Hi all!! A few weeks ago I asked here how you wanted your infantry to fight ( old post ). The top answer by far was "make them hold the line", so that's what I built. It was called Better Infantry AI back then, now it's Hold the Line , and it's out as a beta. Available in Nexus Mods. What it does: No more moshpit: soldiers keep their place in the line and step in and back a little instead of turning into one big blob. AI formations that make contact switch to a charge, so both sides fight the same way. Shields in the front rank: shield and spear first, then other shields, then spears and pikes, then everyone else. Works in shield walls too. No more falxmen eating javelins and arrows in the front while the shield guys wait in the back. Rear ranks fight with spears: the second rank thrusts past the guy in front instead of hitting their back and getting stunned. AI spearmen also keep the spear out more instead of always pulling the sidearm. Deep format...
I was just able to beat TLD in under a hundred days as a Dunadain ranger, after discovering this on my Isengrad playthrough (which took ~300 cause I didn't find it out until way late).
Getting Strength 18/Ironflesh 6/Power Strike 6, and fighting a few battles without a shirt on, will get you Berserker very quickly. That gives +2 Strength, and more importantly, the ability to heal in battle.
After that, you can tackle impossible armies, like 1 vs a Mordor War Party, and just spam retreating to heal up.
That wouldn't be TOO bad, EXCEPT...Each time you retreat and re-initiate a battle, the game treats it as a second battle for ranking purposes. Thus, I was able to get ~900 rank with Gondor for one battle with a Mordor War Party.
This can be done with every faction. I managed to get rank 10+ with all of them except Erebor and Dale, which were at ~7. I was able to get enough influence for every item, and it also let me accrue a huge army.
In my first playthrough, I used all of the influence to get armies to follow me around. But that's actually sub-optimal. Because once you pay for the authority to besiege a settlement yourself, you can no longer advise the marshal. That might be a bug.
What I ended up doing instead, was helping Rohan raze Isengrad's initial three outposts, then went to Gondor. I coached Imrahil into taking the Corsair Camp -> Khand Camp -> Haradrim Camp in succession. I was also able to use Berserker to solo-defend West Osgiliath. Then it let me advise him to take Morannon.
By day ~60ish, Morannon only has ~650 troops. It was definitely takeable. In my Isengrad game, it had ~1500 troops and was a HUGE pain in the ass to take. The game won't let the player besiege Morannon until every other Mordor castle is taken. But it lets the player advise the marshal to do it.
The key to ensuring the marshal's success is heavily recruiting with a decent trainer ranking (high enough to let you turn raw recruits into at least second tier troops in one night), and then constantly reinforcing them every chance you get. I managed to get Imrahil a ~465 size army, by dumping a 130 troops on him the moment it let me offer to reinforce. I did the same for every lord I could find.
You can do the same with West Osgiliath to ensure it repels the constant invasions. But I never had to.
Razing Morannon instantly destroys the Mordor faction.
Another way to hugely stack the advantage in your favor:
If you're evil, you can get a quest to capture an enemy commander, and then...eat them. It basically lets you execute opposing lords. I did this to Gothmog, and the Mordor armies basically never recovered.
If you're good, your best bet is to try and capture either Gothmog or Mog. You won't be able to eat them, but you can hold onto them for ~20 days, in which time Isengrad or Mordor's armies will be at a HUGE disadvantage.
There's a lot of free stat points in the mod. Ent Water gives +1 Str/+1 Charisma. Blessed (a random chance from praying at the grave of an ally) can give +1 Str/+1 Charisma/+20 Weapon proficiency. You can pick up +Strength, +Power Strike and +Agility items with influence.
The Horn of Gondor, Silmarillion and Light of Galadriel together will give +1 Persuasion, +2 Charisma and +3 Leadership.
I ended the game with Charisma 9, Leadership 6, and an army of ~170. I could have pushed it much higher, but the food intake gets crazy after ~150.
The Dunadan got his Weapon Master to 10, Athletics to 10 and Riding to 10 by level 30 (there are items which give +1 to each of these). Which combined with the Noldorin Bow and Westernesse Sword (Speed 130 + Power Strike) and ~400+ weapon proficiency. Allows you to basically one hit low tier archers by charging them with the Mearth Stallion, and to obliterate trolls by knocking them down, and then hacking them apart. Weapon proficiency and XP is acquired very quickly when you're routinely soloing large Mordor War parties.
You can avoid the Nazgul by retreating until there's none flying in the air. I heard that Glorfindel is supposed to scare them off, but that never worked for me.
Suggestions:
1) Change the Berserker trait to not give health 2) Do not allow infinite arrows 3) Give MORE rank, like at least five times what is given now, but not if someone retreats.
I thought getting rank+influence was a horrific, soul-killing slog at first, from trying to do it solely via missions. But if wiping out a Mordor War party at 10 to 1 odds, gave say, 40 Rank, instead of 8, there'd be less incentive to abuse the system.
Submitted November 26, 2017 at 11:11AM by clearsighted http://ift.tt/2i9Ahbw
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