Battles in the Wilderland, MESBG, Lord of the Rings, Mirkwood

 Battles in the Wilderland

We look at the Background Lore, the forces and finally the Battle Report;

Background story;

In the Eastern Vales of the Anduin and the Western Eaves of the Great Greenwood, Rhosgobel, the Woodland Town (commonly called Bruhton) and several smaller settlements sit as the last bastion of defence against the growing powers of Darkness in the Region. Dol Gûldûr grows in strength and often now sends out parties of orcs to raid and pillage, spiders lurk in the darkness of the forest and other foul creatures are more regularily seen in the wood.

Woodsmen clan War-leaders and Elders join for counsel with prominent Elves like the exiled Tauriel and a strange old wizard called Radagast to talk about how to combine strengths and push back the darkness and preserve their way of life within the forest. Most prominent of the War leaders was Elder of Bruhton, Jarl Vitten but he was recently killed in an Orc ambush and raid (see battle report) and Elder Ingomer Axebreaker of Woodland Hall has stood up to take his place as new war leader of the Woodsmen Peoples.

In Dol Guldur, several Orc Captains and Black Numenoreans have become chief amongst them to seek the top spot as servants of Sauron answering only to the Nazgûl... within the old fortress, many pits and dungeons lie, forges of malicious and crude weaponry, breeding pits and garrison halls for the creation of mighty armies. Warboss of the hunter Orcs, Drûhkûz gathers scouting orcs, spiders and fell wargs to send out raiding parties to capture fresh meat for the growing forces within the shadow (We follow his story).

The Forces of Battle 400points each;
(Using the Battles in Wilderland pdf army lists)

Dol Guldur Faction;
Drûhkûz, Hunter Orc Captain on fell warg with bow
Mordor Orcs with Shield, spear OR bow x10
Orc with Banner
Bat swarm

Marzûg, Hunter Orc Captain on warg with bow
Mordor Orcs with Shield, spear OR bow x10

Giant Spiders x2
Mirkwood Spiders x3

Woodsmen Faction;
Jarl Vitten War Leader with bow
Woodsmen warriors with shields x8
Woodsmen warriors with bow and spears x7

Clan Elder Ingo Brightsword with bow and hunting dog
Woodsmen warriors with shields x6
Woodsmen warriors with bow and spears x6

Battle Reports

In the first game Noah and I played the MESBG scenario Fog of War, this scenario usually a bit of a guessing game but at 400 points and only 2 heroes each we knew we had to protect and destroy our non-leader heroes then move forward to capture a secretly noted terrain feature.

The Orcs and Woodsmen pushed forwards to towards each other but slightly offset with spiders hiding on a hill on another flank, the Woodsmen split their army to deal with threats from both angles. The games death blow came when (on turn3 good priority)Drûhkûz charged an enemy warrior 9" away and had his bats fly overhead and hit the same target... calling a heroic combat, Noah watched in horror as the enemy leader flew around the back of his lines with bat swarm into his Clan Elder Ingo utterly destroying him, losing priority the bats and Hunter Capt retreated to the safety of the lines and proceeded to wipe out the poor Woodsmen. On the other flank, Jarl Vitten and his warriors were struck down by the vicious spiders.
The game ended with a major victory to Dol Guldur having secured the terrain, killing the enemy hero and protecting my own.

The next game we played a made up fighting retreat where Noah had to start in the middle with his remaining forces and retreat back to the safety of a nearby palisaded settlement, i started with my remaining forces 6" from the opposite side and had to chase him down, it looked pretty good for Noah he killed both wargs so the captains went on foot, but i had two spiders and they proved their worth and we caught up and annihilated the remaining retreaters in front of the gates!

Middle Earth Strategy Battle Game, Army Showcase

First up is a recent battle I had with my son Noah, we themed it for the Battle of Dagorlad, it was 700points each side and Sauron won the day by screening out Gilgalad and chill soulling him to death and then beating Elendil in submission later on. Evil won as we made the scenario a custom one where it was purely hero killing.

I recently painted up my Lothlorien army, cant wait to use these beautiful elves again. I think of all the plastics I love the Galadhrim boxes the most. There is a bunch of old metals mixed in and this is about half the Lothlorien I have so one day il have to do another batch

Another Army I finished earlier in the year was this Gondor/Grey Havens/Rivendell army themed for the battle of Fornost vs the Witch King. I use Faramirs profile for King Earnur and the Rabgers of the North models I run as Citadel Guard... which to me makes more sense than them all being cheap heroes.

This is my Woodsmen Army, i run them as Laketown Militia and will normally add Tauriel, Beorn and Radagast but Ive had to sideline them because the new rules dont allow them to ally anymore. (Unless I break my theme and add Gandalf)

Over the summer I completed Noahs Army of the Dead force as he had snuck away with best sports at a tournament last year in which he won the 3 hunters box set, i had a spare King of the dead and extra AotD so we kitbashed up some cavalry and a banner so here they are. Hes quite happy they are a very tough force to fight against.

Over the summer a friend had me make him a Mirkwood/Barrels out of Bond display board, was fun to build, the water is mainly MSpolymer

A Rohan fort Noah and I made on one Saturday afternoon. Here I was playing against my friend Matt and my Isengard Bomb team blew up in Aragorn and Gimlis face as they were defending the gate... those bombs are super nasty in the Helms Deep legendary Legion!

Thats all for now, catch u next post!

War of the Ring by Games Workshop

War of the Ring, in my humble opinion, one of the best games that Games Workshop ever produced. Sure... it had its faults, but for those that look past the system which was possibly never intended for competitive play, its then that the game really shines... as a large scale big battle system for narrative battles... like the battles we see from the Lord of the Rings trilogy movies.

I think now, the drawbacks of even starting out in such a game would be too monumental for most people; hundreds of figures to paint, hundreds of figures to buy (yikes!), storage etc. Its just not an easily accessible game system, which I think is a bit sad because its a heck of a lot of fun.

I've been fortunate enough to acquire a significant collection of LotR armies, years of trades and some wheeling and dealing to get to the amount of models I have... so if you want to play this cool game, what I would suggest is this;

Pick up old BGIME collections that noone wants anymore from the trade pages on ebay etc... The basic armies... Minas Tirith, Rohan, Mordor, Isengard, Moria and build one or two of those into a War of the Ring force.

The actual movement trays by GW are also out of production.. so good luck trying to source any of those. Flag that idea and go ask a laser cutter to make you some up. You can get a whole heap for fairly cheap.

As for painting, you dont have to go hard out on all your models, just focus at doing the heroes, banners and special models well and your basic troops can get away with a basic paint job... washes are your friend here. I had a bit of help painting mine too... so thanks Richard and Dave if you ever see this :)

The main rules of the game have some oddities, some of the core rules needed just a little tweak... but the special rules and power combos from the heroes and the army building needed a massive reworking if the game was ever to continue supported. GW dropped the game after putting out the battlehosts supplement, im guessing it didnt have the pick up or sales they were hoping for. Overall the game was great and Ive had a lot of fun with it over the years. My friend Jamie (RoughWar) made some houserules that weve used, so thanks to him for the rules sheet below!

You can also see a starting out/how to play video by Ash Barker at Guerilla Miniature Wargames here;
https://youtu.be/-wQUIuFlasU

And now its 2020... and the game died... so what am i raving about... why now you might ask?

To put that into a short version. Noah my oldest son of ten and I are currently quarantined at home for a month. Government orders... covid19 has hit the world. Weve been doing a Gondor vs Mordor campaign and Noah just loves to write lists, get models out and tinker around dreaming up scenarios and battles.
He takes after his Dad somewhat! So I thought I would share what we have been up to.

The story so far is thus;

We had a largish WotR battle in Northern Ithilien, troops moving south to amass for an assault on Osgiliath. The Easterling hordes won but it was a close battle. 1200points each.

Faramir ambushed the forces of Harad also in a game of Middle Earth Strategy Battle Game (MESBG) but half his forces were trampled by stampeding Mumakil so again Evil pressed on to assaulting Osgiliath. MESBG 500points each.

The Osgiliath battle was another game of MESBG. Mordor defeating Gondor by capturing key parts of the city and repairing the bridge. Nazgul on fellbeasts causing havoc for the defenders. MESBG 800points each.

Then Faramir and his company had to retreat and Mordor caught up to him as he retreated through the Rammas Echor. They again failed to stem the tide of Saurons assault, the Nazgul was unable to wound Faramir.

The Retreat on the Pelennor was the next battle we played, it was WotR and the objective was to get Faramir the heck outta there. As per the booklore, Faramir was wounded as we played the final turn meaning we would next play the Battle of Minas Tirith.

As yet we havent played the Pelennor fields, weve just been sorting models and setting up formations. Its going to be a big event!

Iv got the Dol Amroth knights on the paint table, il do a bit more and hopefully  we can crack on with the game.

Heres a couple of shots of our Big Pelennor event we had a couple of years ago

Cheers and il catch you lot next time!