is Dale winnable?

[Coldfire88]

hi,

Ive started a Dale campaign and was doing great attacking Rhun quickly taking their home regions 1 by 1 til there was only 1 or 2 regions left, then the super stacks appeared, still no problem, I managed to kill 2 of them with average losses, dont know about a 3rd...

but this is when problem started to happen, suddenly Mordor attacked the vulnerable Rhovanion region south of Dale, so I moved in my veteran forces from Rhun and new ones from Dale and starting taking my lost cities back but the more I kill of them the more arrived and now Im facing 4 or 5 stacks with Nazghuls and more trolls than I would like to count...

Whats worrying me is Gondor just lost its capital meaning they will run over Gondor and then turn to me.

Ironically Mordor forces are harder to beat, most of Rhuns armies were Balcoth which my archer easily wiped and generals' cavalry were killed by my spear throwers, but orc bands fights toe to toe with my hearth spearmen and are less vulnrable to archers and are alot less vulnerable to cavalry, not to mention catapults and trolls which will cause losses no matter what you do.

If i really tried I could defend but how could I finally deal with them? I cant match Mordor in numbers and my economy is stretched to the max. and its probably my fault I didnt invest in Rhun's cities and just ignored them...

[Flinn]

It's all about luck ..

As you saw by yourself dealing with Ruhn is not impossible, so if you go for short campaing it is surely winnable, but in general you have to be lucky and be able to build up your empire and create a huge economy (thanks to Ruhn cities) to deal later on with Mordor and/or Harad.

As far as I saw as long as Gondor will keep at bay Mordor and Harad any "good" campaign is winnable, but if they will be wiped out relatively soon, one of this two factions (usually Harad) will become really too strong, and you might have a small chance only if your economy is really strong and allows you to maintain some extra stacks. In my experience I only had to give up a "good" campaign when such an event (Gondor completely overrun) happened.

Anyway, in this case, you can try to retreat towards your original territories, turtle and defend Ruhn's ones, build up economy there and hope to have enough time to be able to field some new stacks...

Ciao

Flinn

[ElvenKind]

Never retreat, never surrender.. THIS IS (SPARTAAA) I MEAN TOTAL WAR

[Coldfire88]

This is DAAALE... wait this is Dale, run for your liiiiiiiives!!!

anyway, developing Rhun's cities til they are producing money and troops would take a long while especially when I have centralized administration submod on.. which means I have to spare a few generals to run around cities. I want to quit but at the same time I dont want to quit, hmmmm.

[Flinn]

I know, is really annoying when you have to quit a good campaign, still not everything turns out as it should ..

I would have tried to turtle just to see if a possibility still exists, but without much hope, you know.. curiuos about the taste of the sand ..

Ciao

Flinn

[FC Groningen]

Hmm, judging by how your campaign goes, I'd recommend to simply go straight for the throat regarding Mordor. If you take Dol Guldur and kick them out of Mirkwood, they usually leave you alone and turn their attention to Gondor until you are ready for them. If you go for Dol Guldur early, there's a very large chance you only have to take Dol Guldur and sometimes the village west of it, Rhosgobel. After, you can completely focus on Rhun. Rhun as is known, has a very flexible and varied roster, but they lack 1 thing until they unlock the late tier units. Spearmen. The cavalry you have can do quite some damage against them, but avoid direct confrontations with their bodyguard units. They are rather slow for cavalry units though so it should be possible to avoid them. Try to make most of your missle units by fighting defensive battles and if you want to play like that, reload to fight in clear weather conditions. Also, if you're fighting a cavalry heavy stack, it might pay off to do battle inside a settlement to prevent them using cavalry to their full potential. Take Uldonavan early on as it's the only castle they can get their hands on for a long time, which means Rhun can only recruit crap for a very long time, unless a script spawns better units. If you allow the Dwarves to have Kugavod, they border Rhun for a very long time which should help you as well.

[ThaDoews]

It's different from game to game.

I've seen that OoMM have overrun northern Middleearth and i have also seen them be defeated before turn 60 on same level... :o

[Mhaedros]

Been there, won it (twice)

You just have to pick your battles and retreat from settlements when you're too undermanned instead of wasting men. Burn down dessert towns instead of capturing them, cos it takes longer time for Dale to recruit men in dessert regions

[Coldfire88]

Been there, won it (twice)

You just have to pick your battles and retreat from settlements when you're too undermanned instead of wasting men. Burn down dessert towns instead of capturing them, cos it takes longer time for Dale to recruit men in dessert regions

Thanks for remidning me about desert raegions, do you know find the rest of it? which areas productive to which culture etc.

I wont recruit but money there is just too much to ignore, moved my capital to the center and made more money than I thought, once I build a few mines...

[DrDragun]

My last Silvans game, Mordor had conquered most of Rohan including Edoras and Harad took most of Gondor including Dol Amroth by the time I was done with the Northern Orcs.

It's winnable. Those stacks don't last forever if you just keep chopping them down. Orc factions are very vulnerable to archers. Hit and run their infantry and you can win 700 vs 3000. Trolls and maybe catapults are really the only difficulty for an archer force. Good luck, you have a lot of meat to carve!

[Gallus]

You should actively help Gondor from the start. Send as many units as you can to Ithilien on turn 20. Mordor is your main enemy, not Rhun.

[Dude with the Food]

It's too late now. Defend against Mordor with 1/2-3/4 stacks in cities with mainly archers while your cavalry, generals, heavy infantry and some spearmen/archers go through Khand and Nurn. Mordor turning round to deal with you behind should leave you and opening to head into Ithilien with a shock army of weak troops and take a random city. It'll give Gondor some breathing space. Don't try to keep it. Just sack it and raid the area around you.

[Pyres Δt Varanasi]

You should actively help Gondor from the start. Send as many units as you can to Ithilien on turn 20. Mordor is your main enemy, not Rhun.

Aye . Mordor is the Enemy of ALL the Free Peoples XD

[C.Maximus]

Ive won a Dale campaign before, but the Dwarves helped me immensly in the beginning. I fought to hold that castle Uldonavan for atlest 40 turns untill i was eventually able to break through and launch a counter attack. Mordor.. Mordor wasnt a problem, they got wedged between Gondor and Harad.. Harad was the evil superpower and they kind of prevented mordor from being anything then a minor player in the world. I never got a chance to get down and fully fight Harad as I was detached and more focused on taking control over that valley where the Beorings live, to the east of the misty mountains while helping the Dwarves fight the orcs of the north.

[Ragga Muffin]

Yep on VH/VH, done it, and my mates done it, last year on v2.0 though. Archer death, you can never have too much longbow, u really need that Rhun castle south that somebody else mentioned and then the rest should be a formallity

Do rhun early and take back door into modor, move on the front if it looks like gondor taking one side or the other, that stuff is yours.

[Emperor Hantscher]

Am I the only one who absolutely does not care about winning a campaign? I just play and develop my empire as I want to. I try to keep my alliances and avoid wars when not necessary, so if my ally holds a region I need for victory condition I don't care. I may trade for it later but only if I want it as a necessity for my empire not if it's in my victory conditions. Maybe that's just me though.

[CatoTheYounger]

Am I the only one who absolutely does not care about winning a campaign? I just play and develop my empire as I want to. I try to keep my alliances and avoid wars when not necessary, so if my ally holds a region I need for victory condition I don't care. I may trade for it later but only if I want it as a necessity for my empire not if it's in my victory conditions. Maybe that's just me though.

Your not weird i usualy play the EXACT same way. Their are exceptions. If im an evil faction i like to conquer and destroy as much as possible and meet the victory conditions. If i am Dale i just try to build a complete northern Kingdom that can fend off al threats and unify the North. The dwarves however are fun to try to meet their victory conditions and retake every lost dwarven hold.

[Mhaedros]

I don't care about winning, only warfare and destruction

[deusvult6]

Here you go. From the modding aid at the beginning of the EDB.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

;------------------------------------------------------------------------
;--- Unit availability --------------------------------------------------
;------------------------------------------------------------------------
;Elves
;1.0	and hidden_resource forest
;0.5	and hidden_resource grasland
;0.25	and hidden_resource mountains or hidden_resource desert
;
;Dwarves
;1.0	and hidden_resource mountains
;0.33	and hidden_resource forest or hidden_resource grasland
;0.25	and hidden_resource desert
;
;Humans
;1.0	and hidden_resource grasland
;0.5	and hidden_resource forest
;0.25	and hidden_resource desert or hidden_resource mountains
;
;Humans evil
;1.0	and hidden_resource desert or hidden_resource grasland
;0.5	and hidden_resource forest or hidden_resource mountains
;
;Evil
;1.0	 and hidden_resource mountains
;0.75	 and hidden_resource grasland
;0.5	 and hidden_resource forest or hidden_resource desert
;
;------------------------------------------------------------------------
;--- Population growth --------------------------------------------------
;------------------------------------------------------------------------
;Elves
;Guild:		and hidden_resource forest		population_growth_bonus bonus 1-3
;
;Dwarves
;Mines:		and hidden_resource silver gold iron	population_growth_bonus bonus 1-3
;
;Humans
;Breed:		and hidden_resource grasland		population_growth_bonus bonus 1-3
;
;Humans evil
;Trade Posts:	and hidden_resource desert		population_growth_bonus bonus 1-3
;
;Evil
;Temples:	and hidden_resource mountains/grasland	population_growth_bonus bonus 1-2

[magicgunnar]

To answer your question: yes.

The superstacks are not unlimited, but appear when you deal a major blow, like taking their capital etc, so destroying two superstacks are good, they will not come back soon.

Dont waste money on melee-units at least not against Mordor. I seldom use melee-units, and only if the enemy has a lot of cavalry. If they only have one or two units of cavalry my archers can take them out before they are a problem, then you only need archers and cavalry.