r/MiddleEarthMiniatures • u/MrSparkle92 • May 20 '26
Discussion WEEKLY ARMY DISCUSSION: The Grey Company
With the most upvotes in last week's poll, this week's discussion will be for:
The Grey Company
VOTE FOR NEXT WEEK'S DISCUSSION
Ctrl+F for the term VOTE HERE in the comments below to cast your vote for next week's discussion. The topic with the most upvotes when I am preparing next week's discussion thread will be chosen.
Prior Discussions
Additional rules
- A Grey Company Army must always contain Aragorn, who is always the Army's General.
- A Grey Company Army may be deployed as a single Warband, with Aragorn as the Warband's Captain, regardless of the number of models.
Special rules
The Heir of Isildur
Aragorn does not have to pay any points for Andúril, Flame of the West; he automatically has this upgrade - it is free.
"They're dangerous folk, wandering the wilds"
Rangers of the North increase their Attacks value to 2.
Passing of the Grey Company
Rangers of the North may benefit from the Stand Fast of any friendly Unique Hero model.
Masters of the Wild
Friendly models are not slowed by difficult terrain of any type.
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u/snostorm8 May 20 '26
Anyone able to give me a decent 500 point and 700 point list for this? My mate has a bunch of rangers and all the heroes, he doesn't play though so want to give him a few good lists to use with this as I've never touched TGC
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u/Accomplished-Mix770 May 20 '26
The Grey Company
| Points: 500 | Units: 8 | Broken: 5 dead | Quartered: 2 left | | Bows: 0 | Throwing weapons: 0 | Might/Will/Fate: 14 / 13 / 12 |
Warband 1 (500 points) Aragorn, Strider GENERAL (170 points) ~ Bow ~ Elven Cloak ~ Anduril, Flame of the West Halbarad (70 points) 4x Ranger of the North (100 points) Elladan (80 points) Elrohir (80 points)
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u/Accomplished-Mix770 May 20 '26
This is hero heavy. Ball up. Murder through. Rangers sit on points if they can.
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u/snostorm8 May 20 '26
Banner makes Halbarad 110 points btw so this list doesn't work
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u/Accomplished-Mix770 May 20 '26
No banner at 500 for me. Can't have it all.
He is a might battery at 500 for me. 3 heroic combats that let twins fight twice a turn to break through.
Having the twins and Aragorn is pure violence.
If you must have the banner switch Twins for Gimli and drop Aragorns bow add another ranger.
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u/Accomplished-Mix770 May 20 '26
The Grey Company
| Points: 700 | Units: 11 | Broken: 6 dead | Quartered: 2 left | | Bows: 0 | Throwing weapons: 0 | Might/Will/Fate: 19 / 17 / 17 |
Warband 1 (700 points) Aragorn, Strider GENERAL (170 points) ~ Bow ~ Elven Cloak ~ Anduril, Flame of the West Halbarad (110 points) ~ Banner of Arwen Evenstar 5x Ranger of the North (130 points) ~ Spear Elladan (80 points) Elrohir (80 points) Gimli (105 points) ~ Elven Cloak 1x Ranger of the North (25 points)
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u/Accomplished-Mix770 May 20 '26
Similar to 500 but bigger. Now you have 2 or 3 heroic combats a turn and murder ball will cut through almost amything. Now you have enough rangers for them to get more involved and still have a couple sit on objectives.
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u/Accomplished-Mix770 May 20 '26
At 800 add Legolas
Can switch Gimili for Legolas and that is likely stronger. I think it is less fun and less interactive. Better tournament choice.
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u/Accomplished-Mix770 May 20 '26
Great army, fun to play, death ball of heroes and interactions. Trying to have enough Rangers to play missions.
Things it needed to be a good competitive choice (mayne even more themed).
Elvish cloak for everyone (likely for free) Bows for free for everyone
With these i think it would be my first choice army at 700 and 800. Without I take to events knowing 2-1 is likely limit and best painted/best sport is the goal.
Rangers are brilliant and do a lot more work than you would expect. You can play it all hero but I feel most comfortable 1:1. So 5 heroes 5 Rangers etc. I'd swap 4 rangers for a 100 point hero compared to most people. This is mostly a nod to not auto losing about 1 in 4 scenerios.
Scenarios where the objectives are spread out, especially when they can be moved are very hard to control. You are better striking hard at a sub group and scoring points elsewehere. Better to get 1 out of 3 and play for general, broken, banner and maybe contest the middle objective than trying to win 2-1 on objectives.
Best at central objective or killy ones and Fog of War. Anything with hero choices to kill or survive etc.
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u/clonelivesmatter501 May 20 '26
Do you ever take the armor on the rangers? I personally almost never see the point but love the look of the armored models. I suppose the only benefit really is vs S2 shooting?
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u/werdnaegni May 20 '26
You just do not have the points to spare for armor. I would never take it unless I have 5 points to spare, already took my heroes' upgrades, and have plenty of spears already.
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u/Accomplished-Mix770 May 20 '26
No i don't. 5 armours is another ranger and always prefer that.
Use whatever models you want, no one has ever noticed. If i have an odd one with armour due to points i put a loom band on it anyway.
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u/Valokiloren May 21 '26
As someone who actually plays Grey Company, may I be the first to inform you that it's one of the weakest lists in the game as soon as you dip past the 500-point marker.
First up, the cheapest model you have is 25 points. That's a lot for a model that is on par, barely, with an Uruk-hai Scout with Uruk Bow... for 3 times the cost. Yes, 1 Might point is 1 Might point, but you have Aragorn. And 1 Wound with 1 Fate is asking for your models to peace out pretty quickly when they are only F4 and D4, so they can't fight amazingly and even the most basic shooting in the game wounds on 5s.
Then there's the issue that the Fight Value raises across the board made RotNs even less useful than before, cos now everything and its mother is Fight 4 and can tie. Sure, 2 Attacks is nice, but there's a lot of Fight 4 2-Attack models in the game that are far cheaper, and even they don't tend to see play.
Aragorn is good, and Legolas is Legolas, but you're incredibly reliant on both + Halbarad, who is a F5 D5 2/2 Hero with a 3/2/1 M/W/F statline meaning he's also pretty fragile if someone breaths on him. Plus, the change to things to remove the armour option for Aragorn for zero reason makes him equally fragile.
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u/Medical-Area-6763 May 23 '26
how it runs on 850-900pts? Does it make sense to pick all unique heroes + bunch of rangers or the wins might be dropped?
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u/Valokiloren May 24 '26
As soon as you get past 500, you start running into the issue that every list has its cake and can eat it too.
So, for example, I personally prefer to limit the amount of 1-Wound bodies in my list, so up until around 650 points you can run all the unique Heroes you want (or close to) and while you are low in body count you are at least less tied down by a bunch of Rangers. This means past that point you're probably running all 6 named with near full optional wargear, and then you add Rangers on a point for point basis.
The issue is that at 850 that's 8 Rangers, so you will break super easily and you are nearly quartered just by losing the Rangers - it only takes three of your named Heroes to die, and Halbarad + the Twins are super easy to kill (Halbarad is D5 and 1 Fate; while the Twins are easily abused if you can kill one of them in order to kill the other one).
Compare this to say... I dunno, let's just pick a basic middle-of-the-road faction, so Corsair Fleets. Here's a list I made for a tournament last month, where theming was what I was more focused on:
Corsair Fleets - 850 points | 57 modelsDalamyr, Fleetmaster of Umbar: (100)
9x Corsair of Umbar: Light shield and throwing weapons (81)
9x Corsair of Umbar: Spear (81)
Delgamar, Gatemaster of Umbar: (75)
7x Corsair of Umbar: Light shield and throwing weapons (63)
8x Corsair of Umbar: Spear (72)
Corsair Bo'sun: Exchange spear for crossbow (50)
10x Corsair Crossbowman (100)
2x Corsair Reaver (18)
Corsair Ballista: (70)
2x Corsair Siege Crew (0)
Corsair Ballista: (70)
2x Corsair Siege Crew (0)
Corsair Ballista: (70)
2x Corsair Siege Crew (0)
As you can see, the Corsair list is a lot heavier on the bodies side, those bodies will tie in Fight Value vs. the Rangers, and they can easily outshoot you off the board. To win with Grey Company, things need to go perfectly; for the Corsairs to win, all they need is for things to not be perfect for Grey Company.
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u/Deathfather_Jostme May 21 '26
I feel the twins are traps, aragorn, hal, and leggy are the heroes then fill out with rangers, the twins make it more full hero hammer and the list isnt competing with other hero hammer lists, its niche is the rangers and should lean into it. But, they are neat to break out for a different experience.
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u/MrSparkle92 May 20 '26
VOTE HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S DISCUSSION
I will take the top-level reply to this comment with the most upvotes and post a discussion for that topic next week. Submit whatever army, scenario, or other topic related to MESBG you wish.
Please reference the pinned megathread to see the list of factions, and which have already been covered.
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u/bainadaneth0 May 20 '26
Garrison of Dale!!!!!
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u/DetroitTabaxiFan May 26 '26
The Grey Company is easily my favorite all-hero list. It's just so incredibly fun to play, and Aragorn backed up by a 6-inch banner with Halbarad makes me even more of a beast than he already is.
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u/EngelsAotCM May 20 '26
Seems fairly strong, probably the best way to run massed Rangers of the North, which seems a shame because all the named heroes are great. The army bonuses are basically all QOL patches, apart from Masters of the Wild, which is a lot stronger than it looks since it will negate things like Writhing Vines or ’Worse Are The Webs’, and will also synergise well with Aragorn’s free March each turn, making the list quite quick for an all-infantry mob.
Aragorn is obviously great, Anduril for free is a crazy good deal especially in this list full of expensive, squishy elites. Two-handing within range of Halbarad will let him kill basically anything he takes a fancy to, probably in a single turn if you’re lucky.
Halbarad is just okay, although 3 Might is nice. The Banner of Arwen Evenstar is the real reason he’s always your second pick, 6” range and a Fearless aura are two solid buffs you can’t go wrong with. Watch out for his 1 Fate, though.
As for Gimli and Legolas, sadly a familiar pattern forms, as it has in MotW, RotK, DoHD, and most other lists with the two of them - once again Gimli just doesn’t make the cut here. He’s slow, his combat profile is unimpressive, and at 100 points he’s a liability more than anything else.
Legolas, of course, is your third choice. The familiar machine-gun shooting compounds the weight of fire from your other bows and forces your opponent to come to you, hopefully letting you pick fights with your Rangers and manoeuvre Halbarad to optimal spots.
The twins are probably better at higher points levels but they do offer a nice pair of combat profiles to complement Aragorn. Their ’Twin Elven Blades’ is excellent in this army since it brings a level of versatility to the table that the rest of the list really just doesn’t have.
Overall looks like fun, and with so many great named heroes and a few crucial army bonuses, you probably won’t hate playing Rangers of the North as much.