The Battle of Five Armies bata4.5
HowTo README

Extract from Tolkein's The Hobbit

"Suddenly a darkness came on with dreadful swiftness; but it did not come with the wind, it came from the North, like a vast cloud of birds, so dense that no light could be seen between their wings.

'Halt!' shouted Gandalf, appearing suddenly within the ranks of Dwarves and Elves, "Dread has fallen upon you all!  The Goblins are upon you!  Bolg of the North is coming.  Behold!  The Bats are above his army like a sea of Locusts!  They ride upon Wolves and Wargs are in their train!  Come, there is still time for council.  Let Dain son of Nain come swiftly to us!'

So began a battle that none had expected; and it was called the Battle of Five Armies, and it was very terrible.  Upon one side were the Goblins and the wild Wolves, and upon the other were Elves and Men and Dwarves.

Ever since the fall of the Great Goblin of the Misty Mountains the hatred of their race for the Dwarves had been rekindled to fury.  Messengers had passed to and fro between all their cities, colonies and strongholds; for they resolved how to win the dominion of the North.

The council's only hope was to lure the Goblins into the valley between the arms of the mountain; and themselves to man the great spurs that struck South and East.  Yet this would be perilous, if the Goblins were in sufficient numbers to overrun the Mountain itself, and so attack them also from behind and above.  On the southern spur the Elves were set, and upon the northern spur were Men and Dwarves. 

Ere long the vanguard swirled round the spur's end and came rushing into Dale."

The Battle of Five Armies is a map based completely and faithfully on the extract of above and in other parts of Tolkein's 'The Hobbit', as well as from a highly useful and accurate map of the battle which I found on Google Images :P The map is currently in it's beta4.5 stage. 

Changes to the map in the next beta (4.7) will be listed below:

* The Isengard Warg Riders will be replaced with SEE's Goblin Wolf Riders and Goblin Warg Riders
* There will be a mix of wild Wargs and wild Wolves on the evil team (also provided by the SEE mod)
* The 'Goblin Captain' currently standing as Bolg on this map will be replaced with SEE's brilliant Bolg hero unit
* Gwaihir will appear alongside seven other normal Giant Eagles 9.03 mins into the battle and will be usable by the player if they are on the good team
* The currently bright green model of the Elfking will be fixed
* The Goblin units that appear at the bottom of the lonely mountain next to your army at the start of the battle will instead appear 3.07 mins into the map
* The Fortresses for each team will be removed along with the starting builders - Thorin's Wall will become the good 'fortress' and Bolg's tent (found in the Goblin camp where the evil fortress is currently located) will become the evil 'fortress'
* Beorn will arrive 9.45 mins into the battle on the good team
* Thorin's silver Dwarven guard will be equipped with Siege Hammers
* Not as many units of Goblins will carry banners
* Some of the Archers of Dale will be replaced with units of Dale Swordsmen
* King Brand (Bard) and Bilbo will be available at the start of the battle on the good team

Things that (unfortunately) cannot be fixed:

* Beorn cannot become a hero as he is simply an enlarged Bear model from Worldbuilder given to the good player, however he will still arrive on the map at the right time in the battle and be a part of the good team's army
* The Elfking will have to remain with the name 'Mirkwood Archer' and use the Mirkwood Archer model as there is no other available
* Thorin Oakenshield, Fili, Kili, Oin, Bimbur, Bofur, Bombur and all the other Dwarves except for Gloin will unfortunately never appear on the map as the BFME II game and SEE do not contain models or units that could be used in place of them

HOW TO PLAY THIS MAP (In order to get the most out of it and re-enact a proper Battle of Five Armies-style battle!)

1) Download the SEE mod for the Battle for Middle Earth II
2) When choosing what faction to be in the game's Skirmish meny screen, choose Dwarves (you can, alternately, choose Goblins - if so, then proceed to step 6), go into settings and put your CP limit to 100X, rescource point starting value to 4000 and turn off CaH and Ring Heroes (as these are not needed)
3) At the start of the game, go to your fortress and purchase the heroes King Brand and Bilbo.  Put Brand next to Dain and his Dwarven Guard when he arrives and put Bilbo next to Gandalf on the opposite side of the map.  Switch Bilbo to defence stance and give him throwing stones as his main weapon.
4) Battle away at the Goblins.  A while into the game you will have gained enough rescources from your fortress in order to buy another hero, Gloin - purchase him and put him on attack stance before charging him into the enemy!
5) Even later in the game you will have gained enough rescources from your fortress again to buy a Giant Eagle, which you should do.  Once this Eagle has arrived, switch it's stance to attack and send it in to attack the Goblin/Warg forces.  This single Eagle should be enough to defeat all the remaining Goblins and Wargs alongside your main forces.
5) Send the last of your army in to destroy the two Goblin camps at the bottom of the map and destroy the enemy's fortress before it has a chance to build up another army.  Once this is complete, you've won the battle!
6) As Goblins, you have two divisions of your forces, one on the right side of the River Running (which also contains two units of Moria Guard (Half Trolls) and Bolg) and one on the left side.  Use each side to attack the forces facing you on each side of the river, but be warned that the left side of the river also has Gandalf and the Elfking which you'll have to defeat, and Gandalf is a very powerful hero.  The right side shouldn't be a problem to use in battle as
they will only be fighting a couple of measly Dwarves and Men of Dale, but be warned about King Dain and his bodyguard which are incredibly strong.  Use Bolg and his bodyguard to remove these pests from the map!
7) Once you have defeated all of the enemy's units, charge your remaining forces into their fortress and destroy it.  You have now won the battle!

Credits
Sgt. Angel (map's creator)

Special Thanks
Professor Tolkein!
New Line Cinemas and Peter Jackson!
EA for their brilliant game the Battle for Middle Earth II and it's expansion!
Nazgul and the SEE mod for their brilliant modding work on the game!

Note: this mod does not require the SEE mod or the Rise of the Witch King expansion to run, however the SEE mod is recommended if you are to get the most out of the map as explained above.  The next beta of this map will be released in accordance with the release of SEE's next beta, 4.7, and will include a number of units from the mod as it will have ported by then to .big format and it's units and models will be useable in Worldbuilder.
If you wish to download the SEE mod please go here: http://see.the3rdage.net/

The SEE mod requires the beta1.06 patch for BFME II.

Look out for future releases by Sgt. Angel:
Smaug's Lair
Goblin Gate
War of the Ring
The Barrow Downs
Gollum's Lair
Dragon's Gate
