A Guide to Bait
Welcome back to the Minds of Moria, today we will be discussing possibly my favorite tactic in the game. Bait. We will discuss how to bait your opponent (several different ways) as well as how to see it in your opponents play and to avoid bad bait.
Baiting: The simplest form
The simplest form of bait is taking a cluster like 3 warriors that have value and throwing them in charge range of a flank of the enemy. This strategy is to be implemented when you want to drag a big hero off to the side. to do this make sure you are outside of range of their normal troops (maybe in range of one or two. mounted heroes then may be enticed to charge these troops. make sure the rest of your army is outside of that heroes range. 10.5 inches is the perfect distance for this. THE entire sole purpose of bait is a trade. You are trading some models in return for the bad positioning of their hero/heroes. if you can pull them to a flank and stall them for about 2 turns with these models then use the rest of you army to maintain this hero on the flank then you have succeeded. this is why it is important that only a select few models may be charged by the enemy hero so that you know where they are going. the important thing is you HAVE to trade something of value. Throwing a Beregond with 3 warriors of Minas Tirith with shields maybe a few spears is the perfect example. A might point and some troops looks super tasty but sacrificing that for positioning for your force is INVALUBLE. even better bait would be throwing a few citadel guards with Beregond. you always must have the idea of a trade in mind. if its simply 2 hobbits why would they take time to go kill them. Baiting tactics become even easier in scenarios where it is all about objectives as your bait will seem much less intentional as bait and rather looks like u are trying to sprint at objectives. Using bait to make heroes like Gwaihir jump behind your lines is another simple tactic for any flying hero. throw a captain out behind your lines. something without strike or defense that looks easy to take down. The opponent is likely willing to sacrifice their heroes positioning for your hero. Then you can swing in following turns to trap and kill that model behind the safety of your lines.
Switch Bait:
The Baith and Switch tactic is one of my favorites. My favorite way to do this is to throw Ingold and a block of about 2-4 warriors of minas Tirith with shield out on their own on a flank. A practically free 65pt 3 might hero with some warriors that are separated... who doesn't wanna walk over their with an Azog and wipe it out in a few turns. Well the issue is... They have much higher defense and staying power then it looks like. Having Ingold means your warriors are only trapped by cav and remain in shield wall making wounding really hard. This means that they can survive quite a hit and means your other part of your army (normally your cav contingent) can swing over ASAP to save your bait and let you have the better positioning as you choose where you want that bait to be. Heroic defensing hero's that are not to big in points value and leave without much support are ideal for this as they seem easy to take out but are quite resilient. The whole idea with this is the bait is durable and is easy to save with the rest of your force making it even more worth while as hopefully you dont lose that much value in trade for their positioning. I recently had a small game where i used this versus a hunter orc horde with Fimbul and the other named hunter orcs. I threw Ingold (my leader) and 3 warriors out on a flank where his wargs and some hunter orcs and Fimbul could come nab his little band. The opponent bit and ran right into the area of terrain that was perfect for my knights of Minas Tirith to run in and hit them and for my shield wall to stay intact through the support of the terrain feature we were now fighting at. I then proceeded to blow through his entire force as i had a mini anvil set up with Ingold's contingent and the hammer of my shield wall and knights. Another way to set this up is to throw out some cav barely outside of their charge range so then if they bite and move towards you they cant charge this turn and if you win then edge again barely out of their range and then they have a choice. they have already committed to coming this far towards you so now do they leave and maybe sacrifice objectives in some scenarios or sacrifice the separation of their force by committing to chasing the cavalry down.
Archery Bait:
This is another quite fun tactic to use and is one of if not the easiest. You simply use your archers as bait. This is extremely useful when you have good firepower behind your bows such as evil shooting (Uruk Hai, Trackers, Harad) or such things as elves dale or anything with good amounts of shooting on the good side as well. This approach is set up by deploying the majority of your archers on a flank and an inch or two further up then the rest of your force. It looks enticing to not only hit some troops that are closer to them but that are also bows nullifying their effect on their spear supports (or heroes in combat if evil shooting). you want to put your archers where you want to either box a hero out of combat from your heroes or in the place you want the fighting to happen. And to be fair the bait is really really enticing. Even i will sometimes go for it if my opponent uses it if i deem the position not to bad for my army in trade for some archers. But even in those cases it gives you as the baiter the advantage of knowing how and where the battle will happen if they are looking at your bait.
Manipulating Maelstrom:
Maelstrom deployment is one of the most hated scenario sets in the game and quite frankly i LOVE those scenarios. Why because: Bait. Baiting becomes even easier in these scenarios as you can do the bate switch tactic with easy. drop a small high defensive warband unit by itself if you have first priority and try to group the rest of you force together with a march in scenarios like hold ground or heirlooms. then just play the objective and your opponent is likely to try to ambush that one small warband. Its entire goal is to die. But to do that very slowly and give you an advantage on the objectives such as boxing out the middle while they deal with your warband. This is the simple way to win with first priority. set your army up as bait but try to only have one warband be able to be isolated and ambushed. use might to keep the rest of your force together so then you can guarantee where they will try to ambush you thus giving you an advantage over them!
Making Bait Work:
Baiting is a skillset. dont expect it to work every time or instantly. You need to set it up. Talk. Use phycological warfare to set it up. In the case of the archery set up just continue to make the lines of measurement and comment when you get into combat my archers will be able to knock out those spears because they are slightly ahead of the rest of my force and other such comments. Make it seem like your bait is your focus to winning the battlefield. measure to objectives from your bait and dedicate your focus (seemingly to it) when you do that so does your opponent and it gets into their mind that they need to take that portion out as it is your key to victory. All are liable just lean into both sides of what they should and shouldn't do. Advise on all options and provide negatives for all options. and positives for charging your bait and what will happen if you dont. dont seem intentional with this but rather like mutter it under your breath loud enough for them to hear. In the end of setting this up with a warfare from your physic against theirs in more cases then not they will bite. The only way they wont is if they see exactly what you are doing which is what i will provide to you so you do not fall for others bait.
Recognizing Bait:
Bait is easy to recognize if you are thinking about baiting constantly yourself. Always be looking for where you want to fight the battle and what terrain helps you or your opponent more. This is where shooting is such a valuable tool as whoever has more or can do the most damage with it gets to decide where you fight. Always weigh the odds with cavalry heroes and flying models before committing those models are easy to bait off. Just be aware and again look for the positioning you want and run towards that. If you can secure more objectives then your opponent then simply set up with a few bowshots even if they have more they have to come to you to get to the majority of objectives that you control thus giving you the advantage even with less shooting. Play the objectives and force them to come to you is a great way to avoid bait. Especially at higher tables most "misplays" are intentional. That is the bait. It is a great way of setting up bait by making it look like an accident to leave a model within charge range of the opponents hero so when playing advanced players watch for that. it is likely not an accident. Be mindful and watch all scenarios.
Summary:
Set up your bait with phycological warfare. Just talk "haphazardly". It works. Set it up with a specific intent and goal and have a backup plan if they see through it and do not bite. like actually committing and moving that little group to grab that objective that you measured to. Recognize the skill of your opponent and note his movement if it is very precise then most times when he "slips up" it is indeed bait. SOMETIMES bait is worth it to go in. For example i recently had a game against a AMAZING player whose movement was profound. he "accidently" left the gap for my Radagast on eagle to get into his tainted behind his lines. His tainted had used 2 will and 1 might so I decided it was worth it and threw Raddy in and one shotted the tainted. It was bait and I bit because I saw the danger of that model later on and it worked out as my army poked a hole right next to where Radagast was trapped and was able to run through and support him and keep him from being trapped. Set it up execute and watch out. Those are the three simple steps to making bait work. Now go enjoy yourselves with the great tactics of baiting your opponents.
This has been the Minds of Moria thank you for reading tune in next to a post on lowly captains in lists with abundant heroes to choose from instead. Until next time, I will return to the depths.
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