Anyone else got unstoppable Dwarves?

[Turok]

Playing a Silvan Elves campaign and the Dwarves have completely annihilated the top of the map in 100 turns. They have declared war upon High Elves and Eriador and are now cleaning up the west of the map. OotMM are all but dead and I have survived by forging an alliance with them by gifting them Moria. The bar in the rankings list is double the height of anyone elses....

Also another strange thing. I had taken Minas Tirith back from Mordor as Gondor really needed my help yet 2 turns later after a failed invasion the whole of Mordor turned to bandits and it was declared the Mordor was dead? I found that a bit strange as the war was just getting good, I had a stack coming to help defend the forts surrounding Minas Tirith and then the 3 stacks on my doorstep just disappear?

It now seems that the Dwarves are the main "bad guys" which is quite strange. They did find the ring if that's what sent them on this rampage through middle earth? Has anyone else had this happen? If so then maybe Dwarves need a little nerf.

[Twist of Cain]

The Dwarves are now cleaning up the west of the map. OotMM are all but dead

May be unrelated, but for some reason I seem to find OotMM far more difficult to play since 1.4.

[Rabbit on crack]

I think the OotMM are just too weak as a faction to face the tides of Elves and Dwarves on all sides.They are spread out too thinly and vulnerable virtually everywhere, while the Dwarves are insulated in the east by Dale and in the West by Eriador and the High Elves. The easiest way i see to solving this is making the OotMM ridiculously cheap and in high numbers, but of base quality. That way the orcs might counter Dwarf High quality infantry, with swarms of Goblins and Orcs overrunning the flanks and battle lines

[Russian Gondor]

That is extremely odd. I find that the OOTM usually completely dominate the entire northern hemisphere.

[the343danny]

Maybe its just that one game?

However in the older versions I always had Dwarves that fought back the orcs and smash the Rhun. In some campaigns they besieged Nurn and I think they once even besieged (but lost) Barad-Dur. Never had them turn on the good nations, probably because of RR/RC

[BanditKS]

I have found on the good number of games i have played that it is pretty random. sometimes the goblins run over everything and then sometimes the dwarves are just short of being unstoppable.

[trueblaze]

It seems fairly random to me. There are certain cities that if one side can hold or can take it seems to give them an edge. However, this seems to be completly random as to wether or not they can hold/take them. Weather Evil is able to win invasions also seems to have an effect as well. The more they win the better they seem to do, but if good is able to hold them off, they'll end up commiting a large number of units to the attacks and it ends up taking them a while to recover which the good AI seems to use as a chance to strike.

[Athalwulf]

The dwarves are the bad guys in my game too. Gondor swallowed up Eriador and Harad, Dwarves took over OoTMM and Rhun and now they declared war on Gondor (I'm allied with Gondor as High Elves) with Silvan Elves, Rohan, and Dale as their allies. Baby Mordor is sleeping in his crib and doesn't even cry to have its diaper changed.

[Turok]

That is extremely odd. I find that the OOTM usually completely dominate the entire northern hemisphere.

Like I said, it may of had something to do with the fact I took Moria very early and gave it to the Dwarves for an alliance. I really had no choice in this though as there were about 3 stacks in Mirkwood ready to pounce on me.

The annoying thing is though, Dwarves still havn't called war on Rhun. They have spent the entire game owning OotMM, Eriador and High Elves and left the evil guys on the doorstep

Anyway, I'm quite astounded by how many stacks they put out. I did toggle_fow to see the state of the map and where the hell Mordor had gone and there are billions of Dwarves stacks roaming Eriador. Is this a occurrence because they captured the one ring? What does the ring actually do when a general finds it?

[trueblaze]

the ring really doesn't do much in this game. It adds HP and some other stats but that's about it.

[Maca]

My Gondor game is rather interesting, I rushed Minas Ithil and have slowly progressed from there to take most of Mordor, and I have ventured into Harad (M/M around 80 turns in,) but this isn't the interesting part, maybe it was my meddling but the Silvans have exploded, forcing Dale and the Dwarves out north east (Not at war with either) whilst destroying Mordor and holding off the OotMM who are expanding West and have taken Imladris and are looking like warring with Eriador, Rohan is respectable after losing Edoras to Invasion recently (I'm going to get it, but not give it back) and the High elves are at war with Dwarves, beating them despite "Gimli the Champion" roaming about with no other units, stupid AI, he has at least eight of every stat (Chivalry not dread) give him an army! Isengard seems to only care about Dunland and Rhun are holding Dale.

So, after that long winded life story, no, the Dwarves aren't unstoppable.

[CrossSide]

In my game the Dwarves are owning also, but not as much as you guys say. They have taken all the north of the map and are fighting against Rhun together with Dale.

Gonder seems to hold against Mordor and is doing nothing special. Harad just invaded Gondor with boats. Mordor hold the line with Gondor and getting some lands of Rohan through invasions on Edoras and Helms Deep. Silvan Elves are trying to hold on against Mordor and have a nice territorium. I closed in Eriador as the High Elves so they are doing nothing anymore. OOTMM are destroyed by me, Eriador, Silvans and Dwarves

Fun game so far!

[Twist of Cain]

I believe I read archery was weakened in 1.4 which would effectively translate into a slight buff for dwarves who rely only on an absolute minimum of archers and can get by just fine without them. In other words, dwarves may be in need of a slight nerfing.

[Turok]

Yeah I think so.... Just playing a Dale campaign and Dwarves have annihilated Silvans, OotMM, High Elves and are starting on Eriador. As usual though, I get no help fighting Rhun. What Dwarves really need is just to slow down there recruitment. They always hit strongest military on the rankings table very early. As a whole there needs to be less of them. As it is the ai just spams a billion dwarves every turn and they swamp the map.

Another few things I have noticed that might need to be balanced. Gondor only holds out for about 40-60 turns. Usually around turn 50 in my games Mordor takes Minas Tirith.

Harad does nothing all game except send a ship every 20 turns to south Gondor.

Rhun does nothing either. As Dale they never even bothered to attack me. 50 turns in and there was still a rebel settlement right next to them.

Isengard never seem to beat Rohan. In all my games they have been pushed West where they start fighting Eriador and ignoring Rohan.

[Twist of Cain]

They always hit strongest military on the rankings table very early. As a whole there needs to be less of them. As it is the ai just spams a billion dwarves every turn and they swamp the map.

Could also be so many (eventually) because they're unfreakingkillable. With archery weakened, even more so now.

[trueblaze]

In my campain as the SE for a while Dale was the force to beat. They even managed to take the Black Gates by turn 35. However, after the first milatary upgrade Mordor took back the gate and has since been slowly hacking away at Gondor.

The Dwarves however, don't really seem to be doing much, though they do have the largest milatary strength at the moment. The fact that they aren't doing much, however, is probably do to the fact the I defeated OotMMs on turn 38 . The funny thing was I wasn't even trying to. I had fought a few border skermishes with them and killed several units and one general. By turn 30 I was running out of income and needed to take a settlement or risk going into the black. So I chose Mordor as it was the closest city to my largest army. I sieged for 6 turns till they came out and killed the faction leader and the Balrog (at the cost of 3 calvary and 4 spearmen units) and then once the battle was over it said the OotMM had been destroyed. It kinda surprised me as I had just seen the faction air two turns ago in another city with a spy.

So after that I took all of the misty mount rebel cities and turtled for about 15 turns. Then turned against Isengard who was currently getting their butts kicked by the combined forces of Erider and the High Elves (Rohon was too buisy fending off Mordor). Funny thing is, I take one of there cities then imidatly that turn have my diplomat ask them for a cease fire if they'd pay me tribute and they'd accept every time only to have me come back a few turns later and do it all over again .

Anyway, for me it doesn't seem like the dwarves are the unstable ones. Surprisingly it seems Erider and the High Elves are currently on the war path if anything.

[Scorpion]

Yeah, it seems that the Dwarves have become the new dark power. They eradicate all of the good forces in the North. Makes the game kind of pointless from my perspective. Good vs. Evil? Dwarves are worse than Mordor lol.

Hey, anyone got a good alliance mod that will cure this un-lore like situation?

[Vifarc]

Hey, anyone got a good alliance mod that will cure this un-lore like situation?

-Good Vs Evil Campaign AI by ZZZZ
-Be Evil faction standings by papio

For now, use those combined 2 small mods, or wait for the next "RC+R for TA1.4" as they're included in:
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=259833

[Baron Samedi]

I say it's all pretty much random whether dwarves can dominate your campaign or not. There are to many factors influencing this. For instance which faction do you play yourself and how are factions like Rhun, Dale and OoTMM doing it. If Dale dies fast lets say by Rhun, chances are more likeling the dwarves will have to counter them. If in another scenario Dale does well and can hold off Rhun, then the dwarves can focus all their power on the OoTMM and begin to dominate them.

[Turok]

Yeah Dwarves can be limited if you play Silvan/High Elves and take out OotMM. However if Dwarves have an extended war with OotMM without any outside influence they will quickly take all of the settlements near the misty mountains. Silvans then get dominated and because Dwarves have the misty mountains they now have an easy route into Eriador/High Elves and then work there way down to Isengard.

Really the simplest fix would be to have them recruit units much slower. The units are tough as nails anyway so there's no need for them to have 500 stacks by turn 50. Slow this down and it may stop them rampaging west with an unstoppable army. If there was a way to have them concentrate the war on Rhun it would be even better. Most of my campaigns has them completely ignoring the Dale/Rhun battle and thats pretty stupid considering both are on the doorstep of the capital.