Return of Shadow Beta 0.3 News
Strongholds
Strongholds
Strongholds will be the 11th faction for Return of Shadow this faction is a hybrid faction consisting of the armies of Dol Guldur, Moria, Misty Mountains and Gundabad.
It is a varied army with a flexible playstyle.
Each of the subfactions has it's strength and weaknesses.
Clans
Strongholds will get a new system that will have a large part in the playstyle of a Strongholds player.
In similar fashion to the Speciaisation and Tribalism systems the Clans system will allow a player to customise their tech tree.
While Tribalism and Specs are singular focus Clans will be more flexible.
Strongholds will have 3 main structures which will be the Deep, Barracks and Cave.
You'll be able to customise each of these structures to focus on a clan.
For the Deep you can choose either the Moria Clan or the Mountain Clan (Misty Mountains) these will be your early game Goblin units.
Moria Clan gives you the Moria Goblins, Moria Archers and Moria Spears.
Mountain Clan will give you the Mountain Goblins, Mountain Archers and Mountain Hobgoblins.
Moria's units are more expensive and a bit stronger with the Spears adding a cheap anti cavalry option while Mountain Clan's units will be cheaper and weaker with the Hobgoblins being an infantry option.
The Barracks give you the choice between the Gundabad Clan and the Dol Guldur Clan.
Barracks will be focused on standard infantry Gundabad Clan gives you Gundabad Soldiers (Pikes) and Gundabad Warriors (Infantry) making them good against cavalry.
Whereas the Dol Guldur clan grants you the Dol Guldur Soldiers (infantry) and Dol Guldur Strongbows (ranged)
Third is the Cave which allows you to choose between Trolls and Wolves.
Troll Clan gives you the Cave Trolls and Stone Trolls (ranged/artillery Trolls).
Wolf Clan gives you the Wood Wolves and the Wolf Riders for more speedy play.
There's a fourth option that I'll reveal at a later point.
Fiefdoms
When initially released the Fiefdoms faction was intended as a preview of sorts reusing some old Lone Wolf art and modified Dunland assets over time I plan to update the faction to be more distinct visually.
Fiefdoms will be gaining a new unit the Pinnath Gelin Crossbowmen a new strong ranged unit that will have pretty solid defence.
Great Rebalance
Other factions will be gaining some new units as part of the Great Rebalancing.
Erebor will get the new Erebor Bombardier a heavy duty missile unit that will deal heavy ranged damage with a knock back.
Gondor, Isengard, and Rivendell will also be getting a new unit each.
I'm also looking into new upgrades and techs for all the factions as well as some balance changes over all.
Much appreciated the effort and well done. Would you consider adding wareworms in Strongholds Tech tree? It'd be too over power ability so how about as the last wheel? Transferring armies from anywhere to any other way ^^ .I wish Fiefdoms could be played somehow as in company of heroes game,choosing styles in Tech tree(for example choosing cavalry spec would lead the players to new heavy horse masters).
I know I'm not the only person who has some ideas so let me apologize guys. Sorry and cheers :-)