Moria Listbuilding Part 2: Comparing the “Big Three” Monsters

 

 

While last week’s article explored the smaller monsters of Moria, this week we’re diving into the holy trinity of monstrous mayhem: the Balrog, Dragon and Watcher in the Water. Unlike those we covered last week, each of these monsters are big enough to need an army built around them to shine; you can’t just plonk a Dragon into any old list unless you’re playing a really big game. But if we’re going to build a list around them, then we want to know what we’re getting for our several-hundred-point-investment. So without further ado, let’s dive into our Moria “Big Three,” starting with the biggest of them all…

 

You really wanna tell this guy he cannot pass? (James Bousema)

The Balrog

The Balrog has a fearsome and entirely deserved reputation. It is the single scariest melee combatant in the entire game, and Sauron himself is the only model that’s really likely to win a duel against it. F10, A4 and S9 are stats that truly stand out from the crowd, ensuring that even the mightiest of Striking heroes will be unable to gain much of an edge against it. Additionally, F10 with a (flaming) sword effectively lets him reroll 1’s to Wound, as Feinting is almost always going to be risk-free. Moreover, with D9 and a massive 10 Wounds, a few unlucky turns of combat aren’t going to cost Mr Shadow and Flame more than a flesh wound. The combination of its offensive and defensive stats means that there’s basically no situation that’s too worrying for the Balrog; it can take on whatever lands in front of it and come out on top every time.

Even better, its free Heroic Combats mean that it can do so at pace. This rule means that your opponent’s nasty plans of slowing it down with a single sacrificial warrior are hopeless, as it's entirely happy to keep on rampaging every turn. When your opponent can’t bog it down in warriors, and their best heroes are little more than speedbumps, options start to run thin. Nor is magic a solution, as our fiery friend has a whopping 10 Will and Resistant to Magic. It’ll take a lot more than one Wizard to re-enact the battle on the Endless Stair in game! And just in case all of that Will wasn’t enough to deal with Terror, the Balrog is Fearless too. Not that it’d be too worried about Terror anyway, because it can always use his whip to pull enemy models into close combat with him, even if they’re hiding behind a battleline or trying to kite it.

 Luckily, the bridge was not Resistant to Magic (Craig Jarman)         

It’s at this point that I’d normally say something along the lines of “If that wasn’t enough,” or “Not only that, but…” Honestly though, it’s getting a bit repetitive here; this model just has too many upsides! Suffice to say, it’s also one of the best buffing models in the game. An enormous bubble of Fearless for its Goblin friends is amazing, as is the Fight value boost it gives them in their Legendary Legion. It’s the “like Sauron but better” rule of no Breaking until half Wounds that really tips it over the edge, giving the force one of the strongest special rules in the game basically for free! The Legion also makes the Balrog a bit less vulnerable to ranged attacks, and gives it the hilarious ability to set someone on fire once a game on a roll of a 2+, just for daring to come near your death machine. Needless to say, this Legendary Legion makes the Balrog the best centrepiece model a list could ask for.

So what’s the catch? Well, the big one is the price. Durin’s Bane brings a lot to the table, but at 350 points, it really ought to. Even at 700 points, it’s going to be half of your army list, and the model is barely viable at all beneath 600 or so. This is slightly mitigated by the fact that you’re probably backing up the Balrog with extremely cheap warriors and heroes, but it still means you’re totally reliant on your centrepiece to do damage. This is particularly tricky because even a F10 A4 model will still whiff its duel rolls and lose a combat around 1/3 of the time if facing more than a couple of die to win the fight. Without any Might, you’re totally at the whim of the dice, and sometimes they just aren’t going to roll anything above a 3. Being almost indestructible, you’re unlikely to be too badly punished for a few bad duel rolls, but they can really slow down your rampage for a few turns. It’s also possible to flub your Wound rolls, though with S9 and almost-permanent Feint rerolls, this is less of an issue. Where it is relevant is when facing heroes with Heroic Defence. With “only” 4 Attacks, it can actually take the Balrog a shockingly long time to chew through someone like Gamling, and a hero like Aragorn can probably hold you up all game long! So while you’re not too bothered by heroes with Heroic Strike, Heroic Defence is kind of your worst nightmare.

If this dude holds up 350 points of flaming death for 4 turns, Moria is probably having a bad time (u/Malleus57)

The other big issue facing the Balrog is one that we see onscreen: it’s kinda slow. Move 6 isn’t awful (unlike another model on this list), and it’s heavily mitigated by both free Heroic Combats and the whip pulling in enemies, but it still leaves our big flame-y boy annoyingly easy to avoid. The whip also only has a 50% chance of working when you’re not charging, and will often just kill the model you grab if it’s a warrior, so it’s not a great solution to the problem of speed. This makes you very reliant on the Might of your Goblin Captains for Heroic Marches and Moves, which is quite annoying for a 350-point model. Goblin Captains are cheap, and you were probably bringing along quite a few for warrior slots anyway, but it’s still frustrating that your centrepiece model is so dependent on backup to keep moving. Finally, the sheer power of the Legendary Legion is also kind of a difficulty; if you want to field the Balrog, you really want to take this Legion, but doing so rules out a whole bunch of Moria’s most useful models. Losing access to Bat Swarms and Warg Marauders particularly hurts, as it means your force is stuck at Move 5 or 6. While it’s maybe a bit harsh to count “It’s part of a really sick Legendary Legion” as a downside of a model, it does mean that the Balrog is a little harder to fit into a force.

 

If the Balrog took a little less time to stomp down this hallway, the Fellowship would have never left Moria (Ollarin)

Dragon

The Dragon, on the other hand, gives up the Balrog's laundry list of advantages for basically two special rules: Fly and Monstrous Charge. Thankfully, those two rules are both ridiculously strong. Fly (which is technically an upgrade but may as well be incorporated into the base price of the model) has a ludicrous number of potential uses, from reaching combat faster to lining up Hurls or hunting enemy support heroes. These deserve a whole article’s discussion, but suffice to say that having Fly is Very Good.

Just buy the Wings. I know they're expensive, but just buy the Wings (Bizzarewarstar)

Monstrous Charge is less versatile, but it turns out that vastly amping up your damage output on the turn you charge is really, really strong. While the Balrog's 4 Attacks can sometimes take a few turns to kill tougher models, anything that loses a fight to a charging Dragon is going to be taking a massive 10 (!) S7 Strikes. There is very little that can withstand that sort of punishment, even amongst the most defensive heroes. Not only does this let the Dragon keep rampaging, but it means you only need to win combat against the enemy leader once to rip them to pieces. No extended duels for you!

Aside from these two massive benefits, the Dragon is also pleasantly versatile at the listbuilding stage. You can run it “naked” with just Wings, dramatically ramp up its durability with Tough Hide, or even turn it into a piece of flying artillery with Breath Fire (although see here for why you might not want to do that). This can let the Dragon more easily fit into a force, as does its status as a Hero of Valour for easy allying. Finally, its comfortable 3/3/3 stats mean that it can laugh off a few Wounds with Fate and call its own Heroic Actions, both very useful abilities.

How many Wounds can it laugh off? Well, do I have an article for you...

However, this again all comes at a price. Your Dragon is coming in at a minimum of 300 points if you want it to be effective, and often rises to 350— the same as the Balrog. That means that it will be fairly unsupported in a lot of games, and you’re really relying on it to do most of your damage for you. That can be quite a nerve-wracking thing to do, as its Survival Instincts special rule can see it flee the field after a single Wound. As explored in the article I linked earlier, this special rule is a little less likely to come up than it first seems, but it’s still a real disadvantage that the other models on this list don’t have.

Moreover, the real effect of Survival Instincts is the vulnerability to magic it brings with it. Because you need to save your Will points for Courage tests, you’re almost helpless to resist the predations of enemy spellcasters, especially Nazgul and the like. Even someone like Gandalf is well-equipped to Immobilise you every turn, preventing your 300+ model from doing the damage it needs to. If you’re facing a Terror-causing army, your opponent might not even have to use magic to pin you down: your measly C4 will see you fail plenty of Courage tests to charge anyway. And if/when the enemy manages to break your relatively bare-bones list, your Dragon has a solid chance to flee the field every single turn. For such an expensive model, that’s… not ideal.

Turns out Gandalf actually is pretty good at killing Dragons (Blade Center)

The final challenge for a player wanting to field a Dragon is that it doesn’t really bring anything to your army besides its own killing power. Sure, it’s got Harbinger of Evil, but nothing Moria has really comboes that well with this. When you compare that singular aura to the buffs the Balrog is handing out like flaming candy, it seems hard to justify the Dragon.

 

The Watcher in the Water

There's a lot to be scared of here (The Lord of the Ring Wiki)

Our last model on this list is one whose inclusion I should probably justify. The Watcher is a good 100+ points less than the last two models, and its stats are largely much worse. However, it earns its place here because of its status as a centrepiece model that you should be building around. As discussed in this article I wrote awhile back on TMAT, any list including the Watcher needs to support it by fielding a huge horde of Goblins and at least one Bat Swarm. Those requirements mean that unless you’re playing a huge game, you really can’t just throw the Watcher in on a whim if you want it to perform, exactly like the other two models on this list. This is in contrast to the “Little Three” models I looked at last week, who are all happy to slot into existing lists without too much hassle.

I’ve established that the Watcher is a bit of a pain to bring along, but why would you want to try? Well, the biggest reason is that your opponent is likely to have very little experience playing against something like the Watcher, simply because there is nothing like the Watcher. The playstyle it encourages and the tricks it can pull off are absolutely unlike any other model in the game, so unless your opponent has played against it much before they will be underprepared for what it can do. This is in stark contrast to the Balrog and Dragon, which are basically the equivalents of a superpowered Troll or Fell Beast, respectively. Because the Watcher has no such equivalent, it is very hard for enemies to plan for and deal with it.

Whatever this thing is, it's definitely unusual (thehobbitcentral)

Of course, for that to matter you’ve got to be able to do some cool stuff with your unusual model. Thankfully, the Watcher has a lot of tricks up its sleeves (I have no idea how this aphorism fits in with the whole tentacle thing). On base stats alone, its 6 Attacks give it a huge edge over literally every other model in the game, and mean that nothing with less than F6 will even slow it down. This is particularly true in light of its Tentacles, letting it pull in enemy banners, spear supports and other fragile models to be devoured. They also add a surprisingly relevant number of S3 hits, which will average about a kill per turn against a lot of enemies. But while these abilities all make the Watcher great at mowing through chaff, the real upside of the Tentacles is the way they let you assassinate enemy heroes. By pulling them into contact with the Watcher, a Bat Swarm and a few more Goblins, even heroes like Azog and Elendil can be taken out in a single round. They’ll be capped at F5, facing a dozen or more rolls to win the fight and then twice many Strikes, half of which will be at S6. Almost nothing is walking away from that, no matter how strong they are. Even better, this setup can be used every single turn and from behind the Goblin shieldwall, allowing the Watcher to pick out choice enemies from a position of safety. And of course, against models without F6 or Strike, the Watcher doesn’t even need the help of its Bat Swarm friend to tear them limb from limb. 

The Watcher's best friend (Kapiti Hobbies)

Alongside the offensive capabilities of the model, the fact that it’s a “mere” 200 points means you can fit in a lot more toys around it than its two competitors. It’s also quite good at withstanding spells with 5 Will and Resistant to Magic, which is a definite edge over the Dragon. And it brings one more truly unique ability in the form of its From the Depths special rule, letting it effectively “Deep-strike” to anywhere on the battlefield. Not only does this let you hold it in reserve until its needed, it also gives you a huge edge in scenarios like Storm the Camp; how many troops do you leave behind to defend your camp when an A6 monster could pop up there at any moment?

You thought these guys were hard to deploy against? (Beasts of War)

Sadly, being able to operate in a totally unique way does come with the downside of not being great at doing ordinary monster things. In particular, you’re very vulnerable to enemy heroes when they can charge you straight up without getting yanked into a tricky spot and Bat Swarmed to death. If your infantry line starts to crumble, then your tentacled deathball can quickly find itself hacked to pieces by Striking enemies. As it starts losing Wounds, it also starts losing its capacity to deal damage, which can really slow you down. Furthermore, the Watcher lacks the mobility to escape a bad situation if you get it into one. Sure, you can arrive on the battlefield wherever you like, but with only M4 you’re going to struggle to redeploy once you do. The Tentacles do mitigate this a lot, giving you a reliable threat range of 8” or 9.5” if you March, but it’s definitely still a weakpoint. The reliance on the Tentacles can also lead to wasted turns, as you’ll occasionally miss with all of your shots and fail to pull anything in to combat with you (~8% of the time if you’ve stayed still, or around double that if you’ve moved). It’s not a common issue, but it’s annoying when it comes up. It’s also vastly more annoying against Blinding Light casters, where you have a roughly 55% chance of missing, or 30% if you’re willing to spend Might. On the plus side, the odds of you whiffing once you get a model into close combat with you are very low: you’ve got an 87% chance of beating an average Captain in a fight, and there’s not much chance of them escaping the combat alive.

If you can grab him, that's normally the end of the matter (Warhammer Community)

We’ve now exhaustively covered these three monsters, any of which are capable of taking on whole armies in the right circumstances. But when does it make sense to actually field them?

For the Balrog, it probably makes sense to flip the question: when does it make sense not to field it? Durin’s Bane is so ridiculously good, especially in its Legendary Legion, that you really need a reason not to bring it along. What might that reason involve? Well, the most obvious is price. If you’re playing a small game, the Balrog will often just be unfeasible to include, regardless of how devastating it might be. Similarly, if you feel like you really need some of the other tools available to Moria lists that might be excluded by the Legendary Legion, then there’s a good chance that the Balrog isn’t for you. The perfect example of this is if your army needs what one of the other two monsters discussed here can bring; if you’ve got the Balrog along, then good luck fitting in a Dragon too. Basically, outside of these circumstances it’s always worthwhile at least strongly considering the Balrog.

Honestly, I think that's how it should be (Warhammer Community)

The Dragon, on the other hand, definitely needs you to specifically want what it's bringing. Maybe you’ve piloted Gûlavhar for years and know that you can get heaps out of the Dragon’s Fly, or maybe you’re worried about backline buffers or devastating cavalry charges; a Dragon can deal with any of those issues with ease. If you’re desperately in need of more magic or a way to break up big enemy formations, then one with Wyrmtongue or Breath Fire could be worthwhile. However, even when you’ve identified some need to include a Dragon, you’ve still got to make sure the list can accommodate it. It’s absolutely terrified of Evil spellcasters, so should only really be brought in a Good v Evil format, and it's weak enough to spellcasters as a whole that you really want some way of dealing with them. An army with good solutions to big heroes (a Bat Swarm and a few Blackshield Shamans, for example) will also make it easier to justify a Dragon. Smaller games can also help, in that there will be less big heroes and magic running around, but it can be hard to find space for a Dragon beneath 600 or so. Overall, I think the Dragon is hard to find a place for in a pure Moria list above this size, but could be worthwhile in an allied force that can deal with enemy spellcasters and heroes well (such as this one run at the Australian Masters recently).

Are these two the solution to the Dragon problem? (Warhammer Community)

The Watcher, meanwhile, fits best into a force with lots of models and at least one Bat Swarm. I think it’s best at around 500 points, as this points level means you often only have one hero you need to neutralise before the Watcher can rampage unconcernedly. It does still work above this points level, but you need to make sure that there are other threats to deal damage and draw aggression away from it. It’s also much better if the scenarios it’s likely to face are ones which concentrate the action so the enemy can’t run away from it, or ones like Storm the Camp that let it pop up unexpectedly and win you the game. Within these constraints though, I think it’s a very versatile model, that can turn matchups against expensive enemy heroes or forces without much Strike into easy wins.

Pull one of these two into a Bat Swarm hug and that's probably game right there (Dorn's Arrow)

The final option to consider is simply fielding none of the Big Three. This “wide” playstyle can work quite well, especially in objective games where the smaller monsters and Goblin hordes it brings along can defeat the enemy in detail. Reducing your reliance on a single model to win you games also makes it harder for enemies to knock you out of the game by killing that model. However, this approach really does start to fall off in larger games, where you can find yourself short on dedicated tools to kill the powerful enemies you start to face at these points values.

These guys just don't really do it against the likes of Aragorn or Azog (Games Workshop)

Overall, I think that in games of 700+ points your starting point should always be the Balrog, and all other models should be viewed as (probably inferior) alternatives. The new Legendary Legion is just that strong that you need good reasons not to take it. Closer to 500, alternatives like the Watcher or “none of the above” start to shine, and even a naked Dragon can succeed at 500 points. But in those larger games, I think that the Balrog just casts too long a shadow. And flame.

I hope you enjoyed that read! It ended up being bigger than even the monsters themselves, but I hope it justified the length. Next week we’ll be looking at something totally different, although I'm sure we'll return to Moria listbuilding soon enough. And as ever, if you’ve got any thoughts on how to build a Moria list, I’d love to hear from you below or on Facebook.

Until next time, may your Balrog always roll a six!