Which Mod?? (Middle-Earth)

[Syanur]

I would like to play ROME-TW again(I had played many times) but in a "middle-earth mod" for this time. As I searched there are 2 major mod for ROME.

1- Lord of the Rings - Total War

2- Forth Age - Total War

I don't have too much time to test and compare these mods, I am not student any more, working now. So I would like to ask you;

Which mod is better, more realistic and detailed(about units, cities, maps etc...) ?? Which one do you suggest??

Thanks

[MasterOfNone]

FATW - is based on the books and currently limited to a portion of the map. It is stable, well-balanced, immersive, lore-accurate and focused on the race of Man. It would appeal more to the Tolkien purist.

LOTRTW - is based on the movies and it has considerable scripting, with a much stronger focus on 3D work and replication of the War of the Ring itself. It covers the whole map, but is not as polished as FATW because of a non-modular release process. It also requires the add-on Alexander - Total War. Of late, lotrtw has been adding some superb battlemap buildings and settlement plans.

So fatw is more detailed in the sense of the small details throughout, but lotrtw is more detailed with building models/battlemap settlements (I'm not sure how much of that is in their current release though).

[Syanur]

Thanks a lot, None-Master... Very usefull&detailed explanation, really. I will make my expactations on this way.

Actually, I am also wondering the "Third age - TW", which based on Med2-TW. They say it is as original as an official release... I don't like Med2 too much, ROME has more fun and better atmospher in my opinion. "Playability" is worse than ROME, and it is gloomy(like Rome-BI) !!! Thats why I am not sure that, does the Third Age worth to play? But it seems Third Age is the best middle-Earth mod in TW series, isn't it??

[Aradan]

There is no "best mod". It depends on what you're looking for. TATW's main focus is the battlemap, units that are inspired by the films and custom settlements. So, if you're looking for BM visuals, TATW is probably your cup of tea. Accuracy, gameplay and atmosphere, on the other hand, are not the mod's strong suit. Though of course if you ask the same thing in TATW's forum you'll probably get a very different answer.


LoTR:TW is similar to TATW in that its main focus is the battlemap and the attempt to follow the movies (hence the heavy scripting), but it has the advantage (from your pov) that it's based on RTW and not M2.