Help me Stop an enemy Shooting!

[Matt-Shadowlord]

Hi
We're heading for a WOTR tournament in a few weeks, and one teams has stated they plan to bring the most broken combination of models they can think of:

40 Corsair Arbalesters (D6 Crossbows) with the Betrayer and Khamul

For anyone who doesn't know, thats 45 S4 shots per turn, using the Betrayer to reroll every single crossbow that doesn't kill. Wounding on 5s, that will kill 15 heavily armoured (D6) models per turn, with another 10 killed by the rerolls. 25 Galadrim with shields dead per turn before the nazgul start their magic.

Obviously while most of WOTR is tournament-ready, this is broken for its points cost. So in the interests of helping make sure it doesn't turn their opponents off the game what I need is ways to stop that fire power.

The easiest would be to stay outside their range; however since crossbows can move, at the double and still shoot if they use Might thats not realistic.
As far as I know, there is only 1 spell that prevents an opponent shooting, and that would require a lot of other spells to reduce Nazgul courage before being effective. Very expensive, and they can use Might to pass that final roll or resist the spell.
Another idea I had was MSU; lots of multiple small units of 8 men, so that the majority of the shooting is wasted (they can only target one per turn)

So what can you come up with? Any ideas are welcome, even the crazy ones.

[Sedge]

That sure is a nasty combination. They will only kill that many if they can see you, yes it is very hard to avoid that kind of shooting but terrain must be your friend. What are the missions for the games? Just kill troops will only do it for one of the three standard wins. High ground, capture and killing fields.

Possibilities are ambush combat units, Ents and Wardens of Carrok.

Eagles swooping the line.

Just heal your casualties with light of valar.

Could you use Wilderness spell to push the unit back? Would that count as the unit moving so can't shoot without Heroic shoot? Sounds a little WAAC but hey he's the one with a dodgy unit

Stay out of the way until last turns then pounce with everythingin one almighty thrust.

Duel those Nazgul asap. I'd start with Khamul to drop the Essance leech.

Let us know how you get on.

[Seigneur_Bacon]

Two formations of cavalry with a captain/hero in each. Try to let him move first, noramlly he will place himself in range of your formations. if not, just wait out of range until next turn), which means he will be at much at 24 paces from your fromantions. then you close in, double pacing (for a total movement of up to 20 paces) and place yourself out of his front arc, and since he alreasy moved he can't reposition himself, thus he can neither shoot nor charge you while you can bash his flanks.

Note this is for an open battlefield. should there be terrain cover, you should definitelly use it. should your opponement place himself in a posiiton he can't be flanked and must be charged headlong, then have a very small formation in front to soak the shooting then charge on with the bulk of your forces.
Remember to always end you movement phase out of his front arc, best if you can rear him.

I think that should do it. In smaller battles Mouvement is the key. if they can't see you, they can't do anything to you while beeing terribly exposed to you wrath.

[greenleaf]

Fight fire with fire: take wood elf archers. He won't be able to target them unless he comes in charge range. Then he'll get one round of shooting at best before you charge him and he'll have to use might even to get that round of shooting off. Hide your other units out of line of sight and just shoot him up until he is forced to come across the board.

Also, you can take Galadriel, Radahast, and Cirdan in an elven list. The three of them are only 385 pts and all have the Command lore. You'll be able to heal 3-9 models per turn and if you get a 6 result here and there on the valar spell, you can heal even more. That could help stem the losses if he someone does manage to shoot a unit. Also, is Blinding Light cumulative? If so, you could force a unit to be -3 to shoot values when shot at if somehow you can't hide the unit. Not sure that Blinding Light stacks that way though.

[FOR GONDOR!!!]

no blinding light is not cumulative.

[Danded01]

Or you could just inform him that its an illegal list

[albanaeon]

He can't play that list. The corsair arbalesters are rare units. Without commons to match, they can't be fielded. Easiest win in history.

Could you imagine this in a real life situation?

Corsair Commander: "Ha HA! Move an inch and I pincushion your army in an instant!"
Other Commander: "Well I don't see any regular troops.
Corsair: "So?"
Other: "Well, by the arbitrarily designed rules in effect, you can't do that. Now take your army and go home.
Corsair: "Awww man..."

[hithero]

Or you could just inform him that its an illegal list

I'm guessing this is only part of the army?
Anyway, apart from playing a game thats not broken, your thought of advanced 1 company skirmishers seems the best bet where that 1 unit will be killed before you charge home.

[Matt-Shadowlord]

What are the missions for the games?

AFAIK from the TO's pack, there is only one mission, which will be played 6 times. Its a non-standard mission with winning based purely on how many points of the enemy army are killed.
There are no objectives other than killing the enemy, and all that matters is the point cost of the units killed.

Possibilities are ambush combat units, Ents and Wardens of Carrok.

Ambush is a good idea; can the ambush units attack the turn they appear? These are 2500 pt games though so I dont expect much empty terrain lol.
Ents...... will just die to this fire power. Their only advantage is the fact that is all the enemy formation will kill, but thats a very expensive arrow magnet.

Just heal your casualties with light of valar.

As I said its '25 Galadrim with shields dead per turn before the nazgul start their magic.' Light of Valar can't heal anyone from a tray that has been removed, and heals about 3 models anyway.

Could you use Wilderness spell to push the unit back? Would that count as the unit moving so can't shoot without Heroic shoot?

You could push, but they will use heroic shooting; noone spends that much on a crossbow formation without some Might points available for emergencies.
Still, its worth considering if they have already moved and could actually be moved outside of range.

Fight fire with fire: take wood elf archers. He won't be able to target them unless he comes in charge range. Then he'll get one round of shooting at best before you charge him and he'll have to use might even to get that round of shooting off.

Wood elves are a good idea due to the elven cloaks. However, the 'one round of shooting' would be absolute carnage. D3 vs rerollable crossbows = 22.5 + 11.25 (from rerolls) = 33.75 dead wood elves per turn of shooting.
Ouch thats worse than I expected lol.

He can't play that list. The corsair arbalesters are rare units. Without commons to match, they can't be fielded. Easiest win in history.

Hitherto's guess was correct, this is only part of the army lol. There will be more nazgul, massess of easterlings, chariots, pikes, more archers (yeah really!) and perhaps even a dragon.

What makes this stand out is its the only part of the army that is effectively 'broken' due to the typo of Corsair shields being D6 in combat as well as at range and the fact that its going to have the 2 most overpowered of all the underpriced Nazgul in it. On purpose

Fair enough, if its in the book its in the book. In interests of a more fun tournament all round I'm hoping to be able to give the other players advice more useful than 'just be ready to lose a formation per turn'

[ptbuckle]

Keeping in mind that corsair crossbow formations are limited to 4 companies, if he wants to take all 40 of his, he'll have to split them, which means Khamul and the betrayer can't be in both simultaneously. Dealing with a 3-4 company formation of crossbows containing those two is much easier than dealing with a 5-company formation. I think Rohan would have the hardest time with this. When facing a maxed-out archery formation led by the betrayer, rohirrim cavalry formations have a tendency to be driven back in the shoot phase almost as much as they move forward, even assuming they don't die completely. I'd just try to stay out of the arc of sight or the range and deal with the rest of the army. Especially keep any cavalry formations away from a betrayer-led archer block unless they're moving second and flanking.

There's just no way to straight-up outshoot a formation like that unless you've got one of your own. Is he planning on adding Saruman the White Hand to that formation to restore casulties and prevent charges?