. Eventually it’s going to happen. It’s like a nuclear bomb going off.

It depends how you cluster your force too. I often make the mistake of keeping my heroes near one another. Normally it's a good move for what I need them to do, but against Nature's Wrath it leaves big chunk of my force unprotected. So make sure to keep every part of your army within 6" of a couple of will points when facing a Nature's Wrath-er.

It's actually happened to me once that my opponent cast channeled Nature's Wrath and couldn't stop rolling 6s, took out half my front line before combat started. Freak accident, but the spell is dangerous enough without being a direct damage spell, this is just extra incentive to keep yourself protected from it.

Do you guys have any specific advice for a morannon orc army with a really solid amount of troops?

I play morannons a lot and I am curious to see from the other side what people would do.
Usually it includes a taskmaster and a shaman so I can fit a lot of troops.

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BLACKHAWK 2010 2013 2015 DYNASTY

I haven't played Mordor much but I think for Mordor you wanna get a couple warbands, with a fellbeast. I think the blackguard are worth taking too, not exclusively but they're pretty good.

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Cheers,

P

Advice on how to play them or how we would try to beat them?

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

Uruk Hai Scouts and Khazad Guard are the absolute worst for Morannons to face. A pike block (Dol Amroth or Isengard) isn't fun either. Woses will tear your bumcrack apart if you're not careful.

Morannons' main strengths are that you have a high S and D value for a low points cost. They're comfortable being outfought because most things struggle to wound them, but FV4+ and high strength? Awwww hell naw. D7+? Nope. Lots of attacks at a higher FV? Nononononono. Models that have a fairly even battle at the same or lower points cost? Go away.

@wan how to play against them....

And @Dude funny you mention that. My friend and I practiced with something tough for my Morannon army to fight. We came up with Khazads supported by woses hahahah. Some other stuff too but that was the main body.

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BLACKHAWK 2010 2013 2015 DYNASTY

I'd definitely go with fiefdoms troops supported by Ithilien rangers. Higher F value, a solid def (referring to dol amroth knights on foot) and the possibility to form a pikeblock, with rangers deployed on the sides targeting the shaman. Morannon orcs are indeed strong, but at least they're not isengard uruks! (Very cheap though)

Before warbands, in the Legions of Middle Earth era, I had this friend whose go-to army for a while was: Woses horde, some KoMT, and a Trebuchet if points allowed. Out of everyone I've ever faced, that's the only army that consistently destroyed me every single time (except once, he still destroyed me but I managed to nab the objective so I won).

If you get too close, there's a cloud of blowpipe shots coming your way, and they WILL hurt. If you keep your distance, you're giving the Trebuchet a really juicy target. Maybe I'd do better against it now, but my sixteen year-old self had no answers to that.

Interesting.

Fell beasts and trolls probably could do some mean damage against that these days. Other stuff too but yeah bsck then especially with different deployment I can see that.

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BLACKHAWK 2010 2013 2015 DYNASTY