Anticipation

I've been list building this week.  In addition to the Harad lists I posted up I've come up with lists for Gondor, Rohan, Isengard, Grey Company and Aragorn and the army of the dead. 

I'm starting to come to the conclusion that at 600 points most lists are going to be between 30 and 40 models.  Despite my reservations about the new format, which I'm putting behind me in the interests of mental health, I'm looking forward to playing with the new lists.  I am really liking the ability to customize basic warriors now. 

New Army List VI - Levy of Kharna II

 After some more thought, this might be a better list than the first Levy of Kharna.  I was having a hard time giving up on my Mahud at that point.  This doesn't have the Betrayer but has a high model count and some actual hand to hand fighters.

New Army List V - The Serpent’s Sting

This list is designed to maximize the benefits of the Betrayer, since he is so many points.  I have the upgraded horn blower.   I have some hard hitting Abrakhan Guards and lots of Kharna bows.  The break point is a little bit lower than I would like, as with pretty much all of these armies.  The Haradrim are fragile, there's no getting around that.

New Army List IV - The Serpent Horde

This list is led by Suladan with his nice big 12" Standfast and extra Might.  It has  decent numbers, the upgraded horn blower and lots of Kharna bows.  It does not have the Betrayer's enhanced poison re-rolls and other goodness.  This is a more pure Harad list.

New Army List III - The Levy of Abrakhan

This list goes back down to fewer models but addresses some of the other issues.  The horn bearer is upgraded to a warrior of Abrakhan.  This gives him courage 4.  With his horn that is C5.  This makes it much less likely that he will run away, depriving my whole army of the +1C.  I have the betrayer and a fair number of bows but they are not upgraded to Kharna bows, so they will not make full use of his re-rolls as they will miss more often.  I'm more comfortable with this breakpoint though.  

New Army List II - The Levy of Kharna

This warband has a higher model count and lots of might.  It has good heroes and some tough models in Warband 1.  The rest is filler, with a couple of upgrades.  This list add in the horn.  The horn has paid for itself in every single game.  

Pros:  High model count, good shooting, decent break point. 

Cons:  No good way to deal with big nasties, it still includes the Mahud Warriors, who just don't seem like they are a good choice anymore.

New Army List I - The Betrayer’s Guard

I have been working on my Haradrim army lists using the new composition rules.  I'll post them here in separate posts.  There are some cool combinations with the new rules.  There are also some serious disappointments (I'm looking at you Mahud).  My model count goes way down, unless I'm just shooting for as many  models as I can by minimizing everything across the board. 

Four Month Plan II

My original plan, found here, is going to have to change a little bit.  The new source books change things a lot.  I'm going to have to react to that, so...

Goal 1:  Have my entire Harad army painted.  This is not going to be done by the end of the league as I have to figure out what my new army is likely to look like.  I'm not going to paint figures that will not be making it into the list, long term.  I'll keep working on spears and bows and Abrakhan Merchant's Guards, since I know they will be in the list.  The rest will have to wait.

Lord of the Rings Source Books - Initial Impressions

My initial impression - I don't like the changes but it's not game breaking and I think everything will be fine in the long run; except for Rohan, they are just as bad as before.

What I don't like:

1.  The Warbands rule.  You have to have a hero for every twelve warriors.  This forces smaller armies.  The hordes are pretty much dead.  There's nothing wrong with hordes.  It was a viable army build.  In return for more warriors you had fewer heroes.  Most factions don't have cheap heroes meaning a bunch of troops are going to have to be dropped to fit in the extra heroes.  This rule just takes away options from the player.  I'm not sure what problem GW was trying to fix with this.

Battle Report - Hard vs Galadrim

Last night was League night down at Collectormania again.  Rhys and I got there early and hung out for awhile.  We talked about the new books coming out this weekend.  We talked about what new models we are likely to see.  We talked about Russ's new orc models.  We watched Craig (Harad with a Mumak and Serpent Riders) play a game against Jonathan (Galadrim).  When that game was over I asked to get one.  I wanted to play Craig as I have not played him yet and I haven't played against a Mumak in years.  On the other hand Evil is behind in the League and I wanted the game to count.  I played Jonathan, which is not second best by any measure.  He is a great opponent and he has beaten me the last two times we played, both good reasons for a re-match.

The Changing Game

This weekend Games Workshop is finally releasing the stats for all of the LotR SBG models.  Sadly they are doing it in five books.  Happily, from my point of view, they are not changing the main rule book.

The good news is that I no longer have to carry around an arm full of White Dwarfs.  This is an eternal problem, as old as White Dwarf, but at least for awhile we will have everything we need in these five books.  This also means that Legions of Middle Earth is now irrelevant.  It's few uses are superseded by the new books.

Battle Reports

The week ended with a lot of gaming, too many for individual reports.  On Wednesday I got off work early and was able to meet up with Keith for a game.  We played Seize the camp.  Smaug went off on his, sadly, normal, solitary blood lust infused charge and chewed through my troops to get into my camp.  I was finally able to see him off with three Black Darts, after which I had to rush a third of my army across the table to get to the center where the remainder were facing off against the rest of the army, a bunch of Black Shields.  Keith thought the fight was over once the dragon was dead but he managed to drag it out for several turns and limit me to a Minor Victory.  As always against Keith, I had to think fast in this game.  I only win about a third of my games against him, one of the things I'd like to turn around this year.

Smaug Munching on Haradrim warriors

Smaug about to get Black Darted for the third time.  The Nazgul is in the forest, top right.

Painting Status I

This is my army list, to be painted by the end of the league, which I think is the end of February.  So it will be the end of the league or the end of the month, whichever comes last.

Haradrim King
Haradrim Taskmaster
Haradrim Chieftan w/ spear
Nazgul
6 x Abrakhan Merchant's Guards
1 x Haradrim Raider with Horn
1 x Haradrim Raider with banner
26 x Haradrim Raider with spear
14 x Haradrim Raider with bow

52 Models.

I have now painted 11 Haradrim Raiders with spears and 1 Nazgul.  They all still need to be based.

Test models - Harad

I have two test models done for my Harad army, as well as the Nazgul.  I use almost all Vallejo Game Color paints with GW washes and some metalics.  I also have some Army Painter Dark Tone dip as well as a can of Antique Walnut MINWAX.  Unless stated otherwise all colors are Vallejo.

Battle Report - Harad vs Eagles

Last night was the second night/week of league play.  We had a large turnout with nine people getting games in.  Off the top of my head we had two Harad armies, one horde infantry (mine) and one with a Mumak.  There were the Eagles of the Misty Mountains.  There was a woodelf army and an Isengard army.  Two Moria armies, one with a cave troll and one with Black Shields and a Dragon.  There was also a Dwarf army led by Durin.

My game was against Russ and his eagles.  He had six eagles including Gwahir.  I had the same list as last week, Nazgul, Harad King, Harad Chieftan, Taskmaster, horn, banner, 6 Abrakhan Guards, 26 spears and 14 bows.  I don't like the banner.  I will not play it after this round of the league.  I never make my re-rolls with them and even if you accept the odds at 50% I think the 3 inch range is too short to make it worth while.  The horn, on the other hand, paid for itself again last night.  In this case it was the huge number of terror tests I had to take in order to charge the eagles. 

The table, looking towards the Eagle deployment zone, after the battle.

League Night

Today is league night at Collectormania.  Last week I had to change my list and drop my Far Harad in order to comply with the league rule that you can only have one ally.  This rule was a holdover from the first round of the league when there were a whole bunch of new players and they wanted to keep it simpler for them.

After some discussion we have decided to open it up to the normal army building, Legions of Middle Earth, rules.  This will help people prepare for the Mayhem in the Mountains tournament in September.  They will get to build tournament legal armies and play against them as well.

After all of that, I have decided to keep my list the same for the rest of the league.  I'll be sticking to a list of Harad with a Nazgul allied in.  This will force me to learn to play the less great aspects of my army without the Far Harad crutch.  It will also simplify my painting and give me something to work on for the next round of the league.

I'm actually pretty sure I'll be able to stick to this decision, though a total shellacking tonight could test my resolution.

P.S.  I'm totally going to try to remember my camera tonight.

Four month plan

I re-read this blog last night, just to see where I've been.  That's the main reason I'm keeping it, to help myself track this hobby.  Here's some themes I took out of it.

1.  I need a deadline in order to paint.
2.  A goal of 20 models a month - painted is reasonable.
3.  I love terrain.
4.  I need more pictures.
5.  If you want to do something someone has to organize it.

Based on these five things here's what I am going to aim for.

1.  I am currently in a six week league at Collectormania.  I am going to aim to have my Haradrim list painted by the end.  This is a stretch goal, to say the least.  It will put me way above the 20 a month, but what the heck.
2.  I am going to paint more than 20 models in January.  I only have a week and a half left so I'd best get cracking.  February is going to be the same story.
3.  I am going to make some Harad specific terrain.  This will be done after the current league round.
4.  I will take my camera to the shop tomorrow night (Thursday) and I will take pictures of my games.
5.  I want to play in a campaign.  I have been planning to build a 3-D campaign map for the last couple of years.  My goal will be to complete that by the end of April.  That way we can play a campaign out in the league, two rounds from now.

So, nothing to grandiose but definitely some stretch goals there.

Battle Report - Harad vs Galadrim

Last Thursday Jonathan and I played my first game of the league. It was a reprise of the game from the week before, his Galadrim led by Glorfindel and Rumil against my Haradrim. I was tripped up at the last second by the League rule that you can only ally one faction into your army, a rule I believe we should change, by the way. Consequently I was forced to drop my Far Harad and went with a list that consisted of Bob the Budget Nazgul, a Haradrim King, a Haradrim Chieftan, a Haradrim Task Master, a banner, a hornblower, six fat guys (Abrakhan Merchant's Guards), fourteen archers and the rest spears for a total model count of 56. We played Domination with the MitM change of only three objectives.

I had a big hill in my deployment zone. there was a ruins between my zone and the objective to my left. The rest of the terrain, of which there was a lot, did not really factor in the game so I'll leave it off. I made a lot of mistakes in this game. Jonathan only made a couple. He, again, got a well deserved win with a minor victory. One more turn would have given me the minor but two more would have made it his game again. This was a real nail biter and I found myself thinking about it quite a bit the next day, which is the mark of a great game, to me.

We started off with a general advance on the part of the elves towards the left and center objectives. The elven phalanx headed towards the left while the cavalry and archers, with Glorfindel riding along, went towards the center. I left my archers behind the hill, firing in volleys most of the game (mistake number 2, I waited way too long to start firing directly). I split my force with a strong infantry force heading towards the left objective and a smaller force going over the hill and towards the center, (mistake number 1. I shouldn't have split them the way I did and had too many high value units in this group with no meat shields.)

My volley fire was average over the course of the game but started out strong. I killed both knight archers and another model in the first round. I got rid of most of his highly prized archers over the course of the game with volley fire. Jonathan killed all of my fat guys with arrows, a very disapointing development but well deserved the way I left them hanging out in view.

I pushed my infantry up into the ruins, about twelve inches short of the left objective, and stayed there. This was where Jonathan made the only real mistake of the game. He brought his phalanx up and charged me. Between the wall bonus and some good use of transfix/compel, I kept Glorfindel out of the fight, killed Rumil and managed to bounce the phalanx. Jonathan realized that he didn't need to fight me and pulled back to the objective, still too strong for me to sally out and contest him.

He also shifted his archers and remaining knights to hold the other two objectives. this is when I realized that the reason I was feeling outnumbered was that I had 15 models hiding behind the hill. I marched my archers out to contest the center and right objectives. Killing Rumil had made me a happy little Haradrim. I had also put a wound on Glorfindel with a Black Dart, something generally frowned upon in tournament play. Most players consider it too risky for too little pay off. Now Glorfindel found himself facing down a haradrim gatling gun of fourteen poisoned bow shots. This is where I made mistake number 3. I rolled all the dice at once. I killed the hell out Asfaloth but didn't have enough left to finish off the elf, though I did put another wound on him. I would have been better off taking the individual shots. The reason I did this is becase it was almost 2100 and I had Rhys (7yrs old) with me. I had already gotten a testy phone call from Mama and 2100 is closing time, though Chris very nicely and characteristically offered to keep the store open for us. So I was rushed. I took another turn to kill Glorfindel. Another moral victory in my eyes.

I managed to take the right objective and was one turn away from having more models on the center objective. I had broken but my hornblower more than paid for himself. Jonathan was one model away from breaking. I had moved my Nazgul up so his phalanx would be taking break tests with no heros on a -1 courage. He was moving troops up to the center objective, who would start arriving a turn after I controlled it. We survived the roll on the first turn after I was broken but the second one ended the game.

Long gone but not forgotten

It has been over a year since I last updated.  I had to run off and fight a real war and that took up pretty much all of my time.

I'm back now.  I have hobby time.  I might even have the desire to work on this blog.  I have not played much in the last year.  I have gotten in two games of LotR in the last two weeks.  I have joined a league and that encourages regular play at least once a week.  I am hoping to get some Warhammer fantasy games in as well as exploring some of the historical rule sets out there.

For LotR I bought a new Harad army right before I deployed.  I got them assembled and basecoated.  The development of that army will probably be the core of this blog for the next few months.  Just like the last time I was actively working this blog, I'm building up for Mayhem in the Mountains in September.  That gives me a lot of time get them painted and to play test the hell out of them.

I'm also going to work on some terrain for the army; perhaps enough for a table at MitM.  I have a Bree table which I can contribute if it's needed but I would like to have a table for the new army as well. 

So, I hope to be hitting this space with battle reports, painting progress and terrain construction.  We'll how it goes.

More Test games

I played another game of LotR the other night.  We are all fine tuning our armies and just trying to get some practice in.  This time I played against Chris Ward, who is always a fun opponent.  We rolled randomly for scenarios and got the night fight one, which is my favorite.

Chris has a nicely painted Uruk army led by Saruman.  I was anxious to play against him because I do not have a lot of experience vs magic.  In addition to Saruman there were a captain, a handful of crossbows and an equal mix of shields and pikes as well as three berserkers.  His model count was 37.

I was running my new list.  Faramir, Captain of Ithilien with rangers and Osgiliath veterans.  My model count was 50.  I really feel the lack of might in this army, with only Faramir's three.  On the other hand the 12" banner, fight 4 within six inches of Faramir and the high model count all work well.  Faramir's better stats are nice too.

As I said, we rolled for a scenario and got "Ill met by moonlight".  We each divided our army in half, with a hero forward.  We were playing on part of the Osgiliath table.  I say part, because we only had some of the tiles and none of the scatter terrain.

Chris had Saruman, the five crossbows and berzerkers forward with the rest of his numbers split, pretty evenly, between pikes and shields.  I had Faramir, all of my rangers and veterans forward with only veterans to the rear.

Chris had to set up first and he built a firebase in a ruin in the very center of the table.  I placed my rangers to each side of that, with veterans in front.  Faramir, valiantly, hid behind a ruin so the crossbows and Saruman couldn't start the game by crushing him.

The first few turns were fairly even.  Our shooting was effective, as usual in this scenario.  The +1 to hit meant he was killing rangers on a 3 and I was killing Uruks on a five.  I had more shooting his was better.  It evened out.  He rushed everything but the crossbows and a couple of shields towards my right flank, which is where Faramir was now.  Both of us were moving our reinforcements up as fast as we could.  My left flank archers were sliding up towards his table edge.  In the way rolls were saving his crossbows, I only killed one through shooting the whole game, though his normal warriors and a beserker were not so lucky.

We finally engaged on the right flank, Saruman threw out a scorerous blast which killed one veteran and knocked over a couple of rangers.  The first round of combat was pretty tame.  Faramir got in one charge, killing two Uruks.  Saruman then blasted him six inches.  Faramir lost his horse but was unhurt, and no one was behind him.

Chris had moved his reinforcements over towards the brawl, dropping a couple off on my left flank, with the crossbows and their guardians, and a couple more in the center, forming a wall between two buildings.  I split my reinforcements, just about evenly, between my right and the center, with a couple heading over to help my left flank out.

Things were looking pretty bad for the forces of good.  Faramir was locked down every turn.  Chris had more models in the main fight and many of mine were squishy rangers.  We then had two brutal, for the Uruks, turns of combat.  In the first turn I killed six Uruk Hai.  I blew away nearly his entire center formation, between the buildings, opening up my route into his rear.  I killed a couple in the main fight, evening things up there enough for me to hold my own.  I also gained clear dominance in the flight on my left flank.

The rest of the game was just me closing the trap on the Uruks who were pinned in on my right.  I broke him but Saruman's standfast meant he didn't have to take any tests.  The fact that he had no room to maneuver and that I was coming at him from, literally, all four directions, meant that almost all of the fights were going my way.  With F4 and a reroll out to 12 inches Chris just couldn't win enough to make a difference.

Chris had some bad rolling going on in the end there, but I think my banner is what made the biggest difference.  In the end, the last turn, I killed Saruman when I jumped him with nine dudes.  He rolled a 1 for the fight, which was not really epic at all.  I offered to let Chris re-roll it, since that seemed like a sour note to end the game on, but he stuck to his guns and took the 1.  We hit 25% over the rest of the turn and the game was over.

I was not broken so it was a Major victory to me.  We didn't keep track of the kills for our heroes, but I think Saruman got one or two and Faramir got two or three.

On my side, I was really pleased with how my army worked.  I really feel the lack of might in the late game, with only one hero.  On the other hand the F4 is pure gold.  The 12" banner really paid off in this game, though this is the first time that it has.  Ranger shooting was as good as always and the large numbers were really useful.  I shielded more in this game and that helped me stay above break until the end.

For Chris, as he said, "I don't know if my army sucks or not with rolling like that".  I had two good rounds of combat that pretty much determined the game.  Saruman was good, making all of his spells and fighting off my troops until he was really, really, outnumbered.  There were a couple of places that Chris could have played differently, but with his center getting blown away in one round of combat there was not much he could have done to salvage it.

It was a fun game, as always against Chris, and I learned more about how my army works.  I'm pretty sure this is the list I will take to MitM.