Overconfidence...

[loony]

... and the stack spawn killed me...

Being experienced vet of TW series I started a Gondor campaign on VH/VH (it says the games is balanced for this difficulty).
I love the mod, however, after several turns I became aware I was not doing something right.... both Harad and Mordor came and came and came while I was short of cash all the time. "What is the economy model in this mod?" I was thinking.. Now I know, it is called a script

Ok, I can defeat anything Harad throws at me (as long as that anything is not mumakill) with a half stack, maybe capture a settlement close by or sack one further away, but they still come, a stack each turn and wear my troops out. Especially annoying is their light cavalry.

Now that could be manageable even with incessant fighting around E.Osgiliath, but by turn 50 mordor was just too much. 5 units of mountain trolls and 4 or 5 Uruk infantry with the Numeorans (sp?) and lots and lots of spearmen? uu......not something militias should be dealing with

I managed to beat the atack on EOsgiliath once. OK, 75% casualties, 2 generals dead .

I sell a town (to non allied silvans, how bad is that?), start re-training my army and then another stack of mordor comes and guess what? More trolls? Ok, now they kill boromir and capture E osgiliath. No matter, I think, I will beat them at the bridge between East and West Osgiliath.

I don't!!

The trolls ran over the bridge, massacred my citadel guards () faster then I could realize it was not going as well as it should have. Ok, i killed off most of the trolls, but then the rest of mordor army came and bye bye. My steward ran to W Osgiliath. Got sieged. with 300 troops inside and 3200 outside.

Well, i thought, need some higher tier units, and the Axement for the AP bonus. sent a small army to sack a harad town on the shore. got some cash and started thinking that "at least I am doing OK with Harad". Then the "omfg moment" came: 2 stacks of harad troops on my southern shore.

Now that is what I call VH/VH/VH/tooH...
Should I restart on H?

[krasni]

VH/VH is pretty unforgiving. If you haven't started taking over one of your enemies as Gondor by turn 50, you're going to be hurting. Popular strategy is to defend against Mordor at Cair Andros and Osgiliath while invading the big coastal Harad cities by sea. Meanwhile you pray to God that Rohan doesn't get steamrolled by Isengard.

H/H is more forgiving (and to me, entertaining), especially if you haven't played that faction yet and don't know what to expect. It's certainly not a cakewalk - just makes things more manageable than VH/VH.

[Seleukos_I.]

VH/VH is pretty unforgiving. If you haven't started taking over one of your enemies as Gondor by turn 50, you're going to be hurting. Popular strategy is to defend against Mordor at Cair Andros and Osgiliath while invading the big coastal Harad cities by sea.

It's not that hard if you haven't killed an enemy by turn 50. In my gondor campaigns I normally don't cross the Anduin until round 100. After that my attacks begin and you still can beat both Mordor and Harad quite easy still there.
Once you know what you have to do as Gondor it is not that hard.
And fitghting trolls on bridges and inside cities is always a bad idea.

[Concrete]

Really really make sure that you have your capitol in the centre of your empire, or your economy will significantly suffer.
It's alright to defend for awhile, but if you think you losing a mere dozen units per Mordor siege you repel will wear them out, you're wrong, they don't wear out, you have to take some initiative.
To take out Harad, you just have to fight them off as best you can, and raid Umbar now and then.
You've basically won when you've done well enough militarily to capture Minas Morgul, or if you reach economic critical mass. (The latter is nigh unachiveable without the former, or at least considerable military sucesss.)

[Mega Tortas de Bodemloze]

I Prefer to play the campaign map {watch the factions develop} and kinda role play, so M/M setting is more than sufficient for me. Even at this lower setting if I don't hit the ground running I'll be swamped by a red & black tsunami...

Block Mordor at the river, keeping them on the eastern shore. Make peace and prosecute Harad til they are basically your training ground for your troops. During this lull upgrade/amour your stacks then Hit Mordor where it hurts. Don't worry even if there focus is on distant lands they'll still have plenty of Trolls too drive you insane.

[loony]

When I think of it, it was the trolls... If there were no trolls, i could manage no problem. One stack distributed between E.Osgilitah, Cair Andros and that other settlement north would suffice to keep Mordor at bay.

but the trolls... I read the "how to deal with them" thread and, well, instinctively I was using the same thing: arrows, meatshield, charges from behind etc etc
But they don't care and just kill half of my army no matter what.
I always thought I was good in battles, apparently not...

[Lord Uxbridge]

When I think of it, it was the trolls... If there were no trolls, i could manage no problem. One stack distributed between E.Osgilitah, Cair Andros and that other settlement north would suffice to keep Mordor at bay.

but the trolls... I read the "how to deal with them" thread and, well, instinctively I was using the same thing: arrows, meatshield, charges from behind etc etc
But they don't care and just kill half of my army no matter what.
I always thought I was good in battles, apparently not...

Catapults near the bridge so when the trolls have to squash together to get on it you can take a lot out, same with land battles

trolls, use a low tier squad, set them to lose formation, and have them 4 - 5 ranks deep, but in loose, this will stop troll just chargin thru yur army, make sure to place the loose squad formation in front of yur main force, just in archer range. Then if you have cav too, especially bodyguard, before they reach yur loose formation squad, keep chargin them, and then withdrawin, trolls will ran faster then the main army usually, so u can cut them down before the main forces reaches you

Do that as well, and you should be alright

[Concrete]

The trolls are horrible, you will take casualties (and significant ones at that) when fighing against them.

[AgentGB]

Best way ive fount on how to fight trolls or elephants,

trolls, use a low tier squad, set them to lose formation, and have them 4 - 5 ranks deep, but in loose, this will stop troll just chargin thru yur army, make sure to place the loose squad formation in front of yur main force, just in archer range. Then if you have cav too, especially bodyguard, before they reach yur loose formation squad, keep chargin them, and then withdrawin, trolls will ran faster then the main army usually, so u can cut them down before the main forces reaches you,

or just use some fountain guard, they will suffer some looses, but will kill the trolls before they can be a threat to the outcome of the battle,

The Jack Of Trades i have fount are the pelga marines, there javelins can down elephants extremely quickly, just remember to sacrafice a squad in front, (loose formation) so marines can get there volleys off, even if outnumbered by elephants, marines will get the job done, just dont allow the elephant to close with them, always good to have 3 squads of marine when goin thru harad country, Marines are also good for takin care of trolls too, but your loose less if you use my earlier tactic, never fight a densed battle agasint elephants or trolls, set to loose formation, lithm rangers are also very good for bringin down elephants, next best thing to marine, althou they wont kill a bunch of trolls before they engage you, unless you sacrafice a squad in loose formation, to stop there charge in front of yur troops.

srry for the wall of text

[loony]

I did try the 'charging with bodyguard" part. the problem was that the trolls are deep in my unit so my charge gets blunted by my own troops; i did kill quite a few of them uglies that way.

If there was a mere 1 unit of trolls, I would not mind. when there are more thant 3 I am toast.

I guess the worst mistake in my campaign was that i did not realize I could not bleed the bad guys, I should have risked more and gone on the offensive. Who cares about heroic victories if the don't matter?

[axnsan]

..not something militias should be dealing with

Not something you should be using by turn 50

You might want to take both osgiliaths + cair andros fairly early then develop troops traing facilities there,so that by the first military event you already have the barracks capable of recruiting the new units, or the last barrack available. Trade buildings don't help too much in osgiliath as they have nobody to trade with except the other osgiliath and Minas Tirith... Farms don't either as the population is very low. So just build military there and focus on economy elsewhere.

Attacking mordor any farther than that with militias is pure suicide. Their nazgul bodyguards just kill everything you have to throw at them by that time. Better wait until you can get full armies of gondor spearmen + infantry with gondor archers support. 2-3 generals should do for your cavalry needs

Harad you should hold at (can't remember the name) just south of the Anduin Delta. A few gondor militia with prealrgir marines(their javelins are made of kill) and archers to shoot at them while they fight you should be enough to defeat most attacks while you rape mordor.

If you think your economy can handle it you could attack both harad and mordor with 1-2 armies.

[loony]

Not something you should be using by turn 50


Attacking mordor any farther than that with militias is pure suicide. Their nazgul bodyguards just kill everything you have to throw at them by that time. Better wait until you can get full armies of gondor spearmen + infantry with gondor archers support. 2-3 generals should do for your cavalry needs

If you think your economy can handle it you could attack both harad and mordor with 1-2 armies.

Well, I found militia more (economically) efficient at fighting orcs than any other unit gondor has. With well timed cavalry charges you rout the orcs no matter what is holding the line. I had elite troops (fountain guards, gondor infantry and citadel guards) to form a second line just in case militias routed.

my economy generates something like 5000 net income (even after I had at least 2 full stacks paying upkeep). not good, but i am used to having modders make money tight.
I was hoping to have few high quality units and mostly militia, i.e. to play something like Milan or Venice in vanilla MTWII.

Honestly, were it orcs, uruks and the like, militia would fully suffice.
I am still unsure higher tier units are so much better. The trolls did massacre my 2 units of citadel guards in shield wall mode at the bridge....
Gondor spearmen are useless against infantry -based mordor; militias perform better.

[Smaug]

In my campaign Cair Andros has not yet been attacked once. Just leave a free upkeep garrison there and concentrate your defenses on East Osg. where all the pressure from Mordor is directed at.

Concerning trolls in field battles, I would like to add that in place of a loose-formation-militia, you can use your heroes (denethor, boromir, gandalf, echtelion) as the meat wall since they have enough hit points to survive countless troll blows. Especially cavalry bodyguard is good because you can then charge the trolls with axemen without the meat wall being on the way. Marines also throw more likely without a dense meat wall.

And fitghting trolls on bridges and inside cities is always a bad idea.

I disagree about cities. In cities, trolls won't charge if your fountain guards are right on the gate whereas in the field their charge is what does most of the damage. Trolls on the wall are also manageable if softened with archers first.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Not something you should be using by turn 50

You might want to take both osgiliaths + cair andros fairly early then develop troops traing facilities there,so that by the first military event you already have the barracks capable of recruiting the new units, or the last barrack available. Trade buildings don't help too much in osgiliath as they have nobody to trade with except the other osgiliath and Minas Tirith... Farms don't either as the population is very low. So just build military there and focus on economy elsewhere.

Attacking mordor any farther than that with militias is pure suicide. Their nazgul bodyguards just kill everything you have to throw at them by that time. Better wait until you can get full armies of gondor spearmen + infantry with gondor archers support. 2-3 generals should do for your cavalry needs

Harad you should hold at (can't remember the name) just south of the Anduin Delta. A few gondor militia with prealrgir marines(their javelins are made of kill) and archers to shoot at them while they fight you should be enough to defeat most attacks while you rape mordor.

If you think your economy can handle it you could attack both harad and mordor with 1-2 armies.

Listen to this guy, he said it all. By turn 50 you should indeed have most of gondor's regular army build-up available.

Cheers

[loony]

I have reloaded from a save on turn 35. Now on turn 40.

NOW I understand everybody's urges to take minas morgul asap:it is EASY with the slopes there. Enough archers, narrow path up, stakes in the path and Minas Morgul is yours
Now getting ready for the goddamn trolls....
Will let you know how it goes next time.

[mattgoby]

Right at least it werent olog hai at that point when they have 3 units of that ur screwed. anyway pelagar marines use there javelins as they have a bonus against elephants and trolls and stuff anyway javelings beat timurid elephants in vanilla

[Smaug]

Right at least it werent olog hai at that point when they have 3 units of that ur screwed. anyway pelagar marines use there javelins as they have a bonus against elephants and trolls and stuff anyway javelings beat timurid elephants in vanilla

They don't have any specific bonus against trolls and elephants. It's just that trolls and mumakil come in small quantities. This combined with the Javelins high att and accuracy means that there are more javelins hitting per troll than there would be javelins per orc. This equals quickly made troll kebab.

[glassakias]

they do have a bonus against elephants.
in my campaign i first met trolls after i had taken barad-dur. easy task for my elite army led by faramir. the trick is to concentrate on mordor and make peace with harad. prevent them from attacking you by giving them that small island near the delta. they will live it ungarissoned, it will rebel, you will get it back, you will give it to them again (maybe for some money) etc. did this like 7 or more times. kept my relationships with harad above poor. when i had taken cirith ungol and secured ithilien, i let the relationships drop and got attacked. i defeated in defence all the stacks they had created (4-5 full) and then attacked with two armies, one elite from ithilien and one militia from the delta.

[Point Blank]

Actually the 'thrown' attribute gives a large hardcoded bonus versus elephants, another weird 'feature' brought to you by CA.

Edit: glassakias beat me to it

[Smaug]

Actually the 'thrown' attribute gives a large hardcoded bonus versus elephants, another weird 'feature' brought to you by CA.

Edit: glassakias beat me to it

One always learns something new. Should have checked the facts before posting .

[Vaz]

As to militia not being useful, the only unit I'd consider not taking in Militia is Spearmen. Swordsmen of whatever variant get hacked apart by AP, Launching, Area effect trolls, so the cheaper the better. Militia Archers have a higher rate of fire than Armoured, and despite a slightly lower accuracy and attack, do more damage in the long run.

Ballista's can fire accurately as well, so you can put in several shots, particularly on bridge battles.

Don't ever bother with Fire Arrows, their bonus for morale damage isn't worth it against Locked Morale units.

Spearmen on the other hand are poor against pretty much everything in Mordor's Armies, and Fountain Court Guard you get for free in any case by completing missions, so the only thing you'll do better at taking them for is when you are deep in Harad territory, and are missing your Javelins, Ithilien Rangers, and FCG, then they provide adequate defence against the Camel Javelins which eat your Knights and bodyguards.

Also, they prove quite useful should you turn on Rohan after eventually defeating Mordor, and Harad.

Also, don't be fooled by the Rhun Cavalry units - Variags are horse archers and are perfectly capable of staying well away from the Spearmen, and pack a hefty charge with their spears. The Rhun BG's and Kataphracts on the other hand munch through any thing except Trolls and FCG.