Battle for Middle Earth - Walkthrough / Hints

Battle for Middle Earth - Hints and Walkthroughs (for tricky missions only)
This post indexes all our hints / walkthroughs for the Battle for Middle Earth campaigns, both Good and Evil, played on HARD Difficulty (120% damage from the enemy, enemy has no limitations on powers and abilities it can choose to use on you).
They are actually best read AFTER you've tried to conquer a particular map or if you are having trouble with one, as you may find a different and interesting approach to the mission than your own -- or have a superior strategy yourself.
None of these strategies really apply for Multiplayer or Skirmish. We are focussing on campaigning and taking units with us from mission to mission.

Factions
General Notes:
You can build slightly more units than your Command Limit by recruiting units while your current Command total is reduced from casualties that will ultimately be regenerated (i.e., from veteran squads), but this will block you from building temporary units in the next mission (e.g., siege engines) since you would be at or beyond your Command Limit.
A veteran unit that has all units killed off except for the Banner Bearer will not regenerate.

Gondor
Rohan
Isengard
Mordor

Campaigns

Evil Campaign
Before you get too far ahead into the Evil Campaign, you should review the One Ring Powers and decide on what you want. At the end of Act 16, you can have over 40 points and enough to get the ultimate power, Summon Balrog.
There are two paths: Resource and Combat. The Resource path very greatly enhances your ability to accumulate resources. I discourage this because resources are generally important in the early game and if you can retain veteran troops, you will start to rely on this less and less because you are not constantly pumping out new troops. If you like to play the Mordor faction, however, which has considerably less survivability in their troops, then Resources can be important because it will help you pump out a constant stream of expendable units.
The Combat Bonus path aims to stack bonuses for your units, helping them fight and helping you keep them alive and accumulate veterancy: War Chant, Eye of Sauron, Tainted Land, Darkness, Freezing Rain / Summon Balrog. Summon Balrog is useful if you want to quickly crack open a base in the late game, where they typically start fully built. You can summon it to hammer open a wall section and leap in to destroy the citadel. Once a wall is collapsed, it cannot be rebuilt except if the base is completely destroyed and then rebuilt, which re-erects walls. You actually do not need Summon Balrog to win any campaign, even the final assault against Minas Tirith.

• War Chant - +150% damage, +50% armor for all units under the area of effect at the time the power is activated.
• Vision of the Palantir - Reveals a part of the map
• Industry - +100% resources from all resource buildings under the area of effect at the time the power is activated.
• Eye of Sauron - Reveals stealthed enemies. Orcs +150% damage, +200% experience, +50% armor while under the eye. The eye can be moved: It appears as a "hero" character on the hero roster. Click on the eye icon to select and right click on target location.
• Devastation - Trees are turned into resources.
• Fuel the Fires - +100% resources from harvesting trees. Passive power.
• Scavenger - All kills earn extra resources. Passive power.
• Tainted Land - In the area of effect, trees are cleared and units that depend on trees for stealth are revealed. All ally units get +50% armor. All enemy units lose all leadership bonuses. Bonus does not affect ally heroes. Penalties do not affect enemy heroes. Cannot be placed inside a base, but CAN be placed at a base site BEFORE a base citadel is erected and you keep the bonus after establishing the base.
• Call the Horde - Increased orc production speed.
• Darkness - Shrouds the entire map in darkness. All ally infantry hordes get +50% damage, +50% armor.
• Freezing Rain - All enemy units lose all leadership bonuses.
• Summon Balrog

Part 1 - Isengard vs. Rohan
Act 1 - Isengard
Act 2 - Fangorn
Act 3 - Eaves of Fangorn OR Gap of Rohan
Act 4 - Summit of Amon Hen
Act 5-6 - Rohan OR whichever map you didn't choose in Act 3
Act 7 - Edoras
Act 8-9 - Dunharrow and Westfold
Act 10 - Helm's Deep

Part 2 - Mordor vs. Gondor
Act 11 - Near Harad
Act 12 - Southern Ithilien

Part 3 - Final Conquest
Act 13-14 - Two of: Central Ithilien, Eastern Rohan, Emyn Arnen, Enedwaith, the Fords of Isen, West Emnet.
Act 15 - Osgiliath
Act 16 - Cirith Ungol
Act 17 - The rest of the map. You can capture any territories adjacent to territories you control. We only comment on some of the trickier maps: Old Brown Lands.
Act 18 - Whenever you control a territory adjacent to Minas Tirith, you can choose to attack it. If you win, you win the campaign. You can delay capturing Minas Tirith to attack various other territories. At this late stage of the game, it is useful to do this generally only to increase the veterancy of your troops and to pick up more One Ring powers. Do not underestimate having level 10 hordes, especially as the Evil factions do not have access to healing powers.

Good Campaign
More so than the One Ring Powers, with the Good Campaign you really need to decide carefully what Evenstar powers you want. There are generally two types of powers and no clear path of synergy: Hero and Summon.
The problem with Hero powers is that you are investing Power Points on heroes who may or may not be around on a map. With Summons, there is a long wait time between them; they aren't permanent; if you use them to take out your enemies, your own units aren't gaining veterancy; if you use them as expendable troops, you are giving the enemy a chance to gain veterancy.
You can of course drive down to get the relatively cheap Summon Army of the Dead (16 Power Points, versus 20 for the Balrog; shortest path to the Oathbreakers is 34 points), but I recommend getting powers that will assist your troops since they will generally do the bulk of the fighting.
Therefore, the powers to get are Heal, Elven Wood, and Cloud Break. If you like to use Peasants hordes, then also get Draft (the AI seems to like to use against you when you fight Rohan in the Evil Campaign).
Heal is particularly useful because Good faction infantry are generally five per squad instead of 10 per horde. Smaller units have slightly less survivability because larger units have more of a chance to survive combat with at least one person standing (excluding the banner bearer), which allows veteran units to recruit and replenish their numbers eventually.
Elven Wood is also an interesting choice because you can plant it over a base (but BEFORE you build the citadel). This means you can get even more bonuses while defending a base on top of having a Heroic Statue inside the base.
After getting these three powers, you may want to concentrate of hero powers. Gandalf is already one of the strongest heroes in the campaign and +150% damage with Elven Gifts and Power of the Istari is not to be underestimated.

• Heal - Heal all units under the area of effect fully. Each battalion under the area of effect has one lost individual replaced.
• Elven Gifts - +50% damage for heroes. Passive power.
• Power of the Istari - Gandalf powers +100% damage and half recharge time. Passive power.
• Elven Wood - All ally units get +50% armor. All enemy units lose all leadership bonuses. Bonus does not affect ally heroes. Penalties do not affect enemy heroes. Cannot be placed inside an established base, but CAN be placed at a base site BEFORE a base citadel is erected and you keep the bonus after establishing the base.
• Draft - All peasants have improved armor against arrows, +40 Health, +5 Damage. Peasants do not need this power in order to receive Rohan Armory upgrades.
• Cloud Break - Stuns enemy units everywhere on the map. May not affect veteran troops. Does not affect monstrous troops like trolls. Cancels Evil weather powers.
• Summon Elven Allies - Summons a group of Elves; not permanent. The area of effect changes land into Elven Wood, but without the bonuses.
• Summon Rohan Allies - Summons Rohirrim.
• Summon Eagle Allies
• Anduril - Aragorn +100% damage. Passive power.
• Summon Ent Allies
• Summon Army of the Dead - At The Black Gate (final mission in the Good Campaign), you need to be about 1/3 of the way from the gates to Mordor in order to summon the OathBreakers with this power. Aragorn's level 10 power is a mini version of this which he can place a short distance from him.

Part 1 - Rohan vs. Isengard
Act 1 - Moria
Act 2 - One Rohan Territory: Eastern Rohan (+1 Power Point), Rohan (+20 Command), or Westfold (+10% Resources)
Act 3 - Lothlórien (+50 Command, +1 Power Point)
Act 4 - Another Rohan territory.
Act 5 - Amon Hen
Act 6 - Two Rohan territories.
Act 7 - Eaves of Fangorn
Act 8-9 - Rohan territory or northern forest territory. Northern territories (Fangorn and Wold) may be accessible if you first attack one of them with Eomer's forces from the Eaves of Fangorn. Otherwise, he moves back south and those territories may no longer be adjacent to ones you control.
Act 10 - Helm's Deep
Act 11 - Isengard

Part 2 - Gondor vs. Mordor

Act 12 - ???
Act 13 - Northern Ithilien
Act 14-15 - Attack two territories in Rohan or Gondor, depending on which are adjacent to the army you choose. Note that after Helm's Deep (Act 10), Eomer's Army is joined with that of Helm's Deep whether you called him to the field or not. The combined army is probably over 500 points at this stage of the game but your Command Point Limit won't be close to that and is in any case capped at 300. After Act 12 (Northern Ithilien), if you command this army to attack a territory, you will lose units from that combined army until it is trimmed down to whatever your Command Limit is at the time. You retain the highest levelled units that will fit into the Command Point Limit.
Act 16 - Osgiliath
Act 17 - ???
Act 18 - Shelob's Lair
Act 19 - Minas Tirith
Act 20 - Attack any number of territories. This is your chance to reorganize your armies after the various scripted events merged and goofed them up. Most of your heroes and battalions can be level 10 if you do all missions prior to the Black Gate -- especially Nurn, which has crazy streams of orcs coming at you constantly. Whenever you can reach The Black Gate, you may attack it to win the campaign.