Hello, T3A!
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Today, I am officially attempting to build a drawing board and team recruitment for my own Battle for Middle-earth 2 mod, "Legions of Middle-earth". When it comes to modernizing the graphics, I'll start off using Create A Hero models and pieces for the unit and hero models like I did for my Dwarf Guardian remodel here:
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But anyway, here is my drawing board for Legions of Middle-earth, whose acronym shall be 'LOM', as in the command to attach will be '-mod LOM':
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Phase One: Factions
- Gondor: The faction who focuses on foot-fighting and artillery. Newly added heroes like Imrahil, Madril, Beregond, Angbor, and Forlong will be added to go with Gandalf, Boromir, Faramir, and Aragorn. Ring Hero = Pippin Took.
- Imladris: The faction whose trademark is a use of stealthy troops, including the familiar Lothlorien fencer/archer hybrid from Bfme1's Rohan, and also including a redo of the one Mirkwood troop type as to be the cavalry version. All other Elven troops will, as the faction name suggests, be based on the Imladris elves from Fellowship of the Ring and Unexpected Journey, too. Heroes will be Elrond, Erestor, Gildor, Arwen, Haldir, Galadriel, Celeborn, Legolas, and Thranduil and at the Ent Moot, Treebeard. Ring Hero = Samwise Gamgee. New wall upgrades being arrow tower, postern gate, and sentry Ent.
- Erebor: The best armored of the free peoples, of which there are six in terms of playable factions in LOM. Aesthetics will be based, for the ground troops including the ram-riders, on the Erebor soldiery from the prologue scene in Unexpected Journey. Gloin, Dori, Nori, Ori, Gimli, Dain Ironfoot, and Thorin Stonehelm are the Erebor faction heroes. Ring Hero = Bilbo Baggins.
- Isengard: The most versatile dark force, on an artillery level. Plenty of Uruk-hai troop types including Scouts who are basically Isengard Uruk-hai equivalents to Gondor's Ranger unit, even in terms of skeleton & animations. Also armed with indeed enough siege ladders, ballista, battering rams, and demolition shells. Wall upgrade versions of the arrow tower, ballista, and mine launcher expansions will be added. Saruman the White will be this faction's Ring Hero, faction heroes consist of Lurtz, Sharku, Mauhur, Ugluk, Grima, and a Dunland chief named Wolfbane.
- Mordor: The faction with the most different troop types and the most faction heroes. Mordor Uruk-hai will be the default swordsmen, archers, pikemen, and warg-riders for Mordor. These will wear the Morgul Uruk armor from Return of the King. Haradrim spearmen, bowmen, and horsemen; Variag Warriors and Horsemen; and Corsair Reavers and Arbalesters; will be the human units of Mordor in LOM. Also, Mordor will have the Mumakil 90% bigger in scale and the Troll Cage will be able to recruit Angmar-style Hill Trolls. Faction heroes? Gothmog, Shagrat, Murgash, Guritz, Mollock the Troll, Mouth of Sauron, Balakan of Umbar, Karbazir of Khand, Dolguzor of Harad, and the following six Nazgul: Witch-King, Lingering Shadow, Dark Headsman, The Forsaken, Abyssal Knight, and Slayer of Men. Witch-King design will be from Return of the King, other Nazgul based on the ones from Battle of Five Armies. Sauron is the Ring Hero for this faction.
- Goblins: The faction where almost every troop type can climb walls. Moria Goblins will be the entire force of troopers, including for the Wolf-riders. Stone Giants will be renamed and retextured to look as gray as the boulders they throw. Goblin Pikemen will be newly added and only the wolf-riders will be unable to climb walls. Even Goblin drummers will be able to climb walls. Faction heroes will be largely borrowed from Games Workshop, as is some of the stuff I already mentioned. Durburz, Ashrak, Azog, Bolg, Fimbul, Gorkil, and Shelob for faction heroes. Smaug is the Ring Hero.
- Easterlings: The faction whose gameplay is worlds apart from the other nine. Both Blue Wizards will be faction heroes, along with human heroes Azulkhor, Niluphel, Zorzagar, and Pharazkhor. As Nazgul; Khamul the Easterling, Abyssal Knight, and Slayer of Men; will be the deadliest Easterling faction heroes, designs pulled from Five Armies. Unlike the Easterling Windmills in other bfme2 mods, the Easterling Windmills in this mod will work like Lumber Mills but the Easterling Laborers can extract iron, gold, meat, eggs, fruit, milk, fish, and other commodities from the map, as well as wood. There is also a Reptile House building from which Mewlips, Turtle-fish, and Were-wyrms [modeled on GW Cave Drakes] are drawn. Swordsmen, Phalanxes, Bowmen, Kataphrakts, Battle Wagons, Guards with Axes, and Warpriests are the regular Easterling troop types. As is the case with Mordor, the Easterlings' Ring Hero is also Sauron. Yeah, 4 of the Nazgul are 2 Abyssal Knights and 2 Slayers of Men: 1 of each for Mordor, 1 of each for Easterlings.
- Men of Dale: The smallest of the ten factions, this one relies mainly on large hordes of troopers to get ahead, which is unusual for a Free Peoples faction in bfme2 gameplay. King Brand, Prince Bard, Radagast the Brown Wizard, Gwaihir the Eagle, and Beorn are the faction heroes of Dale. Like with Erebor, Dale also has Bilbo Baggins for Ring Hero.
- Iron Hills: Aesthetically based on the Iron Hill Dwarves of the Five Armies movie, these guys will be to offensives as Erebor is to Defensives. In other words, this will be the hardest-hitting on the attack of all the Free People factions. Faction heroes are Dwalin, Bifur, Bofur, and Bombur. Ring Hero is Frodo Baggins.
- Rohan: With Merry Brandybuck for its Ring Hero, Rohan happens to also be a faction with a very large menu of horse-riding troop types, but their Yeoman Militia is basically just a Rohan version of the Gondor Rangers, but instead of being able to stealth in trees these militias can get the heavy armor upgrade. These militias are also Rohan's only type of foot fighters. The rest are the following Rohirrim cavalry: Royal Guards, Swordsmen, Axemen, Lancers, Archers, Scouts, Outriders, and Sons of Eorl (the Sons being who can toggle between jousting and archery). Eowyn, Eomer, Theoden, Grimbold, Gamling, Hama, and even Theodred are the faction heroes of Rohan.
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Phase Two: What I am able to do
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Basically, I can do the adding of new factions, buildings, units and heroes myself. Following the tutorials, there is very little trouble for me. I can do intermediate coding and intermediate graphics, too. When I get gameplay videos for LOM uploaded, I hope I will motivate the assembly of a LOM modding team 
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Phase Three: Here's a gallery of Easterling faction stuff.
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Wall Hub:
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Wall Gate (opens down and closes up like with Erebor):
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Wall Segments (3 of them):
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Reptile House:
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And the Golden Stall and Fortress Citadel are two other topics in the Showcase section.
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Thanks for reading this, folks!
