(Photo credit to Ares Games)
Written by Ed Carter, Staff Writer
The Battle of the Five Armies
2 player
Asymmetrical war game, dice, card play, area control
In the Misty Mountains, we make our stand! – Game overview
The world of JRR Tolkien has come alive with movies, TV shows, and board games. The Battle of the Five Armies is a 2-player asymmetrical board game from the same designers of the War of the Ring: the epic game that covers the entire journey of the Fellowship to destroy the ring. Here Bilbo Baggins, Thorin Oakenshield, Gandalf, the Great Eagles, and the skinwalker Beorn take center stage to fight off the gathered forces of the Shadow Lord in the valley of Dale below the Lonely Mountains. This battle is the final one from the Hobbit and none of the key players are missing in this experience.
The game itself has its core mechanics from the War of the Ring with the use of action dice, but as this is only one battle, it’s much more focused on the combat than its grand War of the Ring experience. It is a smaller game and plays in a shorter time: 90 minutes as opposed to 4 hours to play War of the Ring.
Each player has different victory conditions; The Free People win if the fate counter reaches the final position along the fate track, the Shadow hero Bolg is defeated, or Beorn enters the game and the Shadow has not gained 6 points. The Shadow wins by earning 10 or more victory points or having 10 points and control of the Front Gate. There are settlements and fortifications that the Shadow Player vies to control to gain the needed victory points. Fortifications are worth 4 points and the other settlements are worth 2.
There is a darkness growing in Middle Earth: Game setup
To start the game, place out the gameboard and give each player their armies, character cards, story cards, unit cards, reinforcement tokens, control markers, leadership tokens, and dice. The Shadow Player starts with 6 dice, while the Free People begin with 5. The Free People start with 4 characters in play while the Shadow have one. Give the Free People their 3 activation tokens for their characters. Place the fate tracker and the Free People characters along the fate track in their designated spaces. The fate tracker starts at 0. Collect the fate tiles and place them in any opaque container.
The rule book shows where to place the starting armies, reinforcement, and leadership tokens.  Take the remaining reinforcement tokens and place them face down in a draw pile for later use. Shuffle the fate, story, and event decks into face-down piles. Give the fate deck to the Free People and each player draws one card from their story and one from the event deck to create their opening hand. The game is played in turns consisting of 6 phases, starting with the Free People.
The game board is separated into 4 regions, (Broken Lands, Eastern Bank, Southern Spur, and Valley.) There are 5 terrain types and these are used in combat when determining the terrain superiority (swamps. hills, plains, mountains, and ruins.)
The game turn phases
1. RecoveryÂ
Each Player recovers their action dice and draws 2 cards; one from their story and one event card. A player must discard down to 6 cards if they have more in their hand. Fate cards are not considered cards in your hand and do not count towards the 6 for the free people.
2. General’s activation
The Free People can place an activation token on up to three of their characters in play. These Generals can be activated when using a matching action dice indicated on their card. The token can be removed to activate that character’s abilities. For each token placed on a General, the Free People receive a leadership token which is placed in any Free People’s armies. Each token must be placed in a different unit.
3. Fate
For each General with a token, the shadow player draws up that amount if desired in fate tokens. Each token has a number that indicates how many spaces the fate marker moves along the track. The more tokens the shadow can draw, the better their odds to get a token with a lower number. Some tokens have a symbol that indicates the Free People to draw a fate card. Once all tokens have been drawn and the Shadow Player has selected the one to use, the fate marker is moved that many spaces. if it stops or passes a character, that character is immediately readied and can be activated by the Free People using a character die action. Any tokens not used are returned back to the fate pool.
4. Action phaseÂ
This is where the bulk of the game takes place. Each player rolls their action dice and then will use them to take actions based on the symbols rolled. There are 2 player aides that show the symbol and the actions that symbol can do. The actions allow a player to place or use recruitment tokens, move armies, attack, or draw cards, depending on the symbol on the die. Starting with the first player, they select one of their dice to activate and complete the action, then their opponent does the same until both players have used all their dice and the next phase begins. A player can pass their turn if the other player has more dice to activate than they do. This sometimes can be a good strategy to see what their opponent may be setting up to do.
Here is a brief summary of the die faces, but please refer to the rulebook for more detailed explanations. Each die can also be used with a story or event card that matches the die symbol along with the die action. A character die allows a player to activate or move any or all of their characters on the board, make a move and attack or a fast movement. An Army die lets a player also move and attack with their armies. A Muster die lets a player use reinforcement tokens to bring more units onto the board. It also allows a rally action which can heal an army of damage received during a combat. An Event die lets the player draw and play cards from the event and story decks.
The Will of the West symbol on the Free People’s die can be used for any other action and the Lidless Eye on the Shadow Player’s die is for moving, mustering, or attacking with the Goblin special units. There are two mountain passes on the board that the Goblins start in. They cannot start to move along the pass until they have at least 5 units in their starting point. Once that condition is met, they can move along the mountain pass and onto the battlefield to be used by the Shadow Player.
6. End of Turn
Each player checks for victory. If no victory conditions are met, the players remove all leadership tokens and remove any eagles or bats used in the round. The Free People also remove any unused activation tokens from their Generals. The first player passes to the other player and a new round resumes. The game continues until one side has achieved one of their winning conditions.
To War! Combat
Since the bulk of this game centers on combat, and it is made up of several steps. I wanted to give you a quick overview to see how it works.
To Prepare for combat:
-  Determine Terrain Superiority – grab the unit cards for each of the units being used in the combat and look at the terrain type. Each unit type has a preferred terrain. Then compare to the terrain indicated in the combat region. Whoever has the most of the preferred terrain has terrain superiority and will draw an additional event card.
- Preparing the card hand – Each player takes the character cards for each unit type they are using and their event cards.
Combat Sequence.
- Maneuvering – Each player selects one card and puts it face down to use in this round of combat. Players then reveal their chosen card.
- Combat roll – Players total the strength of their units involved and roll a number of dice equal to that amount up to 5. If a player is using a unit card, they replace the white dice with a black one for each unit of that type. The active player rolls the dice to attack. Each 5 or 6 is a success and is one point of damage.
- Leader Reroll – Each player can reroll dice equal to the leader strength of their units; how many leader tokens they have with them.
- Apply damage – assign a number of damage tokens equal to the number of hits. An army may remove one unit from their army to remove 2 damage tokens. If the number of tokens exceeds the number of units in the battle, then they must take casualties until their army is at the same or below the number of remaining damage tokens. If any units still remain after taking casualties, go to the next step.
- End of Round – The attacker can withdraw or continue to press the attack. If they do, the defender can retreat to a safe region adjacent to where the battle is. If there are no safe regions, then the army is routed and continues to take casualties until there are no remaining damage tokens. The victor can decide to advance to the region, taking ground when no defending units remain.
There are additional rules about combining armies and using cards in the combat found in the rule book, but this gives you a general idea.
The war has just begun – Final thoughts
This game is fantastic; I really like playing it. First, it is played in a MUCH shorter time than it takes to play War of the Ring (WOTR), so it is easier to table. It uses the same action dice as WOTR so players of that should have an easy transition to learning and playing Battle of the Five Armies. The Win conditions are very straight forward with each side having clear paths to victory. A lot of the complexity with the political track and hidden movement of the Fellowship are not there so it is much easier to teach as the Battle of the Five Armies is focused on combat.
The combat system works well for this game;  It uses tokens for leadership that provide a bonus when present in an army. In addition, the reinforcements are determined by tokens that are random so players never know how many and what type of units they are going to get in their army. I like that armies are not removed until a threshold of damage tokens is taken. I also like that armies can reduce damage with an action.
Overall. I think fans of The Hobbit will find this game a great experience. War gamers who enjoy asymmetrical game play, will also probably enjoy it as well. I think that fans of the WOTR will want to add this as well. I think it can sit right next to it in a collection and hold its own. I have heard it called WOTR lite, and while that may be true in some ways, looking at this game on its own, I think it is extremely well-designed and worth considering.
Until next time, keep moving those meeples and happy gaming!
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