The Guards, the Crows, and the Vanguard

Hail, Bannermen! We hope that 2024 has been treating you well. We’re getting past the first month of the year and moving into the meat of it, and along with some warmer temperatures, things are heating up on the battlefields of Westeros. We’ve got some new reinforcements making their way to your tabletops soon. Let’s get a scouting report and what you can expect.

Starting off, there’s the Winterfell Guards, naturally for House Stark. These stalwart fighters are veterans of many conflicts and they bring that expertise to the battlefield, with powerful attacks and pretty decent defenses.

While House Stark controls the Combat zone on the Tactics Board, this unit fights with the unrelenting fury of the North, and their attacks never diminish in strength. If House Stark controls the Maneuver zone, the unit adapts and overcomes like true veterans, gaining bonus to Defense Save rolls. These troops will make great frontline soldiers for an attack line.

Up next, the Stone Crows ffight for themselves and for House Stark’s sworn enemy, House Lannister. And while they can only be fielded if the army contains Tyrion Lannister, he is able to be attached to the unit for free. A similarity between them and the Winterfell Guard is that they can often roll their maximum number of dice in full force, even when down a rank or two. That’s because of their Incite order, which gives the unit’s attack Vicious and lets them roll all their attack dice.

And while the unit may suffer from being prone to failing Panic Tests, they have ways to refill lost ranks with new recruits, as the unit restores 1 Wound each time it activates, plus one extra for each missing rank. This is a unit that enemies need to destroy completely, since they can fight hard until the last man.

Our final unit to look at doesn’t hail from any of the major Houses of Westeros, or even any of the minor ones, for that matter. They’re Harma’s Vanguard and they’re a new cavalry unit for the Free Folk. Considering that horses are pretty rare north of the Wall, being able to field a unit of them is rather inspiring to the Free Folk troops.

Though, it’s really their Order: Planned Approach that the unit will be seen for, because at the start of the turn, the unit may target another allied unit at Long Range, and that unit cannot be the target of enemy effects or abilities. The only “downside” is that the unit targeted must then Charge.

And there you have it, a quick look at three new units making their way to tabletops for the A Song of Ice and Fire: Tabletop Miniatures Game.

We’ll see you next time, Bannermen.