The Bolg and The Beautiful: Defending The Profiles of The Hobbit

 

Reviews of the Hobbit trilogy can generously be described as mixed, and almost everyone is at least a little disappointed in them. Controversially enough, I believe that disappointment often trickles down into how we think about MESBG. It is a commonly held opinion that the Hobbit-era profiles tend to be the beneficiaries of substantial power creep, making them undeservedly better than their equivalents in the Armies of the Lord of the Rings book. However, I believe that in almost all cases these profiles accurately reflect the capacities of the characters in question, as depicted in the book and especially in the films. This is a controversial claim, but to me it is clear that these profiles are almost always faithful to what we saw on screen. Whether they should have been depicted that way in the films, of course, is an entirely separate discussion. To back up my big claim, I’m going to go through all of the unpopular profiles for the Forces of Good and Evil, respectively. As mentioned, I’m treating the movies as (somewhat regrettable) canon, and judging the profiles primarily for how they reflect this canon.

 

Thandruil

In case it wasn't clear, Thandruil is "The Beautiful" from the title (The One Wiki to Rule Them All)

The major complaint against Thandruil is that his F7 and absurd number of Attacks are out of proportion to his status as “some random backwater Elf” (a rough quote of the description often given). I would critique this firstly by pointing out that within the lore, he’s hardly a “random.” He was almost certainly born during the First Age, as prince of one of the great Elven kingdoms. This makes him already one of the oldest and most illustrious characters alive, being from the very same generation as Galadriel herself. While it doesn’t appear that he travelled into the West, he was enough of a badass to fight alongside Gil-galad during the Last ALliance, and inherited rulership of one of the largest and most powerful remaining Elven lands in the aftermath. He is clearly a powerful Elf Lord at the height of his power, which to me is already a compelling case for some good stats.

Tauriel was pretty clearly outclassed here (Elcharlot) 

Moreover, in the films we see him take on a number of enemies, from a swarm of Gundabad Orcs to Tauriel, briefly. In each case he is demonstrably leagues above his opponents, and even F6 A3 Tauriel can hardly even see his blade before it cuts her bow in two. This dude is portrayed as an absolute blender, and honestly, I think his rules reflect that. It is potentially arguable that his auric buffs are stronger than required by his onscreen feats, but it’s quite difficult to assess this. Either way, I think that his actions in the films adequately back up his outrageous profile.

 

Dáin

Look how he's holding that hammer! The dude is totally jacked! (WorthPoint)

My main defence of Dáin’s combat ability is simply that it’s not out of proportion to other Dwarves. He has F6, the same as even generic Kings, and has the A3 you’d expect of any powerful fighting character. His S5 and Burly are unusual, but readily justified by how easily he swings that hammer of his around onscreen. And his defensive stats, while formidable, are pretty standard for Dwarf Lords. Similarly, his Courage buff seems justified by the loyalty with which his warriors rallied to him, and Master of Battle is a great representation of the speed with which he adapts to changing circumstances and issues orders to his troops. Overall, I think that Dáin’s onscreen feats easily back up his profile, powerful though it is.

 

The Other Iron Hills Models

Pictured: the Platonic ideal of a shieldwall (Todor)

Now, obviously, Iron Hills are a kind of terrifying army. But their status as the most competitive Dwarven faction is, to me, entirely justified by their in-universe reputation. Their stats are basically those of elite, well-trained Dwarves, reflecting both their performance onscreen and the background for the army. They have Shieldwall because, well, they formed a sick shieldwall. Moreover, their devotion to martial perfection supports their cornucopia of weird supporting tools. Dwarves are renowned for their ingenuity, so I can readily accept the presence of powerful war machines like the Ballista and Chariot. Even the Goat Riders are no more dominant than their devastating charge onscreen would predict. While these Dwarves are definitely miserable to face, they are no more so than one would expect them to be after watching the last movie. Which was itself, admittedly, pretty miserable.

 

Bard

Yeah, this bow should definitely be S3 (The One Wiki to Rule Them All)

Bard’s close combat stats are actually very reasonable. He’s roughly on par with Éomer, which seems a fair comparison. Both are heroes of men without Númenórean descent, who hack their way through plenty of enemies onscreen. Bard fights harder in defence of his daughters, while Éomer fights harder if one of his family is slain. Bard provides much better auric buffs, but that seems fair: he’s a demonstrably excellent leader, who rallied the shattered people of a sunken town into a real fighting force. The only area in which I think Games Workshop were too generous is with his bow. His archery prowess is reasonably depicted, but there is no way that his bow is better than anything produced by the Elves. If Legolas can mow through hundreds of Orcs with a S3 bow, then Bard could have done so too.

 

Lake Town Militia

   

I mean, there is some armour there (Games Workshop)

Now, this one I do have to agree with. Lake Town Militia should probably be D3 instead of D4, because they are very rag-tag. I could argue that they are seen to don a small amount of armour before the battle, in a similar fashion to the Rohirrim militia do before Helm’s Deep— and the Rohirrim have always been D4. But I think there is enough difference between the armours of the respective groups that the Lake Town Militia would have been better off at D3.

 

Azog

   

You've gotta admit, this was not a fight between two equal combatants (A Tolkienist's Perspective)

Azog, on the other hand, I will definitely go in to bat for. The Defiler takes on Thror, Thrain and Thorin, the latter a number of times. All three are powerful Dwarf Kings, with justifiably impressive statlines and “3s in all the right places.” Azog absolutely rips through them all, often defeating them with just a single blow and with no difficulty whatsoever. His statline, therefore, must reflect a character who can take on some of the stronger heroes in the game without slowing. Sure, Thorin eventually brings him down, but Thorin was clearly the underdog in that fight, as he would be if they were to have it out on the tabletop. Yes, Azog is just some nobody Orc in the lore, but he’s portrayed onscreen as vastly more dangerous than a bunch of F6 A3 power heroes. If that doesn’t justify his F7 then I don’t know what will.

 

Bolg

"Why does it hurt so much?" "Because Bolg was F7" (Kimberley Lewis)

Bolg is a murkier case, but I still think he deserves his ludicrous stats. In the films, he faces Legolas (twice), Fili and Tauriel. The latter two he rips through without breaking a sweat, winning the first combat against Tauriel easily and killing Fili with ease when he tries to intervene. Sure, Tauriel manages to drag him off the cliff with her, but it’s pretty clear that if Legolas hadn’t intervened she would have been done for. Ignoring that Hollywood is unable to write female characters without making them be “saved” by men, Bolg showed that he was clearly superior to a F6 A3 hero with a second Striking friend to boot.

The two duels with Legolas are a little weirder. On the one hand, Legolas wins the second and arguably the first, something that would never happen in game. However, we have to remember that the Legolas onscreen effectively reflects the old “Megolas” profile, which had F7 and A3. Bolg and Legolas manage to fight each other to basically a standstill in the first duel, and the Elf only narrowly wins the second. That to me seems a reasonable depiction of a contest between two equal combatants, which would support Bolg being himself F7 and A3. While this is a more complex argument than the one for his father, I think that the evidence available supports Bolg’s current stats.

 

Hunter Orcs

2 swords = 2 Attacks (Games Workshop)

It’s difficult to assess how dangerous a warrior model is when most of their portrayal in the films involves being diced up by powerful heroes; after all, even the mighty Uruk-hai still get sliced up by Aragorn pretty easily. However, there is one scene in which we do see the Hunter Orcs take on warrior models: the barrel-riding scene. Before all the bizarre GoPro footage, we get to see the Hunter Orcs absolutely overwhelm the Elven defenders of the sluice gate in a single round of combat. That to me supports a S4 A2 profile, while the subsequent fightback of the Mirkwood Rangers supports their lowly F3 and D4. Plus, they have two swords: that always means A2, right?

 

Bonus: The “Aragorn” Argument

One common comparison that is often used to complain about the inflated stats of Hobbit-era characters is that of Aragorn. If Strider himself is only F6 A3, then what right do these upstarts have to exceed this? However, I would point out that Aragorn isn’t actually shown to be an amazing duellist. In fact, there are basically three enemies that he duels in the films: the Cave Troll, Lurtz, and the Troll Chieftain. He actually seems to lose his fight with the Cave Troll, being slammed against the wall and knocked down when he tries to defend Frodo. He is barely able to overcome Lurtz, a model with F5, and the Troll Chieftain would undoubtedly have killed King Elessar if Frodo had gone a little slower up Mount Doom. These results imply to me that he can’t be more than F6, simply because he’s not shown to be that good at duelling. In fact, it’s hard to really argue that Azog (as seen onscreen) wouldn’t wipe the floor with Aragorn if the two went toe-to-toe, and their profiles bear this out in game. Instead, where Aragorn stands out is his incredible tenacity and resilience; he just keeps going, no matter how exhausted he is and no matter the odds. And lo and behold, what makes Aragorn special in game is his capacity to be Heroic into the dying turns of the battle. Thandruil, Azog and Bolg can all exceed Aragorn’s Fight value without diminishing the King of Gondor, simply because duelling ability isn’t really his thing anyway.

Yeah, he definitely did not win that fight (Wikiwand)   

 

I hope you enjoyed that break from our regular style of articles. I’m sure this will be a controversial one, and I would genuinely love to hear your takes. Are there any other Hobbit-era models with absurdly inflated statlines? Am I wrong and this is all an elaborate Games Workshop ploy to increase sales on new models? I’d love to hear it in the comments below or on Facebook.

Until next time, may your models always feel like the movies!