In the Mind: New Edition What I Want to Play with It

 In The mind: Exciting lists

There as several lists that I am like IN love with for this new edition. I mean men of the west has to be up there but i am an original old school men of the west so the new beast version of the list is kind of boring to me its five armies but Lotr era so I will definitely play it but it will not be my main list. I will mention several lists and a few reasons why I am super in love with them.

First up perhaps the one i am most excited about is the older days of Gondor with Kings of Gondor and Captains. I love this list. I am so glad my all cav Gondor is still playable even though it will have the citadel guards be converted further into more kings of Gondor on horse. I love what they have done with the generic king profiles and cannot wait to play with this new Gondor force with tons of cavalry troops captains and mounted kings. Especially with the buffs on Aragorn (my old character i used since no one used him as he was deemed to costly) i now expect Aragorn to be everywhere so I will switch to kings until i see Aragorn meta die down. 

Wolves of Isengard: This one has to be at least top 2 but i think will be my MAIN list for the next year or few years. Sharku got a small buff that makes his heroic combats very worth while and with strike now he is a worthwhile fighter rather then using the list as a skirmish force. I love the idea of 50% throwing spears 33% bows then the remaining 17% normal wild wargs for my lists and that is how i am building it up. I recently purchased around 27 warg riders with a dozen wild wargs to run this list in the previous edition which was SO much fun and now it is even better with you still retaining cav attack bonus against other cav... Needless to say i am STOKED about this legion and anyone playing anywhere near Texas... be ready for wolves to show up everywhere! Most people discount the list as a bunch of F3 cav that dies fast and well it is... it is a challenge to get working but it is sooo efficient if you learn it. I started to get to know it after my fourth game with it last edition and i was shocked. if your opponent doesn't know the only way to stop this army from slaughtering them then you should win every time unless its a hero mash list. 

Army of Dale: This list is also so exciting. Losing the knights of dale is in my opinion good as they weren't in the film or directly mentioned in the books so for this movie themed list i like that. I love the usage of the windlance to provide a MASSIVE bubble of +1 to wound. They are now an auto include and I seriously love that. its so thematic. I think it is overly powerful for sure and i think giving it something like a free heroic shoot every turn that has the loose as well would be more thematic and better but nonetheless i really enjoy the list and the plus 1 to wound is insanely powerful. Girion is solid not a total beast but does his job. I rate this list as cool, thematic, and still on the powerful side. 

Assault on Ravenhill: This list just looks like so much fun. free buffs on giving 3 of your heroes an extra attack on of them essentially free combats, another rerolls to wound for free, a free fight value on another, free 6 inch banner that counts for scenario points, and well my favorite rule... bilbos throwing stones are throwing weapons! it is cool I think really powerful yet challenging with the 6 scenarios given so far. It taps out at 650 points which is average so i expect to see this commonly as it just looks cool and has some really powerful rules and models. it is very thematic and cool and i used to run an alliance with the assault on Ravenhill models at 700 points with balin with one crossbowman (to represent him staying behind) then the mounted 4, bilbo, Tauriel and Legolas (mounted with orcrist and the cloak) and it was fun and wasn't that good but it was just a fun mashup list that was efficient at some things so I'm stoked to see that it is now better then it was!

The fellowship: I mean there aren't many words for this one... it looks really cool and honestly i think it will be very very good and will win a bunch and will be much more competitive then it was with its only challenge being many of the scenarios. Its cool, its themey, ill run it.

Rangers of Mirkwood: I do like this as it has the dwarves now. I love the almost red alliance type feel with the heroics. I will definitely run this heavy on the dwarfs with Tauriel and a handful of rangers to provide space stuffing a bit of shooting to draw in opponent with bilbo for moves that affect both sides. the rerolling fate is what made me want to go heavy on the dwarves and take very little elves which also makes it more fun for your opponent. I think this will be very playable but still quite the challenge. Shielding with the rangers means they can just sit and take up space while making the dwarves able to take on a comfortable amount of enemies without being overwhelmed like they used to. Low numbers high heroes makes these rangers very dangerous with their knife fighters to i like this list and definitely am working on my remaining rangers that i bought a while back and never painted. 

Let me know which lists you are most excited about and if any of these make your lists or whether you will simply run the soupy five armies and men of the west to play the most powerful lists out there like i will still do since i have always had a love for eagles with my iron hills or eagles with my Gandalf and Radagast all in the same list... I will be back later with another "In the Mind" on perhaps more thoughts on the new edition? You will have to check in later to find out!