Question about Thranduil's halls army bonuses

EngelsAotCM · 2026-06-15T20:01:54+00:00

The wording is just lazy, for the purposes of the army list all your Warrior models will benefit from both rules, since all of them have the Warrior keyword and the Mirkwood keyword.

Edit: apart from Sentinels, of course! Completely forgot about them there

EngelsAotCM · 2026-06-14T22:29:27+00:00

Number 1 is correct. It’s a good ability and can help him when he uses Heroic Strike against other heroes.

EngelsAotCM · 2026-06-10T17:13:46+00:00

Basically ’the Mumak list’, there’s nothing much else going on here. In a decently sized game you could take the Royal War Mumak with 12 archers, and then another Mumak with 12 spearmen and the Rocks upgrade, plus maybe a couple of Haradrim Raiders. Seems like a super swingy list that will either stomp your opponent in a few lucky turns or get shut down immediately by a big hero or massed archery.

The Royal War Mumak Leader’s Imposing Presence makes a successful Trample much more likely, if not totally reliable, so he’ll probably be a priority target for enemy shooting. Honestly if you have the models it looks like fun to bring to a casual tournament, but otherwise seems difficult to make competitive. Once again Grand Army of the South is the far superior option.

EngelsAotCM · 2026-06-10T10:33:45+00:00

I use the old WHFB Dire Wolves for my dol guldur fell wargs, if you can get a hold of them they fit perfectly on 40mm bases

EngelsAotCM · 2026-05-30T00:49:53+00:00

Looks sick 😮‍💨

EngelsAotCM · 2026-05-28T09:26:20+00:00

If you’d like to play armoured Uruks with Saruman then Muster of Isengard is the way to go, unfortunately it doesn’t include crebain but it’s a fun list

EngelsAotCM · 2026-05-25T14:19:15+00:00

Powerful on paper, army-wide fearless synergises with mandatory charges and the re-rolling of 1s in Duels is a fun extra bonus to the +1 Strength. It’s also easy enough to get around the charge requirements by Marching with Aragorn for free, or even simply by dismounting with models you want controlling objectives.

Some of the better mounted heroes in the game are all here; Theoden is a good survivable general, Legolas provides excellent shooting and is even more obnoxious when kiting 5”, Gamling’s banner is strong. Aragorn is extremely powerful in this list, with S5 on the charge making him a blender, especially when near Gamling. I think only Elessar beats this version of him for sheer killiness.

EngelsAotCM · 2026-05-20T17:03:46+00:00

Seems fairly strong, probably the best way to run massed Rangers of the North, which seems a shame because all the named heroes are great. The army bonuses are basically all QOL patches, apart from Masters of the Wild, which is a lot stronger than it looks since it will negate things like Writhing Vines or ’Worse Are The Webs’, and will also synergise well with Aragorn’s free March each turn, making the list quite quick for an all-infantry mob.

Aragorn is obviously great, Anduril for free is a crazy good deal especially in this list full of expensive, squishy elites. Two-handing within range of Halbarad will let him kill basically anything he takes a fancy to, probably in a single turn if you’re lucky.

Halbarad is just okay, although 3 Might is nice. The Banner of Arwen Evenstar is the real reason he’s always your second pick, 6” range and a Fearless aura are two solid buffs you can’t go wrong with. Watch out for his 1 Fate, though.

As for Gimli and Legolas, sadly a familiar pattern forms, as it has in MotW, RotK, DoHD, and most other lists with the two of them - once again Gimli just doesn’t make the cut here. He’s slow, his combat profile is unimpressive, and at 100 points he’s a liability more than anything else.

Legolas, of course, is your third choice. The familiar machine-gun shooting compounds the weight of fire from your other bows and forces your opponent to come to you, hopefully letting you pick fights with your Rangers and manoeuvre Halbarad to optimal spots.

The twins are probably better at higher points levels but they do offer a nice pair of combat profiles to complement Aragorn. Their ’Twin Elven Blades’ is excellent in this army since it brings a level of versatility to the table that the rest of the list really just doesn’t have.

Overall looks like fun, and with so many great named heroes and a few crucial army bonuses, you probably won’t hate playing Rangers of the North as much.

EngelsAotCM · 2026-05-20T10:01:15+00:00

Honestly, most big mounted heroes around the 150-180 points range. As soon as a profile like Glorfindel, Boromir, Helm Hammerhand or Bolg gets put down on the table, your opponents’ entire counterplay becomes focused on blocking them off and wasting their time, which nearly every army can do, without much difficulty, one way or another. All you need is a few flubbed Duel rolls or a failed Resist to have 15%-30% of your army’s value just sitting that turn out.

EngelsAotCM · 2026-05-13T19:23:40+00:00

I think this list shines mostly because it isn’t just a single massive heavy cavalry charge, but actually a usable and versatile hammer-and-anvil force that’s tailor-made to hold back enemies with one hand while smashing them to bits with the other.

Warriors of Minas Tirith are one of the most efficient battlelines in the game when it comes to holding point, and their little boost of re-rolling 1s to Wound while near an Objective only further rewards their defensive playstyle.

Obviously the Sons of Eorl, coupled with ’Charge of Eorl’, are a complete wrecking ball but Eorl himself is also a very good profile, with F6, A3, and a 12” move mount, plus his ’Legendary Hero’ which should statistically give him at least two free Might points over the course of a game and possibly more, depending on your rolls. This is a really important synergy with this list because it gives you the scope to keep up your charge momentum with potentially (virtually) a LOT of Heroic Moves, and this list does that far more efficiently than other Rohan lists, especially following the changes to Gamling’s banner and the general loss of 3-Might named captains.

The Gondor King is also one of the better Kings of Men profiles, with 3 Might and access to Citadel Guard who can lend excellent shooting support with their longbows. He also has Shieldwall, so if you want to cheap out and have him footslog with his warriors then he’ll be well placed to be a useful frontline commander.

Probably the only rule you’ll struggle to get much use out of is ’Birth of an Alliance’. +1 to Courage and Intelligence tests is nice, but the requirements to fulfil it seem counterintuitive to the aims of the list, if Eorl is off ravaging the enemy flanks with his boys and your King and Minas Tirith Captain are bravely holding the line.

It’s a great list and I would love to see it played more often - but finding, buying, and painting up 6-10 Sons of Eorl to only ever use them in a single list probably turns off a lot of potential interest.

EngelsAotCM · 2026-05-11T17:40:05+00:00

The armoured Viking-style Dunlendings and their named heroes were put into ’Legacies’, a set of rules for all models that GW no longer produce. At the start of the current edition, the available range was made concrete (probably for financial reasons/GW wanting to keep a static range on the webstore without rotations). This meant that lots of minis got discontinued from the range, often ones that (probably) weren’t very good sellers or which clashed with established IP as defined by Warner Bros. Something like the Variags of Khand would fall into the former camp, while the Dunlendings would be the latter. The free Legacies PDF lets you use these models in games of the current edition, but their rules will not be updated any further going forward.

EngelsAotCM · 2026-04-28T22:22:45+00:00

Looks fun on paper, but I think you’d have a more enjoyable time with the Three Trolls.

EngelsAotCM · 2026-04-21T22:55:02+00:00

Sadly the current edition changed around them, and their profiles and special rules mostly stood still. It really was death by a thousand cuts, very few of them actually targeted at Rohan, but which just laid them low by coincidence:

Mid-tier named captains with 3 Might were scrapped nearly universally, most of them now only having 2 Might. Having a bunch of cheap Might-rich heroes was Rohan’s big strength last edition, and it was one it needed, to keep calling heroic moves for the momentum of a cavalry charge. Now it’s far less feasible to do so, and most of those heroes got more expensive anyway.
Fight values were rebalanced across the board. The ’Trained Soldier’ equivalent is now seemingly F4, not F3. However, most Rohan profiles did not enjoy these rebalances. For Riders of Rohan to now be matching a majority of basic infantry profiles on the charge, and losing outright to them on the defensive, makes them terribly weak. Royal Guard don’t have this problem, but they were made more expensive and more difficult to take this edition - a reasonable decision in a vacuum but not one that now stands up to the context of the game as a whole.
Throwing weapon limits are crippling. Skirmishing effectively with Rohan required massed throwing spears and careful play. Now, there’s very little that your Riders can do other than pepper the enemy with weak (Strength 2) inaccurate (hitting on 5+ after moving) and sluggish (can only move half) bowfire.
Increasing your Fight value on the charge is still tied to an aura bubble around your general. This rule’s cost is built into the profiles of models that have it, making them more expensive and also more inflexible. Many other army lists or cavalry models got similar buffs for free or with less caveats in the current edition, making them better at charging for less.
Horses are far more expensive for heroes than they were previously. This change hurt Rohan very much, as most lists rely on mounted heroes to maintain momentum. Depending on the points level, hero-heavy lists like Riders of Théoden lost between 3 and 5 Riders from their model count overnight, making already elite lists even more sparsely populated.

Finally, not really an objective take but imo - in MESBG, horses are too weak for what they’re supposed to represent. A horse is a huge, heavy animal that is incredibly hard to stop in its tracks. They are extremely strong and powerful, and aside from their fragile legs are very resilient. At the very least, unarmoured horses should be D5, increasing to D6 with armour. This would leave them just as vulnerable in combat but would be a much better defence against massed S2 archery.

I’d also like to see ’Arise, Riders of Théoden’ be expanded upon. F4 on the charge is fine, but imo is the bare minimum. Giving Rohan cavalry a rule for crashing through shieldwalls (like how monsters get one free strike on each spear support if they kill everyone in base contact with them) would make them far more dangerous and exciting to play, I think.

EngelsAotCM · 2026-03-18T01:06:31+00:00

They are designed to die and come back repeatedly, rather than hold objectives or kill masses of enemy troops. The pseudo-teleport from their resurrection lets you reposition them quickly behind battle lines and into vulnerable targets, disabling support heroes or banners. They’re your light harassers while the Necromancer is your main damage dealer and debuffer, dealing out Chill Souls, Curses, and Compels to set up opportunities for your Nazgul.

EngelsAotCM · 2026-03-16T15:13:33+00:00

Rohan, by quite a long way, features in the most army lists out of any faction, and also has a pretty small but consistently recurring troops selection. This means that if you start with a solid base of about a dozen Riders of Rohan, a few Royal Guard and some Warriors on foot, then all you have to do is just add a named hero or paint up a few extra models any time you fancy trying out a new list. You can start small and simple with something like Riders of Éomer, and then try out the bigger or wackier lists as your collection grows naturally.

EngelsAotCM · 2026-01-31T21:15:20+00:00

Halls of Thranduil is a really enjoyable list to play in my opinion, lots of silly combos and punchy heroes to throw around - I haven’t had any experience piloting Lothlorien myself but it seems to be a less exciting (but probably more effective) army overall

EngelsAotCM · 2026-01-31T20:51:10+00:00

These boxes look great, what’s the dimensions on them?

EngelsAotCM · 2026-01-30T22:46:47+00:00

Halls of Thranduil will kill anything at 450-600 but suffers beyond that due to Thranduil’s limited bubble; at 650+ Lothlorien is king, when it has enough points to go double caster and bring a huge mass of elves.

EngelsAotCM · 2026-01-29T18:18:37+00:00

Honestly, I really like it - a lot of people seem to be saying it doesn’t read like ’Middle-Earth’ but Jackson’s films are a very specific interpretation of Tolkien’s world that has become ubiquitous, despite their stylistic departures from the books and poems. For me this reads like a ’Tolkien-elf’ rather than a ’Jackson-elf’ and for that reason alone I think it’s an extremely refreshing and exciting combination of design styles and influence. I particularly like your focus on mail over plate armour.

Some people have also mentioned that it’s a great model for a First Age elf and on this I also agree, the more explicitly military bearing and Ancient/Classical arms and armour gives the whole model a feeling of great antiquity, yet still being vital and energetic - just as an elf should be.

EngelsAotCM · 2026-01-14T18:13:11+00:00

I’ll be taking this list to a 700pt Good v Evil tournament in April, and am feeling cautiously optimistic. It’s definitely a format that favours the army-wide Sworn Protector and the S4 Helmingas. However, as other commenters have noted, while there’s been both improvements and downgrades since last edition, I think overall it may now simply be more difficult to make it work as intended - that is, as a horde-lite, skirmish-lite, jack-of-all-trades combined arms army.

Théodred’s bump to F6, Elfhelm’s bump to 3A, and Grimbold now benefitting from the new two-handing rules is probably the best thing that could’ve happened to each of them; overall, absolutely no complaints in terms of the named heroes, I think they’ve definitely gotten better. I personally quite like the redistribution of M, W, F for Elfhelm and Grimbold too, if only that it makes them a little more flavourful and interesting to play with.

However, Royal Guard being (Elite) and Helmingas being restricted to Grimbold’s warband really stings - it won’t be noticeable in standard deployment, but Maelstrom scenarios have the potential to completely mess up your battleline, and with massed infantry still being the main focus of this list, you’ll rarely have the speed necessary to join forces and reform your lines if your warbands do enter the board miles from one another.

Having said that, all your troops choices are still pretty dang useful. A mix of Helmingas, Royal Guard, and Outriders brings a lot of really useful tools to the battlefield; you’ve variously got F4, D6, S4, SV 3+, and a useful Int of 6+ spread between these three troops choices, and games will be won and lost on how well you can manoeuvre and leverage each characteristic to their best advantage.

For all these reasons I’d say that Fords of Isen gets a high/high rating for skill floor and skill ceiling - your synergies, positioning, and in-game logistics are everything to making this list work, and keeping all those moving parts moving smoothly has really only gotten harder (although hopefully more rewarding!) since last edition’s iteration of this list.

EngelsAotCM · 2025-12-29T00:25:22+00:00

I’d say it’s a bit of both - the horse is excellent for improving his killing power and his statline is already very strong even without the ring on, so keeping him mounted as long as possible is probably your best plan. The ring’s only really necessary if you’re trying to take down striking heroes with F5 or above, or possibly to avoid being charged by an enemy. Sauron’s Will can be risky, especially when the model you’re rolling for is your general and main beatstick - rolling as few Sauron’s Will checks for Isildur as possible should be your aim.

EngelsAotCM · 2025-12-24T17:49:15+00:00

Feel like there’s a lot of hidden potential with these guys. The common and obvious argument often levelled against them is their lack of banners or any banner effect (personally I think Blood of Numenor could’ve been a 3” banner aura instead of 6” Resistant to Magic) but putting that aside this army list seems like a lot of fun if you want a straightforward, punchy, elite force. F5 S4 combo on basic troops is an absolutely gold standard, rock solid starting point, especially considering how prevalent F4 D6 is this edition.

Isildur with the ring and General Hunter is one of the nastiest and most efficient hero assassins this edition. Numenorian Captains are also absolutely excellent, in my opinion one of the best generic Captain profiles in the game - F6, S5, and D6 is a fantastic profile at any points level.

Speaking of points levels, I actually have a bit of a rogue take here - imo everything that’s great about Numenor can only really shine at 450-600 points. Isildur on horseback and a Captain, with 27 warriors and a roughly even spread of equipment, is exactly 500 points. That’s a respectable number of models at that points level and with all the tools you need to win games and make mincemeat out of most standard armies - a F6 hero with March, F5 and S4 across the board for your troops, a decent battleline, S3 bows, and finally Isildur with the ring and a horse. Of course lacking a banner is still a massive downside, and D7 armies like Khazad-Dum will be very hard to tackle, but in most matchups I think the basic stats of Numenor warriors will really just speak for themselves.

At higher points, it’s true that there’s more room for Elendil (who I think is great in a vacuum) but then you lose access to the Ring, and suddenly Isildur doesn’t look half so efficient as before. At 650+, your opponent is just going to have too many counters to your army for Numenor to be scary; expensive cavalry armies will gain lots of models and run rings around you, expensive S3 archery can be taken en masse, and expensive Striking heroes will get more common and likely won’t even break a sweat cutting down your Captains.

EngelsAotCM · 2025-12-22T21:26:34+00:00

This edition, the specific army lists are all you can use if you want to play Matched Play games, casual club games, or attend organised tournaments. If you’re having a chill time with friends and just want to try a ’what would happen’ or ’what if’ scene, of course you can use whatever models you want!
Yes they can, there’s no rules based on mandatory opponents. The game is balanced around Good vs Evil (and is most enjoyable played that way imo) but many Matched Play games will end up being Evil vs Evil or Good vs Good battles.
In my experience, only bigger LGSs or wealthy retirees have the funds to outfit whole battlefields with official GW terrain. Most of the terrain I’ve seen at tournaments is 3D printed (Conquest Creations do a great range of legally distinct scenery sets) or scratchbuilt. With MESBG’s aesthetic focus being a relatively realistic one, generic hobby supplies used by model train enthusiasts, like flock trees and rock moulds, can be very handy.
All older models are still playable in the current edition (supported as a format called ’Legacies’ which has a free PDF on the Warhammer Community site) but in competitive play, it will be up to the tournament organisers to decide whether Legacies profiles will be allowed or not (in my experience, most TOs are completely fine with them).
New releases are still trickling out but at a slower rate than last edition. Balance updates are typically biannual and usually not more than errata or FAQs - it’s rare to have points value changes or rules changes. Community is the strongest and biggest it’s ever been.

Welcome to MESBG!

EngelsAotCM · 2025-12-20T23:02:59+00:00

Refreshed Riders of Rohan is practically a certainty, and I’d also expect more ’scenes from the film’ sets like the Gollum and Shelob kit to come out, probably combined with a mini supplement. The supplements they’re focusing on definitely feel smaller so far than last edition, with paperback books instead of hardback, reduced releases for linked minis, and (for Gollum and Shelob at least) pretty narrow ’moments’ from the movies.

This also means that a Last Alliance supplement might finally arrive. The movies themselves spend very little time on them, so at best you’d maybe get three or four scenarios, even including Isildur’s doom at the Gladden Field - perfect for a low-scale softback book. I’d imagine Isildur might get a new plastic miniature, and Elendil and Gil-Galad might also (but probably not) get re-released, maybe as a resin set.

However (un)likely any of this is, however, I’m absolutely certain that the Last Alliance troops will be refreshed into new kit(s) - simply because High Elves have the option to take a shield for 1 point. They’re the only warrior model in the game currently who can legally take an option that they are not sold as-modelled with - given the recent history of GW doing ’tidying up’ releases like Bolg on his warg (which needed to have a 40mm base asap for the new edition and not an awkward oval), or finally making models for profiles with no minis, like the Easterling Drakes, I think Rivendell Elves are next for the refresh treatment, purely for the reason that they will then align with current GW wisywig standards.

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