Fairies of Tarm battle tips?

[Piptoo]

Hello,
I have downloaded this mod fairly recently and I am enjoying it very much. The historia has very interesting battles and cutscenes, and the freeform campaign is very cool in how it brings Zelda to total war. This mod is also very interesting in the way in which it pushes the MTW 2 to its limits, to an extent which I have never seen before.
Now I have been getting into a fairies of Tarm campaign recently and I was doing pretty okay in battles until the Zora came along. I previously fought the Gorons, which went fine but somehow I never seem able to beat a Zora army without losing all my foot soldiers (meaning humanoid manifests, small fairies, and perhaps some Horon soldiers), making it very hard to conquer territory without resorting to sneaky tactics. It is especially difficult when faced with Floodmasters as they destroy my whole army if I do not have higher ground. So is there anybody who is more familiar with the fairies with a good idea how to fight with them as holding any line with them against the Zora infantry with its high morale and their Floodmasters is impossible without losing said line, your ranged soldiers are inferior to the Zora (with the exception of Great Fairies, although they lack accuracy) and get destroyed by the bigocto cavalry, and yea Floodmasters when unattended or on higher ground destroy my whole army anyway ?

[Avatar of the Ice Wolf]

The Zora have the natural advantage against the fairies precisely because their ranged units utilize powerful area of effect damage. Your best bet is to ally the Subrosians. They can outclass the Zora in melee and the Moldorm Riders can devastate the enemy's ranged forces (and most of their infantry, too). This will give your manifests much needed breathing room.

[Piptoo]

Ah, I rejected their offer early in the game as I was concerned that I would get overextended due to the labrynna regime , is there a way to get the offer again? Thank you for your answer btw

[DarkInterloper]

For some reason Labrynna has to loop all the way around north of the Nuun River and south of Subrosia's southern mountain ridge to attack Horon and the Fairies (or they can go through Deku territory, still a long trip)- it works to Labrynna's advantage on the defensive but means their armies will take a while to reinforce if you go to war with them.

[DarkInterloper]

@Avatar of the Ice Wolf
I find the Subrosians one of the most useful NPC factions alongside the Zuna- Ore Knights and Moldorm Riders are such a boon to The Fairies and Labrynna as both factions lack any real Heay Infantry/Cavalry. (well, Labrynna has Mechs, but they're really slow)

[DarkInterloper]

@Piptoo
Getting the Subrosians and Horonians to join you together is almost always a good idea, as they will give you a pretty big initial army in the East to defend your new territories. The Samasa Desert is very naturally defensible and could make a good fallback position if Labrynna or another faction took Horon- just erect forts at the entrance valleys.

And as the the Subrosian offer- I don't think they'll join you if you refuse their offer.

[Piptoo]

ah okay that is a shame, I guess I will just try to grind down the Zora now, thanks for the help
EDIT
On a side note, the fairies do have a quick moving 'cavalry' unit in the form of the beam golems. I usually sacrifice them to mess up the Floodmasters a bit if I find the space. They are not really good in cavalry duties due to their low unit size but they are classified as heavy cavalry

[DarkInterloper]

The Zora are surprisingly powerful for being so frail. I've seen the CPU Dominion curbstomp the Gorons and Hyrule in some campaigns.

[DarkInterloper]

@Piptoo
which is kinda funny, given that the Golems and Beam Golems are supposed to be giant hulking laser-beam shooting engines of death.