Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

In one month's time, the final Hobbit film will be released, and from then onwards, I think it will be save to say that support from GW for LotR/The Hobbit SBG will start to dwindle away, until this once get game is relegated to the dusty corner full of the games of yesteryear, the likes of Necromunda and Mordhiem that have been abandoned by GW. These games still survive, though, through a vibrant online community determined to keep them alive. Of course, us LotR players will keep a similar community going, but every little helps. So what follows is part plea and part challenge that will ensure that this transition goes off with a bang. It's also largely a bit of fun, so don't take it too seriously, and yes, it's overly melodramatic!

"A day may come when the courage of men fails, when we forsake our friends and break all bonds of fellowship, but it is not this day. An hour of wolves and shattered shields, when the age of men comes crashing down, but it is not this day! This day we fight!" Aragorn Ellessar, at the Black Gates of Mordor

So, the plea: Get posting! Whether it's on your own sites, this sub-forum or anywhere else, do something LotR-related between now the end of the year! Whether it's a batrep, a painted mini or army, or even just an inventory of your collection, it's all good. Also, take this info the two world; demo LotR at your LGS or hold a painting contest, even start up a league or campaign!

And to help with that, the challenge. In this very thread, I'll be running something of a challenge between now and the Hobbit release to motivate some friendly competition and general hobbying. I'm afraid there won't be a prize beyond bragging rights, but I hope some of you can get into the spirit of it and join in! The basic premise is that you accrue points based on your LotR hobby activity over the month, and at the end of it, when The Battle of the Five Armies hits cinema screens (17th December), one winner will be pronounced Lord of the Rings/King of The West/Ring bearer/any other suitably grand title!

Points will be given for the following categories, so just post in this thread what you've done, with a link in your post if applicable, and I'll keep a total of points in the OP.

Gaming: points will be given as follows (points marked with a * are cumulative with other points in this section)

But a Taste of the Terror: play a game of LotR of up to 300 points- 3 points awarded
Stand, Men of the West: play a game of LotR between 301 and 700 points- 5 points awarded
The Great Battle of Our Time: play a game of LotR of over 700 points: 10 points awarded

A Member of the Fellowship: play a game of LotR with someone who has not played before: 10* points awarded
Leader of Men: run a demo game of LotR with 2 new players- 15* points awarded
The Road Goes Ever On: play a game of LotR as part of a campaign or league- 5* points awarded


Hobby: points will be given as follows (all points from this selection are cumulative)

Elven Artisan: paint a LotR figure: 2 points awarded
Dwarven Skill: display a picture of painted LotR figures on Dakka or another site: 2 points awarded
Things That Yet May Be: post a WIP photo of a LotR figure: 1 point awarded
The Courage of Hobbits: paint your first LotR figure: 5 points awarded

The Red Book: produce a written battle report of a game of LotR and post it online: 3 points awarded
The Book of Marzabul: produce a battle report with pictures or video and post it online: 5 points awarded

Palantir Visions: produce a LotR SBG related thread, article or discussion on Dakka or another site (please don't post spam topics just for points, though!) 3 points awarded




There we go. So, post here when you do any of the above and I'll tot up the points! Couldn't be simpler. Hope to see some LotR goodness flooding Dakka in month to come...

"Will you follow me, one last time?"
Thorin Oakenshield, King Under the Mountain, at the Battle of the Five Armies

The contestants
Captain Galenus: 31 points
Da Boss
namiel: 19 points
gashbod
Wolf: 29 points
Ahzek
ckig
Godeth
spyguyyoda: 14 points
Jinx Magiga: 6 points
yourintestines
NathanD298: 10 points
Fourkillmaster: 16 points

Total score: 119 points

Will definitely be joining in in this! Clearly lots of effort has been put in to create this, and I to wish to see LotR continue to thrive.

'You have my bow!'

Awesome, thanks for dropping in!

Just to clarify for anyone else, you can join in at any point between now and the deadline, just post and I'll add you to the list!

Awesome idea for a thread, love all the quotes. Will definitely paint some dudes up before the deadline.

Or, as I suppose I should have said: "And my axe!"

LOTR is coming to our local GW and I was asked as the biggest fan of the SBG in the community to help lead the way. Ill be making sure we get some batreps and new painted minis coming. Maybe a few demo games as well

Cool, added you both to the OP! Looking forward to seeing what you come up with, and I'll be posting my own recent efforts soon!

Sounds fun im in

 Da Boss wrote:
Or, as I suppose I should have said: "And my axe!"

Yes! Was Waiting for someone to finish that quote for me!

It's nice to see a lot of enthusiasm for LotR on a Warhammer/40k based Forum. Can't wait to get going...

Btw, it would be a fun challenge to promote LotR more within the Dakka community itself as well, spreading the Hobbit love and getting away from the cliche of 'Lord of the Rings the Specialist game that no one cares about'.

@Namiel the more people you can get into the game the better, I myself am trying to get a friend back into it, though on a much smaller scale than what are planning.

Captain Galenus wrote:


It's nice to see a lot of enthusiasm for LotR on a Warhammer/40k based Forum. Can't wait to get going...

Btw, it would be a fun challenge to promote LotR more within the Dakka community itself as well, spreading the Hobbit love and getting away from the cliche of 'Lord of the Rings the Specialist game that no one cares about'.
.

Yeah, I'm hoping that will be a side effect of this, it's always a refreshing change to see some LotR stuff in the Painting subforums, hopefully this challenge will change that and get it more common, if even for a while.

I doubt the game will ever get back to it's RotK era glory days, but the longer we can keep it out of the Specialist/unsupported Games forum the better! GW haven't really helped with their pricing strategy, but between eBay and alternate manufacturers it's still a pretty cheap game to get into; you can get rulebooks/sourcebooks for a pittance second hand, and companies like Wargames Factory and Gripping Beast do some great kits for some of the more generic factions. 24 WGF Vikings for £15 is basically the core of aRohan/Dunland army, same for their orcs for Mordor/Angmar.

Sadly, I think GW will drop the game as soon as they can, instead of keeping it going like they did after Return, but with any luck the community can keep it alive!

True that, I certainly will be posting more stuff here now (been sticking more to TLA and OR at the moment) so hopefully will spark some interest if only from a collectors point of view. That is if I can actually motivate myself to paint

The move to Fine(or not)cast has also been a real dagger in the side, as even troops now from the Hobbit are in resin making it expensive to build cool armies. I think GW have fallen into a catch 22 now as they feel as if they can't lower their prices for new Hobbit stuff. It is a shame really as some people don't like paying for even one game system...

Aye, eBay is such a saviour nowadays, got 46 Warriors of Minas Tirith and 24 Knights the other day for 99p. Yes you read that correct! If only other people were willing to delve into the treasure trove, it is really quite easy to start older better established (and thus nerfed by GW) armies.

"If this is indeed the will of the council, then Gondor shall see it done"


I'll happily contribute to this, having just got back into lotr recently I'm back in love with the rules and older models !

I will post some pics of my models and the mounted Elendil I am currently working on

Great, added you to the OP! Mounted Elendil sounds cool, is that a conversion or was there a model for it? (Because there just might be some bonus points for conversions! )

It's a conversion of the mounted Aragorn (king) model Sculpting and everything !

I look forward to seeing it!

Hey and you're not doing anything without me (slight edit)

I said is post some stuff to get the ball rolling, so here goes:

Two versions of Aragorn, both from RotK:


Some Rohirrim, the start of a Battle Company:

The Mouth of Sauron:


And though I'm not participating myself, this post would have scored 24 points for the challenge! (6 minis painted and displayed) See how easy it is?

Nice minis! Really want to paint some stuff now...

Have organised a game for tomorrow in my local GW at a time when there are normally quite a few 40k players so hope to have an influence on a few! Am thinking of asking the manager to run a points increase tournament to get more people in the hobby especially with the new film coming out.

Keep up the good work!

Just come back from a game at GW 300pts. Was really good fun and the member of staff I was player was a great guy. Played Reconnoitre on a narrow board so it ended up as a bloodbath between my Gondor and his dwarves which lasted quite a while as you can imagine. Really tense moments though and not a dull moment.

Need to paint up some more stuff now over the weekend for a 500pt battle in the near future...

Right, then, that's the first 3 points on the board!

Gondor vs Dwarves, sounds like a lot of high defence units so I can see how that would go on a bit!

Yeah, became a bit of a stalemate but eventually I managed to start surrounding him. I think next time he might be Mordor so should be a bit easier to chew through units!

Dwarves are such a nasty bunch to get through so many defence 7's !

 Wolf wrote:
Dwarves are such a nasty bunch to get through so many defence 7's !

You really have to treat each army differently. I play my elves against dwarves differently from orcs, from men, ect. Same lists but different strategies.

Yeah that is true, I am curious to your thought on defeating a dwarven army ? What kind of strategies would you use against them

 Wolf wrote:
Yeah that is true, I am curious to your thought on defeating a dwarven army ? What kind of strategies would you use against them

Well with what army? with men?

Well my armies are mostly men I have rohan half mounted and foot, Numenorians and high elves and Easterlings So pretty much all men yeah.

You're generally going to outnumber your opponent as dwarves are tanks so cost a lot. Mobbing war of attrition is a good way to go, or just spear/pike support to get some extra attacks.
Don't spread your lines too thin either, as dwarves will carve through quite easily once given momentum and they are good at taking armies apart piecemeal - don't let your opponent split your forces too much!

Also, Rohan have axes so make use of piercing strikes when you can, and also cavalry so make sure you charge in for the extra attack and leave a fella knocked over so he counts as trapped next turn.

Elven blades are nice as well so you can opt to go two-handed which softens dwarves up a bit. Elves also have same FV as dwarves so you will give away less drawn fights.

Easterlings are just spear phalanxes. Very useful here too. Numenoreans are actually really good at being forgotten as they are destroyed by everything around you.... But can make a good distraction...

Of course magic is also a great tool for taking down high defence armies, especially a well placed Sorcerous Blast to knock down dwarves.

Edit: Oh, and banners can be invaluable if placed well.

Hope I helped a bit!

I think, if you have them, lancers of some kind are good against dwarves. The straight +1 to wound the charge (which you will get first as cavalry) helps negate the high D somewhat, and cavalry are also good for getting around the Dwarves and hitting them from angles hey don't expect. Knights of MT or Dol Amroth should do well.

Outside of that, weight of attacks will do a great job. Get spear/pike support and Trapped bonuses wherever you can, and maybe take a tough hero as a line breaker.

Ahh that ois very helpful actually I think on a few of my games my forces have been spread a bit too thinly leaving me open for attack. Which version of the rules are axes in as me and my buddies play using is it 4th edition ?

The unique rules for axes (and every other type of hand weapon) are in the Hobbit/5th ed rules. I'm not really a fan of them if I'm honest, but I think the special attack for axes is -d3 defence value if you lose the fight, but+d3 Strength if you win. So it's a risk/reward type thing, but might help you get through Dwarf armour.

Ah I see, yeah I don't think we'll be using them as we prefer the older rules. Thanks for the help though, I can direct my forces a little bit better now.

I'll work on getting photos of my various armies up soon I'd love it if you all put some pictures up too.