New faction Yes or No?

[FC Groningen]

All very interesting ideas, but I would like to remind you all that if you add a new faction to either good or evil side, you need to add another one to the other side as well, or you will screw up the balance of the game. Either that, or the balance will need a review.

[Master Celeborn]

All very interesting ideas, but I would like to remind you all that if you add a new faction to either good or evil side, you need to add another one to the other side as well, or you will screw up the balance of the game. Either that, or the balance will need a review.

Currently, the balance isn't in favor of Evill factions?

Evils:

1. OOG
2 OOMM
3.Rhun
4. Isengard
5. Mordor
6. Harad
*** Sauron's papal faction (doesn't count)
Goods:

1. HE
2. Eriador
3. Dwarves
4.Rohan
5.Gondor
6. Silvan elves
7. Dale
** Arnor replaces weak Eriador

in the south, the game is already desiquilibrate between Mordor, Harad and Gondor. In the North, OOG and OOMM have already avantage over weak Eriador and Silvan Elves are always crushed by OOMM. Also, I think Dwarves Crushs Rhun. Correc me If says wrong facts. I never complette an entire game and I Stop at turn 150.

[Trailhog250]

This is why so many people are pushing a Silvan Elves split as the would have their own enemies: Mordor, OoTMM, Rhun, and to a lesser extent Isengard. Factions such as: Ered Luin, Khand, and Umbar, would not be able to fight their common enemies. Though a more reasonable proposal would be to give more AOR units. Say, give Mordor some interesting Dol Guldur units, give the Dwarves some different basic units in all territories in the NW of Middle-Earth. Things that would not require huge revamps but would still essentially serve the same purpose. Different units for the same factions fighting in different parts of Middle-Earth.

[francis86]

Umbar Forever!!!It would be so awesome,some say that the problem is that AI will not use boat but we could only give them a full access to harad terriory,I really think they should have a bigger role in TATW

would be perfect Ennemy of dol amroth,you give umbar outpost on the bay of dol amroth and it would be epic !!!

[nein]

frome splits the elves and dwarves into two factions each, it also adds dunland. It's only for 2.0 and 2.1 I think...

[Descendent of Kings]

This is why so many people are pushing a Silvan Elves split as the would have their own enemies: Mordor, OoTMM, Rhun, and to a lesser extent Isengard. Factions such as: Ered Luin, Khand, and Umbar, would not be able to fight their common enemies. Though a more reasonable proposal would be to give more AOR units. Say, give Mordor some interesting Dol Guldur units, give the Dwarves some different basic units in all territories in the NW of Middle-Earth. Things that would not require huge revamps but would still essentially serve the same purpose. Different units for the same factions fighting in different parts of Middle-Earth.

Exactly what I'd like to see. Except a Silvan Elves split. Splitting would make them weaker and they already get crushed, but new AOR units for them instead. All why I proposed a Dunland faction (you can see my argument on page 2 I believe). Though a Dol Guldur faction continues to sound better and better to me. I always feel it's a hassle to worry about that area when playing as Mordor, I just want to focus on Gondor. I'd be down for the same exact units as Mordor with a couple extra Dol Guldur specific units. I'd say minus Olog-hai (don't think they'd fit in in the forests) and add like spiders and like two foresty (for lack of a better word) orc units for them, ones that have normal recruitment in forests and don't have that slowed recruitment rate.

[Medieval PossuM]

Less factions, less loading time... I´d rather have more units for existing factions than new units for new faction :p

[Hallow]

The only one I would really like myself would be splitting Mordor and Dol Guldur. Would let Mordor focus on Gondor and Dol Guldur focus on Silvan elves.

[KingOfDale]

Pretty much this.
Although I do think a Lorien/Thranduil/VoA faction would definitely have enough room to expand.

Dol Amroth, Dunland, Ered Luin, Khand and Umbar, whilst they could be fiefdoms/vassal factions, will take away more than they give. Dol Amroth is surrounded by Gondor, nowhere to expand except by sea. Dunland is in a good spot for expansion but that will make Isengard extremely weak as most of their settlements are in the Dunlendish region. Khand could have an entirely new roster, look pretty and be playable, but what they do? They're surrounded by Mordor, Harad and Rhun. So unless you made Khand a non-alleigance faction who will go to war with Harad/Rhun/Mordor or vice versa, you'll basically just have a waste of a faction sitting around doing nothing, only useful in invasions. Same goes for Umbar, just a waste of space considering their only expansion route would be by sea, unless you made them non-alligned with Harad, but then Umbar would get dominated straight away. Ered Luin, whilst making sense, has no real enemies around them and wouldn't really have a rival faction. So, you'd probably end up having Ered Luin go to war with the High Elves or Eriador simply because they really have no one else to go to war with.

New factions will only work if -

1. They have room to expand.
2. They don't economically cripple an existing faction by existing.
3. They have a nearby enemy of some sort.
4. They don't go against lore.
5. Their rosters aren't near mirrors of another factions, they were scraping the barrel with OotMM and OoG.

So, if Umbar have very cheap ships and expensive (but good) troops, it should be like a raid-faction. I don't know how the AI handles the invasion from the sea... Umbar can block the ports of Gondor, sends little (but good) troops to raid/conquere cities.

Khand: Like the mongol-faction, very fast horseman-units, so that they go quieckly to the war front.

And sorry for my bad English.

[ahusband]

in the south I have never seen Gondor lose. I have also never seen OOMM or OOG win either. But thats mainly cuz i like playing in the north better so I beat them myself.

What I would like to see in Vanilla is to split silvin elves into Mirkwood and Lorien and then toss in a Dol Guldur faction. I think that would be more accurate with lore and help focus Mordor.

[Wizad]

[Ngugi]

So, so wizad, it's a new fellow

Welcome to TWC ahusband
To see Gondor taking the punch due to the combined efforts of Mordor and more so Harad you will soon face, often some 150+ turns in, even if things are much improved since the days of TATW 2.1 when Gondor was in need of aid 50 turns in or so hehe

A split SE is decent (while King Kong have not fancied the porposal that's been given over and over), while Dol Guldur was a jurisdiction of Mordor, set under Nazgûl care once Sauron left it.
Submods add a split SE, can suggest currently MOS, PCP, and FRoGS and in the future DaC you'll get Dol Guldur as it's own faction as well, IIRC.

[Denbelgica]

Harad has to split cause when i dont play gondor they always crushed by them to early ingame playing h/h

[Viskahn]

Going back to this thread - I think there are a few things which would work in line with the lore and help balance the game.

Firstly though a question - using the M2TW engine it should be possible to have some factions as vassals of others, correct? If that is the case then the answer to some of these sub-factions (such as Dol Guldur, Umbar, Dunland, Dol Amroth and maybe even Ered Luin) would be to have them as vassals to some of the main factions. This would stop their existance from destroying the economy of a faction (eg Dunland and Isengard) because a vassal gives half their income to the "parent" nation, it would stop silly wars (because vassals and parent nations wont go to war) but still give an element of independance to different regions. As was pointed out before, the AI doesnt handle multiple fronts well, and it is entirely true that different subfactions in Middle Earth would have their own agendas despite being part of a larger nation.


So assuming the above is correct - I think the following would help address some imbalances at the moment without detracting anything from the mod;

1) Dol Amroth introduced, as a vassal of Gondor. This would be the answer to Harad - as Dol Amroth would act on its own initiative against Harad, leaving Gondor free to face off against Mordor, which is pretty much as it is meant to be. The two factions (Amroth and Harad) line up well, both being strong naval factions neighbouring each other but still able to provide support to their allies (Gondor and Mordor). Dol Amroth would still be providing income to Gondor however (due to vassalage) meaning it would not entirely screw Gondors war efforts against Mordor - and the fact that Gondor would not need to worry so much about Harad would mean they could focus all their efforts of repelling the assaults from Mordor. Every game I play currently, when invasions start, Gondor WILL lose Osgiliath and then Minas Tirith. You can argue that according to the books Gondor was facing a pretty bleak situation and hence that result is realistic, but unlike in the books, every good faction has their own major enemies to face off against in TATW. In the books you dont hear anything like as much about basically any evil factions other than Mordor, after all.

2) Dol Guldur being split from Mordor and made a vassal. This would make sense as ultimately it was run by the Nazgul who are under Saurons direct control, but again would remedy issues of the AI limitations when it comes to having a spread out kingdom. This would provide a natural enemy to the Silvan elves who in my games have not really had a proper enemy and have been free to conquer Mirkwood and then turtle (Dale and Dwarves have always fought Rhun, Mordor focuses on Gondor, OotMM get assaulted by Dwarves and Eriador (and Lorien - which is point 3). Dol Guldur would represent the shadow of Mirkwood. The roster could happily consist of corrupted animals and creatures such as the giant spiders, in addition to some more foresty Orcs etc.

3) Lorien/Silvan elves split - not much needs to be said here except I think MOS does this one very well. They are separate kingdoms and that should be reflected. Plus when you add Dol Guldur it means the Silvans naturally face off against them, whilst Lorien pushes east into the Misty Mountains. In terms of faction strength, the Lorien Elves arent really meant to be aggressive expansionists so it would make sense that initally they only have the territory and strength to hold their own regions rather than going on the attack. Not all factions should be equal in Middle Earth. Give Lorien troops with big defensive bonuses and forest combat bonuses to reflect their expertise in their homeland and encourage a lore-accurate turtling. Meanwhile the Silvans naturally attempt to reclaim Mirkwood and ultimately Dol Guldur, which again is pretty lore accurate to their situation.

4) Finally, the Dunland/Isen split. This makes lore sense and I believe the issue of weakening Isengard would be addressed twofold - firstly by making Dunland a vassal of Isengard, secondly by simply making the Othanc itself a richer region. In the books and films, Saruman is raising an entire army primarily through Isengard - he should be able to do something similar in TATW. This could be easily reflected by increasing the kings purse or simply the region itself in the game. Add in the vassalage money ("Tribute" from the wild men to Saruman) and Isengard should be fine. At the moment Rohan tends to fall a bit too easily anyway.
As for the Dunland faction, they should start pretty weak and disorganised which woud be a natural side effect from having to pay half their income to Isengard, so they wouldnt exactly be a "steamroll" faction in the way of Harad or Mordor. They have surrounding territories to expand into and then would provide a thread to the Good-Dominated Northwest, assuming that Isengard and Rohan square off. This would provide some proper opposition to the High Elves, Ered Luin and Eriador, who currently have it pretty easy against the Orc factions I think. It makes sense that the Wild Men would potentially turn their eyes north into the poorly defended lands of Eriador/Shire etc, once they had been able to mass their forces.


This is probably just submod material but just ideas which I think would add a bit of depth and complexity to TATW without detracting anything, and hopefully would address a couple of balancing issues.

[Wizad]

In MOS, the region of Isengard is richer than in vanilla I think. They also added some special buildings that make it cheaper to retrain units.

As for Dol Guldur. I do believe that this will allow the Mordor AI to have a better focus on Gondor and perhaps Rohan. I am also in favor of having gameplay as one of the highest priorities. However I feel like splitting Dol Guldur from Mordor would make the game a bit weird. Dol Guldur would have a small roster and Mordor would lose Khamul. I like the 9 Nazgul under the command of Mordor. There has to be a better fix for Dol Guldur than simply splitting them from Mordor. Also if you play Mordor yourself, you won't be able to fight the Elves till very late game. Currently Isengard is the only faction which really depends on one citadel and aggressive gameplay, a Dol Guldur faction would remove that uniqueness.

Harad should just be nerfed. It is a desert kingdom which only real strength comes from the old Gondorian-now pirates Umbar. Harad should have all of its roads reduced and some of its cities should start at a lower population level. There's nothing wrong with Gondor in MOS.

I personally dislike the Lorien-Silvan split, because it makes me feel like I have to compete with my natural ally for core territories. However I see how this makes sense lore-wise. I would really like it if there was some way to really reunite the Elven Kingdoms. Maybe even something that would give you access to all Elven territories. Late game you need forested lands and most of the forests are already occupied by fellow Elves. This, unfortunately, leads to a kin-slaying in my campaigns.

[mondpeiler]

a reunification of the silvan elves would make sense (if they get separated first).
the connection between lorien and greenwood-elves once was deep untill they got divided through saurons influence in green-/mirkwood.
so there could be set a goal (for both factions) to conquer certain regions and reunite/-establish the greenwood-kingdom.

but to prevent the "competing"-term it should be handled, that there are certain territories that have to be conquered either by the player or the AI - so that you don'T have to buy settlements from the other faction (or even declare war).

[Withwnar]

... it should be possible to have some factions as vassals of others, correct?

There is no way to do it directly, like we can with starting alliances, etc.

I have seen talk of using campaign AI rules to make vassalages very likely to happen early in the game but I don't know if anybody has tried it.

[Viskahn]

There is no way to do it directly, like we can with starting alliances, etc.

I have seen talk of using campaign AI rules to make vassalages very likely to happen early in the game but I don't know if anybody has tried it.

Ah, pity. There goes that idea then

[Madril]

More AOR units for Mordor at least. A split for Silvan Elves would make sense since the two folks were torn away during the 3rd Age. In that case Galadhrim could focuse on Misty Mountains and Isengard while Silvan Elves of Mirkwood would attack Dol Guldur and Gundabad or even Rhûn.

Concerning Dol Guldur, I'd like to see it as its own faction. Indeed it is under Mordor's juridiction but it was the main threat in the North. Plus orcs, spiders and even Trolls ahve more a forester style of fighting, so they could get some special orcish units fitting well in the dark corners of Mirkwood. Even if they won't match the Silvan Elves in terms of proficiency nor skill they could be more dangerous and vicious than Mordor Orcs.

Dwarves should get more AOR units, especially in Ered Luin, for instance the Venturers (already made by someone I think) or even some kind of archers, medium armoured. For Erebor they could get a strong shiled unit with an axe or poleaxe. Iron Hills should get warriors with mattocks( in FROGS there are) , or basically making a Iron Hill veteran able to switch between sword and mattock, but I guess this would be hard to do.

High Elves could get some AOR units too.

Indeed, more AOR units and basic units for every faction would give more flavour to the mod. Low-tier and mid units and some mid to heavy AOR units ( think of Gondor or Mordor).

[Ngugi]

The Silvan Elves were to be more accurate sundered during the Second Age due to ideological differences; the Mirkwood group wanted to maintain a proto-Teleri culture and avoid relationships with both Dwarves and Noldor; something the Lórien populations did not care for, having pro-Beleriand Sindar leaders, in alliance with Noldor and Khazad-dûm, and having a Noldor population.