Hello,

I am new to competitive list-building and was wondering if anybody could offer some advice on making a reasonable Gondor army (700 points). I was thinking of using some of the following, although I could potentially throw some other models in:

Boromir of White Tower (on foot with or without banner, on horse with banner)
Faramir on foot (heavy armour)
Captain of Minas Tirith on foot
25 Warriors (8 spear, 8 sword, 8 bow, 1 banner)
6 Knights of Minas Tirith
Battlecry Trebuchet
Avenger Bolt-thrower
Angbor the fearless plus 6 clansmen
Gandalf the Grey (on foot, horse or cart) or Radagast the Brown

Any of these must-includes, or obviously bad? Thank you!

Hi,

I have been playing gondor a lot lately and i found that the cheap heroes is the greatest strength gondor has to offer. Beregond and damrod allow you to bring a lot of troops and Faramir can be a great general.
A front line of defence 6 warriors of minas tirith with rangers and/or citadel guard behind to give you fight value 4 is really strong. (citadel guard with bows are also great to hold objectives) And knights as cavalry support to flank the enemy is great.

I personally never play the siege engines. Most of the time they can shoot 2 or 3 turns and after that they are useless. If you really want to play with a siege engine, use the bolt-thrower.

I hope this helps

Thanks for the advice. I had a feeling that the trebuchet wouldn't be very useful, but it's good to get that confirmed.

Unfortunately I don't own Beregond/Damrod, rangers or citadel guard! I have the knights though.

What's more useful ... a wizard or a bolt-thrower?

Wizard is awesome in all situations but pricy. Bolt is good against immobile melee enemies.

I think you should take the wizard. Reason is that... It can be very helpful against multiple types of enemies. And it makes a great leader for an army! With wizard you can blast enemy melee, so you won't need Boromir. Then take cheap captains and elite forces and a guarantee win.

Wizard. At 700 pts you're gonna need magic support

Thanks all for the advice.

Any good tactics with a wizard ... or articles about this elsewhere? Is the plan just to use sorcerous blast a lot? I can see you get one good hit with that, but is it enough?

Gandalf the Grey will be able to:
1. Immobilize enemy monsters such as trolls, even dragons, to useless.
2. Give will points to an important ally hero to pass courage tests or magical crowd control of enemy.
3. Use wizard plast if enemy has thick formation of units, being especially powerful if enemy has a troll or cavalry.
4. Protect against archers, giving cast blinding light = same areal radius as the shadowlord.
5. Add this boosted 75% fate points, and C7 and 1 free will per turn - he won't leave the battlefield early.

Radagast the brown won't have blast, but he can counter enemy cavalry effectively, and he can give terror to own units in areal. Also Radagast has vision to everywhere on the map, enemy won't be able to hide from him. And of course he can also immobilize enemy monsters / fight heroes.

I am not sure if either can lead gondor warband though?

Thanks again. Some good advice to try. Now time for me to get some more practice!

Hi there! I've been playing Minas Tirith for a while now and agree with what has been said above. One of the guys in my local group has created a fantastic guidebook for playing as this army. If you want to PM me your email address I can send it to you.

Additionally, you may have seen the experimental army bonuses created by the middle earth team for Throne of Skulls (if the army is chosen 100% from one faction). MT's is great - every model gets +1 courage!

Gandalf the Grey is not in the army list, although Gandalf the White now is (according to these experimental rules, which will almost certainly appear in the new Middle Earth SBG next year). My point is, take white over grey with minas tirith!

Some final tips: faramir or boromir on horse with lance, leading knights is great as a heavy hitter unit. You need a battleline of at least defence 6, with fight 4 spear support (you can max out the 33% bow limit with rangers, then fill out the rest of spear support spaces with citadel guard with spears (both the same points value). Sprinkle fountain court guard with shield across the battleline for that D7, mmm. Useful heroes aside from damrod/beregond are Denethor and Madril. Denny is a beast in combat, and more reliable with the new army bonus, and madril comes with 3 might, and is a beast at range or in combat considering he costs the same as a captain with a bow! ( he also has a great special rule).

Have a great time

_________________
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