Lord of the Rings Minas Tirth vs Mordor

Given the amount of downtime I have had, it was only natural I spent a lot of it procrastinating around and reading a lot of blogs, especially new ones. A few of them had people playing games with their children, which I have done once before but thought no more of it since then.

However, I though it was time to get my boys playing again, and playing a game that I was quite excited to play, Middle-earth Strategy Battle Game.

I remember the Lord of the Rings phase many years ago when the movies came out. Needlessly to say, I was a big fan. Model wise, I remember my friend getting a few of the sets, and I got the main box (Last alliance) and the Balrog and Gandalf set. I also dimly remember getting the Two Towers box. As far as games though, I think we only played a couple of games and then it kind of fizzled. That said, over the years I always kept an eye on it, but I always viewed the game, and the models, as temporary. I remember thinking, this is not going to outlast Warhammer Fantasy, so there is little point investing in it. How wrong I was...

So when GW re-released Lord of the Rings, I dived head first. I have wanted a Minas Tirith army since forever, so I went straight for that. I immediately bought my favourite character from the movie and the book, Boromir. I also picked up a few bits and bobs to flesh out the force. I also got some Rohan and Mordor models to flesh  them out form the basic Pellenor Fields box.

So it was this system, as it seemed rather simple, which I got the boys to play. This is the third or forth game we have played. The boys picked the forces of good for this game, whereas I went with the despicable Mordor.

Here are the forces.

Minas Tirith

Boromir with Banner

Faramir

Beregond

7 Warriors of Minas Tirith with shields

6 Citadel Guard with bows

6 Citadel Guard with spears

Mordor

Shagrat with shield

Gorbag

24 Morannon orcs with assorted shields and spears

Mordor troll

I do feel the Mordor side really needs some more omph, but it is a work in progress. I also know I need more heroes to field that many orcs, but they aren't easy to come by, considering the GW site is always out of stock! So needless to say, I just carried on.

This mission was just Faramir escaping from some orcs, and his big brother coming to save him. Pretty simple mash up.

 I really do love the look of the table, just need more trees I think. Oh and the models need a few licks of paint.

 Orcs crashing after Faramir.

 I let the boys get priority first. Faramir made it to Boromir, and they all crashed through the shallow fjord.

 Orcs crash in. The mission for the orcs is to kill Faramir. I told the boys to keep him alive.

 On the other side, the orcs, Gorbag and the troll make for Beregond and his bowmen.

 Duels did not go well for me. The boys have a tendency to roll high. Boromir just turned anything in front of him to mist.

 Beregrong and the Guard jump the orcs as they cross the river.

 More orcs file into the men of Minas Tirith.

 "Aim for the troll!"

 The wave of orcs just kept coming, though Boromir was doing a superb job of clearing the way.

 The troll finally got into combat, and would you believe, got beaten easily and lost two wounds in one round to archers in combat!

 Orcs very thin on the ground now, with Boromir and Faramir taking their toll of orc blood.

Finally numbers stared to go my way against the archers, but too little to late. The game ended in another win for the boys, and for Minas Tirith.

It was a fun game, and easy to remember the rules. I must say, that I love the table set up, I just need to get round to painting the models.

So in my next post I will show some of the models I have done so far.

Thanks for looking!