Battle Report: Vanquishers of the Necromancer v Return of the King

Another round with the Vanquishers of the Necromancer!

Inspired by the absolute mauling the Vanquishers of the Necromancer gave to the Pits of Dol Guldur Legendary Legion in my last battle report, I decided to test them out against a tried and true list: The Return of the King Legendary Legion, replete with plenty of less evil ghosts for them to battle against. This would be a tricky fight, with the Good(er) side having immense magical capacities and some handy Spirit-killing tricks, while Evil(ish) has a heap of D8 infantry and the raw power of Aragorn with Anduril. Who will win? Read on to find out…

 

Vanquishers of the Necromancer Legendary Legion

Why mess with a winning recipe? i.e. Gandalf is still out

Warband 1

Saruman the White (Army Leader)

Galadriel, Lady of Light

Radagast the Brown

Elrond, Master of Rivendell with heavy armour

 

4 models, 12 Might, no fast models, no bows.

Same list as last time, because if it ain’t broke don’t fix it and this absolutely didn’t seem broke last time. Broken, maybe. Big combos are Saruman powering up everyone’s magic, Elrond boosting everyone’s combat power, Radagast keeping them all topped up on Wounds and Galadriel nuking whoever she wants. Good stuff.

 

Return of the King Legendary Legion

Even after last game, it's hard to take those four heroes at the back very seriously in a picture like this

 

Warband 1

Aragorn with Anduril (Army Leader)

11 Warriors of the Dead (11 shields, 6 spears)

Rider of the Dead

 

Warband 2

King of the Dead

11 Warriors of the Dead (11 shields, 6 spears)

Rider of the Dead

 

26 models, 4* Might, 2 fast models, no bows.

At 650 points I’m a firm believer in boys over toys for this Legion. Legolas is objectively great, but he’d drop my model count by 6, taking it from a little below average to very, very compact. More models makes it easier to play the objective, to get those 1:1 combats that this Legion absolutely dominates, and to peel scary threats off Aragorn or the King if need be. Missing Legolas is a big gap, but I’m always so worried about him getting shut down in combat anyway.

As far as matchups go, Good (the Vanquishers) have combat profiles well-suited to killing Warriors of the Dead, and the magic to accentuate this. However, Aragorn only really needs to kill one hero to start to tilt things in Evil’s favour, and the force has a huge edge in objective games.

 

Scenario

Three objective scenarios in this pool makes life pretty difficult for a 4-model army

This time around the dice gave me Pool 3 to pick from, with Seize the Prize, Destroy the Supplies and Retrieval on offer. Evil eventually opted to veto Seize the Prize as it would have allowed Good to clump up more than the others, while Good ended up picking Destroy the Supplies because an all-hero army can (hopefully) just hold off on quartering until they get to the second Supplies marker.

 

Deployment

Heaps of buildings to form chokepoints on this map

The board was a fun Village of Bree map, and the Vanquishers deployed opposite Aragorn. The King of the Dead was off on the other flank, hoping to burn Good’s Supply markers early.

 

Turns 1-2: The Bombardment Begins

Aragorn Marched forward, determined to get out of the gap between buildings to bring his numbers to bear. In return, the Council moved forward and blasted him with magic, Wounding him with first Banishment then Sorcerous Blast after he failed to Resist. Ouch. Radagast threw up a Terrifying Aura, but Saruman decided not to bother yet. On the other flank, the King of the Dead’s warband began pressing forward, continuing to do so on turn two.

The Vanquishers had Priority and moved up, targeting Aragorn with spells again. However, he managed to dodge them all through either Resist checks (although he was down to two Will) or simply failed casts from Radagast and Galadriel. Two Warriors of the Dead did get into combat with Galadriel and Elrond, with the Elf Lord easily slaying his foe.

Aragorn is not enjoying all this magic

Turns 3-4: The King is Dead, Retreat!

On the next turn, Vanquishers won Priority again. Aragorn contemplated calling a Heroic Move but decided against it, reasoning that he’d need his Might for combat and concerned that he might need to peel off enemies with friendly ghosts. Galadriel charged in first, nuking a Rider of the Dead with Banishment then tying up two enemies to open the way to Aragorn. Next was Radagast, using two dice on Nature’s Wrath (plus a reroll) and getting a 6! Aragorn spent his second Will on Resisting this, needing to spend two Might as well to lock it in. Next was Saruman, who Immobilised the King of Gondor after his final Will point rolled low. Finally Elrond went charging in, knocking down the whole frontline with Wrath of Bruinen and preparing to kill the stricken Ranger. He certainly had the odds stacked in his favour, being able to Strike for free against an Immobilised, injured and prone opponent. He even Striked up high enough to get to Feint risk-free!

This is not exactly an ideal situation for Aragorn to be in

The Elf easily won the fight, then inflicted 3 Wounds and spent Might on a 4^th to absolutely guarantee things. With that, the King of Gondor was dead! Elsewhere, a Rider of the Dead at least managed to burn the furthest set of Supplies. Definitely little consolation however.

Down goes Aragorn!

On the next turn, Good, wary of being pinned down between the buildings, opted to retreat around to the right to try and take advantage of the open space there to get through to the Supplies. A hail of spells covered their retreat, although the King of the Dead laughed off a Banishment with a double 6. Elsewhere the Dead swarmed closer, hoping to overwhelm the Good heroes or at least force an early quartering.

Retreaaaaaaaaat!

Turns 4-7: A Trap is Sprung

Evil seized Priority on turn 4 and Good made the (probably poor) decision to not declare a Heroic Move to counter. This allowed Evil to tie them up with several Warriors of the Dead and bring others around both sides of the building to pin them. While a sneaky Banishment enabled Elrond and Saruman to push onwards around the building, Galadriel and Radagast were still held up in combat after Saruman failed to free them with a Sorcerous Blast. The second set of Supplies was burned as well in the Good backfield.

The ghosts swarm over the White Council

Learning from last turn’s mistake, Good called a Heroic Move on turn 5 to spin around the corner. But now the Dead were too close, and not even the bombardment of spells from the casters was able to keep Evil from swamping them and blocking off the path to the Supplies. The Good heroes fought well though, dropping several ghosts for no Wounds taken, but elsewhere the final Good Supply marker was burned by a Rider of the Dead.

The Vanquishers get pinned down in the corner

The following two turns were quite similar: pinned into a corner, the Good heroes slowly whittled down the mass of spirits facing them to try and clear a path. Not even magic was able to make much difference, as while the Dead were definitely being taken down no gap could be forged towards the Supplies. Eventually the Army of the Dead were at least Broken, but this just put the Good heroes on even more of a clock.

A wider shot to take in the whole battlefield

Turn 8: The King is Dead (Again)

Good won Priority on Turn 8 and saw an opportunity to secure a significant swing. The King of the Dead had become slightly exposed as he pushed around the side of a large tree, allowing Elrond to dart into combat with him after Galadriel Banished one blocking ghost and tied up another. Again, the combo of Wrath of Bruinen/Nature’s Wrath/Immobilise left the King helpless and prone, and again Elrond took full advantage. Inflicting four Wounds thanks to his sword’s +1 to Wound against Spirit models, he opted not to spend the Might to lock in the King’s death and was rewarded by his opponent failing all 3 Fate rolls. Elrond had claimed another scalp!

Elrond is on fire this game!

However, elsewhere, I had gotten a little carried away with my killing. I abruptly realised that with the King’s (second) death, there were now only 8 Evil models remaining. That meant that Good, who were currently 2 points down, had to somehow destroy two more sets of objectives without Evil losing more than a single model!

How to get from one corner to burn two sets of Supplies without killing anyone? Some creative use of magic

Turns 9-16: The Vanquishers Stop Vanquishing

What followed was a bizarre demonstration of the power of magic to shut down an opponent. By calling Heroic Moves wherever necessary, Good was able to charge multiple models with Saruman and Radagast, who could use their staves to fight non-lethally as well as Immobilising/Commanding three other models in order to prevent them moving. This, combined with a few Instil Fear casts, meant that only twice were Evil models able to move and thus take Break tests (which they passed with ease, being Courage 6) or charge Elrond or Galadriel (who used their Duel rerolls to deliberately lose combats and avoid killing their foes). Once Saruman was able to set up a sneaky 3-model block of Warriors of the Dead by Commanding one to charge him after he was already fighting two, the two Wizards were able to keep all 8 remaining ghosts tied up with combat and magic. In the meantime, Galadriel and Elrond darted across the Evil backfield, destroying first one then a second Supply marker!

An example of how these turns went. The three unengaged ghosts are all pinned, either with Instil Fear or Immobilise

By turn 15, Saruman was out of Will. He Immobilised one ghost and Radagast got another, but between them this still left one model unengaged and able to move. Considering its oath well and truly fulfilled, the spirit failed its Break test to reduce the Evil force to 7 models.

Elrond gets the second Supply token

Turn 16 rolled around, and Good was able to run Elrond onto the final objective, preparing to destroy it in the fight phase. At last the two Wizards were free to properly fight, and they used a combination of Sorcerous Blast, Nature’s Wrath and their 3 Attacks to banish a trio of Warriors of the Dead. This sudden slaughter quartered the Evil force, ending the game with a decisive 10:4 victory for the Vanquishers!

And still with heaps of Might to burn!

 

Strategy Review

Each side made one big blunder this game. For Evil, pushing Aragorn up to take on the Vanquishers himself was undoubtedly a mistake. In hindsight, there was no way he was going to do anything other than die. He might have lasted a couple more turns if he’d been a little luckier on Resist rolls, but eventually he was going to end up Immobilised and prone, ripe for the slaughter. He’d have been much more useful held in reserve, ready to attack towards the end of the game or simply hiding to secure those two VPs. I just didn’t register quite how devastating that rain of spells would be against a hero with only three Will, and how helpless he’d be in the face of it. Truly an eye-opening experience.

For Good, I got too focussed on smashing apart the Army of the Dead after Aragorn went down. An initial push to kill him was a good call, as was trying to disengage afterwards. But a failure to spend Might aggressively enough to move first saw the four heroes get bogged down against wave after wave of undead. They had no trouble killing them, of course, but got so carried away that I nearly lost anyway.

A Heroic Move here would have saved Good a lot of trouble

Army Reviews

The Return of the King Legion is tried and true, but oh boy it did not hold up here. Numbers and mobility meant it was leading the whole game, but this matchup looks borderline impossible in a killing scenario. Relying on a single big hero meant that once Aragorn got shutdown and killed, as was almost inevitable here, there really wasn’t much left to do but try and die as fast as possible. Would Legolas have changed this? Possibly. His archery would have helped plink Wounds off the Good side, but that might well have just given Radagast something to do with his special ability (he used it once on Elrond and rolled a two). Moreover, it’s a real worry whether Evil could have pinned in the four Good heroes so effectively with six less models on the field. He might have improved things, but not dramatically I don’t think.

At least he still hits on a 2+ into Blinding Light (u/srbandrews)

This Vanquishers Legion, on the other hand, was terrifying to behold. Killing Aragorn on the first real turn of combat is ridiculous, and it honestly just felt so effortless. Once he was down, the three Attacks and banner rerolls meant no one in the Legion was ever really in danger, while their immense magical abilities allowed them to unleash so many sneaky tricks. Galadriel Banishing a model tying up Elrond and Saruman to let them move and then (theoretically) Blast away the model tying up Radagast was a trick I’d never have thought of, but one I’m definitely going to exploit some more. And Radagast and Saruman tying up 8 models singlehandedly was quite beautiful to behold, although they did have to burn through a lot of resources to keep doing it. I could imagine a strategy like that working great in Domination, for example, to address the difficulties with securing objectives.

The two Wizards just forbidding the ghosts from dying

Overall, they struggled a bit to get to the objectives in the mid game, as one would expect from a force like this, but the fact that they did eventually get there is very impressive. And the killing power and durability of this list is out of this world. Really, really scary stuff.

 

I hope you enjoyed my second battle report involving the new Vanquishers Legendary Legion. They’re a potent mix, so keep your eyes open for articles on playing with and against them in the near future.

And maybe another report against Ugluk's Scouts. Spoiler alert, a lot of Scouts die, very fast

Until then, let me know what you thought of this report and how your experiences with this merry little band have been. And if you’ve got thoughts as to whom you’d like to see me smite with them next, sing out in the comments here or wherever you found this.

May your heroes never need to take on the Vanquishers!