The Campaigns Addon (for LotRTW v3.0+)

[Bardo]

Are you on the modified main campaign or one of the provincial campaigns?

The main campaign. I started a VH/VH game with galadrims to see if it is as hard as some player said.
Anyway, I do not plan to make any change to your addon, I prefer to include it as you release it.

[CapnDan]

The main campaign. I started a VH/VH game with galadrims to see if it is as hard as some player said.
Anyway, I do not plan to make any change to your addon, I prefer to include it as you release it.

Yea, Excellent! I'll really look forward to hearing what you think. Especially since I have little inclanation towards VH/VH campaigns.

[Bardo]

I advance slowly because I can't play much lately, but I'm liking this galadrim campaign.

I find the difficulty of this faction similar to vanilla version, as I remember it. It is hard to recover if you make some mistake, or if you lose some important battle, but it is not impossible. Once you get a full stack of elves, there is no AI army that can stop you, even at VH level.

Your changes are very subtle and it is hard to notice them, but I'd say they do improve the playability. I think the galadrim faction is easier to handle, but at same time, the enemy AI seems tougher than I remember. I have read the whole readme, but I still need to check the files to see exactly what you changed.

In my game, I started by building markets and healing houses to maximize income, and I set all taxes to very high when possible. I used the initial forces to conquer 4 rebel settlements (the 2 adjacent to lorien, and the 2 of south deep forest), and then I conquered Dol Guldur by turn 20.
When I had my first full stack, I tried a rush attack to try to kill Sauron, but there were too many enemy armies, and I had to retreat before conquering Moranon.
Isengard conquered Helm's deep and Edoras by turn 15, and I had to help rohan to prevent the fall of other cities. Mordor conquered Osgiliath and Minas Tirith by turn 25, but Gondor is still resisting without my help.
I conquered Moria around turn 40, and now I'm trying to conquer Orthanc before they destroy the weakened rohirrims. Money is no longer problematic, but population is, so I can only recruit units in Lorien. I think I should have kept low taxes in the first settlement that I conquered, in order to upgrade it sooner, but the money is really sort at start (even when you increased it, I think). I'm also curious to know if it is worth to send militia units from my capital to disband them in my smallest cities in order to boost the population in the outer regions.

I created alliances with all the good factions and no one has betrayed me yet, except a fast attack from silvans to dale, but they made peace again a few turns later. I still do not know if the chances of being betrayed are higher or lower at VH difficulty. Something I do not like about VH level is the high casualties when I use autoresolve, that forces me to play every battle, but we never found a workaround for this.

Someone said that there is no strategy in battle because elves armies are full of archers, but I find it really challenging to try to maximize the effect of my arrows and minimize my casualties. I personally use armies with half of infantry to be able to stop the enemy units, and the other half of archers to move them behind the enemy line and shoot them in the back.

I'll open another topic later to comment some issues about campaign balance that affect both our vanilla campaign and your addon, related to pop growth and extermination scripts. And I'll try to talk about specific changes of your addon when I have more time to check them properly. I just wanted to say that overall I'm liking them so far.

[CapnDan]

Cool, well glad to hear the Addon is holding up to scrutiny so far.

Enemy AI: while I didn't change any of the tactical AI (that I can remember), having played around with the unit stats, recruitment values, scripted armies, and autoresolve values seemed to play a role in having AI field, maintain, and make better use of better balanced armies.

I am particularly pleased to hear the strategic AI is doing so well though.

Probably right to focus on the home regions really, many of the outer regions, even when upgraded, may not actually be able to produce top-level units.

Anyway, glad to hear it's so far so good. Already looking forward to the next update and especially to hearing how the process of trying to hold Dol-Guldur works out for ya.

[Bardo]

I'm around turn 90 now, with isengard and orc rabbles almost defeated. Mordor has just conquered the last Gondor region, so Gondor is now eliminated, even when I killed several full stacks of orcs trying to help them.
I have liked the campaign, very challenging, but I think the scripted reinforcements for Mordor appear too often. Most of my battles with Mordor was against these scripted units that feels repetitive. It is the main thing that I'd suggest, to minimize the script reinforcements, or even to try to remove them, because Mordor looks powerful enough in the later game without them.

The only other thing that I found odd was to recruit lothlorien archers in the markets (even when I know I made something similar in my version of the campaign that I didn't like much either). I'd suggest to allow the 3th level barrack in these cities even without elven resources, and to recruit the lothlorien sentinels there.

I also remember to try to design the units available in the forge and the barracks, so it is not possible to recruit units with heavy armor unless there is at least one forge in the settlement. Even when I admit that your redesign of recruitment trees is an improvement (in general, not only elves), I think you did not take it into account, and I think it could be re-implemented without affecting the balance. I mean, just to give higher barracks the requirement of some forge present in the city.

[CapnDan]

I'm around turn 90 now, with isengard and orc rabbles almost defeated. Mordor has just conquered the last Gondor region, so Gondor is now eliminated, even when I killed several full stacks of orcs trying to help them.
I have liked the campaign, very challenging, but I think the scripted reinforcements for Mordor appear too often. Most of my battles with Mordor was against these scripted units that feels repetitive. It is the main thing that I'd suggest, to minimize the script reinforcements, or even to try to remove them, because Mordor looks powerful enough in the later game without them.

The scripted Easterling and Southron armies after turn 30? If those ones then yea my fault, typo (or actually missing 2nd set of random chance values).
The scripted stacks were Easterlings and Southron units rather than mordor orcs yea?

I also remember to try to design the units available in the forge and the barracks, so it is not possible to recruit units with heavy armor unless there is at least one forge in the settlement. Even when I admit that your redesign of recruitment trees is an improvement (in general, not only elves), I think you did not take it into account, and I think it could be re-implemented without affecting the balance. I mean, just to give higher barracks the requirement of some forge present in the city.

Admittedly it's not perfect. In general the redesign follows the same philosophy but with minor exceptions made here and there for gameplay reasons. For the most part the forges are required for the next level of barracks. Did you have a particular unit (other than sentinels at markest) that seemed out of place?

[Bardo]

The scripted Easterling and Southron armies after turn 30? If those ones then yea my fault, typo (or actually missing 2nd set of random chance values).
The scripted stacks were Easterlings and Southron units rather than mordor orcs yea?

I noticed mainly mordor armies with orc units (and trolls) that appeared near dol goldur, even when it was already conquered. I have not checked the scripts, but I'd say I have seen this kind of army (around 10 units including 1 troll and 1 pit guard) appearing long after turn 30. I have also noticed the mordor armies with easterling units.
I know it's me who included these scripted reinforcements, but I'd prefer if we could reduce them so the same army can not be spawned more than once.

Did you have a particular unit (other than sentinels at markest) that seemed out of place?

Not really, although I only tested the campaign with elves. I have read about the changes to other factions, but I can't say until I play them.

[CapnDan]

I noticed mainly mordor armies with orc units (and trolls) that appeared near dol goldur, even when it was already conquered. I have not checked the scripts, but I'd say I have seen this kind of army (around 10 units including 1 troll and 1 pit guard) appearing long after turn 30. I have also noticed the mordor armies with easterling units.
I know it's me who included these scripted reinforcements, but I'd prefer if we could reduce them so the same army can not be spawned more than once.

Cool, well that's useful feedback and also, now that you've mentioned it I have passingly thought about that same issue before but never motivated to look into it.

So, I've adjusted the odds for the scripted armies (War of the Ring Campaign) after turn 30 and added a specific end turn to them as well. The result should be only a handful of the randomly spawned support armies per campaign. Just enough to give the not always brilliant strategic AI a little boost here and there.

Glad to have the comment/reminder, it also reminded me to review and address an issue with greenwood elves recruitment in the Numenor Campaign aswell.

[CapnDan]

Finishing Touches on Campaigns Addon V2.7 - Invitation to thoughts and feedback


1. Numenor Campaign Ending:
I played this faction/campaign through just for fun recently and it was very entertaining right until I reached Mordor and I found myself so sick of the Mordor slog that I just abandoned the campaign. So, I've been thinking for a while on a set of scripted events that might make for a more concise and still suitably epic (initial) ending for the Numenor campaign.

What I've come up with so far:
-Add to campaign description and perhaps an advice popup too a note that the endgame script executes if numenor (with Aragorn in the field nearby) holds both camps outside the black gate for at least two turns. (getting to these camps and holding them should in of itself be an interesting challenge)

-a script checks if both settlements held by Numenor and that is Aragorn nearby: if yes, advisor popup "Scouts report the Black Gates are open and and barely guarded. Surely this must be a trap, will you proceed anyway? A small force of elves has offered to assist us if we do make the attempt. (Form an army with Aragorn and click 'show me how' to proceed through the Black Gates)"

-If the player chooses to take the shortcut Aragorn and his stack are moved to the plains inside Mordor about halfway to Barad-Dur, a small supporting force of elves is spawned, and an impossibly large ambush force of Mordor also
-I'm thinking to make the ambush force composed of a handful of strong stacks near but not touching the two player armies and mostly commanded by generals with the 'static' trait so they don't just run off (for a few turns at least) - then have maybe two other stacks with generals who can move around and do as they please (maybe one commanded by a Sauron clone as long as real Sauron is still without the Ring and contained in his fortress - I will also disable the invincible Sauron scripts in this case)

-My thought here is to have a scripted event that is likely to lead to a truly desperate but not quite impossible battle or series of battles with rapidly diminishing resources that have both a degree of player choice to them and an element of random chance (tough to know that the floating generals will do, and might also make two possible variants of each scripted army just for variety). Also real potential for a Pyrrhic victory and being unable to conquer Barad-Dur after the fact.


So, that's my thought so far. Any thoughts?

[Bardo]

In my galadrim campaign it happened something similar to me. Once isengard and orc rabbles were destroyed (around turn 100), there was a huge amount of mordor armies. I was destroying 1 or 2 full stacks per turn, and I got a bit tired. In this case, I'm glad there is a script that destroys Mordor when Sauron is killed, and I like how you disabled Sauron invulnerability by conquering only Dol Guldur and Minas Morgul. This way there is still a chance to finish the game without conquering every mordor region one by one, and I'm very close to achieve that. Its being a good final for the campaign so far.

I have not played your numenor campaign, and I do not know how much it depends on scripts. If it is heavly scripted like the "fellowship of the ring" campaign, then your suggestion could work. Else, I'd suggest to adjust the existing scripts so it is not that annoying to fight against Mordor in the final stages of the game. In your numenor campaign, why you do not find good enough to kill sauron in a final battle at barad-dur in order to destroy Mordor?
If it is because there are too many armies, you could reduce or remove the scripted reinforcements. If it is too hard to avoid the Sauron invulnerability, you could remove this script too, so there are less battles needed at the end.

In the main campaign, I'm inclined to try to reduce as much as possible the use of scripts. For example, I'm liking the idea to replace the script "return of the noldor" by regular recruitment at buildings that require long construction times, to avoid situations where the script is not triggered because some of the checked factions is dead. I'm also liking the idea to replace the scripts that create special units like trollmen or ents, by regular recruitments on certain buildings (as you did for some units).

[CapnDan]

The numenor campaign is minimally scripted. Minimally scrpted but with a couple of little additions. The Rohan and Gondor games, for example, are timed battles for survival that end around turn 45 (with a scripted battle similar to the one I'm suggesting for the Numenor faction - or rather they will in 2.7 - I don't think the final battles are in 2.6..).

The main reason I'm looking to script a special finale is mostly because I'm just tired of conquering Mordor the usual way since it's a requirement for almost every faction in almost every campaign. So, looking for a way to streamline or change it up, just for variety sake.

Other than that, the story of the Numenor campaign is a desperate final last chance against Mordor. So, Mordor generally conquers a fairly large territory by around turn 40 which makes it relatively easy for a clever player to sneak in close but then end up needing to play a couple defensive battles on Black gates or Minas Morgul, both of which are still slightly buggy despite being cool to look at, so I also wanted to try and avoid more of those too (lose battle due to settlement bug rather than any other reason is frustrating..).


As for "return of noldor" scripts - they have been adjusted slightly in the Campaigns addon and do occur quite reliably now. Otherwise special buildings for special units - I'm all for it - anything that gives the player greater sense of control and strategic flexibility.

[Bardo]

I understand your reasons. Since all good factions must destroy mordor to win the game, it is good to have some alternative ending. That was our reason to add the script that destroys mordor when Sauron is killed, or when the One Ring is destroyed. I see a good thing that you make an alternative script for numenor campaign.
I remember that my main concern about those game-ending scripts was to avoid the possibility to win the game too soon by using them. In order to prevent premature endings I added 2 scripts that now I'm not liking very much: the invulnerability of Sauron until you conquer certain regions (I like much more your readjusted version), and the spawn of orc armies near Mount Doom when there are enemy armies around (I plan to readjust it myself so it is only triggered in the first stages of the campaign).

-If the player chooses to take the shortcut Aragorn and his stack are moved to the plains inside Mordor about halfway to Barad-Dur, a small supporting force of elves is spawned, and an impossibly large ambush force of Mordor also

-I'm thinking to make the ambush force composed of a handful of strong stacks near but not touching the two player armies and mostly commanded by generals with the 'static' trait so they don't just run off (for a few turns at least) - then have maybe two other stacks with generals who can move around and do as they please (maybe one commanded by a Sauron clone as long as real Sauron is still without the Ring and contained in his fortress - I will also disable the invincible Sauron scripts in this case)

You may move Aragorn army directly near Barad-dur and force a battle against the real Sauron, so you do not need to clone it. Since you know the unique name of both commanders, you can give them reinforcements as you please. Or you may remove the trait that prevents Sauron from moving and use the scripts to move it out of Barad-dur and meet Aragorn midway (iirc, in the rometw tutorial they use this kind of scripts).

But I have forgotten many things about scripts, I guess you know now better what can be done and what not.

[CapnDan]

... and the spawn of orc armies near Mount Doom when there are enemy armies around (I plan to readjust it myself so it is only triggered in the first stages of the campaign).

Haha! I've actually adjusted these quite a bit with the Addon but was never willing to completely get rid of them. Initially because I figured there must have been a good reason to have them, and then later they just became a thing I took for granted... Never even considered just removing them entirely!

You may move Aragorn army directly near Barad-dur and force a battle against the real Sauron...

Already done for the Gondor and Rohan, wanted to try for something special for Numenor. Like a grand finale! ;P

[Bardo]

I have finally finished my galadrim campaign. It is one of the few times that I have continued a campaign until all victory conditions are met. These new conditions looks more reasonable to me.
In the first versions of our campaign, I used to stop playing because it soon became too easy, but this campaign was never easy, it was very challenging until the end. I needed 150 turns and I played several epic battles. I lost some of them and I even lost some settlements. Celeborn died while defending Dol Guldur in a battle where there was only one survival unit, and Haldir was ambused and killed while trying to free Rohan from Mordor domination. My last battle against Sauron was a bit dissapointing because I killed him with arrows from the back (not very fair I admit), but good battle against a full stack of orcs (and I had to win like 10 battles in the previous 10 turns until I reached this final battle at Barad-dur...).

As I said, the only thing I did not like was the huge amount of orc armies that forced me to play many repetitive battles, but that is mainly fault of my scripts as we commented. I'd also suggest to avoid units with 0 recruitment times for mordor, in order to encourage AI armies full of greater orcs in the final stages of the game. When there are lower orcs in an army, I find it too easy to make them flee and propagate the panic to the rest of units.

I just wanted to say that your changes seems to work, and I suggest everyone to try this addon if you plan to start new campaigns. If we release a new version, we will surely use this addon as reference.

Good job!

[CapnDan]

I have finally finished my galadrim campaign. It is one of the few times that I have continued a campaign until all victory conditions are met.

Nice!

In the first versions of our campaign, I used to stop playing because it soon became too easy, but this campaign was never easy, it was very challenging until the end. I needed 150 turns and I played several epic battles. I lost some of them and I even lost some settlements. Celeborn died while defending Dol Guldur in a battle where there was only one survival unit, and Haldir was ambused and killed while trying to free Rohan from Mordor domination. My last battle against Sauron was a bit dissapointing because I killed him with arrows from the back (not very fair I admit), but good battle against a full stack of orcs (and I had to win like 10 battles in the previous 10 turns until I reached this final battle at Barad-dur...).

Cool, yes very happy to hear that was the result in the campaign!
Part of the theory for randomly invincible Sauron was maybe to make this sort of thing less simple. I figure if there's a ~20% chance he'll be invincible in a given battle one might have to engage only to use up all their arrows and realize they'll need to escape! The only major problem I foresee with this revised approach though is having a 'no chance to retreat' battle within Mordor and your army just being destoyed rather than retreat - that could be annoying..

As I said, the only thing I did not like was the huge amount of orc armies that forced me to play many repetitive battles, but that is mainly fault of my scripts as we commented. I'd also suggest to avoid units with 0 recruitment times for mordor, in order to encourage AI armies full of greater orcs in the final stages of the game. When there are lower orcs in an army, I find it too easy to make them flee and propagate the panic to the rest of units.

The scripted armies thing is a very useful feedback that I've tried to adjust down in the next version - it tends to be a tricky balance sometimes given how we know well the campaign AI doesn't always make all the best/most reasonable decisions.

About the lower level orcs present in later game armies. I may have to adjust, although I'm not exactly sure how I could at this point. I've always liked the idea of Mordor generally maintaining large stacks with lower level orcs strewn about here and there. It seemed to fit the lore and I preferred the style of having the player army of intrepid soldiers facing off against endless waves of orcs slowly breaking down your numbers. Much preferred it to facing off against later game Mordor armies of all top tier orc units with stats that are almost better than the main line infantry of human factions. I'd also introduced this as a playstyle challenge for Mordor players where hordes of low-tier units remains a very viable (maybe even a best) option even into the late game.

But all in all it's immensely gratifying to hear you enjoyed the campaign!

[Halvar von Flake]

Hello CapnDan and Bardo, I would like to play a new campaign but I have troubles installing Rome and ALX under Windows 10 System...can you give any advice to get them installed? Thanks in advance!

EDIT: Managed to get LotR-TW installed via steam! Although I don't like steam I am happy to get my favourite mod running after a long break due to problems with my computer systems! Endless thanks to the LotR-TW-Team

Wlesmana, Bardo, and Seth Krn3ll

! Especially to CapnDan still improving this awesome piece of modding!

[CapnDan]

EDIT: Managed to get LotR-TW installed via steam!

Ah, seems I'm late to the game.
Glad you got it working. If you're having problems at any point just try a google search of "rtw on Windows 10" you are apparently not the first person to have problems.

[Halvar von Flake]

Thanks for advice, CapnDan! I guess I have to use annoying steam...Windows 10 is a destructive system trying to manipulate all non-conform installations with every update.

[CapnDan]

Right, Campaigns Addon v2.7_beta can be had at the link below:

http://www55.zippyshare.com/v/EHq1mHV6/file.html (use of an ad-blocker on this site is highly recommended from what I hear)

v2.7 consists almost entirely of incremental changes in line with what's already done (and mostly focused on improvement to the Return of Numenor Custom Campaigns). It's just Beta for now until some brave souls give it a try and can confirm that everything works fine and I've not foolishly neglected to include some file or something.

[jrhindo]

I had started a mordor campaign, but couldnt resist playing dwarves again. Man feels so nice to be op It is a bit balanced in all honesty really, the initial shoestring budget and army is nicely tough, then the hordes you face mean you need tactics and maneuvering skills. AI wouldnt do so well anyway, with auto resolved battles as a big enough balancing factor. A problem i have was when about turn 100, i had cleared most of the misty mountains and was preparing to clear moria, the noldors attacked the blue mountain settlements. Use console to beat and them and script diplo forced peace, couldnt understand why they had attacked. At that point rohan was almost gone, dunmen were in the shire, gondor was just dol amroth and west, and the galadrims only had the eastern part of lorien forest.
Pretty sure it is the default war of the ring campaign. Wish the good guys would try to fight evil.