Playing Isengard

[Gazi Husrev-Beg]

I thought Rohan was struggeling at this time. They have tons of provinces, spamming extremly large armies. Isengard starts very underpowered compared to them. I have started over and over again several times, but until 20th turn I manage to capture 3 to 4 nearby province in addition to my starting 3. In every town I have maybe 2-3 max troops to keep order. First time I thought I am doing pretty well, than suddenly I see 2-3 Rohan full stacks...hey I am supposed to be a horde or something playing on H/H

Is there any more expirienced players that can give me some hints and tips? and why the hell misty mountes orcs do nothing!? Grrrrr

[el Cid]

You should turtle a bit at first and build up an army. You cannot defeat Rohan immediately. Try not to fight field battles, as the Rohirrim cavalry will tear you to pieces. Try to capture a few rebel towns west of Dunland, but don't capture Fangorn! If I'm correct this will spawn an ent army.

[Gazi Husrev-Beg]

yes I get that message that Ent are going to war, but I have yet to see any ents. I will try new game and see what happens.

[son of romans]

Capture all strategic points as bridges or conquer and city and let rohan try to reconquer,in city their cavalry is anusles and their infantry suks on walls,even uruk-hay raiders or arcers will be efective.

[Damocles]

Well. It's been said in other places, but playing Isengard can be rough...especially since you're depending on snaga archers and skirmishers instead of Dunlendings. It takes at least 30+ turns for the main Dunlending town to even increase in tier and give you more than foresters.

What I've had great success doing on VH/VH, is actually manage to ALLY with Rohan. It takes some work and quite a bit of cash, and a little bit of luck. But it's totally doable. I even got my Reputation to reliable from occupying towns and releasing prisoners.

What helped me do this was dashing up and grabbing Fangorn, and offering it as part of my alliance offer.

Meanwhile, you have to move fast to get Tharbad and Ost-in-Esthil before Eriador and the misty mountain orcs. The latter will always get to Ost first, but tend to be defeated, leaving it weaker.

After that, it is a mad dash to the coast...There are between 2-4 provinces to pick up there, down to the sea, and how many you get depends on luck, with the High Elves, Rohan and Eriador closing in around that time too.

Eventually, Rohan and Gondor will become distracted with Mordor and Harad.

Eriador will probably attack you first. Fortunately, their armies suck - even if they spam a whole lot of them. It can be tedious at the start, since Isengard is far from the main action, and it takes like 4 turns even to get to Staddle from your borders. You'll be fighting with A LOT of snagas, goblins and the occasional dunlending band.

But you should be able to eventually eat into Eriador, even if they constantly spawn 21-unit stacks.

The Orcs of the Misty Mountain won't do much except get the kicked out of them by everyone. Even the dwarves alone will maul them. But they will still distract other factions for a while.

Eventually, around the time you've fought up to the Shire, the High Elves and the Dwarves will get involved. And at it this same time, your supply line problems will just barely begin to ease...as places like Bree start being able to put out something besides goblins.

But make no mistake...Even up until turn 100, 95% of your armies will consist of goblins and snagas, even when recruiting all the wargs and foresters you can, simply because Isengard is so far from the actions. By the time your Dunlending towns manage to grow (they start off incredibly weak), you won't need them. You'll already be able to get more and better troops from places conquered in Eriador on on flank, and Isengard will be churning out better troops for any potential fight on the eastern flank. So there is never any reason to recruit the clansmen and levy archers. Which is sad, and an oversight in design, I think.

You can apparently recruit Uruk-Hai archers in Bree, but not Dunlendings.

Anyways. That's what makes the 'Eriador' first strategy so tedious for Isengard. Your long supply lines and having to fight with stacks of 20 snagas/goblins. It's different with Rohan and Gondor, since Isengard is right there.

By focusing on Eriador first, Rohan and Gondor together will probably hold their own. In fact, in my current game, Gondor is number one, and the first evil Invasion has been called on E. Osgiliath. I've been in all out war with the remnants of Eriador (finally reduced to one province in the farthest north), a powerful dwarf faction and the annoying high elves. The OoTMM are close to breaking, but I think they might hold if the dwarves get distracted enough by me (they just recently came in to help the HE, after the HE came in to help Eriador).

I'll admit. It's been very hard and very tedious. But when I eventually have everything west of the misty mountains, I'll be able to combine everything in Isengard and really unleash hell. Maybe even supplant Sauron!

So allying with Rohan works.

[Raiven]

But make no mistake...Even up until turn 100, 95% of your armies will consist of goblins and snagas, even when recruiting all the wargs and foresters you can, simply because Isengard is so far from the actions..

I dunno if something is changedso drastic since 1.3, but when I played Isengard, I was able to recrute heavy Uruk-hai infantri at turn 50 or something

[Darner]

I did'nt ally with rohan, but with only 5 troops in each city (8 in Isengard), its army does'nt attack me. Rohan is wandering on your territory but there's no war, and very fast he has other things to do. So turn against Eriador and eat it. Supply lines are hard, but with massive armies of berserkers, dunlendings and wargs, you can avoid to recruit lesser troops. In my campaign Orcs killed Elrond and I ally with them, helped uthem to butcher Eriador. Dwarves are not too strong, and I did not see other good factions. I did not took part in invasions and preserve peace with my southern neighbour, until Eriador is destroyed. And when you are large enough, with eriador territories, you can think about making war with Rohan.

But it would be less hasardous if rohan were not more or less in war with you at the beginning of the campaign.

[jinjo]

at first capture 2-3 towns and then mobilize your army near strategic areas, like bridges
then wait until invasion is called
when there will be invasion try to take edoras fastly, dont give this city to another evil faction, then it's easy to destroy rohan

[Point Blank]

Isengard is a citadel, turtle and tech up until you are ready to expand.

[Neptune7]

I have never played Isengard, and I was just going to try them out......anymore Isengard advice?...

[Gazi Husrev-Beg]

Its what i have been doing for a while, turtling up and building up tech. Hate fighting with snagas and their archers, kinda like Isengard becouse of Uruk-Hai and proffesional look of their armies. Had to load again and again as OoTMM were defeated several times. I will try to avoid fighting Eriador, wait for the invasion on Edoras. Seems in all games so far with Isengard Edoras is first call for an invasion, little after 20th turn. Thanks for all the advice, will try and see diff methods. Thank Melkor for Save and Load

[Point Blank]

Yep, tech up to Uruk-hai pikemen and Uruk-hai archers and you can murder Rohan cav, and chase their infantry stragglers down with wargs.

[Damocles]

I dunno if something is changedso drastic since 1.3, but when I played Isengard, I was able to recrute heavy Uruk-hai infantri at turn 50 or something

Of course you can recruit uruk-hai...earlier than that.

But distances in Eriador are vast. It can up to half a dozen turns to get anywhere. It's a long trek even to Staddle and gets further from there.

This means that you can't rely on Isengard much at all. You'll have to recruit everything in you can, in the other, closer provinces, to even break even, while fighting in the West...Owing to the AI's constant super stacks.

Honestly, fighting those stacks got SOO tedious, that with my 10-star/10-dread general, I began just surrounding them on all 8 sides, and hitting them with twice as many troops. Autoresolve can give sizable losses, and is /suicide/ against a town, but was preferable to yet another forest brawl between hobbits, lumbermen, bree riders and snagas.

[Neptune7]

Isengard is a citadel, turtle and tech up until you are ready to expand.

yes, that's the way to do it.....I just tried that playing Isengard for the first time, and even though I have only 4 provinces, I am in a positive position at turn 61..I have 43,000 gold in treasury, I have upgraded Isengard to the point where I can recruit all of Isengards great units; Uruk-Hai infantry, Bersekers, Warg Riders, Uruk-Hai crossbowman, Uruk-Hai archers, etc.. I have alliances with Eraidor, High Elves, and the Orcs of the Misty Mountains, so my northern border is secure..I didn't bother taking any rebel settlements, and just took one of Rohan settlements, the castle closest to Isengard, at turn 46. Rohan immediately offered a ceasefire. So I just built up my treasury and building everything I can in my four provinces with low taxes for maximum population growth. The one battle I had with Rohan went great. It was an open field battle where they attacked me while I layed seige to that one castle. I was heavily outnumbered, however my units performed real well against rohans units. I didn't have any Warg Riders so too many got away. Next time will be different. Isengard is ready to expand once again.

[Hartassen]

Why won't people use the search function? Plenty of topics on this matter =)
Both me and Aesir helped another dude with the exact same question in another thread.

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...=351580&page=5

Although I don't agree with calling crusades I consider it cheating even if you use your crusading army for the city you targeted.

[eugenioso]

what i really hate in this world is the ahistorical players:

"and then, as Isengard, i allied myself with rohan! im so awesome"

"i signed a ceasefire with Mordor! "

i mean, wtf? do you have no shame? start playing the custom campaign, ladies!

regarding strategy, i dont seem to find whats so hard about Isengard. great units, excellent income, great leaders, whats not to love about em?

[Point Blank]

Agreed.

[JorisofHolland]

regarding strategy, i dont seem to find whats so hard about Isengard. great units, excellent income, great leaders, whats not to love about em?

The fact that they always give you a CTD, playing RR/RC.

[Point Blank]

Not for me mate...

[Neptune7]

what i really hate in this world is the ahistorical players:

"and then, as Isengard, i allied myself with rohan! im so awesome"

"i signed a ceasefire with Mordor! "

i mean, wtf? do you have no shame? start playing the custom campaign, ladies!

.....