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malfred wrote:Guess I'll soon be buying my dream model.

Mumak!

Same. I see myself mass buying Haradrim this summer.

Ghost in the Darkness wrote:will they still be the same scale as the current LOTR figs.

Yes, of course.

Ghost in the Darkness wrote:So were going to get new plastics with this but will they still be the same scale as the current LOTR figs.

I hope so.

Im quite sure the scale will be the same because uve got poeple like me who already have alomost 100 moria goblins and muiltiple armies!!

Guys, the scale is definitely the same.

Sigh... I really need to find another job to pay for all of this.

Ratbarf wrote:Sigh... I really need to find another job to pay for all of this.

It's actually really cheap. To start.

malfred wrote:

Ratbarf wrote:Sigh... I really need to find another job to pay for all of this.

It's actually really cheap. To start.

I disagree.

If you use metal, it's more expensive sometimes.

What can you tell me about the bases? Is it too much to hope that GW would make movement trays for Daemon players to play in both 40K and WHFB?

They are the right size for WFB with round bases- if you include the rim of a normal move base-

4 wide though... but if you do 3 sets of 'em... can have a 6 wide unit of deamons

Not quite cheep enough, I already have enough Uruks to fight an average battle for this by the sounds of it. The problem is now I want to go out and buy four hundred dollars of Rohirrim and those purty new elves....

I think this war of the rings notion is a terrible idea by Gw.It's almost akin to making a game based on harry potter.

The idea is just a short term one in order to raise cash during the credit crunch and to try and breathe life into the dead lotr concept.It wont last long and i'm amazed that gw still make lotr models, i believe it cheapens the entire hobby and makes them look silly

When Gw started trying to charge £50 for a model of a plastic elephant under the lotr franchise i lost a lot of respect for them as a company.

I think this is totally in reaction to how players are playing and want to play the game. Players want to field big blocks of infantry (like in the films) and have it NOT take all day to play. LotR, as it stands, is a skirmish game, best suited to armies with about 40-50 models in them. WotR is a totally different game from the sounds of it. Which, in some ways, is brilliant on their part, since one set of minis is now supporting two different games.

Legions of Middle Earth was a similar phenom. Players were playing 'warbands' not scenarios. GW responded by giving rules for the warbands.

One thing I don't get is all the hate that LotR gets from fans of the other two games. I find that most of them either havn't played it at all or simply hate it because it clogs up the release lines.... IMHO its the best of the three core games as its incredibly balanced and much cheaper in cost compared to the other two games.

konversionz wrote:I think this war of the rings notion is a terrible idea by Gw.It's almost akin to making a game based on harry potter.

The idea is just a short term one in order to raise cash during the credit crunch and to try and breathe life into the dead lotr concept.It wont last long and i'm amazed that gw still make lotr models, i believe it cheapens the entire hobby and makes them look silly

When Gw started trying to charge £50 for a model of a plastic elephant under the lotr franchise i lost a lot of respect for them as a company.

Twaddle!

LotR has an appeal FAR wider than just the films mate.

To my knowledge, there hasn't been a LotR of this scale done before, and GW wouldn't be doing it if it was evenly slightly risky. LotR is a helluva lot more popular than you give it credit for. Is still outselling Fantasy I believe.

konversionz wrote:I think this war of the rings notion is a terrible idea by Gw.It's almost akin to making a game based on harry potter.

The idea is just a short term one in order to raise cash during the credit crunch and to try and breathe life into the dead lotr concept.It wont last long and i'm amazed that gw still make lotr models, i believe it cheapens the entire hobby and makes them look silly

When Gw started trying to charge £50 for a model of a plastic elephant under the lotr franchise i lost a lot of respect for them as a company.

Pick any army from 40k or WFB bar space marines (and with about 50% of them.... pick 2)

Its gone....

thats the equivilent financial effect for GW


As for the concept- have you played? Because it is actually a very good, very will written rules set, with some excellent tactics, great balance, very nice and rather cheap models- and you know what its great fun

to be honest- war of the ring is LOTR but better... and could become my new fav. game... which my orks may be angry about

malfred wrote:It's actually really cheap. To start.

You can pick up second hand LotR minis dirt cheap (especially the plastics). After the 'bubble burst' LotR second hand values went through the floor.

Ratbarf wrote:One thing I don't get is all the hate that LotR gets from fans of the other two games.

My sense is that it's mostly because LotR is "stealing" some amount of attention away from their favorite game / army.

But as GW is slowing the 40k and WFB releases with the new Wave approach, it appears that the flurry of new stuff from 40k3 / WFB6 is long gone. So that attention wouldn't have been there anyways.
____

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:LotR has an appeal FAR wider than just the films mate.

To my knowledge, there hasn't been a LotR of this scale done before, and GW wouldn't be doing it if it was evenly slightly risky. LotR is a helluva lot more popular than you give it credit for. Is still outselling Fantasy I believe.

Totally agreed. If I weren't completely buried under 40k, burned by WFB, and buying only what I'm really focused on playing, I'm sure I'd have started a LotR army. Or two. Or three. Still might, actually... Easterlings and Rangers? *DO LIKE!*

I really wish GW would break out line-by-line revenue so this would be clear to everyone. Better yet, army-by-army. Man, that'd be fantastic information. I bet it'd explain a lot about why various armies get the love that they do.

I heard one year from the longest living red shirt at my store that LotR outsold WFB at its peak. (Don't know if that is store specific or across the world.)

Ratbarf wrote:I heard one year from the longest living red shirt at my store that LotR outsold WFB at its peak. (Don't know if that is store specific or across the world.)

This is actually true...when the game released most stores, at least in the area that I worked, could not keep the game in. The Two Towers was the most amazing set, what w/ all the mounted warriors and Uruk Hai, and we greatly outsold the other game systems starters at least 10 to 1 for a long time. And really..back than....the other starters were pretty bad. 40k had the Space Marines and Dark Eldar while Fantasy had the Empire and Orcs........and they were priced at $75(working off memory here) while LoTr was what?...$50 maybe for a full playable army?

Ratbarf wrote:One thing I don't get is all the hate that LotR gets from fans of the other two games. I find that most of them either havn't played it at all or simply hate it because it clogs up the release lines.... IMHO its the best of the three core games as its incredibly balanced and much cheaper in cost compared to the other two games.

I really hate the combat resolution in LotR SBG.

You each roll a die and whoever gets the higher number wins.

Wow, - thats incredibly dull and boring. I'd like something a little more complex, something with a little bit more flavor - instead most infantry are all just bog standard. I mean sure there are things you can do to increase attacks, etc and some neat hero rules. But at the end of the day I didn't really care for the game.

Now, I loved the JOURNEY books. In my opinion Warhammer 40K needs Journey books. The only thing 40K truly lacks is good, worthwhile scenarios with specific force compositions and more specifc objectives.

I AM, however, VERY interested in War of the Ring. If this is indeed a new game, then i'm psyched. A LotR version of WARMASTER? I'm interested because I always liked the massed infantry battles better in LotR SBG better than a lot of the stuff focusing on heroes.

My beef with LOTR was the simplicity of the combat resolution, and that everytime I saw a demo game it seemed almost like Risk with miniatures in that whoever had the biggest bucket of dice won.

I also really liked many of the elven models and was slightly annoyed that they were of a different scale to my WFB figures so that I couldn't mix and match in say Legolas as a Wood Elf champion.

And it did slow the 40K/WFB release schedule by using up a third of the yearly release slots.

well WOTR has a very different combat resolution system which seems to work very well

I just actually pulled out all my old LotR miniatures.

My painting used to be so bad! Hah! But LotR was where I started with GW.

I was pleasantly surprised that I still actually have enough miniatures to field a few companies.

If Isengard can ally with Mordor then I can actually field about 4 companies.

I wonder if companies can feature mixed units? Some Mordor Orc swordsmen w/ a couple spear guys?

chaplaingrabthar wrote:My beef with LOTR was the simplicity of the combat resolution, and that everytime I saw a demo game it seemed almost like Risk with miniatures in that whoever had the biggest bucket of dice won.

I also really liked many of the elven models and was slightly annoyed that they were of a different scale to my WFB figures so that I couldn't mix and match in say Legolas as a Wood Elf champion.

And it did slow the 40K/WFB release schedule by using up a third of the yearly release slots.

I couldn't agree more on the combat resolution. I mean 40K is still a bucket of dice combat resolution, but at least it's not high roll wins. I mean you have other factors you're looking at - the Ballistic skill of the shooter, the AP of the weapon, the range/whether the firer moved or not, etc.

Lagduf wrote:I really hate the combat resolution in LotR SBG.

You each roll a die and whoever gets the higher number wins.

I actually liked it. It made killing heros a real pain in the ass for the evil side but I think thats a good thing or you would simply have them brought down by a few Urukhai instead of the 5 and 2 pikes each it takes to take down Glorfindel with any amount of success.

I love lotr. I wish I had some money to blow on wotr.

Yeah, I don't think GW would have used their resources to do more 40k and Fantasy if they
didn't have LotR. They would just have a smaller staff.

Brief review: Looks like a 15mm game using 25mm models. Has enough in common rules-wise to "feel" like the LotR though the combat system is much different (both people fight ). Biggest problem with the game is that it should have come out YEARS ago before the "LotR Bubble" popped. The game has a fairly simple core mechanic with lots of abilities and special abilities and spells and heroes that add quite a bit of complexity to it, which is always a good thing IMHO.

Warning! Long in-depth review ahead!

So I've had some time to go through the rulebook and make up some armylists. At first when I read the white dwarf article I was quite leary about the whole (buckets of dice) slant they went with, but it doesn't look to be quite so bad unless you have units with a LOT of frontage.

Armies are bought from the lists in the book, 5 good and 5 evil lists. stands are called a Company and are 8 infantry models or 2 cav, and typically 1-6 companies make a unit called a Formation. The last company in a formation is picked up the moment it reaches half strength, so you'll want multiple companies in a formation. Large monsters are single-model formations and are not grouped in any way. Every unit is one of 4 classification: common, rare, legendary and epic. You can only have as many rare formations as you have common formations, and you cannot have more rare companies in an army than you have common companies. You can have as many legendary formations as you want, but each can only be taken once and sometimes use odd numbers like the Fellowship or the 9 Ringwraiths, in which case it gives you the dimensions to build a custom movement tray for them. Epic are named heroes and may only be included once, you can't include the fellowship AND have leading another formation. Most units have 1-3 universal special rules. Some legendary units have specific special rules in their unit entry, and most heroes have additional special rules they bestow on their formation. Additionaly, up to 25% of your points may be spent on allies. If you play a Gondor list you may take a quarter of you points as allies from any other good list for instance, and these allies do not have their own organization, so you could take 3 common gondor formations and 3 rare allied formations for instance. In fact, one of the good armies may ONLY be taken as allies except in special scenarios (the Ents, Hobbits and Eagles)

Gameplay is an up-scaled LotR turn-sequence, you roll for priority, winner moves then loser moves, winner shoots then loser shoots, winner charges then loser charges and winner determines order in which you fight. Combats are massed, no breaking models up into individual fights like LotR

Movement is straightforward, every unit has an M value and no part of a company can move farther than that value and turning is free, no wheeling or any of that crap, and formations must end with each company directly in front or beside another in the same formation, reforming depends more on your movement value rather than wheeling or giving up fractions of movement to turn in place since no company can move more than it's M score. Charging is done like 40k except you roll to see how far you go, unit type (not M value) determines this such as infantry charge D6+2 and cav D6+6, with a 1 auto-failing charge. The rules stress allowing a small amount of fudge room while moving when changing formation so the bases line up and you get free wheels when contacting much like fantasy.

All attacks in the game are done similarly. Every company has an Attack value which is always 8 for infantry, 2 for cav, varied for monsters. All modifiers in the game are to the number of dice you roll, better shooting value gives you more dice per company if shooting, in combat a higher Fight value will give additional dice, charging gives you more dice (especially for cav), fighting against a flanking enemy takes away dice, fighting to the rear takes away a lot of dice etc, there's a chart for these modifiers. After you determine how many dice you roll, it's a single die roll of Strength vs Defense using the LotR wound chart. Every hit kills a enemy model (typically). Some units have a resilience value where they take multiple hits before losing a model. Monsters don't have wounds, they have a D6 table you roll on when you cause a hit on them. For regular monsters it's 1-3 = nothing, 4-5 = a wound token, 6 = dead, with wound tokens adding +1 to the roll per wound. Some of the monsters have much tougher wound tables like the balrog and Mumak.

Moral is the LotR system where you roll 2d6, add your Courage value and need to get 10 or higher. You rarely run, typically you just become disorded but if you do run if you hit anything (friend, foe or terrain) you scatter. Usually you just become disordered though where you get a lot fewer dice and can't move until you pass a moral check.

Heroes play a big part of the game, but not like they do in other GW games. Some rare heroes are treated as monsters, but most merely modify the Fight and Courage value of the company they join, and take up their stats. Aragorn joining a Men of Gondor formation replaces one of the models and uses all the Man of Gondor special rules and limitations as well as passing his own on to the formation. Gandalf joining a Riders of Rohan formation becomes a cavalry model etc. Additionally, all heroes have a Might value (will and fate are gone though) and Might works just as it does in LotR, modifying dice rolls the formation makes and doing Heroic Moves, Shoots and Charges which interrupt the normal move order. I think most formations will have at least a generic hero as might looks to be a big part of the game.

Every Magic user has a mastery level which is how many spells he can cast and what spell lists he has access to. Spells just go off with no roll, though some spells are direct counters to others. They are powerful but not game-breaking, think spellcasting in Warmachine more than WHFB.

Terrain is either open, rough (half movement), or a defensible feature. Think bunkers in 40Kv3. Before the game you decide what terrain features are depending on size and what it is. A small forest might be capacity 2 and Defense 1, which means it can hold 2 companies and adds 1 to their defense value. When you enter these features you are removed from the board and you "disembark" when you leave or lose a combat. Enemies then charge or shoot the feature itself, and only half the models occupying it can attack or shoot out of it. If you lose a combat you are forced to "disembarK" for lack of better word, and are destroyed if you're blocked in. There are no siege specific rules per-say, a shame as I thought that was one of LotRs strong points over WHFB terrible, terrible siege system. Overall I'd expect about as much terrain on a table as WHFB, perhaps a bit more.

There's quite a few scenarios in the book, I'll try and write up a review of them after I've given them a better read-through and had a chance to play a few actual, full size games (I've only done some small demo tests so far).

For size of armies, looks like 1k to 2k points is gonna be standard. The 1k Morder army I made up came in at about $200 retail and uses a mix of metal and plastic. Price will depend on how much metal you use, it takes 3 blisters to make a company at $45, but $25 will usually get you 3 companies of a plastic regiment. Heroes, even generic ones, are decently expensive as are monsters. Human basic infantry and cavalry are about 25 points a stand, trolls around 100 to 200 points. Some elite infantry are more like 40 to 50 points a stand, generic heroes are 50-100 and names heroes typically 100-300 points. Command elements like banners and musicians are pretty hefty in points too and easy to convert out of the plastic figs and some brass rod. Plastic LotR figs are the cheapest GW makes at about a $1 a fig.

Overall, the game looks great. Rules are simple with lots of options to mix things up with, writing is decent for GW though there is lots of remarks about playing for fun and not worrying about specifics, but fortunately most of the rules are simple enough it may work for this game. Certainly it's generated a lot of interest for LotR in a way that the original game never seemed to. Again, I just wonder why this didn't come out years ago, the lack of mass scale combat killed the original game for many players

Thanks for the review!

Being not so familiar with the game, what are the 5 good, 5 evil armies?

I only have my Haradrim.

Many of the differant armies in Legions of Middle Earth were combined into the same army, and lists include the heroes of old right alongside the current heroes, so frodo could fight sauron if you really wanted to. For a round.

Good armies:
Gondor & Arnor
Rohan
Elves
Dwarves
Forgotten Kingdoms (Ents, Hobbits, Great Eagles, fellowship, white council)

Evil:
Mordor
Isenguard
Moria (just goblins, trolls, dragons and balrogs pretty much)
Fallen Realms (all the evil humans, haradrim, easterlings and mongolian looking guys)
Angmar