For unit Formations, I suggest forming the largest units possible with all types, with a minimum of 15 figures but mostly the maximum 20. As you can see this is a very large, and brutal force with little finesse, however – at this time – Morgoth was attempting to overthrow the smaller Sindar and Silvan Elven forces with pure weight of numbers and this army reflects that. Shape Change is an additional spell that Sauron can use once in a game: if successfully cast he can shift his shape to one of the other shapes listed below. Gothmog is the only Balrog that can Command an army. Only a single unit of two Balrogs (in addition to Gothmog) can be used. DRAGONS So with that starting point in mind I fished out my copy of the Oathmark rules and saw what was available. Looking at the Spiders first, there is actually a Giant Spider listed:

Elf dogs: there was an Elf Hunt Master miniature, but only as a special offer, and without dogs. There could be a separate box for this, but honestly, I dont think that its really needed... Northstar has some metal dog/wolf miniatures, so if the Elf Hunt Master would be released as a normal miniature, anybody could make a unit with combining them. Sauron can only cast spells in this form (in fact Sauron is the only character of either side that can cast spells), and the magical items rule is removed from his stats. The following units are available to an Orc leader. I will leave the word “Orc” out of each entry as it can be assumed that all of the standard units in this list are Orcs. I also make mention of their armaments. As you can see Sauron is a very powerful character, however he will not involve himself in direct physical combat if he can avoid it This was fought just before the Noldor Elves returned. It was mainly fought against the Sindar and Silvan Elves (this was in fact the only large engagement that involved both these Elven types and led to the creation of their relevant realms).Notes: Because Oathmark limits all troop types to no more than 4 units of each, the largest WOTR army possible in Oathmark (using the above constraints) would be sixteen units: 4 Archers, 4 Human Spearmen and 8 other units, of which no more than 4 can be cavalry and no more than 2 can be heavy cavalry. Northstar's Frostgrave hard plastic kits for wizards, knights, soldiers, crewmen, barbarians, and tribals are a great source of miscellaneous adventuring gear and figures, and can be used for sources of bits for customizing humans, elves, wizards, and more or less human-sized orcs/goblins pretty easily, and can be used to customize dwarves and hobbits with varying amounts of modeling work to make them look right (since weapon-holding arms tend to be shorter than typical human arms!) Again, from this I suggest eliminating Class 1, 2, 4, 6, and 9. I would suggest an Orc General (Class 3) as the Army commander with a bodyguard made up from class 11, the rest of the 40% of the whole army I would make up from Class 7, 8, 10. As an addition to these I would add an option of a Troll unit, using the standard Troll statistics from the rules. These are great miniatures for those looking for something different and a fitting prelude to the arrival of the eagerly anticipated rules system. You could use the same Captain stats for their commanders as a Goblin Captain or Champion. Their Terrain would be a Halfling Village. CONCLUSIONS

A careful use of these Special Abilities can produce troop types which have at least some correspondence with historical units, always remembering, of course, that different gamers have different views on how some troops functioned in any case, yielding another dimension for possible experiment. The goblin infantry won't stay alone within their dark green skinned ranks, as North Star has previewed wolf riders in summer, and these will come in plastic, along with a few metal command models. And their release is set for January 2020! Add in a few engines of war (catapult or ballista) and you got yourself a proper range for fantasy mass combat - at a reasonable rate. I am just missing a bit of gubbins, some looted goods, a horn or drum for the musician, a severed dwarf or elf head for the banner, simply bits. Because if you go for the army project, your banner men and such will look pretty similar, unless you add a few parts from other kits (yes, with the overall plastic range that North Star offers, there are quite a bit choices, still next to the spears was a bit of room for such things...).

Six of the Best

ABOVE: A Crusader battle. The Editor notes the Salute 2003 figure of Richard the Lionheart (sculpted by Mark Copplestone) in the foreground and is very pleased... Sauron's human warriors: Wargames Atlantic's Afghans and Persians might make some splendid Easterlings - the human armies summoned in from the far-eastern corners of Middle Earth to lead the Orcs in war and conquest, and I've just be reminded that Victrix makes some great war elephants/olifaunts that ought to be perfect for that sort of project. Ghoul: Well, I dont see any feasible combination with other unit types here, and a separate set, just for Ghouls is unlikely. Maybe a smaller box, if there ever be smaller boxes. In my opinion, the most likely here, is a cooperation with Mantic, as by the Frostgrave Undead Encounters set. We'll start with the plastic miniatures. A brand new plastic kit is on the way that will feature plenty of different options for kitting out your Orc warriors. They are clad in a mix of different leather and chainmail alongside weapons like swords, axes and big nasty axes. Osprey Games and North Star Military Figures have now released their newest Mass Combat Fantasy System – Oathmark. In it, you build a Kingdom and wage wars against your neighbors. There are four core races in the book (Dwarf, Human, Elf, and Goblin/Orc). Those races all get along within a Kingdom but will fight for their lords against neighboring kingdoms. How will you build your Kingdom?

I felt honour bound to use my Oathmark goblins and I also deployed my new Vendel Goblins, all in (to me at least) big, chunky 15 figure units. To my delight, none of them totally embarassed themselves in their first game. The Oathmark archers, played as orcs, actually finished off Mike's Rangers and the spear orcs got a couple of good charges in. My Vendel goblin archers managed to kill a few of the enemy too, which made them very happy. This set offers up Champions armed with various weapons, Musicians, Sorcerers/Shamans and more. I do love that leader character with the fur cloak and scimitar held aloft! When he was first encountered Glaurung was young and could not breathe fire, so – when used with an Early Orc force – he will be in this form. no more than 25% of the army can be Cavalry of any type; no more than 50% of the cavalry can be Heavy Cavalry. With that in mind, in modern D&D terms, I suppose that both Wargames Atlantic and Northstar goblins would probably nicely fit the niche of hobgoblins, which are generally portrayed as taller, smarter, more militaristic goblins, and distinctly different from the even bigger, stronger, more feral and wild orcs.I’m a big fan of those games. I particularly like Joe’s approach in encouraging players to adapt his game systems to fit their own preferences and contexts. It’s a refreshing, open approach which many gamers seem to respond to, recognising that we’re not all the same, we have different interests, habits, pleasures and resources, and that gamers want to treat a system like a toolbox through house rules and so on. Similarly the ‘fluff’ accompanying Joe’s games is generally indicative rather than definitive, enabling players to create their own variant worlds to greater or lesser extent. Oathbreakers has s urprisingly nothing, not even the box art of the already available Skeleton Infantry... Trolls, ogres, giants: It looks like Wargames Atlantic's upcoming Classic Fantasy trolls would be the perfect Tolkien-style trolls, but they don't seem likely to be ready until later this year. Fortunately, these are popular fantasy gaming standbys and pretty widely available in plastic today: Reaper makes some great, inexpensive Bones plastic trolls and giants in the mean time, and other companies like Games Workshop and Mantic almost certainly have some plastic trolls and/or ogres kits of their own that would work well enough. The third battle of the age was known as the ‘Dagor Aglareb’ (The Glorious Battle). This was fought approximately 60 years after the second battle against the Noldor forces of the house of Feanor, and the House of Fingolfin. It was engendered by Morgoth because he made an erroneous assumption and sent out a force to defeat an enemy which he didn’t think was actually prepared for war: he worked on the principal of attempting to overwhelm the Noldor with numbers as he had attempted against the Sindar and Silvan in the first battle, however – in the end – the Noldor defeated this force so completely that it led to a 400 year long siege of Morgoth’s Realm of Angband. Even if you’re a dedicated historical simulator my hope is these pieces will intrigue you enough to give Oathmark a go.