MOS: How often does Gondor and Rohan get raped by Isengard in your campaigns as GOOD factions?

[Macilrille]

In my MOS Campaigns as any good factions since 1.6 came out (possibly 1.5?); Isengard always owns Rohan and Gondor, allowing Mordor to own the Elves, Dale, Gondor and Rohan.

It could just me me, but...

How often does this happen in your campaigns?



Our feedback improves the mod, and as it is, it seems that a balance has been upset.

And do not forget; I love MOS. So it is not criticising, merely hoping to aid the team (Stylix ATM), fix it if it is indeed unbalanced.

[Macilrille]

Three campaigns, two as FPoE, one as HE.

[bunnysbestfriend]

It seems I am not permitted to vote. So far I am playing my first campaign with MOS 1.61 as Sylvan Elves on hard/hard. In Turn 89, Isengard currently only holds Isengard. Rohan is intact. Gondor seems strong, having captured Umbar and keeping it. Rhun is reduced to 3 provinces courtesy of Dwarves, Dale, Mordor, me and Lorien. Mordor has recaptured Morannon from Gondor recently but now faces an invasion from Lorien. OOM was eliminated early. Eriador is very weak and being thrashed by Orcs of Gundabad.

[Ngugi]

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[Industrious1]

In my games Isengard usually conquers western Rohan fairly swiftly but then the eastern half holds on for a bit until Sauron calls an invastion on them. As for Gondor...it is usually Mordor and Harad that eliminate them from what I've seen.

For whatever its worth I've never had a game where Rohan did well, they are almost always first to go..but that may be by design?

[AdmiralThrawn]

It seems like, while their cavalry is certainly good, it isn't terribly effective against the Uruk Hai with their heavy armor, rapid crossbows, and pikes. Maybe they could be rebalanced to give their horsemen some more power like they had in the books/movies?

[Ministry]

Rohan should just die to the Uruks, they were on the outs anyways with our friend Grima helping.

[Flinn]

I noticed that Isengard has the tendence to go south against Gondor, but in general Gondor is still doing quite good (in 1.4 MOS campaigns it was highly probable that they were steamrolled by Mordor quite early, something it is not going to happen with the latest releases).

Actually I see Rohan suffering much more than usual (in fact they lost all the lands west of Isen to Isengard, so that it has the way opened towards Gondor), but not yet seen Gondor completely owned by Isengard and I must also say that Lorien and SE usually do good against Mordor.
I concur that for lore reasons Isengard should not go south to Gondor (at least until Rohan is completely wiped out) and in general they should be orientated more towards nord and FPoE, but to be completely honest, with the latest releases, I've just played only one campaign over turn 150 so it can be that my experience is only partial.

If I might add, to me is great that almost each time the AI development tends to be different, even though I noticed a strong tendence to have an underpowered (better to say uncommonly stationary) Mordor if you play as evil faction and Gondor if you are one of the good guys. Furthermore, usually by turn 50 or so all the rebels settlements are taken, with the exception of those on the sea side of Dunland, which means that HE seems to be far slower in taking such settlements compared to before, so probably the reason why Isengard goes south is that they miss the presence of HE on their northern borders.

at any rate, I can't complain about variety, and after many campaigns with always the same development, it's not that bad to see something new and surprising, even if it is bad for my side

[Terrorgnom]

Played as well hotseat (2 players, OoG + OoMM, Rhun + Harad, Dwarves + HE, Lorien + Silvan), as singleplayer (Dwarves, Lorien, HE, Mordor...), and always Rohan got conquered on the east side, eriador gets bashed from dunland, OotMM, OoG and Isengard (while Isengard has mor tendency to ge south), and Gondor get's in real trouble as soon as not only Mordor and Harad are attacking from south-east, but Isengard from North-west, too.

There was only one exception: i played one game without garrison script.
Isengard died at about round 10, Mordor at ~60, and by now (~120) Arnor and Rohan are batteling, as well as the Dwarves and Gondor against Dale. OoG seem to be conquered by the silvan elves almost entirely, Rhun only holds 2 Cities or so, OoMM are still quiet strong, and Dunland is really good.

Dunno how this all could happen. Played as Lorien, minding my own buiseness (okay, got Moria and Dol Guldur quiet early, giving both to the Dwarves, hoping they would bash the Orcs... instead Moria turned Rebel again, and the dark Lord called an invasion on Dol Guldur...
Anyway, guess i won't play without garrison script anymore, that one was just weird.
But with it, Gondor and Rohan always get in big trouble and/or wiped out quiet early...even without those scripts for the evil factions.

[Redgrave]

Even with all pro-evil scripts disabled, Rohan & Gondor get smashed 75% of the time. It's not 100% of the time because 25% of the time I'm either playing as Rohan or Gondor, or playing as a faction close to them (e.g. EoL), meaning I smash them! I'd love some more low/mid-tier units for Gondor that are slightly more powerful than the basic militia, and I'd also love wider availability of the high-mid/high tier units- e.g. Blackroot Vale archers, Axemen of Lossarnach and Knights of the realm of Gondor (who I've never managed to get in my campaign ). I'd like some more quality infantry units for Rohan, as well as some more missile cav- javelins and bows. IMO this could balance it out (also maybe weaken Isengard a bit, they steamroll at the start :O ). It's also too easy for AI Isengard to expand northwards into HE territory (again, IMO).

But of course, I'm sure everyone would love more units!

[Macilrille]

A modder friend of mine says that it is the hit point addition from TATW 3.2 onwards that hurts cavalry more than infantry, as cavalry has less men per unit (if I understood him correctly). I tend to agree. But let us not discuss causes or fixes here, just the state of affairs as they are, objectively. And not when you play them, cause the player usually win.

[Macilrille]

A modder friend of mine says that it is the hit point addition from TATW 3.2 onwards that hurts cavalry more than infantry, as cavalry has less men per unit (if I understood him correctly). I tend to agree. But let us not discuss causes or fixes here, just the state of affairs as they are, objectively. And not when you play them, cause the player usually win.

Repeating...

We are not modders, we may speculate all we want, but all that I am interested in is the results.

[Redgrave]

Well, the state of affairs as it is: when I play, even with no evil-assistance scripts, Isengard pwns Rohan. A combination of Isengard/Mordor/Harad pwn Gondor. OoG pwn Eriador (even as Arnor). It's incredibly hard to balance though- Isengard need to be strong enough to survive Rohan but not so strong that they obliterate them.

[Gratzy2]

many times i've seen isengard take a few rohan-based settlements and mordor will often take minas tirith, osgiliath, cair andros but never destroy them

[muller227]

Usually Rohan collapses early, with the strong Mordor Script enabled Gondor does also though later they seem to do pretty well early. I am only guessing here but I think the problem with Gondor may be the Silvan Elves. Starting with one settlement they get weakened faction help early and dominate Mirkwood often taking Dol Guldur. At that point Mordor and Harad turn exclusively on Gondor. Dunland then goes south. This is one of the reasons I tend to play Free Peoples or HE. Free peoples if I feel like running a fairly large Kingdom, and steam rolling to the rescue. HE if I feel Like running just a few settlements with Expeditionary forces scattered all over saving the rest of the good kingdoms. Harad (they leave their settlements terribly exposed), is easy to pound with the Elves Mordor a bit more difficult strategically though less so tactically. Until the troll stacks appear that is, then it gets entertaining.

[Redgrave]

When I play as Gondor, Mordor usually aren't a challenge, I just recruit a lot. When the barracks event comes, I normally push out and take Barad-Dûr and the rest of Mordor, before steamrolling Harad. If I'm not bored then I take out Isengard/Dunland.

When I'm not playing as Gondor, things don't go that well. Not even close. But, (and this is where I lay out my cunning plan), if scripts could be added that strengthened good factions, the game may be balanced out a bit. I know that it isn't as simple as that, but I feel that something along those lines may do the job. Opinions?

[Gigan]

Hmm op, I have the opposite expirience. Usually 65-70 percent of the time Gondor holds off and pushes back Mordor and Rohan wards off Isengard(In fact it seems Dunland is more of a threat than Isengard). A lot of times I cheat and capture settlements for Mordor and evil factions. In fact it seems some good factions are too strong. Right now, the Elves and Dwarves, a dying race, manage to support populations and troop counts that rival Mordor, and me Gondor.

One funny thing about population though. My kingdom has 80000 people yet has 15000 soldiers. Thats about 18 percent of the population that serves in the army, even more than the Soviet Union in ww2 that drafted 30,000,000 out of 200,000,000 at 15 percent!

[muller227]

I have never seen Rohan push back Isengard, usually when I get to them Rohan is screwed. The Dunlanders seem to just sit to later in the game. Strong Mordor I think is part of the issue. The script seems logical regarding Mordor, but underneath it are increments to the king purse of 2000each turn if I am reading the code right ( I may not be) for Harad and Rhun. Harad starts with a strong economy, Rhun less so, Vanilla when I played years ago now I do remember Dale being the powerhouse early so maybe Rhun is understandable not sure about Harad though. Usually it is Harad that kills Gondor in my games.

[Mixxer5]

I currently play as Gondor and I guess that if it'd be AI handling this... Gondor would relocate to Dol Amroth already. Biggest problem is lack of units to recruit (6 turns until Yeomen archers are available to be recruited. Ouch), while Mordor is able to throw full stack at me every 5 turns. My units experience gives me quite an edge (2000 vs 4000- I've lost 200 soldiers, Mordor lost over 3000 troops. And they're already back), but it's not enough. Only relief is fact that Mordor is already low on money, so maybe soon they won't be able to field such forces. But Sauron already holds Lorien...

Rohan on the other hand is having rather random luck. But generally they're in retreat.

[Flinn]

Mac

have you tried asking MOS guys if they changed something in particular for balance (I mean they changed the map so I suppose so)? Because we are seing here variuos differents experiencies from the players, so is hard to see what is happening actually

just an idea to check it directly