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Hello All!

I recently purchased the very old Fellowship of the Ring start set for my wife who is a massive LotR fan. She used to be quite an avid painter and has expressed interest in picking it up again. So instead of getting her one of my many unpainted miniatures to paint I figured I'd get her something she could call her own and this seemed to fit the bill nicely. GW has been dead to me as a gamer since 40K sixth edition so I have not been following the company at all for quite some time. I was not surprised that they launched the Hobbit miniatures based on the release of the new movies but I am very surprised the old LotR line is basically not even half of what I remember.

I have seen some new player threads already and it seems like people on this board advocate the Return of the King starter set which means I clearly bought the wrong one. So before going further and fleshing out this game with a few more options I figured I should ask what everyone thinks I should go from here. This will be a game I play with my wife so I'm not looking for super competitive lists. Just basic tips on what to look for, or things I should definitely make a priority of tracking down while we grow our collections.

Thanks!

GW still sells a balrog! Actually, a ton of LotR stuff is still in print. If it feels like a lot is OOP, that is a testament to how extensive the line has been overall.

As to getting into the game, you can hardly go wrong. Army building is so flexible that you can pretty well play whatever you like, just bearing in mind that good only allies with good and evil with evil. Within each of the contingents that make up your force, there can only be units from one army list but your force can include any number of allied contingents reprrsenting various good or evil army lists consisting of at least one hero and up to 12 warriors. The rule against taking more than 1/3 of your overall force is probably the strictest limitation. The rest is pretty much a question of taste and/or list writing. It is probably wisest to just get the models you like best.

I just checked GW's site and sure enough now there is a Balrog! so I stand corrected on that point. Having a flip through my book I am seeing that it will be pretty easy to expand the forces. Would you Recommend tracking down the return of the King starter for the rules?

I think that set came with the RotK Journey Book so nah, I would not recommend it because it only has rules for some units in several armies plus the rules are partly out of date. (The journey books are nice if you want to recreate scenes from the films of course.) It's really expensive, but the Hobbit SGB hardcover book is the current "core" rulesbook - and from what I understand (having not played the older version) the changes have been on the whole improvements - so I would recommend that. In 2012, GW also published army books for all of the LotR SBG (as opposed to Hobbit SBG) units: Angmar and Moria, Fallen Realms, Free Peoples, Kingdoms of Men, and Mordor. All but Mordor are currently out of print and some of them fetch outrageous prices on ebay. There is a long-running rumor that GW will reprint these and the return of Specialist Games plus the fact GW was advertising a job for someone to manage the Middle-earth product lines makes the rumor more plausible than ever.

Welcome aboard!

First off, if you're just going to be playing with family and friends, there there's really only one rulebook you need, the one we like to call the One Rulebook to Rule Them All or (more mundanely) the Big Blue Book. This was the version that was published between the RotK one and the Hobbit one several years later, and has all the core rules in their newest-but-one (and still perfectly functional) form and profiles for pretty much everything that was in the range at the time, certainly enough to be building armies from. It looks like this:


After that, it really is just a case of picking up minis you like. Check Ebay for cheap plastics by the bucketload, and some of the more common heroes pretty cheap as well, get what you can't find there from GW.

When you say you got the Fellowship starter, do you mean the one with the Elves, Numenoreans and Goblins or are you talking about the Mines of Moria set with the
Fellowship, goblins and troll? Because the rulebook in the latter is the mini version of the one I mentioned above, less profiles but still plenty to be getting on with.

Are there any factions you had in mind? If you want some starter lists put together, let me know!

 The_0perator wrote:
I have seen some new player threads already and it seems like people on this board advocate the Return of the King starter set which means I clearly bought the wrong one.

There's really nothing wrong with the rules in the FotR starter. There were some minor changes in each succeeding release but nothing fundamental. The main problem is that the FotR rulebook only includes the characters and troops from the FotR movie so you are limited in what you can play.

So before going further and fleshing out this game with a few more options I figured I should ask what everyone thinks I should go from here. This will be a game I play with my wife so I'm not looking for super competitive lists. Just basic tips on what to look for, or things I should definitely make a priority of tracking down while we grow our collections.

It kind of depends on what you want to play, what factions and what characters. The RotK rulebook is fairly complete and relatively easy to find second hand. There are two big, hardcover rulebooks, the final LOTR book (also known as the "One Ring" book due to the cover art) and the newer The Hobbit rulebook. The Hobbit book contains some rules tweaks and options, but either one is fine for what you describe as your intended use. Figure on spending $50-80 for either of these books.

There was a set of five "army books" that are mostly OOP now (there may still be one or two of them available in the GW online store) so as you expand your collection beyond the starter set(s) you may want to down at least the ones with the factions you are interested in. You sometimes see them listed for stupid money on eBay, but if you are patient you can find them for fairly reasonable prices still (under $30).

Beyond that, just start collecting the miniatures for the faction(s) that interest you. AFAIK, all the LOTR plastic sets are still available. The big drawback is some of the less popular characters are OOP, and the one's that are in production are all Finecast now. Look in the second hand market for these, but expect to pay good money for some of the more popular/less common figures (some are going for up to $50 or more, each). A lot of them are still available for near original prices, or even less, though so don't let that discourage you.

 Manchu wrote:
I think that set came with the RotK Journey Book so nah, I would not recommend it because it only has rules for some units in several armies plus the rules are partly out of date. (The journey books are nice if you want to recreate scenes from the films of course.)

I think you may be thinking of the rulebook that comes in the Mines of Moria starter? The old Return of the King starter came with a complete softcover rulebook that included all (or almost all) the heroes and troops released through the last movie.

@The_0peratorMade: Here's an ebay offer for the blue rule book Paradigm posted, only 18 USD shipped (not my sale).

@mdauben: The book I was thinking of has Aragon and the Witchking on the cover. I guess you mean the one that only has Aragorn?

I think you might be getting confused over the RotK Rulebook (mini one, came with the RotK Gondor vs Orcs starter and has the full rules and a good selection of profiles) and the Journey Book (a scenario and hobby book detailing the events of RotK, sold on its own). Can't remember the covers, though.

The Mines of Moria also had an extensive profile list, at least all the 'regular' troops and heroes and all the major characters for each army if I recall. Not as many as the Big Blue Book, though.

Is it this one? If so, looks like a pretty good deal - not sure if anything is missing.

That's the RotK starter. 24 Warriors of Minas Tirith, 24 Orcs (setting you up with the bulk of a Gondor or Mordor army respectively, you'd just need to add heroes and special troops and such), the terrain pack which isn't extensive but is OOP and has some nice Objective Markers in, and the rulebook.

At that price, a steal.

I have the Fellowship pack with Last Alliance guys and the Moria Orcs. I'm currently in the process of getting the "One Ring" Rulebook through ebay. Am I right in assuming that this has most of the statlines for the units in it as well or do I really have to hunt down army books.

I'm going to probably be stuck playing the evil side. Since my wife will most likely not want to play them. This flies in the face of my screaming need for a Rohan force but such is marriage all compromise and what not. What are some cool options for an evil player?.. I mean aside from the Balrog.

Also uh what is the "War of the Ring" book about?

One Ring rulebook has a good chunk of them but there is a lot of newer models missing out of it. It's more than enough to get going and playing some games and most of the stuff from the films is in there.
Trolls are always fun, even more so in the new Hobbit rulebook were you can start throwing models halfway across the table...
War of the Ring was a game they brought out to facilitate large battles. It was open to some out right cheese abuse but its a fun game to play. The downside is even a small army was generally 100 models +
On the other hand once you had that many models painted the games look suitably epic. If you can find it the White Dwarf edition covering the release of the rules featured a battle report on Pelenar Fields. The size of the game is mindboggling.

Ah ok.... yea I don't think I'm in War of the Ring territory yet!

Going to be keeping it small while we plan further purchases. I'm pretty sure my wife will want to collect the fellowship sooner rather than later. Since this will likely be my next purchase what on the evil side would I need to go toe to toe with them. Based on my fairly limited understanding of the rules at this point. Gandalf scares me lol!

Cheers!

Points-wise, The Fellowship themselves are the equivalent of a whole army, around 700 points. You could bring 2-dozen Orcs with a Naazgul and a pair of trolls for that and have change, and the Evil side would probably win every time, as on their own, though Aragorn, Boromir, Legolas, Gimli and Gandalf are awesome, the Hobbits are dead weight and a basic fact of this game is that without support for the latter, a bunch of warriors will beat 1 Hero eventually.

What you might want to look into, though, is picking up the Fellowship/Towers/Return Journey Books, and work through those getting what you need to play as you go along. For Fellowship, that's basically handful of Nazgul, a whole lotta Goblins, the Balrog, a Troll or two and some Uruks for the end. Towers you can then build that Rohan army you want, and some Uruks to oppose them, while laying the foundations for Gondor/Mordor forces through the Osgiliath bits. Then in Return you bring it all together, add some Army of the Dead and Corsairs and you'll have the stuff to play pretty much any scene from the films/books, not to mention several armies for less narrative play.

There are plenty of options for Evil ... and of course you can mix and match them pretty much to your heart's content! For example, in addition to the Witch King and Khamul the Easterling, GW came up with identities for the other Ringwraiths: the Undying, the Tainted, the Knight of Umbar, the Betrayer, the Shadow Lord, the Dark Marshal, and the Dwimmerlaik. Want to terrorize the people of Rohan? Consider building a force of Warg Riders led by the Dwimmerlaik who can team up with some Saruman's Uruk-Hai and/or the wicked Dunlendings.

The best force to combat the fellowship is the fellowship of evil, the 9 nazguls

I am also just getting back into LOTR. I bought the Fellowship starter set back in 2001and have in the last few months gathered quite a collection by scouring ebay and third-party sellers on amazon. I have most of the rulebooks now except the Hobbit one.

Does it contain the profiles for all models, or just Hobbit models?

The Hobbit rulebook only had rules for the first film Hobbit minis, so that's just Thorin's Company, the Erebor Dwarves, Elrond's Household, The White Council and Azog's Hunters. These are also available as a free PDF from Black Library, so really, you're much better off just looking on Ebay for the mini rulebook, unless you want the AUJ scenarios as well.

Like most GW rulebooks, the stats for everything is in the back of the Hobbit book but of course it doesn't show special rules or points cost. It's really just a reference.

Just to clarify I mean the big $80 Hobbit rulebook.

Is that what you guys are talking about also? If so that's a shame. Tracking down the sourcebooks is ... obnoxious.

That's the one, all it has are the core rules (same as the mini rulebook), Unexpected Journey Profiles (free from GW/BL) and scenarios.

Thanks for the clarification. I suppose I'll continue trying to hunt down the One Rulebook.

I've been really kicking myself for the past few months for not sticking with this game through its prime.

Here is another question for you guys...

It is looking like my wife will be playing the Rivendell Elves, the ones that look similar to the Last Alliance elves she already has. I was wondering if it was possible for her to use the Knights of Rivendell in a LotR High Elves force?

Thanks for your help

Yep, easily done. You'll need to take them as a Warband from the Elrond's Household list, so will need one hero from that (Eldrond, Lindir or a Knight Captain) but other than that's there's no issue whatsoever.

The profiles can be found here:
http://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/Errata/The_Hobbit/Heroes_and_Villains_of_Middle-Earth_EN.pdf

 Paradigm wrote:
I think you might be getting confused over the RotK Rulebook (mini one, came with the RotK Gondor vs Orcs starter and has the full rules and a good selection of profiles) and the Journey Book (a scenario and hobby book detailing the events of RotK, sold on its own). Can't remember the covers, though.

The Return of the King box set I bought back when it was first released came with a full sized book, containing RotK scenarios, profiles and a full set of rules. Unless they changed the contents later in the production run, it did not come with a "mini" rulebook. All three of the movie/starter boxes came with full size, soft cover rulebooks. The only sets I know of that had "mini" (half sized) rulebooks were the Mines of Moria starter box and the Escape from Goblintown starter box.

I also recently got a Return of the King box (still sealed no less!) and I can verify that it has a full-sized rulebook with scenarios, profiles, terrain and painting guides, etc.

Cool, I must have got mixed up with the Mines set.