For this alliance system, each faction is given a list of other factions that it can bring as either Formal Allies or Convenient Allies. If a faction is not listed as either type of ally, then it may not be brought as an ally.

Formal Allies are armies or realms that have standing alliances with one another by treaty, custom, or connections between rulers. There warriors and heroes respect and value one another and will work together in a well-coordinated manner. A player may choose to bring any number of allied contingents from multiple factions so long as all factions are Formal Allies. Each contingent’s heroes can include troops from their own faction in their warband and has its own bow limit. Treat allied contingents as part of the same army after they are deployed on the field.

Convenient Allies are armies or realms that are adjacent both geographically and chronologically. They do not have any standing alliance but can be expected to work together, albeit sparingly, when the situation demands it. A player may choose to include one contingent from a faction in their army as Convenient Allies. The allied contingent break separately from the rest of the army and has its own bow limit. Models that are Convenient Allies with one another will not respond to each other’s heroic actions, standfasts, warhorn, drum, or banner effects.

Good Alliance list – Alphabetical

Army of Lake-Town - Formal Allies: none Convenient Allies: Halls of Thranduil, the Iron Hills, Thorin’s Company
Army of Thror – Formal Allies: Garrison of Dale, Convenient Allies: Halls of Thranduil
Arnor - Formal Allies: Rivendell Convenient Allies: The Kingdom of Khazad-dum, Lothlorien
Balin’s Expedition – Formal Allies: none Convenient Allies: Lothlorien, the Misty Mountains, the Rangers
Champions of Erebor – Formal Allies: The Iron Hills, Survivors of Lake-Town Convenient Allies: Halls of Thranduil, The Misty Mountains
The Dead of Dunharrow -Formal Allies: none Convenient Allies: none
Eregion – Formal Allies: Fangorn, Kingdom of Khazad-dum, Lothlorien, Numenor Convenient Allies: none
Fangorn – Formal Allies: Eregion, Lothlorien, Numenor Convenient Allies: The Fellowship, Kingdom of Khazad-dum, the Misty Mountains, Rohan, the White Council
The Fellowship – Formal Allies: Lothlorien, Rivendell, the Misty Mountains Convenient Allies: Fangorn, the Rangers
The Fiefdoms – Formal Allies: Minas Tirith, Rohan Convenient Allies: The Rangers
Garrison of Dale – Formal Allies: Army of Thror, Convenient Allies: Halls of Thranduil
Halls of Thranduil – Formal Allies: Survivors of Lake-Town Convenient Allies: Army of Lake-Town, Army of Thror, Champions of Erebor, Garrison of Dale, the Iron Hills, Lothlorien, the Misty Mountains, Rivendell, The White Council
The Iron Hills - Formal Allies: Champions of Erebor, Survivors of Lake-Town Convenient Allies: Halls of Thranduil, The Misty Mountains
The Kingdom of Khazad-dum – Formal Allies: Eregion, Lothlorien, Numenor, Convenient Allies: Arnor, the Misty Mountains, Rivendell
Lothlorien – Formal Allies: Eregion, Fangorn, the Fellowship, the Kingdom of Khazad-dum, the Misty Mountains, Numenor, Rivendell, the White Council Convenient Allies: Arnor, Balin’s Expedition, the Rangers, Rohan
Minas Tirith – Formal Allies: The Fiefdoms, Rohan Convenient Allies: The Rangers, Wildmen of Druadan
The Misty Mountains – Formal Allies: The Fellowship, Lothlorien, Rivendell Convenient Allies: Balin’s Expedition, Champions of Erebor, Fangorn, Halls of Thranduil, the Iron Hills, the Kingdom of Khazad-dum, Survivors of Lake-Town, Thorin’s Company, the White Council
Numenor – Formal Allies: Eregion, Fangorn, Kingdom of Khazad-dum, Lothlorien Convenient Allies: none
The Rangers – Formal Allies: Rivendell Convenient Allies: Balin’s Expedition, the Fellowship, the Fiefdoms, Lothlorien, Minas Tirith, Rohan, the Shire
Rivendell – Formal Allies: Arnor, The Fellowship, Lothlorien, The Misty Mountains, the Rangers, the White Council Convenient Allies: Halls of Thranduil, the Shire, Thorin’s Company
Rohan – Formal Allies: The Fiefdoms, Minis Tirith, the Wildmen of Druadan Convenient Allies: Fangorn, Lothlorien, the Rangers
The Shire – Formal Allies: none Convenient Allies: The Rangers, Rivendell
Survivors of Lake-Town – Formal Allies: Champions of Erebor, Halls of Thranduil, The Iron Hills Convenient Allies: The Misty Mountains
Thorin’s Company – Formal Allies: The Misty Mountains Convenient Allies: Army of Lake-Town, Rivendell
The White Council – Formal Allies: Lothlorien, Rivendell Convenient Allies: Halls of Thranduil, The Misty Mountains
Wildmen of Druadan – Formal Allies: Rohan Convenient Allies: Minis Tirith

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"Draw your sword with a heavy heart, but swing it with a heavy hand"

This is an alternative faction allying system that I put together on a lark during my newfound spare time. It is supposed to be an amalgamation of the current alliance matrix and the old Legions of Middle Earth era fixed alliance lists. I tried to keep factions together based on time periods that they existed in and what the members of that faction could reasonable be believed to have been interacting with at the time. There are a few hiccups with this arrangement owing to the models that included in each list.

Halls of Thranduil and the Misty Mountains, for instance, are not part of the formal alliances that represent the Last Alliance despite both Mirkwood, and the great eagles having been involved. This is because the lists we have for Mirkwood and the Misty Mountains are only representative of the time around the Hobbit and the War of the Ring. I did create/restore Eregion to create a distinction between the Last Alliance high elves and the Hobbit/War of the Ring ones in Rivendell. Something along those lines could be done for Minis Tirith, Rohan, and other such factions but I figured that is would be better to just leave those instances to specific Legions rather going the old Legions of Middle Earth route of having a whole bunch of factions with only slightly altered hero selections.

I also chose to create a couple of new factions and implied the existence of some Legendry Legions to get everything as sorted as I could lore wise. Balin’s Expedition is just the Kingdom of Moria sub-faction. Eregion is now the home of Gil Galad and Rivendell that of Elrond’s kids and Gildor but the other models are shared. Champions of Erebor is just the dwarves of Thorin’s Company since I wanted to delete Erebor Reclaimed and make it a Legendary Legion with no allies. Radagst’s Alliance got the same Legendary Legion treatment with Beorn going to live in Wanders in the Wild. Eorl and Helm would also be heroes that would be give a special rule that makes them only useable in their own Legendary Legions. Eorl would, presumably, get his own Fields of Celebrant Legion with a king of men and some Minis Tirith units thrown in too.

Now, I recognize that this system isn’t perfect and that there are some details I have overlooked about how everything would run in practice. Still, I though this draft was worth sharing. I’d love to hear what you all think of it.

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"Draw your sword with a heavy heart, but swing it with a heavy hand"

You have put a lot of work into this and it shows! I only have one question - I never understood that Rivendell is a convenient ally of Balin's Expedition? They are on the west side of the mountains while Balin approaches from the east. Just a minor quibble on my part.

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"Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer."

Thanks Mapper! It is a project I have been pondering of a while.

With Balin's Expedition being connected to Rivendell, I was thinking for of a probable connection between a possible connection between Elrond and Balin that may have developed. Now that you have pointed out that is seems odd, I do agree on that. It is really something that should be left to an open play "what if" scenario then a match play alliance system. I'll edit it out.

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"Draw your sword with a heavy heart, but swing it with a heavy hand"

Evil Alliance list – Alphabetical

Angmar – Formal Allies: none Convenient Allies: none
Azog’s Hunters– Formal Allies: Azog’s Legion, Dark Powers of Dol Guldur Convenient Allies: Dark Denizens of Mirkwood, Goblin-town, the Trolls
Azog’s Legion – Formal Allies: Azog’s Hunters, Dark Powers of Dol Guldur Convenient Allies: Dark Denizens of Mirkwood
Barad-dur – Formal Allies: Far Harad, Variags of Khand Convenient Allies: none
Corsairs of Umbar – Formal Allies: Mordor, the Serpent Horde Convenient Allies: Far Harad
Dark Denizens of Mirkwood – Formal Allies Dark Powers of Dol Guldur Convenient Allies: Azog’s Hunters, Azog’s Legion
Dark Powers of Dol Guldur – Formal Allies: Azog’s Hunters, Azog’s Legion, Dark Denizens of Mirkwood Convenient Allies: Desolator of the North, Goblin-town
Desolator of the North – Formal Allies: none Convenient Allies: Dark Powers of Dol Guldur
The Easterlings – Formal Allies: Mordor, Variags of Khand Convenient Allies: Far Harad, the Serpent Horde
Far Harad – Formal Allies: Barad-dur, Mordor, the Serpent Horde Convenient Allies: Corsairs of Umbar, the Easterlings, Variages of Khand
Goblin-town – Formal Allies: none Convenient Allies: Azog’s Hunters, Dark Powers of Dol Guldur
Isengard – Formal Allies: none Convenient Allies: Mordor, Moria
Mordor – Corsairs of Umbar, the Easterlings, Far Harad, the Serpent Horde, Variags of Khand Convenient Allies: Isengard, Moria
Moria – Formal Allies: none Convenient Allies: Isengard, Mordor
The Serpent Horde – Corsairs of Umbar, Far Harad, Mordor Convenient Allies: the Easterlings, Variages of Khand
Sharkey’s Rogues – Formal Allies: none Convenient Allies: none
The Trolls – Formal Allies: none Convenient Allies: Azog’s Hunters
Variags of Kand – Formal Allies: Barad-dur, the Easterlings, Mordor Convenient Allies: Far Harad, the Serpent Horde

I was a bit torn when sorting out the War of the Ring era factions. Obviously there is a great deal of distance between the Easterlings and Far Harad or Umbar but all those factions are really supposed to be the people that were turning up at the Pelennor and they were all in service of Sauron it would stand to reason that all of the southern evil factions ought to know about and be willing to work with each other to some extent. To that end, I made the southern factions all Formal Allies with Mordor and their neighboring factions then Convenient Allies with everybody else that was at the Pelennor. The Corsairs, having not actually made it to the Pelennor, did not receive this exemption, therefore, they are not Convenient Allies with the Easterlings or Khand.

I also decided to give Barad-dur some human minions by making them Formal Allies with Far Harad and the Variags. Lacking any named characters to date them exclusively to the War of the Ring, these two factions can represent the evil men that followed Sauron at the time. It should allow for evil armies from the Last Alliance era to have some more variety.

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"Draw your sword with a heavy heart, but swing it with a heavy hand"