Has anyone tried an army using Warriors of the Dead support by Rangers (from the Grey Company) with spears? On paper it looks quite effective. Here's a 700pts list I worked out:

King of the Dead
20 Warriors of the Dead
4 Dunedain with spears
16 Rangers with spears
Captain of Minas Tirith with shield

Models: 42, Might: 6, Shots: 20

The list would be able to outshoot most opposing armies, and Warriors of the Dead with two attacks (due to the spear support) will be pretty formidable. There is an inevitable lack of numbers, which I expect will lead to the army being flanked if you're not careful.

The reason I didn't put this in the Army Help forum is because I'm not bothered about the army list, it's just an example. I'm more interested in whether Army of the Dead and the Grey Company is a viable combo.

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"There are few left in Middle Earth like Aragorn, son of Arathorn." - Gandalf, Many Meetings

It is a viable army, but it has some fundamental problems when compared to a similar Dwarf/GC list which you can make. Who is your champion? King of the Dead I guess not and Captain of MT is not very good otherwise.

Barely anyone uses Shamans competitively so in terms of them charging you it would give you a slight edge, but the truth is that Warriors of the Dead are not as good as supported Khazad Guards when fighting Morannon Orcs, look at these stats:

In terms of killing ability:
- Supported AotD wins & kills a Morannon 38% of the time (50% to win and 75% to kill after that)
- Supported KG wins & kills a Morannon 34% of the time (61% to win and 56% to kill)
=> That means that AotD's killing ability is equal to 1.11 : 1 in comparison to KG.

BUT:
- AotD's cost of x compared to the KG's cost of y is equivalent to 1.36:1, therefore it is not as efficient as the supported KG.

That plus the fact that King of the Dead is probably the most overpriced character in the game - I wish there were captains for 50 points or so available or if the King had F5 with 2 attacks at least.

So if you compare AotD to KG and work out that you can get a very similar list of Dwarf/Grey Company to this one, except that you don't have to take the King, you can come up with the following list:

Saruman the White
Dwarf Captain
14 Khazad Guards
7 Dwarves with Shields
4 Rangers of the North on Horses
16 Rangers of Arnor with Spears

43 models. I'm sure you could drop 1 Dwarf to upgrade 4 others to KG, but the reason for shieldmen is that they can shield and gain survavibility through that.

And that list finished 2nd in the 2009 GT. In comparison it has the same number of shots, 1 more Might, 1 more model and just 6 less high quality warriors, but then again I would say that Saruman is a bit better than King of the Dead and should cover that difference

So in the end: yes it is a viable combo, but there are better options that have very similar structure.

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Coordinator of the Great British Hobbit League

BlackMist: The key problem with that force is that you get Khazad Guard with two-handed weapons and to be supported must use only their hand weapons (you cannot support someone using their two-handed weapon), so your stats are unfortunately off.

Khazads have hand weapons just like any other model in the game, unless specified that the model is unarmed - check the FAQ if you don't believe. I wouldn't be giving a GT podium finishing list if it was being played illegally, would I?

That also means that Elves don't need Elven Blades because they have weapons, because "No Equipment" =/= "unarmed" according to GW. Berserkers can be supported too because they count as having hand weapons.

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Coordinator of the Great British Hobbit League

It even says in the ORB, "Khazad guard carry a two handed axe and an axe (hand weapon)."

A list I was thinking for 400 points would be this

kotd
10 wotd
3 rotn with spears
8 roa with spears

At this points' level, not many players would be able to field much to counter that. At least I think.

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"War does not determine who is right, only who is left."
- Bertrand Russel

Hold, before you start telling me that I'm wrong - reread what I said please. I didn't say they couldn't support Khazad Guards due to them owning a two-handed axe, I said that they couldn't support one USING their two-handed axe.

As a result, you're paying for equipment that you plan to not bother using. Why not just take Iron Guard or Dwarf Warriors with shields instead?

That was the point that I was making. A two-handed weapon, in use, cannot be supported.

True... but even without use of their 2-handed weapon I think Khazads are still a better deal than Iron Guard/Dwarf shieldmen. Higher strength than the shieldmen, higher defense/cheaper than iron guard, plus the Bodyguard rule.

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"Not all those who wander are lost"

"With hope in our hearts, and wings on our heels" - Chariots of Fire

Because S4 owns D6 models and S3 doesn't and the point difference is small.
Iron Guards have D6 which gets owned by Morannons that are half the price. Also you can't get as many Iron Guards and you're already pretty low on numbers (can Iron Guards even be used in Durin's Folk? It's the only list that allies with Grey Company as far as I remember). Again, I wouldn't post that list if it wasn't one of the best Dwarf/GC lists around and if it wasn't backed up by a pretty serious tournament result

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Coordinator of the Great British Hobbit League

But why would you ever use two-handed weapons with Khazads against uruks? S4 is easily enough. And as BM said, iron guard are much more expensive and are butchered by S4 so the stats aren't off. From what you were saying, it sounded like you thought you could only use two-handed weapons. But if I was offensive I appoligise.

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"War does not determine who is right, only who is left."
- Bertrand Russel

I wasn't meaning to deny the benefits of Khazad Guard, simply trying to make sure it was mentioned that using 2H and Spear doesnt work Also, I don't actually play SBG any more (lack of opponents and money to buy the current rules/get to clubs/GWs), so can't comment on the merits/pitfalls too much, let alone what can be used in which list from memory Sorry, just wanted to make sure people reading this that were new to the game knew the KGs couldn't use their 2h weapons and get supported.

This isn't really relavant to my original question, but why have the RotN on horses? Just to have a little cavalry for objective missions?

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"There are few left in Middle Earth like Aragorn, son of Arathorn." - Gandalf, Many Meetings

Because 4 Horses are 24 points, for which you don't get much else and it makes the Rangers much better in combat with potential 4 S4 strikes when winning combat.

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Coordinator of the Great British Hobbit League