Elara
Sergeant at Arms
I've been pretty interested in this mod for a while (it's such a nice change from regular M&B stuff) and I've decided to try to write up some things about the various factions. (this was originally posted on MBX. Interested in new fresh feedback).
THE GOOD GUYS:
The GoTT:
The Guardians of the Throne are a small, but elite faction that wears blue. Their focus is on heavy melee troops using heaving mail armour. They have two main lines of troops : the guardians and the guardian paladins. Paladins are mounted. They usually don't go far into enemy territory, but are easy to raise from inns.
Tactics: The GotT is mostly a mixed force. Everyone is heavily armoured, and they use heavy, two handed melee weapons in combat. It's always best to have some paladins mixed in with the infantry. Paladins will break up troll charges, and then infantry will come in to finish them off. A guardian army is deceptively powerful, but is slow. It will devastate some troll units such as brutes and cyclopes, but if faced with strong orc boar calvary or heavy axe and spear throwing units, it's speed will end up getting it killed.
Fighting Against: they're slow, and their calvary has no lances, or ranged forces. Trollish players should use ranged weapons and have axe or spear throwing units.
Strengths: Good armor. Great weapons. Good mix of calvary and infantry.
Weaknesses: Slow, vulnerable to counter calvary charges and ranged attacks.
The PotF:
The Protectors of the Frontline wear yellow and focus on lightly armored, spear armed foot infantry. They have neither mounted units nor ranged units. The heaviest armored PotF soldiers wear a sort of light mail. As their name suggests, they are usually seen near the front lines.
Tactics: The PotF is good at savaging any orc calvary, and they have good speed for foot soldiers. They use spears and halberds and typically have a fairly high agility, giving them good speed. When they mob up and use their spears, they can act as a primitive, badly synchronized phalanx at times. Unfortunately, while very good against orc boar calvary and the lighter , weaker trolls, they are no match for brutes, cyclopes, or war trolls.
Fighting against: Horse archery. You can solo huge PotF armies since they have nothing to catch you with. But if you charge them, they *will* bring you down and pinion you to death. They have shields, so it will take some time and a lot of arrows. The best units to bring against them are spear throwers, war trolls, and brutes. Remember that the larger a PotF army is the more likely they are to swarm you and spear you to death.
Strengths: Fast, good weapons, effective against both calvary and infantry.
Weaknesses: no calvary, crap for armor, and dead against mounted ranged attacks.
The KotA:
The Knights of the Alliance wear red plate armor and focuses on mounted combat with light swords and shields. They are incredibly powerful when used properly, since most of the army is mounted, and trolls can't handled mounted forces well. They are swift, fairly well armed, and tend to roam all over the map. I haven't been able to raise any for my own use yet. They do have some very strong foot troops again using one handed weapons (maces, swords) but with no shield.
Tactics: just let them go. Calvary charges end up as total bloodbaths, unless troll spearmen are deployed in numbers. Unlike the slow plodding of the Guardians, the Knights are fast, and they are good at circling and cutting troll units to bits. They also handle orc boar calvary well. They don't have effective infantry, just low ranking ones, so they are vulnerable to massed spear men. The infantry they have is rather slow, and without shields are too easily killed by axe hurlers or even orc boar riders.
Fighting against: There aren't many easy answers here. Troll spearmen, lots of them, and lots of axe hurlers. Leave expensive units such as cyclopes and brutes at home. Take their horses out, and what remains isn't very impressive.
Strengths: Good weapons. Stupendously good armor for the calvary. Fast. Flexible. Usually fast enough to cut apart ranged attackers.
Weakness: no strong infantry to handle spearmen, armor makes them slooow once off their horses. Infantry wears paper-thin armor.
The Elves:
The elves fight without a stock standard. Most of them wear green, although there is highelven armor available with gold as a color of choice. They use a radical mix of weapons: huge two handed blades, the most overpowered bows ever, disgustingly light but powerful armor, and shorter swords that are faster than daggers. The latest version has a sword of elven broadsword that is absolutely sick.
Tactics: Elven armies have a complex advancement tree that basically breaks down to swordsmen, archers, and mounted death machines. In battle, the archers are the most dangerous thing. I've been hit for 84 points of damage from elven archers and seen cyclopes go down in two arrows. The elven swordsmen are very, very fast, and can stunlock enemies with ease if they gang up on them.
Fighting against: Luckily, elves are not invulnerable. Although they have the advantage over most other armies, they are WEAK. They boast very low HP levels and typically have low STR, so they can be knocked out easily. While fast, they don't have any spearmen (that I have seen yet) and are vunerable to orc boar calvary. The mounted elven warriors are almost overpowered but are rare.
Strengths: way overpowered weapons. Strong armor. Fast. Incredibly powerful archery , good infantry, and strong calvary.
Weaknesses: low Hp and no defensive spearmen.
THE BAD GUYS!
The Trollz!:
Trolls don't have livery, usually, but like blood red, brown, iron grey, and black. They are big into spiky bits. They focus mostly on one handed hacking blades, light spears, and thrown spears and axes. The occasional war troll wields an ugly morningstar. They mostly wear light mail, and have no calvary.
Tactics: Trolls go for brute power. They're fast enough, incredibly strong, and their weapons HURT. While the lower ranking trolls are not all that impressive, troll spearmen will happily handle most calvary. Axe and spear hurlers can kill charging knights and even kill off elves. They have high strength and thus, are hard to kill.
Fighting against: Trolls are not pushovers, and will usually need specific tactics, outlined above. The main rule to remember is that the trollish aspect of the army will always be heavy weapon and good armor on a tough footsoldier, so archery and calvary wins the day.
Strengths: good weapons, armor, strong health, fairly fast, good spearmen, decent ranged attack with axes.
Weaknesses: no calvary , vulnerable to archery.
Add in Allies:
Orcs, Minotaurs, and Cyclopes are not separate factions but are add-ins to troll armies, and each one plays it's own role.
Orcs are mounted warriors, usually riding on boars or war boars. Although lightly armored, they are fairly strong, and can use bows and spears, or long trollish swords, to good effect. Boars have a huge charge value and will smash infantry aside like kindling, while mounted archers are death to some alliance forces. For all of that, orcs have low armor, low health, and once dismounted, die screaming. Orc foot archers are strictly rabble from what I've seen, and have no place in a serious war party.
Minotaurs are fast, strong heavy melee warriors with limited armor. They favor two handed weapons and can close swiftly, taking a good deal of punishment. they are perfect for breaking PotF armies with. No matter how fast they can run, however, they are still vulnerable to calvary.
Cyclopes are the supermen of the trollish invaders. Take everything about minotaurs and expand it. They are VERY strong, if rather slow, and can take a phenomenal amount of punishment. They can crush even calvary if they have enough constrained space, and always fight with the very heaviest of twohanded weapons. Unless being hit with heavy elven archer fire, arrows just seem to piss them off, and trying to lance them more often then not gets your horse's skull crushed and your face pounded into pudding. I end up just throwing infantry at the things until they die.
General Considerations:
Balance is a key part of playing this mod. In stock M&B, everything was simple because both sides were balanced to a degree. In FantasyMod, they are deliberately unbalanced. The Alliance player has a better selection of army types to choose from, but his armies are equally one-trick ponies. The GotT are the closest thing you have to generalist troops -- the PotF are too lightly armored to stand toe to toe with brutes, but the KotA are no good against spear chuckers. You have to balance your forces.
Elven players raising an all elf force have an attractive mix of forces, but elves are hard to recruit, slow to level up, and are stupidly fragile. A group of 50 swift bows will pincushion any attacking force, but it takes a LONG time to gather that many.
Always try to mix your forces up as the alliance player.
Conversely, the trolls don't have as much choice in types of army, but their basic choices make things simple. Troll troops are much more generalized and capable of handling themselves than human troops, but aren't rare like elven ones. A mixed force will always be able to deal with problems.
THE GOOD GUYS:
The GoTT:
The Guardians of the Throne are a small, but elite faction that wears blue. Their focus is on heavy melee troops using heaving mail armour. They have two main lines of troops : the guardians and the guardian paladins. Paladins are mounted. They usually don't go far into enemy territory, but are easy to raise from inns.
Tactics: The GotT is mostly a mixed force. Everyone is heavily armoured, and they use heavy, two handed melee weapons in combat. It's always best to have some paladins mixed in with the infantry. Paladins will break up troll charges, and then infantry will come in to finish them off. A guardian army is deceptively powerful, but is slow. It will devastate some troll units such as brutes and cyclopes, but if faced with strong orc boar calvary or heavy axe and spear throwing units, it's speed will end up getting it killed.
Fighting Against: they're slow, and their calvary has no lances, or ranged forces. Trollish players should use ranged weapons and have axe or spear throwing units.
Strengths: Good armor. Great weapons. Good mix of calvary and infantry.
Weaknesses: Slow, vulnerable to counter calvary charges and ranged attacks.
The PotF:
The Protectors of the Frontline wear yellow and focus on lightly armored, spear armed foot infantry. They have neither mounted units nor ranged units. The heaviest armored PotF soldiers wear a sort of light mail. As their name suggests, they are usually seen near the front lines.
Tactics: The PotF is good at savaging any orc calvary, and they have good speed for foot soldiers. They use spears and halberds and typically have a fairly high agility, giving them good speed. When they mob up and use their spears, they can act as a primitive, badly synchronized phalanx at times. Unfortunately, while very good against orc boar calvary and the lighter , weaker trolls, they are no match for brutes, cyclopes, or war trolls.
Fighting against: Horse archery. You can solo huge PotF armies since they have nothing to catch you with. But if you charge them, they *will* bring you down and pinion you to death. They have shields, so it will take some time and a lot of arrows. The best units to bring against them are spear throwers, war trolls, and brutes. Remember that the larger a PotF army is the more likely they are to swarm you and spear you to death.
Strengths: Fast, good weapons, effective against both calvary and infantry.
Weaknesses: no calvary, crap for armor, and dead against mounted ranged attacks.
The KotA:
The Knights of the Alliance wear red plate armor and focuses on mounted combat with light swords and shields. They are incredibly powerful when used properly, since most of the army is mounted, and trolls can't handled mounted forces well. They are swift, fairly well armed, and tend to roam all over the map. I haven't been able to raise any for my own use yet. They do have some very strong foot troops again using one handed weapons (maces, swords) but with no shield.
Tactics: just let them go. Calvary charges end up as total bloodbaths, unless troll spearmen are deployed in numbers. Unlike the slow plodding of the Guardians, the Knights are fast, and they are good at circling and cutting troll units to bits. They also handle orc boar calvary well. They don't have effective infantry, just low ranking ones, so they are vulnerable to massed spear men. The infantry they have is rather slow, and without shields are too easily killed by axe hurlers or even orc boar riders.
Fighting against: There aren't many easy answers here. Troll spearmen, lots of them, and lots of axe hurlers. Leave expensive units such as cyclopes and brutes at home. Take their horses out, and what remains isn't very impressive.
Strengths: Good weapons. Stupendously good armor for the calvary. Fast. Flexible. Usually fast enough to cut apart ranged attackers.
Weakness: no strong infantry to handle spearmen, armor makes them slooow once off their horses. Infantry wears paper-thin armor.
The Elves:
The elves fight without a stock standard. Most of them wear green, although there is highelven armor available with gold as a color of choice. They use a radical mix of weapons: huge two handed blades, the most overpowered bows ever, disgustingly light but powerful armor, and shorter swords that are faster than daggers. The latest version has a sword of elven broadsword that is absolutely sick.
Tactics: Elven armies have a complex advancement tree that basically breaks down to swordsmen, archers, and mounted death machines. In battle, the archers are the most dangerous thing. I've been hit for 84 points of damage from elven archers and seen cyclopes go down in two arrows. The elven swordsmen are very, very fast, and can stunlock enemies with ease if they gang up on them.
Fighting against: Luckily, elves are not invulnerable. Although they have the advantage over most other armies, they are WEAK. They boast very low HP levels and typically have low STR, so they can be knocked out easily. While fast, they don't have any spearmen (that I have seen yet) and are vunerable to orc boar calvary. The mounted elven warriors are almost overpowered but are rare.
Strengths: way overpowered weapons. Strong armor. Fast. Incredibly powerful archery , good infantry, and strong calvary.
Weaknesses: low Hp and no defensive spearmen.
THE BAD GUYS!
The Trollz!:
Trolls don't have livery, usually, but like blood red, brown, iron grey, and black. They are big into spiky bits. They focus mostly on one handed hacking blades, light spears, and thrown spears and axes. The occasional war troll wields an ugly morningstar. They mostly wear light mail, and have no calvary.
Tactics: Trolls go for brute power. They're fast enough, incredibly strong, and their weapons HURT. While the lower ranking trolls are not all that impressive, troll spearmen will happily handle most calvary. Axe and spear hurlers can kill charging knights and even kill off elves. They have high strength and thus, are hard to kill.
Fighting against: Trolls are not pushovers, and will usually need specific tactics, outlined above. The main rule to remember is that the trollish aspect of the army will always be heavy weapon and good armor on a tough footsoldier, so archery and calvary wins the day.
Strengths: good weapons, armor, strong health, fairly fast, good spearmen, decent ranged attack with axes.
Weaknesses: no calvary , vulnerable to archery.
Add in Allies:
Orcs, Minotaurs, and Cyclopes are not separate factions but are add-ins to troll armies, and each one plays it's own role.
Orcs are mounted warriors, usually riding on boars or war boars. Although lightly armored, they are fairly strong, and can use bows and spears, or long trollish swords, to good effect. Boars have a huge charge value and will smash infantry aside like kindling, while mounted archers are death to some alliance forces. For all of that, orcs have low armor, low health, and once dismounted, die screaming. Orc foot archers are strictly rabble from what I've seen, and have no place in a serious war party.
Minotaurs are fast, strong heavy melee warriors with limited armor. They favor two handed weapons and can close swiftly, taking a good deal of punishment. they are perfect for breaking PotF armies with. No matter how fast they can run, however, they are still vulnerable to calvary.
Cyclopes are the supermen of the trollish invaders. Take everything about minotaurs and expand it. They are VERY strong, if rather slow, and can take a phenomenal amount of punishment. They can crush even calvary if they have enough constrained space, and always fight with the very heaviest of twohanded weapons. Unless being hit with heavy elven archer fire, arrows just seem to piss them off, and trying to lance them more often then not gets your horse's skull crushed and your face pounded into pudding. I end up just throwing infantry at the things until they die.
General Considerations:
Balance is a key part of playing this mod. In stock M&B, everything was simple because both sides were balanced to a degree. In FantasyMod, they are deliberately unbalanced. The Alliance player has a better selection of army types to choose from, but his armies are equally one-trick ponies. The GotT are the closest thing you have to generalist troops -- the PotF are too lightly armored to stand toe to toe with brutes, but the KotA are no good against spear chuckers. You have to balance your forces.
Elven players raising an all elf force have an attractive mix of forces, but elves are hard to recruit, slow to level up, and are stupidly fragile. A group of 50 swift bows will pincushion any attacking force, but it takes a LONG time to gather that many.
Always try to mix your forces up as the alliance player.
Conversely, the trolls don't have as much choice in types of army, but their basic choices make things simple. Troll troops are much more generalized and capable of handling themselves than human troops, but aren't rare like elven ones. A mixed force will always be able to deal with problems.