Dol Amroth for Gondor!

Dol Amroth for Gondor! This is the call of the mighty Swan Knights as they charge forward to battle the ever pressing hordes of Mordor. Led by their mighty prince, Imrahil, they have unmatched skill, instinct and courage.After last year's first annual Gathering in the Desert, I decided that I wanted to see an army brought to the table that I had never seen before. My choices were still pretty plentiful, including the Army of the Dead on the good side, and the new Black Numenorians on the evil side. With the release of the Mordor supplement, I was sorely tempted to go evil, but I couldn't keep the calling of the free peoples of Middle Earth from my mind. As such I decided I wanted to field either the Army of the Dead or a fully Fiefdoms army. I wanted to have ONLY models of that line in my list so I had to think how best to outfit my army to compensate for areas of concern. In the end, I decided that the Fiefdoms held the better overall list for my next GT army. (That isn't to say that we won't see me go crazy and play the Army of the Dead in 2010!)


In creating my army, I felt it best to throw caution to the wind and field the mighty Imrahil as my leader. I could have chosen a lesser hero, or even a standard captain, but felt it may be helpful to have Imrahil with his additional might and fighting score. Not to mention his amazing banner like affect on Dol Amroth troops! Additionally, I wanted to use mounted units this tournament and so chose to also mount Imrahil on his steed! Here are some shots of my finished model.

Along with Imrahil, I gave him a large phalanx (seven in all) of mounted Knights of Dol Amroth, or MKoDA for short. With the MKoDA taking a large portion of my army list points I had to think of how best to further outfit my army for the long haul of playing in the GT this year. To give an idea of the MKoDA details, here is a close-up shot of one of the riders. There is a group shot of the entire unit with Imrahil at the top of this post!

As mounted troops cannot always be the only units in an army, strong foot models are needed to help shore up the lines of battle. I chose to field a large contingent of Knights of Dol Amroth on foot, or KoDA for short, for this purpose. The KoDA have a solid Defense and also a great fight skill which will enable them to win most fights that are 1-on-1. Here are some pictures of my finished KoDA.

One of the failings of the Fiefdoms list is spear support. Don't get me wrong, they have models, but they are not cheap and the models they do have lack the superior defense that the KoDA have. As such I felt it best to mix my support models and chose to run eight Men-at-arms of Dol Amroth and four Axemen of Lossarnach. The Men-at-arms have the benefit of pikes allowing them to double support which can be helpful in tight circumstances and also gain the banner effect benefit from Imrahil. The Axemen don't get the benefit of the banner, but they get the duel role of playing spear support and also getting to wield a 2-handed weapon if needed. This is a huge help when I have the opportunity to mass attack stronger enemies where I can mix and match my combating models. Here is the pictures of both the Men-at-arms and the Axemen. If you notice, I deviated from the standard white sash colors and chose a blue consistent with my knights to help tie them into the rest of my models colors.

Last for my army is bows. Having played last GT with a Grey Company army list I know the virtues of the bow and additionally the benefits of the Rangers of Gondor over Gondor warriors with bows. The higher fight and better shooting help greatly making their lower defense of 4 easier to swallow. As my rangers are meant to be part of my Dol Amroth army I have painted them also in blues, with grey cloaks. This helps them fit in nicely with the Dol Amroth knights. The color scheme was inspired by the rangers of the Morthond Vale.

One thing to note on the details is that I have decided to string all the bows. I think this adds significantly to the design and style and helps truly set apart these rangers other bow armed models I have fielded in the past.

So,what do you all think of these models? This army was the fulfillment of about two months of effort in assembling and painting the models. C&C is always welcomed! Let me know what you think and also, if you are planning to attend GitD, what army lists are you bringing?