Battle for Middle Earth 2 - Rise of the Witch-King - Epilogue - Fall of Angmar

Battle for Middle Earth II - Rise of the Witch -King - Epilogue - Fall of Angmar
This is a hint/walkthrough post for Battle for Middle Earth II: Rise of the Witch-King. You can find an index of all our Battle for Middle Earth II posts here.

This is an easy mission if you proceed slowly and let your heroes take point and heal. The first stage consists of basically holding ground and finding the enemy heroes and their clumps of troops. Snow trolls come at you, but it is nothing you can't handle with just your heroes, possibly with one or two battalions of archers.
You can build any number of fortresses you like, but you can advance quite deeply before building one. Just have healing wells to keep your troop numbers up.

Once you build your first fortress, recycle your pikemen and archers into Lindon Horse Archers so that you are not vulnerable to tramples, and can counter-trample with devastating numbers.
There are only two trebuchets at the outer walls of Angmar, so send your heroes to take them out. Retreat them when the enemy comes out to let your archers assist, then go back to take out the trebuchets before you bring in your own. Destroy the tower defenses, but leave the gates for now. Box in Angmar by planting a full fortress outside each gate before cautiously advancing.
If you can, draw out the Witch-King to either fight alone or near one of your fortresses, and hit him with all your ranged troops -- you only need to kill him to win. He does have an area-effect melee attack, so try not to engage him with any non-hero units in melee.

Battle for Middle Earth 2 - Rise of the Witch-King - Mission 8 - Fornost

Battle for Middle Earth II - Rise of the Witch -King - Mission 8 - Fornost
This is a hint/walkthrough post for Battle for Middle Earth II: Rise of the Witch-King. You can find an index of all our Battle for Middle Earth II posts here.

You can earn enough Power Points in this mission to get all Angmar powers provided you have also maximized your Power Points during the previous missions. Try to start with 50 Power Points here so you can get the Tier 4 powers right away.

You can only build one fortress -- the one pre-built for you, so be patient and accumulate resources to build walls. Build farms at the south side only. Any further ahead and trebuchets come out at you. You need to find their siege works and destroy them or you will have a hard time advancing.
Start by holding ground and watching how the enemy sends initial attacks against you -- horsemen on the west side, mixed infantry on the east side, and trebuchets down the middle (which tend to go for your fortress, so you can position archers slightly to the side to shoot them down before they do too much damage). Position archers and arrow towers to protect the vulnerable resources until you can hold them without really paying attention to them or losing troops.

Next, clear the Fornost walls of trebuchets, using a mix of the Witch-King's Sanctum power and your Avalanche power. Once they are clear, send in the Troll Stone Throwers to destroy all the arrow towers -- but don't advance too far yet.
Hit their troop producing buildings -- especially siegeworks -- but don't advance too far into the enemy territory and don't go down the center to their main gate or destroy it. You may not be ready for the counterattack.

Once you've thinned their ability to produce troops, concentrate on the east side and penetrate as deeply as you can all the way to the northeast, where the siegeworks are (in the fog of war not yet revealed until you pass the inner wall).
Instead of committing troops, you may want to have them in a support role and use any summons you have from your Angmar powers. You can, for example, clear the inner wall of wall defenses with your powers and artillery, then send in the hardy Shade of Wolf. When the fog of war is revealed, call down the other summons in the midst of enemy troops vulnerable to their attacks. Strive to wipe out all the siegeworks there.

If the trebuchets stop or slow to a manageable quantity, you can advance to the next phase, which is to build a lot of walls lined with mostly trebuchets of your own. The reason you probably don't want to do this too early is because their trebuchets have a longer range than those on your walls.
Once you hit the main gate, the enemy will pour out and come straight south to hit your fortress. If you are ready with the walls, you can advance with them to hold ground (remember that you do not need to send out any builders to build walls -- you can start from a hub at your fortress and expand from any wall hub).
Keep building wall defenses until you can hold your walls against enemy counter-attacks.

Finally, with your walls handling the attacks from Fornost, go for the citadel. Using your forces, advance down one of the sides and hit the citadel from behind to win.

Battle for Middle Earth 2 - Rise of the Witch-King - Mission 7 - Plague Bearer

Battle for Middle Earth II - Rise of the Witch -King - Mission 7 - Plague Bearer
This is a hint/walkthrough post for Battle for Middle Earth II: Rise of the Witch-King. You can find an index of all our Battle for Middle Earth II posts here.

You do not have to hold all the barrows to corrupt 1000 souls before the time limit. Three or four should be fine. At each barrow, put down 2-3 towers (upgraded to ice arrows if you have the Resources), and garrison your sorcerer inside. A garrisoned sorcerer still counts as being atop the barrow and will still corrupt souls.
Keep building Mills whenever you can.

Build a few more battalions of Dark Rangers so that you can use their Arrow Volley to take out the riders at each barrow who immediately try to flee to get reinforcements.
Shortly after taking each barrow, whether the rider escapes to call reinforcements or not, some Dunedain Rangers will attack the barrow. Protect your sorcerers and builders by temporarily putting them in a tower.

1-2 battalions of Dark Rangers can sometimes shoot at enemy units without provoking them to move. This is probably because they are shooting from that unit's fog of war, and because they can't see the Dark Rangers, they do not move.

Battle for Middle Earth 2 - Rise of the Witch-King - Mission 6 - Carn Dûm

Battle for Middle Earth II - Rise of the Witch -King - Mission 6 - Carn Dûm
This is a hint/walkthrough post for Battle for Middle Earth II: Rise of the Witch-King. You can find an index of all our Battle for Middle Earth II posts here.

I found this a very tough mission at the start, not the least because I hadn't expected that the tower trebuchets would have a SHORTER range than the enemy trebuchets.
Also, I could not successfully place Hwaldar's ability to summon Hill-Men (the targeting marker seemed to be red everywhere, indicating a location where the summons could not be placed). Angmar powers that summonned creatures seemed to work fine, however.
Finally, the Witch-King's fear power was utterly useless.

On my first attempt, I put together a force of Snow Trolls to try to run around the enemy and take out their trebuchets. This worked quite well, except there were a seemingly endless stream of trebuchets.
Resources are very tight especially initially and if you cannot defend your Mills (by keeping the enemy engaged and not letting them run loose too much). Definitely build a lot of them when you have time. You probably won't have much time later during the attack waves.

One of the keys to an easier time here is to use Hwaldar's leadership bonuses. You can get both increased attack ability and Resources this way. Build a Hall of the King's Men and queue a lot of Thrall Masters. Most should end up being Axe Throwers, with two or at most three battalions of Spearmen. No Wolf Riders because there are a heck of a lot of elven pikemen in this mission.
Thrall Masters are cheap to build, so you can assemble a good-sized force to hold the outermost wall. You are really only doing this for as long as you can in order to get resources for a final stand later as there will be an overwhelming number of elves.

Another key to a solid defense is to use Troll Stone Throwers. Place them near the walls to fire over them and at the enemy as they try to break their way in. Keep them in at least two groups so that if one group is rushed, you can probably still continue firing (or give covering fire) from the other group. They also only cost 25 Command Points but if allowed to fire freely can do devastating damage.

The Elves will also go after the Witch-King directly, with several battalions of high-veterancy Lindon Horse Archers beelining for him. When that happens, retreat him to the innermost wall. When the pursuers enter the space between the middle and inner walls, shut the gates to trap them inside. They will try to fight their way out, but mostly get cut down by trebuchets and arrow towers.

If you lose the outer wall, leave your troops behind and retreat your heroes to the innermost wall. Hopefully by this time you will have accumulated a good amount of Resources not only from your Mills but from Hwaldar's leadership. Build a similar force to defend the inner wall. Builders can throw up towers to be garrisoned (or to give your Witch-King respite from pursuit) if there is spare cash.

Using the types of units mentioned above, plus all the Summon powers available, I didn't need Rogash's reinforcements to defend Carn Dûm.

Battle for Middle Earth 2 - Rise of the Witch-King - Mission 5 - Barrow Downs

Battle for Middle Earth II - Rise of the Witch -King - Mission 5 - Barrow-Downs
This is a hint/walkthrough post for Battle for Middle Earth II: Rise of the Witch-King. You can find an index of all our Battle for Middle Earth II posts here.

You start with some sorcerers for this mission, but don't rely on them. The range of their spells is very short, so from the time you specify the location to hit to when they actually walk over very slowly to cast the spell, you will probably already need to re-target. And with the number of troops coming at you from all sides in this mission, it will be very hard to micromanage this way.
Also, the enemy has high-veterancy cavalry that can run right through your pikemen to mow down your sorcerers.

For the Thrall Masters, you will probably want to summon at least two units of wolf riders for cavalry. There will be an enormous number of archers and infantry, and if you don't have cavalry to at least delay them (running over infantry causes them to fall even if you don't kill them outright), you will probably be overrun. Also, wolf riders are cavalry and therefore cannot be trampled. If enemy cavalry charge, you can counter-charge them and hopefully get them to stop moving while your ranged units attack. Then set the wolf riders to move to another unit while your axe throwers or other units quickly engage the cavalry.

If you don't head immediately for the king's barrow, you will receive an optional objective to clear out the Dunedain Rangers hiding about the Barrow-Downs of Cardolan. Do that first, and also look around the edge of the map. Around the middle of the north side you will probably come across a couple battalions of lancers, and more from off screen if you engage them. Once the entire map is clear, have Hwaldar stand on the barrow.

When reinforcements come, you will probably not have time to organize them, much less set sorcerer spell preferences. Just select all of them, hotkey them together, and use an attack move behind the nearest enemy wave.

You can move Hwaldar and your troops away from the barrow once the quest-location marker spotlight turns off.

Battle for Middle Earth 2 - Rise of the Witch-King - Mission 4 - The Dark Lord's Eye

Battle for Middle Earth II - Rise of the Witch -King - Mission 4 - The Dark Lord's Eye
This is a hint/walkthrough post for Battle for Middle Earth II: Rise of the Witch-King. You can find an index of all our Battle for Middle Earth II posts here.

This is a tough mission primarily because you have to split your attention so much between building Mills, recruiting units, tactical combat. As soon as possible, it would be wise to take the time pressure off so you can concentrate on getting resources.

Instead of rushing around to get the Shards, or even getting four Shards to fulfill the mission objective of keeping Arnor from four, advance down the road (or around it if there are knights camped in the middle of the road) and box in the enemy at their fortress. Morgomir should be able to take down the catapult towers at the entrance. Bring up a Troll Stone Thrower and whatever reinforcements you can build (Dark Rangers are probably best here), then demolish the Arnor base.
Once the base is demolished, you can take your time to build up your forces, defend your holdings, and get the remaining Shards at your leisure because Arnor has no where to deliver their Shards.

In general, Arnor already has sizable forces at each Shard site. When you get close, they grab the Shard and make a run for it while some of their forces delay you. Periodically, Dunedain Knights are spawned from off the map and attack your Mills, so instead of chasing them, put two towers at each Mill.

Battle for Middle Earth 2 - Rise of the Witch-King - Mission 3 - Amon Sûl

Battle for Middle Earth II - Rise of the Witch -King - Mission 3 - Amon Sûl
This is a hint/walkthrough post for Battle for Middle Earth II: Rise of the Witch-King. You can find an index of all our Battle for Middle Earth II posts here.

Once you get rid of the Sun Scorch Mallorn Tree, you just need to hold on until you build your first fortress. At that point, the rest of the mission is attrition.

Start by attacking the arrow tower on the wall near the tree. It will probably shoot at Rogash, so set your other heroes to a more aggressive stance and set Rogash to defensive. Only 3 heroes can attack the tower -- send one to capture the Outpost.
Meanwhile, start your Mills for resources.

After you destroy the Sun Scorch Mallorn Tree, Amon Sûl will probably start sending attacks (usually cavalry) to the northeast corner (stopping for nothing in the meantime) where you started and attack buildings there. If you have anything in the southern side of the map, they will also attack there occasionally.

You can either wait for resources to bring out your first fortress, or go for some Snow Trolls to help your heroes early on. Snow Trolls can trample just about everything, especially Dunedain Rangers summonned by one of the other special Mallorn Trees.

Once your first Fortress is up, keep defending and building Mills (if there is room) until you can get the Witch-King's Sanctum. Use the iceball (Winter's Wrath) power to blow up the Cloud Break Mallorn Tree, then the Dunedain Ranger Mallorn Tree. Those are probably the next two most dangerous ones. Advance and hold ground with more fortresses. The rest of the map should be pretty straightforward.

Out of general principle I covered the roads leading out of the map with Fortresses, but Amon Sûl called no reinforcements.

The Witch-King and Morgomir can reach level 10, Rogash level 8, Hwaldar level 6. As the missions get harder from here, it is best to level everyone up to the maximum possible.

Battle for Middle Earth 2 - Rise of the Witch-King - Mission 2 - Conquest of Rhudaur

Battle for Middle Earth II - Rise of the Witch -King - Mission 2 - Conquest of Rhudaur
This is a hint/walkthrough post for Battle for Middle Earth II: Rise of the Witch-King. You can find an index of all our Battle for Middle Earth II posts here.

You start with a wide variety of units. I recommend restarting this mission several times while you play around with first and second Tier powers as well as the various units.
Some things I found are...

• Snow Trolls really can trample everything (at least everything you encounter in the campaign so far) without fear. At about 4x the Health of regular cavalry, they still take a lot of damage, but one solid trample to kill the enemy is all they need. For maximum effect, engage the enemy with Morgomir first, as his Dread Visage lowers enemy damage and armor; and turn on the Snow Troll Charge, which increases damage and armor.
• Snow Trolls run slower than typical cavalry, so if you mix them with wolf riders, they will get separated, and if you have hotkeyed them together, you won't charge and turn them properly.
• The Thrall Master units are rubbish -- they cannot receive upgrades and you cannot discard them to call new units, which completely negates the flexibility of the Thrall Master to choose units. Hwaldar does give bonuses to Hill Men, but it might not be worth the trouble as you can probably get by with just two types of units: Snow Trolls for cavalry and Dark Rangers.
• Dark Rangers have a range with their arrows (not the power, but their regular attack) that is greater than that of an archer tower. You can therefore use them to safely take out an archer tower without Troll Stone Throwers.

The entire map is revealed, only you cannot see troops outside your visual range. You can therefore locate Hwaldar first by looking for his cage. Get him freed as soon as possible because he starts at only level 1. He can go up to level 4 while the Witch-King and Morgomir can get to level 6.

You start this mission with a limited number of green troops. Take point with your heroes and have them soak missile fire while your archers shoot back or while you maneuver your cavalry in to trample. You will probably want to do the former as moving troops in too close to a camp can get you swarmed.

Once you have secured all the camps, quickly plant a fortress at both river fords, although the northern one will probably be the active one, sending very large sorties of veteran troops across the river. One fully upgraded fortress should be able to hold them off without assistance if you have maybe two catapult towers on the side away from the river ford. I recommend one Wolf Pen pointing at the river to keep the enemy troops briefly tangled up while your fortress catapult towers bombard them. Put your four free Troll Snow Throwers behind the fortresses to add firepower.

Now, hold ground and blanket your side of the river with Mills to start your resources. Fully upgrade your fortress, then start using the Witch-King's Sanctum iceball (Winter's Wrath) power from your fortress to soften the enemy base (taking out troop buildings and trebuchet towers) while you continue building -- remember that the entire map is revealed except for enemy units, so you can easily locate and target dangerous buildings like Catapult Towers.
Cover the road exits with fortresses. Double up the fortresses at each river ford or map entry point if you like. Recycle units you don't want and replace them with the ones you do want. I recommend a force of nothing except Snow Trolls and Dark Rangers.

The first reinforcements come from the north road, close enough to the northern river ford that your fortress there can probably handle them. If you have your Witch-King's Sanctum power ready, you can actually destroy the entire force with a nicely timed bombardment just as they are clumped and entering the map, especially if they stop to attack a Mill or fortress.

Because Winter's Wrath has a limited range, you can either build more fortresses as close to the river as possible to get more uses of the power, or after you've softened them enough just move in with your troops. If you have taken out the troop-producing buildings in the north west base, the AI will start sending out raiding parties from the southern base. There are some units leftover at the Gondor bases to keep it protected, but you can blindly bombard them as well as other buildings. It will take a lot of bombardments to actually destroy the enemy fortress -- I tried with 6 Witch-King's Sanctums and it only took a fortress down to about half Health.

In this mission, the Witch-King and Morgomir can both get the wight-making Morgul blade power. Keep it on automatic as any living unit killed can get you a very useful level 5 wight.
Wights heal when they hit the enemy, so a single wight can potentially take out one or two battalions that can't kill it quickly enough.

Battle for Middle Earth 2 - Rise of the Witch-King - Mission 1 - Foundation of Angmar

Battle for Middle Earth II - Rise of the Witch -King - Mission 1 - Foundation of Angmar
This is a hint/walkthrough post for Battle for Middle Earth II: Rise of the Witch-King. You can find an index of all our Battle for Middle Earth II posts here.

Capture the northeast camp, northwest camp, and finally the southwest camp. This gives you Mills, troop upgrades, and the ability to recruit snow trolls. After you get your first builder, you should blanket the land with Mills to bring in a steady amount of cash for fortress upgrades and troops. Recycle your troops to get just Snow Trolls as you do not have access to any archers at this time. Troll Stone Throwers will be too slow for your defense of the fortresses later unless you pre-position them with the foresight from having played this mission before or by reloading after seeing where they are coming from.

After you take the final fortress location and the fortress is erected, a very short countdown starts before a massive army appears where you began this mission. If you rush, your Snow Trolls can get there with maybe 30 seconds to spare on the timer. Have them trample everything -- even pikemen -- and you can easily win without the Númenóreans getting anywhere close to a fortress.
The reason Snow Trolls can trample pikemen is their high Health. For typical cavalry, this would be suicide. We'll talk more about this in Mission 2 (Conquest of Rhudaur).

The Witch-King and Morgomir can attain level 3, and Rhogash can attain level 4.

Battle for Middle Earth 2 - Rise of the Witch-King - Angmar Powers

Battle for Middle Earth II - Rise of the Witch -King - Angmar Powers
This is a hint/walkthrough post for Battle for Middle Earth II: Rise of the Witch-King. You can find an index of all our Battle for Middle Earth II posts here.

There are only a few One Ring powers for Angmar and no direct-damage ones until Tier 4. Overall, in the early missions of the Angmar Campaign they are largely useless and you will probably be building Fortresses to get Winter's Wrath from the Witch-King's Sanctum instead.

Powers are made available in the Campaigns based on what mission you are in. You begin with 5 Power Points in Mission 1 and can earn them at an aggressive rate. You will probably be able to easily get by in the early missions, so I recommend banking 30 Power Points to try out various Tier 1-3 powers and see what they are like before finalizing a choice.

Mission 1 - Foundation of Angmar - 10 Power Points can be earned in this Mission

• Blight - Halves the resource production of any resource structure within the area of effect. The area effect is very small and you can expect to get only one farm or mine or other basic resource building in it.
• Fell Wind - Moves enemy units closer to the center of the area of effect. Does minimal damage. The area effect is small for what it is supposed to do (gather units together), but can be useful if an area-effect attack does more damage near the centre rather than all around, and if the units are on the move. The duration of this power is VERY short, so you really need to be fast with getting the other power lined up. Some powers have a long charge-up time, such a the Witch-King's Sanctum ice comet from Angmar Fortresses. This means you've got to be careful about timing as well. A good follow-up power to use might be the Dark Ranger Arrow Volley. I recommend giving it a try especially if (like me) you rarely use powers anyway, especially as it gives access to Frozen Land, which might be the best of the Tier-2 powers.
• War Chant - Target allies gain +50% Damage and +50% Armor. Does not stack. Frozen Land does the same at a wider radius and a longer duration, but does not attach to units the way War Chant does.
• Untamed Allegiance - Neutral monster lair comes under your control. It must not be reduced to ruins. If you attacked it and levelled it but did not utterly destroy it (which would result in it disappearing and replaced by treasure chests), you can wait until it rebuilds. Any units from the lair come under your control when you take control of your lair. Overall a very useless power since you have no control over what Lairs are available to you, and the creatures you get aren't that great -- not even the Fire Drake, as the Angmar Campaign features strong and plentiful enemies who aren't shy about trying to outshoot you with a lot of archers. For all other lairs, you can recruit better units from your own buildings.
• Frozen Land - Ally units gain +50% Damage and +50% Armor. An alternative to War Chant, especially if you are trying to hold a position. Probably the best of the Tier-2 powers, but you need either Blight or Fell Wind to get it.
• Snow Bind - All Structures within the area of effect cannot produce, but are immune to damage. You could use this if for some reason you can't wipe out the building quickly enough and need some respite while dealing with other units. In general, you will probably find it very rare to need to use this. It is really hard to justify 10 Power Points for this.

Mission 2 - Conquest of Rhudaur - 15 Power Points can be earned in this Mission

• Summon Orcs - Summons several hordes of orcs under your control. More or less summons cannon fodder to delay the enemy, though if put in the midst of a large archer clump, it can save the day. Of the Tier-2 powers, this is probably the best choice after Frozen Land.
• Summon Giants - Summons two Giants under your control. Giants can throw stones as far as artillery, and have an area-effect Stomp attack if you switch them to hand-to-hand combat. This power is an interesting option as Angmar siege engines (ice trebuchets) cost 25 Command Points each. It would save you from having to wait for them, and giants are more competent when engaged by the enemy. On the other hand, the AI likes to mass upgraded archers and almost always starts with veteran units, making this a useless power unless you have already made the area safe for them.
• Freezing Rain - Temporarily covers the map in rain. All enemy units lose their leadership bonuses. What it does occurs rarely enough to justify 15 Power Points. It unlocks both Tier 4 powers, so it is on the shortest path to getting both of them, but in the Angmar Campaign, this won't matter so much because you cannot select the Tier 4 powers until Mission 8.
• Summon Wights - Summons several wights under your control. Wights are an interesting option because against a small number of units, a single wight can kill them all as each attack restores some of its health. They move very slowly, so they are easily killed by ranged attacks. Great for holding ground, blocking a choke point, or covering a retreat. Useless if there are too many units at once -- they won't last half a minute.

Missions 3-7

• 20 Power Points can be earned in each of these Missions (total +100).
• No new powers available.
• Because of the overwhelming number of enemies in Mission 6, you will probably want to have all the Summon-type Powers by the start of that mission.

Mission 8 - Fornost
You can have banked up to 130 Power Points by the time you begin this mission. If you save 50 Power Points for the Tier 4 powers here, you can have spent 80 Power Points previously -- enough to get all the Summon powers by Mission 6 and still have unlocked both Tier 4 powers. In this mission, you can earn just enough points to get every power providing you maximized your Power Points in previous missions.

• Avalanche - Summons an avalanche that will damage enemies and put out fires. Better than Shade of Wolf because it doesn't summon a creature that has to fight (and possibly get killed, prematurely ending its usefulness). Not enough to destroy some Tier 3 buildings.
• Summon Shade of Wolf - Summons a spectral wolf under your control. Bursts out of the ground, throwing units aside as a result. Even if they aren't killed, they are severely delayed. Seems to be quite resistant to arrows -- more so than the Dragons or the Balrog from the One Ring Tier 4 powers.

Epilogue - The Fall of Angmar
In this mission, you start with a fixed set of EvenStar powers and cannot earn any Power Points.