Experienced players will probably enjoy playing with the new sorcerer and thrall master units. Since, according to the game's story, the Witch-King seized control of the mostly human-inhabited region of Angmar by means of intimidation, the faction has several units who either act as, or command groups of, miserable slaves. Sorcerer units begin their careers with a handful of magic spells (and they can learn additional ones to further specialize), yet the units are surrounded by a handful of apprentices at all times. Each time sorcerers cast one of their more-powerful spells, such as the soul-freeze spell that temporarily renders a target invulnerable to damage but unable to move or attack, several of their apprentices' souls are torn from their bodies, killing them instantly. Yes, the entourage of the sorcerer is gradually replenished over time, but the cost of using higher-level magic poses an interesting strategic choice. For example, throwing around your most powerful magic can severely hinder your opponents, but it also deprives the sorcerer of a bodyguard to soak up damage.

The expansion will also make numerous improvements to BFMEII's core gameplay, such as, in Rahimi's words, "making sieging more fun and more relevant" by rebalancing the game so that general hero units can't deal siege-based damage to enemy walls and structures (an issue in the previous games that made siege weaponry less useful in battle). The expansion will also let you command your armies of mixed troops to march together, in formation and at the speed of the slowest unit, so that you can keep massive forces together without having to chase them down. It will also offer smarter artificial intelligence for skirmish mode; rebalancing for its various custom hero options to cut down on exploits; and the ability to carry over armies persistently from battle to battle in an improved version of the semipersistent War of the Ring mode (the hybrid turn-based/real-time mode introduced in previous games that let you attempt to conquer Middle-earth from a board-gamelike interface before jumping into real-time battles).