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Gondor

3 (10.7%)

Mordor

2 (7.1%)

Isengard

4 (14.3%)

Spiders (not exact name)

5 (17.9%)

Ents (not exact name)

6 (21.4%)

Dragons (not exact name)

5 (17.9%)

Corsairs (pirates and outlaws)

3 (10.7%)

Total Members Voted: 28

Voting closed: February 01, 2016, 07:58:07 pm

[Vendayn]

Leaving poll up for 3 days, so it will be a short lived poll. My friend voted for Spiders, so that is one vote for them (if I can vote in my own poll, I'm going to put spiders to replicate my friend's personal vote).

Won't be doing a youtube series on this, I am however going to do a story of some type. Think similarly to a written story (with screenshots of course) of games like Europa Universalis or Aurora 4x that people have done that are similar. I don't do videos, but it should be good enough People seem to tend to like them when done with Aurora, so should be fine. I'll of course incorporate user choices too, so people can talk about what to do and they can be a general or something (even though pretty sure can't actually rename generals in Medieval 2, they can pretend its actually them doing the commands ). Though, some of it will still be left up to me. Like not gonna send a single general to take over a city for him to just die Unless the general sucks...then it can be like crusader kings 2 style

Also. Spiders, dragons and ent factions aren't in the base mod, but in a submod of Third Age Total War (it also has a ton of other factions, but these are what I narrowed down too)

Thanks

[Vendayn]

Sorry for the after edit poll option. I missed there was corsairs and outlaws faction which sounds fun, and my friend recommended I put it up (his vote would still be spiders). I made it so you can change your vote if you change your mind of who you voted for.

[A Thing]

This should probably be in Play With your Buddies. As for what faction, I can't really vote when a good chunk of the poll options I don't understand. By spiders I imagine you mean the Mirkwood Elves? Ents I guess mean Rohan? Dragons I guess mean Harad? But that is supposed to be a serpent not a dragon from what I remember.  I imagine this is some kind of in-joke, but it seems like a bad idea to use these names for a poll.

[Cheedows]

Corsairs and Harad, I always found them really interesting considering how little Tolkien focused on them, their ambiguity made them more intriguing.

[Vendayn]

This should probably be in Play With your Buddies. As for what faction, I can't really vote when a good chunk of the poll options I don't understand. By spiders I imagine you mean the Mirkwood Elves? Ents I guess mean Rohan? Dragons I guess mean Harad? But that is supposed to be a serpent not a dragon from what I remember.  I imagine this is some kind of in-joke, but it seems like a bad idea to use these names for a poll.

No, literal spiders. The submod lets you play as actual spiders. Ents being the tree guys and dragons are literal dragons. Hence the names lol.

As for play with your buddies, to be honest, it probably does fit there more. I never knew that board existed rofl, even though its a sub board that shows up right on top of the forums. I've only ever gone to "other games" and the masterwork forum. So used to coming here.

[A Thing]

No, literal spiders. The submod lets you play as actual spiders. Ents being the tree guys and dragons are literal dragons. Hence the names lol.

As for play with your buddies, to be honest, it probably does fit there more. I never knew that board existed rofl, even though its a sub board that shows up right on top of the forums. I've only ever gone to "other games" and the masterwork forum. So used to coming here.

Huh well if Gondor, Mordor, Umbar Corsairs and Isengard are my options I guess I'll go with Isengard? I can't really see the other factions being interesting. Spider just sounds like it's doomed to failure and is just kinda weird for the setting. Dragons and ents just sounds like it would get boring since you would pretty much smash everything. Also, I think you can rename generals with a console command but I can't remember it.

[RAM]

I would assume that spiders are the dudes from The Hobbit that were massacred by an invisible Bilbo. I recall them having some sort of society or something... And, of course, there is the obligatory appearances by Shelob. Really, spiders were a pretty big deal, but they tended to go out of their way to stay out of everyone else's way. They seem more sensible than the dragons which basically never seemed all that organised or common. I am voting for Dragons pretty much just to hear how that would even work...

[Shadowlord]

Wasn't Smaug the only one even still alive?

[Vendayn]

I would assume that spiders are the dudes from The Hobbit that were massacred by an invisible Bilbo. I recall them having some sort of society or something... And, of course, there is the obligatory appearances by Shelob. Really, spiders were a pretty big deal, but they tended to go out of their way to stay out of everyone else's way. They seem more sensible than the dragons which basically never seemed all that organised or common. I am voting for Dragons pretty much just to hear how that would even work...

To let everyone know, I played this mod 3-4 years ago, so I have a basic idea of how things work. It was pretty buggy then, but its supposed to be all fixed up. So if its not, this might end up shortlived. I was kinda hesitant saying what (at least the starts) are like since I kinda didn't want it to influence the poll. And a lot has probably changed anyway, so its outdated stuff from 3-4 years ago. But don't think it matters, help give an idea before its decided on 1st. I'm going to say all this in present tense, but like I said, its old info that may or may not be the same. But I suppose more information makes it a lot better to decide what to play.

The spiders you use giant hordes of them, they are pretty weak to be honest (and at the time there was only three types you could ever get) but there is just so many of them in each "squad/horde". Their surrounding area isn't so bad to deal with, but it does get a lot harder once you branch out. They are kinda like a zerg rush kinda thing that use overwhelming numbers.

The ents were interesting. In the ent game I did, I took over isengard and resided over the white tower. That was pretty cool. They are REALLY strong, but...it takes sooooo much time to recruit them. So you replace the speed of recruiting with just pure strength. Kinda OP back then, but with that said, I lost all my ents in one battle (really weak to siege) and just couldn't train enough up in time. So still a challenge in that regard.

Dragons were the most unique to be honest, but more strong than the ents. They died easier to siege than the ents though. You got basic human troops as fodder, but a queen dragon would lay an egg and eventually hatch into a dragon hatchling that eventually grows into an ancient dragon. If you thought ents were slow at making new units (besides the human ones)...dragons two or three times slower. And oh wow were they strong as heck. Once I got past the VERY hard surrounding area (each "cave") that surrounds your starting area is guarded by dragons and its hard as heck to get past them all. Once I did that, it wasn't too bad to sweep through. However, I had both gondor, the freemen, the dwarves, and mordor all declare war on me and I got overran.

The pirates to be honest, had by far the most developed gameplay for minor factions. They had roughly the same amount of buildings and units as gondor, mordor and the other "main" factions had. They played kinda typical to gondor/mordor, so not really too much unique gameplay there. But the mod creator did the most work on them as far as minor factions go. Pirates (for uniqueness) also got elephants by conquering the guys (Harad I think) down south in the desert. That and I was able to do a lot of sea-based raiding on Gondor and go all over the place on the sea.

Isengard wasn't changed from base mod. So, its just Isengard. Not much to say lol.

Gondor and Mordor pretty much fight each other. Being Mordor is fun to take over Minas Tirith, but wow holding onto that city is harder than getting a rocket to the moon rofl. Literally giant stacks of Gondor units nonstop attacking Minas Tirith to retake it, over and over. And opposite of that, Gondor fighting Mordor is just as hard. Gondor and Mordor both got a ton of changes and new events, but I don't remember what those were and don't want to read to look, would rather just see it in-game.

The only problem I have with actually playing Gondor or Mordor, is while I can go on to other objectives, really I just want to fight the other guy. So it gets kinda linear and samey, but if I'm Mordor, I only will ever want to conquer Minas Tirith as my major goal. Every game as Mordor. And after that it opens up to other things. And Gondor I just want to take over Mordor. But that is also partly how its setup to do anyway, but as fun as that particular scenery is, doesn't give any options at the start but one. I did add them to the poll though, since they are a lot of fun and they are most developed honestly out of anyone. But the others are just as fun too. Except if Mordor for example, the only goal to start with is to get Minis Tirith

[Vendayn]

and to follow up on above post. When I played, after 100 or so turns, the mod would just cause crashing all the time. And entering battles with any faction would cause a crash. This was 3-4 years ago, and its supposed to be fixed. Like I said, could be short lived But I really want to try it again, so there

And with above information, feel free to change vote, or keep it. Doesn't really matter either way, all of them are fun. Only one I didn't really talk about is Isengard, but they have a pretty fun start too.

Actually with Isengard, there is a way to create an alliance with someone close by (I think the free men?) or be friends to them and have peace. Don't remember exact details. I know Isengard is a VERY diplomatic/espionage focused game. Going to war is a possibility, but they don't have the troop sizes and what not to do too much of that early on.

[A Thing]

Presumably Isengard would be able to ally with Rohan. I remember that being a big thing that almost sorta happened in the books. The dunlendings (I think that is their name) to the west are also a option, I remember them being on Saramaun's (or whatever) side during the Battle at Helm's Deep. Also, I think there were more dragons in the mountains to the north of Erebor? I vaguely remember that being a reason as to why the dwarves never settled there anymore. But yeah, I forgot that the spiders were actually sentient. I dunno why I would because pretty much every friggin' animal in the books are sentient in some form.

[Vendayn]

Presumably Isengard would be able to ally with Rohan. I remember that being a big thing that almost sorta happened in the books. The dunlendings (I think that is their name) to the west are also a option, I remember them being on Saramaun's (or whatever) side during the Battle at Helm's Deep. Also, I think there were more dragons in the mountains to the north of Erebor? I vaguely remember that being a reason as to why the dwarves never settled there anymore. But yeah, I forgot that the spiders were actually sentient. I dunno why I would because pretty much every friggin' animal in the books are sentient in some form.

ah yeah, that was it. They can ally Rohan in-game.

[Vendayn]

Also, if there happens to be a tie. I'll be doing a random generator with a list of ones that are tied and it'll pick from there. No idea what a good random generator is, but can't be hard to google since there are so many

[Shadowlord]

random.org is pretty standard

[Vendayn]

random.org is pretty standard

Yeah, that is what I figured.

Also, there is supposed to be a release patch for the submod. I don't know when it'll be out, but its been being made for a few months (or maybe longer actually) and it doesn't appear close to release. So, shouldn't affect the sort of let's play. But thought I'd put it out there. I'll be playing the current beta patch though, since it works better.

And finally. There is a console command to change general name? I think I can use ESF editor to change general names inside the save game, but I'd have to look more into that.