Since Galadhrim warriors are light armor with no shield option, I imagine the Galadhrim knights will be very similar to RoR, light cav. Rivendell is where you find the tank-armored Elves so they may be heavy cav.

I can only see these forces being participants in earlier time-period games, but since so few people care about mixing forces from different ages we'll still probably see them mixed in.

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http://TacticsInMiniature.com

According to GW however, the Galadhrim are just the division of Armoured Haldir's elves, not the race in general.

Where does GW talk about the "fluff" of the Galadrim knights? I would love to read it...

I think that elves would use cavalry as either

1. Scouts etc - especially in the third age with there being so few left

2. a royal escort - the leader/king/important elf would ride out with a cohort of his finest warriors

Personally the idea of elves using horses all geared up in armour frightens me but the thought of an elf riding in heavy armour just cant lodge itself in my head. Elves are magical creatures and prefer to be able to wield a blade fully rather than riding about and taking hits. They would not need the added protection as they seem to be skirmish armies (in the third age)

Still i think that in the first age an elf would ride in light armour on an unarmoured horse so as to give both mount and rider more freedom when attacking and defending. Dol amroth knights are just ploughing machines with all their heavy armour were as elves are more majestic.

Also sunlight reflects 'brilliantly' off armour so wood elves would use light unarmoured horses.

Rivendell elves strike me a being heavily armoured but i think the horse would have no protection because again they are not cruel like men - ie no reins or saddles.

They are my thoughts, still i like the conversion - the horse doesnt neccesarily have to be armoured but instead just wearing a fancy garment

I think it's great that we can have thought-out discussions here on the One Ring, unlike the "What next, boltguns?" arguments favoured on the old GW forum.


I find two flaws in that (well, not flaws, but room for counter-argument ).

Yes, Elven craft was graceful, but that would indicate that the armour used by the Elves would be graceful and not hinder them when mounted. The strong armour crafted by the Elves (such as we see on the infantry at the Last Alliance) would be light and flexible enough to allow full movement if worn mounted. Certainly there were groups of Elves who traded a lot with the Dwarves in the First and Second Age, so armour for horses or the riders could alternatively be made of "weightless" Mithril. Therefore, whatever armour used wouldn't hinder them in being "able to wield a blade fully", as you suggest. Also, even though they don't try to "ride about and take hits" (although a cavalry unit that only did that would be funny to see ), the mass of spear and bow-amed Orcs in Morgoth's army would cause horrific damage to any unarmoured Elves. When you consider what a stray arrow or block of spears would do to riders, you realise that cavalry would really need some strong armour.

Secondly, you gave the argument that "Dol amroth knights are just ploughing machines with all their heavy armour were as elves are more majestic." Well, I have already noted that the seemingly heavy armour of the Elves could indeed be majestic, but furthermore, many of the people of Dol Amroth were tall with dark hair and grey eyes, and could speak Elvish. Indeed, the city was nearby the Elven port of Edhellond, and according to one story, the Lords of Dol Amroth had Elven blood. Dol Amroth was the most noticably Elvish part of Gondor - such as for its ships in the Elven style and its tradition in playing the harp - so if the Elves had the same cavalry it wouldn't seem out of place.


I agree that Wood Elves would use unarmoured horses and riders if they did, but then I don't think they used cavalry anyway, leaning towards the stealthier approach. And with regard to the "cruelty" side of it, I think it is more cruel to the mount to ride it unarmoured in battle.


Well thanks. The "fancy garment" is why I chose the mount in the first place (that and because a metal horse is better for supporting a metal conversion). The actual term for this is a "caparision", which I painted in the colours of one the Houses of Gondolin, and it makes the horse look very Elvish to me.

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lol very witty and structually argumentative reply

Men of D.A. still seem more in place with the man side than with the elves. Also gondor wears heavy armour in general so it would make sense for a slower moving cav block to be armoured also - unlike with elves....

....As you said mithril is light and any light armour is also light
so....i think elves would be more at place riding down archers or stray orc bands, getting into combat swiftly with their UNARMOURED mounts lol

Regarding the cruelty thing - the quotes earlier in this thread suggest that elves are good with horses - so i think that there would be less need for an elven warrior to have things such as a saddle weighing him down. For instance look at Legolas mounting the horse in the Two Towers film before the warg charge - so cool!

My last point is that i would imagine that some elves would be cavalry masters and could ride anything - these IMO would make for interesting elf scouts similar to the rohan outrider stats, though perhaps slighlty more powerful seeing how old and wise they are

I agree about this being fun discussing elves, horses and animal cruelty

BTW i still think your conversion makes for a great elven leader

This is the problem: whether Mithril is to be termed "heavy" or "light" armour. For the purposes of this discussion, I'm going to take this image as the kind of Elven armour we are discussing:
http://www.framecaplib.com/lotrlib/html ... tr0011.htm

Next, I take this assumption. Physically, the armour worn by the Elves is light to lift, because it doesn't weigh much and is graceful to fight in. But, as far as strength goes, it is actually categorised as heavy (it is as effective for defence as wearing heavy Mannish armour). Got that? Now this is confusing... It is physically light, but I refer to it as "heavy armour" because of its strength.

Now, we take this as being as effective as the heavy armour of Gondor. Remember, an Elf with "heavy" armour and shield has the same Defence value as a Warrior of Minas Tirith with "heavy" armour. Because the Elven armour weighs less, heavily armoured Elven cavalry is as possible as heavily armoured Gondorian cavalry. Whether the mounts are armoured or not isn't the main issue, since "heavy cavalry" refers to the rider, not the mount. So either way, I'm still leaning for the mix of heavy and light cavalry, depending on the circumstances: heavy for First Age Gondolin (with some of the leaders maybe having armoured horses); light for First Age Hithlum and the Second Age Last Alliance; and then no cavalry by the end of the Third Age.

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given their points cost in legions, id say the elves used heavy cavalry. 20 points is a bit much for light cavalry

Maybe for normal human cavalry. But in case of elves, I suspect that GW is attempting to use a high points cost in order to keep the use of cavalry somewhat limited.



I agree with that. I assume that the properties of Elven heavy armour differ quite significantly to Gondorian Heavy Plate-Mail. Because of this, it would've allowed more freedom to the Elves whilst fighting, allowing them to gain that reputation of being lithe, and agile fighters. I still think that elves would have armoured horses if they were a heavy cav force however. If they managed to find out how to create armour that wouldn't inhibit their movements, why not increase the horses protection as well?

I agree with Grimhelm on most of the points. Really, just putting some chainmail or fauld peytrals and neck armor (dang, I forgot what horse neck armor was called), as well as a chamfron thats made of mithril on a horse isnt going to weigh it down any more than the rider already would. Besides, if it was heavy cavalry were talking about, the horses can hold a lot, and are going to be big and beefy enough to take it. My view is that First Age armies would basically vary, according to Grimhelms view, so there. But a Second Age army at the fall of Eregion or the Last Alliance would probably look like this. It would be anywhere from 60% to 80% infantry, and 20 to 40% cavalry. About half to 70% of the cavalry would be light-medium cavalry with bows, sabers, and half-armor, maybe a helmet and a chest plate, and maybe greaves. They would ride around, shoot the enemy, and harass, and in some cases, charge the flanks of the enemy force. They would also run down the enemy as they flee. The rest of the cavalry would be the generals bodyguard, protecting him, as well as being shock cavalry to be thrown in at a moment of crisis, or at the turning of the tide. The heavy cavalry would be noblemen, friends of the general, or in his entourage, and woud have full armor, sabers, lances, and shields, albeit smaller than the infantry shields, and would have horses armored in mithril fauld and chainmail horse armor.
By the Third Age, Noldor forces would be so small, so that the warriors would mount horses when they needed them, since they wouldnt really maintain an army by then. The warriors would only really be fighting skirmishes with Orcs, bandits, and other nasties, and wouldnt really use their horses in a melee, unless they were riding down enemies. htey would have used horses for scouting and traveling, and only when they needed them, not having a specialized cavalry. Thats just my ideas.

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DOUBLE WOOTAGE....erm, yeah.

I have been carrying on the discussion about Elven Cavalry with a friend on another web-site deveoted to a set of rules that he is developing for basically himself an the group in TX that I ocassionally play with (Although, I will be the first to bring actual LotR minis in 28mm to the games. It has been done in 15mm for the time being).

He is VERY deep in LotR and Tokein Lore. Most members of these boards seem to be as well, but I haven't seen a lot of data pulled from the Unfinished Tales or the Letters of LRRT.

The elves of the First Age, Norlor Specifically, would probably have had a pretty wide variety of Cavalry, ranging from full Cataphracts (NOT knights in the traditional sense) to Fast Elven Light Cavalry whose job it would have been to harrass an enemy. But, these same LH would probably have been armed with Lances and/or some other form of close combat weapon, so that they could form-up to charge an enemy if necessary (This would be similar to the tactics of the Mongols, Goths (Which the Rohirrim are an excellent example of), and of many other "historical" counterparts, which Tolkein used as a basis for his vision of various members of ME.

The Practic of the Cantabrian Cicle (Riding in a circle to hurl javelins from the closest point of the circle) or Skythian (rinding in a "circular" formation to shoot at the enemy from a point in that formation - I use the word "Circular" because in this case it was more like a rotating line than a circle proper) would have been pretty common among the Elven Light Cavalry; even unto the late Third Age, where I imagine the techniques would have been much more common, as the use of Heavy Elven Cavalry had likely gone out of Vogue. You need massed formations of Heavy Cavalry to really make it effective (Numbers of 500+, and really 1000+ is required for Cataphract or Ghilman* type operation)

I am none to terribly worried about which direction GW choose to go with Elven Cavalry. I will use what they put out if I ever play in any "Official" games, and just go with what I envision for my own... Simple really..

All I really care about is:

When are they going to be producing some mounted Elves (Hopefully in metal so that the helmet detail will not be lost), so that I won't have to convert them?


Matthew

*Ghilman is the plural of "Ghulam", which is a type of Turkish Heavy Cavalry that was promenint in the Later Dark Ages. Its tactics included firing from horseback with bows to soften an enemy, or goad them into a premature charge, and Heavy Cavalry Tactics that included being able to charge with Lance and fence with a Lance (This is a different form of Cavalry tactic than the more familiar "Charge home and run them over" approach that most people think of. Most cavalry did not do this, but would ride up rapidly, and each rider would pick off a member of the front rank of the enemy, before pulling back to go in for another run. The higher maneuverability of the horse would allow them to do this unless the infantry broke formation to run them off. This is exactly what the Cavalry want them to do, as formed Infantry that stands their ground almost always will beat Cavalry charges. Expecially if armed with spears)...

In any event... It is highly likely that the Elven Cavalry of the First/Second Ages would have used tactics similar to this when they had "Heavy" Cavalry.[/i]

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It's nice to know there is still interest in this type of topic. Since you're new, you might be interested to know that a refined version of the argument, taking the discussion into account, was published in the Tengwar Beacon:

http://www.one-ring.co.uk/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=11057

There will be similar discussions of particular aspects of Middle-earth in future issues, which can be found when browsing by article under "essays":

http://www.freewebs.com/tbarchive1/brow ... #121583576

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