Helms Deep HOW??

all right heres my tips

good side.

point 1 evenstar powers. when you get to 8 points chose summon elves. thats what i did.

point 2 build a rohan well and archery range at the keep.

point 3 have archers at the keep on the wall also fire arrows very important.

point4 when you start to lose archers at the main wall { pull heros back to the keep }

point 5. hold them at the keep and wait for reinforcments.

evil side.

point 1. build two camps and a lumber mill

point 2. make 3 balistias and a couple of siege ladders and an explosive mine.

point 3 when ready move balistias to attack archers and peasants on the main wall. when ready put explosive mine in position then get urak berserker to light the flame and blow up the mine.


point 4. once wall is down send in uraks and warg riders.

I'll throw my two cents in as well.

Good side:
1: Take Eowyn and Theoden and mount them on horses. COmbine them with your unit of riders (or two units if you're not playing on hard). Grab the treasure chest that spawns just to the west of the outer gate. Then send them down to the south end of the map somewhere, to help save the refugees later on. PS: Watch that spot with the treasure chest. It respawns.

2: Build out all but two of your free foundations with farms. Reserve the last 2 spots for an armory and a stables, but don't build them as of yet. Save all of your resources until the elves arrive.

3: When the elves arrive, position them on the deeping wall, above the grate. DO NOT combine them into units of 10. This causes 5 to use swords, and 5 to use bows. Being that you have a wall to stand on, you either want 10 bows, or 10 swords (and you can switch them when you need to) and never 5 of each. the 5/5 formation is useful elsewhere in the game, but not now.

4: Now that the elves have arrived you can build elves. Start training them in your archery range, and spread them out across your walls. Make sure to place some on top of the outer gate, as well as all along the walls. Elves are better than yoeman archers, because they have much more health, and because they can pull their swords in a pinch to clear off compromised walls. They are worth the command points and cost, on this map at least.

4: Kill the wargs that chase the refugees with your pre-positioned riders and heroes.

5: Once you have all the refugees (and grabbed the loot bonuses), position them behind your main gate, draft them, and leave them till you really need them. They can be used as quick melee support, or (mainly) to repair the gate as it is getting hammered.

5: Heroes. Put aragorn and theoden on the walls, to the left and right of the main elves on the deeping wall. THe leadership bonuses they give will make your archers many times stronger than before, and they can be used to smack down any troops that make it on your walls. Keep eowyn around near your outer gate for sallying forth with your riders to kill battering rams or whatnot. Gimli and boromir are also good to have behind your outer gate, in case you need some good melee power there in a pinch. Put Legolas on top of the deeping wall somewhere, or on top of the outer gate. While his range and strength are nice to have on the outer gate, his ability to grant experience to troops (if he's high enough rank by now) will allow you to level your archers on the deeping wall without needing to pay for the banner upgrade. Don't forget to take advantage of this power from time to time.

6: Now that you have positioned everyone purchase your fire arrow upgrade (you've been building elves, so it should be available now), and start equipping all of your archer units with fire arrows. This is critical. Fire arrows allow you to take down seige ladders, and to destroy explosive mines before they get in range of your walls. Regular arrows just don't cut the mustard.

7: Once you have sufficient resources, build an armory, and purchase the banner upgrade. Then give it to all of your archers (that legolas hasn't already upgraded). Rank 2 is very important, allowing your troops to replace lost units. Once finished, purchase the heavy armor upgrade, and upgrade your archers. Once finished that, build a stables, and ensure you have a few cavalry units around for sallying forth to destroy battering rams, ballistas and such. Eventually try to get around to purchasing the swords upgrade, and upgrade your cavalry to the max.

8: General tactics.
-Always pan your camera up and down the walls *constantly*. The moment you see a seige ladder, wait until it gets in range, then set a unit or two to specifically shoot it. The Uruks love to screen the seige ladders with uruk cannon-fodder. Don't let your elves be fooled. Make sure they take out the ladders. Note: Don't tell them to fire on the ladders before they are in range! If you have a postern gate (and you should probably have 2) then your dumbass elves will hop off the walls and venture out on the open field to get in range. doh!
-Also, when the game says to watch out for mines, start err.. watching out for mines. Take them out as soon as they are in range, and you'll probably get the joy of watching a large part of the enemy force go flying. They always send the mines at the grate in the deeping wall. Keep vigilant, and don't let your wall get blown up, it makes the level much easier. If they get too close with the mines, don't shoot them. Let them place the mines, and just start watching for Beserkers. A fire arrow will detonate a mine, so once it's too close, you don't want to fire on it. All is not lost. I finished the level once, with their mines placed already, by killing any berserkers that got too close.
-After picking off battering rams, mines and seige ladders, focus fire on crossbowmen. Saves you some troops. You can effectively ignore the pikeman/infantry, until you want to sally forth with cavalry.
-Slave all your elven archers to a single key. Ctrl+1 or whatever. This allows you to select them all to see quickly who is damaged and who is not. It also allows you to upgrade them easily.
-Select individual units from time to time to see how many men they have left. If they have 2 or 1, then rotate your damaged and undermanned units off of the wall to use the healing pool (that you started the game with). Keep your troops in top shape.
-If you lose the outer gate, or the deeping wall, you can often keep the hole plugged with melee heroes and peasants, dending on how soon you are expecting Eomer's reinforcements. If the breach happens early on, then you need to go to the inner keep immediately, don't wast any troops defending a lost cause.
-Once ballistas arrive, try and sally forth to annahilate them. Use postern gates. Theoden can mount up and go with your riders, using his special glorious charge power to keep them from dying easily. Legolas can also effectively hit the ballista from the walls if he's in the right spot, but this is an iffy solution at best. Circle your riders around any pikemen if possible, don't let them come in contact. Use archers to clear pike formations outside of your postern gates, before sallying forth.
-If you see alot of units coming up the ramp to your outer gate, and none of them are pikemen, don't waste the opportunity! Sally forth and run your riders right through them all. Sometimes you can clear away the pikes with your archers, and then let fly with your riders - creating many casualties for the enemy.
-SUMMON ROHIRRIM! Can't be overemphasized. You need this. When you spot a ballista or ram, or something you can't get to in time, a quick summon can make life easy. Try to summon them on the far side of their target from any enemy pikemen.



The trick to the good campaign is just vigilance. Watch like a hawk, and make sure to respond to the few units that can actually hurt you. Namely mines, siege ladders, battering rams and ballistas. THe infantry is just cannon fodder, with the crossbows being the most threatening, and not much at that. It is **imposible** for the enemy to win this level without his seige equipment, so that's the only thing you need to really watch for. If you are vigilant enough, and save your walls/gate the level is easy.

Evil campaign:
This is as easy as pie. Unlike the good campaign, the enemy does not control the pace. All you have to do is take the time to formulate your army and strategy and then execute it at will. Personally I built a few ballistas and protected them from enemy cavalry with pikes/crossbow combo formations. The ballistas did the job for me. They have no means of countering ballistas other than emerging from their walls and your pikes can cut them to ribbons. Another time, I took their wall down by waving mines at them. Eventually they light a mine with a fire arrow when it is too close, or they fail to stop the mine before it is deployed. A following wave of berserkers seals the deal. The evil campaign is really very easy here, and not worth a big writeup imo. Time is on your side, so you can basically sit back, and wave them with seige gear if you want to. About the only difficulty is taking down their heroes, and focus fire does that quite quickly. EVen on hard level the AI does not use it's heroes very well.

Good:
Make sure to get a lot of resources buildings. Have one stable, 1 or more archery ranges, and a lot of farms. Peasents are useful.
Evil:
Wait for the ents and kill them. Don't waste your time with siege weapons: build a mine and yse firearrows to destroy it on the wall, not a beserker. Kill everyone on the wall and on the field, then move to the right and kill everyone there.

how does all this help you destroy the isingard camps?

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