Rohan Faction Thread

[tallstark]

I can feel ya. I did actually cheat in my campaign but only by giving SE and Gondor more money to counter Mordor, but I soon realized it is not the way how I want to play the game.

@tallstark
Thanks for your tips & tricks (well earned +rep). Well definitely try some bits of your strategy out if I will try a new Rohan campaign. But (new) players should be aware that your options to be creative are very limited in the new 1.4 patch, because of the tough economy you have to deal with.

Thanks Baron, I am on a biz trip to Costa Rica so I have not been able to try 1.4 yet, should be interesting! In general tho I think all the campaigns with no cheats and vh/vh are almost always a good challenge, and I for sure have lost some too! If 1.4 is a lot harder, I may have to try h/h until I figure it out!

[Emme]

I would say Rohan campaign is on the easier category (depending on how aggressive you play) regardless of the difficulty levels, similiar to the Elves for the good faction.

Someone mentioned earlier in the thread - the only real enemy is Isengard in the beginning of the campaign and they can be easily taken out within 20 turns with your full stack of generals and army by grouping them from the intial settlements (you don't even have to recruit any units until mid game). Yes, even with the infamous garrison script, your full stack (3 generals + archers + militia + scouts) >> Isengard full stack. Once you take Isengard and Duneard, it's over - just take all the rebel settlements on the west and you have the biggest empire by turn 20. After that, you can build up all your cities and defend off the invasion calls easily.

If you want more challenge, I would recommend - do not attack Isengard until after 50 turns or so, just fend them off. this way you would have to face multiple side wars and have a big of a challenge. At least I found that more challenging than destroying Isengard and rushing to expand and pretty much pushing into Mordor already by turn ~30 or so.

[Sl1978]

Okay. I'm playing the long campaign, actually at turn 90. A couple of advices how to create a big empire while playing with Rohan. Conquest strategy:

• You start with many generals, they cost a lot of money so make them useful. Collect them and turn north. It could be a good step to collect a half stack (10 cavalary units) and attack Isenguard. Conquer Isenguard in the first couple turns and kill Sauron.
• At the begging your economy is a wreck. If you try to train capable units you will experience a quick bankcrupcy. In the first 20-30 turns use all your money to build cash producing buildings: mines, markets, food production, roads etc. Don’t build any military buildings, they have no real use at this time. If you must (in order to keep a settlement under control without a revolt) build lowest level cultural building or train some simple cheap militia.
• Wait for the other generals, turn left in order to destroy the remenants of Isengard. You can expect 2 full stacks and some more garrisons. Always use your general stacks to take the biggest part of the fight.
• If you perform good, you should have destroyed the Isengard faction by turn 15-20.
• Calm down a little bit and take the settlements west of Rohan. Three or four generals should be far enough to complete this task. They are quite isolated so noone will attack them through the whole game but they will pay their taxes to you.
• Now Gondor’s state and capabilities are crutial. Harad will invade Gondor from the south, while Mordor attacks at Osgiliath. If Gondor is too weak (loses much territory to Harad or the Minas Tirith area is about being invaded by Mordor orc hords you have to intervene (otherwise you may lose the calm southern border). I think in this case the simplest tactic would be attacking nearby Osgiliath to ensure the orc stay away from Minas Tirith (The Haradian border is simply too far away). I was lucky in my campaign, Gondor did well, holding back both enemy factions until about turn 80.
• Take Fangorn to ensure some Ent help (altough this is not a big help), and the rebel settlements east from Fangorn (and north from Minas Tirith).
• Paralelly you can take one of your armys (My advice is to maintain an army with many generals in it) and attack the Orcs of the Misty Mountains. Their goblin troups are very weak, you can deal with them easily. Take Moria if you can, because it is a Huge City and brings a lot of money.
• If you have the power take down the OMM armys one after another and destroy the faction. After this you can keep marching north to extinguish Gundabad. This will be a harder fight, but if you are a little bit lucky they are already in war with the Free People and the Dwarwes (maybe the Silvian Elves too). In my campaign I destroyed Gundabad by turn 85.
• With all the northern evil factions killed, you have the oppurtunity to deal with Mordor. Near Argonath, where the two kings stand by the river you have an opportunity to cross it. That’s important because in the south you can only traverse through Cair Andros or Osgiliath (which are very close to Mordor territory and often besieged). So you can cross without a fight and can take the northern Mordor settlements. (Dol Guldur in the north, some quite useless village at the plains and another by the hills next to Rhun lands).
• Having reached this position you have multiple options (that’s where I stand now). You can attack the Black Gate directly, conquer Henneth Annun or Osgiliath and place garrisons in it etc. I have the One Ring now, so I will try to create a safe pass in order to move my general into Mordor.

Economic advices:

• You should keep a big investment level on economy buildings. I read somewhere that building stables increases trade too, but build the traditional buildings first.
• Create two or three training centers. You should bulid your military buildings in theese cities.
• Do not bulid brothels, inns, taverns (they should be created only in one or two towns).
• Reach trade agreements with everybody.
• While building a mine, always look at the possible revenue. Some mines have a 20 turn rate of return, but some have 5 or 10 turn ones. Build the latter first to ensure better economic performance.

Battle tactics:

Rohan’s cavalary can beat everyone, but the other parts are average or below average. Let’s have a look at the units:

Melee:

• Eorling Milita: quite useless in battle, only good for garrison duties. They can form schildstrom but even then they will fall to an average orc attack.
• Eorling Axeman: better than the first, but only an average unit. Trolls and better orc troups kill them without difficulties.
• Eorling Swordsman: can defend quite well they can stand a fight.
• Riddermark Axeman, Dismounted Eored Lancers, Dismounted Royal Guard: premium, good quality infantry able to stop many threats when brought to a good defense position.

Archers:

• Eorling archers: average archers, not that bad as the militia but only useful in defensive situations (wall, hilltop).
• Helmingas: just like axeman with bows. Above average unit splendid when defending a castle or city.

Mounted:

• Generals guard: very strong and have the special ability to replenish their lines after every battle. An army formed of general units is flexible, very strong, capable to gain many experience, and has many movement points.
• Scouts: good basic cavalary with bad defense. While charging an average enemy you will lose about 10-20 percent of them in each wave. Very good for chasing enemy missile troops or hunting down the remaining survivors after you have routed your opponents army.
• Rohan Riders: A little bit better but still weakly armored. Better use them like the scouts.
• Other cavalary (Riders of the fold, Heavy Lancers, Royal Guard) strong, armoured units, with better survival rate after charges. Combine them with the scouts and the riders, while the latter attack the weak units and the premium cavalary the tough ones.
• Missile cavalary: Rohan Horsearchers, Riddermark Skirmishers. In other games (Stainless Steel mod) I prefer to use light missile cavalary, because their quickness, flexibility and relative cheapness. Rohan missile cavalary is far worse. They are not really cheap, have very few ammo. Better not produce them in great quantities.

Some battlefield tactical tips:

• Use Rohans flexibility and speed. Create mounted armies to conquer, employ foot soldiers mainly to garrison and defend. Try to lure out the enemy to plains, hills or mountains without forests.
• Hit and run. Charge the enemy with full power, than run away to get distance between you and them, and charge again.
• Try to take out enemy cavalary and missile troups at first. While fighting the orcs you have to deal with warg riders. They are strong so try to divert them from the main army (attack them and let them chase you) and then charge them from multiple angles. Many times the missile units will go forward and try to shoot one of your units. (for example: if you have got three foot melee units and six cavalary, it is very likely that the AI will attack your foot soldiers first with its missile troups). If this occurs, attack them with your cavalary and scatter them before the main army arrives.
• Try to rip the enemy army in parts. Position your cavalary in two or three directions to the enemy army. The AI will march and try to take out one of them, escape with the one they chase and strike with the other two hit and run style. With this strategy you can tear down parts from the main army, then isolate and destroy them.
• Do not enter a siege if you have a possibility to avoid it. There are two reasons for this: when entering a siege, you can’t position your troups at the beginning of the battle. You will find yourself in front of the attacked settlement while your enemy storms out. (In some unlucky cases the other enemy army arrives in your back). The other reason is the garrison script. Avoid this at all cost, because it’s a real gift to the AI (it has no costs, and creates really powerful armies). Instead of this, place your army near an enemy settlement with garrison script. Many times the AI will judge that your mounted army (with less soldiers in it) is an easy prey so it will attack from the settlement. In this case, you can arrange your starting position and manouver. If you win the battle and don’t let the remaining army escape, the settlement will be yours (or unprotected). This tactic works well, I took Moria, Dol Guldur, Gundabad etc. by doing this.
• TATW 3.1 enables you the sally mode when besieged. This means you can attack the enemy while it prepares. Usually the enemy withdraws fast in situations like this, sometimes – in cases you are very weak – it justs stands there and waits for you to attack. If you have cavalary or missile cavalary garrisoned you should go out and try to take down a part of their army. At the and of the fight you should return to the settlement with all your units remaining. In this case the will declare a draw for both participants and the siege continues.

[Gallus]

1. Is Rohan Very Easy, Easy, Moderate, Hard, or Very Hard compared to other TW: Third Age factions you've played?
I love the combination of strong and quick cavalry and good economy so I'd say it's easy compared to TATW average.

2. What is your opinion of Rohan's starting position/situation?
Rohan is the only faction in the game that can get involved in any part of the map very early in the game. I love it's starting position.

3. What rivals does Rohan always end up at war with?
Isengard obviously. Rohan player will most likely and up in a war with Mordor, OotMM, Harad and maybe even Rhun. As I said, after Isengard falls Rohan can attack almost any evil faction.

4. Which factions are potentially dependable allies/trading partners?
Gondor, Eriador, HE and SE have never backstabbed me and are all good trading partners and allies. Gondor is the most important, every Rohan player MUST help Gondor if he doesn't want to fight Ologs and Mumaks in the middle of the Mark.

5. What are some early- and mid. game strategies that have worked for you with Rohan?
Put all your units from western towns, including generals, in one stack and besiege Isengard. Wait for Isengard to sally out. Then defeat all Isengard stack you can find and do the same with Duneard. Take the remaining Isengard settlements and then focus on Mordor.

6. What are some strategies that don't work for Rohan?
Camping. Whatever you do, do not give Isengard time to develop.

[Wizad]

[The Mouth]

"As the shadow wills!" Ha that picture was nostalgic.

[Lordwims]

To be honest, Rohan is really easy. Just use a general and two horse units to pick of small isengard armies or hit and run. Do this every turn and their snaga count will be really low, allowing you to attack their capital. And SPAM horse archers, biggest douches of em all.

[Mikail Mengsk]

nostalgia! é_è

[addicTofWar]

stupid question here but what's required to build Earl's stable/Royal Guard?

[nein]

blitz isengard with a cavalry centric force and then do the same to mordor in defense of gondor. It's all about speed and doing quickly... gondor cannot fail!

[AragornElessar]

nostalgia! é_è

Indeed!

[spicky]

Hi,
Is the mentioned better cavalry charge working for 3.2?

[Bladvak]

Wow, this thread was necroposted twice in its lifetime.
As for your question, I don't know what to make of it, but yes, cavalry charges in 3.2 do work well i.e. they do enough damage to be worth the cavalry's upkeep.

[Macilrille]

[Ulfgard the Unmaker]

Call Galadriel. I think that blasted Necromancer's moved back into Dol Guldur again.

[Ngugi]

If Bladvak's reply was not what you were looking for spicky, please ask further questions here: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...-Answer-Thread


Afraid Galadriel is on a Council meeting right now, but I know of another bloke who's experienced with this kind of skeleto(r)ns


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