War In Middle Earth Retrospective
fan
time when not many people had computers besides nerds and geeks. We're
talking about the late 80s and we're talking about a game called "War In
Middle Earth" by Melbourne House. The game is for the PC.
This stays very true to the books. You begin with Frodo and Sam. You must
find the other hobbits and then meet Aragorn along the road to Rivendell.
You can stop by Treebeard's home if you so wish. But the Nazgul are after
you so you may end up heading further west to escape them. Once you find
Aragorn, and arrive at Rivendell, you'll gather your party and must
decide on a path to reach Mordor. You can head south to join the forces
of man, cross Moria, or do nothing and gather your forces for a march
against Sauron. This is where the book and game differ. Sauron and
Saruman will attack the cities of the west and you must not let him
capture three cities or the game is over. You can gather your forces and
defend one city.
Now it's up to you how to finish the game. Attack Mordor with your forces
and try to kill Sauron or you can use your party to drop the ring into
Mount Doom. There are also artifacts and relics that can aid you in
mobilizing the ents and men that you can try and find by talking to
people you meet along the way including other wizards.
All the cities and forces of Middle Earth from spiders to watch towers to
elves are present. There's even the balrog if you are close to the mines
of Moria and Gollum if you are near Mordor.
While this is not a new game, it is a game that keeps Tolkien's vision of
Middle Earth intact without adding one new character or element. You are
free to roam and click on any location or creature in Middle Earth and
you are free to control all the forces of the west.
AC
> Here's a game not many people played because it was released during a
> time when not many people had computers besides nerds and geeks. We're
> talking about the late 80s and we're talking about a game called "War In
> Middle Earth" by Melbourne House. The game is for the PC.
<snip.
I take it, then, that you have not read the book.
--
Aaron Clausen
Tancred
> While this is not a new game, it is a game that keeps Tolkien's vision of
> Middle Earth intact without adding one new character or element. You are
> free to roam and click on any location or creature in Middle Earth and
> you are free to control all the forces of the west.
Heh... therein lies its' downfall as a faithful recreation of
Tolkien's work. Bwahahahaaa...
See, my battle strategy was this: send Frodo as far West as I could,
keeping him out of the clutches of the Nazgul. Once I get my forces
built up to a decent size, launch an all-out attack on the Orcs around
Mount Doom and keep sending as many reinforcements as I could.
Eventually, we'd wear them down.
Once that was achieved, send Frodo into the clutches of the Nazgul.
The Naz grabs the ring, pegs it to Barad-Dur (I could have gotten
Frodo to walk there, but a Nazgul is faster and there's only so many
cups of coffee you can go away and make) only to fall afoul of the
huge army of goodness camped around the Mountain of Fire. Scrag one
Nazgul, drop one ring into the flames - and hurray! Back home to
Gondor in time for tea and medals.
If only *I*d been in charge in the book, eh?
paulh
>time when not many people had computers besides nerds and geeks. We're
>talking about the late 80s and we're talking about a game called "War In
>Middle Earth" by Melbourne House. The game is for the PC.
>
>This stays very true to the books. You begin with Frodo and Sam. You must
>find the other hobbits and then meet Aragorn along the road to Rivendell.
>You can stop by Treebeard's home if you so wish. But the Nazgul are after
>you so you may end up heading further west to escape them. Once you find
>Aragorn, and arrive at Rivendell, you'll gather your party and must
>decide on a path to reach Mordor. You can head south to join the forces
>of man, cross Moria, or do nothing and gather your forces for a march
>against Sauron. This is where the book and game differ. Sauron and
>Saruman will attack the cities of the west and you must not let him
>capture three cities or the game is over. You can gather your forces and
>defend one city.
>
>Now it's up to you how to finish the game.
I just let Saurons armies do what they want and sent the ring bearer the 'long
way around' the back of Mordor.. make a guick run in toward Orodruin and popped
the ring in.
Easy
nice game otherwise tho... I can see a copy from here.
paulh
TitaniumWulf
> time when not many people had computers besides nerds and geeks. We're
> talking about the late 80s and we're talking about a game called "War In
> Middle Earth" by Melbourne House. The game is for the PC.
I think I played this game on the Amiga. It was terrible. First of all,
the quests were difficult to complete in the time alotted. So when
Saurman attack, I sent the Hurons to Helms Deep, the Ents
to Isengard and everone else in the whole of Middle Earth (who I could
direct) to Minas Tirith.
Now the Hurons and Ents totally wiped out their respective foe.
Sauron sent waves of 10000 Orcs interspaced with 500 Trolls
to Minas Tirith. They were chucked in a meat grinder and I would
wipe out 10000 or the 500 with the loss of 10 or 20 of my forces
maximum!
When Sauron had shot his load, I sent everyone I had to his gaff.
I smoked his cigars, went to bed with his wife and slapped Sauron
silly. That took less than a day of playing.
I was so disgusted with the game I took it back and asked for
my money to be returned.
The Hobbit for the Speccy was much better. You can still
play it if you get the emulator.
Wyatt
Conrad Dunkerson
> Here's a game not many people played because it was released during a
> time when not many people had computers besides nerds and geeks.
Actually, I believe it was re-released later and quite alot of people
have played it. I have anyway. My strategy was generally to build up
a ridiculously large army, barge into Mordor and sack Barad-dur...
which shouldn't have been possible but was actually not all that
difficult... Aragorn going through the Paths of the Dead and
Merry/Pippin meeting Treebeard could give you a massive increase in
forces in time for the major battles. I recall that once everyone
else was wiped out Sauron could often take out whole sections of your
army on his own before eventually being defeated.
jsberry
the time of The Hobbit and have 7 players. Men, Elves, and Dwarves
compete against each other but each have the primary goal of defeating
Sauron. The men's secondary goal is to expand their kingdom; Elves'
goal is to sail as many of their forces West as they can spare;
Dwarves collect as much gold as possible. Each side collects victory
points for achieving their separate goal. Gandalf is the fourth
player with the burden of forcing cooperation among the three good
powers, while finding and destroying the ring. Sauron and Saroman get
points from conquest and getting the ring. The seventh player could
be the northern goblins, who get points for killing dwarves and elves
and expanding mountain empire. Army movement is public and a neutral
GM (or computer) would monitor secret movement of characters.
Now can anybody with software skills write this game?
Steuard Jensen
<1178b6d1.03062...@posting.google.com>:
> fan <f...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> > Here's a game not many people played because it was released
> > during a time when not many people had computers besides nerds and
> > geeks.
> Actually, I believe it was re-released later and quite alot of
> people have played it.
I don't actually recall when I bought it, but I have at least a vague
feeling it was in its first release. (I was quite young at the time.)
> Aragorn going through the Paths of the Dead and Merry/Pippin meeting
> Treebeard could give you a massive increase in forces in time for
> the major battles.
Now, this puzzles me, and makes me wonder whether I just had a very
buggy release (for what it's worth, I seemed to recall that some
things in the manual seemed to be missing from the game, too). As far
as I recall, I only saw the Dead Men once, but only as something that
Aragorn "evaded", never as a unit on the screen. I _think_ I even
tried to duplicate the book events in that section precisely once,
too. Also, my memory was that Merry and Pippin meeting Treebeard
never accomplished anything more in my games than getting a little
advice; it took Gandalf' meeting him (or going _somewhere_ in Fangorn;
I don't recall) to get the Ents moving. (I don't _think_ Gandalf the
Grey could do it...)
And in any case, I never had the slightest control over the Ents or
Huorns. They went on their automated way to Isengard and Helm's Deep,
and stayed there for the rest of the game (much to my frustration).
(I had trouble controling Gollum, too, on those occasions when I
actually got him to show up; some of that seemed to be intentional,
but I thought it went a bit beyond what it was supposed to.) I never
figured out what the various magical objects scattered around the
world were good for at all. :) (Well, the Palantir was obvious, I
guess.)
Steuard Jensen
Conrad Dunkerson
> As far as I recall, I only saw the Dead Men once, but only as something
> that Aragorn "evaded", never as a unit on the screen.
Sorry, I was unclear. If you sent Aragorn through the paths you could
then recruit the forces from the coastal cities earlier than they
would normally appear. I used to send Aragorn off alone to get to the
paths early and pull all the Gondoran forces into Minas Tirith.
> Also, my memory was that Merry and Pippin meeting Treebeard never
> accomplished anything more in my games than getting a little advice; it
> took Gandalf' meeting him (or going _somewhere_ in Fangorn; I don't recall)
> to get the Ents moving.
> And in any case, I never had the slightest control over the Ents or
> Huorns.
Hmmm... I thought I used the hobbits to do it, but it has been a long
time. I do recall that sometimes I could control the Ents and Huorns
and sometimes I couldn't. Not sure what the difference was though.
> I never figured out what the various magical objects scattered around the
> world were good for at all. :) (Well, the Palantir was obvious, I guess.)
Some of them allowed you to recruit and control different types of
troops I remember. Like, the red arrow would get Rohan up in arms and
the dwarven ring would let you recruit forces from Erebor. Others
just made individual heroes fight better. I used to split up my party
to grab specific items and recruit the associated forces. Generally I
had most of the armies on the map already in Minas Tirith by the time
Mordor launched its assault.
Steuard Jensen
> If you sent Aragorn through the paths you could then recruit the
> forces from the coastal cities earlier than they would normally
> appear. I used to send Aragorn off alone to get to the paths early
> and pull all the Gondoran forces into Minas Tirith.
Cool. I didn't realize that Aragorn could be used for that; it's neat
that they had multiple ways of accomplishing the same things. I
usually activated the Gondorian forces by taking the Scepter of
Annuminas to Denethor in Minas Tirith. As I recall, I'd typically
send Merry and Pippin to get the scepter and the Red Arrow from where
they were hidden in the north while Frodo and the rest went on to
Rivendell. (Eomer would go to get the Dwarves' and Wood-elves'
special artifacts.) I'd send Merry and Pippin and Eomer to their
target destinations just before Frodo got to Rivendell so they could
get there in automatic safety during the (skipped) long wait at
Rivendell before the Fellowship sets out. It generally worked pretty
well. :)
Steuard Jensen
Yuk Tang
[snip]
> Steuard Jensen
I'm trying to look for an instruction manual for WiME, having downloaded a
copy from one of the retro sites. However, I have fond memories of another
game that was based on LotR: Lords of Midnight. Now that caught the spirit
of that part of the story.
Cheers, ymt.
Ciarán Irvine
>
> I'm trying to look for an instruction manual for WiME, having downloaded a
> copy from one of the retro sites. However, I have fond memories of another
> game that was based on LotR: Lords of Midnight. Now that caught the spirit
> of that part of the story.
>
> Cheers, ymt.
Lords Of Midnight and Doomdark's Revenge are still very much alive and
kicking, with a newsgroup:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/midnight/
And a quasi-official home of remakes:
And at least 4 or 5 modern remakes or LOM-inspired games being created
by enthusiasts, of which WOTS (War of the Solstice) is probably the
most eagerly-awaited. Amazingly, we still have discussions on LOM
strategies after all these years, with recent debates discussing the
feasibility of holding the plains of Blood or immediately launching
counter-invasions of Valethor or Korkith....now *that's* a long-lived
game!
Yuk Tang
>
> And at least 4 or 5 modern remakes or LOM-inspired games being created
> by enthusiasts, of which WOTS (War of the Solstice) is probably the
> most eagerly-awaited. Amazingly, we still have discussions on LOM
> strategies after all these years, with recent debates discussing the
> feasibility of holding the plains of Blood or immediately launching
> counter-invasions of Valethor or Korkith....now *that's* a long-lived
> game!
I've tried playing the PC conversion of LoM again recently, but haven't yet
spent the time re-acclimatising myself to the map. I've also browsed the
group, and found the post on the strategy of holding Blood vs an elastic
defence. Can you point me to any other particularly interesting threads?
Yahoo groups isn't Google, and offers less possibility of searching,
unfortunately.
As for myself, I used to conduct a sweep of the east and the south, then
retreat to the passes of Xajorkith in numbers. As each square can hold
around 10K troops, I would usually use the citadel itself as the main lure
for Doomdark's main attack, using the walls to give my army the extra oomph.
The remainder of the army would be arranged around the citadel. If this
were real, it would have been disastrous for the northern Lords and the bulk
of the civilian population, given up as lost in the face of the enemy, only
to be 're-converted' when Doomdark's assaults had lost momentum and the time
had come for me to 'liberate' lost territory.
Also, are the flashier PC versions workable?
Cheers, ymt.
Ciarán Irvine
> Yahoo groups isn't Google, and offers less possibility of searching,
> unfortunately.
Search on "Valethor" for lots of discussion on the "Invading The Gap"
strategy. Currently in the "Korkith" thread there's talk about how to
take Ushgarak as quickly as possible while defending as much as
possible. Francisco currently has the record with 15 days, though he
lost the citadels of Ithrorn, Kumar, Dreams and Dawn and a few other
areas in the attempt. What's interesting about LOM, after all these
years, is that every poster has wildly different ideas on the right
way to go about things!
> As for myself, I used to conduct a sweep of the east and the south, then
> retreat to the passes of Xajorkith in numbers.
Ah, the old "Withdraw To Xajorkith" strategy. I fought that for
*years* before I started getting bolder and trying to hold more and
more of Midnight from Doomdark's hordes, mainly because as you say:
>If this were real, it would have been disastrous for the northern
Lords and the >bulk of the civilian population, given up as lost in
the face of the enemy, >only to be 're-converted' when Doomdark's
assaults had lost momentum and the >time had come for me to 'liberate'
lost territory.
Which is why I prefer the Valethor strategy above all. Hold every
single keep, keep the Foul back everywhere, defend the people of
Midnight at all costs! You might try holding a line along
Athoril->Dawn->Shimeril->Thimrath to start off with, then expand that
out as you get more comfortable. Actually holding the Keep Of Blood
throughout is seen as something of a rite of passage in the Yahoo
mailing list ;-)
> Also, are the flashier PC versions workable?
>
The Midnight Engine (TME) available on the Icemark site is fully
playable, well worth the download and a look. Apparently the latest
almost-fully-playable alpha of WOTS will be along soon-ish, that one's
worth keeping an eye out for every few weeks. Legends and Marshall
Lords are further away from completion, though the Marshall Lords v0.5
beta is apparently pretty playable. Java application, so expect much
mucking about with Classpaths to get it working ;-)
Een wilde Ier
wrote:
<snip>
>> Also, are the flashier PC versions workable?
>>
>
>The Midnight Engine (TME) available on the Icemark site is fully
>playable, well worth the download and a look. Apparently the latest
>almost-fully-playable alpha of WOTS will be along soon-ish, that one's
>worth keeping an eye out for every few weeks. Legends and Marshall
>Lords are further away from completion, though the Marshall Lords v0.5
>beta is apparently pretty playable. Java application, so expect much
>mucking about with Classpaths to get it working ;-)
? I was following this thread up until this point...
cheers,
David
--
Journalist: Where in Northern Ireland will the two leaders meet?
Ari Fleischer: Dublin.
Press Briefing with Ari Fleischer,
George W. Bush's chief spokesman
April 4, 2003
Yuk Tang
>> Can you point me to any other particularly interesting threads?
>> Yahoo groups isn't Google, and offers less possibility of searching,
>> unfortunately.
>
> Search on "Valethor" for lots of discussion on the "Invading The Gap"
> strategy. Currently in the "Korkith" thread there's talk about how to
> take Ushgarak as quickly as possible while defending as much as
> possible. Francisco currently has the record with 15 days, though he
> lost the citadels of Ithrorn, Kumar, Dreams and Dawn and a few other
> areas in the attempt. What's interesting about LOM, after all these
> years, is that every poster has wildly different ideas on the right
> way to go about things!
I assume that 'The Gap' means Gorgroth, across the mountains, then across
the plains and into Ushgarak. Pretty easy going, geographically, with only
the small matter of tens of thousands of Doomdark's troops in the way,
outnumbering you 10-1.
>> As for myself, I used to conduct a sweep of the east and the south,
>> then retreat to the passes of Xajorkith in numbers.
>
> Ah, the old "Withdraw To Xajorkith" strategy. I fought that for
> *years* before I started getting bolder and trying to hold more and
> more of Midnight from Doomdark's hordes, mainly because as you say:
I hit upon this strategy when I decided to map the Icemark. Previously, I'd
given up the game as near unplayable - in trying to save all the garrisons
of Blood at the start, I was invariably caught in the open and annihilated.
Once I'd mapped it, I stumbled upon the joys of concentrated armies and
piecemeal AI attacks, and exploited it by placing all my troops at the
decisive point. At that point, I thought I'd found the optimal strategy,
and went on to Elite. But as you said, there are a myriad of ways in which
to play LoM; I was just too immature to see the possibilities beyond merely
beating the game.
Btw, the first computer game I ever bought was Vulcan - The Tunisian
campaign. Being a kid, I was attracted to the cover (prat!), but a look
back at contemporary reviews show that it was probably the best wargame made
for the Speccy. Nonetheless, when I recently played a PC conversion of the
game again, I managed to find even better ways of exploiting the A-non-I.
Whereas in RL, the Allies suffered tens of thousands of casualties before
capturing Tunis and Bizerta, 7 months after the start of the campaign, I
managed it in a week, with the loss of just over 200 men. However, if this
were real, the Axis would not have had the opportunity to pour another 100+K
men into a lost cause, although DAK would have been caught with nowhere to
hide. Similarly, while the Xajorkith strategy manages to win with a minimal
loss of troops directly under Luxor's control, it would have entailed other
losses if the scenario were played out for real.
>> If this were real, it would have been disastrous for the northern
> Lords and the >bulk of the civilian population, given up as lost in
> the face of the enemy, >only to be 're-converted' when Doomdark's
> assaults had lost momentum and the >time had come for me to 'liberate'
> lost territory.
>
> Which is why I prefer the Valethor strategy above all. Hold every
> single keep, keep the Foul back everywhere, defend the people of
> Midnight at all costs! You might try holding a line along
> Athoril->Dawn->Shimeril->Thimrath to start off with, then expand that
> out as you get more comfortable. Actually holding the Keep Of Blood
> throughout is seen as something of a rite of passage in the Yahoo
> mailing list ;-)
I thought that holding Blood was a suicidal affair, but how the heck do you
manage Valethor? Gorgroth is directly in the way, and several thousand
enemy are going down the western flank to join the attack on the plains. I
suppose the Fay in the east are easier to hold on to if you occupy the
Valethor area, but it seems to me that it's impossible to gather enough
troops to capture Gorgroth _and_ defend the line you suggest. And if you
bypass Gorgroth; say goodbye to reinforcements from the south, not that
they'll arrive in time to do much good.
>> Also, are the flashier PC versions workable?
>
> The Midnight Engine (TME) available on the Icemark site is fully
> playable, well worth the download and a look. Apparently the latest
> almost-fully-playable alpha of WOTS will be along soon-ish, that one's
> worth keeping an eye out for every few weeks. Legends and Marshall
> Lords are further away from completion, though the Marshall Lords v0.5
> beta is apparently pretty playable. Java application, so expect much
> mucking about with Classpaths to get it working ;-)
Mein gott. Does it actually require further tweaking using Java and stuff
to get it working? I can just about manage VB, but anything more complex
makes me shiver.
Now I'm just wishing for another Elite or Mercenary to appear, the former
with an automatic docking computer.
Cheers, ymt.
Ciarán Irvine
> manage Valethor? Gorgroth is directly in the way, and several thousand
> enemy are going down the western flank to join the attack on the plains. I
> suppose the Fay in the east are easier to hold on to if you occupy the
> Valethor area, but it seems to me that it's impossible to gather enough
> troops to capture Gorgroth _and_ defend the line you suggest. And if you
> bypass Gorgroth; say goodbye to reinforcements from the south, not that
> they'll arrive in time to do much good.
Oh no, holding Blood is actually pretty easy. The trick is Luxor -
10,000 Riders are following him, so send Luxor out to the East with
Kumar, Dregrim and company, they can hold out easily, but those extra
10,000 Foul ease the pressure on Blood significantly. The Invasion of
Valethor strategy took a while to get right, but it can be done.
Basically by day 3 you can have enough forces assembled on the plains
between the Keep of Blood and Valethor to launch an immediate
counter-strike before Doomdark has a chance to get moving. It's
impossible to take the Citadel, but you *can* take and hold one of the
two keeps on either side of the Gap (that's what we call the pass into
Valethor BTW). 90% of Doomdark's troops then attack that keep and
never even get onto the Plains of Blood, never mind anywhere else. The
slaughter is unbelievable and most times you'll end up with armyless
and dead Lords by the end, but it's a lot of fun and extremely tense!
Only works about 2/3 of the time too...
The key, of course, is recruitment, and having enough people heading
in the right directions, and making use of the Cup of Dreams at
various liths and henges, to get as many lords as possible saddled up
and heading for Valethor as quickly as possible. There's a detailed
walkthrough of how I did it on the Yahoo site somewhere...
> Mein gott. Does it actually require further tweaking using Java and stuff
> to get it working? I can just about manage VB, but anything more complex
> makes me shiver.
Well, it *is* still a beta ;-) Ben plans on making it a no-brain
install eventually, but at the minute some people have found it a bit
baffling to get up and running. Apparently it's worth it though, a
LOM-style game with a few improvements, a modern interface, and a
whole new world to explore. WOTS is a pure LOM remake with modern
graphics and the screenshots from the development team are stunning -
and old LOM fan like yourself will get a kick out of these:
http://www.frozenempire.net/gallery.html
> Now I'm just wishing for another Elite or Mercenary to appear, the former
> with an automatic docking computer.
Ah, Elite....the original version of course ;-) I still play it
occassionally on the Spectrum emulator for nostalgia purposes. *Still*
haven't managed to make Elite yet, stuck on Deadly despite many raids
on the Thargoids in Witchspace ;-)