Next faction to receive an update is Isengard. Nearly all heroes, as well as the Uruk Captains, had some or all of their abilities reworked. The usefulness of Uruk Scouts was increased and changes to the Spellbook and various balance changes were made as well.
Heroes
- Saruman - the master of Isengard and a powerful wizard. He starts off at rank 5 at the cost of 5000 resources and has received a new ability:
- Rank 10: Saruman of Many Colors - Saruman gains 500 bonus health, his spells deal 50% bonus damage and their recharge speed is reduced by 25%.
- Grima Wormtongue - the traitor of Rohan and a cunning servant of Saruman. Grima is a stealth based hero and starts off at rank 3 at the cost of 900 resources. All of his abilities were reworked and more were added in order to give him more depth and usefulness:
- Rank 1: Witless Worm - Grima becomes invisible until he is revealed, attacks or uses a spell. Using this ability is necessary in order for him to achieve his full potential.
- Rank 3: Loyal Servant - Provides passive bonuses to all other Isengard's heroes:
- Saruman: +15% Experience.
- Lurtz: +10% Vision and Attack range.
- Ugluk: +25% Armor.
- Sharku: +25% Attack.
- Rank 5: Sabotage - Deals medium damage to a target enemy structure, reducing its resource output and Armor by 50% for 60 seconds.
- Rank 7: Poisonous Words - Reduces the Attack, Armor and Speed of a target enemy hero by 33%. The effect lasts for 20 seconds.
- Rank 10: Assassinate - Deals significant damage to a target enemy hero. Especially deadly if used against an enemy Saruman. Less effective against regular units.
- Ugluk - a durable warrior hero, also adept at leading troops. Ugluk starts off at rank 3 and is recruited at the cost of 1100 resources. He has received two new abilities and his leadership has been reworked:
- Rank 1: Uruk-hai Lieutenant - Nearby Uruk Scouts and Uruk-hai gain +15% Attack and Armor and +10% Vision range.
- Rank 3: Brutalize - Deals significant damage and knockbacks a target enemy unit. Enemies near the target will also be knockbacked. Less effective against structures.
- Rank 5: Forced March - Nearby infantry units gain +15% Speed for 20 seconds.
- Rank 7: Supper - Heals nearby Orcs and Uruks.
- Sharku - an agile mounted hero, adept at scouting and leading Warg Riders into battle. Sharku starts off at rank 3 and is recruited at the cost of 1100 resources. He has received a new ability and his leadership has been moved from rank 3 to rank 4:
- Rank 3: Maiming Strike - Deals significant damage to a target enemy unit, slowing it down for 10 seconds. Less effective against structures.
Spellbook
- Tier 1: The Vision of the Palantir spell has been replaced with:
- Spies of Saruman - Summons a flock of Crebain to reveal a target location. Summoned Crebain can't be moved nor attacked and last for 60 seconds.
- Tier 3: The Spies of Saruman spell has been replaced with:
- Wildmen of Dunland - Summons 4 hordes of Wildmen of Dunland for 90 seconds.
- Tier 5: Rain of Fire can now be properly unlocked after Wolves of Isengard spell has been purchased.
Units
- Uruk Captains - the fierce captains of Isengard's army. They are trained at the cost of 700 resources and are limited to 3 at a time. Their abilities have been reworked:
- Rank 1: Battle Formations - Nearby friendly infantry units gain +10% Attack and Armor.
- Rank 3: Siege Commander - Nearby friendly siege machines gain +20% Attack, +10% Armor, +20% Vision and +10% Attack range.
- Rank 5: Assault Leader - Nearby friendly units gain +50% Experience while Isengard Berserkers gain additional +25% Attack.
- Uruk Scouts can now have Banner Carriers and can be upgraded to rank 2. Two Uruk Scout hordes can now form a combo horde.
- Uruk-hai, Isengard Crossbowmen and Isengard Berserkers were given new, higher resolution textures.
- Isengard Berserkers are no longer limited to 10 at a time.
- Isengard Crossbowmen now cost 400 resources instead of 300.
- Wildmen of Dunland are no longer trainable and are summonable only. They received new textures and use the Wildmen of Dunland sound set from BFME 2 .
Credits for Wormtongue's model and parts of the texture for the Wildmen of Dunland go to Mathijs and the former Shadow and Flame mod team.
That would be all for this update. I hope you like the changes and additions and feel free to post any suggestions and report any bugs you find in the current released version of Middle-earth Extended Edition.
Cheers,
Rohirim91
I always find Isengard lack of spice in every mod. Only uruks and wargs with some summons. Why you are putting wildman to spells ? They were important part of raid parties in the film. You should keep them as recruitable and if possible put their building as buildable to the base build plots. This will give you more income through settlements.
And Isengard is a industry based faction. Furnaces and lumber mills are okay. Also fires of industry spell is a great buff for lumber mills. But I always found slaughter houses out of place. Maybe put a mine structure instead of slaughter houses ? This will make Isengard look more industry based faction.
These are my suggestions for Isengard update.
Isengard already is a well rounded faction, and only needs a few heroes, Spell book spells and a unit or two to completely represent what is shown in the books and the movies.
Slaughterhouses are there to reduce the cost of Wargs, else they would be too expensive to be cost effective. Also, no matter how industrialized a faction is, it still needs to feed itself.
Mines would need to provide a discount of some sort, otherwise they would be just a fancy looking resource spawner.
The only viable discount would be an infantry cost one, which is not needed as Isengard's infantry is cheap enough already. Also the mines shown in the movies are underground and are therefore hard to represent in the game with a lore friendly, yet functional model that makes sense in the game.
Wildmen are more of an auxiliary force and are not great in numbers on their own. Their uses are not many, as they are lightly armored and will die quickly in a prolonged fight. They are meant to harass the enemy's economy or attack unguarded skirmishers during a battle. Therefore it is not worth spending resources and, more importantly, a building plot and command points on them.
Also making the Wildman Tent a base plot building would be bad, as the building only trains one type of unit, of which you don't need too many hordes.
epic
Thanks!