Help needed against Harad

Sir Richard · **Posted:** Sun Nov 03, 2013 11:53 am

Hey guys, I have a friend who plays the Haradrim, and he has recently been using shoot-and-run tactics against my armies, and as I am partial to battles being decided in the melee phase of the battle, instead of at range, I am wondering how to counter this. I usually play Goblin or Dwarf armies, and like to either swarm with Goblin numbers, or smash and break with Dwarven elites, and both being melee tactics, I've sorta been caught off-guard.
My first reaction was to charge as fast as I could into the fray where his bows couldn't be effective, but of course as soon as I get in close, he starts pulling back half-move just to prolong my agony. True, with dwarves very few die, but with goblins they tend to die by the swarm.

Dwarfendale · **Joined:** Mon Jun 04, 2012 11:44 am **Posts:** 15

My tactics for engaging any shooting force like harad, elves is this,

Get in quick!
Start at the half way line of the board when setting up your army and try and face your opponents archery if you can.
Use heroic marches.
If using goblins consider a warband of archers as cheap and you can station them at the flank of your main force and they can shoot your enemy whilst your main force advances.
You could also consider using a few bat swarms (points permitting) who you can use as archery fodder ahead of your army, as they have 4 wounds each.
If your opponent is retreating make sure he is adding the +1 to his shooting so harad are normally 4, this will make 5 so his archery will be less effective.
If using Moria make sure your taking one or two shamans and channelling fury so any wounds are saved on a 5 plus.
You can also use an Allie who has cavalry (warg riders) or blinding light maybe (shadow lord).
Hope this helps

LordElrond · **Posted:** Sun Nov 03, 2013 1:03 pm

With Dwarves, either max out your shooting and try to out-shoot him, or forget about bows and go for the higher Defence.

Dorthonion · **Posted:** Sun Nov 03, 2013 2:29 pm

Is his force all infantry? No cavalry or mumakil? You have not specified the points sizes of the games so maybe a little more information would help us make more helpful suggestions.
One tactic I heard was putting your entire army on one flank and piling the lot into the opposition on that side as fast as possible, leaving some of the enemy out of touch for a turn or two so you have local numerical advantage and can wreak as much havoc as possible before the rest of your opponents force can get into position.

JamesR · **Posted:** Sun Nov 03, 2013 2:45 pm

If he's using horse archers you don't have much choice other than a few archers yourself because he can match your speed and still shoot.
Gotta applaud him personally, he found a tactical advantage and exploited it

Grungehog · **Posted:** Sun Nov 03, 2013 3:09 pm

If you have some warg marauders for your goblins, use them aim for something like this
groblog
2 shamen
2warg marauders(they benefit from fury)
a lot of goblins, a bat swarm or 2, and maybe some dwellers

The reasons for the marauders are simple, they benefit from fury, move 10"/24cm,can move full and shoot even in combat, have 3 attacks and wounds, will be wounding harad archers on 4+, and have Fight 3 which is usually what harad archers have.
Groblog +shamen=a 5+ fury save, that and groblog has 3 might which helps should wish to call heroic march.

Failling that you could ally in an orc task master+troll drummer which would nullify his whole tactic rather easily.
Think about it, troll drum all friendly units within 12"/28cm benefit from an extra 3"/8cm as long as they don't charge, in addition the taskmaster could be used to call heroic march on top of it all off, cumulatively you could have goblin sprinters going at 11" per turn.(that and you have a freaking mordor troll to destroy your opponent with)

Even if your opponent has cavalry he/she will be hard pressed evading that movement value

I hope I have given helpful advice here

Denizen · **Joined:** Sun Mar 03, 2013 8:15 pm **Posts:** 156

Are you playing the scenario's in the Sourcebooks? Or just fight till one force is broken/wiped?
With new deployment you're starting pretty close to him already and when moving 9 inch/turn (Heroic Marsh), you should get there early.

LordElrond · **Posted:** Sun Nov 03, 2013 3:52 pm

Denizen wrote:

(Heroic Marsh), you should get there early.

Heroic Marsh, lol, I don't think a marsh would ever speed you up...

Denizen · **Joined:** Sun Mar 03, 2013 8:15 pm **Posts:** 156

LordElrond wrote:

Denizen wrote:

(Heroic Marsh), you should get there early.

Heroic Marsh, lol, I don't think a marsh would ever speed you up...

Woops

Bilbo · **Posted:** Sun Nov 03, 2013 5:56 pm

I got absolutely spanked using a mostly mounted Harad force against Dwarves and Gwaihir and two great eagles, who destroyed all my cavalry before I even got into combat mainly by using hurl!

Isilduhrr · **Posted:** Sun Nov 03, 2013 7:50 pm

Monsters will destroy light cavalry like harad's. I'd recommend fast moving monsters, such as eagles, less so Fellbeasts.

Sir Richard · **Posted:** Mon Nov 04, 2013 3:45 pm

As out-shooting a harad force is impossible with either force(harad having access to 50% bow limit), getting in fast is really the only option for me. We don't have the Hobbit rules, and until recently we didn't even have the warbands sourcebooks(being in a country where there are no GW stores makes it a bit hard and expensive to get things). Thanks for all the comments guys! It's been a big help! Overall, I've decided to try to increase the amount of scenery in our games, and make sure we include the warbands rules(13 men for every hero; that ought to lower his bow count even if he's stretching the bow limit to the max).

Dorthonion wrote:

Is his force all infantry? No cavalry or mumakil? You have not specified the points sizes of the games so maybe a little more information would help us make more helpful suggestions.

He usually takes 100% infantry, and because we usually fight 250-500 point battles, he doesn't use any mumakil(nor does he in fact have any xP). I certainly like the idea of using some shamans in my goblin force, as the chance that less men will die from bow-fire will be nice. Again, thanks for the comments!

JamesR · **Posted:** Mon Nov 04, 2013 7:02 pm

Sir Richard there are GW's here in Texas. There are several in fact that I have been to
In fact there are at least two within an hour of you Grapevine mills mall and Denton

JamesR · **Posted:** Mon Nov 04, 2013 7:14 pm

Also your Dwarves could easily out-shoot Harad, not in volume of fire but in the strength of their bows and the accuracy of their shots (with Dwarf Rangers)

Sir Richard · **Posted:** Tue Nov 05, 2013 7:09 am

Yeah, there's plenty in Texas, but I don't live there. I'm just originally from there, so that's why I put that on my profile. Pick any of the countries that GW doesn't have any shops in and I could be there. I like the idea of trying to out shoot him though, I've never had a shoot-out before... That might be fun. Having my archers hide behind my higher defense dwarves would also make it harder for him to do as much damage to me as I could do to him I suppose. I plan on having a couple of games with him later this week to try some of these ideas out, I'll post some brief batreps here afterwards.

Bilbo · **Posted:** Tue Nov 05, 2013 1:10 pm

JamesR wrote:

Also your Dwarves could easily out-shoot Harad, not in volume of fire but in the strength of their bows and the accuracy of their shots (with Dwarf Rangers)

Out shooting Harad sounds a bit silly, particularly as the average archer for an extra point can be upgraded to hit on a 3+, making them the equal of a dwarf ranger, but allowing you to field more of them at 3 points cheaper, and being able to field 50% bows in your army rather than 33% with dwarves. Oh there is also Harad's poison rules that allow them to re-roll failed to wound rolls of 1, which are boosted to 1 or 2 if the Betrayer is in range. Even under the pre Hobbit rules I am afraid that your maths do not stack up James R.

The one thing dwarves are famous for is there toughness, if you are fielding dwarves you want to use this to get as many strength 4 models as swiftly into combat with Harad troops as is possible, as they are squishy with a defence of 4 and will die on a 4+.

If you are playing with current rules heroic march will help you get there quick!

JamesR · **Posted:** Tue Nov 05, 2013 2:55 pm

You are correct about without the betrayer (I wasnt factoring him in because of the op's posts), I was thinking for some reason dwarf bows would wound on a 4+ against harad

Help needed against Harad

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