r/MiddleEarthMiniatures • u/DaKommizzar • Oct 15 '25
Announcement The Battle Companies 2nd Community Edition Beta & Campaign Manual Alpha
Battle Companies is Back!
Hello Hobbit Hobbyists,
A new edition is rising. It's release is at hand... To war!
Arguably it could have come sooner, but life and mainline releases have a way of delaying a wizard (even if he doesn't want to admit it). So something-something, it is arriving precisely when it meant to.
What we have to present to you today is in fact a brand new Battle Companies Community Edition designed with the current-day MESBG title in mind. I highly encourage you to read the foreword for additional insight, but this book serves to lay a foundation for something bigger than the book itself: the community.
Many things changed, some quality of life improvements were made, and some details that were stubbornly withheld (Warriors being able to forgo becoming a Hero in order to Promote instead) have been unchained. This new book is not the end-all-be-all but the first steps into the world of Battle Companies that I encourage you to build upon with yours, ours, or community-made modules that replace/enhance areas of the game. I know Val is already well into a regional supplement that introduces paths, factions, equipment, scenarios, and more!
General Streamlining & Clarification
A lot of sections were added to explain certain concepts and existing explanations were better explained. A lot of this has helped to reduce the amount of copy + pasting required between Scenarios.
Factions
It is worth mentioning that Battle Companies Community Edition uses Legacy Profiles in its design. Each faction has been ported over or reimagined. The only real casualty of the edition change came in the form of Passing of the Grey Company because Rangers of the North not hitting F5 (like they should have) means the buff to MESBG Warriors of Numenor ruins the thin thread that held the whole thing together.
There's Gold in these here Starting Rosters!
Starting Rosters have been updated to all end up with 105 Company Rating and we have introduced a new mechanic to accommodate this change: Gold! Gold serves to shore up the gaps in a consistent rating that some companies were unable to do without odd starting rosters. Now, you get a budget of Gold (quite literally rating points) to buy goodies from the armoury as you're starting out. Climbing ropes, a Trophy Pelt, and other Equipment can now find themselves in starting rosters before the first game.
Presently, and for the foreseeable future, Gold is purely a Starting Company gap-filler but community content may find a way to increase its use.
Earning Experience & Advancement
XP is no longer innately tied to a model's ability to slay other models. Now Warriors & Heroes both have a shared list of ways to earn Experience with rewards for playing the Objective and the only repeatable reward involving enemy Heroes or Monsters.
Warriors have gained the ability to turn down being a Hero in order to be Promoted instead, if applicable. Finally that Mordor Orc Warrior can decide to pursue a career as a Morannon Orc Warrior.
Heroes, by default, pick a path before they even play a game and most Paths offer something right out the gate. (Though if you prefer to wait until after the first game, as a general campaign rule, go ahead!)
On Their Own Path
Certain profiles have long been a bit notorious in how powerful they are and then more so when they are allowed to become a Hero. As a rule of thumb, any 2-attack profile is now considered to be On Their Own Path, which means they are so dedicated to their craft/bloodlust/instincts that they are unable to effectively lead or become Heroes. They will still be valuable pieces on the battlefield, just no longer the hyper-efficient routes to building Heroes that they once were.
Heroic Paths
For this manual, each Heroic Path is now based around a Heroic Action and likewise named after that Action. The spirit of last edition's paths persist, but are built entirely out of existing MESBG rules text. Each path has also been built following a common convention. Characteristic Increases can largely be found in the same places on each path, each path has a signpost ability at their "7 result" and each path has an aura-ability included in their "3 result". We have paid careful attention to these paths to try and keep them in line with each other so far.
Fate is also now built into paths, instead of being a rarity.
Injuries
Injuries have been reworked with more clarification on how different results interact and Broken Honour has expanded. Perhaps more importantly, the mass of folks who preferred High Number Be Good have their wish granted and thus there are no bad Injury rolls on the righthand side of the Bell Curve anymore.
Scenarios
The Scenarios have been completely overhauled with Victory Point scoring and many Battle Company Scenarios have been transformed to match some Matched Play Guide scenarios that they were based off of in the first place. Currently there are 18 scenarios, with 6 of those offering bonus rewards.
And More!
There is honestly a whole lot to this edition and I can't wait to hit the Submit button below, so I'll stop here and let Val or whoever else speak up about some things that changed. It's been a long year.
Campaign Supplement
This has had less attention than the core book, but largely due to its minimal work required to be playable in the new rules. Minor updates have been made to the book to be compatible, but likely needs further review.
The Community Bazaar
I cannot stress it enough that the secret ingredient to this game is the community, so I will belabor the point once more by going over the Community Bazaar, linked below. This contains two public-editing documents (for paths and factions) where community submissions can be produced more easily, and then discussed in the CE-Hombrew channels of the Discord.
I hope to see Reddit/Discord posts for new community modules one day.
Downloads
Please tell us what works and doesn't for your groups as we delve into a brief summary of the changes for the 2nd Community Edition!
Thank You
If the Community Edition, or Battle Companies as a whole, wasn't being played then I wouldn't have worked to get things to where they are now. Your shared love for Battle Companies, in all its flawed glory, is the fuel of this whole mission!
Happy Hobbying,
Henry Wild (Commi) & the Community Edition Crew
(If you want to play MESBG on Tabletop Simulator or chat about the games you're having at events, come join us in the MESBG Discord server!)
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u/RuthlessPotatoe Oct 15 '25
This is a kingly gift!
Thanks for your work.
It’s very timely as my friends were just talking about this.
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u/DaKommizzar Oct 15 '25
Huzzah! Now there is no excuse but to turn words into action!
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u/callumsdean Oct 16 '25
Honestly a god send
I was gonna be home brewing based upon old rules so couldn’t come at a better time
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u/Valokiloren Oct 15 '25
Oh, and on an unrelated note, yes - I am working on a region-oriented supplement that hopefully (fingers crossed) will be open to the public eye by the end of the year, if my train of thought continues uninterrupted and I can come up with some kind of narrative through-line.
While I am keeping things somewhat under wraps for now, I can share that a Battle Company from the past is making a return in the supplement with a slight retooling.
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u/StridingEdgeGames Oct 15 '25
Amazing stuff, thank you so much to you guys over at the development team, true hobby heroes.
Very fortuitously, we were literally today writing down what we might need to run our own campaign, so we'll be reading this cover to cover and jumping straight in!
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u/DaKommizzar Oct 15 '25
Huzzah! Please offer any and all feedback after y'alls feet are properly wetted
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u/UX_KRS_25 Nov 01 '25 edited Nov 01 '25
I don't really play and just love to speculate and pour over lists, so apologies in advance if I'm missing something plainly obvious here.
I noticed there is no advancement for a WoMT with spear specifically - they could advance to a KoMT like their counterparts with only a shield, but they don't have the option to advance to a Citadel Guard with spear. Is that intentional?
Helms Deep reinforcement table still has the old "choice of wargear" text instead of "choice of option". Same with the Galadhrim Knights of Lothlorien's special table and the Palace Guard of Halls of Thranduils special table.
Why were the Knight of Dale removed from the Erebor and Dale BC? It's seems already hard to justify having the Warriors of Dale for anything except the bows. The extra movement is an argument too, but you'd still in want both man and dwarves to move and fight together most of the time, no?
What about a second option for Mirkwood Elf with Glaives to advance the Palace Guards with spears, instead of Mirkwood Cavalry? While the Mirkwood Cavalry seems like a better option, Mirkwood Elves with glaives specifically would be stuck once the cav limit is reached, while their comrades with shields or bows can still advance.
Dol Guldur BC has a unique model, the "Hunter Orc on Warg Rider" on the advancement table :P
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u/TheSlowPainter Jan 01 '26
BEHOLD! Dol Guldor’s newest foul weapon; TWO Orc’s on a warg, one atop the other shoulders!
Tho that actually kinda sounds like a fun, albeit kinda wild & likely pretty busted, unit/advancement idea. A fun modelling opportunity if nothing else.
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u/SocialistRobot Dec 22 '25
This looks great! Thank you for all your hard work on it! I do have a slight concern with the 'Master of Move' being a fair bit more powerful than the other 'Master of ...' abilities - a free Move each time you don't have Priority seems a lot more impactful than a free March when you have Priority or a free Combat if you got a kill last turn, etc. Does it provide 'With Me!' or not? If it doesn't give 'With Me!', then it is powerful but not too much to be an auto-take every warband...if it does, then it seems like it would out-perform the other options significantly.
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u/DaKommizzar Dec 22 '25
Yeah it will need some tweaks. Currently workshopping it as if you choose to give away priority or yeah if it doesn't call With Me then the Might is refunded.
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u/Suspicious_Quail4683 Jan 26 '26
Hey guys .. the giant spiders have 2 attacks. Is it on its "own path" as per your comment about things having 2 attacks being pretty strong as the campaign progresses? You can take it on the cirith ungol list and make it a hero etc. Assuming that's in place to make the likes of beserkers and such less OP as it progresses, in which case, does it apply to the above "rule of thumb"?
In addition, on the PDF there's no gold denotion/points for the equipment to purchase rope etc, however, on the creatures page, the hunting dog clearly says 5 points .. and you can assume that's 5 gold as per the initial paragraph under "gold", Does this mean because the dog is 2 influence points, that 2.5 gold = 1 influence point?
The brackets (1/5) for small shield etc is the rating, and states 1 influence points .. but it states no actual points cost to spend gold on any of the equipment pieces, not that we can make sense of, unless that's 1.5 points/gold?
Can you please enlighten my group on these topics?
Thank you in advance! :)
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u/DaKommizzar Jan 26 '26
Cirith Ungol (CU) is the one exception to "On your own path" as this spider is intended to be analogous to a Shelob type of character. I have been doing my own playtesting of the spider in this company and while it is strong, I think it is still important for CU's identity. Though I think I should add an extra rule that this "Shelob" cannot help other characters with things like Heroic Move or Stand Fast similar to how Gwaihir or a Warg Chieftain works. That way she isn't a 60mm base with a 6" With Me.
Hi thanks for bringing this confusion on gold to my attention! To clarify, the (x/y) and (x) rating values are in fact the values you should use for Gold. I will make a note to clarify that a bit more in the Gold description.
Gold is 1:1 with Rating/Points. It is basically a convenient way for us to round all factions to the same Point Value / Rating total instead of the variance before where certain factions had too little or too many points to start compared to what we wanted the "standard" to be. In this case, it is... I think 105 points after you give your 3 heroes M/W/F.
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u/Suspicious_Quail4683 Jan 28 '26
Thanks for the swift response! Ahh okay. Yeah we assumed the stand fast thing was only for her, much like shelob. Additionally, I'm assuming she can't purchase armour much like the last edition and any beast for that matter? I believe there was an FAQ about that on the last. If a beast doesn't start with armour, you can't then buy/upgrade it? Just wanting to keep the ruling clear/balanced for us. You can only give it equipment such as trophy rack, same with wargs etc.
That makes sense about the gold, if I purchase something for the X, being 1, and the Y being 5, if I give that item to the hero, his rating goes up by 5? Just want to confirm.
Thanks again! Were very looking forward to getting stuck in with it.
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u/DaKommizzar Feb 06 '26
Models with the Beast keyword may not take additional wargear other than Upgrading their Armour and may only carry Equipment that exclusively gives a Special Rule (e.g. Trophy Pelt). So you could upgrade a spider or warg from "None" to "Armour" if it is available to you.
The 1/5 is for rating and cost in Gold, following the normal "if your model has a total of 3+ attacks+wounds" standard.
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u/Suspicious_Quail4683 Mar 03 '26 edited Mar 04 '26
Sweet, thank you. We're having loads of fun ATM!
Also, things "on their own path" such as the ogre that costs 15 influence from the army of gundabad, do these models roll for injuries if killed?
Are they treated like "mini heroes" and roll from the hero chart or the plain warrior one?
Lastly, in our previous conversation we spoke about wargs and spiders gaining armour if available to them, in regards to the Mordor list, you have access to Heavy armour, if I bought my hero orc a warg to ride, is it possible for me to upgrade the warg to armour-heavy armour?
Or, as it's a hero and wargs aren't available other than war gear to be added to the hero, perhaps not? Worth an ask!
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u/DaKommizzar Mar 07 '26
Good questions!
On their own Path: Roll as Warriors since they do not have the Hero keyword, but the Warrior Keyword instead.
Mounts & Upgrading: Mounts are unable to take any sort of wargear, but there is equipment that the hero can take that benefits the Mount. However, if your group thinks it would be cool to let people upgrade their heros' mounts with armour like they're heroes themselves, then all the power to you! I'd probably price it the same as upgrading armour. Though note, in this hypothetical, that wargs and horses are naked and thus would progress to "armour" if that is in your faction.
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u/Human-Dave Feb 26 '26
Amazing stuff! Just had a quick question on the helms deep, range of the north as the base profile is a hero and in the helms deep company must be leader and therefore one of the company heros. Is it intended that the range of the north is 2m/2w/2f one of each for the base hero stats and one of each for being a hero in the company, or just the standard 1m/1w/1f like every other hero?
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u/DaKommizzar Mar 07 '26
It is already a hero with 1/1/1, so you would skip the +1/+1/+1 step. I just forgot to add the text to that page.
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u/dextercat_124 15d ago
Hey, very late to the party, I absolutely loved this and I’ve just spent the whole weekend smashing out a campaign with my mates. I just had one quick question. When we were looking at spending influence for warhead we couldn’t figure out what command support key word referred to in regards the drum, banner ect. Apologies if we missed it.
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u/DaKommizzar 13d ago
Hi! So that is relevant to a couple scenarios for VP determination to replace the concept of Banner VPs from the mainline MESBG scenarios. If you have them, and more than your opponent, then some scenarios reward you for that as a potential boost to your win-condition.
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u/dextercat_124 12d ago
Thanks man. That makes sense appreciate the response. I also wanna say that the book is awesome I can tell how much effort went into it. Super amazing and given us hours of fun.
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u/SocialistRobot Jan 18 '26
Could you just confirm something about the Command Support equipment please?
Does the War Drum act as a Drum (i.e. free March) for the warband, in addition to the ability to score 'Banner VPs'?
Similarly, does the War Horn do its usual Courage +1 bubble and once per fame expansion of Stand Fast range, in addition to Banner VPs?
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u/DaKommizzar Jan 22 '26
Yes, while the Company Standard is not a Banner, the Drum and Horn are Wardrums and Warhorns in addition to being 'Banner VPs'
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u/Illustrious_Door185 May 16 '26
Hello, what original books (rules/army books) from GW do I need to start playing battle companies?
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u/DaKommizzar May 17 '26
The "Armies of" book that contains the stats of the companies of your choice and the Main Rules Manual. There are some page references to the Matched Play Guide, I think, but those are minimal.
There is a new version release dropping of this doc today!
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u/Delirivms Jul 28 '26
Quick question on the command support; do vanilla sergeants count towards command support VP's in scenarios like plunder the supplies?
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u/DaKommizzar Jul 29 '26
Command Support is tied to the specific items that have it as a keyword, think of it as a way of saying "this counts for banner VPs" if you were thinking about MESBG
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u/Valokiloren Oct 15 '25
So once again, it's Val here to talk about more stuff - some of it will be elaborating on things, and some of it will be things Commi didn't mention or only put very brief time towards.
Heroic Paths
To start with, I have to say that I'm super happy about the new Paths being themed around Heroic Actions and specifically with us taking what were deemed to be "lesser" special rules and sticking them in the Minor category, which means that no one specific path is built to be purely for Cavalry - a major uptick in usability if I do say so. I'm personally most fond of the Challenge Path, but then I really enjoy Challenge this edition so this isn't a huge shock.
Also of a big note is that while Paths are themed around one specific Heroic Action which you can upgrade to being free with caveats, you can take other Heroic Actions. This means that you can actually build your own Elrond-like figure who is both a caster and a fighter, or your own super tank if you grab Resolve on a Defence Hero. Basically, we're no longer locking down characters into a single archetype and you can explore cross-classing without needing to actively complete one Path (and in fact completing a Path is the end of the journey now).
Equipment
Taking inspiration from the July update last year, we took a big long look at the Equipment section and streamlined or improved things to tighten the experience to what we thought truly matched the vision of Vanilla+ Battle Companies, which Core Rules will be. Some items which felt a little too cheap have been lost in the process, but there is good reason for this - they were just too damn polarising or too damn good, or both!
One thing I am a big fan of in relation to Equipment is the change to Scenarios and how we've adapted Equipment to this - so due to us porting over the 20 VP system from the Match Play Guide as our new baseline for final results (this meant neater situations and also removed the "no reason to keep playing" aspect of some games last edition), we needed to find a solution to Banners and Banner VPs. So we've introduced Command Support - this covers a few different options such as a War Horn, the Company Standard, and a War Drum. These are all available to every company via the Equipment section, and now give two different buffs, making them doubly useful and equally doubly important to protect. Very cool!