How to keep Rhun in check with the Dwarves?

[Jojobobo]

So I started a VH/VH Dwarf campaign about a year ago now, and things went great. As long as you send large stack armies to Gundabad and Carn Dum early on, even with their garrison scripts the die easily; following that taking Moria and the rest isn't a problem, and Dwarves are fairly good at fending off invasions.

However, Rhun caused serious problems for me. At first it was fine as Dale keeps them in line fine, but I found eventually the Dale fell and Rhun subsequently turn all their armies against me. Even though the Dwarves are good at fending off seiges, Rhun did the trick of sending an army in as soon as they lost a siege battle giving me no option to recover my troops; and trying to send in across a supporting army is hopeless as Rhun will engage you any chance it gets and the Dwarves get massacred in the open field. As such Azanulimbar-Dum fell, and all the rest of my cities that way were only lightly garrisoned (I did not consider them to be under threat) and Rhun proceeded to steamroll me.

I'm now looking to play another campaign with the Dwarves on VH/VH, but don't want this to be a problem again. Does anyone have any advice on dealing with Rhun with the Dwarves? I thought maybe if I funded the Dale that might alleviate the problem, as their armies are far more equipped to deal with Rhun than mine, but I'm not sure how well this would work. I don't really want to go on the offensive early as then I would be fighting a war on two fronts, plus I would quite happily not tackle Rhun at all as nothing they have is necessary to take for the Dwarves' victory conditions.

[Mhaedros]

I'd just keep a large garrison at Azanulimbar-Dum and make sure that the armies of Rhun don't come north of the River Running in Dale's territory. If they do, you better have half a stack ready to help them.

[Lortano]

I'd just keep a large garrison at Azanulimbar-Dum and make sure that the armies of Rhun don't come north of the River Running in Dale's territory. If they do, you better have half a stack ready to help them.

Or you could target them first by taking Kugovad and nipping the bud if you will by destroying Rhun before they become too strong.

[FC Groningen]

Seems you gave your own answer. You can't focus 100% on the orc factions while you ignore Rhun and let Dale die. Try to use a natural border to fend of Rhun otherwise. Try to go for Kugavod early on and then keep a garrison on the bridge between it and Rhomen and you are probably good to go. Dwarves should fare exceedingly well in bridge battles and Rhun much less. At the very least, their javelin units never use their javelins in such fights.

[Macilrille]

Also, as Mhaedros said in another thread about Dorfs; it is probably best to fight Rhün at fords and fortifications. There should also be certain tiles around you can stand on and use as a natural fortification. I always remember those when I find them by luck and then fight battles there.

I was never myself good at playing Dorf, but Mhaedros advice seems sound.

[Mhaedros]

The thing about targeting Kugavod, and Rhun in general is that you can't recruit units as fast down in grassland/dessert regions, so you have to bring reinforcements from Azanulimbar-Dum and Erebor, which will take a real long time.

As Mac points out that I have pointed out, you need to pick your battles (third time I've written this in a week I believe) Settlements, forts and bridges are your friends.

[Macilrille]

As are those hilltops with only one way in, etc...

I never did well as Dorf, but what would taking Kugavod, plundering it, destroying all buildings and leave it to rebel not work to give him breathing space? And when Rhûn retakes it, do it again... I sometimes do that as Gondor with Harad settlements.

[FC Groningen]

If you ask me, camping on the bridge near Rhomen works best still. To prevent losses, have 2 generals in the stack and have them stand at the front to prevent losses. A few units of axethrowers and later, some crossbowmen and you're probably good to go.

[Mhaedros]

The difference is that as Gondor you can board your ships and be off, while as dwarves you'll get chased by some of the best mounted units in Middle Earth

[Macilrille]

The difference is that as Gondor you can board your ships and be off, while as dwarves you'll get chased by some of the best mounted units in Middle Earth

You forget that I turtle, so I only hit the nearest Haradic settlements, and on foot. My ships block the ford at Pelargir and keep the Haradrim off Tolfalas. Later they prevent Corsair Invasions.

Edit, though Imrahil and the Gondorian Generals are... different to Dorfs in that they can overrun almost anything Harad can send at them.

I do not know whether it is possible to take Kugavod and retreat, but it might be if you choose the retreat route wisely.

[Jojobobo]

Thanks for the speedy responses all. The consensus seems to be that I should take Kugavod and then park on the bridge, so that's what I'll do. Honestly the Dale does a very good job of defending against them for a very long time so I don't think I'll act on Kugavod too quickly; I'll use spies so I can tell when things are chancey for the Dale.

[Dunadd]

Not sure, as i've not played as dwarves, but i'd have thought you want to have pikemen/spearmen/halberdiers if you can get them since Rhun has lots of cavalry - and you're going to need plenty of archers/crossbowmen/ artillery to counter Rhuns archers, horse archers and skirmishers - and to kill routers as you won't have cavalry.

I know as Dale there are human Rhovanian riders and spearmen available as mercenaries to represent Rhovanian remnant allies across most of the North-East (Dale areas and four former Rhovanion ones plus Dorwinion) - can you get those as dwarves? If so their cavalry and spearmen might help a lot. The cavalry have low defense but a high attack and charge bonus, so if you charge enemy in the flank/back with them they'd help alot - or they could counter Rhun cavalry with the aid of dwarf or mercenary human pole-arm troops.

There are also mercenary hunters who can help counter Rhun skirmishers if you put them in the second rank and tell them to fire at will until the enemy close.

[Aldor]

I don't know about the mercenaries, but I would go for Rhomen (has a garrison script) after Kuvagod.

The bridge under Rhomen is the only passage they can take and Rhomen is a quite nice city.

Rhomen + Kuvagod will pay for the army.

[Mhaedros]

The Rhovanion mercenaries aren't available for Dwarves, but Dale Cavalry is as merc.

[Wizad]

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Take Kugavod early, then take Rhomen in the midgame.

[Jojobobo]

Oddly, I left Azanulimbar-Dum virtually ungarrisoned when I started this time and Rhun took it virtually straight away -it's not something that's happened to me before even on VH/VH. So I started again (again) and this time I did something completely left field - I broke my alliance with the Dale and forged one with Rhun! I had to give them Lune-Land, but that's no big deal. If the alliance holds I'll be in a pretty great situation, first starting on the Orcs and then picking the Dale off with the help of my new buddies. I'd imagine having all the Dale lands and Erebor would make quite a bit of money.

[Deceneus]

Oddly, I left Azanulimbar-Dum virtually ungarrisoned when I started this time and Rhun took it virtually straight away -it's not something that's happened to me before even on VH/VH. So I started again (again) and this time I did something completely left field - I broke my alliance with the Dale and forged one with Rhun! I had to give them Lune-Land, but that's no big deal. If the alliance holds I'll be in a pretty great situation, first starting on the Orcs and then picking the Dale off with the help of my new buddies. I'd imagine having all the Dale lands and Erebor would make quite a bit of money.

Don't forget gifting as an option. Have a Diplomat give 100 Florin "gifts" for a number of turns to Rhun to make Rhun "like" you more. And the more they like you the less probable they will attack. At least until Dale is defeated. You don't need to ally with them, you just need to be the least "disliked" enemy.

[clumsywordsmith]

Thus far I've found it rather effective to just steamroll across Rhun from the very first turn as the dwarves; Gimli and Co. haven't had any trouble keeping the orcs in check to the west, and more than that have actually been expanding despite having nothing better than dwarven warriors. Meantime I pushed straight through the Rhun capital and on to the south, with a second invasion force poised to mop up what's left of Northern Rhun.

The trick, lame as it is, is to rely on auto-resolve more than anything else when facing off with Rhun. Those javeliners will ravage your dwarves in an actual fight, but the computer can usually give me far better victories than I can manage on my own. Even with Dalish cavalry support. (So depressing, to watch a troop of dwarven warriors get melted as they charge for a band of lowly tribesmen...)

Quite the opposite of the orcs, on the other hand, where dwarves are quite capable of scoring victories against four times their number in the early game.

First time playing the dwarves, and I must say they are the single most frustrating faction I could imagine. It seems like simply everything outruns them...

[Brave Brave Sir Robin]

Put 3-4 units in the fort across the river from Dorwinion. Two will be free to upkeep and early on it stops Rhun from taking Dorwinion and they start focusing to the south more. When Rhun focuses on the south of the sea, they expand slower and Dale does better. I did this and Dale stood their ground against Rhun until I had destroyed OOG and was moving south on Moria.

[Jojobobo]

It turns out my alliance to Rhun (and later Mordor) wasn't destined to last: I called a truce with the OotMM whilst I finished off the OoG, and then when I started fighting the OotMM Rhun had conveniently made an alliance with them. As such, they used this as grounds to cleave the alliance they had made with me and immediately started being hostile. I just formed alliances with the majority of good factions after that point.

So I took Kugavod and Dorwinion, and keeping a half stack on the Kugavod bridge did work fine to rebuff attacks. In the mean time I had taken Moria and killed off the OotMM, but of course an invasion got called there in short order. Although I valiantly defended Moria for a good 50 turns or so, eventually it fell as I just didn't have strong enough supply lines of new troops to support it. However, the High Elves immediately re-took it, and so I traded them Kugavod and Dorwinion for it being the settlements least important to me. In short order, as the High Elves didn't have any units in Kugavod and Dorwinion (no mercs in the area for them and no culture to recruit units) they got taken back by Rhun.

Finally, after taking Mordor's Mirkwood settlements, I'm back to trying to kill off Rhun about 200 turns in - starting with Kugavod and Dorwinion (I have 2 full stacks comprised of 3 generals each and then Dale Cavalry, Iron Crossbows, Iron Guard and Axemen of Erebor) and seeing how far I can get through their settlements until I run out of steam. With any luck things will go well!

It happened to me once as Dwarves that Rhun went north of the Kugavod forest and attacked me in the back...I obviously held the bridge, so I had reinforcements to bring, but if I did that, I would've had to let the remaining Rhun stacks through without a fight. First time I've ever been outsmarted by an AI

This happened to me too, fortunately they didn't try and come over the bridge at the same time. As such I could just use the stack at the bridge to fend them off, I used spies to keep track of their comings and goings anyway so I couldn't be taken at unawares.

Put 3-4 units in the fort across the river from Dorwinion. Two will be free to upkeep and early on it stops Rhun from taking Dorwinion and they start focusing to the south more. When Rhun focuses on the south of the sea, they expand slower and Dale does better. I did this and Dale stood their ground against Rhun until I had destroyed OOG and was moving south on Moria.

I would actually let them take Dorwinion as, in my experience, what then happens is they send the majority of armies from Dorwinion west into Dale territory. If you keep Dwarves in that fort north of the river, you are less than 1 turn's worth of movement from a siege (plus the fact Dwarves shouldn't really be concerned if Rhun choses to turn the tables and siege the fort as most Dwarvern armies excel in sieges). Have a spy in the settlement, and when they have left very few units in the town take them at unawares - as there is no garrison script I took the settlement when there was only one general unit there which is presumably a lesser force than whatever rebel army was in it beforehand. Doing this cuts off the Rhun supply line into Dale territory - as even if Rhun has managed to take a Dale settlement they won't have the culture to make troops or fresh supplies from Dorwinion to maintain their efforts and the Dale will in time re-take it. Effectively, you have weakened Rhun by cutting off fresh troops to a fruitless offensive and covered your ass at Kuvagod in one fell swoop.