With Rise of Angmar hitting stores and gaming tables soon, Thundercloud takes a dive into the new evil units and Legendary Legions.
We would like to thank GW for providing a copy of Rise of Angmar for review.
Table of Contents
New Units
No LOTR supplement is complete without some new units to shake things up, whether something taken from the background and getting a model for the first time or a new minor character added to the lore.
The miniatures are all hits for team Evil, with the Hill Trolls and Shadow of Rhudaur in particular worth being singled out for praise as models.
The Shadow of Rhudaur
What if there was a more impressive version of a Barrow Wight? The model is great, but let’s talk about the rules.
You pay 30 points more than for a Barrow Wight, and gain an extra 2 points of Fight and a second attack, as well as gaining 2 Might and 2 Fate and getting a completely different range of magical abilities. You can also select an enemy Hero at the start of the game, and if it is within 6″ it subtracts 1 from its Courage and -1 from its Fate rolls.
The spell list includes Curse and Wither, to remove Fate points or reduce a model’s strength, and it’s the only model with Curse available to Angmar. Essentially it’s a cut down spell list that overlaps a little with what Ring Wraiths do but is different enough to be interesting. Trying to channel Curse to strip all of a model’s Fate points on a six on the casting roll is tempting when facing the 3 Fate big expensive heroes.
This makes a solid hero hunter and wizard and it pairs particularly well with Ringwraiths who can reduce enemy courage to make Blades of the Dead more, well, deadly.
Nazthak Orc Captain
A named Orc Captain with an extra point of Might and the very interesting Scavenge rule, which lets him pinch equipment from models he kills (with exclusions; you can’t steal horses or Fell Beasts or the One Ring). This would include things like bows, spears, shields, and two handed weapons, so you can tool the model up throughout the game.
I think people will get a bit fascinated with this, and he’ll end up running round with Elf Bows or War Horns or Elven Cloaks or Anduril or Sting or whatever, and it’ll make for good stories.
Hill Troll
An economical monster option at 75 points, the Hill Troll costs exactly the same as a Cave Troll and has better abilities. Fight, Strength and Defence 6 with 3 attacks make this a great line breaker, particularly combined with the Hill Troll Intelligence ability, which lets them reroll a dice in fights against infantry (though not monsters). A shooting of 4+ combined with Throw Stones 12″ Strength 8 gives them reasonable shooting. With the power attacks Monsters have access to, this is a great choice even in 500 point games.
Werewolf
Werewolves jump out of the pages of the Silmarillion and into ME:SBG.
25 points gets you a pseudo cavalry model that causes Terror, has Fell Sight (charge models you don’t have LOS to), and has Fight 5, Strength 5 and two attacks. Feral Charge lets them knock down Infantry if they’ve charged as long as they are not charged by cavalry in return. This makes them great shock units and a move of 10″ let’s them cover a lot of ground. Paired with cheaper Wargs they can trap and murder key enemy models and a lot of human level heroes with Fight 4, and a werewolf or two adds a lot of punch to a Warg pack.
Shade
The Shade gets a new set of rules and a different stat line and a point drop. While the model gains a second attack, and becomes Courage 5 (increased from 1), its Will points drop from 8 to 4 and the model gains a point of Fate.
Chill Aura is gone, which is the big reason players took Shades, as it created a 6″ bubble of -1 to enemy Duel rolls that helped Angmar chomp their way through enemy rank and file. I foresee a lot of complaining about this.
It’s been replaced by Swirling Mists, which gives models within 6″ -1 to be hit by shooting attacks, -2 if the shooter is within 12″. It still costs a point of Will, so can be used a maximum of 4 times.
It also gains two more abilities. Conduit of Angmar lets Ringwraiths within 6″ measure their Magical Powers from the Shade, and inflict a wound on the Shade to add one to the casting roll if they choose. This expands the range of the Ringwraiths powers, lets them target things out of line of sight, and is generally pretty useful.
The second power, Ghostly Resolve, gives friendly Angmar Orcs within 12″ +1 to their Courage.
This makes Shades less a Chill Aura casting battery hanging out behind your lines like an inverse banner, and more of a general support piece and leader model. Its points drop from 100 to 75, and it’s a viable warband leader/support hero for Ringwraiths.
Aldrac, Warlord of Carn Dum
A solid mid-tier Hero with a couple of really solid abilities. Mighty Blow doubles wounds when they’re inflicted, and Fight 5 and 3 attacks helps win fights. Access to Heroic Strike and Heroic Strength helps win against/bring down enemies, and the Battle Frenzy ability means that if Aldrac kills an enemy he can declare a Heroic Combat in the next turn without spending Might (letting you set up that Heroic Combat in the next movement phase with key models to follow you into the follow up fight).
In addition Warlord of Carn Dum gives a 6″ bubble for friendly Carn Dum models to be able to reroll Courage tests.
A solid hero at lower point levels and in the Carn Dum Legendary Legion, but at higher point values Aldrac is directly competing with things like Ringwraiths, and can’t take a mount to get places faster.
Freacht, Vassal of the Witch King
Freacht is a mid-level caster character with no offensive spells, and the spells are ‘Incantations’ which muddies the water a bit. As they are not offensive and simply set up buffing bubbles around him there is no interaction with resisting magical powers, but the nature of the power (buffing friendly models) means it couldn’t be resisted anyway if it was a magical power (as per page 97 of the rulebook). I’m not sure why they aren’t just magical powers. It seems like a way to set up Prayer type powers as seen in AoS in ME:SBG, which is interesting, though I’m not sure having a pseudo-magic power type was necessary given the rules as they are.
The buffs are reasonably useful and affect friendly Carn Dum models within 3″ (reroll 1s to wound, ignore wound on a 5+, not slowed by difficult terrain except water features).
Heroic Resolve gives models within 6″ an extra dice to Resist, which is useful if your facing a lot of magic, but it’s once per game.
For 65 points Freacht isn’t terrible in combat, and is a nice support caster with the Ignore Wound 5+ and reroll 1s to wound bubbles being particularly useful.
Captain of Carn Dum
Providing another generic captain, the Carn Dum Captain comes in at 55 points. Against an Angmar Orc Captain with shield, which comes in at 45 points, the Carn Dum captain has an extra point of Courage and the Glory Seekers ability, which helps, but they are a little pricy for what they bring and can’t be put on mounts.
Warrior of Carn Dum
The rank and file beef cakes, they provide Strength 4 warriors with better courage than Orcs and the Glory Seekers ability (+1 to wound enemy heroes they are engaged with). For 9 points they are equivalent to Mordor Uruk Hai with shields, and the miniatures have the option of Maces or an extra point for spears. As they lose their ability when supporting, then having Angmar Orcs with spears as your second rank is the better choice, leaving team beefcake to use their Strength 4 and Bash if they get the chance.
Factions
Angmar
Angmar is amended as a faction, adding all of the new evil units in the book, and giving Angmar four new named characters to play with. You then have the option of 4 Angmar Legendary Legions, each with a different theme and locking out some of your choices in favour of getting more special rules. Some of these Legions are particularly good at certain things.
To start collecting Angmar the best first purchase is the Mordor Battlehost. Everything in it can be taken in Angmar, everything can be taken in the Host of the Witch King Legendary Legion, and all the Orcs and Warg Riders can be taken in the Army of Carn Dum and Buhrdur’s Horde, giving you plastic troops and cavalry to mitigate the financial cost of forces with a lot of Forgeworld resin models. As ever, for an Evil player, getting a box or two of Mordor Orcs painted up is the first step to having a completed force.
The faction special rule is that friendly Angmar Orc models within 3″ of a friendly Spirit Hero gain the Terror rule. The faction has a lot of Spirit Heroes and a lot of Terror anyway, and this gives them even more, taking the Courage problems Orcs normally have and mitigating them or shifting them to their enemies.
The additional units add interesting new options, with Warriors of Carn Dum giving a Morannon Orc/Mordor Uruk Hai equivalent, Hill Trolls replacing Cave Trolls, Werewolves giving a shock semi-cavalry model and a bunch of new characters to provide alternatives to the ubiquitous Orc captain.
In every book there is a legendary legion or two that we’ll see a lot of at the 500 points level that becomes sort of a meme force and turns up a lot in the one day Middle Earth events. Think Bear Force One for Beornings, or the Uruk Hai scouts, or Dale. This book has three legions for the Evil side that I think fit this, and which do very different things with different play styles, and will find fans for each of them.
Legendary Legions
It’s worth noting that all of the legendary legions have some plastics available, either Orcs and Warg Riders or Wargs, and this helps control the cost of buying your army. Orcs and Warg Riders being the staple for half the evil armies out there really helps, but Wild Wargs are also not that expensive.
Host of the Witch King
The Legendary Legion has a lot of benefits for Ring Wraiths, and given how pricy they are, this pushes it towards the higher points level games (750-1000). You have to take the Witch King, and how you tool him up has been the subject of dozens of blog posts and youtube videos in the past. He’s clocking in at between 70 (for no horse, no extras) to 175 (tooled up to the hilt). You can’t take a Fell Beast, but armoured horse is a good call against a lot of opponents to try and keep your ride alive for longer.
The Witch King is upgraded to three attacks, only loses a point of Will for being in a fight if he loses it, and gets +1 to his fight value when engaged with an enemy Man model. Being Fight 6 with three attacks is incredibly useful.
This makes the Witch King a very good combat wizard, and things like Harbinger of Evil and Drain Courage means he can make juicy targets very vulnerable to Barrow Wights/Dead Marsh Spectres with Blades of the Dead.
Dark Sorceries gives all Ringwraiths the ability to reroll a dice when casting or Resisting, so the Witch King basically gets the Crown of Morghul for free, and other Ringwraiths become more reliable as casters.
Once you’ve got your Witch King kitted out how you want, you are looking at your other options. You can take The Tainted and the Dwimmerlaik as other Ringwraith options, both are Fight 5 Ringwraiths, and both have abilities that mess with enemy Heroes. The Tainted also has 2 Might points to spend to win fights and can create a 6″ no Heroic Action bubble, but The Dwimmerlaik has the Sap Fortitude ability to cancel enemies spending Might, Will or Fate, which can be critical in making sure big heroes can’t Might their way to victory or Fate their way out of death.
You keep the Angmar Faction rule for Spirit Heroes giving Orcs within 3″ of the Terror, which is useful.
The Shadow of Rhudaur clocks in at 80 points, and provides a lot of things Ringwraiths do with some interesting other options.
Nazthak is a fun little guy, and LOTR players love a fun little guy (see also the huge number of fun little guys in the hobbits list).
Shades are a decent support hero choice, and particularly useful against shooting armies, but are much less of a compulsory pick now. Barrow Wights are similarly good to have, but overlap significantly with Dead Marsh Spectres in their role within the army. However they’re both Spirit Heroes, creating Terror bubbles for Orcs and the Shade gives Orcs within 12″ +1 Courage, which is nothing to sniff at.
Finally for heroes we have Angmar Orc Captains and Orc Shamans, giving a cheap jobber or caster for bringing more models to the table. Orc Captains are 40 points and have Heroic March, Orc Shamans are cheap and have Instill Fear, which pairs well with all the Courage negatives the army has. You can put them both on Wargs to get them going faster around the board as well.
For troops you have Angmar Orcs, Angmar Warg Riders and Dead Marsh Spectres. Orcs are Orcs. They’re cheap jobbers that hold a battleline, support things with spears, whack things with two-handed weapons and give you the numbers to trap things so your various wraiths or ghosts or whatever can win fights and they can pile in. The army rules and buffs available mitigate their low courage, and Terror messes with the enemy, but they are still the expendable mooks that die in handfuls.
Dead Marsh Spectres give you Blades of the Dead and the great A Fell Light is In Them ability to pull key enemy models out of formation, either away from where they are needed to support or into the open where your guys can jump on them and boot them to death.
Angmar has always done well competitively, and while there’ll be much wailing and gnashing of teeth over the changes to Shades, the army is balanced and pretty mean at higher point levels where they can take a lot of ghost toys and back them up with plenty of Orc boys.
Army of Carn Dum
This is a list that will be fairly solid at 5-600 points and then start struggling when you go higher.
You have to take Aldrac, and at 120 points he’s a fairly solid beat stick hero whose major downside is no mount to help with mobility. Show of Strength (if a Carn Dum hero kills enemy models then it gains +1 to Fight value in the following turn) pairs nicely with Battle Frenzy (free Heroic combat next turn if you kill enemy models). This sets Aldrac up to blender his way through enemies with repeated free Heroic Combats and Fight 6.
Fraecht is a cheap caster whose buffing bubbles jump to 6″ range in this legendary legion, making him very useful. Similarly banner range increases to 6″, making a banner pretty much compulsory in the list.
Carn Dum Captains are fairly cheap and have Glory Seekers (+1 to wound heroes) and Show of Strength in this list, making them more viable compared to Orc Captains providing cheap Heroic March.
You’ll want to mix Carn Dum warriors with Angmar Orcs, as Orcs provide spear supports for 60% of the cost, and give you numbers to help stop you getting overwhelmed/give you the ability to surround your enemies.
Warg Riders are worth a mention as your source of fast models, and throwing spears are the better upgrade for them.
You also have access to Orc Trackers. These are 5 points, have bows and 4+ shooting, and are cheaper and better than Orc warriors with bows. Choose these as your shooting option if you are taking one. You can upgrade them with Wargs for 7 points for skirmish cavalry with bows, but in a list where you want to get stuck in I think having your Wargs be punchy support for flanking and objective grabbing rather than their own little skirmish formation would be better (but if you disagree you can make it work).
As a whole the list is solid, but when approaching 7-800 point levels and the only additional heroes you can bring in are more captains, I think it runs out of puff. But at 5-600 I look forward to seeing how it does tearing around the 1 day events.
Wolf Pack of Angmar
I think this will be the meme list from this book, with players going ‘Wolf Pack! Uwu!’ at events.
It’s a simple list that plays fairly straight forward. Everything moves 10″. There’s no shooting or magic or special rules. There’s only 3 profiles to remember. You take a few packs of Wargs with Werewolves for added spiciness, and you charge round the board biting things. You have some Terror (Warg Chiefs and Werewolves) and you can spend an extra point to have Fell Wargs instead of Wild Wargs and gain Fell Sight.
Everything gets the Knock Down ability that werewolves get on the charge against infantry (and similarly don’t benefit from it if they are charged by cavalry later).
You pick one of your Warg Chieftains to be the alpha, and they gain an extra point of Might, Will and Fate and become a Hero of Valour. If they get wounded then all friendly models within 6″ count as being in range of a banner.
There is an army wide rule where you basically get a Waaagh. You go ‘Uwu’, declare that the Warg Chieftain you chose as the general is using the ability, and then all friendly models get +1 Fight and may rerolls 1s to wound. This is great for the key turn where you have to win fights and kill things.
The army has one available character, the Warg Chieftain, and you’ll be building packs around a Chieftain, a werewolf or two and then Wild Wargs/Fell Wargs. There’s no support models, nothing else except these four units. Wild Wargs are only 7 points, so you can go with a proper horde. You could literally have 3 Warg Chieftains, 3 Werewolves and 26 Wargs/Fell Wargs in a 500 point force.
Buhrdur’s Horde
This is another army that benefits from smaller games, though this is because apart from Buhrdur, there are no named characters, and Warg Chieftains and Orc Captains aren’t going to bring the abilities that other legendary legions with three, four or five named characters to play with can.
You have to take Buhrdur, so it’s a good thing he’s a beefy fellow. You have Hill Trolls, which are fairly cheap as monsters at 75 points, and can take Orcs, Warg Riders and Wargs to give you numbers.
The army-wide special rule, Masters of Terrain, gives all friendly models Woodland Creature and Mountain Dweller and means you ignore a lot of difficult terrain and reroll Jump, Leap and Climb tests.
Buhrdur’s Warband gains the Ambushers special rule, meaning that it is held in reserve until the end of the movement phase in Turn 3 and then comes in from any board edge as reinforcements OR is deployed within an inch of a piece of terrain they could be hiding in (woods, buildings, rocky outcrops, etc). This let’s you jump out with a significant chunk of your force after three turns worth of movement, including potentially jumping out on an objective, jumping out behind a shieldwall, jumping out to cut off enemy running away with treasure, etc. This can be absolutely devastating.
Buhrdur gains the Blood and Glory special rule, getting a Might point back if he slays an enemy hero, and also gaining Fearless, automatically passing all Courage checks for the rest of the battle.
I think this will be another favourite small points force, where two to three monsters backed by a lot of cheap chaff can be very strong. It’s less point and click than the Wolf Pack, but given the majority of figures are the Orcs/Warg Riders/Wargs that are the bread and butter of evil forces, you are only getting Buhrdur and a pack of Hill Trolls to have a different Legendary Legion.
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