Battle For Helm's Deep - A General Guide

[PKCrichton]

This is a general guide about how this new Epic Battle System works.



There are two ways to access the Epic Battle system. First is the traditional Instance Finder method. The second is through the new UI panel which has been renamed from Battle for Helm's Deep to Epic Battles.



The window itself eats up a lot of space and is 1024x768 in size. If you run on a resolution below 1024x768 there is now a feature allowing you to scroll around the new version of this window. We aren't able to resize the window to our liking but at least we are able to access the full window.



The new panel Epic Battles is accessible in the main system menu on the far left of your UI. It can also be accessed by typing Shift+B.



Epic Battles

This new panel is broken into 3 tabs on the left hand side.



Tab 1 - Road to Battle

Road to Battle is a Map of Helm's Deep with 5 numbers on the map. You select the number and then on the right hand side it explains the instance lets you select the group size and then either to Launch or to Queue the instance. If you select to Launch you will be thrown into the queue and then launch the instance with the number of people you already have. If you select Queue you will enter the queue and wait until others wish to do this instance at which point it will launch. Each battle has to be run in numerical order in Solo/Duo to completion before you can access the next battle. On the bottom you see 4 medals with progress bars and next to each bar a button. These bars are the Bronze, Silver, Gold and Platinum rankings you have gotten so far towards Jewelry of each type. The buttons next them allow you to 'forward' your progress from the bar you are on currently to the next bar to advance it more. You are only able to forward your Bronze and Silver reward progression. Platinum rewards have to earned on their own merit.



On the map you can see the 5 instances of Epic Battles.
- Each battle has to be run in numerical order in Solo/Duo to completion before you can access the next battle.


1. Helm's Dike - This instance can be run Solo/Duo or Fellowship

This is a battle that takes place ahead of Helm's Deep itself. It is a dike setup north of Helm's Deep itself. The instance is broken up into 4 segments. The West, The East, The Center and then the Gate/Stables below. The center has a wooden gate that bridges the Western and Eastern Sides of the Dike. A river flows under this gate as does the road south to Helm's Deep. There is a rope on the western edge of the upper gate that leads down to the road below and a rope at the bottom that leads back up to the top of the gate. This instance has 3 phases the first two are East and Western attacks and the third is a Central attack. The Central attack uses the two closest ingresses one from East and one from West in addition to a side quest on the road. Of special note to help you get around in this instance you are able to ride your normal Horse or Goat.



2. The Deeping Wall - This instance can be run Solo/Duo or 12 Man Raid.

This battle takes place mostly upon the Deeping Wall itself. To the West you have the gate room where some side quests take place. To the East you have a Tower with a Catapult on top and under it is another guard house where another side quest takes place. In the guard house there are also stairs that lead down to the Deeping Coomb there are more side quests that take place down there as well. Up on the wall section is where most of the instance takes place. Each section of Wall has 3 Rock Fall defenses that you can arm, load and use to put damage spots below on the ground to harm mobs before they climb up the wall. Periodically ladders and grappling hooks are placed onto the wall by the attacking orcs. You can click on or use Delete U to then disable/kickoff the ladders and grappling hooks. As long as ladders and grappling hooks are on the wall the orcs are able to continue climbing up and overwhelm the defending Rohirrim and yourself. Off in the distance you can see the organizing orcs and their siege weapons their own catapults. You can use your own defenses to take them out. If you don't the catapults will rain down aoe damage upon you that hurts a lot. When this instance reaches its conclusion the western section of the wall explodes, if you are on it you will be defeated but will still complete the instance.



3. The Deeping Coomb - This instance can be run Solo/Duo

This battle takes place in the Deeping Coomb which is the section of land protected by the Deeping Wall only now there is a huge hole in it where orcs will flood in from. There are two battle fronts on on the western side of the river and one on the eastern. The waves of mobs in the first phases will go for one or the other(typically the eastern side first) and the 2nd phase it will switch to the other side (western side). There is a bit of a lag between when they call for the front switch and when the mobs will change to attacking the other side. Until then you have to continue to cover the 1st front. When it is called back to fall back to the Hornburg or Glittering Caves this is the end of the battle. Of special note to help you get around in this instance you are able to ride your normal Horse or Goat.



4. The Glittering Caves - This instance can be run Solo/Duo or 3 Man.

This battle takes place within the Glittering Caves. You start off in a central hill within the caves with all the women and children of Rohan. There are two paths down one that leads off to the east and one more to the south and then west. Both paths circle around the central hill leading to the two man fronts to the NE and NW of the central hill. Each of these is manned by Gamling or Gimli as well as the Rohirrim. In this instance you fight off the waves at those locations before falling back more to two secondary battle fronts again manned by Gamling and Gimli respectively. You hold these points and do the side quests until the instance is completed. Of special note to help you get around in this instance you are able to ride your Goat.



5. The Hornburg - This instance can be run Solo/Duo

This battle takes place upon the outer wall of the Hornburg. You start off on the wall directly north of you is the Gatehouse. Inside the gatehouse is a door that will lead you down into the Lower Gatehouse where the main gate is. On the top of the gatehouse are two giant ballista guarding the main entrance to the Hornburg. Durectly south of you is the bridge leading to to inner sanctum of the Hornburg. Going down the stairs to the south will lead you to the wall connecting two towers. It is between these two towers and this segment of wall where all of the fighting will take place. You have a rope that allows you to get back up on top.

P. Retaking Pelargir - This instance can be run Solo/Duo

This battle is an Offensive battle. You start off with the Sons of Elrond and one group of soldiers. Your task is to open the gate for Aragorn and his forces to come into Pelargir and take on the attacking corsairs. There are 3 main locations in this battle. Above the Gate, A causeway and Above the Docks. You will have to fight your way to each location facing minor forces of the Corsairs. At each location you will have to sit and hold that location as you are assaulted by waves of enemy forces which may include a Boss and Epic Foe type enemies.

Tab 2 - Promotions

Promotions is the complex tab that is all about the three roles or professions of the Big Battles. You have Engineer, Officer and Vanguard. On the left you see your general progression of Bonuses a little bit like our Class Trait capstones, the deeper you are traited into one of the roles the more bonuses you obtain. Then next to that on the right are the trait lines for the three roles. On the bottom you see how many promotion medals you have earned that you are able to spend on the different roles. Next to that on the right we have the Re-Specialize, Cancel and Apply buttons just like for our Class Traits. On the far Right we have 5 preset specs that you can obtain just like with our Class Traits and Mounted Combat Traits. If you are Free to Play only 1 will be unlocked, if you are VIP you will have 2 unlocked with a maximum of 7.



The Engineer - The Engineer focuses on utilizing interactives and siege equipment within the space to defeat their enemy. The majority of his promotions focus on improving the efficiency with which he performs his actions and unlocking new options for utilizing and upgrading siege weaponry. Engineers also gain the ability to place a variety of traps that can damage or hinder your opponents.



The Officer - The Officer focuses on direct and supporting the Rohirrim in battle, You can issue orders to tell the defenders to heal, boost their damage, change their target priority or swap stances. Officers also gain the ability to place banners that can aid nearby engineers and vanguards. As you trait deeper the power of your commands increase and their cooldown decreases.



The Vanguard - The Vanguard focuses on directly engaging the enemy before them. As you kill enemies you gain access to new skill and abilities to unleash powerful area based effects and damage. When you fall in battle those around you will be inspired by your loss and fight harder.





- For Promotions Free To Play accounts will have 1 preset available to them free. VIPs will have 2 presets available to them for free. There are a total of 7 presets that can be obtained. Each preset costs 100 Mithril coins.



Tab 3 - Battle History

Battle History shows you how many of each medal you have earned on the far right. on the left it lists off each version of the Big Battles that exist Solo, Small Fellowship, Fellowship and raid. It also depicts the rank you completed of each of the side quests within the instance. You are able to click on each of the instances to bring up more detail about them and see exactly which quests you have completed, with what ranking and suggestions on things to do to get a higher ranking. On the bottom you see 4 medals with progress bars and next to each bar a button. These bars are the Bronze, Silver, Gold and Platinum rankings you have gotten so far towards Jewelry of each type. The buttons next them allow you to 'forward' your progress from the bar you are on currently to the next bar to advance it more.









Tutorial


Before you go into any battles there are two things you should do.

- Go to the Boar Fountain in Bree. There you will find a small tutorial for Epic Battles. In this tutorial it explains the 3 professions Engineer, Officer and Vanguard. It also allows you to try out what its like to give orders to the Commanders and to build, aim and fire a ballista and catapult. Vanguard though is simply explained as to what its function is.

- Go into the Solo/Duo version of Helm's Dike. Before you click on any npc to begin the battle go around and look. You will find npcs explaining a number of different functions of battles. One npc explains how you will be seeing ladders over the course of the night and this is how you deal with them. You can then click on and kick the ladder away. There are a number of little nuggets of explanation scattered about.







Epic Battles

Once you are in the battles themselves they are each set up on a Battle Front basis. There are multiple Battle Fronts a bit like Siege of Gondomon. At each battle front there will be at least one Rohirrim Commander and multiple Rohirrim Soldiers. Each Commander issues orders to select soldiers.

- Each battle has to be run in numerical order in Solo/Duo to completion before you can access the next battle.

- Each battle has Instant Death Locations these are places where the enemy archers will instantly kill you. Each one should be marked with Dead Bodies On The Ground.

The size of the instance space is determined by the group size of the instance you are in. Solo/Duo will will have less space to defend than the 3 Man, 6 Man Fellowship or 12 Man Raid versions of a given instance.

- For instance the Deeping Wall the Solo/Duo has 1 gate room, 1 wall section and 1 guard tower and stairwell down to defend. The 12 Man raid has 1 gate room, 3 wall sections, 2 guard towers and 2 stairwells down to defend.

- For the instance Helm's Dike with Solo/Duo you have 2 ingress points on the West and 2 ingress points on the East as well as the road to defend. For the 6 Man Fellowship you have 3 ingress points on the West and 3 ingress points on the East as well as the road to defend.


Each instance as a map table that functions as an exit the the instance if you wish to exit early or you can use Instance Leave.

Within the instance are crates that Engineers of sufficient level can utilize to obtain barricades, ballistas, catapults and other contraptions to aid in your defenses.

The quests work like most any other quest but we are given more information. All quests are daily quests so once you complete them once you can't get credit for that quest the next time you run that battle at that size until the next day.


The quests are laid out like this. You have a Main quest. It will tell you the objectives of the quest. Immediately below that is a 'status bar' This shows you what 'medal' you are currently on task to obtain and how your progression is to being on task to reach the next medal. Below this is the list of medal progression detractors. That is multiple events that will cause your medal progression bar to go down if they happen. On the main quest this is always Death of Soldiers, Death of Commanders, Destruction of Banners, Death of Gilmli/Legolas/Aragorn. Your metal progression on the main quest is also affected by the completion and metal rank of your side quests. So if you get Gold or Platinum rank on your side quests then the main quest will have a better outcome as well.



- All Quests both Main and Side Quests are Dailies. You will only see their progress and obtain rewards if you have not already completed them for the day.

This is a warning that within the Epic Battles there are locations that are instant death if you go past them. These locations should be marked by dead bodies on the ground right before them.


Rewards


As was stated before the rewards for these instances when it comes to gear is obtained on a merit basis. On the bottom of the Battle History and Road To Battle tabs you see 4 medals with progress bars and next to each bar a button. These bars are the Bronze, Silver, Gold and Platinum rankings you have gotten so far towards Jewelry of each type. The buttons next them allow you to 'forward' your progress from the bar you are on currently to the next bar to advance it more.For every medal of a certain kind you obtain it fills the meter up of that medal type. All rewards are Bind on Acquire.

- Bronze Rewards are Common Yellow role specific pieces of jewelry.

- Silver Rewards are Purple role specific pieces of jewelry.

- Gold Rewards are Teal role specific pieces of jewelry.

- Platinum Rewards are Class Specific Teal and Gold pieces of jewelry with set bonuses.

The speed at which the meter fills up is determined also by the size of the instance you are in as well as the number of side quests you complete. The breakdown of how they affect the rewards meters are as follows

	Solo/Duo	3 Man	6 Man	12 Man
Side Quest	1	2	3	4
Main Quest	2/3	6	9	12

*Table numbers provided by Lunasa*

Some Solo/Duo instances have 2 side quests that come up each time you run it while others have 3. If they have 2 you get 2 points from the main quest. If you complete 3 then 3 points.

The first time you obtain a specific medal on a quest your meter will also go up 5 addition points beyond the normal worth of that medal. After that though you will only get the normal worth of that medal.

A detailed example:
You do Helm's Dike for the first time ever. You get Bronze medal on the first quest, Gold on the second and third, Silver overall. This is what you get:

Bronze Reward Bar advances for 26 points: 1+5 for the first quest, 1+5 for the second, 1+5 for the third, 3+5 for the main quest. You get a Bronze-level jewelry piece and gain 7 points extra.
Silver Reward Bar advances for 20 points: 0 for the first quest, 1+5 for the second, 1+5 for the third, 3+5 for the main quest. You get a Silver-level jewelry piece and the Reward Bar resets to 0.
Gold Reward Bar advances for 12 points: 0 for the first quest, 1+5 for the second, 1+5 for the third, 0 for the main quest.
Platinum Reward Bar does not have any counts.

Imagine you return to this battle tomorrow and get exactly the same Medals. Your rewards will be:
Bronze Reward Bar advances for 6 points.
Silver Reward Bar advances for 5 points.
Gold Reward Bar advances for 2 points.
Platinum Reward Bar does not have any counts.


Merit

Ok since there is much talk wondering exactly how this works for gaining points to spend on the Promotion trees this is how it is.

Each Medal is worth 1 promotion point.

When you do the quest for the first time and get that level of medal for the first time you get the points for the medal you obtained and any medal lower than that one.
- Example if you get a Silver for the first time you will get 2 points. If you then went in again on the same quest and you get Gold for the first time you will get 1.

Any time after that whenever you obtain a medal you had previously obtained you will get no new points.

So Every Quest is worth all of 4 Medals both Side Quest and Main Quest.

This is the break down of how points are distributed.

	Side/Duo		3 man		6 man		12 Man
	Main	Side	Main	Side	Main	Side	Main	Side
Worth	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	1
Number of Quests	6	31	1	6	2	14	1	9
Points	24	124	4	24	8	56	4	36
Points Per Size	148		28		64		40
Total Points	280

So for now if you only do Solo/Duo you can only obtain 148 points. If you do every sized space you can obtain 280 points but currently you can only use 246 of those. The 3 man, 6 man and 12 main numbers will change over time as they are likely to add more 3/6/12 mans to the existing battles.

[PKCrichton]

Promotions

*Note I'm just adding the information first I'll work on formatting and adding images later.*

Something very important to know is that as you unlock trait triers they will unlock for all 3 Promotions types. So you can be a Rank 3 Engineer and have access to deeper traits in Vanguard and Officer. This is very handy for obtaining better ability in the other lines. For example Engineer has Crank, Extinguish, Repair, Build all at deeper tiers of traiting. Officer has their Heal skill cooldown, power all at different tiers as well. Vanguard has a run speed boost at a deep tier. It is important to note though that you can put points into any of the traits that have been unlocked but that does not mean you have the ability to use the abilities associated with those traits until you have the correct Promotion Rank.


General Tasks For All Battles
This is a list of tasks that anyone is able to do within the battles.

Engineering Tasks
Anyone can help out with these different functions but it is the Engineer who has special traits that will enable him to be faster at them.
In the Engineer section I will detail these tasks in more depth.
- Building Barricades
- Building Ballistas
- Building Catapults
- Aim/Load/Crank/Fire Ballista and Catapults
- Extinguishing Anything Burning
- Rebuilding Anything Damaged
- Disabling Explosives
- Knocking off Ladders and Grappling Hooks.

Multiple People Can Help At Once
That is if you are for instance Building if multiple people select this it will get accomplished faster. This is really helpful for Ladders/Grappling Hooks, Disabling Explosives, Extinguishing Fires, Repairing, Cranking Ballista/Catpults, Aiming Ballista/Catapults, Upgrading devices.
While person is Loading another can be Cranking/Aiming/Upgrading. You cannot however have one person Aim Up while another Aims Left/Right/Down.

Officer Tasks
Anyone can help out by issuing orders to a Commander but it is the Officer who has special traits that will enable him to have both stronger orders and shorter cooldowns on his orders. In the Officer section I will detail these tasks in more depth.
Issuing Heal Orders To Commanders
Issuing Haste Orders To Commanders
Issuing Damage Orders To Commanders
Issuing Armour Orders To Commanders

[PKCrichton]

Engineer

*Note I'm just adding the information first I'll work on formatting and adding images later.*

The role of the engineer varies based on the battle you are in. In some of the instances you will have multiple roles that you need to fill. The general roles of the Engineer are as follows.

Rank 0

Barricade Setup and Maintenance.
In most instances the barricades will not have been set up. You will need to either pick up a crate to place it or you will see a red outline of a barricade that needs to be built. When you are placing a barricade down from a crate the direction your character is facing will determine what way the barricade faces. You will want to place it so that enemies will travel through the barricade for the longest duration.
Sappers when they come in on waves are going to target barricades as one of their main targets. When they are inducting it means they are about to set it on fire. If you can interrupt them. Otherwise while a barricade is on fire it will take constant damage until it is Extinguished. You will have to click on the barricade and use the Extinguish function to put it out and then Repair to fix it.

Catapult/Ballista Setup and Manning.
Most Catapults and Ballistas will need to be built before they can be utilized.
The Catapult needs to be Loaded and Cranked before you can see where your target is. With the Catapult you can then crank more to increase the distance. You can also Aim Left and Right to change the position of your target.
The Ballista requires only a Load and a single Crank before you can see where your target is. From there you Aim Left, Right, Up and Down to change the position of your target.

Ladder/Grappling Hook disabling.
On any battle on the wall you can control the flow of battle some by knocking down Ladders and Grappling Hooks. This cuts down on the number of foes that can climb the wall. Ladders have been observed to be the only means for Commanders to climb the wall.

Explosive Disabling.
Sappers and other Orcs in side quests will place explosives down at different goals. It is important to disable this quickly. There are multiple sizes of explosives the larger the size the longer it takes to disable. These larger explosives need multiple people to disable them.

Rank 1



This is the UI you get when you have Traps as well as a Catapult, Barricade and Ballista picked up. This also shows you the range of effect of the different Traps.

Able to pick up Placeable Barricades

Able to Place Traps. That is the Bear Trap, Caltrop and Tripwires. Engineers can obtain traits that will shorten the cooldown, increase the number of times a trap triggers and increase the damage done by the different traps. Traps are very handy for slowing foes and assisting in damaging them. A trap placed where a barricade is is quite handy.
- Bear Traps deal damage to enemies and make them more vulnerable to attacks.
- Caltrops will stick in enemies feet and continue to damage them.
- Tripwire will knowck down enemies making them more vulnerable to attacks and easier for allies to land critical hits on. If an enemy has stun immunity on them this will not affect them.

Able to Upgrade Armour on Siege Weapons

Rank 2

Able to load Heavy Catapult Shells.

Grants +5% Contribution boost to all engineering activities. That is you get 5% faster at everything.

Rank 3

Able to place boxed up Catapults and Ballistas.

Able to Upgrade the Crank speed on Siege Weapons.

Able to Add Demoralizing Powder to Catapult Shells.

Rank 4

Able to Load Grapeshot Catapult Shells.

Able to Add Leeching Powder to Catapult Shells. This will leech morale from the targets over time.

Grants a 15% Contribution boost to all engineer activities.

Rank 5

Able to load Triple Catapult Shells. This a multi spread shell that hits 3 places.
Able to Upgrade Damage of Siege Weapons.
Able to Apply Slow Powder to Catapult Shells.

Rank 6

Able to load Spread Catapult Shells.
Able to Upgrade Distance of Siege Weapons.
Able to apply a Rending Powder to Catapult Shells.
Grants a 30% Contribution boost to all engineer activities.

[PKCrichton]

Officer

*Note I'm just adding the information first I'll work on formatting and adding images later.*

The role of the officer is pretty standard regardless of what battle you are in. The roles are as follows.

Rank 0


This is the Commander UI

Issuing Heal Orders To Commanders. Anyone can order a Commander to Heal themselves and their Soldiers. But the Officer Promotion Tree has traits that will shorten the cooldown and increase the power of these orders.
Issuing Haste Orders To Commanders. Anyone can order a Commander to command their Soldiers to fight with Haste. But the Officer Promotion Tree has traits that will shorten the cooldown and increase the power of these orders.
Issuing Damage Orders To Commanders. Anyone can order a Commander to command their Soldiers to deal higher Damage. But the Officer Promotion Tree has traits that will shorten the cooldown and increase the power of these orders.

Rank 1

Order Armour Stances. You obtain the ability to order Shield Stance, Siege Armor and Arrow Volley Armour stances. This can be handy as there are times where your soldiers will take more damage based on enemies, arrow volleys or enemy catapults.

Rank 2

Set Soldier Target Priority. You obtain the ability to set target priority to Archers or Warriors.
Able to Set Vanguard and Engineer Banners down. These banners will enhance everyone's Engineering or Vanguard contributions. You can also trait to enhance these banners and shorten the cooldown between banner placements.

Rank 3

Set Soldiers to Two Handed Weapons Stance. This is a marked increase in their damage output. It is very good to place on Commanders where you need extra help.
Set Soldier Target Priority. You obtain the ability to set target priority to Sappers or Berserkers.
Moderate Initial Heal Order Power Increases.

Rank 4

Set Soldier Target Priority. You obtain the ability to set target priority to Commanders.
Increase Range you can deploy your Banners.
Increase Duration of Heal, Haste, Armour and Damage Orders by 5 seconds.

Rank 5

Increase Area of Effect of Banners.
Adds Heal to Corruption Removal.
Increase Duration of Heal, Haste, Armour and Damage Orders by 10 seconds.

Rank 6

Moderate Initial Heal Order Power Increases.
Adds an Initial Heal to Banner placement.
Increase Duration of Heal, Haste, Armour and Damage Orders by 10 seconds.

[PKCrichton]

Vanguard

*Note I'm just adding the information first I'll work on formatting and adding images later.*

Rank 0


This is the Vanguard UI

Once you spend points into one of the traits you have access to kill streaks and the benefits of the trait bonuses and skills you have selected. You spend killstreak points to utilize your killstreak skills on the left hand side of the UI. Your selected effects on the right hand side of the UI will trigger upon each trigger event unless they are on cooldown.

You need to have put 1 promotion point into one of the following five traits as well, in order to get the effect that grants the pips (probably not communicated as well as we could on this part) :
Killstreak Max
Killstreak Skill Strength
Killstreak Skill Duration
Killstreak Skill Target Count
Killstreak Skill Cooldown

These are the different defeat effects.


These are the different Killstreak Skills.


Rank 1

Able to use Demoralizing Shout Killstreak skill.
Able to use Invigoration Recruit Defeat Effect.

Rank 2

Able to use the Simulating Loss Hero's Defeat upon your death and Eye for an Eye Soldier Defeat Effect.

Rank 3

Able to use the Enfeebling Cry Killstreak skill.
Able to use the Motivating Fall Hero's Death effect and the Serrated Recruit Defeat Effect.
Hero's death effects also have an increased duration.

Rank 4

Able to use the Galvanizing Defeat Hero's Death effect and the Rejuvenation Soldier Defeat Effect.
Have a chance to refund half the Killstreak spent to trigger a Killstreak skill.
Hero's death effects also have an increased duration.

Rank 5

Able to use the Piercing Road Killstreak skill.
Able to use the Fleetness Recruit Defeat effect.
Have a chance to refund all the Killstreak spent to trigger a Killstreak skill.
Hero's death effects also have an increased duration.

Rank 6

Able to use the Stunning Bellow Killstreak skill.
Able to use the Inspiring End Hero's Death effect and the Entrenchment Soldier Defeat effect.
Increase to the area of all Killstreak skills and Hero's death effects.
Hero's death effects also have an increased duration.

[PKCrichton]

****Saved for future updates.****

[hurant]

Thank you for this excellent guide!

I have some questions:
1. What exactly is "role specific pieces of jewelry"? Could you provide some examples or screenshots of such jewelry?

2. Could you provide a more detailed description on how promotion points are acquired? This overlaps with question 3 I've posted in this thread:

3. Do medals directly translate to role-points available in the Officer/Engineer/Vanguard roles? Is getting a medal unlocking these points forever? Does getting a higher tier medal give more points?
Are medals in the solo/duo and other(3,6,12) version of the instance completely separately counted for this purpose?

Further details:
I expect it could be like this: 1 point for a bronze medal, 1 point for silver medal, 2 points for a gold medal, 2 points for a platinum.
What are the correct values of those points or is my description inaccurate?
What is the maximum number of role-points (or how much % of platinum completion do you need to get all role-points)?
Am I correct in assuming that getting good scores even on solo/duo instances would boost your chances of getting the 12-man-platinum due to having more role-points?

Thank you in advance!

[Crell_1]

2. Could you provide a more detailed description on how promotion points are acquired? This overlaps with question 3 I've posted in this thread:

!

Yes, to all of the above, (except perhaps the specific point values you've suggested), Basically, If you get a platinum medal, you get the equivalent net point value of all the points below it to use from that objective.

[Lunasa]

Further details:
I expect it could be like this: 1 point for a bronze medal, 1 point for silver medal, 2 points for a gold medal, 2 points for a platinum.
What are the correct values of those points or is my description inaccurate?
What is the maximum number of role-points (or how much % of platinum completion do you need to get all role-points)?

The correct values are: 1, 1, 1, 1. Which means that if you get a gold medal on the first attempt, you will receive 3 points total - 1 for bronze, 1 for silver, 1 for gold. If on another day you complete the same quest for a platinum medal, you will receive one more point for that. So you can get maximum 4 points for any quest.

The maximum number of points is 216. This is basically a number of all available quests in all battles multiplied by 4.

[PKCrichton]

Thank you for this excellent guide!

I have some questions:
1. What exactly is "role specific pieces of jewelry"? Could you provide some examples or screenshots of such jewelry?

2. Could you provide a more detailed description on how promotion points are acquired? This overlaps with question 3 I've posted in this thread:


Thank you in advance!

Lunasa and Crell have answered your 2nd question.

As for the first. Role specific means Caster, Melee, etc... jewelry. Jewelry that is specific to the stats of your general class type. So the jewlery will focus on your stats Might, Agi, Will, etc... I would have to look through my own and others to find screen shots I'll look for that after a bit.

[J_Howell]

Thanks for the guide!

I have a few questions. Maybe the correct answer is simply "wait until Monday and start trying these battles" but we don't have much else to do until then.

Are certain battles (or certain quests within battles) notably better or worse suited to certain roles? Quest X is super easy on a Vanguard but very hard on an Engineer, that kind of thing. Seems like that's how they should have designed it (within reason) but I don't have a good sense of how polished the system is and whether they actually achieved their goals...

For the group battles, is a broad mix of roles required? Probably a non-issue with the 12-man (if there are ever enough people to run it), presumably differences in personal taste will naturally result in some sort of mix of the three roles. Could be a problem in the 6-man and especially the 3-man though.

Are the roles reasonably well balanced in effectiveness and fun? Would be unfortunate if (say) officer totally sucked and/or was very boring, so hardly anyone traits that way. Assuming that some diversity of roles is in fact needed or desirable...

How much effect does your class have in these battles? Are there any synergies between certain classes and roles (champ vanguard seems plausible, for example)? Or are classes and roles totally decoupled, so that minstrel vanguard and champ officer work just as well together as champ vanguard and mini officer? Some of the class forums seemed to suggest that tanking isn't really a thing in these, and I didn't get a clear sense of whether or how well one can heal npcs with class skills (is that purely an officer ability, or can one also use class heal skills?).

[PKCrichton]

Thanks for the guide!

I have a few questions. Maybe the correct answer is simply "wait until Monday and start trying these battles" but we don't have much else to do until then.

Are certain battles (or certain quests within battles) notably better or worse suited to certain roles? Quest X is super easy on a Vanguard but very hard on an Engineer, that kind of thing. Seems like that's how they should have designed it (within reason) but I don't have a good sense of how polished the system is and whether they actually achieved their goals...

For the group battles, is a broad mix of roles required? Probably a non-issue with the 12-man (if there are ever enough people to run it), presumably differences in personal taste will naturally result in some sort of mix of the three roles. Could be a problem in the 6-man and especially the 3-man though.

Are the roles reasonably well balanced in effectiveness and fun? Would be unfortunate if (say) officer totally sucked and/or was very boring, so hardly anyone traits that way. Assuming that some diversity of roles is in fact needed or desirable...

How much effect does your class have in these battles? Are there any synergies between certain classes and roles (champ vanguard seems plausible, for example)? Or are classes and roles totally decoupled, so that minstrel vanguard and champ officer work just as well together as champ vanguard and mini officer? Some of the class forums seemed to suggest that tanking isn't really a thing in these, and I didn't get a clear sense of whether or how well one can heal npcs with class skills (is that purely an officer ability, or can one also use class heal skills?).

I have planned on writing up a brief guide on the Promotion Roles but I haven't gotten to it yet so the jist of things is this.

When it comes to the main quest your Promotion role is important as the deeper you are in Ranking the better you are and the more you can do. If you are Vanguard your class role is just as important as your Promotion.

Melee classes and high dps classes can be very handy as Vanguard.

Casters, Range and Healers can be very good as Officers. This is because they can stand back next to the Commanders and issue orders at times as well as sit and Heal or DPS.

Anyone can be a good Engineer. But I've found that a KoA/Blue Line LM is very handy as an engineer who is laying down traps and using Catapults/Balista because they can park their pet near battle while they are busy setting things up and taking out foes at range.

In the Side quests I found a combation of Role and Class to be important because with many of the side quests you have to kill specific mobs pretty quickly to get a high Merit rating.

In group instances 3 man Glittering Cave, 6 man Helm's Dike and 12 man Deeping Wall it is very important to have a mixup of promotions. If you have VIPs in your group you will have them swapping between 2 different roles.

When it comes to the 12 man personally I recommend waiting to do this until you have about 100 points to spend so you can have strong traps, aim/crank, orders, set your soldiers to 2 handed weapons etc...

If you wait a day or two I'll try and get a Promotions general guide written up and either added into this thread or put into a new thread.

[Lunasa]

Are certain battles (or certain quests within battles) notably better or worse suited to certain roles? Quest X is super easy on a Vanguard but very hard on an Engineer, that kind of thing. Seems like that's how they should have designed it (within reason) but I don't have a good sense of how polished the system is and whether they actually achieved their goals...

Yes. Some quests require you to be a good engineer and sometimes a good officer. I did not notice any strong requirement for Vanguards in solo/duo battles as I could complete all non-bugged quests for platinum medal without ever playing as Vanguard.

For the group battles, is a broad mix of roles required? Probably a non-issue with the 12-man (if there are ever enough people to run it), presumably differences in personal taste will naturally result in some sort of mix of the three roles. Could be a problem in the 6-man and especially the 3-man though.

Not required, but welcome. It is nice to have officers to keep the NPCs alive. And you still need the engineers for some quests.

Are the roles reasonably well balanced in effectiveness and fun? Would be unfortunate if (say) officer totally sucked and/or was very boring, so hardly anyone traits that way. Assuming that some diversity of roles is in fact needed or desirable...

My opinion - no. As I mentioned before, there is no requirement for Vanguards - they might be fun for an aoe dps class and they might be useful in a raid, but definitely not a must. The Officer role - while important - feels a bit too simple and boring due to long cooldowns on all availble skills. The Engineer role is a bit too important and if you don't like this RTS-style micromanagement - these are bad news for solo.

How much effect does your class have in these battles? Are there any synergies between certain classes and roles (champ vanguard seems plausible, for example)? Or are classes and roles totally decoupled, so that minstrel vanguard and champ officer work just as well together as champ vanguard and mini officer? Some of the class forums seemed to suggest that tanking isn't really a thing in these, and I didn't get a clear sense of whether or how well one can heal npcs with class skills (is that purely an officer ability, or can one also use class heal skills?).

If you want, you can use the class abilities efficiently.
- Healing is very important, even though only direct single target heals can be used (exceptions: LM's pet, RK's group bubble). As a healer you can choose to ignore the Officer role for solo and concentrate on other stuff. Or the opposite - in groups you can feel more comfortable as an Officer since you can heal soldiers both by commands and your own skills.
- Good DPS is nearly required for the efficient use of the Vanguard role. So definitely some synergy here.
- Tanking works if you are traited for that. Forced taunts allow you to attract the attention of any mob and protect NPCs in this way. I think that tanking works best with vanguard role since you increase the chances of landing the killing blow and gaining the killstreaks. There were certain agro issues in the Battles till the last beta build and this is why you still can see a lot of complains around. It is fixed now.
- CC/debuffs does wonders. So it is still useful and can be easily combined with any role.

As a captain, I tried different trait setups (healing/dps/tank) and different battle roles (mostly engineer or officer) and they all seemed viable for certain quests. I did swap class traits and battle roles multiple time in every battle though. Maybe it is not required, but for me this way of playing was the most enjoyable.

[Kapt_Kaos]

Quick question on the scaling of rewards: I'm assuming that if you play the big battles at lower levels, the gear rewards you get are scaled to your level. So when you get a piece of jewelry then, does the bar empty and become available to start refilling, so that as you level up, you can redeem for the same piece of gear scaled to your new level when you fill it up again? And the corollary to that, when you get your lvl 95 jewelry, and fill the bar again, can it be redeemed for any other type of rewards?

[PKCrichton]

Quick question on the scaling of rewards: I'm assuming that if you play the big battles at lower levels, the gear rewards you get are scaled to your level. So when you get a piece of jewelry then, does the bar empty and become available to start refilling, so that as you level up, you can redeem for the same piece of gear scaled to your new level when you fill it up again? And the corollary to that, when you get your lvl 95 jewelry, and fill the bar again, can it be redeemed for any other type of rewards?

Ok on the rewards. Whenever a bar gets totally full it will automatically 'empty' and you will get a piece of jewelry that is scaled to match your real level. Then when you obtain your next medal the bar begins filling up again. There is no redeeming for other types of rewards, I have only ever seen jewelry be obtained from the bar cashing out. We have no control over this system other than to forward your Bronze points to Silver and your Silver points to the Gold meter.

[furtim]

I've seen Relics come from Epic Battle rewards on occasion, but always in addition to a piece of jewelry.

My guess is that there's a "critical success" sort of mechanic tied to the reward boxes. For Platinum rewards, the lucky hit gives a Gold piece rather than a Teal one. For the other reward tiers, you instead get a set of relics with quality relative to the tier of the reward box, in addition to whatever reward you would have otherwise received.

I don't know that for a fact, but I think that's reasonable guess based on what I observed.

[PKCrichton]

Updated the first replies for a brief guide to the Promotion Roles. What they do and how they function.

[Julaneth]

Someone told me you can have a level 1 character and still do these battles. Is that true? And how could that possibly work if you still need to do some things with your regular skills? Or is it just completely scalable?

[Calta]

Someone told me you can have a level 1 character and still do these battles. Is that true? And how could that possibly work if you still need to do some things with your regular skills? Or is it just completely scalable?

You can enter the battles at level 10 and you will be autolevelled to 95. The dev diary explains how this works: essentially you won't be as tough as a 'real' 95 but you will have a role. I would suggest trying them as an engineer.
Oh and please report any issues/bugs with scaling as you go (as I suspect the mid-lower levels may have been undertested.)

[raymondo]

Hi, i can launch the game through the instance finder, however when i try to use the road to battle screen all i see where it says launch / queue in your image is unlock as if i dont already own the expansion which i do, i'm guessing this is some kind of bug for me.

[jwbarry]

Hi, i can launch the game through the instance finder, however when i try to use the road to battle screen all i see where it says launch / queue in your image is unlock as if i dont already own the expansion which i do, i'm guessing this is some kind of bug for me.

This is a known issue. If you open Instance Finder and use the Advanced or Specific tab you can select and play the Helm's Deep Battles through there.

[raymondo]

yup thats exactly what i said but it means that i cannot queue to join a big group so i am stuck playing solo also once i've played an instance when i play it again i get no merit bars coming up so i can't see my progress bit of a pain cause i then can't tell which group needs me most

[PKCrichton]

yup thats exactly what i said but it means that i cannot queue to join a big group so i am stuck playing solo also once i've played an instance when i play it again i get no merit bars coming up so i can't see my progress bit of a pain cause i then can't tell which group needs me most

You can join a queue to get a larger group by using the Battle For Helm's Deep Window. In Tab 1 the Road to Battle. Select the battle and group size and then press the QUEUE button. This will put in you waiting to find a group.

Update ok there is a bug that prevents queuing to join a random group of people other than using the specific instance finder.

[Bel-Astarte]

for the time and effort put in to put this information together, with thanks also to anyone who helped in the compilation.

I think it's going to be invaluable as we get our kinnies into the Big Battles. Tip of the hobbit hat to you, and a round of pie and ale.

[PKCrichton]

Updated the Battles section of the guide. I thought I had already put this information in there but I didn't see it on a quick reread.

Each battle has Instant Death Locations these are places where the enemy archers will instantly kill you. Each one should be marked with Dead Bodies On The Ground.

By the way thanks for the sticky status for this thread.