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Thread: [TW Guide] M2TW-KD: A Guide to the Dwarves (TATW)

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    Default [TW Guide] M2TW-KD: A Guide to the Dwarves (TATW)



    Author: Alex-ander
    Original thread: A Guide to the Dwarves

    A Guide to the Dwarves
    PlayingThe Dwarves
    By Alex-Ander
    Start Turns 1-30
    The Dwarves are one of the easier factions to play. As the Dwarves you will be far from the main action and you will probably not meet Mordor in the field until late in the campaign. Your big problem is that your empire is divided into two parts so corruption and unrest will be a problem for a long time. And it will be very difficult to move an army between the two parts of your empire. It will be a long time before your empire is united and you will essentially have to treat each part of your empire separately for a while.

    Your main enemies will be the Orcs of the misty mountains (hereafter called OOTMM) and Rhun in the East and the OOTMM in the West. Usually you only have to fight the OOTMM, and Rhun in the East. At the start try to fight against the OOTMM only try to avoid war with Rhun. If war with Rhun is unavoidable let them throw their stacks against your fortresses. The OOTMM may expand west so they need to be taken down as soon as possible. The High Elves and Eriador should be happy to accept an alliance. Offer them one and maybe throw in a little sweetener gold or maps if they seem reluctant to accept. Once you have your alliances your only have to worry about the OOTMM in the west.

    There are some good things going for the Dwarves you're infantry are like pint sized tanks and you have the best crossbow and axe throwing units in the game. Dwarves are the best faction to kill big enemies like trolls, or balrogs. Early game you need not focus on getting good infantry, Dwarven Warriors are good enough for most things you meet. You should work towards axe throwers and Iron Crossbowmen, once you have these, things will get a lot easier. Just keep firing at the OOTMM Snagas with them while your Dwarven Warriors take care of their infantry.

    Economy
    You start with all of your cities undeveloped, corruption is high and most of them don’t even have a dirt road, any farms and markets you have are very basic. The first thing to build are roads, they do two things they increase trade and they help your armies to move more quickly. Then start to develop your farms, markets, and the city hall line of buildings. The farms will help your population to grows faster the city hall buildings will reduce the corruption. Later on you will be able to build mines do so they make good money.

    Set your taxes on low for selected cities to help them to grow faster. Move your governor out of the city first or he may get one of the bad taxman line of traits. The bad taxman trait can have a significant effect on a cities income and will make you general useless as a governor.

    Expanding
    If you start from Kibil Dum (Gimil's Castle) you've got Wormcove to the North, and Dain's Halls to the West. And a rebel province Kugavad south east.

    If you go South around the Grey Mountains from Dain's Halls you have a rebel city and a rebel castle pretty close together Wyakaburg and Framsburg but you have to be quick or the Silvan Elves will take them.

    If you go North around the Grey Mountains from Dain's Halls you'll quickly find yourself at Mt. Gundabad and the way into the Misty Mountains.

    Your first targets should be Wormcove, Kugavad and Dains Hall in the east. You can also consider taking Dorwinion and using it as a base for the fight against Rhun which is probably inevitable. In the far west Lunelith should be your first target. Luenlith starts with a high Dwarf culture so it will not take an army to hold it.

    In the longer term capture or trade Beorn’s Hall. One of the major Orc towns, Goblins town is only two days march away. And once you capture that it’s just a case of working your way down the Misty Mountains to Moria and the OOTMM are history.

    Army setup
    This is an example of some formations when setting up your army

    A-I-I-I-I-I-I-A
    -- C-C-C-C-
    - -OI-OI-OI-
    or
    C-I-I-I-I-I-I-C
    --- A/C/A/C
    - -OI-OI-OI-

    A- axethrowers,
    I-infantry(basic or defensive, good to have some Vault Wardens),
    C- crossbowmen (crossbow dwarves ) ,
    OI- offensive infantry, some Axemen (axe dwarves) of Erebor or Dragonslayers, sometimes Guards of Khazad-Dum

    Axethrowers have the second strike after the crossbows, they deal a lot of damage to enemy infantry, especially if it has amour. When the enemy infantry is close you just retreat with the axethrowers and crossbows, alternatly have your infantry hold the enemy, and then move your axethrowers to strike from the rear or flank

    Dwarvs do not have good cavalry to outmaneuver the enemy. You have to move your slow but powerful infantry and crossbowmen in a tactical fashion to gain an advantage (few other factions have this obvious limitation)

    Especially as the dwarves you can win some heroic victories even on the field when you are outnumbered 1 to 2. And remember that loosing a battle is not a shame it reduces the enemy troops as well

    Dwarves are the best in city battles their units have massive armor and very good defense skill that enables players to win also there is no problem with snagas if you have at least one unit of cavalry or archers. Vault wardens are also very nice, especially when dealing with enemy cavalry. However Dale cavalry is relatively cheap and pretty quick recruitment refill so you can get 2-4 units quite early in the campaign by the time you are fighting OOTMM.. Rhun skirmishers are almost as annoying as Snagas but usually not such a large part of their armies as snagas are for OOTMM.

    Infantry - against OOTMM they can easily meet the enemy 1:4 especially the more advanced units (Iron guard, Dragon slayers). This fact makes it ideal to defend towns or castles, meaning you can keep garrisons at a minimum without risking loosing the settlements. It will also tempt the enemy to attack you - giving you the defensive edge most dwarves enjoy.

    Crossbowmen - can be accessed from about turn 7 or so. It’s vital to avoid trying to outrun the enemy which is impossible whatever faction you are fighting. They have high missile attack rating so they will make short work of any but the most heavily armored opponent - slow reload though. I recommend at least 3-4 crossbowmen for a decent army.

    Cavalry - already mentioned, can be recruited as mercs in Dale. Use them in to chase routers, not to try to outmaneuver the enemy,

    The OOTMM
    The Orcs should be no real problem for the Dwarves. Man for man (or should it be Dwarf for Orc) the Dwarf troops are better. Only three OOTMM units should cause the Dwarfs any problems, the Sagas and the Trolls and the Balrog and then Balrog you should meet once when you attack Moria.

    Snagas
    The Snagas are your biggest nightmare early campaign unless you've got some crossbows. It’s impossible to catch them and draw them into melee with your slow moving troops. You will spend a very frustrating time trying to chase down and finish the last few Snaga units.

    The best way to combat the Snagas is,
    1, Make sure you have lots of crossbows to outshoot the Snagas.
    2, Wait for them to run out of ammo, they will stop skirmishing then.
    3, Have a least two units Dale Cavalry to chase them down and have at least four units of Axe-throwers and two units of Crossbowman in your army.

    Trolls and Balrogs
    The Dwarves are one of the best factions for dealing with Trolls. Most of the dwarf units have the amour piercing attribute. This makes dealing with the trolls a lot easier.

    The best way of dealing with trolls is,

    1, Use ballistas or catapults

    2, Surround them with infantry. This will take longer than method one but eventually the trolls will start to fall

    For the Balrog the same tactics will work but your losses will be much higher.

    Rhun.
    Fighting Rhun is a much tougher proposition than the OOTMM. Early on Rhun has skirmishers, decent cavalry, and missile troops. Their bodyguard units are particularly nasty. The best tactic early campaign is to avoid field battles against Rhun. Siege their cities so they're forced into either siege battles or sallies which should make things easier for you (especially sieges).

    Crossbow units, halberds, and pikes are needed against Rhun's cavalry. So develop the cities and the facilities needed to recruit pike/halberd and crossbow dwarves as quickly as possible. With Azanulimbar-Dum and Erebor you've got two big recruitment centers directly near Rhun.

    If you do face them in the field best tactic is like fighting a Renaissance army. A line of crossbowmen, backed by pikes, backed by halberds and heavy axes that move forward once the enemy cavalry have been stopped by the pikes and the crossbowmen have moved back.

    Place two or three units of crossbow in a semi U or V shape at the beginning and deploy stakes. This makes it hard for their cavalry to do much damage by charging in, as even when they try to go around the stakes they still usually manage to catch the edges. Behind the crossbow place your heavy and light foot units. If their foot units get too close, engage them inside the stakes, this disorganizes their line and prevents their cavalry from charging in. Other than that, just engage the infantry with yours and let the crossbow's long range and high power cut down the cavalry as they run back and forth trying to get around the spikes.

    It's usually a good idea to disable the crossbowmen’s skirmish mode. That way they won't run back while your infantry are fighting and instead continue to let loose their bolts. If they do run back, they usually run back far enough for the Rhun cavalry to isolate them and kill them quickly.

    Some tips:
    > use spies on enemy forces moving against you to plan your military setup
    > conquer (or trade) Moria to get the guards of Kházad Dûm
    Last edited by Saint Nicholas; September 03, 2010 at 06:59 PM.

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